Death On Blackheath

Chapter Eleven

Pitt had sat up very late the previous evening, rereading all the papers he had on the Kynaston case. He thought of it in those terms because the root of it lay in Kynaston’s house. He had finally gone to bed at about half-past one, when the pages were swimming before his eyes and he was only wasting time looking at them.

He was jerked out of sleep by Charlotte’s hand on his shoulder, gentle but quite firm, shaking him. He opened his eyes and saw pale grey daylight in the room. It was the first of March. The sun was rising earlier every day. The equinox was less than three weeks away, the first day of spring.

‘Sorry. I slept in,’ he mumbled, sitting up reluctantly. His head felt thick and there was a dull ache at the back of his neck.

‘It isn’t all that late,’ she said quietly. Her voice was soft, but he had known her too long and too well to miss the strain in it.

Suddenly he was truly awake. ‘What’s happened?’ His mind raced over thoughts first of his children, then of Vespasia, or even Charlotte’s mother. Now he was cold, clenched up.

‘They’ve found another body in one of the gravel pits up on Shooters Hill,’ she answered. Her face was anxious, her brow furrowed.

All he felt was a wave of relief, as if the warm blood had started to flow in his body again. He threw off the covers and stood up.

‘I’d better get dressed and go. Who called you? I didn’t hear the telephone.’

‘Stoker’s here waiting for you, with a hansom. I’ll make him a cup of tea and a slice of toast while you’re dressing, and there’ll be some for you when you come down.’

He drew in his breath to argue, but she was already at the door.

‘And don’t tell me you haven’t time!’ she called. ‘The tea will be ready to drink, and you can carry the toast with you.’

Fifteen minutes later he was washed, dressed, hastily shaved, and sitting beside Stoker in the cab. They were going as fast as possible through the broadening daylight, rattling over the cobbles heading south.

‘Local police called me,’ Stoker told him. ‘Haven’t been there yet, came straight for you. They said this one’s worse. A lot worse.’

‘Another woman?’ Pitt asked.

‘Yes. But with fair hair.’ Stoker did not look at Pitt as he said it. Perhaps he was ashamed of it, but there was relief in his voice.

‘Does anyone know who she is? Any of the local police recognise her?’ Pitt asked.

Stoker shook his head. ‘Not at the time they called. Maybe they’ve got further now.’

Neither of them spoke for the rest of the journey as the hansom slowed a little going up the incline through Blackheath and then beyond on to Shooters Hill. Here the countryside was bare, the wind raking the grass between the few clumps of trees, which were none of them yet in leaf. Some of the gravel pits were filled with water after the winter rains.

Pitt prepared himself for the blast of the wind, which would be heavy and damp when he got out. He tried to imagine the sight that was waiting for them, as if foreknowledge could blunt the edge of the impact.

‘I ain’t waitin’ for yer,’ the cabby said gravely, his face windburned, half hidden by the muffler around his neck and chin. ‘I’nt fair ter me ’orse.’

‘Wouldn’t think of asking you.’ Pitt climbed out a little stiffly and paid the man generously more than he had asked for.

The driver found a sudden change of manner. ‘Thank you,’ he said with surprise. ‘Good o’ yer … sir.’ Then, before Pitt could have the chance to change his mind, he urged his horse on, turned in a circle, and headed back down towards Greenwich to find another fare.

Pitt and Stoker walked into the wind towards the group of men they could see huddled about a hundred yards away. The tussock grass was rough and the ground between littered with small stones and weeds. In moments their boots were covered with pale, sandy mud.

Some movement must have caught the eye of one of the men because he turned, and then started to walk towards them, the loose ends of his scarf flapping. Before he reached them he stopped, nodding to Stoker, then speaking to Pitt.

‘Sorry, sir. Looks too much like the last one not to let you know. Over this way.’ He started to walk back, head bent, feet making no sound on the spongy earth.

Pitt and Stoker followed, each consumed in their own thoughts.

The sergeant in charge was the same man as before. He looked tired and cold. ‘Mind those tracks there,’ he directed, pointing at what there was of a pathway. ‘Looks like a pony and trap, or something of the sort. Might have nothing to do with the body, but more than likely it was what the swine brought her here in.’

