by Anne Perry
She got up and washed and dressed. She did not care how she looked. Clean and tidy was all that mattered, good enough for the job. Pretty wasn’t important anymore. Only the day before it had mattered so much.
She went downstairs and passed Doll looking busy but with a faraway smile on her face, and Gracie found it in herself for a moment to be glad for her.
In the servants’ hall she met Gwen, taking a quick cup of tea before going up with hot water for Emily to wash.
“I’m sorry,” Gwen said with a little shake of her head. “He seemed like a nice fellow. But far best you’re out of it now, and not later. One day you’ll maybe find someone decent, and you’ll forget all about this. At least you’ve still got your character, and no one thinks the worse of you.”
Gracie knew she meant well by it, but it was no comfort. The broken ache of loneliness inside her was just as deep—in fact, in ways deeper, because other people knew about it. Better they were sympathetic than not, probably. But it was surprising how kindness could hurt, make you want to sit down and cry.
“Yeah, I s’pose,” she said, not because she agreed, but she did not want to prolong the conversation. She poured herself a cup of tea. The hot liquid might warm her up inside, and it would give her something to do other than stand and talk. Maybe Gwen would go and carry the water up soon. Then she could draw her own and take it up to Charlotte.
“You’ll be all right,” Gwen went on. “You’re a sensible girl and you’ve got a good place.”
Sensible girls could hurt just as much as silly ones, Gracie thought, but she did not say so.
“Yeah,” she agreed absently, sipping at the tea. It was too hot. “Thank you,” she added, in case Gwen thought she was sulking.
Gwen put down her cup and went out, patting Gracie quickly on the arm as she passed.
Gracie sipped her tea again, without really tasting it. It was time she ran the water for Charlotte. She would probably have to take up enough for Pitt too. Don’t suppose Tellman would think of that.
Her tea was too hot to hurry. She was still only halfway through when the door opened and Tellman came in. He looked terrible, as if he had been up half the night, and had nightmares the little he had been in his bed. At another time she might have been sorry for him, now she was too consumed with her own hurt.
“D’yer want some tea?” she offered, indicating the pot. “It’s fresh. And yer look like summink the cat brought in.”
“I feel like it,” Tellman replied, going to the teapot. “I was up until heaven knows when.” He looked as if he had been about to add something more, than changed his mind abruptly.
“Wot for?” she asked, passing him the milk. “Yer ill?”
“No,” he replied, looking away from her.
In spite of her own absorption in misery, she was aware that something must have happened. Perhaps it was to do with Finn. She had to ask.
“Why were yer up, then? Did summink ’appen?”
He looked at her closely, searching her face, then made his decision. “Mr. Pitt was up too. We were just trying to solve the case, that’s all.”
“And did yer?”
“No, not yet.”
“Oh.” She did not want to know any more about Finn. She was afraid of what it would be, so afraid her stomach knotted up in misery, but she also desperately wanted Pitt to win, he must! That was her first loyalty. That was the deciding thing which had driven her to tell him about the dynamite. She would rather not talk about it at all. She would rather not even have been there. But she had no choice; really, no one ever did have, unless they were going to run away altogether.
“I gotter get the water,” she said, finishing the last of her tea. It was cool enough now. “Mrs. Pitt’ll be gettin’ up.”
“I doubt it,” he replied. “She was probably woken when Mr. Pitt went to bed. I expect she’ll want to sleep in.”
“P’r’aps, but I’d better see.” She did not want to stay there with Tellman, of all people. She started towards the door.
“Gracie …”
She could not just ignore him. “Yeah?” she said without turning.
“Whoever killed Mr. Greville was the kind of person who’s used to killing people. It wasn’t done out of passion, or self-defense, or revenge or anything like that. I mean … I mean, if it had been Doll Evans, or Mrs. Greville, or someone like that, you could understand it. It’d still be wrong, of course, but you could understand it.”
She turned around slowly. “It weren’t Doll, I know that, ’cos I saw ’oo done it. She weren’t as tall as Doll. It were Mrs. Greville or Mrs. McGinley, I reckon.”
“No, it wasn’t,” he said, his face tight with emotion, his eyes steady on her. “The woman you saw tried to kill him, but he was already dead. She didn’t know that, but his neck was broken. That’s what we found out last night.”
“Broken? How d’yer know that?”
“You don’t want to hear that And don’t you go saying anything to anyone, do you understand? That’s confidential police business. It’s a secret. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.”
“Why did yer?”
“I …” he hesitated, looking unhappy. “Gracie … I … I hate to see you hurt like this.” He was acutely uncomfortable, there was a flush on his hollow cheeks, but he would not stop now he had begun. “But I thought it might help to know that whoever killed Mr. Greville was professional at it. You don’t just kill someone that easily, with one blow, if you’ve had no practice.” He was more wretched by the moment. “I daresay they think what they’re doing is right, but it isn’t right by any of the sort of things we believe in. You can’t get freedom for people by murdering other people just because you think they stand in your way. What kind of a person does that make you?”
