I tightened my grip on the doorknob I hadn’t noticed I was still clutching from when I’d closed the street door behind me. “Please don’t tell me Mr. Millford decided to scrub my article on the Marble House murder and run some rot Ed tossed together. Is that why my article wasn’t on the front page this morning?” What had been on the front page? In my eagerness to find my own article, and then my disappointment at not seeing it, I’d ignored the actual headlines.
Oh, but it wouldn’t be the first time Ed Billings stole a byline from me with a hastily scrawled, uninformed report. And merely because he was a man, while I, a woman, should focus my attentions on fashions and parties and other such rubbish. Or so Mr. Millford often told me.
Donald wrinkled his nose, a flash of his glasses recapturing my attention. “I wouldn’t know anything about that, Emma. But at this point no one is going to care about the murder of some charlatan with no real Newport roots. Not now.”
I released the doorknob and strode to the desk, only just stopping myself from leaning over its littered surface to grab Donald’s shoulders and shake him. How dare he imply my article was unimportant? “What are you talking about?”
“Anthony Dobbs. He’s been suspended from the police force under suspicion of extortion.”
My mouth dropped open; I backed away from the desk. Yet I can’t claim to have been completely shocked. I’d never liked the man, never fully trusted him, and I had ample cause to resent the way he’d treated my brother through the years. Had the bully Dobbs finally gotten his comeuppance? It had been Dobbs who had most wanted to see Brady hang for a crime he didn’t commit, who had been ready to seal Brady’s fate before all the evidence was in.
I frowned. “Whom was he extorting money from?”
“Oh, you know . . . the town bookies, that so-called doctor who likes to prescribe mint oil for all manner of ailments, and apparently a real-estate broker who was selling land that didn’t exist off the mainland coast. And then there were the usual run of townies—barkeepers watering down the liquor, restaurants serving horse instead of beef . . . and the like. You see, they were all paying him to turn a blind eye. And a blind eye he turned, for quite a profit from what I understand.”
I started to wonder how I’d had no inkling of any of this, when a notion dawned. “Fortune-tellers?” I whispered, my mind turning the information over.
Donald shrugged. “I suppose so. Newport has a fair amount of those.”
One fortune-teller in particular, who would never gaze into her crystal ball again? I searched Donald’s bland features for affirmation of my unspoken theory, but he’d already turned his attention back to the documents under his nose. I headed down the corridor to Mr. Millford’s office to see what I could learn.
From the Observer office I made my way across town and wound a circuitous path through the bustling activity of Long Wharf. Here commercial hulks vied with elegant sailboats and steamers for docking space and waterfront access, while trains snaked slowly along the wide arcs of the adjoining tracks. Amid billowing clouds of steam, shouts, horns, and bells clamored in the air around me, and I felt Barney’s discomfiture in the pull of the reins wrapped around my hands. I maneuvered through the throng carefully yet almost absently as new revelations filtered through my mind.
Mr. Millford had had to step out when I arrived in his office, so I’d questioned Ed Billings about the Anthony Dobbs case. His answers had been measured and evasive. It didn’t surprise me; Ed typically guarded his information jealously, apparently suspecting in others the unfair tactics he himself employed. I had no intention of stealing his story from him. But I wondered . . .
If the charges were true and Anthony Dobbs had been extorting not only con artists but local businesses attempting to cut corners to maximize the profits that would plummet when the summer season ended, who had reported him? Ed either couldn’t or wouldn’t answer that question; my guess was the latter.
A new and unexpected motive for murder had arisen, widening the pool of possible culprits. Aunt Alva had spoken harshly to Madame Devereaux, demanding the woman lie to soothe Consuelo’s fears concerning her impending marriage; and the medium and Aunt Alva’s guest, Mrs. Stanford, had certainly seemed to share a mutual abhorrence. Motives . . . perhaps. But flimsy ones when compared to the end of a police detective’s career, the ruination of his good name, and the very real possibility of his spending the next several years in prison.
A familiar face roused me from my speculations and reminded me I hadn’t come to the wharf to solve a murder, but to continue the search for my cousin. Near the far end of the wharf, all but lost between a freight barge and a proud, three-mast schooner, an ancient-looking skiff bobbed up and down with the gentle tide. A man with shoulder-length red hair pulled back in a queue, a fair, freckled complexion, and a weathered countenance that belied his youth sat hunched in the bow of the boat. His gaze found me as I steered Barney to a stop beside the boat slip.