Traitors Gate

8

PITT WOKE UP SLOWLY, the thumping in his head becoming more persistent till it dragged him to the surface of consciousness and forced him awake. He opened his eyes. The bedroom was barred with sunlight where the curtains did not quite meet. Charlotte was still asleep beside him, warm and hunched up, her hair in loose braids beginning to come undone.

The banging was still going on. There was no sound in the street outside, no carriages, no drays, no noise of footsteps or voices.

He turned over and looked at the clock beside the bed. It was ten minutes before five.

The banging was getting worse. It was downstairs at the front door.

He sat up reluctantly and pushed his fingers through his hair, then put his jacket on over his nightshirt and walked barefoot across the floor to open the window. Charlotte stirred but did not fully waken. He pushed up the sash and looked out.

The banging stopped and a foreshortened figure stepped back from the door and looked up. It was Tellman. His face was very white in the early morning light and he had come without his usual bowler hat. He looked disheveled and upset.

Pitt indicated that he would come down, and after closing the window again, he walked as quietly as he could back to the door to the landing and went down the stairs into the hall. He undid the lock and pulled the door open.

Tellman looked even worse closer to. His face was ashen and what little flesh there was seemed to be sunken away. He did not wait to be asked.

“Something terrible has happened,” he said as soon as he saw Pitt. “You’d better come and deal with it yourself. I haven’t told anybody yet, but Mr. Farnsworth’s going to be in a right state when he hears.”

“Come in,” Pitt ordered, standing back. “What is it?” All sorts of fears whirled around in his head; presumably some terrible news had come from the German Embassy. Although how would Tellman know that? Had someone absconded, taking papers with them? “What is it?” he demanded more urgently.

Tellman remained on the step. He was so pale he looked as if he might collapse. That in itself alarmed Pitt. He would have thought Tellman inured to anything.

“Mrs. Chancellor,” Tellman said, and coughed painfully, then gulped. “We’ve just found her body, sir.”

Pitt was stunned. His breath caught in his throat and the words came out in a whisper. “Her body?”

“Yes sir. Washed up in the river at the Tower.” He watched Pitt with hollow eyes.

“Suicide?” Pitt said slowly, unable to believe it.

“No.” Tellman stood motionless except that he shivered very slightly although the morning was mild. “Murder. She’d been strangled, and then put in the water. Sometime last night by the looks of it. But you’ll need the medical examiner to tell you for sure.”

Pitt felt a sorrow so sharp it exploded in him in a kind of wild anger. She had been such a beautiful, vulnerable woman, so full of life, so highly individual. He remembered her vividly at the Duchess of Marlborough’s reception. He could picture her face in his mind as Tellman was talking. It was so seldom he had known a victim in life, the sense of loss was personal, different from the pity that he usually felt.

“Why?” he said violently. “Why would anyone want to destroy a woman like that? It doesn’t make any kind of sense.” Without realizing it he had clenched his fists and his body was tight with rage under his jacket. He was not even aware of his bare feet on the step or the fact he had no trousers on.

“The treason at the Colonial Office …” Tellman said unhappily. “Maybe she knew something?”

Pitt thumped the door lintel with the heel of his clenched fist, and swore.

“You’d better get dressed, sir, and come,” Tellman said quietly. “There’s no one knows about it yet, except the boatman as found her and the constable who reported it to me, but we can’t keep it that way for long. Don’t matter what you say to ’em, discretion and all that, somebody’ll talk to someone.”

“They know who she is?” Pitt was startled.

“Yes sir. That’s why I was called.”

Pitt was irritated with himself; he should have thought of that before.

“How?” he demanded. “How could riverboat men know her?”

“The constables,” Tellman explained patiently. “They were the ones who knew who she was. She was obviously someone of quality, any fool could see that, but she had a locket ’round her neck, little gold thing that opened up, with a picture in it.” He sighed and there was a sadness for a moment in his eyes. “Linus Chancellor, it was, clear as you like. That’s why they called us. Whoever she was, they knew that picture meant something that could only mean trouble.”

“I see. Where is she now?” Pitt looked back at him.

“Still at the Tower, sir. I had ’em cover her up, and left her where she was, more or less, so as you could see.”

“I’ll be down,” Pitt said, and left Tellman on the step. He went back upstairs, taking off his jacket as he reached the landing and pulling off his nightshirt as soon as he was through the bedroom door.

Charlotte had drifted back to sleep and it seemed cruel to waken her, but he had to give her some account of where he had gone. He finished dressing first. There was no time to shave. A brisk splash of cold water in the basin and a rubdown with the towel would have to do.

He reached over and touched her gently.

There must have been some rigidity in him, or perhaps the coldness of his hands after the water, but she woke immediately.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” She opened her eyes and saw him dressed. She struggled to sit up. “What’s happened?”

He had no time to tell her gently. “Tellman’s come to say they have found Susannah Chancellor’s body washed up from the river.”

She stared at him, unable for a moment to comprehend what he had said.

“I have to go.” He bent to kiss her.

“She committed suicide?” she said, her eyes still fixed on his. “The poor creature … I …” Her face was wrenched with pity.

“No … no. She was murdered.”

There was both shock and a kind of relief in her face.

“Why did you think she committed suicide?” he asked.

“I … I don’t know. She seemed so troubled.”

“Well there was no doubt about it, from what Tellman says.”

“How was she killed?”

“I haven’t been there yet,” he answered, not wanting to tell her. He kissed her quickly on the cheek and stepped back.

“Thomas!”

He waited.

“You said ‘from what Tellman said.’ What did he say?”

He let out his breath slowly. “She was strangled. I’m sorry. He’s waiting for me.”

She sat still, her face full of grief. There was nothing he could do. He went out feeling sad and helpless.

Tellman was waiting in the hall and he turned and led the way out into the street as soon as Pitt appeared. Pitt closed the door and hastened to catch him up. At the corner they crossed into the main thoroughfare, and it was only a matter of minutes before they hailed a hansom and Tellman directed it to the Tower of London.

It was a long journey from Bloomsbury. They went south first to Oxford Street, and then east until it turned into High Holborn and then for nearly a mile before turning right farther towards the river down St. Andrews Street, Shoe Lane and St. Bride’s to Ludgate Circus.

Tellman sat in silence. He was not a companionable man. Whatever his thoughts were he was disinclined to share them and he sat uncomfortably, staring straight ahead.

Several times it was on the edge of Pitt’s tongue to ask him something, but he could think of nothing that would be useful. Tellman had already said all he knew for certain. The rest would be only speculation. Anyway, Pitt was not sure he wanted to hear Tellman’s ideas on Susannah Chancellor. Her lovely, intelligent face with its capacity for pain was too sharp in his mind, and he knew what he was going to see when they got to the Tower.

They turned along Ludgate Hill and swung around St. Paul’s churchyard with the giant mass of the cathedral above them. Its dome was dark against the pale, early sky, which was marked only by a few shreds of cloud like banners across its limpid blue. There were very few people about. Down the whole length of Canon Street they passed only half a dozen cabs, two drays and a dung cart. Canon Street turned into East Cheap and then into Great Tower Street.