What he said was true. In her heart she already knew it. It had been a glimmer, like a door opening, the minute she saw the dynamite. It had been growing wider, more certain since then. She had not lost something real, she had only lost a dream. But dreams can matter very much, and it was too soon to feel anything but pain.
“Yeah, I know,” she conceded, not looking at him. “I gotter take the water up all the same.”
“Gracie!”
“What?”
“I wish … I wish I could make you feel better ….”
She looked at him standing by the table, awkward, so tired he looked hollow-eyed. He was lantern-jawed. No one could have called him handsome, or even charming, but there weis a tenderness in him which startled her. Had it not been so obvious, she would not have believed it, but he cared for her, it was there, naked in his face.
“Yeah,” she said quietly. “Yeah, I reckon you would. It’s nice of you. I … I gotter take the water. She might be awake any’ow.”
“I’ll carry it,” he offered. “It’s heavy.”
“Thank you.” It was his job anyway, at least to carry the water for Pitt, but she did not feel like saying so, not this time.
He walked to the door and held it open for her while she went through, then filled the jugs and carried them upstairs for her, not speaking again. He did not know what else to say, and she knew that. It did not matter.
When she got upstairs, far from waiting for her, Charlotte was still sound asleep, as Tellman had said she might be, and looked so tired Gracie did not have the heart even to make a noise, let alone draw the curtains. She left the water and crept away again. If Pitt had to be up, that was another thing. Tellman put his water in the dressing room, and he could do everything he needed without disturbing Charlotte. She could always ring when she woke.
Gracie was downstairs again, passing the conservatory door, when she glanced sideways and saw Mr. Moynihan and Mrs. McGinley standing very close together, talking earnestly. She had no business to, but she stopped and listened.
“… but, Iona, we can’t just walk away from each other like this!” Fergal said wretchedly.
“Then how?” she asked, her face calm and sad, a stark contra
st to his, which Gracie could see if she moved forward six inches. He was miserable and confused. There was almost a sulkiness about him, as though he felt not only profoundly unhappy but also aggrieved.
“Don’t you care?” he demanded, the anger coming through in a sharp note. “Is this all it means to you? You can just say good-bye without fighting for what you want or weeping when you lose it? Perhaps I want it far more than you do?” That was said with challenge. He did not want her to agree, but if she did, then he was branding her cold, without fire or dreams, without the reality of love.
“What do you want, Fergal?” she asked. “Do you really know? Is it me you want, or is it a great romance, some desperate cause to suffer for, and perhaps to excuse you from having to fight for a Protestant Ireland you no longer totally believe in?”
“Oh, don’t make that mistake,” he said, shaking his head, his eyes dark and narrow. “Don’t ever deceive yourself I don’t know what I fight for in Ireland. I’ll never change in that cause. I’ll not bend the knee to Rome, whoever I love, or lose. I’ll not sell my soul for a superstition, a set of beads and incantations, instead of the disciplines and virtues of God.”
“That’s what I thought,” she answered wearily. “And I imagine you would know I would never give up the laughter and the love, the heart’s faith of my people, in trade for the dark miseries of the north with all its anger and blame, its hellfire punishments and its vinegar-faced ministers. It is because I love you that I know it’s best we part now, while we can still keep good memories and be sorry we hurt each other, not glad. I want to remember you with a smile.”
He stood there motionless, still confounded. She had made the decision and taken it out of his hands, and that too annoyed him.
Iona looked at him for a moment longer, then turned and walked back towards the doorway to the hall.
Gracie was obliged to scuttle backwards in order to walk away with any kind of dignity, as if she had not seen them, and she heard no more. But she thought of it for the rest of the morning as she went about her duties. It was so easy to fall in love, sometimes, and so hard to give up the magic, the excitement, the color it lent to everything. But that kind of feeling did not always stand the test of honesty, of any kind of affliction except the momentary. Sometimes you stayed loyal for loyalty’s sake, not because it was what you believed. Love of love was so easy to understand. It was what Mr. Moynihan had felt, and now he was angry and hurt because it had not transformed itself into something which would last.
Mrs. McGinley could see that. She was wise enough to leave it before it was broken too far even to remember.
Maybe it was best for Gracie herself to leave Finn Hennessey when she could still think of the cold glasshouse with its chrysanthemums and the smell of his skin and the touch of his lips. Better not to know too much about the rest, and the gulf between them. Some things could not be explained. The more you know, the worse it becomes. Their imaginations had met, and perhaps that was all.
Charlotte woke up with a start. The curtains were still drawn closed, but it was obviously mid-morning. Pitt was gone, and she could hear no servants on the landing. She sat up quickly. Her head was throbbing, her mouth dry. She had slept too heavily and too long. Where on earth was Gracie, and why had nobody called her?
Then she remembered the night, Pitt coming to tell her what they had discussed, and then Justine, and Piers, her own involvement, Pitt’s anger and worry, and then his touch afterwards, the warmth of it.
But it was not only Piers’s world which had crumbled around him; in a smaller way, Gracie’s had also. Charlotte wished there was something she could do to help, but she knew there wasn’t. There was no help for that kind of pain, except not to keep referring to it, or talking around it, trying to convince the person that it did not really hurt and was all for the best. Above all, never tell people you know how they feel. Even if you have had the same experience, you are not the same. Each person’s pain is unique.
