Paragon Walk

by Anne Perry

  Vespasia extended her hand, and her eyes regarded Charlotte frankly from toe to top, ending with a direct stare from her flittering old eyes.

  “How do you do, Mrs. Pitt,” she answered levelly. “Emily has often spoken of you. I am pleased that you have been able to call.” She did not add “at last,” but it was in her voice.

  Charlotte doubted that Emily had spoken of her at all, still less that it had been often. It would have been most injudicious—and Emily had never been injudicious in her life—but she could hardly argue. Neither could she think of a suitable answer. “Thank you” seemed so foolish.

  “It is kind of you to make me welcome,” she heard herself saying.

  “I hope you are staying to luncheon?” It was a question.

  “Oh yes,” Emily rushed in quickly before Charlotte had time to flounder. “Of course, she will stay. And this afternoon we shall go calling.”

  Charlotte drew breath to make some excuse. She could not possibly go around Paragon Walk with Emily, dressed in gray muslin. Momentarily she was angry with Emily for putting her in such a position. She turned to glare at her.

  Aunt Vespasia cleared her throat sharply.

  “And who, precisely, did you have it in mind to call upon?”

  Emily looked at Charlotte, realized her mistake, and fished herself out of it with aplomb.

  “I thought Selena Montague. She admires herself in plum pink, and Charlotte will look so much better in it I should enjoy putting her in my new silk, and obliging Selena to look at her. I do not care for Selena,” she added as an aside to Charlotte, quite unnecessarily. “And the dress will fit you excellently. The foolish dressmaker got her fingers muddled and made it much too long for me.”

  Aunt Vespasia allowed her a small smile of admiration.

  “I thought it was Jessamyn Nash you disliked,” she remarked casually.

  “I like irritating Jessamyn,” Emily waved a hand. “That is not really the same thing. I have never thought whether I like her or not.”

  “Whom do you like?” Charlotte inquired, wanting to know more about the Walk. Now that she was freed from the immediate problem of dress, her mind went back to Fanny Nash and the fear that the others seemed to have forgotten.

  “Oh,” Emily considered for a moment. “I quite like Phoebe Nash, Jessamyn’s sister-in-law, if she would be a little more definite. And I like Albertine Dilbridge, although I have no patience with her mother. And I like Diggory Nash, but I do not know why. I can think of nothing in particular to say about him that is good.”

  Luncheon was announced, and the three of them departed for the dining room. Charlotte had not seen a meal of such simple grace for a long time, perhaps not ever. It was all cold, and yet of such delicacy that it must have taken hours to prepare. In the still heat it was delicious just to contemplate the cold soups, fresh salmon with minute cold vegetables, ices, sherbets and fruit. She was halfway through eating it, elegantly, as if she ate such things every day, when she remembered Pitt would probably be chewing through heavy bread sandwiches with a little cold meat in them, if he was fortunate, if not, then cheese, dry and clogging in the mouth. She put her fork down, the peas rolling away. Neither Emily nor Vespasia noticed.

  It took half an hour, much critical surveying by Emily, and a least a dozen pins, before Charlotte was satisfied that she looked acceptable in the plum silk and could go calling to the Walk. Actually she was rather more than satisfied. It was a very good quality silk indeed, and the color was remarkably flattering to her. The warmth of it against the honey of her skin and the richness of her hair was enough to carry her away in a flight of vanity. It was going to hurt to take it off and give it back to Emily at the end of the afternoon. The gray muslin had lost all its appeal. It no longer looked smart, merely drab and very much last year’s.

  Aunt Vespasia complimented her with dry humor as she came down the stairs, but she met the old lady’s eyes without a flicker and hoped she had no idea how many pins there were in it, or how hard she had relaced her stays to get into Emily’s old waist.

  She thanked Vespasia and walked with Emily out into the sunlight on the carriageway, head high and back very straight. Actually it was more than a little uncomfortable to hold herself in any other way, and she would have to sit with care.

  It was only a hundred yards or so to Selena Montague’s house, and Emily said very little on the way. They knocked at the door and were let in immediately by a smart maid in black and lace, obviously poised to expect callers. Apparently Mrs. Montague was in the garden at the back, and they were invited to join her. The house was elegant and expensive, although Charlotte’s practiced eye could see tiny economies, a mend in the fringe of a lampshade, a cushion whose upholstery had obviously been turned, the new piece from the underside darker against the faded wings. She had done the same herself and knew the signs.