Tellman leaned forward and suddenly banged sharply against the roof for the cabby’s attention.

“Turn right!” he ordered. “Turn down Water Street to Lower Thames Street.”

“Ain’t nothing down there but Queen’s Stairs and Traitors Bridge,” the cabby replied. “If you want the Tower, like you said, you’d be better off in Trinity Square, which is up to the left.”

“Just take us to Queen’s Stairs and then go about your business,” Tellman said curtly.

The cabby muttered something inaudible, but obeyed.

They glimpsed the Custom House to the west, already busy with men coming and going. Then they turned right facing the great medieval bastion of the Tower of London, a stone memory of a conquest that spanned back to the Dark Ages and a history recorded only in brief bursts by illuminated writing and quaint works of art and tales of bloody battles and exquisite, passionate islands of Christianity.

The hansom stopped at Queen’s Stairs. Pitt paid the cabby and he turned and left, his horses moving into a brisk trot.

It was two minutes before six. The great silver sheet of the river was utterly calm. Even the cargo barges, dark against the bright surface, barely made a ripple. The air was fresh and slightly damp and smelled of salt from the tide.

Tellman led the way along the water’s edge to the stairs, where a boatman was waiting for them. He looked up without a change of expression and deftly maneuvered the small craft around so they could get in.

Pitt looked questioningly at Tellman.

“Traitors Gate,” he said succinctly, climbing in ahead of Pitt and sitting down. He disliked boats, and it showed in his face.

Pitt followed him easily and thanked the boatman as he pulled away.

“She was washed up at Traitors Gate?” he asked with a catch in his voice.

“Tide left her there,” Tellman replied. It was only a few yards down the river to the gate itself, the entrance to the Tower by which condemned people had been brought to their execution, and which opened directly onto the water.

Pitt could see the little knot of people already gathered around: a constable in uniform looking cold in spite of the mildness of the morning, a scarlet tunic of a Yeoman of the Guard, the traditional Beefeaters who man the Tower, and the other of the two boatmen who had first found her.

Pitt climbed ashore, only just avoiding getting his feet wet on the slipway. Susannah was lying on the waterline where the high tide had left her, only her feet below the surface, a long, slender form barely crumpled, turned over half onto her face. One white hand was visible protruding from the wet, dripping cloth of her gown. Her hair had come unraveled from its pins and lay like seaweed around her neck, spilling onto the stone.

The constable turned as Pitt came ashore, recognized him and stepped back from the body.

“Morning, sir.” He looked very pale.

“Good morning, Constable,” Pitt replied. He did not remember the man’s name, if indeed he knew it. He looked down at Susannah. “When was she found?”

“‘Bout ’alf past three, sir. High tide’d be just before three, ‘cording to the boatman ’ere. Reckon as they were the first past ’ere on this side o’ the river after she were washed up, poor creature. Weren’t no suicide, sir. Poor soul was strangled, no two ways about that.” He looked sad and very solemn for his twenty-odd years. His beat was on the river’s edge, and this was not the first body he had seen, nor the first woman, but she was perhaps the first he had seen with beautiful clothes and—when the hair was pulled back, as it was now—such a passionate, vulnerable face. Pitt knelt down to look at her more closely. He saw the unmistakable finger marks purple on her throat, but from the lack of swelling or bloating on her face, he thought perhaps she had actually died of a broken neck rather than suffocation. It was a tiny thing, very tiny, but the fact that she was not disfigured eased the hurt. Possibly she had suffered only very briefly. He would think that as long as he could.

“We didn’t touch her, sir,” one of the boatmen said nervously. “’cept to make sure as she was dead, and we couldn’t ’elp ’er, poor creature.” He knew enough of the circumstances which drive people to suicide to have no judgment over it. He would have put them all in consecrated ground and left the decision to God. But he was not a churchgoing man by choice. He went only to please his wife.

“Thank you,” Pitt said absently, still looking at Susannah. “Where would she have been put in the water to be washed up here?”

“That depends, sir. Currents is funny. ‘Specially in a river like this where it twists and turns, like. Most often bodies sink at first, then come up again right about where they went in. But if she was put in on the turn o’ the tide, into the water, like, if she moved at all it could a’ bin upriver from ’ere. That’s if she were put in off a boat. But if she were put in off the shore, more like it were on the incoming tide, and she came upriver from below. And that would depend on when she were put in, as to where, if you follow me, guv?”

“So all we know for sure is that she was here when the tide turned?”

“Yer got it right,” the boatman agreed. “Bodies stay in the water different sorts of times. Depends on what passes making a wake, or if they bump summink. Things get caught and pulled sometimes. There’s eddies and currents you can’t always account for. Maybe the doc can tell yer ’ow long she’s been gone, poor thing. Then we can tell yer if she were put in then, like, just about where it would be.”

“Thank you.” Pitt looked up at Tellman. “Have you sent for the mortuary wagon?”

“Yes sir. It will be waiting up in Trinity Square. Didn’t want a whole lot of talk going on,” Tellman answered without glancing at the boatmen. If they didn’t know who she was, so much the better. The news would spread fast enough. It would be an appalling way for Chancellor to learn, or anyone else who had cared for her.

Pitt straightened up with a sigh. He should tell Chancellor himself. He knew the man, and Tellman did not. Apart from that it was not a duty to delegate.

“Get them down here to take her to the medical examiner. I must report it as soon as possible.”

“Yes sir, of course.” Tellman glanced once more at Susannah, then turned on his heel and went back to the boat, his face twisted with distaste.

A few moments later Pitt left also, climbing up the Queen’s Stairs and walking slowly around to Great Tower Hill. He was obliged to walk as far as East Cheap before he found another cab. The morning was beginning to cloud over from the north and now there were more people about. A newsboy shouted some government difficulty. A running patterer had an early breakfast at a pie stall while he studied the day’s events, getting ready to compose his rhymes. Two men came out of a coffee shop, arguing animatedly with each other. They were looking for a cab, but Pitt reached it just before them, to their considerable annoyance.

“Berkeley Square, please,” he directed the driver, and climbed in. The driver acknowledged him and set off. Pitt sat back and tried to compose in his mind what he would say. It was useless, as he had known it would be. There was no kind or reasonable way in which to break such news, no way to take the pain out of it, no way even to lessen it. It was always absolutely and unequivocally terrible.

He tried to think at least what questions to ask Chancellor, but it was of little use. Whatever he decided now, he would still have to think again when he saw Chancellor’s state of mind, whether he was able to retain sufficient composure to answer anything at all. People were affected differently by grief. With some the shock was so deep it did not manifest itself to begin with. They might be calm for days before their grief overcame them. Others were hysterical, torn with helpless anger, or too racked with weeping to be coherent, or think of anything but their loss.

“What number, sir?” the cabby interrupted his thoughts.

“Seventeen,” he replied. “I think.”

“That’ll be Mr. Chancellor, sir?”

“That’s right.”

The cabby seemed about to add something more, but changed his mind and closed the trapdoor.

