Belgrave Square

by Anne Perry

  Still Pitt found him less of an offense against his code than the rich men who stole indirectly from strangers in order to become richer still, and who corrupted others to escape the consequences.

  He returned to Scotland Yard and his poky little room with the pile of papers, and resumed his study, concentrating on the crimes that involved men he thought likely to be members of the Inner Circle, or to be of interest to its members.

  Here at last he found what he had dreaded: lines of inquiry dropped for no accountable reason, prosecutions not proceeded with even though they might well have succeeded, curious omissions of diligence for a man otherwise exacting in his standards. Any individual one might have been explained easily enough as simple misjudgment. Latimer was no more infallible than any other man and it would be unreasonable to expect him to be right every time. He, like anyone else, could guess wrongly, be overtired, miss a connection, a link in the chain of evidence, leap to a wrong conclusion, have his prejudices and his blind sides. But taken all together they formed a very faint pattern, and the more he looked at them the more definite the pattern became. There was no way he could find out; the society was secret and the punishment for betraying a brother was severe. So Urban had said, and if he was right, Weems’s list proved it. But Pitt believed all the unaccountable omissions and strange misjudgments were with cases where the interests of the Inner Circle were concerned, and Latimer had been an instrument to their ends.

  Had there been one he had refused to hide, one crime that had offended him more than he could bear, and he had at last refused? And the brotherhood had punished him by putting his name on Weems’s list, so he would eventually be discovered, and ruined? It was a heavy price to pay, and he would then be of no further use to them. Pitt shivered, cold in the stuffy room. But the other brothers would know, the waverers would be brought up sharply against the reality of what it meant to betray the Inner Circle, and every other brother would be strengthened in his loyalty.

  What about Micah Drummond? His name had not appeared on the list. Did that mean he had never defied them, never refused their orders? Certainly he had responded quickly enough to help Sholto Byam, and the case was murder.

  The thought was so intensely ugly Pitt found himself feeling sick. He liked Drummond as much as any man he knew, and a week ago he would have staked his own career that Drummond was utterly honest.

  Perhaps Latimer’s juniors felt like that about him too.

  He tidied up the piles of papers and left the office, locking the door behind him and returning the key to the sergeant who had given it to him.

  “You all right, sir?” the man asked tentatively, his face screwed up in concern. “Yer don’t look all that sharp, if yer don’t mind me sayin’ so, sir.”

  “Probably need a little air,” Pitt lied automatically. He needed to protect his information; he could trust no one. “Hate all that reading.”

  “Find what you wanted, sir?”

  “No—no, I didn’t. It seems it was a wrong trail. Have to try somewhere else.”

  “S’ppose there’s no shortcut to bein’ a detective, sir,” the sergeant said philosophically. “Used ter think it was what I wanted, now I’m not so sure. Mebbe find out a lot o’ things I’d a bin ’appier not knowin’.”

  “Yes,” Pitt agreed, then changed his mind. “Or find out nothing at all.”

  “Bad day, sir? Mebbe termorrer’ll be better.”

  “Maybe.” Pitt forced a smile at the man, and thanked him again before leaving and going out into the rapidly cooling evening air. It smelled like rain. The faint wind was easterly, off the Channel, and it carried the sounds of the river up from the Pool of London and the docks. It would still be light for several hours yet, and on the Embankment there were carriages clipping along as people took the air. A pleasure boat with bright little flags fluttering made its way upstream, towards Windsor or Richmond. He could hear the laughter drifting across the water. Somewhere out of sight, also towards Westminster Bridge, a hurdy-gurdy played a popular tune and a cart was propped up on the opposite side of the Embankment, selling winkles and eel pies.

  It was six o’clock, and he was ready to go home and forget Weems and his list, and all the misery and corruption it had shown him. He would have supper in his own kitchen, with Charlotte, then go outside and do a little work in the garden, perhaps cut the grass and tidy up some of the bigger weeds which Charlotte did not get to.