‘So she didn’t die here?’ Pitt asked.

The man bit his lip. ‘No, sir. Looks just like the other one back a few weeks ago. Even got the same kind of hair, same sort of build. From what you can tell, she must a’ bin real ’andsome when she were alive. We’ll need the doc to tell us for sure, but I reckon that wasn’t all that lately. Week or two, at any rate.’

‘Hidden from view?’ Pitt asked.

‘That’s it,’ the sergeant replied, ‘she wasn’t. She was right out there for anyone passing to see. Couldn’t hardly miss her, poor creature.’

‘So she was put there very recently?’

‘Last night. That’s why the wheel tracks are worth something, or might be.’

‘Who found her?’ Pitt asked.

‘Young couple.’ The sergeant pulled a grim face. ‘Bin out all night. Walking the girl home so she could pretend as she’d been in ’er own bed, like. Not fooling anyone now!’ He gave a bark of laughter.

‘At least they reported it,’ Pitt observed, keeping pace with him. ‘They could have just kept going. Then it might have been a lot longer before we found her. Could have been more wind and rain, and we wouldn’t have found the cart tracks. How far do they go?’

‘Far as the main track over there,’ he pointed. ‘Then they get lost in all the gravel ruts. But then it’s reasonable that’s the way he came. Isn’t really any other way.’

‘Which means she was deliberately brought here,’ Pitt pointed out just as they reached the group. They were all standing close together giving the illusion of sheltering each other, although the wind managed to pick them out, whip everyone’s scarves and coat tails, and bend the grasses around their feet.

They parted slightly to allow Pitt to walk through and look down at the corpse that lay in the shallow dip in the ground. Her clothes were spread out around her, dark and lacking any distinguishing shape or colour in the wet early light. Her hair was immediately noticeable because it was thick and fair, a little longer than average. Pitt thought that in life it would have been beautiful.

Her face was harder to appreciate because it was already distorted by death and, like the earlier corpse, it had been obscenely lacerated by a razor-sharp blade. The eyes, nose and lips were missing. It was worse, because decomposition had begun, and small night animals had already reached her. As the sergeant had told him, she had been dead some time before she was placed here.

‘What killed her?’ Pitt straightened up, trying to control the horror and pity that welled up inside him. His whole body was shaking, and he could not control it. He looked from one to another of the men. ‘I can’t see anything obvious.’

The sergeant spoke quietly, his voice hoarse. ‘We’ll need the police surgeon to tell us for sure, but ’er inside is broken up pretty bad, and both her legs are broke, high up, across the …’ He drew his own hand across his upper thighs. ‘God knows what did that to ’er.’

‘But no blood,’ Pitt said with surprise. He looked at the ground near her and saw nothing to mark the proximity except the claw marks of small animals. ‘And she wasn’t here last night?’ he went on.

‘She’d ’ave bin seen, this close to the main paths,’ the sergeant answered. ‘And ’er clothes are damp but not soaked. There’s the cart tracks as well. No, she was put here after dark yesterday. God alone knows what for! But if we catch the swine what did it, you won’t need the hangman …’

One of the young men cleared his throat. ‘Commander Pitt, sir?’

Pitt looked at him.

‘Sir, she’s lying kind of odd, like her spine’s bent, or something. But I were ’ere when we found the first one, sir, an’ she were lying exactly the same way — I mean absolute exactly. Like it’s the same thing all over again.’

Pitt had a flash in his mind’s eye of the woman they had thought was Kitty. It was exactly the same, as if she had the same internal pain twisting her back.

The wind was rising, whining a little in the branches above them and rattling as it knocked the dead weed heads together.

‘You’re right. Well observed,’ Pitt said. ‘I presume the police surgeon in on his way?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Then I’ll talk to the couple who found her, until he comes. Might as well let them be on their way. Anything else about her? I suppose no one has any idea who she is?’

