The other police reporters all wore suits and derby hats. Conversation and card games alike stopped when Diana entered the "Reporter Office." Some of her new colleagues radiated suspicion, others hostility. Nowhere was there a welcoming expression.

The smell of cigar smoke and unwashed spittoons engulfed her as soon as she crossed the threshold, and here there were no newspapers on the floor, as there were at the offices of the Independent Intelligencer, to sop up stray puddles of tobacco juice and prevent the hem of her skirt from being soiled. She took a few more steps and stopped to study the room. It was furnished with a large table and a number of wooden arm chairs—all of them occupied—a smaller table containing a coffee urn, and a tall wicker wastepaper basket. Light came from an overhead lamp with two shades and two gas jets under each. Framed pictures of scantily clad girls decorated the walls, although there was also an alarm bell mounted on one.

Before Diana could decide how to proceed, a police officer came into the room. His initial reaction was no more hospitable than that of her fellow journalists. When she was so bold as to introduce herself, he looked her up and down with something resembling contempt and said, "Girlie, you ought to stick to your knitting."

"I have been assigned to offer readers a woman's point of view on crime," she informed him, speaking loudly enough so that everyone in the room could hear her words.

"Women shouldn't read newspapers at all, let alone the crime stories," the officer said.

She bit back a retort. Why waste her breath?

And why did she think the stories she wrote now would receive any better treatment than those she'd turned in on theatrical and literary subjects? Her earlier sense of anticipation faded. Reporting real news was a step up from what she had been writing for Horatio Foxe, but only a small one. She'd been told outright to produce accounts of crimes for the entertainment and edification of her readers. The push to inject scandal and sensationalism into stories of human misery fueled the Independent Intelligencer—and the even more infamous National Police Gazette—and would dictate what she wrote and how she wrote it . . . and how much Foxe added to the result.

One of the reporters sidled up to her and slung a too-familiar arm around her shoulders, breathing a noxious blend of tobacco and peppermint into her face. "Best to face the truth, my lovely. Women are frail creatures, unsuited to hearing all the lurid details of murders or bank robberies. If you must write about crime, you'd best stick to domestic squabbles."

"Ah. You mean husbands murdering wives and the reverse?" A jab with her elbow persuaded him to release her.

"I've got just the story for you, Mrs. Spaulding," another man said. "A case of boarding house theft."

Diana gave the speaker a sharp look. He'd tipped his chair back against the wall and lounged there insolently, one foot resting on the opposite knee. The cheroot dangling from his lips threatened to set fire to his scraggly mustache and over-long mutton chops.

From the grins, nudges, and winks, exchanged among the other reporters, it was apparent to Diana that no one else wanted to bother writing about such a minor crime, and that they thought they were putting one over on her by convincing her to take an interest. Recalling what she'd read about boarding house thieves in Professional Criminals of America, however, Diana was inclined to pursue the subject. "Tell me more," she said.

The chair came down on all four legs. The reporter pulled a scrap of paper out of his jacket pocket and scribbled an address on the back. "This is just down the street from where I live," he told Diana with a wink. "If you're still around when I get home, maybe I'll show you the sights."

Diana snatched the offering out of his hand and made what she hoped was a dignified, if hasty, exit. It was not until she was back out on Mulberry Street that she glanced at the address and discovered that the boarding house in question wasn't even in New York City. It was across the new bridge in the neighboring municipality of Brooklyn.

The occupants of Mrs. Hanover's boarding house in Brooklyn were short-term lodgers—traveling businessmen, ladies wanting to shop in Manhattan but frugal enough not to want to pay for an expensive hotel room, and a young lady who worked in a nearby office. Only two of the residents were at home when Diana called, the proprietor and an elderly woman, Mrs. Beesom, who was still too shaken by the loss of her possessions to leave the house.

"With your help, this villain may be caught and your property restored to you," Diana explained, after Mrs. Hanover, somewhat reluctantly, invited her to share a cup of tea with them.

"Little likelihood of that," Mrs. Beesom snapped. "She's long gone by now."

"She? The thief was a woman?"

"Did you think I'd let a man into my room?" Taking offense seemed to put color back into the old lady's cheeks. She sat up straighter and glared at Diana as Mrs. Hanover handed around cups made of fine bone china. "Mrs. Dumais, she called herself."

