Anne Perry - [Thomas Pitt 13]

by Farriers' Lane

  “Seen leaving Farriers’ Lane?” Drummond interrupted incredulously. If that were true, how could Tamar Macaulay possibly doubt his guilt? Surely even family love could not be so blind? “By whom?”

  “A group of men lounging around,” Winton replied.

  Drummond caught some inflection in his voice, some lack of force which made him uncertain.

  “Saw Godman—or saw someone?” he asked.

  Winton looked fractionally less confident. “They did not identify him with any surety,” he replied. “But the flower seller did. That was a couple of streets away, but she had no doubt whatever. There was no shadow there, and he actually stopped and spoke to her just after the clock had struck, joked with her, she said! So she not only saw his face and heard his voice, she also knew the time.”

  “Going away from Farriers’ Lane or towards it?” Drummond asked.

  “Away.”

  “So it was after the murder. And he stopped to talk to a flower seller? How extraordinary! Didn’t she notice the blood on him? If it was visible to the layabouts in the street, it must have been very obvious to her.”

  Winton hesitated, anger flickering in his expressive eyes. “Well—no, she didn’t see it. But that is easily explainable. When he came out of Farriers’ Lane he was wearing an overcoat. He had disposed of it by the time he reached the flower seller. Which is natural! He could not afford to be seen in a coat covered with blood. And there must have been a hell of a lot of it from a murder like that.”

  “Why did he not leave it in Farriers’ Lane, rather than come out still wearing it and risk being seen at all?” Drummond asked the obvious question.

  “God knows!” Winton said savagely. “Perhaps it was being seen by the layabouts that made him aware of it. He may not even have noticed it himself until then. He was a man in an insane rage, demented enough to kill a man and crucify him, for God’s sake! Don’t expect logical thought from him.”

  “And yet he behaved like a perfectly normal man a couple of streets away, joking with a flower seller. Did you find the coat? There cannot have been much ground to look.”

  “No, we didn’t!” Winton snapped. “But then that’s hardly surprising, is it! A good winter coat doesn’t lie around long, bloodstained or not, on a cold evening on the London streets. Wouldn’t expect to find it, days after the event.”

  “Where did he go after the flower seller saw him?”

  “Home. We got the cabby who took him. Picked him up in Soho Square and set him down in Pimlico. Not that it makes much difference. The murder was already committed by then.”

  There was little more for Drummond to say. He could sympathize with Winton and indeed with all the men who worked on the case. The pressures must have been constant and intense, newspapers screaming headlines of horror and outrage, the public in the street full of criticism and demand that the police do the job for which they were paid, grudgingly, and from taxes. And certainly the hardest to resist, the most powerful and most uncomfortable, would be from their own superiors, giving orders, demanding that solutions be found and proved within days, even hours.

  And then there was the other pressure, which was between them in a silent understanding, not needing speech, certainly not explanation. Drummond was a member of the Inner Circle, that secret brotherhood dedicated to works of beneficence, discreet gifts to help charitable organizations, and the furtherance of the careers of individual members so that they should gain influence—and power. Membership was secret. Any given man might know a few by name, or by sign and word, but not all. Allegiance to the Circle was paramount; it overrode all other loves and loyalties, all other calls upon honor.

  Drummond had no idea whether Aubrey Winton was a member of the Inner Circle or not, but he thought it extremely likely. And that pressure would be the greatest of all, because it would be hidden; there would be no appeal and no help.

  His sympathy for Winton was sharpened. It was not an enviable position, then or now, except that it seemed he had done all that anyone could, and his behavior was beyond exception.

  “I cannot think what Stafford was following,” he said aloud. “Even had there been some irregularity in the trial—or in the appeal—it seems beyond question Aaron Godman was guilty. Nothing can be served by raking it up again. I begin to think the answer lies elsewhere.”

  Winton smiled for the first time.

  “Not an appealing thought,” he agreed. “I understand why you sought to find another answer, but I am afraid it doesn’t lie with the Blaine/Godman case. Sorry.”

  “Indeed,” Drummond said. “Thank you for your time.” He rose to his feet. “I’ll tell my man all you told me.”

