CHARLOTTE WAS DEEPLY TROUBLED, not only by Delia’s death but by the manner of it. Had she really believed herself deserving of such an appalling end? Even if she had killed Halberd, surely there were some mitigating circumstances, some pain so deep that to her what she had done was justified? Anger, rejection after hope? Or fear? What danger would Halberd have been to her? Apparently he knew an inordinate amount about a lot of people. Pitt had said that much. Was Halberd blackmailing her? Hardly over her affair with the Prince of Wales. That was common knowledge, and always had been. No doubt those who were interested in such things could have named every woman in whom the prince had shown an interest over the last forty years.
Was there something else Elsie Dimmock would have told them, but had not?
Charlotte sat opposite Emily in her boudoir, the sun streaming in through the windows, which were open onto the garden. Birds chattered pleasantly outside and somewhere in the distance a dog barked.
“Why?” Emily said bleakly. “If she did it herself at all.”
“Why now is the question we need to answer,” Charlotte replied. “Whether she did it to herself, or someone did it to her, there was a reason it happened. It was something new, or something old that got horribly worse. Either way there will have been a change.”
“Do you think she did it?” Emily’s face was filled with unhappiness, deep lines across her brow.
“No.” Charlotte had been thinking about it ever since she heard of Delia’s death. She had to admit that it seemed strangely pointless. “I formed a very deep impression that she was a fighter,” she replied to Emily. “Someone who turned her eyes outward, not in on herself.”
“When we went to her former lady’s maid and probed about the past, I didn’t sense that Elsie Dimmock was deliberately evading anything,” Emily said. “Did you?”
“No. I’m trying to find a place to start looking to see if Delia really did kill herself,” Charlotte answered.
Emily bit her lip. “How likely is it?”
“Well, if it happened, very likely,” Charlotte said with a self-mocking smile. “It didn’t look as if Halberd was murdered either, to begin with. It seemed to be a rather ridiculous accident, the sort one doesn’t talk about, it was so…undignified: A much-respected friend of the Queen falls out of a rowing boat while alone on the Serpentine at night and drowns in water he could have easily stood up in. Nobody hangs themselves from a meat hook in their own kitchen by accident! The point is that neither of them looks like murder, but one of them definitely is, and maybe the other one too.”
“What did Thomas say, exactly? Or as close as you can remember?”
“That it looked as if she did it herself, but he is not at all sure it’s so. Kendrick said Halberd was having an affair with her, and it was pretty disgusting. He blackmailed her into it, and when she couldn’t take it anymore, she killed him.”
“Then why kill herself?” Emily asked reasonably.
“Because she was afraid of being found out?”
“But did Thomas even suspect her?”
“Not that I know of. But I don’t know very much.” Charlotte tried not to let the loneliness creep into her voice. Emily was watching her closely. She did not need words; Emily would catch even a change in tone, and understand it.
“Was Kendrick surprised when he knew she’d…done that to Halberd?” Emily asked.
“Yes, he was shocked…really horrified,” Charlotte replied, recalling the look of grief in Pitt’s face when he told her the very little he had. She even wondered if he would have told her at all, had she not known Delia personally. There were so many things he could not discuss with her. It would be wrong of her to try to persuade him to tell her more—a very selfish piece of cruelty. She wanted to know for her own sake, because she wished to be closer to him, to share and to be part of what mattered to him so much. But put like that, it sounded very childish. If she wished to share something with him apart from the daily details of life and home, then she should do something herself, and share that! Perhaps after all this was over, she would find something that mattered, a cause worth fighting for.
“If she didn’t murder Halberd, what was it that made her kill herself?” she said. “It couldn’t have been Thomas suspecting her of killing him. So it was something else. We need to find out what it was.”
“A different affair?” Emily suggested. “She does seem prone to them…”
“The only one we know of is with the Prince of Wales, and everybody knows of that,” Charlotte pointed out. “Halberd was what Kendrick said.”