  He would make a decision what to tell Drummond tomorrow. Perhaps in the morning it would seem clearer.

  It did not really rain, just a light drizzle, so fine it lay on top of the grass, barely bending the petals of the flowers or the long light stems of leaves. Pitt stayed outside in it because he wanted the cool feel of it on his face and the sight of the slowly dimming light across the sky. He had been inside all day, and hated it. And it was a satisfaction to work manually and see the garden begin to look cared for, manicured and husbanded. Charlotte did the small chores like taking the dead heads off the roses and pansies, lifting the tiny weeds, and Gracie swept the path, but they had too many other chores to attend to it every day, and the grass cutter was too heavy for them anyway.

  He came in at last a little after nine o’clock when the overcast was bringing the dusk early. He took off his wet jacket and boots and sat down in his chair in the parlor, ignoring the fact that his trouser legs were damp also.

  Charlotte was mending a dress of Jemima’s. She put it down, poking the needle in carefully where she could find it again.

  “What is it?” she asked, her face grave, her eyes on his.

  He thought for a moment of evading the question and giving some trivial answer, but he wanted to share it. He did not want to make the decision alone, and she at least he could trust absolutely. With brief, painful words he told her.

  She sat listening without moving her eyes from his face and her hands in her lap for once were completely motionless. She did not reach again for the needle or to wind wool or skein silks.

  “What are you going to tell Mr. Drummond?” she said at last when he was finished.

  “I don’t know.” He looked at her, trying to see any certainty in her face, if she had a vision of judgment he had not. “I don’t know how deep he is in this brotherhood himself.”

  She thought for only an instant.

  “If you don’t tell him, you are making the judgment that you do not trust him.”

  “No,” he said, denying it immediately. “No,” he said again. “I am simply not placing him in a position where he has to defy the Inner Circle if he is to continue with the Weems case as it is at the moment. Latimer may not be guilty of killing Weems.”

  “Only of corruption,” she said bluntly, still sitting without moving.

  “I don’t even know that,” he argued. “I only believe it from the case notes. They could all be misjudgments, or simply errors. If anyone went through all my cases they would find a lot that is open to criticism, and perhaps worse, if they wished to see it that way.”

  Charlotte seldom thought of things like means and opportunity, weapons, forensic evidence, but she understood motive, emotions, lies, all that was concerned purely with people.

  “Rubbish,” she said with a smile full of gentleness, her eyes so soft he could not take hurt. “Superintendent Latimer is corrupt, and you are afraid that Micah Drummond is too, or may become so. But you cannot make the choice for him, Thomas, you must give him the chance to do the right thing, whatever the consequences.”

  “The consequences may be very ugly.” He shifted a little, sitting lower in his chair. “The Inner Circle is secret, powerful and ruthless. They have no forgiveness.”

  “Do you admire them?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I despise them more than almost anything else. They are worse than a simple garroter who kills people in the street; they seduce and corrupt minds and turn ambitious and foolish men into liars and corrupters of others.” He stopped; his voice had become harsh and his hands wer
e clenched on his knees with the violence of his feelings. He stared at Charlotte and saw her face intensely clearly in the lamplight, its high cheekbones and soft mouth, her eyes steady on his.

  “Do you not think that Micah Drummond might hate them too, if he understood what they are?” she asked him. “Perhaps even more strongly than you do, since they have tried to soil him too.”

  “Perhaps,” he agreed slowly.

  “Then you must give him the opportunity to fight them.” She leaned forward a little. “You cannot protect him from it, and I don’t believe you should try. I should not thank you if you removed from me the chance to redeem myself from a terrible mistake of judgment.”

  He took her hand in his and held it gently.

  “All right. You don’t need to argue any further. I understand. I shall tell him tomorrow.”

  She lifted her other hand and touched his face very softly, smiling, her eyes bright. It was not necessary that she should speak.

  However the following morning Pitt’s intention was balked by a furore of excitement when he reached Bow Street. There were newspapers being passed from one person to another and cries of indignation and anger all around the entrance and the desk and the corridors.