  “Not at all. Very delicate,” Winton said with understatement. “Sometimes our position is not easy.”

  Drummond smiled sourly and bade him good-day.

  The afternoon was fine, with a brisk wind blowing away the clouds and allowing brilliant shafts of autumn sunlight into the streets. Trees along the pavement and in the squares and parks were shedding their last leaves and there was a sharpness in the air that made Drummond think of woodsmoke, ripening berries in the hedges, and gardeners turning the damp earth and lifting and breaking the clumps of perennial flowers ready to replant for the spring. In the past when his wife had been alive and his daughters young, before he sold the house and took a flat in Piccadilly, there would have been chrysanthemums blooming in the borders, great shaggy, tawny-headed things that smelled like loam and rain on leaves.

  He ached to share such thoughts. As always lately, his mind turned to Eleanor Byam. He had seen her very little since the scandal. Many times he had wished to go to her, but then he had remembered how he and Pitt—no, that was untrue, it had been Pitt with Charlotte who had done it; but it was their investigation, their persistence and intelligence which had uncovered the truth, and that truth had ruined Eleanor, made her a widow and an outcast where before her husband had been honored and she had been respected and liked.

  Now she had sold their big house in Belgravia and retired to a small set of rooms in Marylebone, her income gone and her name only whispered in society, with awe and pity. There were no invitations, and precious few calls. Drummond was not responsible. No part of the crime or the tragedy which had overcome Sholto Byam had been his doing, and yet he felt the very sight of him must bring back to her only painful thoughts and comparisons.

  Yet he found himself walking towards Milton Street, and unconsciously lengthening his stride.

  It was late afternoon and the lamplighters were lifting their long poles to turn on the gas and bring the sudden glow of warmth along the darkening street when he came to Eleanor’s rooms. If he stopped to think now his courage would fail him. He walked straight up to the door and pulled the bell. It was a very ordinary house, curtains drawn in grim respectability, small garden neat, bright with a few late daisies and golden leaves.

  A middle-aged maid with a suspicious face opened the door.

  “Yes sir?” The “sir” was an afterthought on seeing the quality of his coat and the silver head to his stick.

  “Good evening,” he said, lifting his hat a fraction. “I would like to see Mrs. Byam, if she is at home.” He fished in his pocket and brought out a card. “My name is Drummond—Micah Drummond.”

  “Is she expecting yer, Mr. Drummond?”

  “No. But”—he stretched the truth a little—“we are old friends and I was in the neighborhood. Will you please ask her if she will see me?”

  “I’ll take the message,” she said less than generously. “But I can’t do no more’n that. I work for Mrs. Stokes as owns the ’ouse, not for the ladies wot ’as the rooms.” And without waiting for a reply she left Drummond on the step and went to discharge her errand.

  Drummond looked around him, oppressed by the change from the old circumstances. Such a short while ago, Eleanor had been mistress of a rich and spacious house in the best part of London, with a full staff of servants. Now she had a few rooms in someo
ne else’s building, and her door was answered by someone else’s servant who it seemed owed her no allegiance, and precious little courtesy. What permanent staff she had he did not know. He had only seen one ladies’ maid on his previous visit shortly after she had come.

  The maid returned, her face pinched with disapproval.

  “Mrs. Byam will see you, sir, if you come this way.” And without waiting to see if he followed, she turned on her heel and marched along the passage towards the back of the house. She knocked sharply on a glass partition door.

  It was opened by Eleanor herself. She looked very different from her days in Belgravia. Her hair was still dressed in the same manner, sweeping back from her forehead, jet-black with a peppering of gray which was broader now at the temples, almost a streak. Her face was still the same with olive skin and wide gray eyes. But there was a tiredness in it; the certainty and the composure had slipped away, leaving her vulnerable. She wore no jewelry at all, and her gown was very simple dark blue. It was well cut, but devoid of lace or embroidery. To Drummond she looked younger than before and, in spite of all that lay between them, more immediate, more warmly real.