"She was a clever piece of work," Mrs. Hanover interjected. "Only here a few days. Took a room like any other boarder. Friendly type."

That fit the pattern Inspector Byrnes had described in his book. "She chatted with you?" Diana suggested to the landlady. "Found out everything you knew about your boarders?"

"I'm no gossip!" Mrs. Hanover protested.

"She'd have been clever about it." Once more Diana drew on what she'd read. "A day is enough for a clever thief to determine what valuables her fellow boarders possess. Women tend to wear their jewelry at table and men like to boast of their success in business. Once she'd made a full inventory of what was kept in various rooms in this house, she'd have chosen a time when the other guests were all accounted for elsewhere to remain upstairs."

"She said she had a headache," Mrs. Hanover admitted. "Everyone else came down to breakfast."

"Then that's when she gathered up everything of any worth and slipped out of the house with a well-filled gripsack, never to be heard from again," Diana concluded.

"That's just how it happened," Mrs. Beesom declared. "But you said you could find her. How? The police don't seem optimistic. Indeed, one of them had the effrontery to demand money before he'd make any attempt to solve the crime."

"I have my methods," Diana said. "Describe Mrs. Dumais to me. Every detail about her that you can remember, in particular the characteristics of her face."

Not only did Inspector Byrnes discuss many types of criminal, but he provided photographs—his Rogue's Gallery—showing the faces of many of the offenders he'd dealt with over the years. The female criminals in particular had intrigued Diana. She'd studied the pages with their likenesses intently.

Every portrait in his book, Inspector Byrnes claimed, contained some characteristic which made its subject instantly recognizable—the tilt of a chin, perhaps, or the lines of the forehead, or the shape of a nose. In spite of grimaces and other facial contortions and changes in the appearance of hair and beard, some feature would always remain to be what Inspector Byrnes termed "a tell-tale." It could be anything from a habitual twitch to a birthmark, but there was always something.

"She was charming," Mrs. Hanover said, "but plain. Dark hair. Blue eyes."

"A cheerful person," Mrs. Beesom added. "Always had a twinkle in her eyes. Laughing at us, I must now suppose."

"She had a bit of a limp. Poor thing, I thought when I noticed it."

"Lovely manners," Mrs. Beesom grudgingly admitted.

"What about the shape of her nose?" Diana asked. "Her mouth? Her teeth? Her ears?"

But they could remember nothing further. Diana wished she had Inspector Byrnes's book to show them pictures, but from what she recalled of the women he'd photographed, none matched their description of "Mrs. Dumais."

The evening meal at Mrs. Curran's house was served early, before most of her boarders went to work. In addition to Diana, the residents included an actress, a dresser, and a seamstress who made theatrical costumes, and while Diana had been in Brooklyn, Mrs. Curran had added a newcomer to the fold.

"This is Miss Brickett," Mrs. Curran said as Diana took her accustomed place at table. "Miss Daisy Brickett. She's taken the room that's empty now that Eunice Cartwright has gone on tour."

Miss Daisy Brickett was a young woman of no more than twenty-five, only a bit older than Diana. Her physiognomy was pleasing but unremarkable —blue eyes, a nose of average size, and a nondescript mouth behind which showed slightly misaligned teeth. Light brown hair fell in a fringe over a high forehead and tiny gold loops decorated rather small ears.

"Miss Brickett, this is Mrs. Spaulding. You may have read her theatrical and literary review column in the Independent Intelligencer."

Diana started to correct her landlady, to say that, as of today, she would be writing about criminals rather than thespians, but Miss Brickett cut her off.

"You write 'Today's Tidbits!'" she exclaimed in a pleasant if high-pitched voice. Her smile made her entire face light up. Even her eyes gleamed with pleasure. "It is the first thing I turn to in the newspaper. I especially loved your most recent columns."

Diana blushed and managed a disclaimer. "Some of those were the result of editorial meddling and exaggerated the situation." Indeed, Horatio Foxe had stretched the truth until it very nearly broke in two!

Miss Brickett's eyes continued to twinkle. "They gave the impression that got to know your subject very well."

That part had not been exaggerated, since he'd asked her to marry him. But Diana did not know Daisy Brickett well enough to share confidences. She was relieved when Mrs. Curran interrupted their exchange.

