“I’ll catch up with you,” Vivian told her sister, changing course to head toward him.
“Her windows should have been open,” the doctor said as Vivian came up next to him, though he didn’t turn to look at her. “In this heat, there was no reason for them to be closed. And I should have paid more attention the last time I was there. Lot of good I’m doing,”he added, with bitter self-deprecation. “University degree and what do I have to show for it? Can’t even keep one old woman alive through the summer.”
“She was near ninety,” Vivian pointed out quietly, distracted from her reason for coming to speak with him. She didn’t want to dismiss Mrs. Kaminski’s life or death, but she didn’t think the doctor should have been so hard on himself either.
“No,” said the doctor simply. He took a long drag of his cigarette. “No, this one was my fault.” He tossed the cigarette down, grinding it out angrily with the heel of his shoe. “Vivian, I think she got one of those letters.”
Vivian didn’t argue. She had already been thinking the same thing. And the cruelty of it took her breath away: an old woman, too alone to really tell anyone what had happened, too frail to follow the letter’s demands. “You said she was upset about her mail.”
He nodded, still staring at the ground. She could see a muscle jumping in his jaw as he pulled out his cigarette case and fumbled for a new one. “And I didn’t pay any attention, because I just thought she was a sweet old lady whose mind was maybe drifting away a little bit. I don’t know what she might have had that was valuable, but—”
“Candlesticks,” Vivian said, quiet and heartsick. She wished he would offer her a cigarette, or better yet a drink at a bar. Something to steady her nerves. But men like him seemed to think it was polite to pretend women didn’t do those kinds of things. “Florence told me. Two silver candlesticks. Now she’s dead, and they’re not there anymore. Just like Pearlie.” A sudden thought occurring to her, she grabbed his arm. “Did you tell them? The police? That you don’t think it was an accident?”
“How could I?” he demanded, shaking off her hands. His own were trembling as he stuck the cigarette between his lips and struck a match. It took him two tries to light it; once he did, he held it between two fingers and blew out a frustrated breath of smoke. “What are they going to believe? That they need to look for some shadowythief who’s robbing people in this miserable little corner of the city? Or that another old woman got careless with her gas line and died in a sad accident?”
“It’s going to be impossible, in all that mess, to find Mrs. Kaminski’s letters, isn’t it?” Vivian asked, feeling hopeless. His words,this miserable little corner of the city,echoed in her head, a tinny song made of equal parts anger and despair. Miserable it might have been, but it was her home, and the people there mattered. She could still see Florence inside the open door of the building, talking to Will Freeman as they collected yesterday’s mail from the boxes in the front hall. “But you think that’s what she was talking about, don’t you? You’re a doctor. You’re not like most of the folks here. They might listen to you—”
“Not without proof,” he said, bitter with frustration. He tossed his second cigarette down before it was even finished, and the butt of it glowed like a fallen star before he crushed it with his heel. “And no one has any of that, do they?”
“The bottle,” Vivian said suddenly. “The brandy bottle. It’s still at the coroner’s office.” She hadn’t wanted to tell the coroner where it came from when she was still afraid Pearlie’s mobster boss had sent it. It had been too big a risk, then, that they might come after the rest of the Henrys next. But if Hattie Wilson was right, whoever was running this operation wasn’t out for revenge. They wanted things kept quiet, with no evidence left behind and folks running scared. And the medical examiner had seemed to believe her. If she told him where it had come from, he might be able to convince someone official to look further…
“That might…” Dr. Harris let out a slow breath. “It’d be a stretch to convince them where it came from. But if you could do that, it might lead somewhere.” He frowned. “Offices at Bellevue are closed today.”
“Then I’ll get my friend to take me back tomorrow,” Vivian said, her heart racing with nervous energy. She’d have to check with Bea first, anyway. “Maybe the police’ll actually be good for something.”
“You’re a pretty determined girl, aren’t you?”
Vivian couldn’t tell if it was a compliment or not, but she lifted her chin anyway. “I sure can be,” she said, and her voice only shook a little. “Determined and foolish. Just ask my sister.”
“Tell me what the coroner thinks,” he said grimly. “Maybe I can add my two cents.”
“I’ll let you know, Doc.” Vivian hesitated, then gave him a gentle pat on the arm. “See you around, I guess.”
“You’re a good girl, Vivian,” he said with a half-hearted smile. “I’ll see you around.”
Inside, people had mostly gone back to their homes, but the building hummed with gossip. Vivian climbed the stairs slowly, feeling like there were weights in her shoes. She didn’t want to think about Mrs. Kaminski. She didn’t want to think about Pearlie. She just wanted to leave behind everything heavy and ugly and sad in her life. The doctor’s words echoed cruelly in her head.Miserable little corner of the city.
She wanted to go dancing. She wanted to run away.
Instead, she went home, three flights up that felt like three miles, and slumped against the door as soon as it was closed behind her. Slowly, too tired to keep standing, she slid down to the floor.
Florence was sitting at the table looking through a catalog that had come in the mail. Beans simmered on the stove. There were canned pears waiting to be opened and a loaf of bread from the day-old bin at the bakery. They had so much, Vivian reminded herself. They were so lucky. Things were better than they had been ever since she could remember.
“Vivian?”
The odd note in Florence’s voice, like one instrument playing off-key in an otherwise perfect song, made Vivian’s wandering mind snap back to attention.
“Vivian, I… I think someone is threatening me.”
Florence was holding a letter.
SIXTEEN
Vivian stared for a heartbeat that felt like a year, then stumbled to her feet, a cold stab of fear in her chest. “What does it say?”
“It says…” Florence frowned, shaking her head. “This is so strange. How could anyone know about this?”
“What does it say, Flo?” Vivian tried to keep the panic out of her voice but knew she wasn’t succeeding.
