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do you say that, Miss Cross?” Officer Dobbs rounded on me, his pad and pencil held aloft. “The other person might merely have been Alvin Goddard, catching your brother red-handed. The two struggled. Your brother threw Goddard over the balcony. Drunk as he obviously was, he stumbled back inside, hit his head, and passed out.”
    “Over the balcony?” Brady sprang up from his chair, sending the piece tumbling over backward. “I may be a thief, a cheat, and a drunkard, but I’m no murderer!”
     
    It took some minutes and a substantial dose of cognac to calm Brady down. Through Neily’s and my combined efforts, we resettled him in his chair and persuaded him to repeat, calmly, the events as he remembered them.
    Jesse turned to Uncle Cornelius. “Sir, why would Alvin Goddard have entered your bedroom tonight?”
    Uncle Cornelius stared at the other man as if he didn’t understand the question. Then he dropped his face into his hands. “Dear God, he’s really gone, isn’t he?”
    No one said anything. Neily shuffled his feet as if about to move to his father’s side, but then seemed to change his mind and stood staring down at the carpet. Officer Dobbs, meanwhile, inspected the fallen candelabrum for traces of blood, but declared the item perfectly clean except for the smudges left by Brady’s fingers.
    After a moment, Uncle Cornelius pulled himself together with a lift of his shoulders. “I sent Alvin in. Before toasting my daughter, I conducted a bit of business in my office. I sent Alvin here afterward to return the paperwork to my safe.” His eyes narrowed on my brother. “What were you doing here, Brady? What papers did you steal?”
    When Brady pulled a sheepish expression, Neily lifted his chin and spoke up. “He swiped the plans for the New Haven-Hartford-Providence line.” He gestured to the bed where Jesse had deposited the documents. “My guess is he copied them and wanted to return them before anyone noticed they were missing. Thing is, I’d already noticed. Sorry, Brady old boy, but your nasty little secret is out.”
    Uncle Cornelius stood, his features blacker than I’d ever seen them. I cringed as he crossed the room, snatched up the documents and glowered at them, then snapped them down again. He lurched as if to hurl himself on Brady. Only Officer Dobbs’s quick reflexes stopped him, and for once I was glad for the boorish man’s presence. The policeman’s beefy hands closed around Uncle Cornelius’s upper arms from behind, or I believe my uncle might have gone for Brady’s throat.
    “Damn it, Brady, I gave you employment for Emmaline’s sake, so she wouldn’t have to worry about her elder brother. And this is how you repay me? Theft? Disloyalty? You’re a swine!” He struggled in the policeman’s grip. I cried out for him to be reasonable, but he seemed not to hear. “No one crosses me like this! No one! I want to know who you sold me out to!”
    The blood drained from my face and I tightened my grip on the footboard for fear my legs would collapse beneath me. Officer Dobbs noticed my distress. “I think it’d be best if you left now, Miss Cross. And as for you, Mr. Vanderbilt,” he said with a warning tug on Uncle Cornelius’s arms, “I’ll let you go if you promise to calm down.”
    I’d no intention of going anywhere, but even if I had, Jesse had other ideas. “Indeed, Mr. Vanderbilt, you’re not helping matters. But, Emma, don’t you go anywhere. According to what your cousin told me over the telephone, you were a witness to Mr. Goddard’s death. Is that true?”
    All eyes turned toward me.
    “I . . . um . . . well . . .” Oh, how I suddenly wished I’d curbed my tongue when I sought help from Neily earlier, at least until I’d had the chance to talk to Brady. Was I about to implicate my brother? “It was dark and I couldn’t really see anything. . . .”
    Officer Dobbs released Uncle Cornelius and took a stride closer to me, his bulk looming over me in a