Oh Danny Boy (Molly Murphy Mysteries, #5)

He looked up at his wife, who was still hovering in the doorway, and she nodded.

Mrs. Goodwin glanced at me before saying, “Mr. Rosetti, would it be possible to talk to your daughters alone, without you and your wife in the room? They may be too shy to speak in front of you, but Rosa may have confided something to them. Something she didn’t want you to know.”

“My Rosa, she tell her mama and papa everything,” he said angrily.

“Sometimes even the best girls don’t tell their parents everything,” I said quietly. “You do want us to find out what happened to Rosa, don’t you?”

“You want I should go?” he demanded.

“If it helps to find Rosa,” Mrs. Goodwin said.

He gave a large, expressive shrug. “Bene. I go. Anything to bring my Rosa home to me. Come, Mama.”

The door closed behind them.

“Now girls,” Mrs. Goodwin said, “we need to know if your sister told you anything that she kept secret from your parents. Did she have a secret admirer? Did she give any hint that she was planning to meet a boy?”

“Oh no, signora,” the older girl said. “She wouldn’t do that. Papa would never allow it. When we go out, he makes us all go together and watch over each other.”

“Like this photograph at the beach?” She produced the picture.

They smiled. “Si, signora.”

“Was this taken at Coney Island?” I asked.

“Si.” They nodded again, their eyes smiling with the memory.

“Do you go there often?”

“When there is money to spare. It’s only a nickel on the train and Mama packs us a lunch so we don’t have to buy food. Sometimes Lucia treats us to a ride or a show. Sometimes we just walk around and watch the people.”

“And did Rosa ever meet a boy during one of these outings?” I asked.

“No. Never,” the older one said.

“But she did get that note,” the younger one reminded her.

“What note?” Mrs. Goodwin asked quickly.

The younger girl gave her sister a half-frightened glance then said boldly, “Last time we went. Rosa laughs and says some boy slipped a note into her pocket. He said he liked her and wanted to meet her alone.”

“Did you see the boy?” Mrs. Goodwin asked.

“No, and neither did Rosa. She just found the note in her pocket. It would be easy for someone to put the note there without her noticing because the crowd is so thick that it’s hard to move.”

“Where was this exactly?” I asked.

“On the Bowery. You know where that is? It’s like a street in the middle of the fun fair. Lucia had made overtime money and she treated. She told us we could choose what we wanted to do. So we went to the freak show, cos we’d never seen it before and we had a good laugh there.”

The older sister took over. “Then Rosa said she wanted to visit the Cairo Pavilion and maybe be snatched up by a sheik and taken to his harem. We all laughed. Rosa was naughty sometimes. She said wild things. Have you ever been there? They have real camels and belly dancers and fire-eaters—oh my, it’s wonderful. It’s like being in another world.”

“And did she keep the note? Do you still have it?” Mrs. Goodwin asked.

“Oh no. Lucia made her throw it into the nearest rubbish bin. Rosa made a fuss and said Lucia was being a spoilsport and no boy had ever said nice things to her in a note; but Lucia grabbed it, crumpled it up, and tossed it into the bin. ‘You know what Papa would say about that, don’t you?’ she said.”

“And she never heard from the boy again?”

“Never. Lucia made us go straight home after that. She was mad at Rosa.”

“How long was this before she disappeared?”

The girls wrinkled their foreheads. “Four days,” the little one said. “It was the weekend before she vanished.”

“Mrs. Goodwin got to her feet. “I’m going to ask your father if I can look through her things. She might have a secret hiding place for letters and treasures.”

The girls looked at each other and laughed. “We share a chest of drawers, all four of us,” the younger one said. “There is no place to be secret in our room.”

“Nevertheless, I’d like to see for myself.” Sabella was firm.

Papa Rosetti led us upstairs and we went through the room carefully. The girls owned nothing more than a change of underclothes, a few pairs of well-darned stockings, missals, rosaries, and a few treasures like a lace handkerchief or a cheap broach.

“Tell me, Signor Rosetti,” Mrs. Goodwin said carefully, “does Rosa have any special ways to identify her—a mole perhaps or a scar? Anything unusual?”

His face went ashen gray. “You think something bad has happened to her.”

“We’re not sure yet. But just in case.”

“No,” he said. “She has nothing wrong with her. She is a beautiful girl. Full of life. Everyone loves Rosa.”

At that moment the oldest girl, Lucia, burst in.