Cater Street Hangman

Chapter Ten

Of course, Charlotte knew nothing about Dominic’s feelings, or what had passed between him and Sarah on his return from the club. But the following day she could not help but be aware that there was a deep strain between them, deeper than anything accountable for by Sarah’s standing suspicion about Dominic and herself.

The whole matter was swept violently from her mind in the afternoon, however, when she was alone in the house, copying out a folder of recipes for Mrs. Lessing. She had just turned to the window to look at the clouds massing; everyone else was out visiting and Charlotte was thinking that they would get wet-when there was a timid, urgent rapping at the door.

“Come in,” she said absently. It was too early for tea. It must be some problem with the preparations for dinner.

It was Millie, the new maid, and she looked terrified. Charlotte’s immediate thought was that she had been outside on some errand, perhaps only as far as the areaway, and had either been molested herself, or seen something or someone that had put the hangman into her mind.

“Come in, Millie,” Charlotte said again. “You had better sit down. You look dreadful. What is it?”

“Oh, Miss Charlotte.” The poor child was shaking as if she had a fever. “I’m so glad it’s you!”

“Sit down, Millie, and tell me what has happened,” Charlotte commanded.

Millie’s legs seemed locked rigid and her hands were twisting in each other as if of their own volition. Suddenly speech deserted her and she looked as though she was about to run.

“For goodness’ sake,” Charlotte sighed, taking Millie bodily and pushing her into a chair. “Now what has happened? Were you outside on an errand? Or in the areaway?”

“Oh no, Miss Charlotte!” she looked quite surprised.

“Well, what is it then? Where were you?”

“Upstairs in my room, Miss. Oh, Mrs. Dunphy told me I could go!”

Charlotte stepped back; she was confused herself. She had been sure Millie’s pale demeanor had something to do with the hangman. Now it seemed it had not.

“So what’s wrong, Millie? Are you sick?”

“No, Miss,” Millie stared down at her hands, still twisting in her lap. Charlotte followed her eyes, and realized for the first time that she was holding something.

“What have you got, Millie?”

“Oh,” Millie’s eyes filled with tears. “I wouldn’t have brought it Miss, but I was afraid for my name!” She sniffed violently. “I’m so glad it’s you, Miss.” She began to cry with quiet hopelessness.

Charlotte was puzzled; she was not only sorry for Millie, but a little frightened herself.

“What is it, Millie?” She put out her hand. “Give it to me.”

Slowly Millie’s white little fingers uncurled to show a crumpled man’s necktie. It meant nothing at all to Charlotte. She could not see any reason why Millie had brought it to her, or why it should inspire any feeling whatever, let alone the paralyzing terror that so obviously had stricken Millie.

Charlotte took it and held it up. Millie stared at her with enormous eyes.

“It’s a necktie,” Charlotte said blankly. “What’s the matter with it?” Then another thought came to her. “Millie, you didn’t think anyone was strangled with a necktie, did you?” She felt relief sweep through her, almost weakening her knees. She wanted to laugh. “It wasn’t a necktie, Millie! It was a garotting wire. Nothing like this! Take it away, and have Maddock attend to it. It’s filthy!”

“Yes, Miss Charlotte,” but Millie didn’t move. The fear still held her white and motionless.

“Go on, Millie!”

“It’s Mr. Dominic’s, Miss Charlotte. I know, because I collect the laundry. The master’s are made of a different stuff. You can always tell them apart. When I take the laundry back I only have to look, and I know whose it is.”

Charlotte felt the sick fear come back, though it was without reason. Why should it matter that Dominic had lost a tie?

“So it’s Mr. Dominic’s,” she said with a quick swallow. “It’s filthy. Take it back to the laundry.”

Millie stood up very slowly, gripping the tie hard, mangling it in her hands.

“It’s nothing to do with me, Miss Charlotte; I swear it isn’t. As God is my judge, Miss, I swear it!” She was shaking with the passion of her fear and her need to be believed.

Charlotte could no longer avoid it. Her stomach felt hard and cold inside her. There could be only one question that mattered. She asked it.

“Where did you find it, Millie?”

“In my bedroom, Miss.” Her face flushed painfully. “It was under the bed. When I turned the mattress it fell from round the bedstead onto the floor, Miss. That’s why it’s all creased and dusty. It was there from before I came, Miss. I swear it!”

Charlotte felt as if her world had exploded. A voice whispered inside her that she should have expected it. She hunted in the chaos for something worth saving, to start rebuilding with. That had been Lily’s room for years. Sarah had never slept there; there had never been legitimate reason for Dominic to go to it. Could Lily have taken laundry there for some reason? Could Lily have taken it to mend? That possibility was excluded simply enough. There was no tear in it. Could Millie be lying? A glance at her face was enough to dismiss that notion.

“I’m sorry, Miss,” Millie whispered desperately. “Did I do wrong?”

Charlotte put out her hand and touched the girl’s clenched arm.

“No, Millie, you did the right thing, and there is no need to be afraid. But in case anyone should misunderstand, don’t speak of it again unless. . ” She did not want to say it.

