Anne Perry - [Thomas Pitt 13]

by Farriers' Lane

  “It is easier,” she replied frankly, “and often more emotionally satisfying to be mortally offended on behalf of your God than to serve Him by altering one’s style and manner of life—and in a short space, it is certainly much more comfortable. One can feel righteous, very much one who belongs, while heaping vengeance on the heads of sinners. It costs a lot less than giving time or money to the poor.”

  He ate the last of his salmon and offered her more wine.

  “You are becoming cynical, my dear.”

  “I was never anything else”—she accepted the wine—“where the self-proclaimed righteous were concerned. Was the case really so different from most?”

  “Yes.” He pushed his plate away and like a shadow the butler removed it. “There was a distinct alien culture which could be blamed,” Thelonius continued grimly, his eyes sad and angry. “Godman was a Jew, and the resultant anti-Semitic emotions were among the most unpleasant manifestations of human behavior that I have seen: anti-Semitic slogans daubed on walls, hysterical pamphlets scattered all over the place, even people hurling stones in the streets at those they took to be Jews—windows smashed in synagogues, one set fire to. The trial was conducted at such a pitch of emotion I feared it would escalate beyond my control.” His face pinched as the memory became sharp in his mind. Vespasia could see in his eyes how much it hurt him.

  Saddle of mutton was served in silence and they ignored it. The butler brought red wine.

  “I am sorry, Thelonius,” she said gently. “I would not willingly have reawakened such a time.”

  “It is not you, Vespasia.” He sighed. “It seems it is circumstances. I don’t know what Stafford could have found. Perhaps there really is new evidence.” A wry expression crossed his face, half amusement, half regret. “It is not anything in the conduct of the original trial.” His smile became more inward, more rueful and apologetic. “You know, for the first time in my life, I considered deliberately letting pass something incorrect, some point that would allow a diligent barrister to find grounds to call for a mistrial, or at least a change of venue. I was ashamed of myself even for the thought.”

  His eyes searched her face to read her reaction, afraid she would be shamed for him. But he saw only grave interest.

  “And yet the hatred was so palpable in the air,” he went on. “I was afraid the man could not receive a fair hearing in that court. I tried—believe me, Vespasia, I lay awake many nights during that time, turning it over and over in my mind, but I never found any specific word or act I could challenge.” He looked down for a moment, then up again. “Pryce was excellent, he always is, and yet he never exceeded his duty. Barton James, for the defense, was adequate. He did not press hard—he seemed to believe his client was guilty, but I don’t think one could have found an attorney in England who did not. It …” He seemed almost to hunch inside himself a little and Vespasia was keenly aware that the memory of it still caused him pain. But she did not interrupt.

  “It was so … hasty,” he continued, picking up his wineglass and turning it by the stem in his fingers. The light shone brilliant through the red liquid. “Nothing was omitted, and yet increasingly I had the feeling that everyone wished Godman to be found guilty as rapidly as possible, and to be hanged. The public required a sacrifice for the outrage that had been committed, and it was like a hungry animal prowling just beyond the courtroom doors.” He looked up at her suddenly. “Am I being melodramatic?”

  “A trifle.”

  He smiled. “You were not there, or you would understand what I mean. There was a rawness in the air, a heat of emotion that is dangerous when one is trying to pursue justice. It frightened me.”

  “I have never heard you say such a thing before.” She was startled. It was unlike the man she remembered, at once more vulnerable, and yet, in a curious fashion, also stronger.

  He shook his head. “I have never felt it,” he confessed. His voice dropped lower and was full of surprise and pain. “Vespasia, I seriously considered committing one injudicious act myself, so as to provide grounds in order that the whole thing could be tried again before the justices of appeal, without the hysteria, when emotions were cooler.” He breathed in deeply and sighed. “I tortured myself wondering whether that was irresponsible, arrogant, dishonest. Or if I simply let it all proceed was I a coward who loved the pomp and the semblance of the law more than justice?”