‘No idea at all, sir. Except the quality of her dress an’ jacket suggest she could be another maid. Looked at ’er ’ands, an’ she’s got little burns and scars on them too, like she did a lot of ironing or cooking, or that kind of thing. And … there’s a handkerchief in her coat pocket, an embroidered one with lace and an “R” stitched on it. Far as I can recall it’s a pretty exact match for the one we found on the other body. An’ worse than that, sir, we found this on her.’

He took an envelope out of his own pocket and opened it. Inside was a gold chain with a very beautiful fob on it, also gold, about an inch in diameter, but of an irregular shape. It was slightly indented around the circumference, like a five-petalled rose. On the reverse were the initials ‘BK’ in an ornamental script. Bennett Kynaston? It had to be the missing chain and fob from Dudley Kynaston’s watch that he claimed was taken from his pocket.

‘I can just imagine what the papers will make of this,’ he said grimly. ‘Let me see the handkerchief too, please?’

The man bent and picked it out of the dead woman’s pocket. He passed it to Pitt. It was a small square of white lawn, lace-edged and embroidered with an ‘R’ in one corner, with tiny flowers. It was an exact match for the earlier one.

‘I’ll go and speak with Kynaston,’ Pitt said to the sergeant, then he turned to Stoker. ‘Stay here. Speak to the couple who found her. Learn all you can. I’ll catch up with you at the police station, or the morgue. Make damn sure this gets priority.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Stoker and the sergeant replied as one.

Pitt was cold and hungry when he knocked on the front door of Kynaston’s house on Shooters Hill. This time he had no interest in the area steps, or the servants except as they might corroborate anyone else’s story.

The door was opened by Norton, the butler, who regarded Pitt with unhappy misgiving. No one with any manners called at this hour. It could only mean bad news.

‘Good morning, sir. May I help you?’ he said very coolly.

‘Thank you.’ Pitt stepped inside, forcing Norton either to let him in, or deliberately to bar the way. ‘I apologise for my boots. They are unfortunately filthy. I have been to the gravel pit … again.’ He knew his voice was shaking. His body was tense, muscles looked tight across the shoulders and in his belly, as if he were as cold as the mutilated body up on the wind-combed grass a thousand yards away. He had tried, really tried, to get it out of his imagination, to concentrate on his job, to watch and listen to the present, but he could not.

Norton was pale. He swallowed hard. ‘I’m sure the bootboy would be able to do something for you, sir. Perhaps you would care for a pair of slippers in the meantime? And a cup of tea?’

Pitt was bitterly cold, and he realised his throat was dry. He was also on duty regarding a particularly vile crime. To accept cleaner footwear was a necessary courtesy to the housemaids who would have to try to clean the carpets after him. Tea and toast was a luxury, and therefore an indulgence.

‘That is very kind of you,’ he replied. ‘Slippers would be a practical courtesy; the tea is unnecessary. I require to speak to Mr Kynaston before he leaves the house. You will doubtless hear about it very soon. I’m afraid there has been another body found in the gravel pits.’ He saw Norton’s look of horror. ‘It is not Kitty Ryder,’ he added quickly. ‘In fact, it is quite possible that Kitty is still alive and well.’ Instantly he knew he should not have said so much. Certainly Norton would tell his master. Pitt had given away his opportunity to catch Kynaston unaware. ‘I’m sorry, but it cannot wait,’ he added.

‘Yes, sir.’ Norton bowed his head very slightly in acknowledgement. ‘I shall inform him immediately. If you would like to wait in the morning room, it is agreeably warm. See if these slippers will fit you.’

Pitt obeyed, taking off his prized boots, then following Norton to the morning room, slippers in his hand.

Kynaston came only moments later, his face grave and anxious. He closed the door behind him and remained standing.

‘Norton tells me you have found another woman’s body in the gravel pits,’ he said without preamble.

‘Yes, sir, I’m afraid so. This one also has been mutilated, and appears to have been dead some time, but placed there only last night.’

The last dregs of colour drained out of Kynaston’s face. He swallowed hard, as if something constricted his throat.

‘For God’s sake, man, why are you telling me this?’ he demanded huskily. ‘Do you imagine that it is Kitty at last?’

So Norton had not told him! Interesting. Had he not had the opportunity, or was his loyalty more divided than one might suspect?