“Unless what, Miss?” Millie stared at her, gratitude in her eyes. “What should I say if I’m asked, Miss Charlotte?”

“I don’t see any reason why you should be asked, but if you are then tell the truth, Millie: just exactly what you know, nothing else. Don’t make any guesses. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Miss Charlotte. And-thank you, Miss.”

“That’s all right, Millie. And you’d better get that thing washed, and put it with the rest of the laundry. Please do it yourself. Don’t let Miss Sarah know.”

Millie’s face whitened.

“Miss Charlotte, do you think-”

“I don’t think anything, Millie. And I don’t want Miss Sarah to think anything either. Now go and do as you’re told.”

“Yes, Miss.” Millie bobbed a little curtsey and almost tripped over her feet going out.

As soon as she had gone, Charlotte collapsed onto the seat behind her, her legs shaking, her fingers stiff with pins and needles.

Dominic and Lily! Dominic on Lily’s bed! Dominic taking his tie off, his shirt, perhaps more, and then putting them on again in such a hurry he forgot his tie. She felt sick. Lily-little Lily Mitchell.

She had loved Dominic with all her heart, not asking anything in return, and he had gone to Lily, the maid. Was there something wrong with Dominic, with all men? Or with her? Was it her tongue? Was she unfeminine? People had liked her, but only that wretched Pitt had ever admired her, been enamoured of her because she was a woman.

This was ridiculous. Self-pity helped no one. She must think of something else. Lily was dead. Had she loved Dominic, too, or was it just-no, don’t think about that! Dominic was handsome, charming-her heart lurched. Why shouldn’t any woman admire him? Verity had, and she had seen it in Chloe’s eyes, too. And they were both dead!

She sat frozen. It could not be! Dominic had seen Papa in Cater Street the night Lily was killed. That meant he had been there himself. They had forgotten that. They had only thought about Papa. It had never even occurred to her that Dominic. .?

What was she saying? She loved Dominic; she had always loved him, as long as she had been a woman. How could this even be entering her mind?

What was the love she felt for him, then? What was it worth if she knew him so little she did not even know in her heart whether he could have done such things? Could she really love someone whom she knew so little? Before this afternoon she could not have conceived of his sleeping with Lily! And now in less than an hour she had accepted it. Was her love little more than fascination, love for love itself, love for something she imagined him to be, even love for his face, his smile, his eyes, the way his hair grew? Did she know, or love, anything of the man inside? What did he feel or think that had nothing to do with her, or even Sarah? Was it possible he loved Lily, or Verity-or hated them?

The more she thought about it, the more confused she became, the more she doubted herself and the love she thought she had felt so passionately all these years.

She was still sitting oblivious of the room, of the house, and certainly of time, when there was a knock on the door. It was Dora to say that the vicar’s wife had called, and should she bring tea, since it was approaching four o’clock.

Charlotte recalled herself with a massive effort. She had absolutely no desire whatever to see anyone, least of all Martha Prebble.

“Yes, Dora, by all means,” she said automatically. “And show Mrs. Prebble in.”

Martha Prebble looked less weary than the last time Charlotte had seen her. Some of her spirit seemed to have returned and there was a look of purpose in her face again.

She came forward with her hands out, frowning a little.

“My dear Charlotte, you look very pale. Are you well, my dear?”

“Oh yes, thank you, Mrs. Prebble.” Then she thought she had better explain herself, if she looked anything like she felt. “A little tired perhaps. I didn’t sleep very well last night. Nothing to be concerned about. Please sit down?” she indicated the overstuffed chair. She knew it was comfortable.

Martha sat. “You must take care of yourself. You have been such a help to poor Mrs. Lessing. Don’t now wear yourself out.”

Charlotte forced a smile. “You should be the last person to offer such advice. You seem to be everywhere, helping everyone.” A thought occurred to her. “And now you are here alone! Did you walk through the streets alone? You really shouldn’t do that! I shall send Maddock back with you. It will be growing darker by the time you leave. It could be quite dangerous!”

“That is most kind of you, but I fear I cannot become accustomed to having an escort wherever I go.”

“Then you must stay at home, at least. . at least as long-”

Martha leaned forward, a faint smile on her strong face. “As long as what, my dear? Until the police catch this man? And how long do you imagine that will be? I cannot stop my parish work. There are many who need me. We are not all equally fortunate, you know. There are those who are alone, old, perhaps sick. Women whose husbands are dead or have abandoned them, women who have children to bring up without any help. The comfortable in the parish do not wish to know about them, but they are here.”

“In this area?” Charlotte was surprised. She thought everyone near Cater Street was at least satisfactorily placed, had the necessities of life, even a few comforts. She had never seen any poor, not that lived here.

“Oh, very respectable.” Martha’s eyes looked out of the window. “The poverty is underneath; the clothes are patched, sewed over and over. Perhaps there is only one pair of shoes, perhaps only one meal a day. Appearance, self-respect are everything.”

“Oh, how dreadful,” Charlotte did not mean it as tritely as it sounded. It was dreadful. It hurt. It was not like the grinding, starving poverty Inspector Pitt had told her about, but it was still painful, a constant, wearing pain. She had never in her life been hungry, or even had to wonder if something could be afforded. True, she had admired clothes she knew she could not have, but she had more than she could possibly claim to need.

