Pitt was standing behind her, debating whether to hang his jacket up or simply let it lie across the back of the chair.
“Probably,” he replied. “Although I can’t blame Lambert for not wanting the whole thing raked up again. It’s a terrible feeling to have your cases reopened and questioned as to whether you were right—especially if the man was hanged. Worse if you are not absolutely sure you did all you could, and you doubt your own honesty at the time.” He opted for laying the jacket on the chair. “It is so easy to make mistakes when everyone is crying out for a solution, and you are afraid for your own reputation, of being thought not good enough, not equal to the task.” He sat on the edge of the bed and continued undressing. “And if your men are panicking because witnesses are lying, and frightened, and full of hate …”
“Are they like that over Judge Stafford?” Charlotte asked, swiveling around on her dressing table stool to look at him.
“No, I don’t think so.” He stood up, took his shirt off and put it onto the chair as well, and his undervest on top of it. He poured warm water from the pitcher into the bowl and washed his hands, face and neck, and reached for his nightshirt and put it on, pulling it over his head, then trying to find the armholes. “It begins to look as if it may be personal, and nothing to do with the Farriers’ Lane case at all,” he added when he finally got his head through.
“You mean his wife?” Charlotte put her brush down, looked for a moment at the pile of clothes on the chair, and decided to leave them where they were and say nothing. It was not the occasion for fussing. “Juniper? Why would she kill him?”
“Because she was in love with Adolphus Pryce,” he answered, climbing into bed. He was quite oblivious of the scattered things he had left around—at least she thought he was.
“Was she?” she said doubtfully. “Are you sure?”
“No—not yet. But I cannot think why Livesey should say so if it is not true. I’ll have to enquire into it.”
“That seems a bit extreme.” She abandoned brushing her hair and rose to turn down the gas in the bracket on the far wall, then climbed into bed also. The clean sheets were cold, and she snuggled up to him comfortably. “I don’t believe it.”
“I didn’t think you would.” He put his arm around her. “But there doesn’t seem to be anything in the Farriers’ Lane murder worth looking into, certainly nothing to kill Stafford for.”
“But you don’t know what he found out,” she protested.
“I know what I found out. Nothing at all. Godman was seen coming out of Farriers’ Lane with blood on his coat, and identified by a flower seller in Soho Square, two streets away. He didn’t even deny that, just the actual time, and that was proved to be a lie. Sorry, my love, but it looks incontestable that he did it. I know you would like him to be innocent, because of Tamar Macaulay, but it seems he can’t be.”
“Then why are the Inner Circle telling you to leave it alone?” she demanded. “If there’s nothing to find out, why should they mind if you look?” She wriggled a little lower and knew Pitt was smiling in the darkness beside her. “In fact,” she added, “they should be very glad if you prove they were right!”
He said nothing, but reached over with his arm and touched her hair gently.
“Except perhaps they aren’t,” she went on. “Are you going to leave it?”
“I am going to sleep,” he said comfortably.
“But is the Farriers’ Lane case really closed, Thomas?” she persisted.
“For tonight—yes!”
“But tomorrow?”
He pulled her closer, laughing, and she was obliged to leave the matter.
In the morning Pitt ate a hurried breakfast, having woken late, and then kissed Charlotte long and gently, and left at a run to take an omnibus to see the medical examiner again.
Charlotte set about the small chores of the day, beginning with a pile of ironing, while Gracie washed the breakfast dishes and then cleaned and blacked the grate in the parlor, laid the fire for the evening, swept the floor and dusted, and made the beds.
At eleven o’clock they both stopped for a cup of tea and a chance to gossip.
“Is the master still on the case o’ the man wot was crucified in the stable yard?” Gracie asked with an elaborately casual air, stirring her tea in apparent concentration.
“I’m not really sure,” Charlotte replied without any pretense at all. “You haven’t any sugar!”
Gracie grinned and stopped stirring. “Won’t ’e tell you nuffing?”
“Oh yes—but the more he looks into it, the less it seems as if Judge Stafford could have found out anything new about it. And if he didn’t, then there isn’t any reason why anybody from that case should have killed him.”
“Then ’oo did? ’Is wife?” Gracie was transparently disappointed. Domestic murder was so much less interesting, especially if it were simply a matter of an affair, and the other party involved was known to them, and not really scandalous.
“I suppose so, or Mr. Pryce.”
Gracie stared at her, ignoring her tea.
“What’s wrong, ma’am? Don’t you think that’s ’oo did it?”
Charlotte smiled. “I don’t know. I suppose they might. I just keep remembering how I felt when I watched her the evening her husband died. Maybe it’s vanity to think I could not be so wrong in my judgment.”
“Maybe it was ’er lover, an’ she didn’t know nuffing about it?” Gracie suggested, trying to be helpful.
“Maybe—but I rather liked him too.” Charlotte sipped her tea and caught Gracie’s eye over the top of the cup.
“ ’Oo is it as you don’t like?” Gracie was ever practical.
“No one yet. But I’ve liked people who were guilty before.”
“ ’Ave yer? Really?” Gracie’s eyes were wide with interest and amazement.
“It depends why.” Charlotte thought she ought to explain. She was about to elaborate, recalling some of Pitt’s cases in which she had been involved, when the doorbell rang, and Gracie, in a flurry of surprise, put down her cup, stood up, straightened her skirts and scampered down the corridor to answer it.
She returned a moment later with Caroline, who was smartly dressed, but obviously she had dressed somewhat hurriedly, and without her usual attention to detail. After the greetings had been exchanged, and the answers that all were in good health, Caroline sat down at the kitchen table, accepted the tea Gracie gave her, and explained her reason for having come. She took a breath and plunged in.
“How is Thomas progressing with the murder of poor Mr. Stafford? Has he learned anything yet?”
“How devious and indirect you are, Mama,” Charlotte said with amusement.
“What?”
“You used to criticize me for being too blunt,” Charlotte replied cheerfully. “You said people did not like it, and that one should always approach things a little sideways, to give people a chance to avoid the subject if they wish.”
“Nonsense!” Caroline expostulated, but there was a distinct pinkness in her cheeks. “Anyway, that was with strangers, and with gentlemen—and I am neither. And what I said was that it is indelicate to be too forthright—it is …”
“I know—I know.” Charlotte waved her hand. “I am afraid he has discovered nothing new about the Farriers’ Lane murder. He has no idea why Judge Stafford should have been looking into it again. It seems quite beyond question that Aaron Godman was guilty.”
“Oh—oh dear. Poor Miss Macaulay.” Caroline shook her head minutely, her face full of sorrow. “I think she really believed her brother was innocent. This will be very hard for her.”
Charlotte put her hand on her mother’s. “I only said he had found nothing new, so far. I don’t think he will give up, unless it was Mrs. Stafford or Mr. Pryce, or both of them.”