“Then we should find out if it was true. I suppose Halberd’s death wasn’t suicide, was it?”
“I don’t know how you could hit yourself over the head hard enough to drown yourself!”
Emily’s face was filled with doubt. “Are we sure they are even connected at all?”
“Maybe not. Who can we speak to, if we do it carefully enough?”
Emily thought for a moment. “Well, Felicia Whyte. And Helena Lyndhurst. She will talk about anything royal for hours. If we approach it that way…”
“Distasteful as it is, we had better begin while it’s still a topic of interest and people remember things,” Charlotte replied. She despised gossip in other people, but it had its uses. Sometimes nothing else served.
“Felicia will be at the ladies’ club this afternoon.” Emily rose to her feet purposefully. “We had better go. I’ll find you something suitable to wear. Don’t waste time going home to change, we must make plans.”
“HOW CHARMING OF YOU to have brought your sister again,” Lady Felicia said as soon as she saw Charlotte half a step behind Emily. Felicia’s expression held just the right balance of warmth and amusement. Clearly she had forgotten nothing of the last meeting here. Charlotte liked her the better that she could find amusement in it.
“Thank you for making me welcome,” she replied in just the same blend of amusement and pleasure. They had no time to waste. This could be a long and awkward task. “I wish the circumstances were unclouded by tragedy.”
Felicia understood instantly what she was referring to. Surprisingly, there was a moment of real and deep regret in her eyes.
“Indeed. It is very sobering. One knows so much less than one imagines.”
“You are right, of course.” Charlotte said it with warmth that was purely tactical, but then immediately after she was surprised to find that she meant it. She did not know much about Felicia. The woman might have experienced her share of grief, of feeling frightened or lonely, or even betrayed.
It took another ten minutes before Emily managed to steer the conversation to Delia.
“You knew her far longer than we did,” she said with a sad little smile. “Were you surprised?” She seemed about to continue, but she was studying Felicia’s face as she spoke, and something in it stopped her from asking her next question.
“Yes, I was,” Felicia said quietly. “I can hardly believe it even now. Delia,” she spoke her name gently, “was more full of life, for good or ill, than anyone else I’ve known. I can’t imagine a despair so deep that she would”—she shook her head a little, quite sharply, as if to dislodge an image from her brain—“do something so hideously final.”
Charlotte decided to take the risk. “There are all sorts of rumors flying about. One is that she was having an affair with John Halberd, and they had a terrible quarrel about something…too awful to say…and that it was she who killed him! And she took her own life because she felt they were about to arrest her.” She bit her lip from guilt at speaking the words when she so despised loose and cruel gossip, as this was. But she had to see Felicia’s reaction to it.
She felt the blood hot in her face at the anger in Felicia’s eyes.
“Who says such a thing?” she demanded. “That’s…vile! And complete rubbish. Sir John may have been proud, and cold, and he knew a great deal more than he ought to have about almost everybody, but he was not the sort of man to have affairs of…a disgusting nature. He did not marry because the one woman he loved died tragically, in Africa, before they had a chance to marry. He never forgot her, or felt deeply about anyone else.” She said it quietly, so as not to be overheard by others, but the certainty of her emotion was unmistakable. “I don’t know that I liked him very much; he was too clever, too…self-controlled for my taste. He was one man you could not manipulate. I always felt somehow at a disadvantage in his company.” She gave a rueful and very slight smile. “As if he understood me far better than I would ever understand him. Couldn’t fault him for anything. And…” She took a deep breath, almost as if she was fighting for self-control.
Charlotte did not turn and look at Emily. She waited.
“And I happen to know that Delia had grown closer to him in the last few weeks of his life, but it was as an old acquaintance,” Felicia continued. “She knew him very slightly, so she said, when she was still married to Roland Darnley. And that was years ago. I would have known if there were anything like what you are suggesting.” The look of distaste in her face was profound.
Charlotte could not help defending herself, startled that she actually cared what Felicia thought of her.