“I’m sorry. Can I help?”

Martha smiled, putting her hand out to touch Charlotte’s knee.

“You are a very good girl, Charlotte. You take after your mother. I’m sure there will be things you can do, things you already have done. It is a great tragedy not all the young women in the parish conduct themselves as you do.”

She was interrupted by Dora bringing in tea. After Dora had gone, and Charlotte had poured and handed her her cup, she continued.

“There is so much lightmindedness, seeking one’s own pleasure.”

Charlotte reluctantly thought of Emily. Dearly as she loved her, she could not recall Emily ever having pursued any ends but her own.

“I’m afraid so,” she agreed. “Perhaps it is only lack of understanding?”

“Ignorance is something of an excuse, but not entirely. So often we do not look because if we looked we should feel obliged to do something.”

It was undeniably true, and it struck a note of guilt in Charlotte. Inadvertently she thought of Pitt. He had obliged her to see things she would have preferred not to, things that disturbed her, destroyed her peace of mind, her comfort. And she had disliked him intensely for it.

“I tried to make Verity see it the same way,” Martha was saying, her eyes on Charlotte’s face. “She had so many good qualities, poor Verity.”

“And I understand you knew Chloe fairly well, too.” The minute Charlotte had said it she wished she had not. It was a cruel reminder, a wakening of pain. She saw Martha’s face tighten and a spasm pass through the muscles round her mouth.

“Poor Chloe,” she said with a tone Charlotte could not understand. “So frivolous, so light. Laughing when she should not have. Pursuing society. I’m afraid there were sometimes sinful things on her mind, things of the-,” she caught her breath. “But let us not speak ill of the dead. She has paid for her sin and everything that was corrupting and corruptible in her is gone.”

Charlotte stared at her. The strong, fair face was full of confusion and unhappiness.

“Let us talk of something else,” Charlotte said firmly. “I have been copying out some recipes. I am sure you would be interested in at least one of them, because I remember Sarah saying you had enquired after a recipe for fricandeau of veal with spinach. I hear Mrs. Hilton has an extremely good cook? Or so Mrs. Dunphy was saying to Mama.”

“Yes, indeed. And so willing,” Martha agreed. “She does so much for church fetes and so forth, an excellent hand with pastry. It is not every cook who can make a good puff pastry, you know. Put their fingers in it too much. Light and quick, one needs to be. And also very clever with preserves and candied fruits. She was always sending her maid round with-” she stopped, her face pale, eyes distressed again.

Charlotte put out her hand instinctively.

“I know. Let us not think of it. We cannot alter it now. I’ll find you the recipe for the fricandeau.” She pulled her hand away quickly and stood up. Martha followed her and Charlotte moved round the other side of the table. She wanted the interview to end. It was embarrassing. She had handled it badly. She was deeply sorry for Martha, both particularly because of her distress for the dead girls, and generally because of her life with the vicar, a fate which right now seemed quite as bad as anything Pitt had spoken of.

“Here,” she held out a slip of paper. “I have already copied the fricandeau. I can easily do another one. Please? And I insist that Maddock walk home with you.”

“It’s not necessary.” Martha took the recipe without looking at it. “I assure you!”

“I refuse to permit you to leave my house alone,” Charlotte said firmly. She reached for the bell rope. “I should be guilty all evening. I should worry myself sick!”

And so Martha had no choice but to accept, and ten minutes later she took her departure with Maddock trailing dutifully behind.

Charlotte was not permitted to have a peaceful evening in which to sort out her chaotic feelings. Emily arrived home from visiting with the bombshell that she had invited Lord George Ashworth to dinner, and would be expecting him a little after seven o’clock.

Emily’s news drove the entire household into immediate panic. Only Grandmama seemed to derive any unalloyed pleasure from it. She was delighted to observe the frenzy, and gave a running monologue on the proper way to order a house in such a fashion that even an unexpected visit from royalty itself could be managed with dignity and at least an adequate table. Emily was too excited and Caroline too worried-and Charlotte too overwhelmed by her own problems to reply to her. It was eventually Sarah who told her sharply to hold her tongue, and thus sent Grandmama into a paroxysm of righteous rage so severe she had to go upstairs and lie down.

“Well done,” Charlotte said laconically. Sarah gave her the first real smile she had offered in weeks.

Everything was calm, at least on the surface, a full five minutes before George Ashworth arrived. They were all sitting in the withdrawing room, Emily dressed in rose pink which suited her very well, even if the extravagance of another new gown had not suited Papa. Sarah was dressed in green, also very becoming, and Charlotte in dull slate blue, a colour she had disliked until she caught sight of herself in the glass and saw how it flattered her eyes and the warm tones of her skin and hair.

She blushed uncomfortably when Ashworth bowed over her hand and his eyes lingered on her with approval. She disliked him, and thought him to be trifling with Emily. She replied to him formally with no more warmth than courtesy demanded.