A moment later Pitt alighted, paid him and stood on the doorstep, shivering in spite of the early morning sun. It was now after seven. All around the square maids were busy bringing out carpets to the areaways to be beaten and swept, and bootboys and footmen went in and out on errands. Even a few early delivery boys pushed carts, and news vendors handed over their papers for the maids to iron so they could be presented at breakfast before the masters of the houses left for the day’s business in the city.

Pitt rang the doorbell.

It was answered almost immediately by a footman who looked surprised to see someone at the front door so very early.

“Yes sir?” he said politely.

“Good morning. My name is Pitt.” He produced his card. “It is imperative I see Mr. Chancellor immediately. It is on a matter that cannot wait. Will you tell him so, please.”

The footman had worked for a cabinet minister for some time and he was not unused to matters of dire emergency.

“Yes sir. If you will wait in the morning room, I will inform Mr. Chancellor that you are here.”

Pitt hesitated.

“Yes sir?” the footman said politely.

“I am afraid I have some extremely unpleasant news. Perhaps you would send the butler to me first.”

The footman paled.

“Yes sir, if you think that’s necessary?”

“Has he been with Mr. Chancellor long?”

“Yes sir, some fifteen years.”

“Then please send him.”

“Yes sir.”

The butler came within moments, looking anxious. He closed the morning room door behind him and faced Pitt with a frown.

“I’m Richards, sir, Mr. Chancellor’s butler. I gather from Albert that something distressing has happened. Is it one of the gentlemen in the Colonial Office? Has there been a … an accident?”

“No, Richards, I am afraid it is far worse than that,” Pitt said quietly, his voice rough at the edges. “I am afraid Mrs. Chancellor has met with … has met with a violent death.” He got no further. The butler swayed on his feet as if he were about to faint. Every vestige of color fled from his skin.

Pitt lunged forward and grasped him, guiding him backwards towards one of the chairs.

“I’m … I’m sorry, sir,” Richards gasped. “I don’t know what came over me. I …” He looked up at Pitt beseechingly. “You are sure, sir? There could not be some error … some mistake as to identity?” Even as he said it his face reflected his knowledge that it could not be so. How many women were there in London who looked like Susannah Chancellor?

Pitt gave no answer. None was necessary.

“I think it would be wise if you were to make yourself available close at hand when I have to break the news to Mr. Chancellor,” Pitt said gently. “Perhaps a decanter of brandy. And you might make sure that there are no callers and no messages until he feels able to deal with them.”

“Yes. Yes, of course. Thank you, sir.” And still looking very shaken and uncertain in his step, Richards rose and left the room.

Linus Chancellor came in a moment or two later, an eagerness in his step and a directness in his eyes that gave Pitt a bitter jolt. He realized Chancellor was expecting news about the African information that was being passed. And with that keenness in his eyes, he also realized, if he had ever doubted it, that Chancellor was innocent of any involvement.

“I’m sorry, sir. I have very grave news,” he said almost before Chancellor had closed the door. He could not bear the misapprehension.

“Is it one of my senior colleagues?” Chancellor asked. “It is good of you to come here to tell me in person. Who is it? Aylmer?”

Pitt felt cold in spite of the warmth of the room and the sun now bright outside.

“No, sir. I am afraid it is about Mrs. Chancellor I have come.” He saw the surprise in Chancellor’s face and did not wait. “I am profoundly sorry, sir, but I have to tell you that she is dead.”

“Dead?” Chancellor repeated the word as though he did not know its meaning. “She was perfectly well last evening. She went out to …” He turned and went to the door. “Richards?”

The butler appeared immediately, the salver with brandy decanter and glass in his hands, his face ashen white.

Chancellor looked back at Pitt, then at the butler again.

“Have you seen Mrs. Chancellor this morning, Richards?”

Richards looked enquiringly at Pitt.

“Mr. Chancellor, there is no doubt,” Pitt said gently. “She was found at the Tower of London.”

“The Tower of London?” Chancellor said incredulously. His eyes were wide with disbelief, and there was a look on his face that seemed close to laughter, as if the sheer idea of it were too absurd to be true.

Pitt had seen hysteria before; it was not altogether unexpected.

“Please sit down, sir,” he asked. “You are bound to feel unwell.”

Richards set the tray down and offered a glass of brandy.

Chancellor took it and drank it all, then coughed severely for several seconds until he managed to regain control of himself.

“What happened?” he asked slowly, fumbling to get his tongue around the words. “What could she possibly have been doing at the Tower of London? She went out to visit Christabel Thorne. I know Christabel is eccentric … but the Tower of London? Where, for heaven’s sake? She can surely not have been inside it at that time of night?”

“Could she and Mrs. Thorne have taken a trip on the river?” Pitt asked, although it seemed a strange thing for two ladies to do alone. Would they find Christabel’s body also, on some further stretch of the riverbank?

“And what … a boating accident?” Chancellor said doubtfully. “Did Mrs. Thorne suggest such a thing?”

“We have not yet enquired of Mrs. Thorne. We did not know Mrs. Chancellor had been with her. But it was not an accident, sir. I am deeply sorry, but I am afraid it was murder. The only comfort I can offer is that it would have been very quick. It is unlikely she suffered.”

Chancellor stared at him, his face white, then red. He seemed about to choke on his own breath.

Richards offered him another glass of brandy and he drank it. The blood left his face and he looked ill.

“And Christabel?” he whispered, staring at Pitt.

“So far we know nothing about her, but we will naturally make enquiries.”

“Where … where was she found … my … wife?” Chancellor seemed to have difficulty saying the words.

“At Traitors Gate. It has a slipway down—”

“I know! I know, Superintendent. I have seen it many times. I know what it is.” He swallowed again, gulping in air. “Thank you for coming to tell me yourself. It must be one of your most unpleasant tasks. I appreciate that you came in person. I imagine you will be in charge of the case? Now if you don’t mind, I would prefer to be alone. Richards, please inform the Colonial Office that I shall not be in this morning.”

Pitt walked from Linus Chancellor’s to the home of Jeremiah Thorne, across the square and along to the far end of Mount Street, and north to Upper Brook Street. It took him less than twenty minutes to reach the front door and ring the bell. His heart was pounding as if he had run twice the distance, his tongue dry in his mouth.

The bell was answered by a footman who enquired as to his business, and when presented with his card, showed him into the library and asked him to wait. He would enquire whether Mrs. Thorne was at home. At this time in the morning it was a ridiculous pretense. He could hardly fail to know if she were at home, but he had been trained to use the polite fiction before allowing any visitor in. If it were inconvenient, or his employer did not wish to see someone, he could hardly return and say so as bluntly.

Pitt waited with a tension so severe he was unable to sit down or even to stand in one spot. He paced back and forth, once catching his knuckles on the edge of a carved table as he turned, oblivious of his surroundings. He was aware of the pain, but only dimly. His ears strained to hear the sound of footsteps. Once when a maid passed he went to the door and was on the point of flinging it open, when he realized he was being absurd. Then he heard giggling and a male voice answering back. It was a simple piece of domestic flirtation.

