Death On Blackheath

Chapter One

Pitt stood shivering on the steps leading up from the areaway to the pavement and looked down at the clumps of blood and hair at his feet. There was blood on the shards of glass as well, and some of it had already congealed. Splinters lay on the steps below and above. The January wind whined across the open stretch towards the gravel pits in the distance.

‘And the maid is missing?’ Pitt asked quietly.

‘Yes, and sorry, sir,’ the police sergeant said unhappily. His young face was set hard in the grey early morning light. ‘Thought that seeing whose house it was, like, we should call you straight away.’

‘You did the right thing,’ Pitt assured him.

They were in Shooters Hill, a very pleasant residential area on the outskirts of London. It was not far from Greenwich, with the Naval College and the Royal Observatory from which the world took its time. The imposing house rising above them into the still, shadowed air was that of Dudley Kynaston, a senior government official deeply involved in matters of naval defence, a weapons expert of some kind. Violence so very close to his house was of concern to Special Branch, and thus to Pitt as its commander. It was a recent promotion for him and he was still uncomfortable with the extraordinary power it lent him. Perhaps he always would be. It was a responsibility that ultimately he could share with no one. His triumphs would be secret, but his disasters appallingly public.

Looking down at the grim evidence at his feet, he would gladly have changed places with the sergeant beside him. He had been an ordinary young policeman himself when he had been this man’s age, twenty years ago. He had dealt with regular crimes then: theft, arson, occasionally murder — although not many with political implication, and nothing to do with terror and violence towards the state.

He straightened up. He dressed smartly now, if a little untidily, but even this new woollen coat could not dull the knife edge of the wind. He was cold to the bone. The chill was blowing up from the river a mile and a half away, not hard, but it had the steady bitterness of the damp. From this height he could see the lowlying stretches to the east shrouded in mist, and hear the mournful wail of foghorns.

‘Did you say it was reported by the first servant to get up?’ he asked. ‘That must have been hours ago.’ He glanced at the wan daylight.

‘Yes, sir,’ the sergeant replied. ‘Scullery maid, slip of a thing, but sharp as a tack. Scared the poor child half out of her wits, all the blood and hair, but she kept her presence of mind.’

‘She didn’t run all the way to the police station in the dark?’ Pitt asked incredulously. ‘It must be a mile and a half at least, from here.’

‘No, sir,’ the sergeant responded with some satisfaction in his voice. ‘Like I said, she’s pretty cool-headed, and all of about thirteen, I would guess. She went in and woke up the housekeeper, a sensible sort of woman. She has the use of the telephone, so after she’d checked that the blood and hair were real, not just from some animals fighting, she called the police station. If she hadn’t, likely we’d still be on the way here.’

Pitt looked down at the blood, which could easily enough be human or animal. However, the strands of hair were long, auburn in the lantern light, and could only be human. He also thought that without the telephone to waken him at his home in Keppel Street on the other side of the river, he would have been having breakfast in his own warm kitchen now, unaware of any of this potential tragedy, and all the grief and complications that could arise from it.

He grunted agreement, but before he could add anything more he heard rapid footsteps along the pavement. The next moment Stoker appeared at the top of the areaway. He was the one man in Special Branch that Pitt had learned to trust. After the betrayals that had led up to Victor Narraway’s dismissal, he trusted no one who had not earned it. Narraway had been innocent and, after desperate effort and cost, had been proved so. But that episode had still been the end of his career.

‘Morning, sir,’ Stoker said with only the slightest curiosity in his voice. He glanced down at the lantern and the patch of stone steps illuminated by it, then at Pitt. He was a lean man with a strong, intelligent face, although it was a bit too bony to be good-looking, and too dour for charm.

‘One maid missing,’ Pitt explained. He looked up at the sky, then back at Stoker. ‘Make a note of exactly what you see. Draw it. Then pick up a few samples, in case we need them in evidence one day. Better hurry. If the rain comes it’ll wash that whole lot away. I’m going in to speak to the household.’