Throughout the evening, however, she was obliged to revise her opinion to some extent. He behaved without appreciable fault; in fact, if he had not been in danger of hurting Emily, both publicly and privately, she could have quite sincerely liked him. He had wit and a certain outspokenness, although, no doubt, in his social position he could afford to say what he chose without fearing the consequences. He even flattered Grandmama, which was not difficult since she loved a handsome man, and loved a title even more.

Charlotte looked across and saw Emily’s face pucker in a little smile. Apparently she knew perfectly well what he was doing, and it suited her. Once again Charlotte’s anger rose. Damn the man for hurting Emily. She was a child in the ways of the world, compared to him!

The next time Charlotte spoke to him it was with a considerable chill in her voice. She saw Dominic staring at her in bewilderment, but she was too angry to care. And then all her old confusion about Dominic returned. She had loved him so much, and now all she could feel was a heart-sickening urge to protect him from-from what? From Pitt, the police-or himself?

It seemed as if the evening stretched forever. It was only eleven however, when George Ashworth took his leave and Charlotte excused herself and gratefully escaped to bed. She had expected to lie awake in a fever of thought all night, but she was hardly aware of lying down before the sleep of exhaustion overtook her.

The following day something infinitely worse awaited her. It was no more than ten o’clock in the morning when Maddock came to say that Inspector Pitt was in the hall and wished to see her.

“Me?” She tried to fend it off, hoping he would see someone else, perhaps that he had even come to see Papa, and was here now only to ensure that Papa would be in that evening.

“Yes, ma’am,” Maddock said firmly. “He especially asked for you.”

“Make sure it isn’t really the master he wants to see, this evening, will you, Maddock?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Maddock turned to leave, and as he was at the door, Pitt himself opened it and came in.

“Inspector Pitt!” Charlotte said sharply, intending to embarrass him into withdrawing. He was the last person in the world she wanted to see. Dominic’s tie loomed so large in her mind, it seemed as if Pitt would only have to speak to Millie, go into any part of the kitchen or laundry, and it would stare him in the face with all its appalling implications. She was even more afraid of what she herself might say. The sheer concentration on not mentioning it, the fear, kept it in the forefront of her mind.

“Good morning, Miss Ellison.” He watched Maddock disappear into the hall and closed the door behind him. “Charlotte, I came to tell you about George Ashworth.”

Relief flooded through her. It was nothing to do with Dominic.

“You know?” he said with surprise. What an extraordinary face he had; his feelings were so easily reflected, almost magnified in it.

She was confused.

“No? What about him? Did you discover something?” Again she was afraid, thinking of Emily. Was it Ashworth after all? That would at least mean he would not be able to hurt Emily any more, humiliate her by leaving her for someone else. The thought was touched with deep regret, which was ridiculous. It was only a very small part of her that had liked him.

Pitt was watching her. “You like him,” he observed with a smile. His eyes were gentle.

“I dislike him intensely,” she said with considerable sharpness.

“Why? Because you are afraid for Emily? Afraid he would kill her, or afraid he will eventually get bored with her and move on to someone else, perhaps someone with money, or a title?”

She resented his accuracy, his intrusion. Emily’s humiliation and hurt were none of his business.

“Afraid he might kill her, of course! What is it you came to tell me, Mr. Pitt?”

He ignored her terseness, still smiling. “That he probably did not even know the Hiltons’ maid, and he certainly did not kill Lily Mitchell. His actions are very fully accounted for all that day and night.”

She was pleased, very pleased, which made no sense. It meant Ashworth would remain free to humiliate Emily, and she cared very much that that should not happen.

“So you have eliminated one more person,” she said, looking for words, anything to say to him to banish the silence and avoid his eyes watching her, smiling, seeing every expression, every thought in her face.

“Yes,” he agreed. “Not a very satisfactory method of detection.”

“Is that all you can do?” She meant it as a genuine question, not a criticism.

He smiled a little wryly, a self-deprecating gesture. “Not quite. I’m trying to build up in my mind a picture of the kind of person we’re looking for, of the sort of man driven to do such things.”

Involuntarily she voiced the same thought that had so horrified Dominic. “Do you think perhaps he’s a man-who-doesn’t know himself what he’s done, doesn’t know why, doesn’t even remember afterwards? Then he would be just as ignorant and as afraid as the rest of us?”

“Yes,” he said simply.

It was no comfort. She wished he had said no. It brought the person, the hangman, closer; it removed the gulf between them. He could be any one of them. Only God could know how he would feel when he discovered himself!

“I’m sorry, Charlotte,” he said quietly. “It frightens me, too. He must be found, but I am not looking forward to doing it.”

She could think of nothing to say. Her mind’s eye could see only Dominic’s black tie, big enough to strangle the world. She wished Pitt would go away, before the very dominance of it in her mind made her tongue slip.

“I saw your brother-in-law the other day,” he went on.

She felt herself tighten. Fortunately she had her back to him and he could not see the spasm in her throat, the terror. She tried to speak, to sound casual, but nothing came. Was that what he had really come for, because he knew or guessed already?

“In a coffeeshop,” he continued.

“Indeed?” she managed to speak at last.

