Murder on Amsterdam Avenue by Victoria Thompson Page B

your concern.”
    Oakes took a sip of his whiskey. Frank wondered if he always used liquor to soothe the rough edges of his life. After a moment Oakes said, “What did your man find?”
    â€œJust as you suspected, Charles was poisoned. The coroner found traces of arsenic in him and in the cat, too.”
    A spasm of pain twisted Oakes’s face, but he recovered quickly. “All my life, I have taken great pleasure in being right, until now.”
    â€œI’m sorry, Mr. Oakes. I was hoping I would have better news for you.”
    â€œArsenic, did you say? Not some exotic poison?”
    â€œI’m afraid not. It’s so readily available, just about anyone could have access to it. Practically every home in the city has a box of it somewhere. The question is, who also had access to Charles?”
    â€œAnyone in this house, of course. He was also away from home all day when he first fell ill, and I’m not sure we even know where he spent that time.”
    Frank didn’t remind him that the cat, who had died from the same poison, had never left the house. “I guess the real question is, what do you want to do now? You can always pretend you didn’t know and bury your son with no scandal.”
    â€œAnd let a killer go free?” he asked, outraged. “And what if Charles is just the first victim? Suppose the killer is some madman who intends to keep on killing indiscriminately? How could I live with myself if someone else died because I wanted to shield my family from gossip?”
    â€œWe don’t know that Charles was killed ‘indiscriminately.’ He may have been killed deliberately, by someone who knew him well.”
    â€œBut why? Oh, Malloy, I know you warned me that the killer would most likely be someone in this house, but I’ve been racking my brain ever since, trying to think of anyreason someone here would want him dead, and nothing could be more ridiculous. You can’t think his mother or his wife poisoned him, or his grandmother either for that matter. And the servants have all been with us for years. If one of them had run mad enough to do something like this, someone would surely have noticed.”
    Frank decided not to inform Oakes that most people were murdered by someone very close to them, like a wife or a mother or an angry servant. And madmen usually killed viciously, not with the secret cunning of a poisoner. From what Sarah had told him about the wife, Frank was willing to put his money on her, sight unseen. “You’re right, it’s hard to believe someone close to him could have done it, which is why an investigation like this is so painful. A lot of innocent people will be upset that they were considered suspects, no matter how unlikely. And if it turns out to be someone you trusted, you’ll have to live with the guilt of not having seen their treachery in time.”
    â€œAnd if I do nothing, I will have to live with the knowledge that my son’s killer is enjoying life and freedom while he lies in an early grave. Which is worse?”
    â€œThat’s a question only you can answer, Mr. Oakes.”
    â€œThen I will answer it, Mr. Malloy. Charles was my only child. There will never be another, and he left no heirs, so my line ends with me. Whatever Charles might have accomplished in his life will never happen now. Whatever his children might have accomplished will never happen. I have to live the rest of my life knowing there is no future, no one to remember me when I am gone and no one to carry on my name or bear the weight of my hopes and dreams. I want the person who stole all this from me to be punished. I want them to suffer as my family has suffered.”
    â€œEven if the killer is part of your family?”
    â€œHe is not, I promise you that, Mr. Malloy. And even if I am wrong, even if the killer proves to be someone dear to me, I will rejoice to see him punished for taking Charles. Under those