Ashworth Hall

11

IT WAS NOT EASY searching for the suppers with the blue heels. Charlotte excused herself from the luncheon table, pleading an unnamed indisposition. Let people assume it was a discomfort of the stomach. That was something about which no one would enquire too closely, nor would anyone feel compelled to follow her. For such things one wished privacy above all.

As soon as she was out of earshot of the dining room, she ran across the hall and up the stairs. A footman looked at her anxiously but said nothing. It was not his place to query the eccentric behavior of guests.

It had not been Kezia that Gracie had seen on the landing, of that Charlotte was almost certain. Kezia was too handsomely built. It could have been any other one of the three remaining female guests. She feared it was Eudora. She, above all, had a reason any woman could understand.

Charlotte already knew which was each person’s room. She would start with Eudora, who, thank goodness, had been persuaded to join everyone else for luncheon. It would have been dreadfully awkward if either of the two recently widowed women had decided to remain in their rooms, which they could well have done without needing to offer any further explanation. Emily had had to work hard to achieve that. But Emily was a good diplomat, and she was certainly fully persuaded of the necessity for solving this crime most urgently. She was still finding it very hard to keep her composure and not give way to her fear for Jack. At least there was something she could do, some oudet for her physical and mental energies, a way of helping.

Charlotte knocked on Eudora’s bedroom door, just in case Doll should be there.

There was no answer.

She opened the door and went in, and straight through to the dressing room. There was no time to consider anything now except which cupboard housed Eudora’s boots and shoes. She looked in the first and saw rows of gowns. It was horrible searching through another woman’s clothes without her knowledge. They were beautiful, heavy silks and taffetas, fine quality laces, smooth wools and gabardines. There was a rich fur collar on a traveling cape. They were colors which would have suited Charlotte perfectly. And none of these would be borrowed! She felt a prick of envy.

That was absurd! Who would want a queen’s ransom of clothes at the price of being married to a man like Ainsley Greville?

The boots and shoes were on the rack below the dresses and on shelves to one side. They were as she had thought, all earth colors and warm tones, nothing blue or with blue heels.

She did not know if she was relieved or not. That meant it was either Iona or Justine. She would like it to be Iona.

It was a grubby thing searching through other people’s bedrooms. They were so personal. It was the one place where you were most yourself, when your secrets and pretenses were taken away, where you let down your guard and allowed yourself to be vulnerable, naked in every sense, and asleep. Eudora’s room had a faint odor of lilies and something heavier, spicier. It must be a perfume she liked.

Charlotte went to the door and opened it, looking outside cautiously, which she realized was pointless as soon as she did it. If anyone saw the door move at all, they would see her. She had no possible excuse. There was nothing she could say to justify being in Eudora’s room.

There was no one there.

She slipped out just as Doll came around the corner. She looked prettier than Charlotte had seen her before, and for the first time she was smiling. Her head was high and she moved easily and lightly. Charlotte had no idea what had caused the change, but her start at being seen gave way immediately to a surge of happiness. If anyone in this house deserved a little joy, it was Doll.

“Afternoon, Mrs. Pitt,” Doll said cheerfully. “Can I help you? Do you need something?”

Charlotte was a long way from her own room, and she could hardly claim to be lost. She scrambled for a he which would be credible—and failed to find one.

“No, thank you,” she said simply, and then hurried past Doll towards the end of the corridor and the landing. It was a nuisance. She wanted to search Justine’s room, but Doll would still be around. They might be finishing luncheon, and Emily could not hold them indefinitely. Searching Eudora’s room had already taken some time, long enough for a complete course at least.

She could not afford to hesitate. She had better try Iona’s room.

She glanced around just to make sure there was no other servant in sight, then opened the door and went in. The floral curtains were drawn wide and the room was full of sunlight. Lorcan’s brushes and his personal effects like collar studs and cuff links were gone from the tallboy, but when she went across to the wardrobes his clothes were still hanging there, and his boots beneath. It was an unpleasant sensation, a reminder of the closeness of life and death. An instant and one was changed into the other. Yesterday morning he had been alive. He had been far braver, more selfless than she had imagined him. Now it was too late to get to know him or know anything of the man he had really been behind the rather brittle exterior and the passionate hatreds and ambitions behind which he had hidden his virtues. He had seemed so cold, and yet he could not have been.

How did Iona feel now? Was that part of the beginning of the end of her romance with Fergal Moynihan? And it did seem as if they were feeling a sudden chill, a realization of the differences between them which no amount of fascination could overcome.

She tried the next wardrobe. It held gowns, but not as many as she had expected. There were dark blues, dark greens, a rich, lush purple which she envied. They were dramatic colors, highly flattering to dark hair and blue eyes. Iona knew how to make the best of herself. From the shawls and blouses, she also knew how to make a relatively small wardrobe look much larger.

There were three pairs of boots, brown, black and fawn, and one pair of slippers, mid-green.

She closed the door and took another quick glance around. There was nothing else of interest. Her eye caught the waste-paper basket, a pretty thing of woven wicker with a flower motif on the side. There were pieces of torn paper in it. It was an appalling thing to do, but she went over and picked up two or three of them. She looked at them. It was inexcusable. They were part of a love letter from Fergal. There were only a few words, but it was unmistakable.

She dropped them again quickly, her face hot. Kezia was going to have a lot to be generous over, if she could find it in her. Perhaps Fergal would have learned something about infatuation, and about love and loss, and how easy it is to follow one’s desires, and need the compassion of those you have treated lightly, when your own time of loneliness and defeat comes.

Out on the landing there was nothing left but to go back to Justine’s room. Unless it was Kezia after all, it must be Justine.

She looked very carefully from left to right to see if Doll were still anywhere in sight, but thank heaven she was not.

Charlotte ran along the corridor and, after the very briefest rap on the door, threw it open and slipped inside, closing it behind her as quickly as she could.

