Anne Perry - [Thomas Pitt 05]

by Bluegate Fields

  “All right!” Athelstan snapped. “Then you’d better take what men you need and find out who he is! And for heaven’s sake try to be tactful! Don’t offend anyone. Take Gillivray—at least he knows how to behave himself with quality people.”

  Quality people! Yes, Gillivray would be Athelstan’s choice to be sure of soothing the outraged sensibilities of the “quality” obliged to face the distasteful necessity of receiving the police.

  To begin, there was the perfectly ordinary task of checking with every police station in the city for reports of youths missing from home or educational establishments who fitted the description of the dead boy. It was both tedious and distressing. Time after time they found frightened people, heard stories of unresolved tragedy.

  Harcourt Gillivray was not a companion Pitt would have chosen. He was young, with yellow hair and a smooth face that smiled easily—too easily. His clothes were smart; his jacket was buttoned high, the collar stiff—not comfortable and somewhat crooked, like Pitt’s. And he seemed always able to keep his feet dry, while Pitt forever found himself with his boots in a puddle.

  It was three days before they came to the gray stone Georgian home of Sir Anstey and Lady Waybourne. By now Gillivray had become used to Pitt’s refusal to use the tradesman’s entrance. It pleased his own sense of social standing, and he was quite ready to accept Pitt’s reasoning that on such a delicate mission it would be tactless to allow the entire servants’ hall to be aware of their purpose.

  The butler suffered them to come in with a look of pained resignation. Better to have the police in the morning room where they could not be seen than on the front step for the entire street to know about.

  “Sir Anstey will see you in half an hour, Mr.— er—Mr. Pitt. If you care to wait here—” He turned and opened the door to leave.

  “It is a matter of some urgency,” Pitt said with an edge to his voice. He saw Gillivray wince. Butlers should be accorded the same dignity as the masters they represented, and most were acutely aware of it. “It is not something that can wait,” Pitt continued. “The sooner and the more discreetly it can be dealt with, the less painful it will be.”

  The butler hesitated, weighing what Pitt had said. The word “discreetly” tipped the balance.

  “Yes, sir. I shall inform Sir Anstey of your presence.”

  Even so, it was a full twenty minutes before Anstey Waybourne appeared, closing the door behind him. His eyebrows were raised inquiringly, showing faint distaste. He had pale skin and full, fair side-whiskers. As soon as Pitt saw him, he knew who the dead boy had been.

  “Sir Anstey.” Pitt’s voice dropped; all his irritation at the man’s patronage vanished. “I believe you reported your son Arthur as missing from home?”

  Waybourne made a small deprecatory gesture.

  “My wife, Mr.—er.” He waved aside the necessity for recalling a name for a mere policeman. They were anonymous, like servants. “I’m sure there is no need for you to concern yourself. Arthur is sixteen. I have no doubt he is up to some prank. My wife is overprotective—women tend to be, you know. Part of their nature. Don’t know how to let a boy grow up. Want to keep him a baby forever.”

  Pitt felt a stab of pity. Assurance was so fragile. He was about to shatter this man’s security, the world in which he thought he was untouchable by the sordid realities Pitt represented.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” he said even more quietly. “But we have found a dead boy whom we believe may be your son.” There was no point in spinning it out, trying to come to it slowly. It was no kinder, just longer.

  “Dead? Whatever do you mean?” He was still trying to dismiss the idea, to repudiate it.

  “Drowned, sir,” Pitt repeated, aware of Gillivray’s disapproval. Gillivray would like to skirt around it, to come at it obliquely, which seemed to Pitt like crushing someone slowly. “He is a fair-haired boy of about sixteen years, five-feet-nine-inches tall—of good family, to judge by his appearance. Unfortunately he has no identification on him, so we do not know who he is. It is necessary for someone to come and look at the body. If you prefer not to do it yourself—if it turns out not to be your son, we could accept the word of—”

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” Waybourne said. “I’m sure it is not Arthur. But I shall come and tell you so myself. One does not send a servant on such a task. Where is it?”