  “It’s downright dishonest!” the desk sergeant said, his face bright pink.

  “It’s monstrous, that’s what it is!” a constable said heatedly, holding the offending newspaper out in front of him. “It’s lies! How do they get away with printing such things?”

  “It’s a conspiracy!” another constable agreed with outrage in his voice. “Ever since the Whitechapel murders they’ve been out to get us!”

  “I wouldn’t wonder if there’s anarchists behind it,” the desk sergeant added.

  “What is it?” Pitt demanded, snatching one of the newspapers from a constable.

  “There.” The constable pointed with a rigid forefinger. “Look at that.”

  Pitt looked.

  “ ‘Police brutality’!” he read. “ ‘Miss Beulah Giles, a victim of police harassment and brutal interrogation, was yesterday taken forcibly from her home to Scotland Yard where she was secretly interrogated by Superintendent Latimer in police attempts to defend themselves against charges of perjury on the park bench case.’ ” And it went on in the same vein about the shock and dismay to an innocent girl’s feelings as she was removed from her home and family and subjected to insult and degradation in a desperate effort to force her to change her testimony and incriminate her friend.

  Pitt pushed the paper back at the constable and reached for one of the others. The words were a trifle different, but the meaning was essentially the same. Beulah Giles had been the victim of police insult and intimidation. Everywhere people would rise to avenge the outrage. What was this new police force coming to when an English maiden was not safe from their assaults and abuse? Their entire existence must be questioned forthwith. Pitt swore, quietly and bitterly—an extraordinary circumstance for him; he very seldom lost his temper, and even more rarely did he use unseemly language.

  8

  WHEN PITT HAD LEFT the next morning, Charlotte went straight to her escritoire in the parlor and took out her pen, ink and paper. She wrote:

  Dear Emily,

  I hope you are feeling thoroughly well, and have no need of me at your forthcoming dinner party for that reason, nevertheless it is most important that I come. Thomas told me some extraordinarily serious things about his current case last evening, and I am determined to do all I can to help. I cannot remember having seen him so upset before in quite this way. He has nowhere else to turn, for the most wretched of reasons.

  And I know you will already have arranged how your table is to be, but I would like you to change it so as to place me next to both Lord Byam and Mr. Addison Carswell. Believe me I have excellent reasons for asking this, and I do know how inconvenient it will be—but both are being blackmailed and are suspects for murder. You know I do not exaggerate in such matters nor say it lightly.

  Naturally I shall tell you all you wish when I see you, however I think perhaps you had better burn this letter when you have read it. In the meantime I remain your loving sister,

  Charlotte

  She folded it, put it in an envelope, wrote Emily’s address on it, then she found a postage stamp which she licked and stuck on.

  “Gracie,” she called out.

  She heard Gracie’s feet scuttling down the passage and her head appeared around the door.

  “Yes ma’am?”

  “Will you take this letter and put it in the box for me, please? It is extremely urgent. I must go to Mrs. Radley’s dinner party tomorrow evening, and it is terribly important that if possible I sit next to particular people, because they may have committed murder—one of them, I mean, not both.”

  Any other housemaid might have shrieked and fainted at this point, but Gracie was well used to such ideas and fully intended to help where she could. Her eyes widened in her thin little face and she stood more smartly to attention.

  “Oh ma’am.”

  Charlotte knew she was longing to help as well, but she could think of nothing for her to do, beyond posting the letter. Judges and politicians were completely outside Gracie’s knowledge, in fact she had probably never even seen such a person, let alone spoken to one.

  “It was a moneylender who was killed,” she added, just so her instructions were not so bare.

  “Good,” Gracie said instantly, then blushed. “Beggin’ yer pardon, ma’am. But they in’t nice people. Once they gets their ’ands on yer they don’t never let go. Don’t matter ’ow much as yer borrers, or ’ow little, yer never gets done payin’ ’em back.” She frowned, screwing up her face. “But ma’am, people what goes ter Mrs. Radley’s dinner parties don’t borrer from the likes o’ moneylenders, do they?”