"And have you had any luck finding a job, Miss Brickett?"

Miss Brickett grimaced. "Starting tomorrow I am to be one of a hundred girls in a pantomime—a stage amazon in a white wig and a helmet, scantily clad in tights and tunic. I am also to carry a spear and a shield and I am to make the grand sum of five dollars a week for my efforts. Still, it is employment, and I will be able to search for a better job during the day."

Conversation became general then, and Diana's thoughts returned to the interviews she'd conducted in Brooklyn. She couldn't help but notice that their resident actress, Delia Newburgh, had worn her diamond brooch and a ruby ring to the table. Mrs. Pritchard, the dresser, and Mrs. Griswold, the seamstress, owned few valuables, but the best they had was proudly displayed. The former sported pearl earbobs while Mrs. Griswold wore a thick gold wedding band. She never took it off, even though she'd been a widow for nigh onto forty years.

Diana fingered the cameo at her throat. It was the most expensive jewelry she owned, a gift from the man who wanted to marry her. Until today she'd never thought of wearing it as putting temptation before a thief.

Unbidden, her gaze shifted to the newcomer, Daisy Brickett. Except for the color of her hair, she fit the description of "Mrs. Dumais," even to the friendly gleam in her eyes.

Diana tried to dismiss the thought as absurd. A twinkle in the eyes as a tell-tale? Preposterous! And what trick of fate would bring a boarding-house thief to the very place where a crime reporter lived? A crime reporter who had, by sheer chance, ended up investigating the last crime she'd perpetrated?

Diana bent over her chicken and dumplings to hide her frown. Daisy Brickett didn't know Diana was now writing about crime. She thought Diana only wrote stories about the theater. And although some of those who lived in the house on 10th Street, including Diana, had to pinch pennies and eschew luxuries, Mrs. Curran and Mrs. Newburgh had accumulated some very nice jewelry and quite a bit of money during their careers on the stage.

Diana paid particular attention to Miss Brickett for the remainder of the meal, noting how often her eyes strayed to Delia Newburgh's jewelry. When Miss Brickett laughed at a story Mrs. Pritchard told, the twinkle reappeared.

Repressing a sigh, Diana dipped a spoon into the ice cream Mrs. Curran had made for dessert. She must proceed as if Miss Brickett was a thief. If she was wrong about the other woman, no harm done. But if she was right, letting the matter slide would cost her more than a sensational news story. It would also hurt her fellow boarders.

"How did you find out about Mrs. Curran's boarding house?" Diana asked when there was a lull in the conversation.

"Another girl at an audition mentioned this place. I never did get her name."

So, Mrs. Curran had taken Miss Brickett's word for it that she was part of the theatrical world. It was not something most women would lie about, Diana thought. An actress's place on the social scale was higher than a prostitute's, but not by much.

Miss Brickett went on to tell them about the small troupe she'd belonged to. They'd traveled around the southwest to put on shows. Diana had never encountered them there, but that didn't mean much. There were many small companies of actors that never moved beyond a single limited region of the country. Diana's late husband had briefly and disastrously been the manager of one such troupe.

It was much later that evening, after Miss Brickett had retired for the night, before Diana found the opportunity to warn Mrs. Curran that she might have admitted a criminal into her household.

"I've no idea if she's your thief," Mrs. Curran said after Diana detailed her suspicions, "but she's no actress."

They were in Mrs. Curran's small parlor, which doubled as a sewing room. Mrs. Curran sat at the Singer and the steady thump of the treadle punctuated her words.

"How can you be so certain of that?" Diana turned sideways on the plush-covered settee, so that she could see her landlady's face, and tucked her lower limbs beneath her.

"Have I not been in the theater long enough to know everyone? And I've an excellent memory."

"You cannot have come in contact with every company in the country. And you have been retired for some time now."

"I have, yes, but I still know most troupes and their stands and what plays are in their repertoires. If all the shows she mentioned were put on where she says they were, I'd have heard of it."

"She's not the first actress to pretend to more experience than she has."

"She's not an actress at all," Mrs. Curran insisted, pumping harder. "Medicine show. Carnival. Circus. Perhaps one of those. But she's not been on the legitimate stage."

"If she's a thief and lied about her theatrical background, why take that job in a chorus?"

"Did she?"