  Selena was sitting in a wicker chaise lounge, her arms dangling over the sides, her face lifted upward, but protected from the harsh sun by a floppy, flower-decked hat. She had excellent features, although her nose was perhaps a trifle sharp. Her eyes were wide and brown, long lashed, and she opened them with intense interest when she saw Charlotte.

  “My dear Selena,” Emily began in her best voice. “How charming you look, and so cool! May I present my sister, Charlotte Pitt, who has called upon me?”

  Selena did not move, but surveyed Charlotte with barely disguised curiosity. Charlotte had an unpleasant feeling that nothing had been missed, from her rather worn best boots to every pin in her dress.

  “How delightful,” Selena said at last. “So,” she glanced down at Charlotte’s boots again “—considerate—of you to have come. I am sure we shall all enjoy your company.”

  Charlotte felt her temper rise instantly. Above all things she hated to be patronized.

  “I hope I shall also enjoy yours,” she said with a cool smile.

  The implication was not missed by Selena, and from the pressure of Emily’s fingers on her arm Charlotte knew that she too had taken the point.

  “You must come and dine with us sometime,” Selena went on. “These summer evenings are so warm we frequently eat out here. The strawberries are quite delicious this year, don’t you think so?”

  Strawberries were utterly beyond Charlotte’s budgeting.

  “Very sweet,” she agreed. “Perhaps it is the sun.”

  “No doubt,” Selena was not interested in where they came from. She looked up at Emily. “Please sit down. I’m sure you would like some refreshment, you must be dreadfully hot—” Charlotte saw Emily’s face tighten at the implication, and her cheeks did look flushed. “Perhaps a sherbet?” Selena smiled. “And you, Mrs. Pitt? Something cooling?”

  “Whatever you care for yourself, Mrs. Montague,” Charlotte put in before Emily could speak. “I would not wish to put you to inconvenience.”

  “I assure you it is no inconvenience!” Selena said with a touch of tartness. She reached out and rang a small bell on the table, and its sharp sound was answered by a maid in starched white. Selena gave elaborate orders. Then she turned to Emily again. “Have you seen poor Jessamyn?”

  Emily sat in a white wrought-iron chair, and Charlotte perched on another beside her, carefully, so as not to burst a pin.

  “No,” Emily replied. “I did leave my card, of course, and a small letter to express my condolences.”

  Selena struggled to hide her disappointment and failed.

  “Pour soul,” she murmured. “She must be feeling quite dreadful. One simply cannot imagine it! I hoped perhaps you had seen her and could tell me something.”

  Emily knew immediately that Selena had not seen her either and was consumed with curiosity.

  “One doesn’t even wish to try,” She shivered. “I’m sure she has the sympathy of absolutely everyone. I have no doubt each of us will call upon her in the next weeks, it would be inhuman not to. Even gentlemen will call, I’m sure. It would be the least they could do to comfort her.”
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br />   The nostrils flared on Selena’s sharp little nose.

  “I would not have thought any comfort possible after one’s sister-in-law has been violated practically on one’s doorstep and has staggered in to die literally in one’s arms.” There was an unspecified criticism of Emily in her tone. “I think I should retire altogether if such a thing happened to me. I might even become quite deranged.” She said it very certainly, as if she were in no doubt that such a thing had already happened to Jessamyn.

  “Good gracious!” Emily affected horror. “Surely you don’t imagine it will happen again, do you? I didn’t even know you had a sister-in-law.”

  “I don’t!” Selena snapped. “I was merely saying how I sympathize with poor Jessamyn, and that we must not expect too much of her. We must be understanding if she seems a little odd—at least I am sure I shall be.”

  “I’m sure you will, my dear.” Emily leaned forward, her voice cooing. “I’m sure you would never intentionally be unkind to anyone.”

  Charlotte wondered if Emily were not giving her credit for rather many “accidents.”