“I didn’t believe it either,” she said. “I told the busybody who said it something close to what I thought of her.”
“Close to?” Felicia asked.
“I couldn’t use the kind of language I wished to.”
Felicia’s expression softened. “I see. The temptation must have been intense, but perhaps best not to…Although I agree.”
“Jealousy destroys everything,” Emily said. “Like a disease that eats you inside.” She looked at Felicia. “You must have experienced a good deal of it, in your position.”
Felicia chose to take it as a compliment. “You are very perceptive. Yes, it is like acid, corroding everything it touches.”
It was Charlotte’s turn. She felt a moment of real sorrow for this woman who had so much, and yet so little. “In the end I hope this will not touch the memory of Delia, just rebound on the people who think such things, whether they said them aloud or not. I’m glad Delia knew Sir John in a pleasant way, and that she received some regard from him before he died.”
Felicia thought for a moment. “I rather think she was seeking his help for some purpose, although I have no idea what.” She furrowed her brow in an effort to recall a thought that eluded her. “I know she asked my husband as well. He was in Africa for many years, you know? But not the south, I don’t think. Or at least not much.”
Charlotte gave a little shiver. “You mention Africa, and I am touched with fear of another war.” She had begun the sentence intending a dramatic effect, but realized when she finished it that she really was afraid of another war. It was not that she knew so much about the implications, but she was concerned by the expression on Pitt’s face when it was spoken of, and the diligence with which he read more and more articles about it in the newspaper.
Felicia was watching her closely now. “Do you think Delia feared it as well?” she asked. “What would Sir John know?”
“You said he knew a great deal about all kinds of things. Perhaps he knew something interesting, or dangerous?” Charlotte suggested. As she was saying it, she realized it made more sense. Many people were worried, particularly those who had already lost sons, husbands, or brothers in the first war.
But what was Delia’s connection? Or was Charlotte building something out of nothing? “Would Delia Kendrick be concerned about war, or know anything more than any other casual reader of headlines?” she asked.
“That depends very much on the conversations she overheard,” Emily assured her.
“She might have,” Felicia said after a moment’s hesitation. “She was very inquisitive, even intrusive, in some ways. You know, at a glance her first husband was handsome, certainly in his own eyes, and not much use to anyone at all. He never appeared to have any interests apart from amusing himself. He wasn’t in business of any sort, and he had no land, unless it was something in the wilds of Scotland. Delia had the money, but he spent a great deal of it. Not that that is unusual, of course.” She seemed to be looking far away, as if remembering the past with more clarity than she had seen it at the time. “Once or twice I saw him act quite serious about things, and I know my husband had a degree of respect for him. And he is not one whose regard is earned easily.” She seemed to lose her thread of thought and fell silent.
“Poor Delia,” she said at last. “I wonder if we would all have been kinder if we knew what lay ahead for them.” She gave a shudder and the color faded from her face. “Or for ourselves.” She shrugged. “But then we would live in perpetual fear. Perhaps the only way to have courage is not to know. Tell me, Mrs. Pitt, are you serious about joining in the struggle for suffrage for women?”
Charlotte was caught completely off guard. “Why…yes. Yes, I am. It has to come one day. I am all for making it soon.”
Felicia smiled, but it was clearly an effort. “Then I must introduce you to several people I know.” She made a beckoning gesture. “Come.”
CHARLOTTE SAID NOTHING TO Pitt about any of Felicia Whyte’s comments, but she tried to persuade him, very much against his will, to attend a reception where Walter and Felicia Whyte would be.
They were sitting after dinner. It was past midsummer and the darkness was coming earlier. By nine the light was fading and color filled the sky.
“I haven’t time,” Pitt said, affecting regret. He did not wish to disappoint her, but clearly the last thing he wanted was to waste his time standing around making polite and totally artificial conversation. “I’m sorry,” he added.
How much should she tell him of what she and Emily were doing? As little as possible, of course, only what was necessary in order to find out more about Delia. She wanted to be honest. Pretense and manipulation were not the actions of friends. And yet sometimes one has to keep certain things secret, at least for a while.