He was still close to the door when Christabel came in. She was wearing a pale gray morning dress and looked in excellent health, but very questionable temper. Although curiosity was holding it in check, at least until she had ascertained the cause of his call at such a time.

“Good morning, Superintendent,” she said coolly. “You alarmed my footman by your rather vehement insistence upon speaking to me. I hope your reason is adequate to justify it. This is a very uncivil time to call.”

He was too shaken to respond sharply; the tragedy was real. His mind’s eye was still filled with Susannah’s face as she lay in the silence of Traitors Gate, the water of the river lapping over her feet.

“I am extremely relieved to see you well, Mrs. Thorne.”

Something in the gravity of his face frightened her. Quite suddenly her manner altered entirely, the anger evaporated.

“What is it, Mr. Pitt? Has something happened?”

“Yes, ma’am. I am very sorry indeed to have to tell you that Mrs. Chancellor met her death last night. Mr. Chancellor had believed she was with you, so I naturally came immediately to make sure you were not …”

“Susannah?” She looked stricken, staring at him with her enormous eyes, the arrogance fled out of her. “Susannah is dead?” She took a step backwards, then another until she found the chair behind her and sank into it. “How? If … if you feared for me also, then it was … violent?”

“Yes, Mrs. Thorne. I am afraid she was murdered.”

“Oh, dear God!” She put her hands up to her face and sat quite motionless for several moments.

“May I call someone for you?” he offered.

She looked up. “What? Uh—no, no thank you. My poor Susannah. How did it happen? Where was she, for heaven’s sake, that she could be … was she attacked? Robbed?”

“We don’t yet know. She was found in the river, washed up on the shore.”

“Drowned?”

“No, she was strangled, so violently that her neck may well be broken. It was probably very quick. I’m sorry, Mrs. Thorne, but since Mr. Chancellor had believed she was coming to visit you, I have to ask you if you saw her last evening.”

“No. I dined at home, but Susannah did not come here. She must have been attacked before she …” She sighed and a shadow of a smile, small and very sad, touched her lips. “That is, if, of course, she intended to come here. Perhaps she went somewhere else. It would be unwise to suppose it had to be here she had in mind. Although I do not believe it would be an assignation. She was too much in love with Linus for that to be … likely.”

“You don’t say ‘possible,’ Mrs. Thorne?” he said instantly.

She rose to her feet and turned to look out of the window, her back to him. “No. There is not much that is impossible, Superintendent. That is something you learn as you get older. Associations are not always what you suppose, and even when you love one person, you may not necessarily behave in a manner other people would understand.”

“Are you speaking in generalities, or do you have Mrs. Chancellor in mind?” Pitt asked quietly.

“I don’t really know. But Linus is not an easy man. He is witty, charming, handsome, ambitious, and certainly extremely talented. But I have always wondered if he was capable of loving her as much as she loved him. Not that many marriages are composed of two people who love each other equally, except in fairy stories.” She kept her back to him and her voice suggested she was indifferent whether he understood her or not. “Not everyone is able to give so much. There is usually one party who has to compromise, to accept what is given and not be bitter or lonely for the rest. That is especially true for women who are married to powerful and ambitious men. Susannah was clever enough to know that, and I think wise enough not to fight against it and lose what there was for her … which I believe was much.”

“But you do not think it impossible she may have found some friendship or admiration elsewhere?”

“Not impossible, Superintendent, but unlikely.” She turned back to face him. “I liked Susannah very much, Mr. Pitt. She was a woman of intelligence, courage, and great integrity. She loved her husband, but she was well able to speak and act for herself. She was not … dominated. She had spirit, passion and laughter….” Suddenly her eyes filled with tears and they spilled down her cheeks. She stood quite still and wept without screwing up her face, simply lost in a deep and consuming grief.

“I am so sorry,” Pitt said quietly, and went to the door. He found Jeremiah Thorne in the hall outside, looking surprised and a little anxious.

“What the devil are you doing here?” he demanded.

“Mrs. Chancellor has been murdered,” Pitt replied without preamble. “I had reason to believe your wife might also have been harmed. I am delighted that she is not, but she is distressed and in need of comfort. Mr. Chancellor will not be in to the Colonial Office today.”

Thorne stared at him for a moment, barely comprehending what he had heard.

“I’m sorry,” Pitt said again.

“Susannah?” Thorne looked stricken; there was no mistaking the reality of his emotion. “Are you sure? I’m sorry, that’s an absurd question. Of course you are, or you would hardly have come here. But how? Why? What happened? Why in God’s name did you think Christabel was involved?” He searched Pitt’s face as if he might have seen some answer in it more immediate than words.

“Mr. Chancellor had been under the impression that his wife was intending to visit Mrs. Thorne yesterday evening,” Pitt replied. “But apparently she did not reach here.”

“No! No … she was not expected.”

“So Mrs. Thorne told me.”

“Dear God, this is dreadful! Poor Susannah. She was one of the loveliest women I ever knew—lovely in the truest sense, Pitt. I am not thinking of her face, but of the spirit that lit her inside, the passion and the courage … the heart. Forgive me. Come back and ask anything you like later on, but now I must go to my wife. She was deeply fond of Susannah….” And without adding anything further he turned and went towards the library, leaving Pitt to find his own way out.

It was far too soon to expect any information from the medical examiner. The body would barely have reached him. The physical evidence was slight. As the boatman had said, she could have been put into the water upstream after the tide had turned at about two-thirty and drifted down, or downstream on the flood tide, and have been carried up, and thus left when the ebb began. Or as likely as either of those, she could have gone in roughly where she was found. Below the Tower were only Wapping, Rotherhithe, Limehouse, the Surrey Docks, and the Isle of Dogs. Deptford and Greenwich were too far for the brief time before the change from flow to ebb. What on earth would Susannah Chancellor have been doing in any of those places?

Above were much more likely sites: London Bridge, Blackfriars, Waterloo; even Westminster was not so far. He was talking about miles. Although she was probably put in either from a bridge or from the north bank to have washed up on the north side as she was.

To have gone in where she was found, at the Tower of London, seemed impossible. What could she have been doing there? Nor could she have been in the immediate area. There was only Customs House Quay on one side and St. Catherine’s Docks on the other.

The best thing would be to find out what time she left her home in Berkeley Square, and how. No one had mentioned if she took one of her own carriages; presumably they had at least one. Where had the coachman left her? Was it conceivable she had been killed by one of her own servants? He could not imagine it, but it had better be eliminated all the same.

He was already retracing his steps to Berkeley Square and it took him only another few minutes to reach number seventeen again. This time he went down to the areaway steps rather than disturb them at the front door.

It was opened by the bootboy looking white-faced and frightened.

“We ain’t buyin’ nuffink today,” he said flatly. “Come back another time.” He made as if to close the door.

“I am the police,” Pitt told him quietly. “I need to come in. You know what has happened. I have to find out who did it, so I must discover all you know.”

“I don’t know nuffink!”

“Don’t you know what time Mrs. Chancellor went out?”

“Who is it, Tommy?” a man’s voice called from somewhere behind him.

“It’s the rozzers, George.”

The door opened wider and a servant with his right arm in a sling faced Pitt suspiciously.