  With another man she might have leaped to deny it, but it would have made their conversation ordinary; it would have set a distance between them that she did not wish. It would be the polite thing to say, the obvious, but not the more deeply truthful. He was a man of profound integrity, but his soul was as capable of fear and confusion as any other, and that he should have slipped and given in to it was not impossible. To suggest it was would be to desert him, to leave him, in a particular way, desperately alone.

  “Did you ever reach an answer you knew was true?” she asked him.

  “I suppose it is all about ends and means,” he said thoughtfully. “Yes—one truth is that you cannot separate them. There is no such thing as an end unaffected by the means used to obtain it.” He was watching her face. “In effect I was asking myself if I would intentionally nullify a trial because there was a passion and a haste about it of which I personally did not approve. You understand, I did not think Aaron Godman was innocent, nor do I think so now. Nor did I think that any of the evidence offered was tainted or perjured. It was simply that I felt the police had acted more in emotion than in impartial duty.”

  He stopped for a moment or two, perhaps uncertain if he should continue. “I was perfectly certain Godman had been beaten while in custody,” he said at last. “He was bruised and lacerated when he appeared in court, and the wounds were too fresh to have occurred before his arrest. There was an air of both outrage and urgency which had nothing to do with the seeking of truth, nor the proof of it. And yet Barton James did not refer to it. I could not prejudice his defense by raising the matter myself. I did not know the explanation of it, nor do I now. It is assumption on my part.”

  “Beaten by whom, Thelonius?”

  “I don’t know. The police, or his jailers I assume, but it is conceivable they were self-inflicted, I suppose.”

  “What about the appeal?” she asked.

  He began to eat again. “It was raised on grounds of evidence not fully explained—something to do with the medical examination of the body. The doctor concerned, Humbert Yardley, had first stated that the wounds were deeper than could be accounted for by the farrier’s nails that the prosecution stated were used, not only to nail him afterwards to the stable door, but actually to kill him—with a piercing wound to the side. Thank God he was dead when he was crucified!”

  “You mean Godman might have used some other weapon?” She was confused. “How does that affect the verdict? I don’t understand.”

  “No other weapon was ever found either in Farriers’ Lane or anywhere near it,” he explained. “And the people who saw him come out of the lane with blood on his clothes were quite definite he had no weapon with him. And he had nothing of that nature on him when he was arrested, or in his lodgings.”

  “Could he not have disposed of it?”

  “Of course—but not between the stable yard and the end of the alley where he was observed on the night of the murder. The alley lay between the sheer walls of buildings. There were no places to conceal anything at all. Nor was anything found in the yard itself.”

  “What did the judges of appeal say to this?”

  “That Yardley was uncertain, and later under examination did not deny that a long farrier’s nail might have caused the fatal injury.”

  “And that was all?” She was curious, troubled.

  “So I believe,” he answered. “They dealt with it quickly, and ruled that in every particular the trial verdict was correct, and should stand.” He shivered. “Aaron Godman was hanged three and a half weeks later. Since then his sister has attempted to have the matte
r raised again, and failed. She wrote to members of Parliament, to the newspapers, published pamphlets, spoke at meetings and even from the stage. Always she failed, unless, of course, Mrs. Stafford is correct, and Samuel Stafford was intending to reopen the case before his death prevented him.”

  “There seems little reason,” she said quietly. She looked up at him, meeting his steady, clear eyes. “Are you quite sure he was guilty, Thelonius?”

  “I have always thought so,” he replied. “I hated the manner in which the investigation was conducted. But the trial was correct, and I don’t see that the judges of appeal could have found differently.” His brow furrowed. “But if Stafford had learned something between then and his death, then possibly—I don’t know …”

  “And if not Aaron Godman, then who killed Blaine?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. Joshua Fielding? Devlin O’Neil? Or someone we know nothing about as yet? Perhaps we shall know more if we learn who killed Samuel Stafford, and why. It is an extremely ugly matter; every answer is tragic.”

  “There are seldom any answers to murder which are not. Thank you for having been so frank with me.”

