Let's Talk of Murder by Joan Smith

the exertion, she said, “Fanny will be down in a moment. You can speak with her in the visitors’ room.” She indicated an austere room behind her own alcove. It was furnished with two hard sofas, a sofa table and two hard chairs. The only access to it was through her office. Like the virgin’s bedroom in old homes, Corinne thought, located behind the mistress’s bed chamber to protect the maiden from harm. Coffen and Corinne waited and Mrs. Bruton led the others away.
    As she walked them along at a brisk pace, she spoke of the home, with many sideways compliments to Doctor Harper, herself and Reverend Morgate. “We can handle twenty-four girls at a time,” she said. “We’re usually filled up, with a waiting list. We can’t undertake to raise the children. We put them up for adoption right away. The girls know that when they come to us. Well, how could they raise a poor child, when they can’t keep out of trouble themselves?
    “In payment for their keep, they do the work about the home. Cleaning, laundry, gardening, cooking, and so on, while they’re able. Toward the end of their nine months, they’re allowed to rest and read worthwhile books, take little walks about the garden at the back, and of course attend chapel. We have Bible readings at each meal and before retiring. Doctor Harper comes for services and a sermon as often as he’s available.”
    Young girls, some obviously pregnant, some just beginning to show, worked about the place, pushing floor polishers, dusting, carrying trays. They all wore the same costume, a simple gray gown, immaculate white apron and cap. Mrs. Bruton described the meals—three meals a day of good, simple food—and took them to the kitchen to show the meals in preparation, again with the girls doing the work, supervised by a couple of older women. They were shown the laundry and the garden at the back where the girls walked. Prance and Byron made suitable compliments and asked a few not too hard questions.
    As they were returning below, Prance stopped on the second landing. Two girls in the gray uniform were rushing down a corridor. Their hasty pace suggested they were not yet far along in their pregnancy. When they reached the end, one of them drew out a key and unlocked the door. “I don’t believe we were down that corridor, were we?” Prance asked.
    “That is the birthing facility,” she said. “It’s set off from the bedrooms so the girls won’t be frightened by the screams. They’ll find out the wages of sin for themselves soon enough.”
    “Why is the door kept locked?” he asked.
    “There are some drugs stored there, when the facility is not in use, it’s kept locked. Those girls are in charge of cleaning the place and preparing it for the midwife’s work.”
    As she led them back to the lobby, Byron said, “Are they allowed visits from family and friends?”
    “Not as a rule,” she said firmly. “Nor do we very often get such a request. If their families and friends cared for them, they wouldn’t be here. We hope to detach them from the evil influences of their past. Of course if parents change their minds and want to take a daughter back home, we oblige them. We make an effort to place the girls in a good position. Doctor Morgate has many friends who help along that line.
    “Speaking of help, in what way did you feel you might be able to help us, gentlemen?” Her steely eye suggested it was time to repay her kindness. “I have a check book in my office, if you don’t happen to have yours with you,” she added, to make her meaning perfectly clear. She ushered them back to her alcove.
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Chapter 9
    While Coffen and Corinne waited for Fanny, Coffen had a snoop around Mrs. Bruton’s desk for clues, but without discovering anything significant except a taste for lurid fiction. A copy of Lewis’s The Monk was open face-down in her top drawer. At the sound of flying footsteps, he darted back to his chair, moving with amazing agility for an