Pitt handed him his card.

“You’d better come in,” the man said reluctantly. “I don’t know what we can tell you.”

The bootboy stood aside to allow Pitt in. The scullery was full of vegetables, pots and pans, and a small maid with red eyes and her apron bunched up in one hand.

“Mr. Richards is busy,” the man went on, leading Pitt through the kitchen and into the butler’s pantry. “And the footmen are in the hall. The maids are all too upset to answer the door.”

Pitt had assumed he was a footman, but apparently he was mistaken.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“Coachman, George Bragg.”

Pitt looked at the arm. “When did you do that?”

“Last night” He smiled bitterly. “It’s only a scald. It’ll mend.”

“Then you did not drive Mrs. Chancellor when she went out?”

“No sir. She took a hansom. Mr. Chancellor went with her to get one. She was going to be some time, and Mr. Chancellor himself was planning to go out later, in the carriage.”

“They keep only one carriage?” Pitt was surprised. Carriages, horses and general harness and livery were marks of social standing. Most people kept as many and of as high a quality as they could, often running into debt to maintain them.

“Oh no sir,” Bragg said hastily. “But Mrs. Chancellor hadn’t been planning to go out, and so we hadn’t got the big carriage harnessed up, and Mr. Chancellor was going to use the brougham himself, later. She was going only less than a mile away. I daresay she’d have walked it in daylight.”

“So it was after dark when she left?”

“Oh yes sir. About half past nine, I would say. And looked like it could come on to rain. But Lily saw her go. She would tell you more exact. That is if she can pull herself together long enough. She was very fond of Mrs. Chancellor, and she’s in a terrible state.”

“If you can find her, please,” Pitt requested.

George left Pitt alone to do as he asked, and was gone nearly a quarter of an hour before he returned with a red-faced, puffy-eyed girl of about eighteen, who was obviously extremely distressed.

“Good morning, Lily,” Pitt said quietly. “Please sit down.”

Lily was so unused to being asked to sit in the presence of superiors, she did not comprehend the order.

“Sit down, Lily.” George pushed her with a gentle hand into the chair.

“George says you saw Mrs. Chancellor leave the house last night, Lily,” Pitt began. “Is that so?”

“Yes sir.” She sniffed.

“Do you know what time that was?”

“About half past nine, sir. I’m not sure exact.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“I were up on the landing, from turning down the beds, an’ I saw the mistress going across the ‘all to the front door.” She gulped. “She were wearin’ her blue cloak which she’s so fond of. I saw her go out the front door. That’s the truth. I swear it is.” She started to cry again, quietly and with surprising dignity.

“And you usually turn the beds down at half past nine?”

“Yes, yes … sir …”

“Thank you. That’s all I need to trouble you for. Oh—except, you saw Mrs. Chancellor. Did you see Mr. Chancellor as well?”

“No, sir. ’e must a’ gone out already.”

“I see. Thank you.”

She stood up with a little assistance from George, and left the room, closing the door behind her.

“Is there anyone else you need to see, sir?” the coachman asked.

“You said Mr. Chancellor went out later?”

“Yes sir.”

“But you didn’t drive him?” Pitt looked at the arm in the sling.

“No, sir. I hurt my arm before he went out, in fact just before. Mr. Chancellor drove himself. He’s quite good with a light vehicle. He could manage the brougham easily, and of course he’d called down before, so it was already harnessed.”

“I see. Thank you. Do you know what time he came back?”

“No sir. But he’s often late. Cabinet meetings and the like can go on half the night, if the government’s got troubles … and when hasn’t it?”

“Indeed. Thank you, I don’t think there is anything else I need to ask here, at least for the moment. Unless you can tell me anything you think may be of use?”

“No sir. It’s the most terrible thing I ever heard. I don’t know what can have happened.” He looked grieved and confused.

Pitt left, his mind full of doubts and ugly speculation. He walked back along Bruton Street deep in thought. Susannah had told her husband that she was going to see Christabel Thorne, but apparently that was untrue; unless she had been waylaid somewhere along Mount Street, within ten minutes of leaving home?

But why lie, unless it was something she did not wish him to know? Where could she be going, and with whom, that she felt compelled to keep it from him? Was it possible she knew who the traitor was in the Colonial Office? Or at least that she suspected? Was it even conceivable that it was she herself, stealing information from Chancellor without his knowledge? Did he take papers home with him, and she had somehow seen them? Or did he discuss such matters with her, since her family was so prominent in banking? Could she have been on the way, even then, to the German Embassy? Then who had stopped her? Who had found her between Berkeley Square and Upper Brook Street, and taken her to the riverbank and killed her? He must have been waiting for her, if that were true.

Or was it a far simpler, more ordinary explanation, one of an assignation with a lover? Christabel Thorne had doubted it, but she had not thought it impossible. Was that what lay between Susannah and Kreisler, and all the arguments about Africa were of only secondary importance, or even none at all? Was the emotion that racked her guilt?

And why had the hansom driver not come to the police? Surely he would do once the discovery of the body was broadcast throughout London when the newspapers reached the streets. That could only be a matter of hours. The early editions would have it now, and by lunchtime newsboys would be shouting it.

It was a bright day, people were smiling in the sun, women in frocks of muslin and lace, parasols spread, carriage harnesses shining, and yet he felt none of it as he walked, head down, towards Oxford Street.

Was it even imaginable that it was anything to do with the Inner Circle? She had known Sir Arthur, and apparently liked him profoundly. Could she possibly have known anything about his death? Was that the secret that troubled her, some dreadful suspicion which she had at last realized?

If so, who was it? Not Chancellor. Pitt would be prepared to swear Chancellor was not a member. What about Thorne? Susannah was a close friend of Christabel. She would feel she was betraying a relationship that was dear to her, and yet she would feel equally unable to keep her silence in the face of murder. No wonder Charlotte had said she looked tormented.

Two young women passed him, laughing, their skirts brushing his feet. They seemed a world away.

Did Christabel know anything about it? Or was she speaking the truth when she said Susannah had not been there? Perhaps she had no idea that the husband she seemed so close to was capable of murdering her friend to prevent her from exposing the Circle. How would she bear it when she was forced to know?

Was Jeremiah Thorne, in his own way, another victim of the Inner Circle, destroyed by a covenant made in ignorance, if not innocence, a man who dared not be true to himself, for fear of losing … what? His position, his social standing, his financial credit, his life?

In Oxford Street he hailed a cab and gave the driver the address of the Bow Street station. The medical examiner might have made a preliminary report, at least, a guess as to the time of death, and apart from that, he should see Farnsworth.

He spent the journey considering what steps to take next. It would be difficult. One did not lightly investigate the wife of a cabinet minister, and one of the most popular at that. People would have their own ideas as to what had happened to her, fundamental beliefs they would not wish challenged. Emotions would be raw. He would present an easy target, someone to blame for the grief and the anger, and for the fear which would follow. If a cabinet minister’s wife, in a hansom in Mayfair, could be murdered, who is safe?

By the time he alighted in Bow Street the late editions of the newspapers were on sale, and a boy was shouting in a clear, penetrating voice.