‘Yes, sir. Why us, sir? Missing maid — what’s wrong with the locals doing it?’ He gave the sergeant a nod, but the question was directed at Pitt.

‘Householder is Dudley Kynaston — naval defence …’ Pitt replied.

Stoker swore under his breath.

Pitt smiled, glad not to have caught his exact words, although he probably agreed with them. He turned and knocked on the scullery door, then opened it — and walked past the stored vegetables into the kitchen. Immediately the warmth wrapped around him, along with the rich aromas of cooking. It was comfortable, everything in order. Polished copper pans hung from hooks, their sheen winking in the lights. Clean china was stacked on the dresser. Shelves were piled neatly with labelled spice jars. Strings of onions and dried herbs hung from the rafters.

‘Good morning,’ he said clearly, and three women turned from their tasks to look at him.

‘Mornin’, sir,’ they replied almost in unison. The cook was a comfortably rounded woman, at the moment holding a large wooden spoon in her hand. A maid in starched and lace-trimmed apron was setting out tea and toast ready to carry upstairs, and the scullery maid was peeling potatoes. She had dark, unruly hair and wide eyes. As soon as he saw her, Pitt knew that she was the one who had gone outside and found the blood and glass. The sleeves of her grey dress were rolled well above her elbows and her white apron was covered in smuts from relighting the stove.

The cook regarded Pitt apprehensively, unsure where to place him in the social scale. He wasn’t a gentleman because he had come in through the back door, and he didn’t have the natural arrogance of a man used to the attention of servants. On the other hand, he seemed very sure of himself in a different kind of way, and she could tell at a glance that his overcoat was of excellent quality. In the circumstances, he was probably a policeman of some sort, but he did not look like an ordinary sergeant.

Pitt gave her a brief smile. ‘May I speak to your scullery maid, please? I would appreciate it if you could give me a quiet room where we will be without interruption. If you wish the housekeeper to be with her, that will be acceptable.’ He phrased it as a request, but it was an order, and he held her eyes long enough to be certain that she knew that.

‘Yes, sir,’ she said, her voice catching as though her mouth were dry. ‘Dora here can go with her.’ She gestured at the startled parlour maid. ‘I’ll take that tray up to Mrs Kynaston. Maisie, you go with the policeman an’ tell ’im what ’e needs to know. And you be civil, mind!’

‘Yes, Cook,’ Maisie said obediently, and led Pitt as far as the door. Then she turned to him, looking him up and down with bright, critical eyes. ‘You look like you’re froze to the bone. You want a cup o’ tea … sir?’

Pitt smiled in spite of himself. ‘Thank you, that would be very nice. Perhaps Dora would bring us a pot?’

Dora was strongly disapproving. She was a parlour maid, not someone to fetch and carry cups of tea to the likes of policemen and scullery maids, but she could not find the right words to say so.

Pitt’s smile widened. ‘Very helpful of you.’ He acknowledged her departure from duty, then followed Maisie along the corridor to the housekeeper’s sitting room. The housekeeper herself was no doubt about other duties necessitated by the alarming circumstances that had arisen this morning.

Pitt sat down in the armchair by the fire, which was newly lit and not yet warm. Maisie sat upright on the hard-backed chair opposite him.

‘What time did you come down to the kitchen this morning?’ Pitt started straight away.

‘’Alf-past five,’ she replied without hesitation. ‘I raked out the ashes an’ took ’em out ter the ash can in the yard. That was when I found the …’ she gulped, ‘… the blood … an’ that.’

‘About quarter to six?’

‘Yeah …’

‘It would be very dark then. How did you notice them? They weren’t all that close to the ash can,’ he pointed out. ‘Was there somebody else there, Maisie?’

She took a very deep breath, then let it out in a sigh. ‘Opposite’s boot boy, but ’e wouldn’t never ’ave done anything like that. ’Sides, ’e likes Kitty … I mean she were nice to ’im. ’E … ’e comes from the country an’ ’e misses ’is family, like.’ Her dark eyes stared unwaveringly at Pitt.