  “In the morgue, sir. Bishop’s Lane, in Bluegate Fields.”

  Waybourne’s face dropped—it was inconceivable.

  “Bluegate Fields!”

  “Yes, sir. I’m afraid that is where he was found.”

  “Then it cannot possibly be my son.”

  “I hope not, sir. But whoever he is, he would appear to be a gentleman.”

  Waybourne’s eyebrows rose.

  “In Bluegate Fields?” he said sarcastically.

  Pitt did not argue anymore. “Would you prefer to come in a hansom, sir, or in your own carriage?”

  “In my own carriage, thank you. I do not care for public conveyances. I shall meet you there in thirty minutes.”

  Pitt and Gillivray excused themselves and found a hansom to take them to the morgue, since Waybourne was obviously not willing to have them accompany him.

  The drive was not long. They were quickly out of the fashionable squares and into the narrow, grimy streets of the port-side, enveloped by the smell of the river, the drift of fog in their throats. Bishop’s Lane was anonymous; gray men came and went about their business.

  The morgue was grim: less effort made to be clean than in a hospital—less reason. There was no humanity here except one brown-faced little man with faintly Eastern eyes and curiously light hair. His manner was suitably subdued.

  “Yes, sir,” he said to Gillivray, who led the way in. “I know the boy you mean. The gentleman to see it has not arrived yet.”

  There was nothing to do but wait for Waybourne. It turned out to be not thirty minutes but very nearly an hour. If Waybourne was aware of the time elapsed, he gave no sign. His face was still irritated, as though he had been called out on an unnecessary duty, required only because someone had made a foolish error.

  “Well?” He came in briskly, ignoring the morgue attendant and Gillivray. He faced Pitt with raised eyebrows, hitching the shoulders of his coat into better position. The room was cold. “What is it you want me to see?”

  Gillivray shifted his feet uncomfortably. He had not seen the corpse, nor did he know where it had been found. Oddly, he had not inquired. He regarded the whole task as something he was seconded to because of his superior manners, a task to be fulfilled and forgotten as soon as possible. He preferred the investigation of robbery, particularly robbery from the wealthy and the lesser aristocracy. The quiet, discreet association with such people when he was assisting was a rather pleasing way to advance his career.

  Pitt knew what was to come—the inescapable pain, the struggle to explain away the horror, the denial right up to the last, inevitable moment.

  “This way, sir. I warn you.” He suddenly regarded Waybourne levelly, as an equal, perhaps even condescendingly; he knew death, he had felt the grief, the anger. But at least he could control his stomach through sheer habit. “I’m afraid it is not pleasant.”

  “Get on with it, man,” Waybourne snapped. “I have not all day to spend on this. And I presume when I have satisfied you it is not my son, then you will have other people to consult?”

  Pitt led the way into the bare white room where the corpse was laid out on a table, and gently removed the covering sheet from the face. There was no point in showing the rest of the body with its great autopsy wounds.

  He knew what was coming; the features were too alike: the fair wavy hair, the long soft nose, the full lips.

  There was a faint sound from Waybourne. Every vestige of blood vanished from his face. He swayed a little, as though the room were afloat and had shifted under his feet.

  Gillivray was too startled to react for an instant, but the morgue attendant
had seen it more times than he could recall. It was the worst part of his job. He had a chair ready, and as Waybourne’s knees buckled he eased him into it as if it were all one natural movement—not a collapse but a seating.

  Pitt covered the face.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” he said quietly. “You identify this as the body of your son Arthur Waybourne?”

  Waybourne tried to speak but at first his voice would not come. The attendant gave him a glass of water and he took a sip of it.

  “Yes,” he said at last. “Yes, that is my son Arthur.” He grasped the glass and drank some more of it slowly. “Would you be so good as to tell me where he was discovered and how he died?”

  “Of course. He was drowned.”

  “Drowned?” Obviously, Waybourne was startled. Perhaps he had never seen a drowned face before and did not recognize the puffy flesh, marble white.

  “Yes. I’m sorry.”

  “Drowned? How? In the river?”