"Perhaps not," Diana conceded, "but there's something about her that makes me want to believe her."

"There is, yes," Mrs. Curran agreed, and continued to sew.

The next day Diana paid a visit to see Horatio Foxe, editor and publisher of the Independent Intelligencer. That left Miss Brickett on her own at the boarding house, but Mrs. Curran had promised to keep an eye on her.

Diana's editor was a man who had his ear to the ground. "Where the dirt is," he was wont to say. He listened without comment, gnawing on an unlit cigar and looking thoughtful, as she recounted the details as she knew them. Then he rattled off three addresses in Manhattan, locations of other recent boarding house thefts.

"No one important was robbed, nor was anything of great value taken, but in each case the thief was a woman."

"Why hasn't that story already appeared in print?"

"Too much else was more newsworthy, what with the blizzard last month and your adventures, and the usual murders, bank robberies, fires, and brawls. Now if one of the victims had caught the thief in the act, and the two women had gone at each other, pulling hair and tearing clothing, that would have been on the front page."

In spite of his disparaging remarks, Foxe liked the angle of the tell-tale twinkle. Before the morning was out, Diana had visited each of the boarding houses on his list. One of the thieves had indeed been remarkable for the friendly gleam in her eyes, but the other two women seemed to bear no resemblance to Daisy Brickett.

All the descriptions varied as to hair color, which was not surprising, and one of the thieves had worn spectacles, but one woman was also described as stout, which Miss Brickett assuredly was not, and another as almost cadaverously thin, an equally difficult physique to attain even if one were a talented actress.

In addition, two of the crimes had taken place so close together in time as to make it nearly impossible for one person to have been boarding at both places.

Feeling more confused than ever, Diana returned to 10th Street. Clearly Miss Brickett was not using any theatrical disguise at Mrs. Curran's. She must know that a house full of thespians would see right through it. But had she cleverly disguised herself in those other instances? Was she an aspiring actress, or a thief of remarkable cleverness?

She had not been wise to remain in the same area when she'd already committed a crime. Indeed, that fact seemed to argue for her innocence. According to Professional Criminals of America, it was unusual for a boarding house thief to stay in one place. They tended rather to board a train for some distant destination as soon as they had successfully completed a job.

When Miss Brickett left the boarding house late that afternoon, Diana followed. Miss Brickett never looked back. She took the El north, then walked, at a brisk pace, to a dilapidated house on West 96th Street.

Diana studied the structure for a moment, then slipped into the dark, narrow alley that separated it from its neighbor and made her way through to a small, overgrown back yard. She peered through a dirt-streaked window just as Miss Brickett entered the room, a kitchen.

A towheaded girl of perhaps nine or ten stood on a box to reach the sink where she was washing dishes. She turned to look at Miss Brickett, but did not greet her, nor did she seem particularly glad to see the new arrival. The girl appeared somewhat nervous. A servant, Diana supposed, but whose?

As if in answer to her silent question, a man strode into the room. Without a word he snatched Miss Brickett's bag away from her and dumped the contents out onto a table. He rifled through them, as if searching it for money or jewelry, then turned on her, fists raised, when he discovered nothing of value.

Although her face had gone white as a corpse, Miss Brickett held her ground. Her lips moved. Diana pressed closer to the glass, trying to hear what Miss Brickett was saying, but the couple stood too far away for her to hear a single word. She watched them argue, with some heat, and wondered if she would end up reporting on a murder after all.

The man gestured towards the child, who had continued to wash dishes with a fierce concentration. Abruptly, Miss Brickett's defiant stance crumbled. She bowed her head submissively as he continued to berate her.

Puzzled, and deeply troubled by what she'd witnessed, Diana crept away from the window. Across the street from the house was a row of shops. She waited in one of the doorways until Miss Brickett emerged and once again followed her. To Diana's surprise, Miss Brickett went directly to the theater where she'd said she'd gotten a job in the chorus line. That was, it appeared, the truth.

Late that night, upon Miss Brickett's return to 10th Street, Diana confronted the other woman in her bedroom. Like Diana's, it was small and simply furnished with a narrow brass bedstead, a washstand, a small but comfortable chair, and a pie-shaped table. Miss Brickett had brought no trunk, only a gripsack and a valise, and to judge by the scarcity of possessions she'd unpacked, the valise had been empty.