  “It must be very difficult to know what to say,” Charlotte suggested. “I should not know whether avoiding the subject might seem as if I were indifferent to her loss, or then on the other hand discussing it might appear like curiosity, which would be so vulgar.”

  Selena’s face hardened, taking the inference perfectly.

  “How very frank of you,” she said with wide-eyed surprise, as if she had discovered something alive in the salad. “Are you always so—candid—about your thoughts, Mrs. Pitt?”

  “I’m afraid so. It is my greatest social disadvantage.” Now let her find a civil answer to that!

  “Oh! Well, I dare say it cannot be too serious,” Selena replied cooly. “Your sister does not appear even to be aware of it.”

  “I am inured to it.” Emily smiled dazzlingly at her. “I have suffered disaster upon disaster. Now I only bring her to call upon friends I know I can trust.” She met Selena’s brown eyes squarely.

  Charlotte nearly choked, trying to maintain a sober face. Selena was outmaneuvered, and she knew it.

  “How kind,” she murmured pointlessly. She took the tray from the maid. “Do have some sherbet.”

  There was a natural silence after this for a little while, as they dipped their spoons into the cool delicacy. Charlotte wanted to use the opportunity to learn something more about the people, perhaps something that Pitt, as an obvious policeman, could not observe, but all the questions in her head were too clumsy. And she had not decided precisely what she needed to know. She sat with the sherbet dish in her hand and stared at the roses on the far wall. It reminded her a little of Cater Street and her parents’ home, only this was grander, lusher. It seemed such an unlikely place for a sordid crime like rape. Embezzlement or fraud she could have understood, or of course burglary. But did men who lived in houses like these ever rape anyone? Surely no matter how eccentric their tastes, or even perverted—she had heard that there were such things—men from Paragon Walk could afford to pay to indulge them. And there were always people who catered, everywhere, from the teeming rookeries to the expensive brothels, even boys and children.

  Unless, of course, some particular woman was tormenting them, teasing, and flaunting herself. But from everyone’s descriptions, Fanny Nash had been anything but a flirt—in fact, decidedly gauche. Thomas had said Jessamyn made as much a point of it as was only just short of unkindness, and Emily had borne her out.

  She was still thinking about it, convincing herself it had been some drunken coachman from the Dilbridges’ party and nothing to touch Emily, when she was distracted by voices across the lawn. She turned to see two elderly ladies, dressed in identical turquoise muslin and lace, although the styles were different, as suited their vastly different figures. One was tall and gaunt, flat-chested, the other small and rotund with a high, overstuffed bosom and plump little hands and feet.

  “Miss Lucinda Horbury,” Selena introduced the small one, “and Miss Laetitia Horbury.” She turned to the taller. “I am sure you have not met Lady Ashworth’s sister, Mrs. Pitt.”

  Greetings were exchanged with elaborately concealed curiosity, and more sherbet was brought. When the maid had left, Miss Lucinda turned to Charlotte.

  “My dear Mrs. Pitt, how good of you to call. Of course you have come to comfort poor Emily after the dreadful happening! Isn’t it too appalling?”

  Charlotte made polite noises, scrambling to think of something useful to ask, but Miss Lucinda did not really require a reply.

  “I really don’t know what things are coming to!” she went on, warming to the subject. “I’m sure when I was young such things never occurred in decent society. Although, of course—” she glanced at her sister “—we did have those among us whose morals were not without fault!”

  “Indeed?” Miss Laetitia’s faint eyebrows rose. “I don’t recall that I knew any, but perhaps you had a wider circle than I?”

  Miss Lucinda’s plump face tightened, but she ignored the remark, lifting her shoulder slightly and looking toward Charlotte.

  “I expect you have heard all about it, Mrs. Pitt? Poor dear Fanny Nash was vilely assaulted and then stabbed to death. We are all quite shattered! The Nashes have lived in the Walk for years, I dare say for generations, a very good family, indeed. I was talking to Mr. Afton, that’s the eldest of the brothers, you know, only yesterday. He has such dignity, don’t you think?” She flushed and looked at Selena, then Emily, and returned to Charlotte. “He is such a sober man,” she continued. “One can hardly imagine his having a sister who would meet with such an end. Of course, Mr. Diggory is a good deal more—more liberal—” she pronounced the word carefully “—in his tastes. But I always say, there are things a man may acceptably do, even if they are not very pleasant, which would be quite unthinkable in a woman—even of the loosest order.” Again she lifted her shoulder a little and glanced momentarily at her sister.