  “No, sir, in a bath.”

  “You mean he—he fell? He hit his head or something? What a ridiculous accident! That’s the sort of thing that happens to old men!” Already the denial had begun, as if its ridiculousness could somehow make it untrue.

  Pitt took a breath and let it out slowly. Evasion was not possible.

  “No, sir. It seems he was murdered. His body was not found in a bath—not even in a house. I’m sorry—it was found in the sewers below Bluegate Fields, up against the sluice gates to the Thames. But for a particularly diligent sewer cleaner, we might not have found him at all.”

  “Oh, hardly!” Gillivray protested. “Of course he would have been found!” He wanted to contradict Pitt, prove him wrong in something, as if it could even now in some way disprove everything. “He could not have disappeared. That’s nonsense. Even in the river—” He hesitated, then decided the subject was too unpleasant and abandoned it.

  “Rats,” Pitt said simply. “Twenty-four hours more in the sewer and he would not have been recognizable. A week, and there would have been nothing but bones. I’m sorry, Sir Anstey, but your son was murdered.”

  Waybourne bridled visibly, his eyes glittering in the white face.

  “That’s preposterous!” His voice was high now, even shrill. “Who on earth would have any reason to murder my son? He was sixteen! Quite innocent of anything at all. We lead a perfectly proper and orderly life.” He swallowed convulsively and regained a fraction of his control. “You have mixed too much among the criminal element and the lower classes, Inspector,” he said. “There is no one whatsoever who would wish Arthur any harm. There was no reason.”

  Pitt felt his stomach tighten. This was going to be the most painful of all: the facts Waybourne would find intolerable, beyond acceptance.

  “I’m sorry.” He seemed to be beginning every sentence with an apology. “I’m sorry, sir, but your son was suffering from the early stages of venereal disease—and he had been homosexually used.”

  Waybourne stared at him, scarlet blood suffusing his skin.

  “That’s obscene!” he shouted, starting from the chair as if to stand up, but his legs buckled. “How dare you say such a thing! I’ll have you dismissed! Who is your superior?”

  “It’s not my diagnosis, sir. It is what the police surgeon says.”

  “Then he is a mischievous incompetent! I’ll see he never practices again! It’s monstrous! Obviously, Arthur was kidnapped, poor boy, and murdered by his captors. If—” He swallowed. “If he was abused before he was killed, then you must charge his murderers with that also. And see to it that they are hanged! But as for the other”—he made a sharp slicing motion with his hand in the air—“that is—that is quite impossible. I demand that our own family physician examine the—the body and refute this slander!”

  “By all means,” Pitt agreed. “But he will find the same facts, and they are capable of only one diagnosis—the same as the police pathologist.”

  Waybourne gulped and caught his breath awkwardly. His voice, when it came, was tight, scraping.

  “He will not! I am not without influence, Mr. Pitt. I shall see that this monstrous wrong is not done to my poor son or to the rest of his family. Good day to you.” He stood a little unsteadily, then turned and walked out of the room, up the steps, and into the daylight.

  Pitt ran his hand through his hair, leaving it on end.

  “Poor man,” he said softly, to himself rather than to Gillivray. “He’s going to make it so much harder for himself.”

  “Are you sure it really is—?” Gillivray said anxiously.

  “Don’t be so stupid!” Pitt sank down with his head in his hands. “Of course I’m damned well sure!”

  2

  THERE WAS NOT time for the decencies of mourning to be observed. People’s memories were short; details passed from mind. Pitt was obliged to return to the Waybourne family the next morning and begin the inquiries that could not wait upon grief or the recapturing of composure.

  The house was silent. All the blinds were partway down, and there was black crepe on the front door. Straw was spread on the road outside to reduce the sound of carriage wheels passing. Gillivray had come in the soberest of garb, and stayed, grim-faced, two steps behind Pitt. He reminded Pitt irritatingly of an undertaker’s assistant, full of professional sorrow.