  His body relaxed at last, his shoulders easing and the tension, the doubt, softening from his smile.

  “Had you imagined I should prevaricate with you? I have not changed so very much as that!”

  “You would not have told me anything I should better like to hear,” she replied, and knew immediately that that was not true. There were other things, but they were indiscreet—foolish.

  “Don’t flatter me, Vespasia,” he said dryly. “That is for acquaintances. Friends should tell the truth, or at worst keep silence.”

  “Oh, please! When was I ever capable of silence?”

  He smiled suddenly and dazzlingly. “On a given subject, any time you chose. But tell me what you are presently engaged with—apart from your friend Mrs. Pitt. It would be impossible to relate all that you have done since we last spoke to each other with any candor.”

  So she told him of her crusades to reform the poor laws, the education acts, the housing acts, of the theater and the opera she had enjoyed, and some of the people she felt most deeply for—or against. The evening slipped by as present news was replaced by memories, laughter recalled, and sadness, and it was long after midnight when finally he saw her to her carriage steps, held her hands in his for a moment, and bade her farewell for what they both knew would not be long.

  Micah Drummond could not free his mind from the Blaine/Godman case. Of course it was possible, very possible, that Samuel Stafford had been poisoned by his wife, or her lover, although there seemed to be no driving necessity for such a violent and dangerous act on their part. If they were discreet, and it appeared they had been, they could hope to continue seeing each other, on occasion, almost indefinitely. Divorce was out of the question; it was socially ruinous. Pryce could never marry a divorced woman and continue to practice the law as he did now. Society would be scandalized. Stafford was not only his friend, he was a most senior judge.

  But an affaire was quite a different matter, as long as they did not flaunt it. Why should they do anything as ugly—and as dangerous—as killing him? There was no need. Juniper Stafford was well into her middle forties. She would hardly be hoping to marry Pryce and have children. The pleasure of domestic life together was something that had never been a possibility, unless they were prepared to forgo all social acceptance and reduce their standard of living to approaching penury by comparison with their present situations. And Pryce at least would never countenance that, on her behalf, even if he might on his own.

  Was that enough to resort to murder?

  He knew what it was like to love a woman so completely that she haunted all private moments; all pleasure was pervaded with thoughts of her, the desire to share; all loneliness and pain were reflections of being separated from her. But never in the blackest or most self-wounding times had he imagined any happiness lay in forcing the issue or resorting to physical or emotional violence.

  If Juniper and Pryce had descended to an affair, deceiving Stafford, Micah Drummond despised their weakness and their duplicity, but he also felt a compassion he could not deny.

  He inclined to think Livesey had misunderstood Stafford’s intentions about reopening the Blaine/Godman case, or else Stafford had intentionally misled him, for whatever reason. It had been an unusually ugly case. Emotions had been fever high, beyond the edge of hysteria. It would not surprise him to learn that some of that emotion had lasted this long, even though he could not think who would have killed Stafford, or what purpose they now hoped to serve.

  Stafford had left no notes to indicate what evidence he was investigating, or what he believed to be the truth, who he suspected, even, of lying, far less of having killed Kingsley Blaine.

  The only way to learn would be to investigate the case again themselves. Pitt would probably begin with the original witnesses and suspects. Drummond could start at the top, with the senior police officer in charge of the men who had conducted the investigation—a deputy commissioner, and senior to himself. Therefore he sent a brief note requesting an interview.

  It was granted, and Drummond found himself in the ornate and overfurnished office of Deputy Commissioner Aubrey Winton at ten o’clock the following morning.

  Winton was a man of average height, fair curling hair receding a little at the temples, and an expression of calm, satisfied confidence.

  “Good morning, Drummond,” he said civilly. “Come in—come in!” He held out his hand and shook Drummond’s briefly, then returned to his seat behind the desk. He leaned back and swung around to face Drummond, indicating another chair. “Please, sit down. Cigar?” He waved his hand at a heavily scrolled silver box on the desk top. “What can I do for you?”

