In a Gilded Cage - By Rhys Bowen Page 0,75

bottle of stomach mixture. But I’m not the kind of person who is good at waiting. What else should I be doing, I wondered. Would I learn anything from paying a visit to Mademoiselle Fifi, or to Bella? Probably not, and Daniel would say that I’d only tip off a murderer with my blunderings, but I’ve never been one to take wise advice. I decided that Sunday afternoon would be a perfect time to visit Mademoiselle Fifi. Theaters were dark and she’d most likely be resting.

So I walked to East Twenty-first and knocked on her door. I hadn’t planned in advance what I was going to say, and this was a mistake, because when the maid opened the door I just stood there.

I decided to play it straight. “Is your mistress at home?”

She took in my funereal appearance. “If you are from the church, you waste your time,” she said in her French accent. “She will not see you.”

“I’m not from the church. I have some questions about a friend of Mademoiselle’s.”

“Mademoiselle has many friends,” the maid said.

I bet she has, I thought. “This particular friend is called Mr. Poindexter.” She pretended to look blank. “And don’t try to deny that she knows him. I am a detective and I have been watching the house. I saw him here.”

She shrugged in that wonderfully Gallic way. “I see if Mademoiselle is awake and wishes to speak to you.” And she admitted me to the house.

It was very warm inside and rather untidy, with a hat thrown on a chair in the front hall, a feather boa draped from the hat stand and a pair of high boots lying on the linoleum. Clearly the maid was not known for her housekeeping prowess. I was told to wait, overheard a rapid exchange in French, and then was admitted to what can only be described as a boudoir. Mademoiselle Fifi herself lay on a daybed, looking as if she were about to audition for La Dame aux Camélias.

“I’m sorry to disturb your rest,” I said, “but I would like to ask you a couple of questions regarding your relationship with Mr. Poindexter.”

At this she leaped up, her peignoir flying open to reveal too much flesh for my taste. “That monster! Do not speak his name to me! Never again. Never.”

This was a surprising turn. I took a minute to recover.

“I take it that you and Mr. Poindexter are no longer, shall we say, friendly? And that you didn’t part on good terms?”

“Two years I am with him,” she said, her Gallic eyes still flashing. “Two years of my life. I know he is married, but he say his wife is cold and does not love him and he is only happy when he is with me. But then last week he comes to me and says it is all over. Finished. He never want to see me again.”

“Did he say why?”

She shook her head. “I think another woman, of course. Or that his wife found out about us and makes a big fuss.”

“His wife is dead,” I said. “She died right after he came to see you.”

“Mon dieu.” Her eyes opened wide with surprise, then narrowed again. “Then it is another woman. Someone suitable for him to marry, not someone like me whom he could not take into polite society.”

“It’s possible,” I said.

“Tell me who it is. I will kill her,” she said with great drama. Honestly, I’d had quite enough of actresses in the past months.

“I have no idea who it might be,” I said. “Have you not thought that Mr. Poindexter might be grieving for his wife and overcome with guilt?”

She shrugged again. “Possible,” she said. “These Protestants always have guilt. They have no confession, you see. They have to carry it around with them.”

I thought that was quite a shrewd remark. Mademoiselle Fifi was no fool.

“You are a detective?” she asked me.

I nodded.

“If you find out who the other woman is, I pay you,” she said. “I pay you well.”

“All right,” I said, but in truth I had no intention of telling her.

• • •

I left her and walked home down Fifth Avenue, digesting what I had just learned. So Anson Poindexter broke up with her just before Fanny died. I could see Fifi being the sort of person who could poison Fanny in revenge for being abandoned, but the question was how. Someone like Fifi would never be admitted to an apartment in the Dakota and would most certainly have