It was smaller, prepared in haste for an unexpected guest. The dressing room was barely big enough for the wardrobes, dressing table, and small central table with a lace cloth and a low easy chair beside it, and a pleasant fireplace. She looked in the first wardrobe. There were several dresses, all of very good quality and apparently bought within the last year or two. The colors varied but were suitable for a young, unmarried woman. Justine might lack family; she certainly was not without funds. Her parents, or some other relative, had left her very well provided for.

She looked at the shoes and boots. They too were of very fine make and style. None were blue or had blue heels.

She could not stay there any longer. Anyone could leave the table for a dozen different reasons, and she would be caught here. She would look like a petty thief at worst, or at best an unpleasantly nosy woman who snooped through other people’s clothes and personal belongings.

On second thought, perhaps it was better simply to be thought a thief!

She went out into the corridor and had only just reached the landing when she saw Justine at the head of the stairs.

“Are you feeling better?” Justine asked solicitiously.

Charlotte felt as if she must be blushing scarlet. “Yes … yes, thank you,” she stammered. “Much better. I … I wasn’t nearly as ill as I thought. Maybe the room was a little warm. A … a drink of water.” That was a stupid remark. There was plenty of water available in the dining room. It was the easiest place to find it. And the room had not been hot. Her guilt must be standing out like spilled wine on a clean tablecloth.

Justine smiled.

“I’m so glad. I expect it is just the distress of the last few days. I am sure it will affect all of us, one way or another.”

“Yes,” Charlotte said gratefully. “Yes, that will be what it is.”

Justine walked past her. She moved extraordinarily grace fully, back straight, head high, a very slight swing to her skirts. One side brushed against one of the chairs on the landing. Charlotte, who was staring after her, saw a glimpse of heel, blue heel. Justine’s gown was smoky gray-blue, with darker patterning on it. Blue slippers were right. On the first evening she had been there, when Greville had been killed, she had worn another blue dress.

Charlotte stood on the spot as if she truly were faint. She found herself gripping the railing to steady herself. Perhaps Gracie had been mistaken? She had seen the heel only for an instant. Maybe it had been gray or green? Gaslight could be misleading. It could alter colors, everyone knew that, certainly every woman. There were colors which suited perfectly in the daylight, and by gaslight made one look a hundred and jaundiced into the bargain.

She was still in the same spot when Emily came up the stairs towards her.

“What’s the matter?” Emily demanded. “You look terrible. You aren’t really ill, are you?”

“No. I saw the shoes ….”

Emotion crowded Emily’s face—elation, fear, anxiety.

“Good! Whose are they?” she demanded.

“Justine’s. She’s wearing them right now.”

Emily stared at her. “Are you sure?”

“No … yes. No, I’m not sure. Except I am, because they aren’t anyone else’s.”

Emily said nothing. She looked suddenly sad, hurt, as Charlotte felt.

“I must go and tell Thomas,” Charlotte said after a moment or two. “I wish it were not her.”

“Why?” Emily shook her head.

“Because I like her ….” Charlotte said lamely.

“No … I mean why would she kill Greville,” Emily clarified. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

“I know that.” Charlotte started to move at last. “But she had the shoes. That’s what I’m going to tell Thomas … just that she had the shoes.”

As soon as Charlotte entered the withdrawing room Pitt stood up, excusing himself to the others, and came towards her, his face intent.

“Are you all right?” he asked her in barely more than a whisper. “You do look rather pale. Did you find the shoes?”

“Yes …”

“Well? Where are they?” Now he looked pale as well, his eyes hollow, dark-ringed from lack of sleep. “Are they Eudora’s?”

She managed the ghost of a smile. She would have preferred it if they were.

“No … they are Justine’s. She’s wearing them now.”

He stared at her. “Justine’s?” He said exactly what Emily had. “Are you sure? It makes no sense! Why on earth would Justine want to kill Ainsley Greville? She only met him—” he stopped.

Padraig Doyle moved forward from the fire where he had been standing. “Are you all right, Mrs. Pitt?” he asked with some concern.

“I’m sure she will be,” Pitt said quickly, putting his arm around Charlotte. “I think it would be better if she went upstairs and lay down. The long journey to London yesterday must have been too much for her. Please excuse us both?” And with a charming smile he guided Charlotte out of the room and closed the door behind them as Kezia also politely wished Charlotte restored health.

“You make me sound like some drooping lily,” she said hotly the moment they went out of earshot. “One trip on the train and I faint all over the place. They’ll think I’m too feeble for words.”

“We can’t afford to care what they think,” he replied impatiently. “Come on upstairs. We have to reason this through and make some kind of sense out of it.”

She went obediently. She had no desire to sit through an afternoon’s polite conversation in the withdrawing room, and if Justine returned she would not be able to hide the confusion or the sadness she felt. She thought she was quite a good actress and could mask her feelings rather well, but Emily said she was awful. On reasonable consideration, with some honesty, it was possible Emily was right.

Up on the landing Pitt turned not towards their room but in the opposite direction, towards the Grevilles’ bathroom. He opened the door and went in. She followed with a shiver, although in fact it was not cold, except to the mind.

“Why in here?” she said quickly. “I can think just as well in the bedroom.”

“I want to re-create exactly what happened,” he replied, closing and locking the door.

“Will that help?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Perhaps not.” He looked at her with raised eyebrows. “Have you got a better idea?”

She felt a kind of desperation welling up inside her. She tried to steady her mind. Whatever the outcome was, there must be reason in it, emotional reason. Nobody was mad, acting from unconnected, irrational motives, it was simply that there was something important that they did not know.

“She must have had a reason,” she said, not directly in answer. “I don’t think it’s anything to do with Ireland. It must be personal. Perhaps we were wrong in assuming they don’t know each other?”

“They neither of them showed the slightest sign of recognition when she came in that first time,” he pointed out, sitting on the edge of the bath.