“I’m learning to see Felicia Whyte in a different way,” she began tentatively.
Now he was listening, puzzled. “Why? She is as unlike you as possible.”
Was she so predictable? Should she tell the truth? If so, what part of it?
This was the moment that she told him the truth, or brushed it off and lost the opportunity forever.
The words came easily. “I don’t really like her, but I can imagine very clearly the fear she feels. She understands Delia Kendrick better than anyone else I know, and she has, for a long time. She spoke about Delia’s first husband, Darnley, and that Walter Whyte knew him and had a respect for him for which there did not appear to be any reason. And she was really angry about the gossip concerning Delia having had an affair with Halberd.” She stopped, looking at Pitt to see if he was listening.
She knew from his face that he was quite aware she was trying to find out something, the way she had when they were first married and he had been able to share his cases with her. She’d been so much better than he at understanding the rules and shibboleths of society, and had a very sharp instinct for other people’s emotions.
“What is it you are looking for?” he asked her bluntly.
“I don’t know. I think Delia was murdered, and for something she saw, or heard. She understood its meaning, where other people didn’t. Her death is connected with Halberd’s, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know, but I believe so.” He was very serious. “However, if looking into it got her killed very brutally, whoever it is won’t hesitate to kill anyone else who seems to be following the same path. Don’t give yourself any illusions that you are safe. If this issue is as big as I fear, no one is.” He leaned forward. “Please, I can’t do my job if I spend half my time worrying about where you are and what rats’ nest you’ve just poked!” He said it with a slight smile, but only on his lips. It did not reach his eyes. He was totally serious.
“It’s all been just social conversation,” she began.
“Social conversation is all you need!” His voice was sharper.
She deliberately misunderstood him. “If Walter Whyte knows something about Delia, isn’t it worth finding out? You don’t believe she killed herself, do you?” She made the question very serious, because she knew he would not lie to her outright. He might refuse to answer, but that in itself was answer enough.
“No, I don’t think so,” he admitted. “And if she didn’t, then it was Kendrick who killed her, and Halberd almost certainly had some connection with it. What I don’t know is why, or how to prove it.”
“Then we must find out what she knew.” She said it as if it were simple, and she were out of danger here in this familiar room, in her own house. But Delia had been killed in her own home, either by her own hand or by someone else’s. “Thomas, we can’t let this happen and look the other way.” She said it more vehemently than she had intended to, but it was reality, not affected by drama.
“I don’t intend to leave it,” he promised. “It was the Queen who asked me to find out who killed Halberd, and why. I can’t leave it even if I wished to. And I don’t.”
Suddenly she had no breath. “The…the Queen? She asked you…I mean, in person? And you didn’t tell me?” An enormous space opened up in front of her, vast, lonely, things she couldn’t see and was not part of…and she couldn’t help him.
He touched her face very gently with the tips of his fingers.
“I can tell you all of it when it is over. If I had told you she sent for me, but not why, it would have been frightening and misleading. It’s not personal, it’s part of my duty. If Narraway had been here, she would have sent for him. But he isn’t.”
Now she understood why he had been so withdrawn, telling her almost nothing. He was carrying the weight of this alone, and it was far heavier than just the embarrassing death of a much-admired man. The Queen had sent for him! A wave of fierce pride swept over her, followed quickly by a very sober fear of what failing a job for the Queen would mean.
“You must let me help,” she said decisively. “I will be very careful, and always stay with other people. I promise. But I can ask questions that you can’t, and overhear conversations. Women notice far more than many men realize—”
“Which may be exactly why Delia was killed,” he interrupted her.
“Stop trying to shut me in the nursery,” she demanded angrily, because she felt useless and she wished so badly to help.
“I’m afraid for you!” He was exasperated, as if she still did not understand.