‘No, sir, I think that is not possible,’ he replied. ‘This woman has fair hair, very little like the description of Kitty Ryder. Also we have found Harry Dobson, and he says Kitty ran away with him, but has since left him. We checked, and neighbours and local shopkeepers saw her, alive and well, since she left here.’

‘And you couldn’t have told us this before?’ Kynaston said in a sudden explosion of fury. His eyes were blazing, the colour dark in his cheeks. ‘What the devil is the matter with you, man? Whatever you think of me, what about my wife’s feelings? Or those of the other servants? She was part of our household! We cared about her!’

Pitt felt the lash of his words, but curiously it pleased him. The man was showing some sign of ordinary decency.

‘We have only just found out, sir,’ he answered levelly. ‘Yesterday. Sergeant Stoker worked in his own time. This morning I was woken with the news of this second body, which also has a handkerchief identical to the one we found on the first body, and to several your wife possesses.’ He took the gold watch fob out of his pocket and laid it on the table between them. ‘And she also had this …’

Now Kynaston did sit down, hard, as if he were uncertain his legs would support him much longer. His face was ash pale. ‘That is my watch fob. It used to be my brother’s. That’s why I was so upset when it was stolen.’

‘Where did the theft happen, sir? Even approximately?’

‘Oxford Street. It was crowded. I only realised when I went to check the time later. Someone is trying to make it appear that I am involved in this,’ he said desperately. ‘God knows why! I have no idea who this woman is, what happened to her or how she got there. Any more than I had for the first one, poor creature.’ He looked up. ‘If she is not Kitty, for which I am profoundly grateful, who is she? She’s still someone, violently dead and her body discarded. Why aren’t you doing everything you can to find out who she is, and who did this to her?’

Pitt controlled his own feelings with some difficulty. He had seen this body, and the first one.

‘That’s a regular police job, Mr Kynaston. I’m Special Branch, and my job is the security of the country. And in this case, to safeguard you and your reputation so you can continue with the work you do for the navy.’

Kynaston buried his head in his hands. ‘Yes … I know that. I’m sorry. Tell me when this latest body was put there, if you know, and I’ll account for wherever I was.’

‘Some time after dark yesterday evening,’ Pitt told him, ‘and before light this morning, probably at least an hour before. I can’t tell you closer than that at the moment. I might be able to after I’ve seen the police surgeon, and he has had time to look at her more closely. She’s been dead quite a while.’

‘How … how did she die?’

‘I don’t know that either. But perhaps we can exclude you before we’ve learned that. Where were you from sundown yesterday until, let’s say, six o’clock this morning?’

Kynaston looked vaguely surprised. ‘I was in bed most of the night, like anybody else!’

‘From sundown yesterday evening, sir?’

‘I dined out … at my club. I’d been working late in the City. I didn’t want to come all the way home here to eat. I was tired, and hungry.’ There was a sharp edge to his voice, but Pitt could not tell if it was from irritation or fear.

‘Did you dine alone?’ Pitt asked. ‘Would one of the stewards remember you?’

‘I had things to consider for a meeting. I was in no mood for idle conversation, however agreeable. But certainly the steward will remember me. Ask him.’

‘Yes, sir, I will. If you will give me the name of the club, and the address. And if you recall which steward it was who served you, I’ll speak to him personally. What time did you leave?’

‘I didn’t look at the clock. Half-past nine, roughly.’

‘And you got home at what time?’

‘The traffic was bad. Some stupid accident; man not in control of his horses. I was late. Ask Norton, he’ll tell you. I think it was about eleven.’

‘Did you speak to Mrs Kynaston?’ Pitt and Charlotte shared a bed, but he knew that many people with large houses did not necessarily do so, especially when they had been married for some time. Kynaston’s sons were at boarding school or university and both his daughters were married.

‘It was unnecessary to disturb her at that time of night,’ Kynaston replied. His mouth twisted in a bitter smile. ‘But if you think I crept out of the house unseen, found some wretched woman’s body and somehow or other carried it up to the gravel pits and left it there, then returned home to my bed again, you might ponder how I managed to do it without disturbing anyone and getting my clothes sodden. Or how I even carried her! It wasn’t in my carriage. The groom would know if I’d disturbed the horses, and I certainly didn’t do it in a hansom cab!’

