“Foul play! Miss Yingling’s note gave no indication of any such thing.”
“Did you think a perfectly healthy woman just dropped over dead for no reason?” Frank asked curiously.
Quimby found the question offensive. He was the sort of man who was easily offended, dignified and quietly respectable, well-groomed and well-mannered. “Of course not. I assumed she had taken ill or that she’d had some sort of attack.”
“She died in her carriage on the way home from the rescue house yesterday.”
“Then Miss Yingling will know what happened.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because they were always together. Vivian never went anywhere without that girl. I always said I thought she knew more about Vivian’s business than Vivian did.”
“Miss Yingling wasn’t with her.”
“She wasn’t? That’s odd. Where was Mrs. Van Orner going?”
“Home, I understand.”
“Then that doesn’t make any sense at all. Miss Yingling lived with the Van Orners. Why wouldn’t she have gone home with Vivian?”
“Miss Yingling said Mrs. Van Orner was upset and left without her.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“That Mrs. Van Orner would leave without her?”
“No, that Mrs. Van Orner would be upset. I’ve known her for ten years, and I’ve never seen her anything other than completely calm and in control of her emotions.”
“She’d had a conversation with that woman Amy, the one with the baby that you rescued a few weeks ago, and another with Mrs. Spratt-Williams. Can you think of anything she might have talked to them about that would have upset her?”
“Of course not. Well, I can’t actually speak for the girl, I’m afraid. I only saw her very briefly the day we rescued her from that house where she worked. I haven’t seen her since, although Mrs. Spratt-Williams mentioned the other day when I saw her at church that she wasn’t doing very well. Many of them don’t, you know.”
“No, I don’t know,” Frank said. “Why is that?”
“I’ve never understood it myself,” he admitted. “You’d think they’d be so glad to be freed from their horrible bondage that they’d be grateful for whatever they received. Not all of them are, though. They don’t like wearing cast-off clothes, and they get bored with the simple pleasures of ordinary life. Some of them are addicted to drink or opiates, and they get surly when we don’t allow them to indulge anymore. But the worst trouble comes when we tell them they must find a job and learn to support themselves.”
“Are they lazy?”
“Oh, no, it’s not that. They just can’t be satisfied with the frugal lives they must lead. Jobs for women don’t pay very well, I’m afraid. Most employers assume the girls live with their families and are just helping out until they find husbands. As soon as they marry, they have to quit their jobs and make room for the next batch of girls. No one expects them to support themselves on what they can earn in a factory, but these girls have to.”
“I see. That would be discouraging.”
“You have no idea. The work is hard, too, which is another deterrent. After a few months, many of the girls are back on the street, trying to supplement their meager incomes. Word always gets back to their employers, and they lose the factory job, and then . . . Well, they must go back to their old lives or starve. I don’t know what the answer is.”
“Better-paying jobs for women would help,” Frank said.
Quimby must not have heard him. “So you see, Vivian was used to the girls at the house complaining. She wouldn’t have been surprised by that, much less upset by it.”
“What about her conversation with Mrs. Spratt-Williams?”
Quimby made a little grunting sound of disgust. “They were always squabbling about something, the way women do.”
This piqued Frank’s interest. “Anything in particular?”
“Oh, Antonia—that’s Mrs. Spratt-Williams—she was always trying to ignore the rules.”
“What rules?”
“The rules we abide by as tenants in the United Charities Building.”
“What rules did she ignore?”
“She didn’t like reporting the women we helped. They keep track, you know. All the charities keep a list of the people they help so nobody can get help from more than one charity. Antonia didn’t think that was right, but she could never convince Vivian. We had to abide by the rules whether we liked them or not.”
So, nothing to inspire a murder there. Frank moved on. “Did you know this girl Amy claimed that a man named Gregory had fathered her baby?”
From the look on his face, he hadn’t. “Good God! Did Vivian know that?”
“I believe this Amy made a point of telling her. She named the baby after him.”
Quimby sucked in his breath with a hiss.
“Do you think it’s possible Mr. Van Orner really was the baby’s father?” Frank asked.
The color rose in Quimby’s plain face. “Why would you ask that?”
“Because rumor has it that Mrs. Van Orner started her rescue house because her husband liked to visit prostitutes.”
“I don’t know anything about that. Vivian knew my interests lay in helping the less fortunate citizens of our fair city, and she asked me to help her. She said God had laid it on her heart to help these fallen sisters, and I didn’t question her further about her motivation.”
“But you knew about Mr. Van Orner.”
He pressed his lips together until they were white. “I have heard rumors,” he finally admitted.
“So you think it’s possible Van Orner fathered Amy’s baby?”
“The girl worked in a brothel. How could she possibly know?”
“I have no idea, but she might’ve made that claim to Mrs. Van Orner. Do you think that would have upset her enough to make her leave without Miss Yingling?”
“I’m sure it could have, although as I said, it’s difficult for me to imagine Vivian getting upset over anything.”
“What about something Mrs. Spratt-Williams might’ve said?”
“Good heavens, no. They were the closest of friends.”
“You just said they argued all the time.”
“I believe I said they squabbled. They weren’t fishwives. They didn’t argue. They simply disagreed on that one issue. I hardly see what any of this has to do with Vivian’s death. You haven’t even said what kind of foul play was involved.”
“We think she was poisoned.”
“Poisoned! Are you insane? Who would have poisoned her?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out.”
He considered this for a moment. “Well, I can assure you it wasn’t Mrs. Spratt-Williams.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because ladies might disagree, but they never argue and they never, ever poison each other.”
SARAH LOOKED AT MRS. SPRATT-WILLIAMS. “ARE YOU sure no one knew about Mrs. Van Orner’s flask except Miss Yingling, her husband, and you?”
Suddenly, she wasn’t sure at all. “Of course, I can’t speak for her servants. Servants know so much more than we ever tell them, don’t they? I suppose they can’t help overhearing and seeing things, no matter how careful we try to be.”
“You’re absolutely right,” Sarah said, hoping to encourage her. “Some of her servants may have known.”
“Her maid would have, I’m sure. We can’t hide anything from our maids.”
“No, we can’t,” Sarah agreed, remembering the days so long ago when she’d had a maid.
“Servants can take offense, too,” Mrs. Spratt-Williams confided. “I’ve seen it happen. They can be spiteful and vengeful over the slightest little things.”
“Was Mrs. Van Orner harsh with her servants?”
“Oh, no, not at all. But if one of them took a notion . . . Well, I’m sure she never did anything intentionally, but you know how they are.”