He did not reply. She knew he was looking at her. She could not bear the silence. “I cannot imagine you had a great deal to discuss.”

“The hangman, of course, but not much else, except a few other crimes. He seemed to feel this was the most important.”

“Isn’t it?” She turned back to look at him, to judge from his face what he meant.

“Yes, of course it is, but there are many others. My sergeant lost his arm a week ago.”

“Lost his arm!” she was horrified. “How? What happened?” She remembered the little man vividly. How could he have had such an appalling accident?

“Gangrene,” he said simply, but she saw the anger in his eyes. For a moment she actually forgot about Dominic. “He got an iron spike through it,” he went on, “when we went into the rookeries after a forger.” He told her what had happened.

“That’s horrible,” she said fiercely. “Does that sort of thing happen to-to many of you?”

She saw the flicker of hope in his face, then self-mockery as he derided his own feelings. Emily was at least partially right. He did care what she thought of him.

“No, not many,” he answered. “It’s as often tragic, pitiful, or even funny, as it is violent. Most people would prefer to serve their sentences and stay alive. The punishments for violence are too savage to be taken lightly. Murder is a hanging offence.”

“Funny?” she said incredulously.

He sat sideways on the arm of one of the chairs. “How do you suppose people stay alive, in the rookeries, without a sense of humour? Without a rather bitter notion of the ludicrous, without wit, one could drown in it. You wouldn’t understand the costermonger, the prostitutes, the dolly-shop owners, but if you did, you’d find them funny sometimes: savage, giving no quarter and expecting none, inventive, greedy, but often funny as well. That’s the sort of world they live in. The weak and the disloyal die.”

“What about the sick, the orphaned, the old?” she demanded. “How can you regard that with humour!”

“They die, just as they often do even at your end of society,” he replied. “Their deaths are different, that’s all. But what happens to a divorced woman in your world, or one who has an illegitimate child, or a woman whose husband dies or can’t meet the bills? He’s politely driven to ruin, and often suicide. As far as you’re concerned, he or she is ruined from the day of their disgrace. You no longer see them in the street. You no longer call on them in the afternoons. There is no possibility of work, of marriage for the daughters, no credit with tradesmen. It’s a different kind of death, but we usually see the end of it, all the same.”

There was nothing to say to him. She would like to have hated him, to have denied it all, or justified it, but she knew inside her it was true. Little bits of memory returned, people whose names were not to be mentioned anymore, people one suddenly did not see again.

He put his hand out and touched her arm gently. She could feel the warmth of him.

“I’m sorry, Charlotte. I had no right to say that as if it were your fault, as if you were part of it willingly or consciously.”

“That doesn’t alter it though, does it?” she said bleakly.

“No.”

“Tell me about some of the things that are funny. I think I need to know.”

He leaned back, taking his hand away. She felt a coldness from the move. She would have expected to find his touch offensive; it surprised her that she did not.

He smiled a little wryly. “You met Willie at the police station?”

Involuntarily she smiled also. She recalled the thin face, the friendly mixture of interest and contempt for her ignorance.

“Yes; yes, I imagine he could tell a few colourful stories.”

“Hundreds, some of them even true. I remember one he told me about a costermonger family, and a long and picturesque revenge against a shofulman-”

“A what?”

“A passer of forged money. And Belle-I was going to say you would like Belle, but she’s a prostitute-”

“I might still be capable of liking her,” Charlotte replied, then wondered if she had committed herself too rashly. “Perhaps. . ”

His face softened in amusement. “Belle came from Bournemouth. Her parents were respectable but extremely poor, in service in a middle-class house. Belle was seduced-I understand with more force than charm-by the son of the house, and as a result turned out. She was henceforth marked as soiled. Naturally it was never considered that he should marry her. She came to London and discovered she was pregnant. To begin with she worked as a seamstress, sewing shirts-collars and wristbands stitched, six buttonholes, four rows of stitching down the front, for two and a half pence each. Do you sew, Charlotte? Do you know how long it takes to make a shirt? Do you do household accounts? Do you know what two and a half pence will buy?

“She tried the workhouse, but was turned away because she did not have an official admittance order. At that point she was propositioned by a gentleman not old enough to be rich enough to make an advantageous marriage, but with plenty of natural appetite. It earned her enough to feed her child and buy him a blanket to sleep in.

“And it opened a whole new world to her. She wrote to her parents every week; she still does, and sends them money. They think she earns it dressmaking. And what good would it serve to let them discover otherwise? They don’t know what dressmakers earn in London.

“She found a landlord who protected her, but then he started taking more and more of her money. But this time she had friends-of many sorts, not just customers. She’s a handsome girl, shrewd, but not unkind, and I’ve seldom seen her when she couldn’t smile about something.”

“What did she do?” Charlotte cared.

“She had a steady lover who was a screever, a writer of letters, a forger of certificates, false testimonials and so forth. He had an uncle who was a kidsman. He organized all his little proteges to plague the landlord every time he went out of the door. His watch was stolen, his seals, his money. But worse than that, they jeered at him, pinned notes to him, and made him a laughingstock.”

“If he was robbed, why didn’t he call the police?” she felt compelled to ask. “Especially if he saw who did it, and it continued?”