  “Good evening, Micah,” she said, pulling the door wide. “How pleasant of you to call. Please come in. You look well.” She turned to the maid, who was standing in the center of the hallway and was filled with curiosity. “Thank you, Myrtle, that will be all.”

  With a sniff Myrtle retreated.

  Eleanor smiled as Drummond came in. “Not the most appealing creature,” she said wryly, taking his hat and stick and setting them in the stand. “Please come into the sitting room.” She led the way, offering him a seat in the small, modestly furnished parlor. He had never been farther than this, and guessed there was probably no more than a bedroom, maid’s room, kitchen and possibly a bathroom or dressing room of some sort beyond.

  She did not ask him why he had come, but he had to offer some sort of explanation. One did not simply arrive on people’s doorsteps. And he could hardly tell her the truth—that he desired above all things merely to see her again, to be near her.

  “I was—” He nearly said “passing.” That was absurd, an insult she did not deserve. It would be idiotic to pretend the visit was chance. They both knew better than that. He should have thought what to say before he came this far. But then he would not have come at all had he stopped and weighed it. He tried again. “I have had a long and trying day.” He smiled and saw the color creep up her cheeks. “I wanted to do something totally pleasing. I thought of chrysanthemums in the rain, and the smell of wet earth, and leaves and blue woodsmoke, and I knew of no one else I could share them with.”

  She looked away and blinked several times. It was a moment before he realized there were tears in her eyes. He had no idea whether he should apologize or be tactful and pretend not to have noticed. Or if he did that, would she find him unbearably cold? Or if he remarked it, would that be offensively intrusive? He was in an agony of indecision and felt his face burn.

  “You could not have said anything kinder.” Her voice was gentle and a little husky. She swallowed hard, and then again. “I am sorry your day was trying. Have you a difficult case? I suppose it is confidential?”

  “No—not really, but it is most unpleasant.”

  “I’m sorry. I imagine most of them are.”

  He wanted to ask her about herself, how she felt, what she did with her days, if she was all right, if there was anything he could do for her. But it would unquestionably have been intrusive, and worse than that, it might seem as if it were based in pity, as if his entire visit were one of a sense of obligation and compassion, and she would hate that.

  She was sitting looking at him, waiting, her face quick with interest. Between them the low fire burned with just sufficient coal to keep it alight.

  He found he was talking about himself, and that was not what he had wanted to do, apart from the ill manners of it. It was she he cared about, not himself, but he had to fill the silence and he was so afraid of appearing to condescend. He wanted to talk about music, or walking in the rain, the smell of wet leaves, the evening light across the sky, but then she would find him too pressing—too forward when she was so vulnerable.

  So he told her about Judge Stafford, and what Aubrey Winton had told him of the Blaine/Godman case.

  It was silent outside, and raining in the dark; the hall clock had struck eight, when he suddenly realized how long he had been there, and that it was past time he left. He had outstayed a social call. Now it had become difficult to return to politeness and excuse himself. The outside world intruded again.

  He rose to his feet.

  “I have kept you too long, because for a while I forgot my manners and simply enjoyed myself. Please forgive me.”

  She rose also, gracefully, but the shadows of reality returned to her face.

  “There is nothing to forgive,” she replied. It was the obvious thing to say, yet he felt she really meant it. For all the stilted words there was an ease of understanding between them. It was on the edge of his tongue to ask if he might call again, then he changed his mind. If she refused, and she might feel she should, then he had closed the door to himself. Better simply to come.

  “Thank you for receiving me,” he said with a smile. “Good night.”

  “Good night, Micah.”

  He hesitated only a moment, then picked up his hat and his stick and went out into the main hallway and back to the wet, lamplit street, the loneliness within him warmed and illuminated, and yet also sharper.

  4

  THERE WAS NOTHING Pitt could do on Sunday. There were no places of business open, and he was quite certain that none of the private persons he wished to speak to would be available and agreeable even to receiving him, let alone giving him the time and attention he would need in order to gain the information, or even the impressions, he desired.

  So he had a thoroughly enjoyable day at home with Charlotte, Jemima and Daniel. It was the loveliest of autumn weather, utterly windless with hazy sunshine and a soft golden light, a sense of height in the sky that made it possible to forget all London around them and imagine that beyond the wall there were trees and harvest fields.