‘Who’s Kitty?’ he asked.

‘Kitty Ryder,’ she said as if he should have known. ‘Mrs Kynaston’s lady’s maid wot’s missing.’

‘How do you know she’s missing?’ he asked curiously. He knew that ladies’ maids seldom got up at half-past five.

‘’Cos she in’t ’ere,’ she replied reasonably, but he knew from the defiance in her face and her very slight sniff that she was perfectly aware of being evasive.

‘You thought the hair on the steps looked like Kitty Ryder’s?’ he pressed.

‘Yeah … some …’

A thought occurred to him, a chance to be seized before Dora came any moment with the tea, and, of course, remained as a chaperone.

‘And you were afraid something had happened to Kitty?’ he suggested.

‘Yeah … I …’ She stopped. She looked into his face and knew that somewhere there was a trap in the question, but she did not look away.

He heard Dora’s footsteps in the passage.

‘So Kitty might quite likely be on the areaway steps in the middle of a winter night, and possibly have a quarrel that could turn violent? A suitor you don’t like?’

‘A wot?’

‘A young man?’

Dora came in through the door balancing a tray with a teapot, milk jug, sugar bowl and two cups and saucers. She placed it on the table and stood back a little, her face stiff with disapproval.

Pitt nodded his thanks but kept his eyes on Maisie. ‘A young man,’ he repeated. ‘Kitty had a young man and she went out at night to meet him. That was why when you saw the blood and hair you immediately thought of her, and checked to see if she was home — and she wasn’t. Is that right?’

Maisie stared at him with respect, and a new fear. She nodded silently.

‘Thank you,’ Pitt acknowledged. ‘And did you find Kitty at all?’ He asked that with a deep sense of impending sadness. He already knew the answer.

Maisie shook her head. ‘She in’t nowhere.’

‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ he asked.

She nodded, still not taking her eyes from his face.

‘Dora, would you pour two cups of tea, please?’ Pitt requested. ‘I take mine with milk and no sugar. You’ll know how Maisie likes hers. Then perhaps you would find either the housekeeper or the butler for me and have them come here.’

Dora glared at him, but did as she was told. She had been brought up to be very careful never to make trouble with the police, whatever sort they were.

An hour later Pitt had learned all that he could from the staff. He and Stoker made a complete record of the areaway with sketches and diagrams, then went together to the withdrawing room to speak first to Dudley Kynaston. If necessary they would also speak to his wife.

The room was spacious, as Pitt had expected. Surprisingly, it was also comfortable, as though it were arranged for their own pleasure, not for entertaining, or to impress. The carpets were mellow and well-worn, the leather of the chairs creased into lines of comfort, cushions placed for ease. Kynaston was standing in the middle of the floor, but there was a pile of papers on the sofa where he had apparently been sitting. He must have heard their feet on the parquet of the hall, and risen to his feet. Pitt wondered if that were out of good manners, or the instinctive desire not to be at a disadvantage.

Kynaston was a tall man, almost Pitt’s own height. His face was handsome, regular featured, with thick fair hair greying at the temples. He looked unhappy, but not more anxious than any decent man should be at the thought of possible violence.

Pitt introduced himself and Stoker.

‘How do you do?’ Kynaston replied courteously, but to Pitt, merely nodding towards Stoker. ‘I don’t know how I can help you. I appreciate Special Branch’s concern, but if my unfortunate maid is involved, then it is probably no more than an unusually vicious quarrel. Perhaps some young man had too much to drink and was reluctant to take “no” for an answer. Unpleasant, but these things happen.’ He was politely telling Pitt that he was wasting his time, and he did not have the air of a man making excuses.

‘Is it usual for Miss Ryder to be about at this hour of the morning?’ Pitt asked him.

Kynaston shook his head fractionally. ‘No, that is most unusual. I can’t explain it. She is normally a very reliable girl.’

