Traitors Gate

by Anne Perry

  They walked a few paces farther and then turned along the path towards the stone wall and the early roses spilling over it. The archway was in dappled sunlight, picking out the flat surfaces of the individual stones, and the tiny plants in the crevices low down where it was moist, ferns and mosses with flowers like pinprick stars. Above them there was a faint rustle in the leaves of the elm trees as a breeze moved, laden with the smell of grass and leaf mold.

  She looked at his face and knew he was thinking of the pleasures of being home in England, the timeless grace of old gardens. Africa with its savagery, its gaudy vegetation, so often seared and withered by relentless sun, its teeming wildlife, all seemed unreal in this ancient certainty where the seasons had come and gone with the same nurturing pattern for a hundred generations.

  But Susannah’s death would not go away. Law was also a thing more certain here, and Nobby knew Pitt well enough to have no doubt that he would pursue it to the end, no matter what that end might be. He did not bow to coercion, expediency or even emotional pain.

  If the truth were unbearably ugly, she did not know if he would make public all the evidence. If the answer proved to be too desperately tragic, if it would ruin others for no good cause, if the motive caught his pity hard enough, he might relent. Although she could not imagine a reason that could ever mitigate the murder of someone like Susannah.

  But that argument was pointless. It was not Pitt she was afraid of, or prosecution or justice, it was truth. It would be equally terrible to her if Kreisler were guilty, whether he were charged or not.

  But why did she even entertain the thought? It was hideous, terrible! She felt guilty that it even entered her mind, let alone that she let it remain there.

  As if reading her thoughts, or seeing the confusion in her face, he stopped just beyond the arch in the small shade garden with its primroses and honesty and arching Solomon’s seal.

  “What is it, Nobby?”

  She was abashed to find an answer that was neither a lie nor too hurtful to both of them.

  “Did you learn anything?” She seized upon something useful to ask.

  “About Susannah’s death? Not much. It seems to have happened late in the evening and when she was alone in a hansom cab, no one knows where. She had said she was going to visit the Thornes, but never arrived, as far as we know. Unless, of course, the Thornes are lying.”

  “Why should the Thornes wish her harm?”

  “It probably goes back to the death of Sir Arthur Desmond—at least that is what Pitt has apparently suggested. It makes little sense to me.”

  They were standing so still a small, brown bird flew out of one of the trees and stood on the path barely a yard from them, its bright eyes watching curiously.

  “Then why?” she said quietly, the fear still large within her. She knew enough of men who traveled the wild places of the earth to understand that they have to have an inner strength in order to survive, a willingness to attack in the need to defend themselves, the resolve to take life if it threatened their own, a single-mindedness that brooked nothing in its way. Gentler people, more circumspect, more civilized at heart, all too often were crushed by the ferocity of an unforgiving land.

  He was watching her closely, almost searchingly. Slowly the happiness and the sense of comfort drained out of him, replaced by pain.

  “You are not convinced that I did not do it, are you, Nobby?” he said with a catch in his voice. “You think I could have murdered that lovely woman? Just because …” He stopped, the color washing up his face in guilt.

  “No,” she said levelly, the words difficult to speak. “Not just because she differed with you over settlement in Africa, of course not. But then we both know that would be absurd. If you had, it would be because of the shares she has in one of the great banking houses and the influence she might have over Francis Standish, and of course because of her husband’s position. She supported him fully, which meant she was against you.”

  He was very pale, his features twisted with hurt.

  “For God’s sake, Nobby! How would my murdering her help?”

  “It is one supporter less….” She trailed off, looking away from him. “I am not supposing you killed her, only that the police might think so. I am afraid for you.” That was the truth, but not the whole truth. “And you were angry with her.”

  “If I killed everyone I was angry with, at one time or another, my whole career would be littered with corpses,” he said quietly, and she knew from the tone in his voice that he had believed only the truth she had spoken; the lies and the omissions he understood for what they were.

