Locked rooms - Laurie R. King [62]
“I'm all right,” I croaked.
He paused, out of sight, and I cleared my throat and repeated the assertion, with sufficient strength this time that he could understand me.
“Can I get you something?” he asked, sounding nervous. “A glass of water?”
“That would be good, thank you.”
By the time he returned, I was sitting upright, feeling the colour seeping back into my face. I drank the water, thinking somewhat nonsensically that Holmes would have given me brandy, and placed the glass on his desk. My hands were steady enough to reassure him.
“I'm terribly sorry,” he said. “I should have realised that the news would be a shock.”
“How did she die?”
His long pause made me think that perhaps he had already told me, while my ears were filled with the rush of receding blood, but by that time I was more concerned with the information than reassuring him as to my sanity. I looked at him sharply and said, “Please, how did Dr Ginzberg die?”
“She was hit on the head. The police thought . . .” and for the second time, his mouth moved while no sound reached me. I waited calmly until his face muscles were still before I asked him to repeat himself. His gaze flicked to the door and back, and I thought that if he got up to summon help, I would physically stop him and force the information from him. Fortunately, assault proved unnecessary.
“Someone broke into her office at home, where she met patients. Apparently he thought she was out, but she was not, and she disturbed him in the process of ransacking her desk for money. He hit her with a statue she had on the desk, and left her for dead. She wasn't found until morning. She never regained consciousness.”
There. I had it now, and hadn't fainted or gone deaf again. I could handle this. I heard myself speak, and sat wondering at my ability to appear rational.
“When was this, precisely?”
“Precisely, I don't remember. But it was in the early weeks of 1915.”
“That's not possible.”
“Er, well, I suppose I could be mistaken, although I think—”
“I'd appreciate the date, if that's available.” It could not have been so soon after I left for England, simply could not.
“I could have my secretary research it,” he said, clearly uncertain why it would matter.
“Thank you. Another question: Why is the hospital still receiving the mail addressed to her home?”
That question made his body relax into surer ground. “We administer Dr Ginzberg's estate. She left everything to the hospital, for the benefit of mental patients. Some of her holdings we sold, others we retained as income. The house is one of those.”
“Where do letters go?”
“She didn't have much family. We generally open letters, and if they are business we answer them, if personal—there are few of those anymore—we send them to a cousin of hers who lives near Philadelphia. I believe the cousin is getting on in years; her communication has become quite . . . eccentric.”
“Was an arrest made?”
“Not that I've heard.”
“Do you know the officer in charge of the investigation?”
“I met him, but years ago. His name slips my mind.”
“Perhaps your secretary could look that up as well?”
“If you like. Although as you are not family, I don't suppose he'd have much to tell you.”
“We'll see,” I told him, a trifle grimly. Although Holmes tended to travel under an assumed name—currently he was using a favourite, Sherrinford Holmes—if necessity called I would not hesitate to send him in under his own name. There wasn't a policeman in the world who would turn down a conversation with Sherlock Holmes. “Well, thank you, Mister, er . . .”
“Braithwaite,” he provided.
“Of course.” I pushed myself out of the chair, obscurely pleased that I did not fall on my face. My feet seemed remarkably far away.
“Miss Russell, let me arrange a car for you.”
“That won't be necessary; I have a taxicab waiting for me. I think.”
Still, his sense of responsibility demanded that he arrange for an escort, who proved to be the secretary occupying the desk outside of his office door. The woman was at least sixty and so thin she might have snapped in two had I leant on her firmly,