Pitt felt more than heard Stoker fidget from one foot to the other behind him.

‘You are sure she’s not anywhere in the house?’ Pitt asked.

‘There’s nowhere she can be.’ Kynaston looked confused. ‘She’s never done this before. But, from what the butler tells me, the mess on the area steps indicates a rather nasty quarrel. It’s all very unpleasant, and we shall have to let her go, but I hope she isn’t seriously hurt. Beyond permitting you to search the house for yourself, and question anyone you please, I can’t think of any way in which I can be of help.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ Pitt responded. ‘Perhaps I could speak with Mrs Kynaston? I’m sure she will know more about the domestic servants. As you say, it is probably no more than a quarrel that became violent, and once we have found Kitty Ryder and assured ourselves that she is all right, then we can close the issue.’

Kynaston hesitated.

Pitt wondered if he were being protective of his wife, or afraid she might say something unintentionally indiscreet. It could be irrelevant to the hair and blood on the steps, possibly some other matter entirely, but one that he would still like to keep private. So many times Pitt had investigated one thing, only to uncover secrets of a completely different nature. Privacy, once intruded upon, was never entirely the same again. He felt a moment’s pity for Kynaston, and he regretted that he could not afford to indulge it.

‘Mr Kynaston?’ he prompted.

‘Yes … yes, of course,’ Kynaston said with a sigh. He reached over and rang the bell by the side of the fireplace. It was answered by the butler, a sober man, his pleasant face marred by an anxious frown. ‘Ah, Norton, would you please ask Mrs Kynaston to come to the withdrawing room?’ Clearly he had no intention of allowing Pitt to speak with her alone.

Norton retreated again and they waited in silence until the door opened and a woman came into the room. She was of average height and at first of very unremarkable appearance. Her hair was thick, but an ordinary shade of brown. Her features were regular, her eyes neither grey nor blue. When Pitt thought about it afterwards, he could not remember what she wore.

‘I’m sorry to disturb you, my dear,’ Kynaston said quietly. ‘But it seems that the local police have called in Special Branch about the blood and hair on the steps. At least until we know that Kitty is not badly hurt, we must allow them to pursue the issue.’

‘Good gracious!’ she said with surprise. She looked straight at Pitt with sudden interest. ‘Is the safety of the nation so little threatened that you have time to investigate the misbehaviour of a domestic servant?’ Her voice was the one memorable feature about her. It was rich and soft. Pitt could not help thinking that if she sang she would do so beautifully, with the kind of timbre that made all the notes throaty and full of emotion.

Kynaston was clearly at a loss for words.

‘We don’t know that it was Miss Ryder’s hair, ma’am,’ Pitt replied for him. ‘Or her blood.’

She was slightly taken aback. ‘I believe the hair found was of a reddish brown, which Kitty’s is. But I imagine that would be true of many people. Perhaps it has nothing to do with this house at all? It was found on the area steps, wasn’t it? Anyone might have been there.’

Kynaston’s face pinched momentarily. Then the instant he was aware of Pitt looking at him, he smoothed the expression away. ‘Of course,’ he agreed. ‘Although we do not get troubled by passing strangers. We have few neighbours.’ It was an unnecessary comment; the truth of it was obvious. They were surrounded by open country, a few trees, and the large gravel pits that were common between Blackheath village and Greenwich Park.

‘Really, Dudley,’ Rosalind Kynaston said patiently, ‘people will always find a place! And this time of the year, the shelter of the areaway must be a great deal pleasanter than the open in the wind.’

Pitt allowed himself to smile. ‘No doubt,’ he conceded. ‘But could one of the people have been Kitty Ryder, in this case?’

‘I suppose so.’ She gave the slightest shrug, barely a movement of her rather graceful shoulders. ‘There’s a young man she walks out with now and then. A carpenter or something of the sort.’

Kynaston looked startled. ‘Does she? You never mentioned it!’