“Extra! Terrible murder! Minister’s wife! Linus Chancellor’s wife found dead at Tower o’ London! Extra! Extra!” His voice dropped. “’ere, Mr. Pitt. You wanna copy? It’s all ’ere!”

“No thank you,” Pitt refused. “If I don’t know it already, then it is a lie.” And leaving the boy giggling, he walked up the steps and into the police station.

Farnsworth was already there, tight faced and less immaculate than usual. He was coming down the stairs as Pitt reached the bottom to go up.

“Ah, good,” Farnsworth said immediately. “I’ve been waiting for you. Good God, this is awful!” He bit his lip. “Poor Chancellor. The most brilliant colonial secretary we’ve had in years, possibly even a future prime minister, and this had to happen to him. What have you learned?” He turned on the steps and started back up again towards Pitt’s office.

Pitt followed him up, closing the door before replying.

“She left the house at half past nine yesterday evening, Chancellor with her, but he only went so far as to call her a hansom and put her in it. She said she was going to visit Christabel Thorne, in Upper Brook Street, about fifteen minutes away at the most. But Mrs. Thorne says she never reached there, nor was she expecting her.”

“Is that all?” Farnsworth said grimly. He was standing with his back to the window, but even so his expression was unmistakable, a mixture of shock and despairing anxiety.

“So far,” Pitt replied. “Oh, she was wearing a blue cloak when she left home, according to the maid who saw her go, but it wasn’t on her when we found her. Possibly it’s still in the river. If it is washed up somewhere else, it might provide an indication as to where she went in.”

Farnsworth thought for a moment. He opened his mouth to say something, then possibly realized the answer, and merely grunted. “Suppose it could have been anywhere, depending on the tide?”

“Yes, although according to the river boatmen, more often than not they surface again more or less where they went in.”

Farnsworth pulled a face of distaste.

“The time of death may help with that,” Pitt went on. “If it is early enough it had to be well before the tide turned.”

“When did it turn?”

“About half past two.”

“What a damnable thing! I suppose you have no idea as to motive? Was she robbed … or …” His face crumpled and he refused to put words to the second thought.

Pitt had not even entertained that idea. His mind had been too full of treason, and knowledge of the murder of Arthur Desmond.

“I don’t know, sir,” he confessed. “The medical examiner will tell us that. I haven’t a report from him yet. It is a little early.”

“Robbery?” Farnsworth looked hopeful.

“I don’t know that either. There was a locket ’round her neck when she was found. That was how they knew who she was. I didn’t ask Chancellor if she were wearing anything else of value.”

Farnsworth frowned. “No, perhaps not. Poor man. He must be devastated. This is terrible, Pitt! For every reason, we must clear this up as soon as possible.” He came forward from the window. “You’d better leave the Colonial Office business to Tellman. You concentrate on this. It’s dreadful … quite dreadful. I can’t remember a case so … so shocking since …” He stopped.

Pitt would have said, The autumn of ’eighty-eight, and the Whitechapel murders, but there was no point. One did not compare horrors one with another.

“Unless they are connected,” he said instead.

Farnsworth’s head jerked up. “What?”

“Unless Mrs. Chancellor’s death and the Colonial Office treason are connected,” he elaborated.

Farnsworth looked at him as if he had spoken blasphemy.

“It is not impossible,” Pitt said quietly, meeting his eyes. “She may quite accidentally have discovered something, without any guilt on her part.”

Farnsworth relaxed.

“Or she may very possibly be involved,” Pitt added.

“I hope you have sufficient intelligence not to say that anywhere but here?” Farnsworth said slowly. “Not even hint that you have thought it?”

“Of course I have.”

“I trust you to deal with this, Pitt.” It was something of a question, and Farnsworth stared at him with entreaty in his face. “I don’t always approve of your methods, or your judgments, but you’ve solved some of the worst cases in London, at one time or another. Do everything you can with this. Think of nothing else until it is finished … do you understand?”

“Yes, of course.” He would not have done anything else regardless of what Farnsworth had said, and perhaps Farnsworth knew that.

Further discussion was preempted by a sharp knock on the door, and a constable poked his head around the moment Farnsworth answered.

“Yes?” Farnsworth said abruptly.

The constable looked embarrassed. “There’s a lady to see Mr. Pitt, sir.”

“Well tell her to wait!” Farnsworth snapped. “Pitt is busy.”

“No, sir. I—I mean a real lady.” The constable did not move. “I daren’t tell ’er that, sir. You haven’t seen ’er.”

“For heaven’s sake, man! Are you scared of a woman just because she thinks she’s important?” Farnsworth barked. “Go and do as you’re told!”

“But, sir, I …” He got no further. An imperious voice behind him interrupted his embarrassment.

“Thank you, Constable. If this is Mr. Pitt’s office, I shall tell him myself that I am here.” And the moment after the door swung wide and Vespasia fixed Farnsworth with a glittering eye. She looked magnificent in ecru lace and silk, and pearls worth a fortune across her bosom. “I don’t believe I have your acquaintance, sir,” she said coolly. “I am Lady Vespasia Cumming-Gould.”

Farnsworth took a deep breath and gulped, swallowed the wrong way and relapsed into a fit of coughing.

Vespasia waited.

“Assistant Commissioner Farnsworth,” Pitt said for him, hiding both his astonishment and his amusement with some difficulty.

“How do you do, Mr. Farnsworth.” Vespasia swept past him into the office and sat down on the chair in front of Pitt’s desk, resting her parasol, point down, on the carpet and waiting until Farnsworth should have recovered himself, or taken his leave, or preferably both.

“Have you come to see me, Aunt Vespasia?” Pitt asked her.

She looked at him coldly. “Of course I have. Why on earth else should I come to this unfortunate place? I do not frequent police stations for my amusement, Thomas.”

Farnsworth was still in considerable difficulty, gasping for breath, tears running down his cheeks.

“How may I be of service?” Pitt asked Vespasia as he took his place behind his desk, Micah Drummond’s very beautiful oak desk with the green leather inlay. Pitt was very proud to have inherited it.

“You may not,” she replied, a slight melting in her silver eyes. “I have come in order to help you, or at least to give you further information, whether it helps or not.”

Farnsworth was still unable to stop coughing. He stood with his handkerchief to his scarlet face.

“In relation to what?” Pitt enquired.

“For heaven’s sake, assist that man before he chokes himself!” she ordered. “Haven’t you brandy, or at least water to offer him?”

“There’s a bottle of cider in the corner cupboard,” Pitt suggested.

Farnsworth grimaced. Micah Drummond would have kept brandy. Pitt could not afford it, and had no taste for it anyway.

“If … you will … excuse me …” Farnsworth managed to get out between gasps.

“I will.” Vespasia inclined her head sympathetically, and as soon as Farnsworth was gone, she looked back at Pitt. “Regarding the murder of Susannah Chancellor. Can anything else be on your mind this morning?”

“No. I had not realized you would have heard of it already.”

She did not bother to reply to that. “I saw her the evening before last,” she said gravely. “I did not overhear her conversation, but I observed it, and I could not help but see that it aroused the profoundest emotions.”