Pitt smiled back at him. ‘Frankly, sir, I don’t think you did it at all. But someone did. All I have to do is be satisfied that it could not have been you, or anyone in this house …’

‘Norton? Have you lost your wits?’ Kynaston said incredulously. ‘The coachman? The bootboy?’

‘No, sir. I never considered Norton a possibility. But your observation about the horses, and the idea of anyone doing such a thing in a hansom very nicely rules him out as well. Actually, we think it was probably a pony and trap.’

‘I don’t have one.’

‘Yes, sir, I know that.’

Kynaston sighed. ‘I suppose it’s your job. I’m damned glad it isn’t mine! I imagine someone has to do it.’

Pitt was stung. ‘Yes, sir. And sometimes it is extremely unpleasant, full of darkness and tragedy. But if it were your wife or daughter lying out there you would wish me to do everything in my power to learn the truth, whoever it inconvenienced.’ He took a breath. ‘I shall speak to all the servants, with your permission, in case they are able to help.’

He expected Kynaston to lose his temper, but instead he began to tremble and went so ashen that had he not been sitting already he might well have fallen.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said very quietly. ‘I spoke without thinking. This whole business is deeply distressing.’

Pitt wished he had not been so harsh. And yet he had meant what he said, even if he knew instantly that he should not have said it. Perhaps it would be wiser now to leave the matter of his affair until he was more composed. ‘I’ll keep you informed, sir, should we actually find Kitty Ryder. But it was certainly not her body in the gravel pit, either the first time or now.’

‘Thank you. Norton will see you out.’

Pitt went into the hall where Norton handed him his clean and polished boots, and retrieved the slippers. Pitt thanked him.

Pitt spent the rest of the morning checking what Kynaston had said. He did not disbelieve him, but he wanted to have the proof so he could rebut any accusations made by journalists. More importantly he must be able to answer questions firmly, even tartly, that Somerset Carlisle might raise in the House, under the privilege afforded him as a Member of Parliament.

By two o’clock in the afternoon he was tired and miserable. His stomach was gnawing at him with hunger, so much so that he felt light-headed as he sat at one of the tables in a pub. Eating a big steak and kidney pudding with a glass of cider helped little.

Kynaston had been at his club, but he had left at least an hour earlier than he had said, and arrived home an hour later than he had told Pitt. Neither had there been any recorded incidents of traffic accidents or other delays. He had had Stoker speak to a number of hansom drivers, as they were the most reliable source of information as to the traffic conditions on the streets. It was part of their livelihood to know. Word of delays, accidents, and mischance of any sort spread like fire among them. There was hardly a street in London they did not frequent, let alone the way from Kynaston’s club in central London to his home on Shooters Hill.

The barmaid passed by, checking that he was satisfied with his meal. He smiled his thanks and took another mouthful.

Why had Kynaston lied? Clearly he was afraid, but of whom? Of what? Where had he been for nearly two hours that he had not accounted for?

Perhaps the matter came back to his mistress again? The issue of Kitty Ryder’s disappearance had all but died from the public mind. The newspapers’ attention had been taken by other things. The police wished to identify the first body, but had already pursued it as far as they could. Kynaston might reasonably have believed that life was back to normal. Only the discovery of this new body in the gravel pit brought the whole thing flooding back to mind.

Pitt kept on eating, warmer at last.

No doubt the newspapers would have banner headlines on this second wretched discovery. They would sell thousands of extra copies on the sheer horror of it. They would go after Kynaston again because he was a public figure. It was a temptation they would not even try to resist.

Why in heaven’s name had he lied? He must surely have foreseen that?

Pitt knew he must weigh how he would answer Talbot, when he sent for him, as he assuredly would.

Then another thought occurred to him. Was it conceivable that Kynaston knew who had killed those women? Was he protecting him willingly? Or was he afraid of him? Was someone he loved in jeopardy of far deeper involvement than Kynaston could protect them from?