She regarded him with an expression that almost concealed her impatience. ‘Of course I didn’t. Why on earth would I? I hoped it would pass. He is not particularly appealing.’

Kynaston drew in his breath as if to say something, then let it out again, and waited for Pitt to speak.

‘You don’t care for the young man?’ Pitt asked Mrs Kynaston. ‘If she ended the acquaintance do you think he might have taken it badly?’

She considered for several moments before finally replying. ‘Actually, I had not thought so. I believed he had an affection for her, but that he had no prospects. Also, to be frank, I thought Kitty had more sense than to choose the area steps in the middle of a winter night to tell him so.’

‘She should have been safe enough just outside her own scullery door!’ Kynaston protested. His expression darkened. ‘Just how unsuitable was he?’

‘He wasn’t unsuitable, Dudley, he was just not as well as she might have done for herself,’ she explained. ‘Kitty is a very handsome girl. She could have been a parlour maid in the city, if she’d wished to.’

‘She didn’t wish to?’ Pitt was curious. What would keep a good-looking girl here in Shooters Hill if she could have been in one of the fashionable squares in London? ‘Has she family locally?’ he asked.

‘No,’ Rosalind assured him. ‘She comes from Gloucestershire. I don’t know why she didn’t take her chance in the city. I’m sure she had offers.’

It might be irrelevant, but Pitt made a mental note to look further into the reason for Kitty’s loyalty, if she did not very soon turn up alive and well.

‘I suppose your advice didn’t go down very well,’ Kynaston observed, looking at his wife. ‘I thought she had more sense.’ He turned to Pitt. ‘We appear to have wasted your time. I apologise. If there is anything at all to deal with, which there probably isn’t, then it is a police matter. If Kitty doesn’t turn up, or we have any reason to suppose she has been harmed, we’ll report it.’ He smiled and inclined his head a little, as if it were a dismissal.

Pitt hesitated, unwilling to let go of the matter quite so easily. Someone had been hurt on the areaway steps, possibly badly. Had it been a daughter of the house rather than a maid, no one would be dismissing it.

‘Can you describe Miss Ryder for me, sir?’ he asked, without moving.

Kynaston blinked.

‘How tall is she?’ Pitt elaborated. ‘What build? What colouring?’

It was Rosalind Kynaston who replied. ‘Taller than I am, at least a couple of inches, and very handsomely built.’ She smiled with a dry, private amusement. ‘She had excellent features, in fact were she a Society girl we’d say she was a beauty. She has a fair skin and thick, auburn hair with a wave in it.’

‘I think you’re being over-generous, my dear,’ Kynaston said with a slight edge to his voice. ‘She’s a lady’s maid who was being courted by a young man of very dubious background.’ He turned to Pitt again. ‘And as I’m sure you are aware, maids have a half-day off at the weekends, but stopping out in this manner is not acceptable — which, of course, is why she has done it on the sly. If you are still concerned, you might consider the possibility that she has eloped with him.’

Rosalind was saved from making a reply by the entry into the room of another woman. She was taller, in fact only two or three inches short of Kynaston’s own height, and her hair was silver blond. But it was her face that commanded attention, not by its beauty, which was questionable, but by the power of emotion in it, which was more arresting than mere regularity of feature. Her eyes were of a burning blue.

‘Have you found the housemaid yet?’ she asked, looking directly at Kynaston.

‘Lady’s maid,’ Rosalind corrected her. ‘No, we haven’t.’

‘Good morning, Ailsa,’ Kynaston said, rather more gently than Pitt thought he would have, in the circumstances. ‘Unfortunately not. This is Commander Pitt of Special Branch.’

Ailsa’s delicate eyebrows rose. ‘Special Branch?’ she said incredulously. ‘Dudley, you haven’t called in Special Branch, have you? For heaven’s sake, my dear, they have better things to do!’ She turned to stare at Pitt with new curiosity. ‘Don’t you?’ she challenged him.