Diana bent to examine it. "Is this what you use to carry off what you steal?"

She heard Miss Brickett's startled intake of breath but received no other answer.

"I know why you came here. Tell me, Miss Brickett, do you enjoy making new friends and then betraying them?"

If the misery on Daisy Brickett's face was not real, then she was an excellent actress. Suddenly certain there was more to the thefts than simple greed, Diana spoke impulsively. "Tell me your story and promise never to steal again and I'll help you find an honest job, on stage or otherwise."

Miss Brickett burst into tears. It was some time before she could control herself enough to speak. "I cannot," she said, still sniffling intermittently. She sat tailor fashion on the bed, her face almost covered by a large white handkerchief. "I cannot earn enough money from honest labor."

"Then why are you working in the chorus?"

"Because I'm a fool." Diana heard the bitterness in Miss Brickett's voice. "I hoped . . . I thought . . . it doesn't matter."

"Of course it matters!" Miss Brickett's air of hopelessness infuriated Diana and a note of sarcasm crept into her voice. "Why do you need more money than you can earn? A child with consumption? Aged parents to support? Come, come, Miss Brickett. You've not selected wealthy targets. If matters are so desperate, surely you could have found more fashionable boarding houses to rob."

"You won't believe me if I tell you the truth."

"Try me." Diana plopped down into the chair and waited.

Miss Brickett sighed. "This will sound like something from a penny dreadful."

"Truth is often stranger than fiction."

"My parents are dead." Miss Brickett seemed unaccountably nervous, twisting the handkerchief in her hands and doing her best to avoid meeting Diana's eyes. "I am not trying to save a dying child. But . . . there is a child involved."

"Your own?"

"Of course not!" she said in hasty denial. "My . . . sister. The thefts were my husband's idea," she blurted. "I married him because I thought he would take care of us after our parents died, but instead he forced me into a life of crime."

"Perhaps a dime novel, rather than a penny dreadful," Diana suggested under her breath.

Miss Brickett looked up at that and, for just a moment, the twinkle returned to her eyes. It was quickly replaced by a wry twist of the lips. "My story does sound melodramatic. I admit it freely. But that does not make it any less true."

Remembering the girl she had seen washing dishes, Diana asked, "How old is your sister?"

"Violet is ten and I am the only family she has. My husband threatened to send her away if I didn't do as he said. He swore I'd never see her again."

"Surely if you went to the police, they could rescue Violet."

"He had himself made her legal guardian when we married. He can do with her as he pleases and the law won't stop him. And if I confess my crimes, they'll arrest us both. Then what will become of her?"

"They might not send you to jail if she can confirm that you were coerced into stealing."

But Miss Brickett shook her head. "Violet is mute. She cannot speak."

"Can she write?"

"She's never learned. She's clever enough. She understands everything she hears. But she cannot communicate by any means the authorities would accept."

This flood of information, capped by the revelation that Violet could not speak, prompted renewed doubts about Miss Brickett's honesty. Confession might be good for the soul, but Miss Brickett was almost too forthcoming. And how convenient that the girl would not be able to confirm or deny any story Miss Brickett chose to spin.

Diana tried to picture the tow-headed child she had seen through the window. None of Violet's features matched Miss Brickett's, nor did the color of her hair. Diana had not gotten a good look at the girl's eyes, but even if they were blue, that did not add up to much of a physical resemblance between the two. Diana also recalled that she had not witnessed any display of sisterly affection either. Wondering if she had been too hasty to trust Miss Brickett, Diana continued her interview.

"How long have you been married?"

"Almost three months now. I lived in that house for a short time, but it wasn't long before he told me I'd have to earn my keep."

"How do you choose a target? Why this boarding house, for instance?"

"Mr. Tysen—that's my husband's name, Virgil Tysen—tells me where to go. He has a list of boarding houses he's discovered, places where there are likely to be valuables. He sent me out three times before this one and each time was able to give me some information about the residents before I went. He told me that both Mrs. Curran and Mrs. Newburgh would have jewelry worth stealing. You, Mrs. Pritchard, and Mrs. Griswold were also to be robbed but Mr. Tysen said you'd have little of value and that I must not waste too much time searching your rooms."

"You were Mrs. Dumais in Brooklyn?"