“With whom?”

She looked at him as if she knew exactly what he feared. There was profound sorrow in her face.

“Peter Kreisler,” she replied.

“Where was this?”

“At Lady Rattray’s house in Eaton Square. She was holding a musical evening. There were fifty or sixty people there, no more.”

“And you saw Kreisler and Mrs. Chancellor?” he prompted, a sinking feeling of disappointment inside him. “Can you describe the encounter for me, as precisely as possible?”

A flicker of disapproval crossed her face and disappeared. “I do understand the importance of the issue, Thomas. I am not inclined to embroider it. I was some ten or twelve feet away, half listening to an extremely tedious acquaintance talking about her health. Such a tasteless thing to do. No one wishes to know the details of somebody else’s ailments. I observed Mrs. Chancellor first. She was talking very earnestly to someone whose face was mostly hidden behind a very luxuriant potted palm. The wretched place was like a jungle. I was forever expecting insects to drop out of the trees down my neck. I did not envy the young women with deep décolletages!” She shrugged very slightly.

Pitt could picture it, but it was not the time to comment.

“Her face wore an expression of deep concern, almost anguish,” Vespasia continued. “I could see that she was on the verge of a quarrel. I moved so as to learn who her companion was. He seemed to be pleading with her, but at the same time adamant that he would not change his own mind. The course of the argument altered, and it seemed she was the one entreating. There was an appearance of something close to desperation in her. But judging from her face, he could not be moved. After the course of some fifteen minutes or so, they parted. He looked well pleased with himself, as if he found the outcome quite acceptable. She was distraught.”

“But you have no idea of the subject of this conversation?” he asked, though he already knew the answer.

“None at all, and I refuse to speculate.”

“Was that the last time you saw Mrs. Chancellor?”

“Yes. And also the last time I saw Mr. Kreisler.” She looked profoundly unhappy, and the depth of her sadness troubled him.

“What is it you fear?” he asked frankly. She was not someone with whom subtlety or evasion would be successful. She could read him far too well.

“I am afraid Mr. Kreisler’s love for Africa, and what he sees as its good, far outweigh any other consideration with him, or any other loyalty,” she replied. “It is not a quality which will leave Nobby Gunne unhurt. I have known several men during my life whose devotion to a cause would excuse in their minds any behavior towards a mere individual, in the firm belief that it is a nobler and greater ideal.” She sighed and allowed her parasol to fall sideways against her skirt.

“They all had an intense vitality about them, a charm based upon the fire and bravado of their nature, and an ability to treat one, for a short time, as if all the ardor of their spirit were somehow reachable to others, to love, if you like. Invariably I found there was a coldness at the core of them, an obsession which fed upon itself and which consumed sacrifices without return. That is what I am afraid of, Thomas—not for myself, but for Nobby. She is a fine person, and I am extremely fond of her.”

There was nothing to say, no argument to make that was honest.

“I hope you are mistaken.” He smiled at her gently. “But thank you very much for coming to tell me.” He offered his hand, but she rose, disregarding it. She walked, stiff backed, head erect, to the door, which he opened for her, and then he conducted her downstairs and out into the street, where he handed her up into her waiting carriage.

“Before she went into the water, without doubt,” the medical examiner said, pushing his lower lip out and taking a deep breath. He looked up at Pitt, waiting for criticism. He was a long-faced, dour man who took the tragedies of his calling seriously. “One thing to be said for the swine that did this, though, he was quick. Hit her a couple of times, very hard.”

“I don’t see it!” Pitt interrupted.

“You wouldn’t. Side of the head, mostly hidden by her hair. Then he throttled her so violently he broke the bone”—he touched his own neck—“and killed her almost immediately. Doubt she felt more than the first blow, and then a moment’s choking before it was all over. Wasn’t strangled to death.”

Pitt looked at him with a sense of chill. “Very violently?”

“Very. Either he meant to kill her, or he was in such a monumental fury he didn’t realize his own strength. You’re looking for a very dangerous man, Pitt. Either he’s completely merciless and he kills to rob, even when there’s no need—he could have silenced her perfectly well without doing this to her—or else he’s someone with such a hatred in him it erupts in something close to madness, if not actually into it.”

“Was she … molested?”

“Good God, of course she was molested! What do you call that?” He jerked his head towards the body on the table, now covered with a sheet. “If you mean was she raped, don’t be so damned lily-livered about it. God, I hate euphemisms! Call a crime by its ugly name, and be honest with the victim. No she wasn’t.”

Pitt let out a sigh of relief. He had cared about that more than he realized. He felt the knots in his shoulders easing a little and something of the pain inside him dulled.

“When did she die? Can you judge a time?” he asked.

“Not close enough to be of much use to you,” the medical examiner replied with a snort. “Anything between eight and midnight, I should think. Being put into the river doesn’t help. Cold, even at this time of the year. Makes a mess of rigor mortis. Makes a damned mess of everything! Actually, talking about a mess …” He frowned, looking across at Pitt with a puzzled expression. “Found some odd marks on her body, very slight, ’round her shoulders. Or to be more accurate, under her arms and across the back of her neck. She’d been dragged around in the water a lot. Could have been her clothes got caught up in something, pulled tight and caused it. When was she found?”

“About half past three.”

“And when was the last time she was seen alive?”

“Half past nine.”

“There you are then. You can work out for yourself almost as much as I can tell you. You’ve got a very dangerous man to look for, and good luck to you. You’ll need it. Lovely woman. It’s too bad.” And without waiting for anything further he turned back to the body he was presently examining.

“Can you tell how long she was in the water?” Pitt asked.

“Not any closer than you can work out for yourself. I should say more than thirty minutes, less than three hours. Sorry.”

“Was she killed manually?”

“What? Oh yes. He killed her with his bare hands, no ligature, just fingers around the throat. As I already said, a very powerful man, or one driven by a passion the like of which I hope never to see. I don’t envy you your job, Pitt.”

“Nor I yours,” Pitt said sincerely.

The medical examiner laughed with a short barklike sound. “It’s all over when I get them, no more pain, no more violence or hatred left, just peace and a long silence. The rest is up to God … if He cares.”

“I care,” Pitt said between his teeth. “And God has got to be better than I am.”

The medical examiner laughed again, and this time there was a softer tone to it. But he said nothing.

It was a surprisingly long time from half past nine in the evening until about midnight. Not many people could account for their whereabouts for those two and a half hours, beyond possible dispute. Pitt took two men from other cases, leaving Tellman on the matter of the Colonial Office, and also diverted his own time to questioning and checking, but he found no evidence that was conclusive of anything.

Linus Chancellor said that he had gone out, driving his own carriage owing to the accident to his coachman. He had gone to deliver a package of crucial importance to Garston Aylmer, who had apparently been out when he got there. He was most annoyed about it, but had left it with Aylmer’s footman, who upon being asked, confirmed that Chancellor had indeed called at a little before eleven o’clock.

Chancellor’s own servants had not heard him come in, but they had been instructed not to wait up for him.