“Oh he did! That’s how I came to know of it.”

“You arrested them?” she was horrified and angry.

He smiled at her, meeting her eyes squarely.

“Unfortunately I had a stiff leg that day, and I was unable to run fast enough to catch any of them. Sergeant Flack got something in his eye, was obliged to stop and get it out, and by the time he could see again, they had gone.”

She felt a wave of relief. “And Belle?”

“She got a reasonable rent, and kept the rest of the earnings.”

“And did she continue-as-as a prostitute?”

“What else? Go back to stitching shirts at two and a half pence each?”

“No, of course not. I suppose it was a silly question. It makes me realize a little how lucky I am to be born as I was. I always used to think it was unjust, that saying about the sins of the fathers being visited on the children to the third and fourth generations. But it isn’t, is it? It’s just a fact of life. We reap what our parents have sown.”

She looked up and found Pitt’s eyes on her. The softness in them embarrassed her, and she turned away.

“What about the hangman? Do you think he-can’t help it?”

“I think it’s possible he doesn’t even entirely know it. Which is perhaps why even those closest to him don’t know it either,” he answered.

The black tie came back to her mind with cold horror. For a while she had forgotten it, forgotten Pitt as a threat and thought of him only as-no, that was ridiculous!

She stood up a little stiffly. “Thank you for coming to tell me about Lord Ashworth. It was extremely courteous of you, and has set my mind at rest, at least from the worst fear.”

He stood up also, accepting the dismissal, but there was disappointment in his face. She was sorry for it; he did not deserve it. But she was too afraid of him to let him stay. He had an ability to anticipate her, to understand her thoughts too well. His quick sympathy, his intelligence, would lead her into betraying herself, and Dominic.

He was still looking at her, damn him!

Oh God! Had she dismissed him so hastily he sensed her fear? Had she dismissed him so soon after their mention of the hangman and his possible ignorance of his own actions, that he guessed she knew something? She must make amends.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Pitt. I did not mean to appear rude. I have not even offered you any refreshment.” She forced herself to meet his eyes. She smiled, her face stiff. She must look ghastly. “May I ring for something for you?”

“No, thank you.” he walked to the door, then turned, frowning a little. “Charlotte, what are you afraid of?”

She drew a deep breath, her throat tight. A moment passed before she could make any sound come.

“Why, the hangman, of course. Isn’t everyone?”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “Possibly even the hangman himself.”

The room swung round her. An earthquake must feel like this. It was ridiculous. She must not faint. Dominic might be weak, give way to his appetites, but then one must accept that all gentlemen were like that. But Dominic could have had nothing to do with murder, wires round choking white necks in the street! She must have been insane, weak, and treacherous to have let such suspicions come into her mind.

“Yes,” Charlotte agreed. “I imagine so. But you must catch him all the same, for everyone’s sake.” She deliberately put a lift into her voice, a positive sound as if it were all only peripherally to do with her, a social concern and not a personal one.

His mouth curled a little at the corner and with a tiny gesture like a bow, he turned and went out of the room. She heard Maddock opening and closing the front door for him.

Her knees gave way and she collapsed onto the sofa, tears running down her face.

When Dominic returned in the evening she could not meet his eyes. Sarah also sat through dinner in silence. Emily was out with George Ashworth and a group of his friends. Grandmama delivered a monologue on the decline of social manners. Edward and Caroline maintained the rudiments of a conversation that no one else listened to.

Afterwards Sarah said a little stiffly that she had a headache, and retired to bed. Mama accompanied Grandmama up to her sitting room to read to her for an hour or so, and Papa went into the study to smoke and write some letters.

Dominic and Charlotte were left alone in the withdrawing room. It was a situation Charlotte had dreaded, and yet it was almost a relief to face it. The reality might not be as bad as her fears had become.

She waited for a few minutes after the others had gone; then she looked up, afraid that if she did not speak soon, he might also leave.

“Dominic?”

He turned to face her.

She was alone with him; she had his entire attention. The dark eyes were fully on her, a little worried. It should have turned her heart over. But all she could think of was Lily Mitchell, and Sarah upstairs unhappy over a trifle, when there was so much more Sarah did not even guess-or did she? And Pitt. She could see Pitt’s face in her mind, the light, probing eyes that made her feel so close. She shook herself hard. The thought was ridiculous.

“Yes?” Dominic prompted.

She had never been gifted with tact, never been able to approach things obliquely. Mama would have been so much better at this.

“Did you like Lily?” she asked.

His face puckered in surprise. “The maid Lily, Lily Mitchell?”

“Yes.”

“Did I like her?” he repeated incredulously.

“Yes, did you? Please answer me honestly. It matters.” It did matter, although she was not sure what she wanted the answer to be. The thought that he had cared for her was sharply painful, and yet the thought that he had used her without caring was worse; it was shabbier, dirtier, wider in its meaning.

There was a faint colour in his face.

“Yes, I liked her well enough. She was a funny little thing. Used to talk about the country, where she grew up. Why? Do you want to do something about her? She was an orphan, you know, actually illegitimate, I think. There’s no family to speak of.”