“Which only means that they did not want anyone else to know they knew each other,” she said reasonably. “Which in turn means it was not a relationship they could acknowledge.”

He frowned. “But the types of women he was used to were servants and the looser-moraled wives of acquaintances. Justine doesn’t appear to be either of those.”

“Well, if she did know him in that way,” she said with a shudder, “it would provide an excellent reason for her wanting him dead before he could perhaps tell Piers and ruin her prospects of marriage. Added to which, I think she really loves Piers, and I am certain he loves her.”

Pitt sighed. “I have little doubt that Greville would have told him when he had the opportunity. He wouldn’t want his only son marrying a woman who used to be his own mistress, if that word could be used of the way he regarded women.”

“Well, not for Doll Evans, poor creature,” she said bitterly. “And from what you said, possibly not for some of the others he discarded.”

He bent forward and started to unfasten his boots.

“What are you doing?” she asked him.

“Going to reenact what happened,” he replied. “I don’t want to scratch the bath. I’ll take Greville’s part, you take Justine’s.” He took off his boot and began to undo the other.

“I’ll start from the door,” she said. “I’m not going outside. You can pretend I have towels.”

He looked up at her with a bleak smile and took off his other boot. He stood up and climbed into the bath. He lay down gingerly, trying to arrange himself as he remembered Greville.

She watched from the door.

“All right,” he said after a moment. “Come in as if you had a pile of towels.”

She held up her arms and walked forward. He was looking straight at her.

“This doesn’t work,” he answered. “You had better get towels and come in here properly, holding them in front of you. The screen wasn’t up; the room was just like this. He was lying with his head a little to one side, I think.”

“Shouldn’t I get Tellman?” she suggested. “To make sure it was just the same? Maybe he could take Greville’s part and you could watch?”

“He isn’t tall enough,” he agreed. “But yes, fetch him, by all means. And get the towels. If we are right about them knowing each other, he would have said something, surely, if she had come into the bathroom? Didn’t he suspect what she might do?”

“I doubt it,” she said with a slight smile. “He was an arrogant man. He’d used and thrown aside a lot of women. Maybe he thought she was going to plead for his mercy or his discretion.”

“Then she was a bigger fool than I take her for,” Pitt said grimly.

She went out, leaving him lying in the bath looking glum, and went to find Tellman. It did not take her long, and she returned less than ten minutes later with him and also a pile of half a dozen towels.

“Don’t see what it’ll accomplish,” Tellman observed with a shrug and a wary look at Pitt, who did look somewhat odd. Charlotte had told him about Justine and the blue slippers. He had been surprised, and she thought disconcerted also, but she was guessing from the expression in his face. He had not said anything.

Pitt did not reply, but slid back down to the position he thought Greville had occupied and looked at Charlotte to begin again.

She held the towels on one arm and closed the door behind her, as if she had just entered.

“You’re not lying right,” Tellman criticized Pitt. “He had his head a bit more to that side.”

“It wouldn’t make any difference,” Charlotte pointed out. “He could still see me unless I held the towels up in front of my face.” She did it in demonstration. “And I wouldn’t have to look towards him.”

“You would as you passed him to go behind.” Tellman was thoroughly argumentative. He looked back at Pitt. “And you still aren’t in the right position. You are too straight.”

Pitt obligingly slid further sideways.

Tellman regarded him. “Now you’ve changed your shoulders as well. He had his head more to one side—”

“Does it matter?” Charlotte interrupted. “It wouldn’t affect what he could see.”

“Maybe he was asleep?” Tellman said without conviction. “That would account for why he didn’t react or call out.”

“She couldn’t rely on that,” Pitt pointed out. “And Justine wouldn’t leave anything to that kind of chance.”

“It was a crime of opportunity.” Tellman was still disposed to argue.

“No it wasn’t,” Charlotte contradicted him. “She was dressed as a maid. That meant she thought about it and planned it. She must have brought the lace cap up from the laundry room, even if she took a dress from somewhere closer. She chose the only style of cap which would hide her own hair.”

“Well, you still aren’t lying right.” Tellman was immovable. He went over to Pitt and put his hand on the side of Pitt’s head. “You should be another three inches over that way.” He pushed gently.

“Oh!” Pitt let out a cry. “Three inches that way and my neck would be broken!” he said sharply.

Tellman froze. Then he straightened very slowly, his body rigid.

Pitt let out a long sigh, then sat up in the bath, staring at Charlotte.

“Are you sure?” Charlotte whispered. “Absolutely sure?”

“Yes!” Tellman replied sharply, but his very stubbornness was a doubt.

“Only one way.” Pitt climbed out of the bath, characteristically without bothering to straighten his clothes. “We’ll have to go to the icehouse and have a look at the body.” He walked towards the bathroom door.

“Boots,” Charlotte said quickly.

“What?”

“Boots,” she replied, pointing to his boots at the end of the bath.

He came back and put them on absentmindedly, smiling at her for a moment, then following Tellman.

But he got no further than the landing when he met Gracie, her face pinched with anxiety, her cap gone, her apron crumpled.

“Please sir, I gotter see yer!” she said desperately, her eyes on Pitt’s, completely ignoring Tellman beside him, and Charlotte standing in the bathroom doorway. “It’s private ….”

He could see the importance of it to her, whether it proved to be real or not to anyone else. He did not hesitate.

“Yes, of course. We’ll go back into the bathroom.” He turned and walked past Tellman, leaving him on the landing, and caught Charlotte’s eye, hoping she would understand. He closed the door after Gracie. “What is it?”

She looked absolutely wretched, her small hands clenched in her apron, making it like a rag.

“Wot does dynamite look like, sir?”

He controlled his surprise with an effort, and the immediate leap of both hope and fear.

“White and solid, a bit like candle tallow, only a bit different to touch.”

“Sort o’… sweaty?” she asked, a catch in her voice.

“Yes … that’s right. They sometimes wrap it in red paper.”