Susannah’s maid had sat up for her mistress, naturally, as was her duty, so that she might assist her to undress when she returned, and hang up her clothes. She had fallen asleep in her chair about half past three, and only realized Susannah’s failure to return in the morning. She refused to say anything about it, or to explain why she had not raised any alarm earlier.

It was apparent to Pitt that she had assumed her mistress had kept an assignation, and while she desperately disapproved of it, she was too loyal to betray it either. No pressure from Pitt, or the butler, would make her alter her account.

Pitt went to find Peter Kreisler and require him to account for his movements, but when he presented himself at Kreisler’s rooms he was informed that Kreisler was out, and not expected home for several hours. He was obliged to wait for that answer.

Aylmer said he had been out looking at the stars. He was an enthusiastic astronomer. No one could confirm it. It was not an avocation shared by many, and could be conducted excellently alone. He had taken a small telescope on a tripod to Herne Hill, away from the city lights. He had driven himself in a gig which he kept for such purposes, and saw no one he knew. If his story were true, one would not have expected him to. There would not be many gentlemen from the Colonial or Foreign Offices wandering around Heme Hill in the small hours of the morning.

Jeremiah and Christabel Thorne had spent the evening at home. She had retired early. He had stayed up till past midnight reading official papers. The servants agreed that this was true. They also agreed that had either Mr. or Mrs. Thorne left the house by the garden door to the dining room, none of them would have been aware of it, having all retired beyond the baize door to their own quarters after dinner was cleared away. There were no fires to stoke, no visitors to show in or out, and Mr. Thorne had said he would draw the curtains himself and make sure the doors were fast.

Ian Hathaway had dined at his club and left at half past eleven. He said he had gone straight home, but since he lived alone, and he had not required his servants to wait up for him, there was no one to corroborate his word. He might as easily have left again, had he chosen to.

As a matter of course Francis Standish, Susannah’s brother-in-law, was also informed of her death, and probably asked if he would tell them where he had spent the evening. He replied that he had come home early, changed his clothes, and gone out to the theater alone. No, there was no one who could corroborate that.

What had he seen?

Esther Sandraz. He could describe the play in very general terms, but that meant nothing. A newspaper review would give him that.

Naturally every effort was made to find the driver of the hansom who had picked up Susannah Chancellor in Berkeley Square. He was the only one who knew what had happened to her after that, until she had met her murderer.

The constable deputed by Pitt spent all afternoon and all evening searching for him, and failed completely. The following day Pitt withdrew Tellman from the Colonial Office matter and put him to the task. He was equally unsuccessful.

“Perhaps it wasn’t a real hansom?” Tellman said sourly. “Perhaps it was our murderer, dressed up to look like a cabby?”

It was a thought which had already occurred to Pitt. “Then find out where he got the hansom from,” he instructed. “If that is the case, then it cuts down the possibilities for time. We know that most of the people we have suspected so far in the Colonial Office matter can account for themselves at half past nine.”

Tellman snorted. “Did you really think it was one of them?” he said with contempt. “Why? Why would any of them kill Mrs. Chancellor?”

“Why would anybody at all kill her?” Pitt countered.

“Robbery. There are two rings missing, Bailey said. He checked with her maid.”

“What about the locket? Why didn’t they take that?” Pitt pursued it. “And did the maid say she was wearing her rings that night?”

“What?”

“Did the maid say she was wearing her rings that evening?” Pitt repeated patiently. “Ladies have been known to lose jewelry, even valuable pieces, or to pawn them, or sell them, or give them away.”

“I don’t think he asked.” Tellman was annoyed because he had not thought of that. “I’ll send him back.”

“You’d better. But keep looking for that cabdriver all the same.”

The last person Pitt found was Peter Kreisler. Three times the previous day Pitt had called upon him, and on each occasion he had still been absent, and his manservant had had no idea if he would be back at all that day. On the second occasion of Pitt’s calling the footman informed him that Mr. Kreisler had been deeply upset by the news of Mrs. Chancellor’s death, and had left the building almost immediately, without giving any indication as to where he was bound and when he intended to return.

When Pitt went again on the afternoon after Tellman’s unsuccessful search for the cabdriver, Kreisler was at home, and received Pitt immediately and with some eagerness. His face was tired, as if he had slept little, and there was an intense nervous energy about him, but his grief, whatever its depth or extent, was well in control. But then Pitt imagined Kreisler was a man who masked his emotions at any time, and was used to both triumph and tragedy.

“Come in, Superintendent,” he said quickly, showing him into a surprisingly charming room with a polished wooden floor and delicate African carvings on the mantel. There were no animal skins or horns, but one very fine painting of a cheetah. He waved to one of the chairs. “Dobson, bring the Superintendent a drink. What would you like, ale, tea, something stronger?”

“Have you cider?”

“Certainly. Dobson, cider for Superintendent Pitt. I’ll have some too.” He waved at the chair again, and himself sat opposite, leaning forward towards Pitt, his face earnest. “Have you found anything of importance yet? I have been studying the tides of the river to see where she could have been put in. That may help to discover where she was killed, and thus of course where she went from Berkeley Square, which I believe she left in the mid-evening, alone.” His hands were clenched in front of him. “At least, alone as soon as Chancellor had called a cab for her and seen her into it. If she was bound for Upper Brook Street, she must have been waylaid almost immediately. Do you think it was meant to be an abduction, and somehow it went wrong?”

It was actually a thought which had not occurred to Pitt, and there was a glimmer of sense in it.

“For ransom?” he asked, aware that the surprise was in his voice.

“Why not?” Kreisler pointed out. “It seems to me to make more sense than to murder her, poor woman. Chancellor has both wealth and a great deal of power. So has her brother-in-law, Standish. Possibly it was intended to try to coerce him in some way. Which is an extremely ugly thought, but not an impossible one.”

“No … indeed,” Pitt agreed reluctantly. “Although it must have gone very badly wrong to end like this. She was certainly not killed by accident.”

“Why?” Kreisler looked at him intently, his face tight with emotion. “Why do you say that, Superintendent?”

“The manner of her death made that apparent,” Pitt replied. He did not intend to discuss it further with Kreisler, who was in many ways a principal suspect.

“Are you sure?” Kreisler pressed. “Whose good could her death serve? Surely it would …” His voice trailed off.

“If I knew whose good it served, Mr. Kreisler, I should be a great deal further towards finding her murderer,” Pitt answered. “You seem very profoundly concerned in the matter. Did you know her better than I had supposed?” He watched Kreisler closely, the pallor of his skin, the brilliance of his eyes, the tiny muscles flickering in his jaw.

“I have met her several times, and found her charming and intelligent, and a woman of great sensitivity and honor,” he replied with a tensely loud voice. “Is that not more than enough reason to be horrified at her death and to wish passionately that her murderer should be found?”

“Of course it is,” Pitt said very quietly. “But most people, however profound their feelings, are content to leave it to the police to bring that about.”

“Well I am not,” Kreisler stated fiercely. “I will do everything in my power to learn who it is, and make damned sure the world knows it too. And frankly, Superintendent, I don’t care whether that pleases you or not.”