She climbed out of bed slowly, feeling as if her head would drop off if she were not careful. She must get dressed. They still did not know who had murdered Ainsley Greville or Lorcan McGinley, at least not officially. She had a sickening feeling there was little doubt left that it was Padraig Doyle, with all the grief that that would bring.
She would have to summon all the strength she had to deal with that. Eudora would be shattered. Pitt would be torn with compassion for her, aching to be able to help, and guilty because he was the one who would have to uncover the truth and prove it.
Charlotte would dearly like to tell Eudora it was her own distress and she would have to live with it. It was not Pitt’s fault she had failed to grow close to her son, or that her husband was a callous user of people, or that her brother was an assassin.
But if she were honest, what she really meant was that Eudora had a grace about the way she suffered, and her need was consuming a part of Pitt that Charlotte thought should be hers. Not a very becoming sentiment.
The water in the jugs had gone almost cold. She could ring for more or use what was there. Cold water might wake her up anyway.
The door opened and Pitt came in. He stopped in surprise.
“You’re awake.” He frowned. “Are you all right?” He closed the door and came over towards her. “You look dreadful.”
“Thank you,” she replied waspishly, pushing her hair out of her eyes and reaching blindly for a towel.
He passed it to her. “Don’t be sarcastic,” he criticized. “You really do look poorly. I suppose I haven’t realized how hard you’ve had to work to stop this from being a disaster, especially for Emily.”
“She’s terrified for Jack …” she responded.
“I know.” He brushed her hair back off her face. “She has every cause to be.”
There was a knock at the door, and reluctantly Pitt went to answer it, expecting Gracie, but it was Jack.
“Cornwallis is on the telephone to speak to you,” he said.
Pitt let out his breath in a sigh.
“In the library,” Jack added. He looked concerned. He glanced at Charlotte, smiled bleakly, then followed Pitt out.
Pitt went down the stairs feeling weary and apprehensive. He had nothing to tell Cornwallis that he would want to hear. And yet there was also something even more important, deeper into the core of himself, which had eased out. A knot which had been hurting him was unraveled and smooth. He would not ever completely understand Charlotte. He did not want to. In time that would become boring. There would always be occasions when he wished she were more obviously vulnerable, more dependent upon his strength or his judgment, or more predictable. But then she would also be less generous, less brave, and less honest to him, and that was too high a price to pay for a little emotional comfort. She could not give him every answer he wanted, any more than he could for her. But what they could give was far, far more than enough; it was full, heaped, and running over. The few other things did not matter; they could be forgotten or done without.
He went into the library and picked up the telephone receiver.
“Good morning, sir.”
He heard Cornwallis’s distinctive voice on the other end. “Good morning, Pitt. How are you? What is happening there?”
Pitt made his decision about Justine without even being aware of it.
“We had a closer look at Greville’s body, sir. He didn’t drown. He was killed by a very skilled blow to the side of the neck. A professional assassin, or at the very least someone who knew precisely what to do and how.”
“Hardly a surprise,” Cornwallis replied with disappointment. “That only really tells us what we had already assumed. We can’t keep those people there much longer—in fact, not more than tomorrow, or the next day at the very latest, and that may be more than I can manage. We can’t keep this secret, Pitt. The conference report is due tomorrow. I can’t delay beyond another twenty-four hours at the outside.”
“Yes, I know,” Pitt said slowly. “I do know
more of what happened, but it doesn’t yet prove who was responsible.” He told Cornwallis about Finn Hennessey and the dynamite.
“Can’t you get anything from him?” Cornwallis said, but with a downward inflection in his voice as though he took for granted a negative answer.
“Not yet,” Pitt replied, but there was the faintest glimmer of hope in the back of his mind, too small to grasp.
“What are you going to do now?” Cornwallis pressed. “Surely from what you’ve told me it has to be Doyle or Moynihan. And Hennessey would hardly collaborate with Moynihan. Their views and aims are directly opposing! If they weren’t, we wouldn’t have an Irish Problem to begin with.”
“I know all that,” Pitt conceded. “But I can’t prove it, even to myself, let alone to a court. But we’ll go back to the bomb in Jack’s study and see if we can’t trace McGinley’s movements better and see how he knew it was there. We may be able to deduce what he learned, and it might be enough.”
“Please let me know this evening,” Cornwallis instructed. “Even if you have nothing.”
“Anything more on poor Denbigh?” Pitt asked him. He had not forgotten about the beginning of the case, or the anger and disgust he had felt then.
“A little, although I don’t think it will help much.” Cornwallis sounded very far away on the other end of the line, even as if his thoughts were distant. “We’ve been working on it with every man we could spare. We know a great deal more about the Fenians here in London than we did even a couple of weeks ago. But this man seen following Denbigh, and who we are sure is responsible for his death, is not among them.”
“You mean he went back to Ireland?”
“No … that’s the point. He infiltrated the Fenians as well. But he isn’t one of them. He learned a few bits of information about their plans, membership and so on, and then went. I think they’d like to get him almost as much as we would.”
