Murphy's Law (Molly Murphy Mysteries, #1)

"I've seen you before somewhere, haven't I?" He stepped out, making it hard for me to pass. "Your face--I never forget a face, you know."

"Maybe last time you were visiting here, sir," I mumbled, still looking at my boots. "Now if you'll excuse me, I really have to clear up the coffee tray."

He let me pass. I was free. The drawing room door was only a few feet ahead of me.

"Wait," I heard him say. "That hair.

I recognize that hair." Suddenly I was grabbed from behind and my cap was wrenched off. My hair tumbled free and at the same moment a hand came around my mouth, dragging me backward. "Ellis Island," he muttered into my ear. "You were the woman on Ellis Island. You recognized me, didn't you?"

I tried to struggle. We were still in a public hallway. He couldn't kill me here. Any moment a door would open and someone would come. Billy was dragging me toward the door on his left, back to the room from which he had just come. I fought, I squirmed, but his big hand was firmly around my mouth and his other arm around my waist so that

he was half carrying me. When I tried to kick out at him, he laughed. Daniel was only separated from me by one wall. If I could manage one kick against that wall, if I could reach out and topple one of those statues. My toe tipped one plinthe but it was heavy marble and didn't even wobble.

"It's no use struggling," Billy whispered in my ear. "I'm much stronger than you."

As he heaved me inside the room I opened my hand and let the note fall to the floor. Then he shut the door behind us and turned the key with one big hand.

I had a second to glance around the room. It was a small music room with a couple of elegant brocade chairs, a piano, and a harp. Billy had obviously used it as his changing room, makeup and props were scattered on top of the piano and a large theatrical trunk stood on its end, open, with clothes hanging in it.

Billy's strong fleshy fingers were crushing my mouth. His other hand was still holding my hair so tightly that tears were spurting out of my eyes. "Well, isn't this a stroke of luck for me. The one person who could identify me. Not that your identification would stand up in court, seeing as you only saw me in disguise--but it would start people asking questions and I really don't want them to do that."

One thing was sure--I was not going to make it easy for him anymore. I swung out my leg and brought it back hard on his shins at the same time as I sank my teeth into his finger. I tasted blood as he wrenched his hand away.

"You little vixen!" He struck me a savage blow across the face, knocking me across the room. I slammed into the open trunk. It wobbled. He rushed to right it and gave me a savage kick. "You'll be sorry you did that."

"You were going to kill me, anyway. Just like you killed O'Malley--and that poor old photographer!" I tried to sound defiant, but all that came out was a gasp. My head was still singing from the blow.

"I don't want to kill you, you stupid girl. I didn't even want to kill

Donny--"

"Donny?"

"He calls himself O'Malley now, but I recognized him right away. He wrote me a

letter. He thought he was so smart, but it turned out that I was smarter. His bad luck that I happened to be visiting the island that day, just as it was your bad luck to see me." He was looking around the room. It was as if I could read his mind. He was looking for something to dispatch me with. He snatched up a white scarf hanging in his trunk, then shoved me back into the carpet, his large knee holding me down in the center of my back. He was going to strangle me. I tried to make a sound, but his knee was crushing me to the floor. He was a big man, and very powerful. A man who could cut a throat with one stroke. "I'd better not kill you here. Too risky. That bloodhound

Sullivan's in the next room."

"That's right," I said, turning my face out of the carpet to sound as defiant as I could, "And he knows I'm working here as his spy. Any second now he'll come looking for me."

"Then I'll just have to get you away before he comes looking, won't I?" he said.

"And how do you think you'll get me out of the house? I won't go quietly. I'm not afraid of you."

"Elementary, my dear, as that Sherlock Holmes is always saying. I'll take you out in my trunk. We'll get a cab straight to the Hudson River. Up and over into the water. Nice and simple. They'll never know what happened to you." While he said this he yanked me up by the hair. I twisted and turned, kicked and flailed. Just as I got up enough wind to cry out he stuffed a wad of cotton into my mouth, then bound it tightly with the scarf.