  The butler opened the door and ushered them in immediately, not allowing them time to stand on the doorstep. The hall was somber in the half-light of the drawn blinds. In the morning room, the gas lamps were lit and a small fire burned in the grate. On the low, round table in the center of the room were white flowers in a formal arrangement: chrysanthemums and thick, soft-fleshed lilies. It all smelled faintly of wax and polish and old sweet flowers, just a little stale.

  Anstey Waybourne came in almost immediately. He looked pale and tired, his face set. He had already prepared what he intended to say and did not bother with courtesies.

  “Good morning,” he began stiffly. Then, without waiting for a response, he continued: “I assume you have certain questions it is necessary for you to ask. I shall do my best, of course, to give you the small amount of information I possess. I have given the matter some considerable thought, naturally.” He clasped his hands together and looked at the lilies on the table. “I have come to the conclusion that my son was quite certainly attacked by strangers, perhaps purely from the base motives of robbery. Or I admit it is marginally possible that abduction was intended, although we have received no indication that it was so—no demand for any kind of ransom.” He glanced at Pitt, and then away again. “Of course it may be that there was not time—some preposterous accident occurred, and Arthur died. Obviously, they then panicked.” He took a deep breath. “And the results we are all painfully aware of.”

  Pitt opened his mouth, but Waybourne waved his hand to silence him.

  “No, please! Allow me to continue. There is very little we can tell you, but no doubt you wish to know about my son’s last day alive, although I cannot see of what use it will be to you.

  “Breakfast was perfectly normal. We were all present. Arthur spent the morning, as is customary, with his younger brother Godfrey, studying under the tutelage of Mr. Jerome, whom I employ for that purpose. Luncheon was quite unremarkable. Arthur was his usual self. Neither his manner nor his conversation was in any way out of the ordinary, and he made no mention of any persons unknown to us, or any plans for unusual activity.” Waybourne did not move in all the time he spoke, but stood in exactly the same spot on the rich Aubusson carpet.

  “In the afternoon, Godfrey resumed his studies with Mr. Jerome. Arthur read for an hour or two—his classics, I believe—a little Latin. Then he went out with the son of a family friend, a boy of excellent background and well known to us. I have spoken to him myself, and he is also unaware of anything unusual in Arthur’s behavior. They parted at approximately five in the afternoon, as near as Titus can remember, but Arthur did not say where he was going, except that it was to dine with a friend.
” Waybourne looked up at last and met Pitt’s eyes. “I’m afraid that is all we can tell you.”

  Pitt realized that there was already a wall raised against investigation. Anstey Waybourne had decided what had occurred: a chance attack that might have happened to anyone, a tragic but insoluble mystery. To pursue a resolution would not bring back the dead, and would only cause additional and unnecessary distress to those already bereaved.

  Pitt could sympathize with him. He had lost a son, and in extraordinarily painful circumstances. But murder could not be concealed, for all its anguish.

  “Yes, sir,” he said quietly. “I would like to see the tutor, Mr. Jerome, if I may, and your son Godfrey.”

  Waybourne’s eyebrows rose. “Indeed? You may see Jerome, of course, if you wish. Although I cannot see what purpose it will serve. I have told you all that he knows. But I’m afraid it is quite out of the question that you should speak with Godfrey. He has already lost his brother. I will not have him subjected to questioning—especially as it is completely unnecessary.”

  It was not the time to argue. At the moment, they were all just names to Pitt, people without faces or characters, without connections except the obvious ones of blood; all the emotions involved were not yet even guessed.

  “I would still like to speak to Mr. Jerome,” Pitt repeated. “He may recall something that would be of use. We must explore every possibility.”

  “I cannot see the purpose of it.” Waybourne’s nose flared a little, perhaps with irritation, perhaps from the deadening smell of lilies. “If Arthur was set upon by thieves, Jerome is hardly likely to know anything that might help.”

  “Probably not, sir.” Pitt hesitated, then said what he had to. “But there is always the possibility that his death had something to do with his—medical condition.” What an obscene euphemism. Yet he found himself using it, painfully aware of Waybourne, the shock saturating the house, generations of rigid self-discipline, imprisoned feelings.