"How did you—? Yes, I was." As if ashamed, she kept her head bowed. The handkerchief was a twisted mass in her lap.

"And the others?"

Miss Brickett rattled off two more addresses. The first was one of the three boarding houses Diana had visited that morning. The other was new to her. Watching Miss Brickett's face, Diana told her about the robberies committed by the stout woman and the emaciated one.

"I know nothing about either of them."

Miss Brickett's words had the ring of truth, but Diana hesitated to believe her. The robberies had been staged in precisely the same manner as the ones Miss Brickett had perpetrated.

"Do you have a background in theater?" Diana asked.

"Of a sort. I performed in amateur theatricals."

"Is Daisy Brickett your real name?"

"Brickett isn't but I was born Daisy Catherine Parker."

"And Violet?"

Daisy hesitated, making Diana wonder once again if she was telling the truth about the girl.

"Violet Elizabeth Parker," Daisy said at last. Then she blurted, "I must get her away from him. Please, will you help me?"

Early the next day, Diana returned to watch Virgil Tysen's ramshackle house. Soon after she'd settled herself on a convenient bench in front of a barber shop, a woman approached his door—a cadaverously thin woman.

This time, aided by a floor plan Daisy had drawn for her, Diana stationed herself outside the parlor window. Through glass just as dirty as that in the kitchen, she saw the woman give money and jewelry to Virgil Tysen, just as Daisy had.

When the woman came out, Diana accosted her, her demeanor haughty and her voice harsh. "Pardon me, ma'am. It's about that girl of yours. Your daughter is she?"

The thin woman started, attempted a smile, then just looked puzzled. "Are you speaking of Violet?"

"Violet. Yes. That's the child's name. Is she your daughter, ma'am?"

"No. Well, that is, she's my husband's child. My stepdaughter. Mr. Tysen's child by an earlier marriage. I really have to go now." And she fled, casting nervous glances over her shoulder at the house where her husband lived.

Diana stared after her. Virgil Tysen had two wives?

Movement drew her eyes to the house next door to Tysen's. An elderly woman stood in the open doorway, beckoning to her.

Never one to pass up an opportunity, Diana heeded the summons. Ten minutes later she was sharing a cup of tea with Mrs. Cole, who turned out to be one of those neighbors who liked to know what everyone else was up to. She had a rocking chair positioned in her bay window so that she could see a considerable stretch of the street, including the entrance to Virgil Tysen's house.

"Women go into that place," she announced. "Three different ones. Sometimes they're carrying bulging gripsacks or tapestry bags. And when they leave, those bags are empty."

"What do you think was in them?" Diana asked.

"Opium," Mrs. Cole said promptly. "I think that house is an opium den."

Diana fought a smile at the far-fetched suggestion. "But wouldn't you see, er, gentlemen going in at all hours of the day and night if that were the case?"

"Secret entrance, no doubt. I've got my eye peeled. I'll catch them at it one of these days. Have that man arrested, I will. Up to no good. Never lets that girl of his go out, you know."

"Not even to run errands?"

"Not to go to school, either."

"Is she his daughter?"

"No idea. Far as I can see he treats her like a servant. Little bit of a thing she is, and doing slave labor." She tut-tutted and shook her head, making Diana wonder if Mrs. Cole could see through the window into Virgil Tysen's kitchen.

"Have you ever spoken to her?"

"Tried once, over the fence, when she was in the back yard beating a rug as big as she is. She wouldn't answer me."

Wouldn't, Diana wondered, or couldn't?

"Accidentally bumped into one of the women once." Mrs. Cole winked gleefully at Diana. "Apologized and told her my name and asked for hers. She answered before she thought better of it. Mrs. Virgil Tysen, she said. Then she looked guilty, like she wasn't supposed to admit to it. That's his name. The man who lives there. Virgil Tysen."

"What did this wife look like?" Diana asked.

She was not terribly surprised when Mrs. Cole's description failed to fit either Daisy or the woman Diana had just accosted. The third Mrs. Tysen was stout . . . just like the third boarding house thief.

"Virgil Tysen is a bigamist," Diana told Daisy upon her return to the house on 10th Street, and revealed the results of the day's investigation. "That alone can put him in jail, and if I can find both of the other women to testify against him, there will be no need to involve you or Violet."