Pitt finished his meal without the enjoyment such cooking deserved, emptied his glass of cider. He went out to find a hansom to take him to Downing Street to report this latest event to Edom Talbot — although no doubt Talbot would have heard of it already, at least the facts.

Pitt was correct on that. He was ushered in immediately, and Talbot saw him within ten minutes. Only an interview with the Prime Minister himself could take precedence over this.

Talbot came into the room stiff with fury. His hands fumbled with the doorknob and he ended up slamming it in spite of himself. This was the residence and the office of the Prime Minister of Great Britain, and he could not afford such a loss of self-control. He blamed Pitt for it.

‘What in heaven’s name are you doing, Pitt?’ he demanded in a low, angry voice. ‘I thought you had this thing under control!’

Pitt knew that he could not afford to lose his own self-mastery. Narraway would not have, whatever he felt. He had a temper — Pitt knew that very well — but Narraway just had too much dignity to allow someone else to manipulate him. That thought was helpful. He clung on to it.

‘We did have, sir,’ he replied stiffly, ‘until this new body was found. We have no idea yet who she is. I’m waiting for the police surgeon to tell me what he has found, or can deduce. My first priority was to see if Mr Kynaston could provide proof that it has nothing to do with him, or anyone in his house.’

‘And did you?’ Talbot could not conceal his fear. His face was strained, muscles of his neck so tight he could barely turn his head without a wince of pain. His high, stiff collar must be biting into him.

‘To my own satisfaction,’ Pitt answered. ‘But it won’t satisfy the police, or the newspapers, if they get hold of it. It certainly wouldn’t satisfy a jury.’

Talbot seemed not to be breathing, yet a nerve jumped in his temple.

‘Be precise, man,’ he snapped. ‘What are you talking about? The Prime Minister can’t deal in “whats” and “ifs” and “maybes”. Is Kynaston implicated or not? If that damn fool Carlisle asks questions in the House again, the Prime Minister has to have a decent and absolute answer! And I have to be able to assure him that it is accurate. And in spite of appearance to the contrary, that Special Branch knows what the devil it’s doing!’

Pitt kept his voice level with a considerable effort.

‘This woman had a gold watch chain with a very unusual fob. The first one had the actual watch, you will remember …’

‘Half the well-to-do men in London have gold watches,’ Talbot snapped. ‘Probably most of them have a chain and fob of some sort.’

‘The watch was Kynaston’s,’ Pitt said levelly. ‘He admitted it. The fob he owned to as well. It has the initials “BK” on it. He said it had belonged to his brother, Bennett, and was of sentimental value to him. He said it had been stolen from him by a pickpocket, in Oxford Street, or near it.’

Talbot was silent for a moment.

Pitt waited.

‘And do you believe him?’ Talbot said at last.

‘I don’t know. There was a handkerchief like the first one as well.’

‘It means nothing!’ Talbot said sharply.

‘And the watch and fob, on two different women, both dead and mutilated, and left in the gravel pits?’ Pitt asked. ‘On the other hand, we have evidence that the Kynaston’s maid was seen alive and well sometime after the first body was found, and the second one does not resemble her.’

Something almost palpable eased inside Talbot. ‘Seen alive after the first body was found? Then for God’s sake leave Kynaston alone! You can’t prove anything! Maybe this pickpocket is your homicidal lunatic!’

‘Perhaps. But when I asked Mr Kynaston to account for his whereabouts at the time the body was left in the gravel pit, he lied about it.’

‘So he’s got some business, or pastime, he doesn’t want to discuss with the public!’ Talbot raised his eyebrows very high. ‘Haven’t we all? He was gambling, drinking, or whoring, for all I know, or care. He wasn’t murdering some wretched woman and dumping her body in the gravel pits right outside his own damn doorway!’

‘I was hoping for something definitive for the newspapers,’ Pitt explained. ‘They might consider any of the pastimes you mentioned worthy of public attention, and I’m sure we would rather they didn’t.’ He kept the smile from his face with difficulty. It might well have been more of a sneer.