  The bird was still on the path close to them, its head cocked to one side.

  He put his hands on her arms and she felt the warmth of him through the thin sleeves of her dress.

  “Nobby, I know that you understand Africa as I do, and that at times men are violent in order to survive in a violent and sudden land, where the dangers are largely unknown and there is no law but that of staying alive, but I have not lost my knowledge of the difference between Africa and England. And morality, the underlying knowledge of good and evil, is the same everywhere. You do not kill people simply because they stand in your way, or believe differently over an issue, no matter how big. I argued with Susannah, but I did not hurt her, or cause her to be hurt. You do me an injustice if you do not believe that … and you cause me deep pain. Surely I do not need to explain that to you? Do we not understand each other without the need for speeches and declarations?”

  “Yes.” She answered from the heart, her head ignored, silenced in a deeper, more insistent certainty. “Yes of course we do.” Should she apologize for even having entertained the thought? Did he need her to?

  As if he had read it in her eyes, he spoke, smiling a little.

  “Good. Now let us leave it. Don’t go back over it. You had to acknowledge what passed through your mind. Don’t let there be dishonesty between us, the need to hide behind deceit and politeness for fear of the truth.”

  “No,” she agreed quickly, a ridiculous smile on her face in spite of all that common sense could tell her. “Of course I won’t.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her with a gentleness that took her by blissful surprise.

  Pitt was sitting at the breakfast table slowly eating toast and marmalade. The toast was crisp and the butter very mildly salted. Altogether it was something to be savored to the last crumb.

  And he had been out until nearly midnight the previous evening, so if he were late at Bow Street this morning, it was justifiable. The children had left for school and Gracie was busy upstairs. The daily woman was scrubbing the back steps, and would presently put black lead on the range, after cleaning it out, a job which Gracie was delighted to have got rid of.

  Charlotte was making a shopping list.

  “Are you going to be late again this evening?” she asked, looking up at him.

  “I doubt it,” he replied with his mouth full. “Although we still haven’t found the hansom driver yet….”

  “Then he’s involved,” she said with certainty. “If he were innocent he would have come forward by now. If he doesn’t want to be found, how will you get him?”

  He finished the rest of his tea. “By the long, slow process of questioning every driver in London,” he assured her. “And proving whether they were where they say. And if we are lucky, by someone informing. But we don’t know where she went into the water. It could have been upriver or down. All we do know is that she seems to have been dragged some distance by her clothes being caught in something.” Charlotte winced. “I’m sorry,” he apologized.

  “Have you found her cloak?” she asked.

  “No, not yet.”

  He ate the last of his toast with satisfaction.

  “Thomas …”

  He pushed out his chair and stood up. “Yes?”

  “Do bodies often wash up at Traitors Gate?”

  “No—why?”

  She took a deep brea
th and let it out

  “Do you think it is possible that whoever it was intended her to end up there?”

  The idea was puzzling, and one which had not occurred to him before.

  “Traitors Gate? I should doubt it. Why? It’s more likely that he cared where he put her in, close to where he killed her, and unobserved. It would be chance, tide and the currents which took her to the slipway at the Tower. And, of course, whatever dragged her.”

  “But what if it wasn’t?” she insisted. “What if it was intended?”

  “It doesn’t honestly make a lot of difference, except that he would have had to find the right place to put her in, which might have meant moving her. But why would anyone care enough to take the risk?”

  “I don’t know,” she confessed. “Only because she betrayed someone.”

  “Who? Not her husband. She was always loyal to him, not as a matter of course, but because she truly loved him. You told me that yourself.”

  “Oh, yes,” she agreed. “I didn’t mean that kind of betrayal. I thought perhaps it might be back to the Inner Circle again.”

  “There are no women members anyway, and I’m convinced Chancellor is not a member either.”