  Pitt had little time to spend in his garden, but what there was was rare and precious, and he loved it fiercely. From the moment he laid down his knife and fork from breakfast, he went out and started to dig, dressed in old trousers and with his sleeves rolled up. He lifted the dark earth and turned it with intense satisfaction, breaking the clumps, parting the tangled roots of perennials now over, and dividing them into new plants for the spring. The Michaelmas daisies were blooming in blue-and-purple towers and the asters and chrysanthemums raised shaggy heads of cerise and lilac, gold, red, white and pink. The last roses were spare and precious. It was the final cutting of the grass, and the air was filled with the smell of it, and of earth mold, and sun on damp leaves.

  Seven-year-old Jemima was dressed in last year’s pinafore and was half squatting on the ground beside him, her face smeared with mud, deep in happy concentration, her fingers busy with untangling roots and getting out the weeds. A couple of yards away, Daniel, two years younger, was kneeling down listening to Charlotte trying to explain to him which leaves were chickweed and which flowers.

  Pitt turned and looked over Jemima’s head and caught Charlotte’s eye. She smiled at him, hair across her brows, a smear of earth on her cheek, and he felt more totally happy than he could ever recall. There were some moments so precious the ache to hold on to them was a physical thing. He had to force himself to have faith that others as good would come, and the letting go must be easy, or they would be crushed in the very act of clinging.

  By five o’clock the sun was slanting low; there were already deep shadows under the walls, and the dark earth was smooth and full of freshly planted clumps. They were all tired, filthy, and extraordinarily satisfied with everything.

  Daniel fell asleep over tea, and Jemima’s head sank lower and lowe
r as Pitt read her a bedtime story afterwards. By half past six the house was quiet, the fire lit with Pitt dozing beside it, his feet propped up on the fender, and Charlotte was absentmindedly sewing buttons on a shirt. Monday morning seemed like another world.

  But duty returned sharply enough with daylight, and nine o’clock found Pitt alighting from a hansom cab in Markham Square, Chelsea, with the intention of seeking the other witness Stafford had spoken to the day he had died, and whom Pitt had not yet met, Devlin O’Neil.

  He had obtained the address from Stafford’s chambers, and now paid the cabby and climbed the steps to the front door of a very substantial terraced house with wide porticoes and a brass doorknob in the shape of a griffon’s head, and a fanlight above of stained glass. The house seemed to be at least three windows wide on either side of the door, and was four stories high. If Devlin O’Neil owned this establishment then he was indeed doing very well, and had no reason to have quarreled with his friend Kingsley Blaine over a few guineas’ wager.

  The door was opened by a smart maid in a dark dress and very crisp lace-trimmed cap and apron. She was cheerful and full of confidence.

  “Yes sir?”

  “Good morning. My name is Thomas Pitt.” He handed her his card. “I apologize if I call inconveniently early, but I would very much like to see Mr. O’Neil before he leaves on the business of the day. The matter is connected with the death of an acquaintance of his, and is somewhat urgent.”

  “Oh dear! I’m sure as I don’t know who’s dead. You’d better come in, and I’ll tell Mr. O’Neil as you’re here.” She opened the door wide for him, put the card on the silver card tray, and conducted him to the morning room. It was somber, fireless, but immaculately clean, and decorated in a highly conservative and traditional style. The furniture was large, mostly carved oak, and covered with every conceivable kind of picture and ornament, trophies of every visit, relative and family event for at least four decades. The chair backs were protected by embroidered antimacassars edged with very worn crochetwork. The high ceiling was coffered in deep squares, giving the room a classical appearance belied by the ornate brass light brackets. There were no flowers on the side table, but a stuffed weasel under a glass dome. It was a very common sort of domestic decoration, but looking into its bright, artificial eyes, Pitt found it both repulsive and sad. He had grown up on a large country estate, where his father had been gamekeeper, and he could so easily visualize the creature in the wild, savagely alive. This motionless and rather dusty relic of its being was horribly offensive.