Talbot started to make a remark, then thought better of it. ‘Keep me apprised,’ he ordered instead. ‘Do try to get this thing solved and out of the newspapers.’

‘Yes, sir.’

The evening darkness had closed in and it was dripping sporadic rain when Pitt reached the police surgeon at the morgue. He knew the woman from the gravel pit would have been given priority. Surely Whistler would have all the information he needed by now?

He found Whistler in his office looking tired and a little gaunt. His clothes were rumpled and his tie had come undone. A kettle was steaming gently on the top of a wood-burning stove in the corner and altogether the room was very pleasant, apart from its proximity to the morgue itself. All real ease was torn away by the knowledge that within thirty feet of them there were cold rooms with corpses in, and tables on which those same corpses would duly be cut open and the pieces of them examined.

When Pitt went in Whistler was in the act of taking his work jacket off and replacing it with a more casual one. His hands were pink, the skin a little raw, as if he had just scrubbed himself as hard as he could with an abrasive brush.

‘I was expecting you,’ he said wearily. ‘In fact I thought you’d be here waiting, like a dog for its dinner.’ He sat down behind his desk, which was covered with papers in no apparent order.

‘Would it have been worth the wait?’ Pitt asked, closing the door. He was grateful that he did not have Whistler’s job, even if his clients were beyond pain, and Pitt’s were not. They were also beyond help.

Whistler sighed. ‘Tea?’ he offered. ‘It’s colder than a witch’s heart in that damn morgue.’ Without waiting for Pitt’s reply he moved the kettle into the middle of the stove and watched while it boiled. He talked as he made the tea in a battered pewter pot, which must once have been quite handsome.

‘Cause of death is fairly obviously a very bad fall,’ he said. ‘From the look of the poor creature, might have been out of a window. Two storeys up, at least, maybe higher. Lot of broken bones, some of them downright splintered. Only good thing about it is that she probably didn’t know much about it.’

Pitt winced without being able to help it. ‘How long ago?’

‘Ah!’ Whistler poured the boiling water into the teapot and inhaled the fragrant steam. ‘That’s the more difficult part. At least two weeks ago, but I’d bet my money on more like three. But just like the other one from the gravel pit, she’d been kept in a cold place. Couldn’t have made a better job of it if I’d had her here. And I assure you, I didn’t! No apparent marks of depredation, except a little bit from insects. Hadn’t been out there more than a night. But I expect you know that. Do you take milk?’

‘Yes, please.’ Pitt was losing his taste for eating or drinking anything, even as chilled as he was.

‘Sugar?’

‘No … thank you.’

‘Got no cake. Need to stop eating so much. Cut up too many fat people and seen what’s inside ’em to want to become one.’ He passed Pitt one of the mugs. ‘Here.’

‘Thank you. So she was kept for a couple of weeks at least? You’re certain?’ he asked.

Whistler looked at him sharply. ‘Of course I’m certain! You’ve got a bloody lunatic here! The sooner you, or someone else, gets hold of him and locks him up, the better.’

Pitt asked the question he had been dreading. ‘Are you certain she was murdered?’

Whistler’s eyebrows shot up almost to his hairline. ‘What? Man, half the bones in her body were smashed. She didn’t walk herself up to the gravel pit in the middle of the night!’

‘I’m not suggesting she put herself there,’ Pitt said patiently. ‘But could she have died from an accidental fall, and someone else put her there?’

‘Two or three weeks after she died? And for God’s sake — the mutilations! That’s not done by animals or nature — it’s grotesque, man: moral obscenity!’ Whistler took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. ‘But I suppose it’s not impossible her death itself was accidental — if you can look at it in isolation,’ he conceded. ‘But why? Why would any sane man keep the victim of an appalling accident for weeks, mutilate her, and then dump her up at the gravel pit — and right where she’d be sure to be found? If he wanted to get rid of the body, why not bury her? Or even drop her, with a few stones around her waist, in one of the shallow lakes around there? By the time the summer dried them out, she’d be unrecognisable. There wouldn’t be a cat in hell’s chance of finding out who she was, or who put her there. If she was ever found at all!’