“I seen some. I’m sorry, sir, I went there, but I can explain. It weren’t nothin’ wrong.” She looked thoroughly frightened.

“I hadn’t thought it would be, Gracie,” he said, more or less honestly. This was sounding like Charlotte’s area of jurisdiction. He certainly was not going to interfere. “Where was it?”

“In Finn ’Ennessey’s room, sir.” She colored painfully. “I went ter tell ’im I were sorry for makin’ ’im look at the truth about Neassa Doyle an’ Drystan O’Day and Mr. Chinnery. You see, I made ’im look at the newspaper pieces.”

“What newspaper pieces?”

“Them wot Mrs. Pitt brought back from Lunnon. It proved Mr. Chinnery couldn’t a’ done it, ’cos ’e were dead.”

“But that was thirty years ago. It wouldn’t be in today’s newspapers,” he said reasonably. “Are you sure you have that right, Gracie?”

“Yes sir. They was old newspapers … just pieces like.”

“Old newspaper cuttings?” he said in disbelief.

“Yeah. She brung ’em back from Lunnon.” Her face was completely innocent and full of fear.

“Did she indeed? I’ll speak to Mrs. Pitt about that later. So you saw what looked like dynamite in Finn Hennessey’s room?”

“Yes sir.”

“Does he know you saw it?”

“I …” She lowered her eyes. She looked wretched. “I fink so. ’E came after me later on, ter try an’ explain, I fink. I … I din’t listen … I jus’ ran.”

“How long ago did you see this dynamite, Gracie?”

She did not look at him. “About two hours,” she whispered.

He did not need to tell her that she should have reported it to him straightaway. She knew it already.

“I see. Then I had better go and speak to him about it. You stay here with Mrs. Pitt. And that’s an order, Gracie.”

“Yes sir.” Still she did not look up.

“Gracie …”

“Yeah …”

“He might have hidden it, because he knew you’d seen it, but he can’t have taken it off the premises.”

She looked up slowly.

He smiled at her.

Her eyes filled with tears which spilled over down her cheeks.

He put his hand on her shoulder very gently. “I know it’s hard,” he said. “But you did the only thing you could.”

She nodded and sniffed.

He patted her, wishing he could do more, and went out to find Tellman.

Charlotte looked at him inquiringly.

“I think we have to arrest Finn Hennessey,” he said almost under his breath. “I wish I didn’t.”

Her face crumpled with sorrow, and she turned to the bathroom to go immediately to Gracie.

“Come on.” Pitt strode ahead along the corridor, leaving Tellman to follow behind, torn whether to stay or go, hating every step of it.

At the top of the main stairs they found Wheeler looking surprisingly cheerful. For a man whose employer had just been murdered and who therefore was about to be without a position, his general air of well-being was extraordinary. He seemed to glow with some inner secret which buoyed him up and filled him with joy.

“Do you know where Hennessey is?” Pitt asked him.

“Yes sir,” Wheeler said instantly. “He is in the stable yard talking to one of the grooms. Seems to have made friends. Poor young man has nothing much to do now that Mr. McGinley is dead.”

“Rather like yourself,” Pitt observed.

Wheeler looked faintly surprised. “Why yes, I suppose it is.” He did not seem greatly perturbed by it, and having ascertained that that was all he could do to be of assistance, he continued on his way.

“What’s wrong with him?” Tellman demanded angrily, catching up with Pitt to walk side by side with him along the passageway towards the side door. “He looks like he ate the cream instead of a man without a job.”

“I don’t know,” Pitt replied. “I would guess it has something to do with Doll Evans. I hope so.” He shot Tellman a dazzling smile, then went out of the door and strode across the ground towards the stable gates, leaving Tellman to follow after.

Finn Hennessey was standing in the yard talking to a groom who was lounging against the stable door. They were sheltered from the wind and it was quite mild out there in the late afternoon. Pitt dropped his pace to an amble. He did not want Finn to run, and then have to chase him in an unpleasant scene. It would all be painful enough. He saw Tellman walk past and go to the far side of the yard, as if he intended going through the gates and into the drive.

“Mr. Hennessey,” Pitt said, stopping in front of him.

Finn looked around and straightened up, throwing away the straw he had been chewing. The groom seemed unaware of anything untoward.

“Yes?” Finn said, then saw something in Pitt’s eyes, in his face, or even the tension in his body. For a second of prickling silence he stood poised on the edge of flight, panic in his face. Then he realized there was nowhere to run to, and he relaxed. A curious rigidity took hold of him. His body stiffened as though in anticipation of a blow, and a veil came over the directness of his eyes. “Yes?” he said again.

Pitt had seen that look before. He had not really expected Hennessey to tell him anything, but the faint hope of it died that moment.

“Finn Hennessey, I would like to question you about the dynamite placed in Mr. Radley’s study and exploded by Mr. McGinley, we assume, in an attempt to make it safe. Do you know where that dynamite came from?”

“No,” Finn said with a faint smile.

“I have reason to believe there may still be some in your room,” Pitt said grimly. “I intend to go and look. If, of course, you have removed it and placed it somewhere else, then it would be better for you if you tell me where it is before it explodes and hurts someone else … almost certainly someone who has no part in your quarrel.”

“I’m saying nothing,” Finn replied, then stood still, his head lifted, his eyes straight ahead.

Tellman came up behind him and slipped on the handcuffs. The groom looked aghast. He opened his mouth to speak and then found he had nothing to say.

Pitt turned and left to go and search Hennessey’s room. He took the butler, Dlikes, with him, in case he should find something and later require a witness to the fact.

Dlikes stood in the doorway somberly, deeply unhappy at the whole affair. Pitt went into the room and began methodically to go through cupboards and drawers. He found the candles and the one stick of dynamite inside a tall boot at the back of the wardrobe. It was out of sight, but hardly hidden. Hennessey had either been sure enough of Gracie or had thought it not worth trying to hide in some other place less obviously his. Maybe his type of loyalty extended to not attempting to lay the blame on anyone else. He was a passionate believer in his cause, not a murderer for hire or for personal satisfaction.

