Free Murder on Gramercy Park by Victoria Thompson Page A

would you have done?”
    Frank chose not to reply to that. “All right, so Mrs. Blackwell uses morphine. That’s unusual for a woman of her social class, but—”
    “It’s not as unusual as you might suppose,” she disagreed. “Many women of her social class use opiates of some sort.”
    “What on earth for?” He could understand why the poor used stimulants like alcohol and opiates to help them forget the grim realities of their existence, but what could a woman like Mrs. Blackwell need to forget?
    “There are all kinds of pain, Malloy. Life can be hard even if you’re rich.”
    He didn’t bother arguing with her. It was usually a waste of time, even when he knew she was wrong. “All right, so she uses morphine. What does that have to do with her husband’s death?”
    “Her husband didn’t know she was still using it. He knew she’d given it up after he cured her, even though it was very difficult for her. Have you ever seen anyone going through the process of weaning himself off an opiate? Few people ever manage to do it. But then he forced her to speak at his lectures. He gave lectures to promote—”
    “I know all about his lectures,” Frank said. “His assistant explained it to me, but he said Mrs. Blackwell was only too pleased to give her testimony of what the good doctor had done for her.”
    “Mrs. Blackwell tells a different story. She hated speaking in public. It terrified her, but her father and Blackwell forced her to do it.”
    “How could they force her if she didn’t want to do it?”
    “Really, Malloy, how do you force people to tell you things they don’t want to tell you?” she asked, that gleam in her eyes that made her look so wicked he thought he should probably lock her away before she could cause any more trouble.
    “Are you telling me they gave her the third degree?” he asked, giving her trouble right back.
    “Of course not. You should know there are more effective ways of managing someone like Mrs. Blackwell. Women of her class are taught from birth to be obedient and compliant and to please men.”
    “You’re from her class,” he pointed out, reminding her that she had been born into one of the oldest and wealthiest families in the city. “What happened to you?”
    She gave him one of her looks, but she didn’t dignify his words with a reply. “The important thing for you to know is that Mrs. Blackwell started using morphine again to help overcome her fear of appearing at those lectures. It was the only way she could do it. Her husband didn’t approve of her using morphine, and she must have lived in constant fear that he would discover her secret. She also hated speaking at his lectures, which was why she needed the morphine in the first place. I imagine she was excused from doing them once her condition became apparent, but surely, he would have expected her to resume her appearances once the child was born. In fact, she told me he’d forbidden her to nurse the child herself because she had to be free to attend those lectures.”
    “Maybe you’ll tell me why you think all this is important?” he tried, knowing it would annoy her to think he hadn’t figured it out.
    He was right. “Malloy, I’m surprised at you! Mrs. Blackwell might have thought the only way to avoid being discovered as a morphine user and having to speak at those lectures again was to murder her husband.”
    He almost hated to show her how weak her theory was. “You think a woman who was so frightened she’d take morphine to give her the courage to stand up in front of a crowd is going to have the courage to pick up her husband’s pistol, put it to his head, and blow his brains all over her nice carpet?”
    “Desperation can make people do strange things,” she pointed out.
    “Next I suppose you’re going to argue that she wasn’t in her right mind because of her delicate condition.”
    “I’m sure that’s what she’d argue—if she’s guilty, that is.”
    “I can’t see