"But how can you find them?" Daisy asked. "They aren't living with him any more than I am."

"I believe," Diana mused, "that I will ask the police for assistance. There is a nice young officer in the theater district who might be inclined to help."

Daisy's countenance grew troubled at this suggestion. "What if they were coerced into stealing, as I was?"

"There is only one child on the premises."

"Some women think they must blindly obey their husbands, no matter what they are asked to do."

Diana hardened her heart. "I cannot help everyone escape justice, Daisy, no matter how much sympathy I may have for their situations. If we are to assure Violet's safety, the other wives must be sacrificed. Now, then, first we must find them. Are you sure you don't have any idea where he might have sent them?"

Daisy started to shake her head, then paused as if struck by a thought. "The list of boarding houses," she murmured. "He has one. He crossed each location off when I returned from it with my ill-gotten gains. But the list contains addresses other than those I went to. I always supposed those were boarding houses he'd decided not to rob, but perhaps—"

"—those are the houses he sent the others to," Diana finished. "Do you know where he keeps this list?"

"Yes," Daisy said. "I do."

The tinkling of broken glass sounded very loud in the confines of the tiny back yard. Diana's worried glance darted to Mrs. Cole's house before returning to the task of clearing the shards away from the window in Virgil Tysen's back door. No one seemed to have heard, not even Violet.

Carefully, Diana reached inside and turned the key in the lock. The pounding of her own heart was louder than their footfalls as she and Daisy crept into the house. Tysen had gone out only moments before. With luck, they'd have time to find the list of addresses and spirit Violet away before he returned.

Daisy went directly to the desk in the parlor, opened a drawer, and extracted a slip of paper. "This is it." She handed it to Diana. "But where is Violet?" She started towards the stairs and Diana followed.

There was no sign of the child on the second floor, but the door that led to the garret was locked. "She must be up there," Diana said, and turned the key.

Daisy opened the door, then jerked back in alarm, her expression disbelieving when she saw something scurry up the short flight of steps. "That was a rat!"

They found Violet in a garret chamber, huddled on a narrow, lumpy cot, a thin blanket wrapped tightly around her thin shoulders. There was no heat in the room and the child was shivering.

"Oh, my dear!" Daisy cried, her horrified gaze fixed on the rat droppings that littered the floor. "I had no idea things were this bad. What must you think of me for leaving you here?"

Eyes wide, Violet stared at them but did not move. Daisy and Diana exchanged worried glances and crossed the room together, but just as they reached Violet, they heard a door slam two floors below. Virgil Tysen had returned.

"Hurry," Diana whispered. Seizing Violet's hand, she hauled the girl off the cot and down the stairs, pausing only long enough to turn the key in the lock.

Heavy footsteps sounded on the main staircase, forcing the three of them to take shelter in one of the empty rooms on the second floor. They barely concealed themselves in time.

Holding herself still, scarcely daring to breathe, Diana heard Tysen go straight to the door to the garret, unlock it, and bellow for Violet. When she did not immediately appear, he stormed up the stairs after her, muttering under his breath.

Diana dashed out of cover, slammed the garret door shut, and once again turned the key in the lock. "Take Violet to Mrs. Curran's," she told Daisy. "I'll go for the police."

She only hoped the flimsy door would hold. Even before they reached the street, it reverberated with blows from Tysen's fists. His shouts of rage could still be heard a block away.

The next morning, Diana stood with Daisy and Violet on the train platform at Grand Central Station. Mrs. Curran and the other boarders had taken up a collection to pay their fare and give them a nest egg for a fresh start.

"I still can't believe we're free of him," Daisy said.

Their surmise had been correct. The two addresses listed closest to Mrs. Curran's had been Tysen's other current targets. Diana's friend, Officer Hanlon, had helped her convince the authorities to act quickly, with the result that Tysen's two wives, one of whom was legally wed to him, had been arrested at about the same time a police raid on Tysen's house netted Tysen himself, free of his garret prison but still in the building, and discovered enough stolen property to convict him of the boarding house robberies.

"You lied to the police," Daisy said. "If you hadn't, we'd be in jail, too."

"Only in one small matter." Diana had told the truth about Tysen's third wife. She'd simply implied that this woman, her informant, had been long gone from Mrs. Curran's boarding house before Diana approached Officer Hanlon. Since no one had mentioned Violet, Diana had felt no need to volunteer information about the girl.