There was paper ash in the bowl. It could have been anything, possibly the letter Gracie saw on the table. He had taken care at least to destroy everything to link him to someone else. That was worth a kind of oblique respect.

Pitt showed the dynamite to Dlikes, then replaced it and requested the butler to lock the door and give him the key. If there was another key, he was to find that and give it to Pitt also. There was a storeroom with a grille window and a stout door where Hennessey could remain until the local police took him away, perhaps tomorrow or the day after.

Pitt went back to Finn again, with Tellman, and told him about finding the dynamite.

“I’m not saying anything,” Finn repeated, looking directly at Pitt. “I know my cause is just. I’ve lived for Irish freedom. I’ll die for it if I have to. I love my country and its people. I’ll just be one more martyr in the cause.”

“Being hanged for a murder you committed is not martyrdom,” Pitt replied tartly. “Most people would regard murdering your employer, a man who trusted you, another Irishman fighting for the same cause, as a pretty shabby and cowardly betrayal. And not only that, but pointless as well. What did killing McGinley achieve? He wanted exactly the same as you did.”

“I didn’t kill McGinley,” Finn said stubbornly. “I didn’t put the dynamite there.”

“You expect us to believe that?” Pitt said with disdain.

“I don’t care a damn what you believe!” Finn spat back. “You’re just another English oppressor forcing your will on a defenseless people.”

“You’re the one with the dynamite,” Pitt retaliated. “You’re the one who blew up McGinley, not me.”

“I didn’t put the dynamite there! Anyway, it wasn’t meant for McGinley, you fool,” Finn said contemptuously. “It was for Radley! I’d have thought you’d realize that—” He stopped.

Pitt smiled. “If you didn’t put it there, how do you know who it was meant for?”

“I’m saying nothing,” Finn repeated angrily. “I don’t betray my friends. I’ll die first.”

“Probably,” Pitt agreed. But he also knew that he would get little more from him, and grudgingly he respected his courage, if little else. “You are being used,” he added from the door.

Finn smiled. His face was very pale, and there was a sweat of fear on his lip. “But I know by whom, and what for, and I’m willing. Can you say as much?”

“I believe so,” Pitt replied. “Are you as sure that those you’ve used feel as certain?”

Finn’s jaw tightened. “You use who you have to. The cause justifies it.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Pitt replied, this time with absolute certainty. “If it destroys what is good in you, then it is a bad cause, or you have misunderstood it. Everything you do becomes part of it and part of you. You can’t take it off, like old clothes, when you get there. It’s not clothes, Finn, it’s your flesh.”

“No, it isn’t!” Finn shouted after him, but Pitt shut the door and walked slowly back towards the kitchens and then into the main part of the house. He was miserable, and inside him there was a deep, hard anger. Finn had been gullible, like thousands of others. The worst in him had been wooed and won, then used by more cynical people. Certainly he had been willing to choose violence to right the wrongs he perceived. He had not cared who was hurt by it. But he had had the courage of his beliefs. He had taken at least some of the risks himself. Behind him were other men, hidden, who had prompted him to his acts, who had perpetuated the old legends and lies and used them to motivate the repeating violence.

He would dearly like to have known who wrote the letter Finn had burned. That was the man he wanted. And it was probably someone in this house. He feared it was Padraig Doyle.

He went to the library, where what was left of the conference was still proceeding. He knocked and went in. Moynihan and O’Day were sitting at one side of the table, Jack and Doyle on the other. They all looked up as Pitt came in.

“Excuse me, gentlemen,” he apologized. “But I must speak with Mr. Radley. I am sorry, but it cannot wait.”

Moynihan glanced at O’Day, who was watching Pitt.

“Of course,” Doyle said quickly. “I hope nothing further unpleasant has happened? No one is hurt?”

“Were you expecting something?” O’Day demanded.

Doyle merely smiled and waved his hand in dismissal.

Outside in the hall, Pitt told Jack about finding the dynamite and arresting Finn Hennessey.

Jack looked deeply unhappy. “What does it prove?” he said with a frown. “Who is behind him?”

“I don’t know,” Pitt admitted.

Jack was puzzled. “But we have O’Day’s word that neither McGinley nor Hennessey could have killed Greville!”

“I know. That was Justine—”

Jack’s jaw dropped. “What? Oh come, Thomas! You’ve made a mistake there. You must have. You’re not saying she’s behind this? She’s Irish?”

“No—no, that had nothing to do with politics.” Pitt sighed. “I don’t know the answer to that yet, only the evidence. She was seen by Gracie ….” He saw Jack’s face. “Her shoes were,” he tried to explain. “She was dressed as a maid. Gracie saw her back, but today remembered seeing her shoes as well ….” He stopped again. Jack’s expression made continuing unnecessary.

“I must tell Iona and Mrs. Greville that I have arrested Hennessey,” he said quietly. “If you can keep the men talking a little longer it would be very helpful.”

“Doyle?” Jack asked, his voice hard and sad.

“Probably,” Pitt agreed. He did not add that he wished it were not. He could see it in Jack’s face as well. But being likable and having a sense of humor and imagination were not mitigating factors in murder, simply coincidences, just added hurt after the difficulty and the ugliness and the waste of it.

Pitt found Iona alone in the long gallery staring out into the wind and the gathering dusk. She did not turn, and for several moments he stood watching her. Her face was completely immobile, her expression impossible to read. He wondered what was occupying her mind so intensely she was apparently unaware of anyone else having come into the room, let alone of being observed.

At first he thought it was a calmness in her. She seemed almost relaxed, the lines and tension somewhat gone from her features. There was no sense of pain in her, no torment, no violence of emotions, certainly not the anger which so often accompanied loss. There was no struggle to deny the reality, to go back and recapture the past before the bereavement.