“Of course you are,” she retorted instantly. “And you think I’m not afraid for you? Or that I don’t love you? Or maybe you don’t care whether you solve every case or not?” Her words were sharper than she had intended them to be, but she meant them.
For once, he was speechless.
She felt guilty now. “Thomas, I love you. Please don’t try to stop me from being the little bit of help I can be. I can get closer to the truth of some things about Delia Kendrick than you can. I didn’t like her very much, but I understand her, and I’m sorry and angry at what happened to her. Oddly enough, so is Felicia Whyte, I think.”
“We’ll go to this party,” he agreed, although she could tell from the strain in his voice that it was unwillingly. “But you will stay with me.”
She nodded obediently.
“I mean it,” he said, more sharply than before.
“Thomas, I’ve no more wish to get hurt than you do!” This time, it was he who nodded.
THE PARTY WAS VERY glamorous, and Charlotte went in one of her own gowns, plain dark blue but so exquisitely cut that it was remarkably flattering. It was easy to trim it with a variety of small additions: lace, a dash of something pale, or a silk flower. On this first occasion of wearing it, she chose just pearls. Even with his mind on so many other things, she saw Pitt’s eyes widen with appreciation. That was all she needed. Now she would find out everything she could about Delia Kendrick, and do it very carefully.
She had known of the reception in the first place through Emily, and it was Emily who had obtained the necessary invitations for her. She saw her now standing close to Jack as if she was listening attentively to the conversation, but Charlotte knew she would also be thinking of the best way to introduce any subject that could lead to further discoveries.
The first half hour was taken up with introductions and polite formalities, and she could see that Pitt was as bored as she was herself.
“It’s all necessary,” she whispered to him in a quiet moment. “I’ve seen Felicia Whyte over there to our left. She won’t be here alone. Mr. Whyte will be with her.”
“I can’t question him in front of other people,” Pitt replied. “In fact, I have no grounds to question him at all.”
“Stop thinking like a policeman,” she told him under her breath. They were being approached by Somerset Carlisle. Emily must have asked him to come. “You are Special Branch,” Charlotte went on. “You don’t have the same rules. In fact, are you sure you have any rules at all?”
Pitt had no time to answer because Carlisle was already there, with a smile that could have meant anything. He looked elegant and enigmatic, as usual.
“Rules? Seriously, which rules are you thinking of keeping, Pitt?” He smiled. “Or breaking only reluctantly.”
“Only the ones I get away with,” Pitt said. “I’m sure you are one of the best people at that. I’ve never known anyone who does it so frequently, and with such skill.” He smiled back at Carlisle with exactly the same mix of humor and pretense at gravity.
“Are we still talking about Halberd’s death?” Carlisle inquired with a like tone of voice, as if he had been considering the weather.
“Indirectly,” Pitt answered.
“And directly, what else? Are you looking for proof that it was Delia Kendrick who killed him? I doubt you’ll find it.”
“So do I,” Pitt agreed.
“Ah, you don’t think she did!” Charlotte understood immediately.
Pitt hesitated only a moment. “No, I don’t. I need to know who did, and why. More than that, I need to prove it.”
Carlisle looked suddenly bleak. “Don’t worry, Pitt,” he said without a shred of humor now. “I won’t upset it for you.” He did not add any protestation of sincerity. He gave a brief smile, aimed at both Pitt and Charlotte, then moved away to speak to someone else.
It was a little after that when Charlotte separated from Pitt and quite easily drifted into conversation with Lady Felicia, and then with Walter Whyte alone. They had already mentioned the fact that Alan Kendrick would have been here but for Delia’s death.
“Poor man.” Charlotte tried to sound as if she meant it. “Not only has he lost his wife, but in such a terrible way. People can be so…so quick to judge. I blush when I think I disliked her, and allowed myself to show it.”
Whyte looked at her with interest. “You are one of very few…”
“I’m glad,” she said quickly.
