Patchin Place seemed so delightfully normal and safe as I left the bustle of Jefferson Market and made my way over the cobbles. Flowers were blooming in window boxes. A window was open and someone was playing the violin. How I longed to shut myself in my own house and stay there, not be involved any longer in this dangerous business, but I couldn’t back out now. And in truth I was feeling rather pleased with myself at my great discovery that had eluded everyone else. A triumph for Molly Murphy, I said to myself in the way that Houdini had penned similar sayings under his newspaper clippings. I took the cloth from the drawer in the scullery where I had kept it. It looked remarkably unappealing and extremely like blood, not paint. It smelled like old blood too, I thought, and I wondered if I had made a terrible blunder after all. But I was determined to go through with it. I put the tissue parcel into my bag and off I went again.

I was just locking my front door behind me when I heard my name being called and saw Gus was waving from the bedroom window.

“Molly, you will never guess—I’ve just sold a painting,” she said excitedly. “To one of the members of our suffragists’ group. Isn’t it thrilling? I’m a true professional artist at last. Sid is arranging for me to have a show in the fall so I’m painting up a storm. Come and see my latest effort—I think it’s my best work yet.”

“Gus, I’d love to but I have to go to police headquarters this minute,” I said, “and a man is arriving by train from Washington to see me.”

“Mercy me,” she said. “Well, I won’t keep you then.” She sounded disappointed and I felt terrible. They had been such good friends to me and she was so anxious to show me her painting. But she and Sid would never understand that life for me was not all play, that when you work for a living and run your own business, you can’t take a break anytime you feel like it.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ll come and see it tomorrow, I promise. And if Daniel shows up, please tell him to meet me at police headquarters right away. It’s very urgent.”

“All right.” She nodded, then called after me. “Molly, take care, won’t you? Don’t do anything reckless.”

“Don’t worry about me,” I called back as I turned the corner.

Given the importance of the situation, I hailed a cab and we were soon clattering toward Mulberry Street.

“I’m here to see Captain Sullivan,” I said. “Is he in his office?”