Did she really not care, feel no pain or grief at the heroic death of her husband? For all her romantic songs, her poetry and music, was she essentially quite cold inside, a lover of the beauty of art, but dead to reality? It was a peculiarly repellent thought. He found himself shivering although the gallery was not cold.

“Mrs. McGinley …” He wanted to break the moment.

She turned towards him, not startled, simply mildly surprised.

“Yes, Mr. Pitt?”

He saw sadness and confusion in her eyes. She was lost, uncertain what she felt, only that it hurt. There was no excitement, no relief that she was free to go to Moynihan, or even resolution that she wanted to. Perhaps her emotion in seeking him had not been love so much as loneliness?

“I am sorry, Mrs. McGinley, but I have had to arrest your manservant, Finn Hennessey. He was in possession of dynamite.”

Her eyes widened. “Dynamite? Finn was?”

“Yes. It was in his room. He has not denied it, simply refused to give any explanation or say where he got it, though he denies making the bomb or placing it in the study.”

“Then who did?”

“I don’t know, yet, but it is only a matter of time now.” That was a lie, he felt no such certainty, but he wanted her to believe he did. She might even have been the one behind Finn, although he doubted it. He knew she had not placed the bomb herself; her time was accounted for by Moynihan and by Doyle. “I am telling you simply so you know why he is no longer available to you. I’m sorry.”

She turned away from him, looking out again towards the dusk beyond the window where rain now spattered the panes.

“He was always passionate about Ireland, about our freedom. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. But I really never thought he would hurt Lorcan. He loved Ireland as much as anyone.”

She was silent for a moment and when she continued there was a different kind of pain in her voice. “As long as I knew Lorcan, it was what he cared about most … more, I think, than he ever loved me. Freedom for Ireland was what he talked about, planned for, worked for all his life. No sacrifice of time or money was too much. I know it was meant for Mr. Radley, but if Finn knew it was there, you would think he would have stopped Lorcan going to try to …” She shook her head. “No, I suppose not. Perhaps they quarreled. He may have tried to stop him, and Lorcan was determined to defuse it anyway. I don’t know. I don’t even know why.” She blinked. “I seem to find there is so much confuses me now … things I thought I was certain of.”

He did not know what to say. He wished there was something comforting, an assurance that it would pass, but there was none. It would not necessarily resolve.

She looked at him and suddenly smiled very slightly. “I thought you were going to say something trite. Thank you for not doing so.”

He found himself coloring, immensely relieved he had not spoken. He looked at her for a moment longer, then turned and went.

In the evening, after dinner, Pitt was obliged to face the necessity of looking more closely at the body of Ainsley Greville. If Tellman were correct and he had lain in the bath at the angle described, then his neck had been broken. Perhaps it was possible the blow to the back of his skull had accomplished that, but he found it hard to believe, and he would not accept it without detailed examination. The blow, as he had seen it, would have been enough to concuss but not to cause death—unless it were a great deal harder than it had appeared to him. It did not seem at the right angle. If Greville’s neck were broken, then he had not drowned. Pitt needed to resolve it. Perhaps it made no difference to the charge, or to Justine’s guilt, but it was unexplained, and he would not leave it so.

He needed Piers’s help. And if it were necessary to do more than examine from the surface, then it would have to be Piers who did so. He should have Eudora’s permission. That was something he dreaded, but there was no alternative.

Charlotte saw him as he was starting up the stairs.

“Where are you going?” she asked, catching up with him, searching his face anxiously.

“To ask Piers to help me look at the body again,” he answered. “He’s upstairs with his mother. Anyway, I need her permission, or more properly, I would rather not take the time and trouble to apply for a legal writ.”

Her face tightened. “An autopsy?” she said huskily. “Thomas, you can’t ask Piers to do an autopsy on his own father! And … and when are you going to tell him it was Justine? What are you going to do about her?”

“Nothing yet,” he answered, meeting her gaze. She looked frightened and worried, and still her composure was complete. If she wanted or needed comfort there was no sign of it.

“Do you want me to come with you?” she offered. “In case Eudora is very distressed? Some people find the invasion of an autopsy very dreadful … as if in some way the person they loved could know about the … the intimacy of it.”

Instinct told him to decline.

“No, thank you. I think this is something better done with as few people involved as possible. I won’t even take Tellman.” He changed the subject. “How is Gracie? She’s taken this matter of Hennessey very bad.”

“I know,” she said softly, her face bleak with sadness and anger. “It will be hard for her for a while. I think the best thing we can do is say as little as possible. It will just take time.”

“By the way, Charlotte.” He looked very directly at her. “Where did you get the newspaper cuttings that Gracie showed to Hennessey?”

“Oh …” She colored uncomfortably. “I think … all things considered … you might prefer not to know that. Please don’t ask, then I shall not have to tell you.”

“Charlotte …”

She smiled at him dazzlingly, and before he could argue, she touched his hand, then turned and went downstairs.

Charlotte turned in the hall and watched him disappear around the newel at the top. Her momentary happiness vanished. She felt so alone she could have cried, which was ridiculous. She was tired. She seemed to have spent weeks trying to make things run smoothly, to prevent quarrels from becoming permanent rifts, trying to make light conversation when all any of them wanted to do was scream at each other, or weep with grief and fear, and now confusion and anxiety as well, and the dark pain of disillusion as things they thought they had known fell apart.

Emily was still terrified for Jack, and she had good cause. She was looking paler and more tired with each day. It was all pointless anyway; nobody was going to solve the Irish Problem. They would probably still be hating each other in fifty years. Was it worth one more life lost or broken?

And what about Eudora? How was she going to find the strength to comfort Piers when he heard the truth about Justine … whatever that truth was? Could he ever find peace within himself once he knew the woman he loved so much now had been his own father’s mistress—and then murdered him? His world was about to end.