“No.” He shook his head. “I meant of the many who disliked her, for one reason or other. There were several, but you are the only one who regrets it, and is not busy exercising your imagination as to why she would have done such a thing. I don’t want to repeat their ideas.” He seemed to be looking at something far away, beyond this gracious room with its marble pilasters and painted ceiling. His face still kept some of the color of old sunburn, and his eyes were remarkably blue.
Charlotte would like to have asked him about his adventures in Africa, but that would have to wait for another time.
“I can imagine,” she said. “I have heard some of them. But I know from Lady Felicia that Delia had some very hard times. I believe she lost her first husband suddenly and very violently. I don’t know how she bore it, except that one has to.” She allowed her mind to consider how she would feel if Pitt were killed. Her throat was tight and she could hear the emotion in her voice.
Walter Whyte was looking at her, a gentleness in his face. “It was a long time ago,” he told her as if trying to find some comfort himself. “And he was a difficult man. Elusive. I’m not sure how much she knew about him at the time.”
“She learned after?” Charlotte did not have to pretend either interest or a degree of compassion. Not all knowledge is better than uncertainty, but certainly some is.
“I’m not sure,” Whyte admitted. “He disappeared quite often, sometimes for a week or so.” He stopped abruptly.
She waited, not sure if it was some remembered pain of his own or discretion that silenced him. It could even be regret that he had raised the subject at all. She wondered what had been so painful for Whyte: Was there a mistress? Or did he drink himself insensible, and wait to sober up before coming home? Possibly he spent days and nights out gambling when she had no idea where he was.
The one thing Charlotte had not considered at all was what Whyte said next, very softly, a serious confidence not to be overheard.
“I suppose it hardly matters now, poor devil. They’re both dead, but I want at least one person among the gossiping women to know the truth. He had some sympathy with a group of Irish rebels, but when their methods sickened him, he became a double agent.”
Charlotte froze. It was as if the whole room had closed invisible doors on itself and she and Walter Whyte were utterly alone.
“He worked for Victor Narraway,” he continued. “Appallingly dangerous stuff, trying to play both sides.” He took a long, deep breath and let it out in a sigh. “He either made a slip, or someone betrayed him. His death was not accidental; he was murdered. Quickly, skillfully, and unprovably.”
Charlotte’s mind reeled first with grief for him, and for Delia and her baby; then she was drenched with fear for Pitt. It was irrational. He had never been a double agent; he was head of Special Branch. Everyone knew which side he was on. Then she was thinking of Delia, a new widow with a child to support, and her husband gone in one single act of violence.
Thank heaven Victor Narraway had at least helped her financially. It was a matter of honor, and possibly acknowledgment of some sense of responsibility, if it had been he who had persuaded Roland Darnley to play both sides.
Had Delia known that? Would she have accepted the money otherwise? How terrible for her that she could tell no one how or why Darnley had really died. Charlotte was not certain if she could have kept her silence all this time if she were so bereaved and had heard Pitt spoken of lightly, as such a wastrel.
She shivered and shook her head as if to free herself from the thoughts. Walter Whyte was watching her. From the look in his eyes, he understood at least something of what she felt. No doubt he also knew that she would tell Pitt all that she had just learned.
It occurred to her to wonder if she had elicited the information from him, or if he had created the opportunity to tell her, and if he hadn’t tonight, then would he have as soon as the chance lent itself. Might he even have sought out Pitt and told him? Possibly.
The conversation moved to other things, and a few moments after that they were rejoined by Felicia and Somerset Carlisle.
Had Carlisle anything to do with Walter Whyte’s sudden candor? Charlotte would probably never know, nor did it matter.
BUT THERE WAS CONSIDERABLY more, as she and Emily discussed the following morning.
“It’s still possible that Delia killed Halberd,” Emily pointed out. “I don’t believe she did, and if she didn’t, then she had no reason that we know of to kill herself. But how can we go about discovering who did? And if Thomas can’t do it, there’s no chance we can.” She sat in her usual comfortable chair in the boudoir, looking anything but comfortable.
