Then he brightened. “I’ll tell you what—I shall ask Eloise. She will confide in me if there is anything—that I promise you—and I shall report it to you if it has any bearing whatsoever on Mina’s death. Will you accept that? I’m sure you would not wish to distress anyone more than is absolutely necessary.”
Pitt was torn. He remembered all the white, stricken faces he had ever seen of people who had encountered death, especially sudden and violent death. Those faces came back to him each time it occurred again: the surprise, the hurt, the slow acceptance that one cannot evade truth as the shock wears off and the reality remains, like growing cold, creeping deeper and deeper.
But he could not afford to let Tormod Lagarde make his judgments for him.
“No, I’m afraid that won’t do.”
He saw Tormod’s face change, the mouth set hard and the eyes chill.
“I’m quite happy that you should be present,” Pitt continued without changing his own expression or his voice. A smile remained fixed on his lips. “In fact, if you prefer to ask her yourself, I’m quite agreeable. I understand your concern that she should not be harassed or reminded of other tragedies. But since I know facts that you cannot know about Mrs. Spencer-Brown’s death, I must hear Miss Lagarde’s answers for myself, and not as you interpret them to me with the best intention in the world.”
Tormod met his eyes, stared at him for a few moments in surprise, then took a step backward and, with a swing of his arm, reached for the bell rope.
“Ask Miss Lagarde to come into the morning room, will you Bevan?” he said when the butler appeared.
“Thank you,” Pitt said, acknowledging the concession.
Tormod did not reply, turning instead to look out of the window at the gray drizzle that was beginning to thicken the air and dull the outlines of the houses across the Place. The laurel leaves outside hung glistening drops from their points.
When Eloise arrived, she was pale but perfectly composed. She kept her shawl close around her, and met Pitt’s gaze candidly.
As soon as the door opened, Tormod went to her, putting his arm around her shoulders.
“Eloise, darling. Inspector Pitt has to ask you some questions about poor Mina. I’m sure you understand that since we were the last people to see her, he feels we may know something of her state of mind just before she died.”
“Of course,” Eloise said calmly. She sat down on the sofa and regarded Pitt steadily, only the bare interest of courtesy in her face. The reality of death was seemingly greater than any curiosity.
“There’s no need to be afraid,” Tormod said to her gently.
“Afraid?” She seemed surprised. “I’m not afraid.” She lifted her head to look at Pitt. “But I don’t think I can tell you anything that is of value.”
Tormod glanced at him warningly, then back at Eloise.
“Do you remember I left you for a while?” he asked her, his voice very soft, almost as if encouraging a child. “You had been speaking of little things until then—fashion and gossip. Did she confide any other matter to you when you were alone? Anything of the heart? A love, or a fear? Perhaps someone she was becoming fond of?”
Eloise’s mouth moved in a fraction of a smile. “If you mean did she love someone other than her husband,” she said without expression in her voice, “I have no reason to think so. She certainly did not speak of it to me—then or at any other time. I’m not sure if she believed in love of the storybook kind. She believed in passions—lust and pity, and loneliness—but they are quite different things, not really love. They pass when the hunger is satisfied, or the need for pity removed—or when one grows exhausted with loneliness. These things are not love.”
“Eloise!” Tormod’s arm tightened around her and his hand held the flesh of her arm so hard it made white marks on her skin that Pitt could see even through the muslin of her dress. “I’m so sorry!” His voice was soft, a whisper. “I had no idea Mina would speak of such things to you or I would never have left you alone with her.” He swung around to stare at Pitt. “There’s your answer, Inspector! Mrs. Spencer-Brown was a woman who was disillusioned in some tragic way, and she wished to unburden herself of it to someone. Unfortunately she chose my sister, an unmarried girl—which I find hard to forgive, except that she must have been desperate! God have pity on her!
“Now I think you have learned enough from us. I’m taking Eloise away from here, away from Rutland Place, until the worst of the shock is over, and she can rest in the country and put this from her mind. I don’t know what Mrs. Spencer-Brown indicated to her about her private agonies, but I will not permit you to press her any further. It is obviously a—an intimate and extremely painful subject. I trust you are gentleman sufficient to understand that?”
“Tormod—” Eloise began.
“No, my dear, the Inspector can discover whatever else he needs to know in some other fashion. Poor Mina seems unquestionably to have taken her own life. There was nothing you could have done about it, and I will not have you blame yourself in any way at all! We may never know what it was that she could no longer bear, and perhaps it is better that we should not. A person’s most terrible griefs should be buried decently with them. There are things that lie so close to the heart of a person, every decency of man or God demands they remain private!” He lifted his head and glared at Pitt, defying him to contend.
Pitt looked at them sitting side by side on the sofa. He would get nothing more from Eloise, and in truth he was inclined to agree that Mina’s suffering, whatever it was, deserved to be buried with her, not turned over, weighed, and measured by other hands, even the impersonal ones of the police.
He stood up. “Quite,” he said succinctly. “Once I am sure that it was simply a tragedy and there has been no crime, even of negligence, then it would be far better if we all left the matter to be forgotten in kinder memories.”
Tormod relaxed, his shoulders easing, the fabric of his coat falling back to its natural lines. He stood up also and extended his hand, holding Pitt’s in a hard grip.
“I’m glad you see it so. Good day to you, Inspector.”
“Good day, Mr. Lagarde.” Pitt turned a little. “Miss Lagarde. I hope your stay in the country is pleasant.”
She smiled at him with uncertainty, something that struck her with doubt, even a presage of fear.
“Thank you,” she said in little more than a whisper.
Outside in the street Pitt walked slowly along, trying to compose his thoughts. Everything so far indicated some private grief, nursed to herself, that had finally overwhelmed Mina Spencer-Brown and driven her to take, quite deliberately, an overdose of something she already possessed. Probably it would prove to be her husband’s medicine containing the belladonna, which Dr. Mulgrew had spoken of.
But before he allowed it to rest, he must ask the other women who had known her. If anyone was aware of her secret, it would be one of them, either from some imparted confidence or merely from observation. He had learned how much a relatively idle woman could perceive in others simply because she had no business and few duties to occupy her. People were her whole concern: relationships, secrets, those to be told and those to be kept.
He called on Ambrosine Charrington first, because she was the farthest away and he wanted to walk. In spite of the thickening rain he was not yet ready to face anyone else. Once, he even stopped altogether as a ginger cat stalked across the footpath in front of him, shook himself in disgust at the wet, and slipped into the shelter of the shrubbery. Perhaps, Pitt thought, he should not disturb the slow settling of grief. Maybe it was no subject for police, and he should go now, turn and walk away, catch the omnibus back to the police station, and deal with some theft or forgery until Mulgrew and the police surgeon put in their reports.