And Eudora had not been close enough to him to give the gentleness, the silent understanding he would need. She had not been a large enough part of his experiences in the past to travel through this with him. He would not be able to allow her. Charlotte knew it already from the small things Eudora had said, but more from the way Eudora had watched him with Justine and not known how he would react, what would make him laugh or touch his emotions. Charlotte had felt Eudora’s sense of exclusion, as she felt the sudden chill of her own now.

She watched Pitt’s back as he reached the top of the stairs and wondered if he would turn and look at her. He must know she was still standing by the newel at the bottom.

But he did not. His mind was on Eudora and Piers, and what he must ask of them. So it should be. Perhaps hers was at least in part on Emily.

Aunt Vespasia’s advice seemed hollow. There was probably honor in it, but very little comfort. She turned away and went back to the withdrawing room. Kezia was alone. She ought to talk to her, not simply leave her.

“What do you need to look at him again for?” Piers asked with a shiver. He looked pale and tired, like everyone else, but in no sense afraid. It was perhaps the last evening he was going to have such an innocence.

“I would prefer to see if I am correct before I tell you,” Pitt replied, looking apologetically at Eudora, who had risen and was standing in front of the boudoir fire. She had not taken her eyes from Pitt’s face since he had come in. Thank heaven Justine was not there. She had apparently chosen to retire early.

“I suppose,” she said slowly. “If you must?”

“It matters, Mrs. Greville, or I would not ask,” he assured her. “I really am very sorry.” He was apologizing not only for the present, but for the future as well.

“I know.” She smiled at him, and there was a warmth in her he found it impossible to disbelieve. If it was indeed Doyle behind Finn Hennessey and the bomb, she was never going to heal from this. It would be a mortal wound. Half of him wanted to stay and offer whatever understanding or compassion was possible, the other half wanted to escape before he said or did something, or what he feared for her was betrayed in his face. He hesitated a moment.

She looked at him with increasing anxiety, as if she read his indecision and perceived the reasons.

He turned to Piers.

“There is no point in delaying what must be done,” he said grimly. “It is best to begin.”

Piers took a deep breath. “Yes, of course.” He glanced at his mother, seemed on the edge of saying something, then it eluded him. He moved to the door ahead of Pitt and held it open for him.

They went together, without speaking again, down the stairs, across the hall, through the baize door and along the passage past the kitchens and servants’ hall. Pitt collected the lanterns and led the way past the stillroom, gameroom, coal room, knife room, and general other storage and workplaces to the icehouse. He put the lantern down and took out the keys. Beside him Piers was standing rigidly, as though his muscles were locked. Perhaps Pitt should not have asked this of him? He hesitated with his hand on the key.

“What is it?” Piers asked.

Pitt still could not make a certain decision.

“What’s wrong?” Piers said again.

“Nothing.” It would not make any difference in the end. He put the key in the lock and turned it, then bent and picked up the lantern and went in. The cold hit him immediately, and the damp, slightly sickly smell. Or perhaps it was his imagination, knowing what was there.

“Is there a light?” Piers asked with a tremor in his voice.

“No, only the lanterns. I suppose they usually get the meat out during daylight,” Pitt replied. “And I expect leave the door open.”

Piers closed it and held the other lantern high. The room was quite large, stacked with blocks of ice. The floor was stone tile, with drains to carry off the surplus water. Carcasses of meat hung on hooks from the ceiling: beef, mutton, veal and pork. Offal sat in trays, and several strings of sausages looped over other hooks.

A large trestle table had been moved in, and the outlines of two human bodies were plainly visible under an old velvet dining room curtain, faded now.

Pitt took the curtain off and saw the white, oddly waxy face of Ainsley Greville. The other face, Lorcan McGinley’s, was so swathed in the remains of the study curtain to hide the blood and the injuries that it looked far less obviously human.

Piers took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

“What am I looking for?” he asked.

“His neck,” Pitt replied. “The angle of his head.”

“But he’s been moved. What does it matter now? He was hit from behind. We already know that.” Piers frowned. “What are you thinking, Mr. Pitt? What do you know now that we didn’t then?”

“Please look at his neck.”

“That blow wouldn’t break it.” Piers was puzzled. “But if it had, how does that alter anything?”

Pitt looked down at the body and nodded very slightly.

Piers obeyed. There was a very slight moment of reluctance, the knowledge of who it was he was touching so professionally, then he placed his fingers on the skull and moved it gently, then again, exploring, concentrating.

Pitt waited. The cold seemed to eat into him. No wonder meat kept well here. It was not far above freezing, if at all. The damp from the ice seemed to penetrate the flesh. The taste of dead things filled his mouth and nose.

The lanterns burned absolutely steadily. It was totally windless, almost airless in there.

“You’re right!” Piers looked up, his eyes wide and dark in the uncertain light. “His neck is broken. I don’t understand it. That blow shouldn’t have done that. It’s in the wrong place, and at the wrong angle.”

“Would that blow at the back have killed him?” Pitt asked.

Piers looked unhappy. “I’m not absolutely certain, but I don’t think so. I don’t see how it could.” He swallowed, and Pitt could see his throat jerk. “There would be no way of knowing if he was dead when he slid under the water ….”

Pitt waited.

“I could find out if there is water in the lungs. If there isn’t, then the broken neck killed him and he was already dead before he went under.”

“And the blow at the back?” Pitt asked again.

“I might be able to tell from that if it happened when he was alive, or dead, by the blood and the bruising. The bathwater washed the outside clean, of course.” Piers seemed hunched into himself, his face shadowed starkly in the lanternlight. “But if I … if I did a postmortem examination … at least … I don’t know if I … I am really qualified to give an opinion. I couldn’t in court, of course …. They wouldn’t accept my judgment.”

“Then you had better be very careful how you treat the evidence,” Pitt said with a bleak smile. “It could make a lot of difference, one way or the other.”

“Could it?” Piers sounded disbelieving.

