“He told you this?” Pitt asked, uncertainty in his mind, weighing what Juniper Stafford had said, and Pryce. “As late as yesterday?”
“Not entirely yesterday,” Livesey said patiently. “Over a period of time, and yesterday he did not change any part of it. He reaffirmed it, both by what he said and what he omitted to say. There was no change in his mind, and he certainly had discovered nothing new.”
“I see.” Pitt spoke only to acknowledge that he had heard. In truth, he did not see at all. Pryce had seemed so certain Stafford intended to reopen the case, and why should he have any interest in wishing Pitt to believe that, were it not true? Pryce had prosecuted, and seemed to feel a certain responsibility for the conviction. He would not want it overturned now.
And yet if Stafford had had no intention of reopening the case, why should anyone kill him?
Perhaps they had not, and it was some obscure disease with poisonlike symptoms, and either he was unaware of it himself or he had chosen not to tell his wife, possibly not realizing how serious it was.
Livesey seemed to seize Pitt’s thoughts. The judge’s face was grave, all the impatience washed away as if it had been trivial, a momentary and shallow thing. Now he was returned to reality, which concerned him.
“If he was not reopening the case, why should anyone kill him?” Livesey said quietly. “A justified question, Mr. Pitt. He was not reopening the case, and even if he were, there is no one with anything to fear from it, except Tamar Macaulay herself, because it would have reawakened the public to her brother’s disgrace and raised the whole matter in people’s minds again. She cannot wish that, when there is no hope of exoneration.” He smiled without humor or pleasure, only an awareness of the loss and wasted tears.
“I think the poor woman has been so steeped in her own crusade for these many years it has gained its own impetus, apart from any reality. She has lost sight of the truth of the case,” he continued. “She is no longer thinking of evidence, only of her own desire to vindicate her brother. Love, even family love, can be very blind. We so easily see only what we wish to, and with the person absent, as happens with the dead, there is nothing to remind us of reality.” His lips tightened. “The vision consumes. It has become like a religion with her, so important to her she cannot let go. She is a little intoxicated with it. It has taken the place of husband and child with her. It is really very tragic.”
Pitt had seen such obsession before. It was not impossible to believe. But it did not answer the question of who had killed Stafford, if he had been killed.
“Do you think Stafford told her as much?” he asked, looking up at Livesey.
“And she killed him in rage because he had disappointed her?” Livesey bit his lip, frowning. “It strains the credulity, to be candid. She is obsessed, certainly, but I do not think she is so far unbalanced as to do that. It would have to be proved beyond question before I could accept it.”
“Then what?” Pitt asked. “Mrs. Stafford said he was presently involved in no other appeal. Revenge for some old matter?”
“On a judge of appeal?” Livesey shrugged. “Unlikely—in the extreme. I have heard convicted men make threats against witnesses, the police officer who arrested them, against prosecuting counsel or their own defense counsel, if they believed them inadequate—even against the trial judge, and once against the jury—but never against the judges of appeal! And there are at least five of us on any case. It seems farfetched, Mr. Pitt.”
“Then who?”
Livesey’s face darkened.
“I regret to say this, Mr. Pitt, but I have no alternative. It would seem there is little left but his personal life. Most murders are committed either in the course of a robbery or they are domestic, as I am sure you are already aware.”
Pitt knew it.
“What reason would Mrs. Stafford have for wishing her husband dead?” he asked, watching Livesey’s face.
Livesey raised his eyes from the desk and sighed heavily.
“I dislike intensely having to repeat this. It is shabby and an unworthy thing to say of a colleague or his family. But Mrs. Stafford’s relationship with Mr. Adolphus Pryce is a great deal closer than it would at first appear.”
“Improperly so?” For an instant Pitt was surprised, then small memories came back to his mind: a glance, a quick color in the face, an eagerness, an odd awkward moment, self-consciousness where there was no understandable cause.
“I regret to say it—but yes,” Livesey confessed, his eyes on Pitt’s face. “I had not thought it more than a rash affaire, a season’s lust which would wear itself out as such passions often do. But perhaps it is deeper than that. I do not envy you, Mr. Pitt, but I fear you may be driven to investigating such a possibility.”
It answered many questions, unpleasant as it was.
Livesey was watching him.
“I see you have thought of that also,” he observed. “If Adolphus Pryce tried to convince you that Stafford was reopening the Blaine/Godman case, you may readily appreciate why. Naturally both he and Mrs. Stafford would prefer you to believe it was some guilty and fearful party to that case who had committed the crime of murdering her husband, rather than have you investigate either of them.”
“Of course.” Pitt felt unreasonably oppressed by it. It was foolish. He knew that what Livesey said was true. Now that he saw it, he knew he had been careless not to have noticed the small signs before. He stood up, pushing his chair back a little. “Thank you very much for sparing me time this afternoon, Mr. Livesey.”
“Not at all.” Livesey rose also. “It is a very grave matter, and I assure you I shall give you any assistance within my power. You have only to tell me what I can do.”
And with that Pitt excused himself and left, walking slowly, heavy in thought. It was already late, the sun was low behind the rooftops and a slight mist gathered in the damp streets, smoke smearing gray across the pale color of the sky and the smell of it rank as people stoked their fires against the chill of the evening.
Perhaps the medical examiner would have the results of the autopsy. Or at least he might know if there was poison in the flask. This whole case might disappear, a hasty judgment, a fear not realized. He quickened his pace and strode out along the pavement towards the main thoroughfare and the chance of finding a hansom.
The light was still on in the medical examiner’s office, and when Pitt knocked on the door he was commanded to enter.
Sutherland was in shirtsleeves, his hair standing on end where he had run his fingers through it. He had a pencil behind each ear, and another in his fingers, the end chewed to splinters. He jerked up from the papers he had been staring at, and regarded Pitt with ferocious interest.
“Opium,” he said simply. “The flask was full of it. More than enough to kill four men, let alone one.”
“Is that what killed Stafford?” Pitt asked.
“Yes, I’m afraid so. You were quite right, opium poisoning. Easily recognizable, if you know what you are looking for, and you told me. Nasty.”
“Could it have been accidental, intended just as …”
“No,” Sutherland said firmly. “One doesn’t take opium in whiskey like that. It should be smoked. And anyone who took it regularly would know perfectly well that a dose that size would kill. No, Mr. Pitt, it was intended to be precisely what it was: lethal. You have a murder, unquestionably.”
Pitt said nothing. It was what he had feared, and yet a small part of him had still kept hope that it might not be so. Now it was conclusive. Mr. Justice Samuel Stafford had been murdered—not apparently over the Blaine/Godman case. Was it Juniper Stafford and Adolphus Pryce? One of them—or both? As simple and as ugly as that?