Murder in Morningside Heights (A Gaslight Mystery) Read Free Page B

above, and on either side of the foyer, doors opened into what Frank imagined were classrooms of some sort.
    No one appeared to be assigned the task of welcoming visitors, so he glanced around, looking for the kind of directory one would see in a city office building. Before he could find one, two young women came out of one of the classrooms. They wore the bell-shaped black skirts and starched white shirtwaists that seemed to be practically a uniform for young women today. They were chatting pleasantly until one of them noticed Frank standing in the middle of the foyer. She gave a shriek and both of them bolted back into the classroom and slammed the door.
    Frank blinked in surprise, but then he figured they knewthat one of their professors had been murdered just outside and seeing a strange man where he probably had no business being had made them fear for their own lives. This made him reconsider his plan to go wandering about until he found the dean’s office. Luckily, before he had to decide what to do next, the classroom door opened again and an older woman wearing unrelieved black with a watch pinned to her ample bosom stepped cautiously out.
    “Who are you and what do you want?” she demanded.
    “I’m a detective investigating the death of Miss Abigail Northrup. I was wondering if you could direct me to the office of the head dean or whoever is in charge.”
    She seemed to relax just a bit, as if she wanted to believe him but didn’t quite dare. “That would be President Hatch. His office is on the second floor.”
    Frank thanked her and hurried off up the grand staircase before he frightened anyone else. On the second floor he found an impressive set of double doors labeled PRESIDENT’S OFFICE and stepped inside into a wood-paneled room.
    A young woman sitting at a desk worked a typewriter with a good deal of proficiency. She looked up in alarm, and Frank quickly identified himself before she could run away shrieking. “I’d like to speak with President Hatch if he’s available.”
    As if struck dumb, she nodded quickly and scurried over to an interior door. She ducked inside and emerged after a few minutes, looking slightly less terrified. “President Hatch will see you.”
    She held the door for him and closed it behind him.
    President Hatch sat behind a desk larger and more impressive than Frank had seen in any millionaire’s office. Maybe a college president had to try harder to impress visitors. He was a slender man in his fifties with thinning gray hairplastered against his head and pince-nez glasses perched on his nose, probably to give him a scholarly look.
    Hatch rose to his feet, but he didn’t offer to shake hands. “I thought the police had finished their business with us.”
    “I’m not with the police.”
    “But Alice said—”
    “I told her I was a detective. Maybe she got confused.”
    “Then if you’re not with the police, who are you with?”
    “I’m a private investigator.” Frank tossed his card onto the massive desk. Hatch glanced at it but made no move to pick it up. “Miss Northrup’s parents hired me.”
    “To do what?”
    “To find out who killed their daughter.”
    “I thought the police had settled that.”
    Frank gave him a pitying look. “Is that what you want to tell the parents of your students? That a young woman was stabbed to death by a wandering lunatic on the very grounds of your college?”
    Angry color flooded Hatch’s face, but he was far too civilized to shout or anything. “Really, Mr. . . .” He glanced down at the card again.
    “Malloy,” Frank said. “And I wouldn’t want to send my daughter to a place where girls got murdered right in the front yard.”
    Hatch seemed to sag under his carefully tailored suit. “And yet that is what happened, Mr. Malloy, so I don’t see how it matters who killed her. The damage has been done.”
    Now Frank saw the despair. Hatch envisioned his school failing in front of his eyes and had already given