Deadly Illusions Read Online Free PDF

could be.” She began to shake.
    Francesca stood and hurried to her. “There, there, it’s all right. It’s fortunate that you found her. Was her door ajar Monday night when you returned home from your employment?”
    â€œI don’t know. I don’t recall. If it was open last night when I came home, I didn’t notice. Miss Cahill, was he killing her, right next door, while me and my baby slept?”
    Francesca hesitated and clasped her shoulder. “We do not yet know when she was murdered, Mrs. O’Neil.”
    Gwen sobbed. “Dear God, it could have been me or my little girl!”
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    I T TOOK FORTY-FIVE MINUTES to get uptown, and by the time the doorman let Francesca into the Cahill mansion, situated on Fifth Avenue across from Central Park, the gilded clock on the marble mantel in the salon adjacent to the receiving room indicated that it was half past eight. As Francesca handed off her hat and gloves, she did not need to know the exact time in order to know just how late she was. The dining room was several doors down, but she could hear the robust conversation of her mother’s dinner party. As it was accompanied by the tinkle of crystal glassware and the tapping of silver upon china, she knew that supper was already in progress.
    Her head throbbed and her new, white kidskin shoes were too tight. Like Gwen O’Neil—and perhaps Margaret Cooper—her feet were sore. She knew there would be some huge cost to pay, but she’d already decided to sneak up to her room, avoiding the party altogether. Besides, how would she explain that she was late? Her parents frowned upon her sleuthing, as she was only twenty years old and still a part of their household. Of course, she had no doubt she could be thirty and mar ried with children and Julia would still despair over her reputation should she continue investigative work. Many times she had halfpromised Julia that her days as a sleuth were over. But the half truths were merely that. As much as she disliked lying to her mother, she had found her calling in life. She was an excellent investigator, and she had the record to prove it.
    Attending supper was out of the question. Francesca smiled at the doorman and began to cross the long receiving room. The press had dubbed the Cahill home the “Marble Mansion” upon its completion some eight years ago. Her father, raised on a farm in Illinois, had become a butcher and eventually expanded into the country’s largest meatpacking business. Francesca had been born in Chicago, but the family had moved to New York City when she was a child. The press had had a field day with her home—and even as a six-year-old, she had read the dailies. At the time, Andrew and Julia Cahill had outdone the Astors and the Melons. Almost the entire room she now sought to cross was marble—the black-and-white floors, the pale Corinthian columns, the carved panels on the walls.
    The mahogany dining-room doors were open. Francesca touched her hair, trying to tuck some loose blond tendrils behind her ears. By now, the bit of rouge she had started wearing on her cheeks and lips had long since vanished, the hem of her skirts was dirty and she was quite an untidy mess. She hoped no one would note her passing.
    As Francesca started past the open double doors, she stole one sidelong peek into the room, where twenty-two guests sat at the linen-clad table. The table sat ten on each long side, one at both heads, hence twenty-two guests, unless a place re mained vacant for her. Then Julia’s entourage would number twenty-one. She glimpsed a room filled with fine crystal and gilded china, the ladies in evening gowns, the men in tuxedos, and she grimaced, ducking and increasing her pace.
    But there was no escaping Julia. “Francesca!” Julia Van Wyck Cahill cried. Her tone was stern and it halted her daughter in her tracks.
    Her cheeks warmed with guilt. Francesca felt like a