‘My sister-in-law, Mrs Bennett Kynaston,’ Kynaston explained. Pitt saw a shadow of pain cross his face, dismissed instantly, but with an effort. He recalled that Bennett Kynaston had died roughly nine years earlier. Interesting that his widow had kept such close touch with the family, and clearly had not married again. She was certainly handsome enough to have had many opportunities.

‘How do you do, Mrs Kynaston?’ he replied to her. She was staring at him, her eyes wide, so he answered her question. ‘A young woman is missing and there is blood, hair and broken glass on the area steps — enough to indicate the possibility at least of a very nasty fight. The local police called us because they are aware of Mr Kynaston’s importance to both the navy and the Government, and how serious any threat to him might be. If it turns out to be no more than a very unpleasant lovers’ quarrel, then we shall leave it to them to take what action is necessary. At the moment Miss Ryder appears to be missing.’

Ailsa shook her head. ‘You need to replace her, Rosalind. Whether she comes back or not, she is clearly no better than she should be, as they say.’

A look of anger crossed Rosalind’s face, but so quickly Pitt was not absolutely certain he had seen it at all. Had he imagined it, because he knew how his own wife, Charlotte, would have felt about such high-handed instruction from anyone else — even her sister Emily, close as they were in affection?

Before Rosalind could frame a reply, Pitt intervened, speaking to Kynaston. ‘We shall keep the case open until Kitty Ryder is found, or you have some news of her, whatever it may be,’ he said. ‘In the meantime, she appears not to have taken any of her belongings with her. The housekeeper told me even her nightgowns and hairbrush are still in her room. In light of that, we have to assume she did not plan to leave. If you discover anything of value missing from the house, please inform the local police. I would suggest that you be more than usually diligent in making certain that the doors are locked at night. You might inform your butler of the possibility of robbery …’

‘I dare say that is what it is,’ Kynaston agreed. ‘Most unpleasant. She came to us with good references. But your advice is well placed, and I shall certainly take it. I am obliged to you.’

‘I don’t believe Kitty would be involved in robbing us,’ Rosalind said with some heat, a slight flush on her pale cheeks.

‘Of course you’re reluctant to think so,’ Ailsa said gently, moving a step closer to her sister-in-law. ‘She was your personal maid, and you trusted her. One does! Usually one is right, but anyone can be misled, now and then. I understand she fell in with a very nasty type of young man, and we all know they can take people in — heaven knows, even in the best families, let alone a girl far from her home, working as a maid.’

The truth of the remark was unarguable, but Pitt saw in Rosalind’s face disbelief and frustration that she could not defend her feelings.

‘Quite.’ Kynaston nodded at Ailsa, and then turned to his wife. ‘Perhaps you could use Jane for a while. You like her, and she seems quite capable, until we get someone else to fill the place.’

‘What about Kitty?’ Rosalind said sharply. ‘For heaven’s sake, Dudley, she’s only been gone a few hours! You’re speaking as if she were dead and buried!’

‘Even if she returns, my dear, she is obviously unreliable,’ he said more gently. ‘I think this is the best decision.’ He turned to Pitt. ‘Thank you again for your promptness, and your advice, Commander. We won’t detain you any longer. Good day.’

‘Good day, sir,’ Pitt replied. ‘Ma’am,’ he acknowledged both women. Then he and Stoker left, going out through the front door into the deserted street. Rain was beginning to come across the open land of the heath.

‘What do you make of that, sir?’ Stoker asked curiously, turning up his coat collar as he walked. His voice was light but when Pitt glanced at him he saw the doubt in his face. ‘There was a lot of blood on that step,’ Stoker went on. ‘More than a scratch, I reckon. If someone hit that girl it was pretty hard. She must be daft to go willingly with anyone who’d use her like that.’ Now the doubt had turned to anger.

‘Perhaps she cut herself on the glass,’ Pitt said thoughtfully. He pulled the brim of his hat down and his scarf tighter as the rain increased. He looked up at the sky. ‘Good thing you made a sketch of it before this started. In twenty minutes there’ll be nothing to see.’

