Free The Innocent by Evelyn Piper Page B

said, “Don’t!” Because the girl was about to make the gesture again.
    â€œEddie carried on something terrible. That’s why I stayed with her. I had to leave my job; I was working in a laundry in Hackensack. Eddie doesn’t have no other folks, only Miz Brown she lived with, and Miz Brown couldn’t stay with Eddie all the time so I stayed.”
    So no accusations had been made? Claire had written that Edna could get away with the murder if she used the insulin, and she had gotten away with it? But why had she cut Andrew’s throat? Why had he been found in Newark with his throat cut? “What about the police, Grace?”
    â€œWhen Eddie say that was Andrew in Newark, they let her take him. The police didn’t pay Edna no mind. Eddie keep saying she killed Andrew but everyone know she didn’t. But she say so. The police didn’t bother any. I guess she been crazy like they say, but she didn’t act like crazy.
    â€œWe had her to the doctor and he told me to watch her good, and I watched her good. After a while she didn’t talk about Andrew and then she didn’t talk at all, but then the other day Miz Brown give Eddie a good lacing down. She say Eddie have to see all things come to an end sometime. We didn’t have any money left and Miz Brown can’t help us out any more, she has to pay her own rent. She say to Eddie——
    â€œThat was yesterday. Eddie seemed fine to me. She says she was going to get a job and we didn’t have cash for uniforms, and Miz Brown says how about these uniforms here and how she knows Eddie paid for them herself. Miz Brown says no matter what, those uniforms are Eddie’s. Eddie wouldn’t call you up; she wouldn’t talk to you, nohow.”
    â€œNot to me , Grace!”
    â€œNo, ma’am. Eddie wouldn’t have no part of you, but Miz Brown says I could call, so I called.”
    â€œMrs. Carter is dead, Grace. I told you that Mrs. Carter was dead, remember?”
    â€œYes, ma’am.” Grace began to rock back and forth and the tears came from her eyes in a steady stream.
    Marjorie gave Grace her handkerchief. “Please tell me, Grace.”
    â€œYes, ma’am.”
    â€œYou told Eddie—Edna I said Mrs. Carter was dead and she ran out of the drugstore?”
    â€œYes, ma’am. She ran out all right. Oh, Eddie did a terrible thing, Eddie did a terrible thing!”
    â€œYou told her and she ran out and then?”
    â€œI ran after Eddie and I caught and held her good and took her home. Some men they thought Eddie was drunk. They were laughing. I took Eddie home and then she seemed like she’d been, not talking, just sitting there, and then she perked up and said I should go down and buy us a couple a bottle a beer.
    â€œEddie used to like beer, not hard liquor I don’t mean. Andrew was the one for liquor. Just beer. Eddie said I should go and get beer because she was going to get a job like she told Miz Brown she would. She said I should go to St. Nicholas and get this kind of beer. She said that was the only place kept that kind of beer, and I should go there, no where else.
    â€œI would have gone way over to St. Nicholas, too, only on the street I met Miz Brown and she asked where I was going and I said how Eddie wanted this special kind of beer and she said there wasn’t anything special about that beer. She said I didn’t have to go way over to St. Nicholas. We went right into the candy store on the corner and we got the beer and we walked back to the place.
    â€œI didn’t think nothing of it.”
    Grace raised her head for the first time and Marjorie saw the eyes swimming in tears and the face wet with them.
    â€œIf I had done like Eddie said and gone straight over to St. Nicholas, I would have got back too late.”
    â€œGrace! Oh, Grace,” Marjorie whispered.
    â€œShe had the door locked. Eddie. She had the bureau pushed up