Pitt thought of Justine, of Doll, and of Lorcan McGinley.

“Oh, yes.”

“I can’t do it here,” Piers said grimly. “I can’t see, for a start. And I’m so cold I can’t hold my hands still.”

“We’ll use one of the laundry rooms,” Pitt decided. “There’s running water and a good wooden scrubbing table. I don’t suppose you have any instruments with you?”

“I’m only a student.” Piers’s voice was tight and a little high. “But I’m very nearly qualified. I take my final exams this year.”

“Can you do this? I don’t want to send for the village doctor. He won’t be trained for this kind of thing either. To send to London for someone I would have to do it through the assistant commissioner, and it will take too long.”

“I understand.” Piers looked at him unwaveringly in the lanternlight. “You think it was my Uncle Padraig, and you want the proof before he leaves.”

There was no purpose in denying it.

“Can you work with the best kitchen knives, if they are sharpened?” Pitt said instead.

Piers flinched. “Yes.”

Carrying the body from the icehouse was a miserable and exceedingly awkward matter. It must not be handled roughly, or damage might be done which would destroy the very evidence they were looking for. Geville had been a large man, tall and well built. To place him on a door would make him impossibly heavy for Pitt, Tellman and Piers to carry unassisted.

“Well, we can’t get anyone else,” Tellman said tartly. “We’ll have to think of another way. I’ve seen enough of these servants to know what would happen if we used a footman. We’d be branded ghouls or resurrectionists by tomorrow morning.”

“I’m afraid he’s right,” Piers agreed. “We could try boards. There’ll be some in one of the outbuildings, like the ones they used for the study window.”

“We’d never balance him on boards,” Pitt dismissed the idea. The thought of struggling along the passageway in the half dark trying to keep a corpse from falling off a plank was grotesque. “The door is the only thing.”

“It’s too heavy!” Tellman protested.

“Laundry basket,” Piers said suddenly. “If we’re really careful how we put him in it, we won’t disturb the evidence.”

Pitt and Tellman both looked at him with approval.

“Excellent,” Pitt agreed. “I’ll fetch one. You get him ready.”

* * *

It was after eleven o’clock by the time Tellman stood by the laundry door, which naturally did not lock, and Pitt watched as Piers Greville very slowly began cutting into the body of his father, holding Mrs. Williams’s best kitchen knife in his right hand. The ordinary lights were turned up as high as they could go, and there were three extra lanterns placed so as to cast as little shadow as possible.

It seemed to take hours. He worked slowly and extremely carefully, cutting tissue, hesitating, looking, cutting again. He obviously loathed the necessity of what he was doing. But once he had become engrossed in it, his professionalism asserted itself. He was a man who loved his calling and took a kind of joy in the delicate skill of his hands. Never once did he complain or suggest that it was unfair of Pitt to have asked him. Whatever fears he had as to what the evidence might show, he hid them.

It was warm in the laundry, and damp from the steam of the coppers boiling heavy linen and towels. It smelled of soap, carbolic, and wet cloth.

Tellman stood with his back to the door. No one in the house had been told what they were doing. They had brought the body themselves, after making sure all the servants were elsewhere. Most had already gone upstairs. If they heard even a whisper that there had been a body cut up in the laundry, the stories would grow until they were monstrous, and no servant would come to work in Ashworth Hall ever again.

It was now half past eleven.

“Will you hold that, please?” Piers asked, indicating the bones of the chest he had cut with Mrs. Williams’s meat cleaver. Pitt obeyed. It seemed callous to be holding a part of a man’s body, and yet he knew as well as anyone that it was no longer animate, but it still seemed peculiarly personal.

Another ten minutes went by. No one spoke again.

There was no sound but the hissing of the gas. The entire house seemed silent, almost as if there was no one else in all the dozens of rooms.

“There is no water in the lungs,” Piers said at last, looking up at Pitt. “He didn’t drown.”

“Did the blow to the back of the head kill him?”

Piers did not answer, but closed up the chest as well as he could. He wiped the blood off his hands, then, after Pitt had helped him roll the body over so he could see, he turned his attention to the wound at the back of the neck.

Another twenty minutes passed.

“No,” he said with a lift of surprise. “There’s no bleeding, no real bruise at all, just a crushing of bone … there.” He pointed. “And there.” He screwed up his face in confusion. “He was killed … twice … if you see what I mean? First by breaking the neck, which was a very expert blow, exactly right. It must take some skill, and strength, to break a man’s neck with one blow. And there was only one. There’s no other bruising or damage.”

Tellman had come inside earlier, silently, and now he came forward from the door, his eyes wide open, looking first at Piers, then at Pitt.

“Then someone hit him over the back of the head and pushed him under the water,” Piers finished. “I haven’t the faintest idea why. It seems … crazy ….” He looked totally bewildered.

“Are you sure?” Pitt felt a soaring of spirit that was out of all proportion to any good there could possibly be. “Are you absolutely sure?”

Piers blinked. “Yes. You can get a proper police surgeon to check after me, but I’m sure. Why? What does it mean? Do you know who killed him?”

“No,” Pitt said with a catch in his voice. “No … but I think I know who didn’t ….”

“Well, it looks like two people did.” Tellman stared down at the body on the bench. “Or meant to!”

Pitt did not move. He was wondering if he could make a case against someone for hitting the head of a corpse and holding it under the water. What could the crime be? Defilement of a dead body? Would the courts bother with it? Did he even want them to?

“Sir?” Tellman prompted him.

Pitt jerked his attention back. “Yes … Yes, tidy up here, will you, Tellman. I have something to do upstairs … I think. Thank you.” He looked at Piers. “Thank you, Mr. Greville. I appreciate both your courage and your skill … very much. Put the body back in the icehouse, will you, and for God’s sake, lock the door and don’t leave any traces of what we’ve done here. Good night.” And he went to the door, opened it, and strode back towards the main house and the stairs.