‘There was blood on the glass,’ Stoker said. ‘And the hair. Torn out by the roots, from the look of it. Kynaston may be important to the navy, but he’s covering something up … sir.’

Pitt smiled. He knew Stoker’s subtle and quite delicate insolence. It was not directed at him personally, but more at their political masters, whom he knew Pitt occasionally disliked as much as he did himself. He was still nervous that Pitt might yield to them, and not absolutely certain whether Pitt’s predecessor in command had done so or not. But Victor Narraway was a very different kind of man, at least on the surface. He was a gentleman, beginning as a junior lieutenant in the army, then through university in law, and as devious as an eel. Stoker had never been comfortable with him, but his respect for him was boundless.

Pitt, on the other hand, was the son of country gamekeeper, risen through the ranks of the regular Metropolitan Police. He had been promoted sideways into Special Branch, much against his will, when he had offended certain very powerful people and lost his job as Superintendent in Bow Street. Pitt might think he was subtle, but to Stoker he was as clear as the rising sun.

Pitt was aware of all this as he replied, ‘I know that, Stoker. What I don’t know is if it is something we should be concerned about.’

‘Well, if there’s something messy going on in that house, and a maid gets the bad end of it, we should care,’ Stoker said with feeling. ‘Perfect set-up for a spot of blackmail.’ He left the rest of his thought implied.

‘You think Dudley Kynaston was having an affair with his wife’s maid, and knocked her around on his own kitchen steps in the middle of a winter night?’ Pitt asked with a smile.

Stoker flushed faintly and stared straight ahead, avoiding Pitt’s eyes. ‘Put it like that, no, sir. If he’s that crazy he wants putting in the madhouse, for everybody’s sake, including his own.’

Pitt was going to add that it was probably just what it looked like, but he wasn’t sure what it looked like. The maids had found nothing missing to account for the glass. There was too much blood for a graze, and actually there was no way of telling if it was even human, let alone if it was that of the missing maid — who seemingly had gone without even taking her hairbrush. And was it her hair, or only a similar colour?

Who knew the nature of a lovers’ quarrel, if that is what it was?

‘We’ll have the local police keep an eye on it, and let us know if she comes back,’ he said to Stoker. ‘Or if she turns up anywhere else, for that matter.’

Stoker grunted, not satisfied, but accepting that there was nothing more they could do. They trudged through the rain silently, heads down, feet sloshing on the wet pavement.

Pitt arrived home at Keppel Street comparatively early, although at this time of the year it was already completely dark. The streetlamps gleamed like beacons through the rain, haloed in light for a brief space, darkness swirling between them.

Pitt went up the steps to his front door and was about to hunt through his always overstuffed pockets for his key when it opened in front of him, bathing him in the glow of the inside lights and the warmth of the parlour fire where the passage door was open.

‘Evenin’ sir,’ Minnie Maude said with a smile. ‘D’yer like a cup o’ tea before dinner’s ready? My, yer in’t ’alf soaked!’ She looked him up and down with sympathy. ‘I reckon as it’s rainin’ stair rods out there.’

‘Indeed it is,’ he agreed, dripping steadily on to the hall floor as the front door closed behind him. He looked at her freckled face and her piled-up red-brown hair, and for a moment he imagined the missing maid from Kynaston’s house and wondered where she was. Minnie Maude was handsome too, in her own way, tall and womanly; worldly-wise, domestically capable, and naïvely full of trust. He felt a tightness in his chest at the thought of her alone outside somewhere, perhaps hurt, cold to the bone, desperate for shelter. What on earth had happened to Kitty Ryder?

‘Yer a’right, sir?’ Minnie Maude’s anxious voice intruded on his thoughts.

Pitt eased himself out of his wet coat and took off his sodden boots. He gave her his hat and scarf as well.

‘Yes, thank you. And I will have a cup of tea. And I’ll have something to eat. I can’t remember what lunch was.’