  “But what about her brother-in-law, Francis Standish?” she pressed. “Could he not be involved in Sir Arthur’s death, and somehow she found out? Susannah was very fond of Sir Arthur. She wouldn’t keep silent, even to protect her own. Perhaps that was what troubled her so much.”

  “Family loyalty … and betrayal,” Pitt said slowly, turning the idea over in his mind. Harriet Soames’s face was sharp in his inner eye, in passionate defense of her father, even knowing his guilt. “Possibly …”

  “Does it help?”

  He looked at her. “Not a lot. Intentional or not, she will have been put in at the same place.” He pushed his chair back in, kissed her cheek before going to the door. His hat was on the rack in the hall. “It’s something I shall search for with more diligence today. I think it is time I forgot the hansom driver and concentrated on finding a witness to her body being put into the water.”

  “Nothing except what didn’t happen,” Tellman said with disgust when Pitt asked him to report his progress so far. They were standing in Pitt’s office in the early light, the noise from the street drifting up through the half-open window.

  Tellman was tired and frustrated. “No one has seen the damned hansom, either in Berkeley Square or Mount Street, or anywhere else,” he went on. “At least, no one who has it in mind to tell us. Of course all London is crawling with cabs, any one of which could have had Mrs. Chancellor in it!” He leaned against the bookcase behind him. “Two were seen in Mount Street about the right time, but both of them have been accounted for. One was a Mr. Garney going out to dine with his mother. His story is well vouched for by his servants and hers. The other was a Lieutenant Salsby and a Mrs. Latten, going to the West End to dine. At least that is what they said.”

  “You disbelieve them?” Pitt sat down behind his desk.

  “‘Course I disbelieve them!” Tellman smiled. “Seen his face, and you would have too. Seen hers, and you’d know what they were going to do! She’s no better than she should be, but not party to abducting a cabinet minister’s wife. That’s not how she makes her living!”

  “You know her?”

  Tellman’s face registered the answer.

  “Anything else?” Pitt asked.

  “Don’t know what else to look for.” Tellman shrugged. “We’ve spent days trying to find the place she went in. Most likely Limehouse. More discreet than upriver. It’d be eleven or so before he put her into the water, maybe. That’d be four hours before she was found. Don’t really matter whether she hit the slipway on the incoming tide or went past farther into the current and was washed up on the outgoing. Still means she put in somewhere south.” He breathed out slowly and pulled a face. “And that’s a long stretch of river with a dozen wharves and steps, and as many streets that lead to them. And you’ll get no help from the locals. The people that spend their time waiting around there aren’t likely to speak to us if they can help it. Slit your throat for the practice.”

  “I know that, Tellman. Have you a better idea?”

  “No. I tried them all and they don’t work, but I’m known ’round there. Used to be at that station. You might do better.” His expression and his voice both denied it.

  But Pitt was not satisfied. According to the river police, if she had been put into the water within an hour or so of having been killed, which the medical examiner had said could be no later than eleven, or at a stretch half past, then the incoming tide could only have carried her from the Limehouse area, at the farthest It was more likely to have been closer, except that that made it Wapping, right on the Pool of London.

  Tellman had already tried the Thames police, whose station was on the river’s edge. They were extremely helpful, in an utterly negative way. Their patrols were excellent. They knew every yard of the waterfront, and they were sure no woman of Susannah Chancellor’s description and status had been put into the river there that night. It was an extravagant claim, but Pitt was inclined to believe them. The Port of London was always busy, even as late as midnight. Why should anyone take such a risk?

  Which always brought him back to the question as to why anyone should murder Susannah Chancellor anyway. Was it an abduction that had gone tragically wrong?

  Then was it simply greed, imagining Chancellor would pay a fine ransom? Or was the motive political … which brought him back to Peter Kreisler again.

