Tell Me, Pretty Maiden (Molly Murphy Mysteries, #7)

“Oh, of course. Good idea,” he said. “And have you come up with anything?”


“I don’t believe so. Not based on the description that Molly gave me.” She took out a notebook and started reading off names.

“Frieda Hupfer. German. Ran off with unsuitable young man. Believed heading for New York. Described as blond, five foot one, well padded.”

“That’s not our girl,” I said. “She is sleeping upstairs. Come and see for yourself.”

“You have her here now?”

“Molly agreed to look after her for a few days, since she could no longer stay in hospital,” Daniel said quickly before I could reply.

“That was most generous of you,” Mrs. Goodwin said.

“I felt responsible for her, since I was the one who discovered her,” I said.

We tiptoed up and looked at the sleeping girl. As we came down again Mrs. Goodwin shook her head. “Then I’d say that none of the young women on this list is she.”

“We’ve placed an advertisement in the newspapers.” I poured boiling water into the teapot and set out cups and saucers. “And tomorrow we can revise it with a name. She has lost the power of speech but in her moaning we are fairly sure that she said the name “Annie.”

Mrs. Goodwin scanned her list again. “I have no lost girl called Annie on this list,” she said, “but as I explained before, New York is a magnet. Girls from all over the country run away to the big city. This Annie could have started out in South Carolina or even California.”

“It seems rather hopeless to me,” Daniel said.

“I disagree,” I said. “Think of how she was dressed. She was dressed for an evening out. Silk dress, dainty shoes. That is not the mark of a runaway, nor a destitute girl. And she must have started out with some kind of outer garment, given the cold. She couldn’t have come too far wearing those shoes or they would have been completely ruined. As I see it, she was expecting a pleasant evening, something terrible happened, and she ran away. I still think that someone in New York is looking for her. I’m confident we’ll locate her loved ones.”

“I’ll naturally keep my ear to the ground for any more reports of missing persons,” Mrs. Goodwin said, tucking her notebook back into her cape pocket. “You’ve undertaken quite a task here, I should think, Molly.”

I placed cups of tea in front of them. “I’m going to have to hire a nurse,” I said. “I don’t want to leave her alone and I can’t be in the house all day. I don’t suppose you know where I might find a suitable woman?”

“We could always ask my neighbor, Mrs. Tucker,” she said. “You met her when I was in that accident. She’s an awfully fussy woman. She’ll drive you crazy, but at least she is responsible and she likes to be useful.”

“I remember her,” I said. “I’d be most grateful.”

“If she accepts, it will only take you a couple of days before you’ll stop thanking me.” She chuckled. “But at least she’s honest. And she will take care of the poor girl. As soon as I finish my tea, we could go and ask her.”





TWENTY-ONE

I left Daniel minding the sleeping girl and went with Mrs. Goodwin to see her next-door neighbor. That good woman not only agreed to come back with me right away but insisted on bringing a pot of her freshly made soup with her as well. So I was able to go to the dispensary to have the prescription filled, then go with Daniel to New Haven.

I hadn’t asked Mrs. Tucker how much she would charge for acting as nursemaid. I tried not to think about it, reasoning that I had an advance from Miss Van Woekem and I was going to make quite good money from the three cases I was currently handling. Daniel was obviously thinking along the same lines because, as the train came out into bright winter sunshine after leaving the Grand Central station, he said, “At least you’ll be making enough to pay that woman’s wages. We’d better hurry up and close your case with Mr. Roth. I think we can safely say he is reliable and responsible, don’t you?”

“What about his financial reputation? Did you have a chance to check on that yesterday?”

“It was Saturday and the banks closed at two, so I didn’t manage to accomplish everything I set out to do, but all indications were that he was a decent young fellow.”

“I’m so glad,” I said.

Daniel glanced across at me with a smile on his face. “Why should it matter to you if he is responsible or not?”

“I like to conclude my cases in a positive manner,” I said.

Daniel was still smiling. “Molly, you want to put the world to rights, that’s your problem. If you were with the police, like me, you’d learn that most of the time we don’t have it in our power to fix things. The world is a sad and broken place.”

“Not for me,” I said. “I’m going to continue believing that I can help, here and there.”