In Like Flynn by Rhys Bowen

Miss Tompkins, lived with them, as a kind of companion for Mrs. Ffynn. Mrs. Flynn took her everywhere with her.”
    “So no one else was in the house that afternoon except for the master in his study with his cronies?”
    “That’s correct,” she said. “Except for the servants, of course.”
    I was interested that she had hardly thought the servants worth mentioning, even though she had been one herself.
    “And how many of them would there have been?”
    She pushed her hair back from her face, resting her fingerson a grubbyforehead.”Let me see—the butler, of course—Mr. Soames. English. Very proper. Then there was a footman and the master’s valet, and the mistress’s lady’s maid, then just housemaids and parlor maids and cook and the scullery maid.”
    “What about their names and anything you can tell me about them?”
    “No point,” she said. “After the kidnapping, the mistress dis-missed everyone. She said she'd never be able to trust them again, so they went. They'd all be new now.”
    “But did you suspect any of them at the time?”
    There was one gardener, called Adam. A local man employed for the summer. I never liked the look of him—” She dared to look up expectantly. “Does this mean you're going to do it? You'll try and prove my innocence?”
    “I'm going to be there anyway,” I said. “What harm can it do to ask ask a few questions?”
    Her face lit up and I saw that she might have once been a very handsome young woman. “I've nothing to pay you with,” she said. “Of course, you can see that, can't you? But youll have my devotion and gratitude to my dying day if you can show them I had nothing to do with it. Youll have given me back my life.”
    “I really can't promise anything, so please don't get your hopes up too high,” I said cautiously.
    “If anyone can do it, I know you can.” She was still beaming at me as if I was some kind of celestial being, which made me un-comfortable. “You've got that look about you.”
    “Where do you come from, Miss Lomax?” I asked.
    “New York, miss. I was born in Yonkers.”
    “To Irish parents?”
    She shook her head. “No, miss. Scottish Presbyterians.”
    I grinned. “Then for somebody without Irish blood, you've a good command of blarney.”
    She looked puzzled. I reached across and patted her hand. “No matter,” I said. “But I will try my best for you.”
    She drained the last of her mug of tea, then got to her feet. My conscience was wrestling with me. Could I, should I just let her go back onto the streets?
    'Thank you again, with all my heart,” she said and opened the Front door.
    “Just a minute, Miss Lomax,” I called after her. “How will I know where tofindyou if I have news? Do you have somewhere to stay?”
    “You'll find on my patch of Broadway, miss. Right where you got out of the cab is where I sell myflowersevery evening.”
    “But where do you live? Do you sleep on the streets?”
    “Oh no, miss. A group of us girls shares a room down by the docks, in an alley off Water Street. Not exactly what you'd call a respectable neighborhood. I wouldn't want you contacting me there.” She looked up shyly. “I'll stop by your house from time to time, with your permission?”
    The struggle with my conscience was still going on. I could take her in here, couldn't I? I'd be gone to the Flynns' mansion and she could maybe help look after the little ones. I knew it was a risk. She could, after all, be a complete crook. She could bring gangster cronies to take over my house. “Look, Annie,” I began. “May I call you Annie?”
    She grinned. “A darned sight better than what most people call me these days.”
    “Annie—I'11 be gone to Senator Flynn’s house in a while. You could stay here—”
    She shook her head violently. “Oh no, miss. That wouldn't be right. You don't even know me, and besides, this fellow who supplies us with the flowers and lets us sleep in the room, he wouldn't take kindly to me