  “Are you saying that Fanny somehow invited her attack?” Charlotte asked frankly. She felt the ripple of amazement in the others and ignored it, keeping her eyes on Miss Lucinda’s pink face.

  Miss Lucinda sniffed.

  “Well, really, Mrs. Pitt, one would hardly expect such a nature of thing to happen to a woman who was—chaste! She would not allow herself to be put in such a circumstance. I am sure that you have never been molested! And neither have any of us!”

  “Perhaps that is no more than our good fortune?” Charlotte suggested, then added, lest she embarrass Emily too much, “If he were a madman, he might imagine all sorts of things that were entirely false, might he not, utterly without reason?”

  “I have no acquaintance with madmen,” Miss Lucinda said fiercely.

  Charlotte smiled. “Nor I with rapists, Miss Horbury. Everything I say is only a surmise.”

  Miss Laetitia flashed her a smile so quick it was gone almost as soon as it had appeared.

  Miss Lucinda sniffed harder. “Naturally, Mrs. Pitt. I hope you did not imagine for a moment that anything I said was from any kind of personal knowledge! I assure you, I was no more than sympathizing with poor Mr. Nash—to have such a disgrace within his family.”

  “Disgrace!” Charlotte was too angry even to try to control her tongue. “I see it as a tragedy, Miss Horbury, a terror, if you like, but hardly a disgrace.”

  “Well!” Miss Lucinda bridled. “Well, really—”

  “Is that what Mr. Nash said?” Charlotte pressed, ignoring a sharp nudge from Emily’s boot. “Did he say it was a disgrace?”

  “Really, I do not recall his words, but he was most certainly aware of the—the obscenity of it!” She shuddered and snorted down her nose. “I am quite terrified at the mere thought myself. I believe, Mrs. Pitt, if you lived in the Walk, you would feel as we do. Why, our maid, poor child, fainted clean away this morning, when the next door bootboy spoke to her. That’s another three of our best cups gone!”

  “Pe
rhaps you could reassure her that the man is probably miles away from her now?” Charlotte suggested. “After all, with the police investigating and everyone looking for him, this is the last place he would be likely to remain.”

  “Oh, one must not lie, Mrs. Pitt, even to servants,” Miss Lucinda said sharply.

  “I don’t see why not?” Miss Laetitia put in with mildness. “If it is for their good.”

  “I always said you had no sense of morals!” Miss Lucinda glared at her sister. “Who can say where the creature is now? I am sure Mrs. Pitt cannot! He is obviously possessed by uncontrollable passions, abnormal hungers too dreadful for a decent woman to contemplate.”

  Charlotte was tempted to point out that Miss Lucinda had done little else but contemplate them since she had arrived, and it was only sensibility for Emily that prevented her.

  Selena shivered.

  “Perhaps he is some depraved creature from the under-world, excited by women of quality, satins and laces, cleanliness?” she said to no one in particular.

  “Or perhaps he lives here in the Walk, and naturally chooses his own to prey upon—who else?” It was a gentle, light voice, but distinctly masculine.

  They all whirled round as one, to see Fulbert Nash only two yards from them on the grass, a dish of sherbet in his hand.

  “Good afternoon, Selena, Lady Ashworth, Miss Lucinda, Miss Laetitia.” He looked at Charlotte with raised eyebrows.

  “My sister, Mrs. Pitt,” Emily said tightly. “And that is an appalling thing to say, Mr. Nash!”

  “It is an appalling crime, ma’am. And life can be appalling, have you not observed?”

  “Not, mine, Mr. Nash!”

  “How charming of you,” he sat down opposite them.

  Emily blinked. “Charming?”

  “That is one of the most restful qualities of women,” he replied. “The ability to see only what is pleasant. It makes them so comfortable to be with. Don’t you think so, Mrs. Pitt?”

  “I should think it would make for extreme insecurity,” Charlotte replied with candor. “One would never know whether one was dealing with the truth or not. Personally I should be forever wondering what it was I did not know.”