  Tellman had already spent fruitless days in Limehouse and learned nothing of use. If anyone had seen a body put into the water, they were not saying so. If they had seen a hansom, and a man carrying a woman, they were not saying that either. He had even been south of the river to Rotherhithe, but that yielded no conclusion, except that it was not impossible that someone could have taken a small boat from one of the hundred wharves or stairs and carried a body in it. He had even considered if Tellman could be part of the conspiracy, a subtle and brilliant Inner Circle member. But looking at the anger in his face, hearing the brittle edge in his voice, he could not believe his own judgment to be so wrong.

  “What now?” Tellman said cynically, interrupting Pitt’s thoughts. “You want me to try the Surrey Docks?”

  “No, there’s no point.” An idea was forming in Pitt’s mind from what Charlotte had said about betrayals and Traitors Gate. “Go and see what you can find out about her brother-in-law.”

  Tellman’s eyebrows rose. “Mrs. Chancellor’s brother-in-law—Francis Standish? Why? Why in the name of Hell would he want to murder her? I still think it was Kreisler.”

  “Possibly. But look at Standish anyway.”

  “Yes sir. And what will you be doing?”

  “I shall try upriver, somewhere like the stretch between Westminster and Southwark.”

  “But that would mean someone’d waited with her after she was dead and before they put her into the water,” Tellman pointed out incredulously. “Why would anyone do that? Why take that risk?”

  “Less chance of being seen, closer to midnight,” Pitt suggested.

  Tellman gave him a look of total scorn. “There’s people up and down the river all the time. Anything after that’d be as good. Better get rid of it as soon as possible. Easier to travel about in a hansom when they’re all over the streets,” he said reasonably. “Who’d notice one in the many? Notice one at one o’clock in the morning. Too late for theaters. People who go to late parties and balls have their own carriages.”

  Pitt was uncertain whether to share Charlotte’s idea with Tellman or not. On the face of it, it sounded absurd, and yet the more he thought of it, the more it seemed possible.

  “What if he intended her to be washed ashore at Traitors Gate?”

  Tellman stared at him. “Another warning to anyone minded to betray the Circle?” he said with a spark of fire in his eyes. “Maybe. But that’d take some doing! No
reason why she should come ashore at all. Often they don’t. And even if he knew the tides, she could have been dragged; as it happens, she was! He’d have to wait for the ebb, in case she washed off again.” His voice was gathering enthusiasm. “So he waits somewhere, and puts her in at high water, then he’d be certain positive she’d not go off again.”

  Then his face darkened. “But there’s no way, even if he put her in above the Tower, that she’d be sure to go ashore there. She could have gone all the way down to the next big curve, around Wapping, or further, to the Surrey Docks.” He shook his head. “He’d have to put her there himself, by boat, most likely. Only a madman would risk carrying her there down at Queen’s Steps, the way we went to find her.”

  “Well he wouldn’t come from the north bank upriver,” Pitt thought aloud. “That’s Custom House Quay, and then the Billingsgate Fish Market. He’d have been seen for sure.”

  “Other side of the river,” Tellman said instantly, standing upright, his thin body tense. “Horsley Down. Nobody ’round there! He could have put her in a small boat and ferried her across. Just left her more or less where we found her. Outgoing tide wouldn’t touch her.”

  “Then I’m going to the south bank,” Pitt said decisively, standing up and moving away from the desk.

  Tellman looked doubtful. “Sounds like a lot of trouble, not to say danger, just to make sure she fetched up at the Tower. Can’t see it, myself.”

  “It’s worth trying,” Pitt answered, undeterred.

  “The medical examiner said she was dragged,” Tellman pointed out, the last shreds of reluctance still clinging. “Clothes caught on something! He couldn’t have just put her there!”

  “If he brought her from the other side, perhaps he dragged her?” Pitt replied. “Behind his boat, to make it look as if she’d been in the water some time.”

  “Geez!” Tellman sucked his breath in between his teeth. “Then we’re dealing with a madman!” He caught sight of Pitt’s face. “All right—even madder than we thought.”