“No, I wasn’t thinking of doing anything,” she said a little sharply. She had not known Lily was an orphan. She had lived in the same house with her all those years, and for all the interest she had shown, Lily might as well not have existed. Was Dominic really any worse? “I wanted to know because of you.”

“Me?”

Was she mistaken, or had the colour deepened in his face?

“Yes.” There was no point in lying, in trying to be evasive. He was staring at her. Why on earth should she want so much to touch him now? To reassure herself he was still the same person, the Dominic she had loved all her womanhood? Or was she feeling something like pity?

“I don’t understand you,” he said slowly.

She met his eyes with an honesty she could not have imagined a month ago. For the first time she looked deep into him, without fluttering heart or beating pulse. She looked at the person, and forgot the man, the beauty, the excitement.

“Yes, you do. Millie brought me the necktie she found at the back of the bed when she turned the mattress. It was yours.”

It seemed not to occur to him to lie. The colour came to his face painfully now, but he did not look away.

“Yes, I liked her. She was very-uncomplicated. Sarah can be desperately stuffy sometimes.”

“So can you,” she said brutally, and to her own surprise. A new, angry thought occurred to her, and as soon as it was in her head, it, too, was on her tongue. “How would you feel if Sarah went and made love to Maddock?”

His face dropped in amazement. “Don’t be ridiculous!”

“What’s ridiculous about it?” she asked coolly. “You lay with the maid, didn’t you? Lily wasn’t even a butler, just a maid!”

“Sarah wouldn’t dream of such a thing; she isn’t a trollop. It’s extraordinary and degrading of you to have said it, even in fun.”

“The last thing I intended was to be funny! Why are you insulted that I should speak of it hypothetically for Sarah, and yet you can admit it of yourself without any shame at all? You’re not ashamed, are you!”

The colour came back again to his face, and for the first time he looked away from her.

“I’m not very proud of it.”

“Because of Sarah, or because Lily’s dead?” Why was she suddenly seeing him with such clarity? It was painful, like morning light on the skin, showing all the flaws.

“You don’t understand,” he said exasperatedly. “When you’re married, you will.”

“Understand what?”

“That. . ” He stood up. “That men-men sometimes go-”

He stopped, unable to finish it delicately.

She finished it for him.

“That you have one set of rules for yourselves, and another for us,” she said tartly. Her throat hurt, as if she wanted to cry. “You demand perfect loyalty from us, but feel free to give your own love wherever you like-”

“It’s not love!” he exploded. “For God’s sake, Charlotte-”

“What? It’s appetite? License?”

“You don’t understand!”

“Then explain it to me.”

“Don’t be naive. You are not a man. If you were married you would perhaps understand that men are different. You can’t apply women’s feelings, women’s rules to a man.”

“I can apply rules of loyalty and honour to anybody.”

He was angry now. “This has nothing to do with loyalty or honour! I love Sarah; at least, God help me, I did until she”-suddenly his face was white-“until she started to think I could be the hangman.” He was staring at her and she could see helplessness and pain in his eyes.

She stood up also, and without thinking she put her hand out to touch him, catching his hand. He clung to it.

“Charlotte, she does! She clearly said so!”

“She believed Emily,” she said quietly. “And perhaps she knew about Lily as well.”

“But for God’s sake! That’s hardly the same as murdering four helpless girls and leaving their bodies in the street!”

“If she knew about Lily, and believes something about me, then you have hurt her. Perhaps she merely wanted to hurt you back?”

“But that’s preposterous! She can’t be so hurt-that-” He stared at her.

She looked back gravely. “I would be. If I’d given you all my love, my heart and body, and been loyal to you and thought of no one else, I would be hurt beyond anything I could imagine if I knew you had slept with my maid, and if I thought you had courted my sister. I might hurt you as deeply as I could. If you could betray me that way, murder might not seem so very much worse.”

“Charlotte!” his voice cracked a little and went higher. “Charlotte, you can’t think that? Oh, please heaven! I mean, I didn’t-I never hurt anyone!” He grabbed at her hand again, holding it so tightly he crushed her fingers.

She did not pull away.

“Except Sarah, and perhaps Lily? Did she love you, too, or are maids allowed to have appetites, like men?”

“Charlotte, for God’s sake don’t be sarcastic! Help me!”

“I don’t know how to!” She gave him, for a moment, an answering pressure of her own hand. “I can’t make Sarah feel differently; I can’t take back whatever she said, or make you forget she said it.”

He stood still for a long time, close to her, looking at her eyes, her face.

“No,” he said at last. He closed his eyes. “And dear God,” he said very softly, “you can’t make me absolutely sure I didn’t do it. That damnable policeman of yours said this man could be unaware himself of what he’s doing. That means it could be me. I could be doing this, and not know it. I saw your father in the street; no one else seems to have realized yet that that means I was also there. And I knew all four of the girls-and was out when each one of them was killed.”

She could think of only one thing to say that would be of any comfort, and still be true. “If Pitt thought you could have done it, he would have been back here, questioning you. He wouldn’t exclude you just because you’re a gentleman.”