"Still, I'm grateful."

"Prove it by staying on the right side of the law. And this may help." Diana extracted the reply she'd just received to a telegram she'd sent the previous day to her old friend Nathan Todd, with whose company of actors Diana had traveled when her husband was alive. "He'll meet you in Chicago," she told Daisy after explaining that Todd's Touring Thespians was a reputable if not terribly distinguished troupe. "He has an opening for an ingenue and you cannot possibly be less talented than some of the actresses he's previously employed."

"This is more than I deserve." Tears shimmered in Daisy's eyes.

Embarrassed by the display of gratitude, Diana looked around for Violet, who had wandered off to investigate one of the piles of luggage stacked on the platform.

Close up, the girl's physical resemblance to Daisy had not intensified. Her eyes were hazel, not blue, and nothing in the shape of their noses or mouths or ears was similar. For the first time, it struck Diana then that there was also a large gap in their ages. Daisy was some fifteen years older.

Thinking back on the "confession" Daisy had made that night in her room at Mrs. Curran's house, Diana remembered that Daisy had seemed nervous when questioned about her relationship to Violet. Unbidden, an ugly suspicion raised its head. Had Daisy hoodwinked her after all, taking advantage of the fact that the child could not talk to make up a pitiful history in the hope that Diana would not turn her in to the authorities? Had Diana herself been the one to give her the idea by mentioning aged parents and dying children? If so, then it was possible Daisy's real intent was to resume a life of crime in some new location.

Diana sighed. She'd hoped to put Daisy and Violet on the train and go directly to the offices of the Independent Intelligencer to write the story of the bigamist/boarding house thief's arrest—minus a few details—without questioning the fact that everything seemed to have reached a thoroughly satisfactory conclusion.

But what if Daisy had lied? What if Violet wasn't her sister? How could Diana let an innocent child go with Daisy without making sure the girl would be cared for?

Diana crossed the platform to Violet and knelt beside her. She seemed intelligent enough, for all that she could not speak.

"Is Daisy your sister?" Diana asked in a soft voice. "You may nod to signify yes or shake your head from side to side to signify no."

Violet's expression became shuttered. She glanced at Daisy, then away, as if afraid to respond.

Daisy smiled, but the expression seemed forced, making Diana wonder if Daisy had overheard the question. "She is still afraid of Mr. Tysen," Daisy said. "He warned her so many times never to talk to strangers that she is reluctant to deal with them on any level."

"Surely you understand that you're free of him now," Diana said, directing her words at the girl. "He has been arrested. No one can make you do anything you do not want to do. No one."

Daisy came up beside them, ending any further opportunity for private conversation. She placed both hands on the girl's shoulders. "Mr. Tysen will never bother us again, Violet." She held Violet's gaze for a long moment. Then she led the child towards the waiting train.

Getting slowly to her feet, Diana watched them board. She was in an agony of indecision. Had she been too eager to get a story? What if Daisy had been Virgil Tysen's willing accomplice? If Violet was really just a maidservant, perhaps one acquired from a foundling home, then there was nothing to keep Daisy from abandoning her at the train's first stop.

Diana walked along the platform and halted beside the train when she saw Daisy and Violet settle into their seats in one of the passenger cars. She rapped on the outside of their window, causing them both to turn their heads in her direction. Daisy stood and lowered the upper portion while Violet pressed her face close to the glass at the bottom.

"She's not your sister," Diana said.

Daisy hesitated. "No, she's not, although my parents always told everyone she was. She is my daughter. She was born when I was barely fifteen."

For a moment Diana wondered if this was yet another ruse, but when she stepped back to take a good look at the two of them, one head above the other, framed in the train window, she knew this was the truth at last. When they smiled, the family resemblance was unmistakable. In both pairs of eyes, Diana recognized the same tell-tale twinkle.

Read more of Diana's adventures in the Diana Spaulding Mysteries, DEADLIER THAN THE PEN, FATAL AS A FALLEN WOMAN, and NO MORTAL REASON, available in bookstores and libraries nationwide. If you don't see them, ask the bookstore or library to order a copy for you and enjoy!

© 2005 Kathy Lynn Emerson. All rights reserved.