  “One would not think so,” Charlotte agreed. “But he was also a blackmailer, so one never knows. But you must keep all this to yourself, Gracie. It would be most dangerous to allow anyone else to think you know something. No careless words to the butcher’s boy, or the fishmonger.”

  Gracie’s chin came up and her eyes blazed.

  “I don’t speak to the errand boys or their likes, ’ceptin’ to tell ’em their business,” she said with heat. “I listens, ’cos that’s me job, I might learn summink, but I don’t never tell ’em nuffin’.”

  Charlotte smiled in spite of herself. “I apologize,” she said humbly. “I really didn’t imagine you did, I was simply warning from habit.”

  Gracie forgave her instantly, but with a little sniff as she took the letter, and a moment later Charlotte heard the front door open and close.

  She also told Pitt that evening when he came home tired and hot and hungry. She made very light of it, simply saying that she would attend the dinner because both Byam and Carswell would be there, and she had received Emily’s reply, delivered by hand, to say that arrangements had been remade and she would indeed sit at the table between the two people she had requested. She did not tell Pitt the dire threats that were also made, should Charlotte fail to tell Emily every single thing she knew about the case, proved or suspected. That really went without saying anyway.

  “Be careful,” Pitt said quickly, his eyes sharpening and his attention reawakened in spite of the oppressive heat and his real tiredness. “You are dealing with very powerful people. Don’t imagine because they are unfailingly polite that they are as gentle in deed as they are in word.”

  “Of course not,” she said quickly. “I shall merely listen and watch.”

  “Rubbish! You never kept silent in your life when your interest was engaged,” he said with a twisted smile. “And neither will Emily.”

  “I—” she began, then caught his eye and her denial withered away. He knew perfectly well Emily would demand and Charlotte would relate everything she knew, in between the hairpins and the petticoats and the instructions to footmen, parlormaids and anyone else who was involved. “I shall not forget how serious i
t is,” was the very best she could do and retain a shred of honesty. She passed him a glass of lemonade from the pantry (which was still cool, even in this weather) and a small piece of cake, small so as not to spoil his appetite for dinner. “Did you speak to Mr. Drummond?”

  “Yes.” He took the lemonade and the cake.

  She looked at his face and saw the lines of weariness in it, the shadows under his eyes and the tightness around his mouth.

  She slid her hand over his shoulder and touched his hair. It was thick and too long, and badly needed cutting. She kissed him very gently, and did not ask what Drummond had said.

  He set the cake down, put both his arms around her and pulled her closer to him. They were still standing together, her head on his shoulder, when Jemima came in and put her arms around him too, not knowing why, simply wanting to be included.

  The following evening was utterly different. Charlotte was collected in Emily’s carriage so that she would have plenty of time to prepare herself with the help of Emily’s maid, and immeasurably more important, to tell Emily everything there was to tell about the case.

  “So you don’t know if Lord Byam might have done it!” Emily exclaimed, putting the last touches to her hair while her maid was temporarily out of the room.

  “No,” Charlotte conceded. “We have only his word. The ridiculous thing is, why was the letter not there, and the paper incriminating him, and who has them now?”

  “Or did they ever exist?” Emily added. “And if they did not, why did he call in Mr. Drummond and draw attention to himself? Is it all actually something to do with this wretched secret society, and perhaps nothing to do with moneylending or blackmail at all?”

  “Thomas didn’t even mention that. But why?” Charlotte sat in front of the mirror, pushing Emily along a little. They both looked their loveliest. Emily was in aquamarine satin stitched with tiny pearls, extremely expensive; but it was her party, and she wished to impress. After all, that was the entire purpose of it at the moment, enjoyment of personal acquaintance was incidental. Charlotte was in borrowed plumes again, this time hot apricot, and it looked far better on her than it had on Emily two summers ago. It had been extensively remade, both to bring the style more up to date and to add an inch or two for Charlotte’s more handsome figure.