“Do you think he really has any idea?” he said eagerly. It was painfully clear how much he wanted to believe her, and how hard it was for him.

“I know you don’t like him, but do you think you could deceive him for long?”

His mouth turned down in self-mockery. “I don’t think I really dislike him. I think I’m afraid of him.”

“Because you think he’s clever?”

“Yes.” He sighed. “Thank you, Charlotte. Yes, I suppose Pitt has looked at us closely enough. Perhaps, if it were one of us, he would be closing in now. You don’t think he is, do you?” The sharp fear was back again.

This time she lied, as if to protect a child.

“No.”

He let out his breath again, and sat down. “How can Sarah think I could have done it? Surely anyone who knew me at all. .? You said she loves me, how could you love anyone and think that of him?”

“Because being in love with someone is not the same as knowing them,” she said, hearing her words harshly and clearly in her head. Would they mean as much to him as they did now to her?

“She doesn’t really love me,” he said slowly, “or she would not have thought it.”

“You thought it of yourself!”

“That’s different. I know myself. But I never thought ill of her, not in any way.”

“Then you don’t know her, any more than she knows you.” Charlotte meant it, although she was discovering her thoughts even as she spoke them.

“What do you mean?”

“We all have faults-Sarah, too. If you expect her to be perfect that is a wrong you’re doing her that is as great as the wrong she is doing you.”

“I don’t understand you, Charlotte.” He frowned. “Sometimes I think you don’t know what you’re saying.”

“No,” she agreed. It hurt, because she realized he really did not understand. “No, I thought you might not.” She made up her mind quickly, from a deep feeling. “I’m going up to see if Sarah is all right.”

“Sarah?” He was surprised.

She went to the door and turned.

“Yes.”

He was looking at her with a pucker between his brows. She ached inside, all down her throat and in her stomach. She wanted to put her arms round him, to comfort away the fear she knew was in him, but her love for him was quite different. It was no longer mysterious, romantic, blood-quickening. She felt older than he, and stronger.

“Charlotte-”

She knew what he wanted to say, he wanted to say “Help me,” and he did not know how.

She smiled. “I’m not going to tell her anything. And every man near Cater Street who has thought at all, must have the same fears as you do.”

He let out his breath and tried to smile. “Thank you, Charlotte. Good night.”

“Good night.”

Upstairs she found Sarah sitting in her bed, staring at the wall, a book lying open, face down on the covers.

“How are you?” Charlotte asked.

“What do you want?” Sarah looked at her coolly.

“Can I get anything for you? A hot drink?”

“No, thank you. What’s the matter? Won’t Dominic talk to you?” There was a bitter edge to Sarah’s voice, and Charlotte thought she was near tears.

She sat down on the edge of the bed. “Yes, he talked to me for quite a while.”

“Oh,” Sarah affected disinterest. “About what?”

“The hangman.”

“How gruesome. It will make you dream.”

Charlotte put out her hand and took Sarah’s. “Sarah, you shouldn’t let him think you suspect him-”

“Has he been complaining to you, crying on your shoulder?”

“It’s easy to see what you’re thinking! Sarah!” She held onto her more tightly as Sarah tried to pull away. “Even if you think so, can’t you have the kindness, or the sense, not to let him know it? If he were guilty, there would be time enough to know it when it couldn’t be denied. If he’s innocent and you suspect him wrongly, you’ll have built a gap between you that will be difficult to bridge later.”

The tears brimmed over Sarah’s eyes. “I don’t suspect him,” she said gulping. “Not really. It just crossed my mind for a moment. Is that so hard to understand? I couldn’t help it! He’s been out so much lately. He hardly takes notice of me anymore. Is he in love with you, Charlotte; tell me honestly? I think I would rather know now.”

“No,” Charlotte shook her head with a smile. “I used to be in love with him, which is what Emily meant. But he never even saw me.”

The tears were running down Sarah’s face. “Oh, Charlotte, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

“I didn’t want you to.” Charlotte made herself smile. Her own feelings were suddenly very clear. She was desperately, painfully sorry for Sarah because Sarah had wounded Dominic and irreparably hurt herself; and even now Sarah did not understand how, or seem able to undo it.

Sarah was staring at her, pity showing through the tears.

“Oh, it’s all right,” Charlotte said easily. “I’m not in love with him anymore. I like him very much, but I’m not in love.”

Sarah smiled and sniffed. “Your wretched policeman?”

Charlotte was shocked. “Good heavens, no!”

Sarah’s smile widened.

Charlotte leaned forward a little. More than anything on earth she wanted to help and protect Sarah, to take things back to the way they used to be.

“Sarah, tell Dominic you don’t suspect him really, that it was just a momentary thought of how awful it would be. Even lie, if you have to. But don’t let him go on thinking-”

“He won’t come to me.”

“Then go to him!”

“No.” Sarah shook her head.

“Sarah!”

“I can’t.”

There was nothing else Charlotte could say. Silently she touched Sarah’s hair, pushing a strand out of her eyes, then stood up and walked away slowly. She was too tired, too shaken with the upheaval in her life, to feel anything more tonight. Tomorrow the fear and the pity would all come back.