  Drummond did not prevaricate; there was no time. They were colleagues, not friends.

  “The Blaine/Godman case,” he answered. “It seems it may be the cause of a further crime in my area.”

  Winton frowned. “That is most unlikely. It was all cleared up—five years ago.” There was heavy disbelief in his voice. He was not going to accept anything so unpleasant without irrefutable proof. Already the atmosphere was cooler.

  “Mr. Justice Stafford,” Drummond explained, resenting the necessity, “was killed in the theater three nights ago. He had said he was reopening the case.” He met Winton’s eyes and saw them harden.

  “Then I can only assume he found something improper in the conduct of the trial,” Winton said guardedly. “The evidence was conclusive.”

  “Was it?” Drummond asked with interest, as if the matter were still undecided. “I am not familiar with it. Perhaps you would acquaint me?”

  Winton shifted his body but his face remained immobile, eyes on Drummond’s face.

  “If you insist, but I can see no purpose to it. The case was final, Drummond. There is nothing more to add. Stafford must have been pursuing something in the trial,” he repeated.

  “For example?” Drummond raised his eyebrows questioningly.

  “I have no idea. I am not a lawyer.”

  “Nor I.” With difficulty Drummond curbed his desire to be openly critical. “But Stafford was—and he heard the appeal. What could have arisen now that he did not have available to him then? He and the other judges of appeal must have had the whole trial before them at the time.”

  Winton’s face pinched with anger and his fingers on the desk top were clenched. “What is it you want, Drummond? Are you implying that we did not investigate the case thoroughly? I suggest you refrain from making such offensive and ill-informed remarks on a case about which you know very little.”

  The swiftness and the belligerence of his response betrayed a sensitivity that took Drummond by surprise. Justification he had expected, but not such a leap to defend. Obviously Winton still felt a guilt, or at least a sense of accusation.

  Drummond kept his temper with an effort. “I have the murder of a judge to inv
estigate,” he said in a hard, careful voice. “If you were in my position, and heard that he had been planning to reopen an old case, and was interviewing the chief witnesses again on the very day he was murdered, and they were among the few people who had the opportunity to have killed him, would you not look into the evidence of the case yourself?”

  Winton took a deep breath and his face relaxed a little, as though he realized his reaction had been excessive, exposing his own vulnerability.

  “Yes—yes, I suppose I would, however pointless it proved to be. Well, what can I tell you?” He colored faintly. “The investigation was very thorough. It had to be. It was an appalling crime; the whole country was watching us, from the Home Secretary down.”

  Drummond did not make the polite assurances the remark invited. The very fact that Winton had defended himself so sharply indicated he doubted it.

  Winton shifted his position again.

  “The officer in charge was Charles Lambert, an excellent man, the best,” he began. “Of course the public outcry was immense. The newspapers were headlining it in every issue, and the Home Secretary was calling us regularly, putting tremendous pressure on us to find the killer within a week at the outside. I don’t know if you have ever handled such a case yourself.” His eyes searched Drummond’s face for understanding. “Have you experienced the pressure, the outcry, everyone angry, frightened, anxious to prove themselves? The Home Secretary actually came down here to the station himself, all frock coat, pinstripe trousers and white spats.” His expression hardened at the recollection, and Drummond could imagine the scene: the Home Secretary irate, nervous, pacing the floor and giving impossible commands, not thinking how they might be obeyed, only of the pressure on him from the House of Commons and the public. If the murder were not solved and the man tried and hanged quickly, his own political reputation would be in danger. Home Secretaries had fallen before, and no man was secure if the outcry were sufficient. The Prime Minister would sacrifice him to the wolves of fear.

  “We put every man on it we could,” Winton continued, his voice sharp with memory. “And the best!” He grunted. “But in the event it turned out not to be particularly difficult. It was not a random lunatic; the motive was plain enough and he was not very clever. He was seen actually leaving Farriers’ Lane at the time, with blood on his clothes.”