‘Yes, sir. ’Ow about a couple o’ crumpets?’ she offered. ‘Wi’ butter?’

He looked at her. She was about nineteen, four years older than his daughter, Jemima, who was far too rapidly growing into a woman. Thank God Jemima wouldn’t be a servant living in somebody else’s house with only strangers to turn to.

‘Thank you,’ he replied. ‘Yes … bring them to me in the parlour, please.’ He wanted to add something more, but there really wasn’t anything to say that was appropriate.

After dinner, when Jemima and her younger brother, Daniel, had gone up to bed, he sat beside the fire in his usual chair, opposite Charlotte, who had abandoned her embroidery for the evening and sat with her boots off and her feet up, hidden by her skirts. The light from the gas brackets on the walls was a golden colour, muted a little by the glass. It softened the lines of everything it touched: the familiar books on the shelves on either side, the few ornaments, each with its own associations in the memory. The long curtains across the french windows on to the garden were drawn against the cold. He could not imagine anywhere more comfortable.

‘What is it?’ Charlotte asked. ‘You are making your mind up whether to tell me, so it can’t be a secret.’

In the past, when he was still in the police, he had shared many of his cases with her. In fact, some of them she had known to involve crime before he did. She had been something of a detective herself. She was acutely observant of human nature, and alarmingly fearless in pursuing what she felt was justice.

Of course, now so much more was secret and he could not share with her nearly as much as he used to, although he still would were he able. He was often tempted, only the cost restrained him. A betrayal of trust would damage him in his own eyes, and in hers. The loss of his position would destroy his career, and therefore also his ability to look after his family. He had faced that once when he was dismissed from the police, without the hope of ever being reinstated. He had powerful enemies, among them, unfortunately, the Prince of Wales, who would be only too delighted if Pitt’s entire career were called into question.

Charlotte was waiting for an answer. No secrets of state were involved. So far it was nothing but a rather unfortunate domestic incident.

‘Evidence of a fight on the areaway steps of a house on Shooters Hill,’ he replied. ‘And a missing lady’s maid. She was courting so it’s possible she eloped.’

‘I didn’t think there were houses up on Shooters Hill,’ she responded, frowning a little. ‘If I mustn’t know, then don’t tell me, but what you’ve said so far doesn’t make any sense.’

‘I know it doesn’t make any sense,’ he agreed. ‘Blood and hair on the steps, and broken glass … and a missing maid at a time of day when she should have been there, and always has been in the past.’

‘Why you?’ she said curiously. ‘If there’s a crime involved at all, isn’t it for the local police?’ Then her face lit with understanding. ‘Oh … it’s somebody important!’

‘Yes. And you’re quite right, if it’s anything at all, it belongs to the local police. You said Jemima needs a new dress?’

She tucked her feet up a little higher. The coals settled in the fire with a shower of sparks.

‘Yes, please … at least one.’

‘At least?’ He raised his eyebrows.

‘She’s going to the party at the Grovers’ as well,’ she explained. ‘It’s quite formal.’

‘I thought she didn’t want to go to that?’ He was momentarily confused.

There was a slight shadow in Charlotte’s face. ‘She doesn’t,’ she agreed. ‘But Mary Grover was very kind to her, and Jemima promised she would be there to help.’

Pitt remembered Jemima’s argument on the subject, then he looked at Charlotte again. ‘Don’t you think …?’ he began.

‘She doesn’t want to go because the Hamiltons are having a party as well, and she wants to go to that instead, because she likes Robert Hamilton.’

‘Then-’

‘Thomas … she owes Mary Grover a debt of kindness. She will pay it. And don’t tell me “later”. “Later” doesn’t do.’

‘I know,’ he said quietly.

‘I’m so glad.’ Suddenly she smiled and it warmed her whole face with a melting gentleness. ‘I don’t want to fight both of you — at least not at once.’

‘Good,’ he said, relaxing also at last, although he did not doubt for a second that she would have, had he forced her into it.