Pitt thought about it. ‘Well, he doesn’t appear to have been interrupted, so he had time to do whatever he wanted. He must have wanted her to be found.’

Whistler stared at him. ‘We’ve got a lunatic on our hands.’

‘Perhaps …’

‘If this one isn’t, I pray to the Good Lord we never get one that fits your idea of what is!’ he said disgustedly.

‘Anything else you can tell me?’ Absent-mindedly Pitt drank the tea. For all the makeshift preparation of it, it was actually very good. After the subject of the conversation, and the fear that was forming in his mind, he was glad of its warmth.

‘I’ll write up a full report for you,’ Whistler promised. ‘But I doubt it’ll help you much. As far as I can tell, she was a well-nourished woman in her late twenties. From the state of her it’s hard to tell a lot. A few odd scars on her hands, just like the other one. Could have been a maid or laundress, or a young woman with her own house, but no one else to do the chores. But if she was poor, she still ate well. Her hair must have been beautiful, and she was tall and nicely curved in all the right places. Does that help?’ He put his cup down and added more hot water to it.

‘Not that I can see,’ Pitt admitted. ‘We’ll get the local police this side of the river to find out if anyone’s missing that it could be. Thank you, anyway.’

‘Sorry I can’t tell you when she died, closer than by a week or so. Can’t very well rule anyone out over that.’

‘Can’t even tell who put her there,’ Pitt replied. ‘For whatever that might be worth!’

Pitt thanked him and left, glad to get outside into the wind, away from the heaviness and the closed air of Whistler’s office where he could smell the morgue in his imagination.

He walked for a little distance, deep in thought. He was not ready yet to decide his next actions, although it was too late to do much this evening. When he got home he would have dinner, then help Jemima with her homework, or at least make suggestions. He would have a quick game of dominoes with Daniel, who was getting pretty good at it. Another year or two and he would have lost the chance. Daniel and Jemima would be bound up in their own futures. Jemima would probably be in love.

Charlotte would understand if Pitt continued working, but that was not an excuse to do so. Regardless of her wishes that he solve the case, he wanted to spend time with her for himself, time that had nothing to do with Kynaston, or dead women, or possible treason and threats to the state.

Walking home alone in the dark, the wind blustery around him, he would think.

Was someone trying to make Kynaston appear guilty of killing these women? It was an outlandish idea! Worse than eccentric, it was absurd. Since Kitty was alive, at least until a few days ago, the first body could not have been hers. Yet the suggestion that it was had been deliberately created by leaving the distinctive gold watch there. By whom? But more than that, why? Had there been a pickpocket at all? It was totally believable, and impossible to disprove.

He crossed a main thoroughfare and had to wait for a couple of carriages to pass.

Was Somerset Carlisle behind it? This was bizarre and macabre enough for him! It took Pitt back all those years to the case in Resurrection Row, and the corpses then. He remembered with a shiver and a strange, twisted amusement the resolution of that case. Perhaps he should have had Carlisle prosecuted then? But he had not. It was one of the very few occasions when he had bent the rules. His own sense of justice forced him to. Had Carlisle always known that? Yes, he probably had.

And now that Pitt knew Vespasia so much better, cared for her as much as he cared for anyone outside his own immediate family, it was still impossible! Carlisle had been his friend in times of disappointment, or need. He had never found any request for help too dangerous or too troublesome to fulfil.

He increased his pace a little, walking along the pavement.

And he also owed Carlisle for the rescue from his embarrassment, possibly even a major disgrace in front of Talbot. Not that Carlisle would ever attempt to collect the debt! And that made it heavier to carry.

Damn the man, and his charm, his courage and his outrageous behaviour!

In the morning Pitt resolved to have Stoker, and whatever other men he needed, dig more deeply into every aspect of Kynaston’s life, his relationships past and present, personal and professional. Had he rivals for office? What exactly was his financial position? What were his debts, or expectations? And, of course, who was the mistress he guarded so carefully? And lied about? Had he rivals there, other than the woman’s husband, of course? He could not now afford to ignore any of these things, distasteful as they were to pursue. The watch and the fob made them impossible to overlook.