“No, we don’t need to know who did,” Charlotte argued. “Not if we can find where she was.”
“Probably at home, and nobody but Kendrick can confirm that,” Emily pointed out. “And since he’s trying to blame her, or even if he isn’t, he has said that she was not in.”
“Which means that she could not have sworn he was in,” Charlotte said emphatically. “Or that he wasn’t.”
“Unless the servants saw him, and will swear to it.” Emily was taking up the position of devil’s advocate deliberately. The stakes were too important to believe something simply because they wished to.
“Exactly.” Charlotte’s mind was racing at last.
“You’re not going to ask them?” Emily was genuinely alarmed.
“Yes, I am. We are,” she corrected herself. “Not if Kendrick was there, but to try to work out where Delia was. Her current lady’s maid will still be in the house, with any luck. Or if not there, then we will find out where she’s gone.”
“She won’t have a new position yet. It’s been only days.”
“Better still, we can promise to help her find a new position. Between us we must be able to exert enough influence to be of use,” Charlotte said. “Well, you can anyway. Or perhaps Lady Felicia?”
“Delia may not have told anyone where she was going.” Emily put up a last argument.
“Maybe not. That doesn’t mean the maid doesn’t know. And she will certainly know how Delia was dressed, whether her boots needed cleaning or not, if she got wet. Also, probably what hour she went out, then when she returned. Clothes can tell you a lot, if you know them well. And nobody knows them better than the person who has to clean and care for them.”
“What are we going to tell this woman?”
“The truth. That people are saying terrible things about Delia: that she was having a very ugly affair with John Halberd, and she actually killed him that night.” Charlotte was getting more and more convinced that their idea would work. “If Delia was anywhere near the Serpentine, the hem of her dress, not to say her boots, would show it. Maybe the maid would not testify to the police or the court, but if she can, she will help us learn where Delia was, if it will clear her lady’s name now.”
“And if Kendrick finds out? We can hardly cross-question his servants without his knowledge, and we certainly won’t get his permission. We’ll have to be…inventive.” There was both doubt and hope in Emily’s face.
Charlotte agreed that was a problem. “We might need help.”
“Thomas won’t help with this…will he?”
“I don’t know. I don’t intend to ask him, because it would involve his lying, which might compromise his position later. But Somerset Carlisle would do it in a moment…I think!”
Emily gave a beaming smile. “Of course! Why didn’t I think of that? We will ask him immediately, and go as soon as he can arrange it.”
It took a good deal of arranging, but Carlisle saw the point straightaway, although he required some persuasion and very definite restrictions before he would agree to come with them. He supplied both Charlotte and Emily with police whistles, or at least whistles that looked the same and sounded earsplittingly fierce when blown. Both of them had to swear they would use them if they felt in the least threatened.
Charlotte appreciated that they were running a degree of risk, because if they were correct in their beliefs, Kendrick had killed both Halberd and Delia, and so far had got away with both murders. To deal with two women at once might be very much harder for him, but it would still be, at the very best, an embarrassment if they were caught.
“Somerset is the one man who will be able to save us, even at risk to his reputation, or his life,” Charlotte said earnestly.
“His reputation is beyond repair, but his life I care about very much,” Emily replied.
Charlotte was not sure if she wanted to tell Emily that Carlisle was not coming unarmed to Kendrick’s house. He had a very small pistol, but at close quarters it would be quite deadly.
“It could be terribly awkward,” Charlotte admitted. “We will just have to succeed. After all, we are only going to call on a lady’s maid and see if we can help her find a new position. I’m sure there is somebody we know—you know—who is looking for one.”
It was nervousness that was making them talk. Charlotte had no intention at all of turning back. Of course, discovery would be, as she said, acutely awkward. But so would the inability to catch Alan Kendrick. Then Pitt would have failed the Queen. More important to Charlotte than that, he would have failed himself. She knew him well enough to have a good idea of what that would mean to him. This was not an ordinary case. Of course, he did not solve every case. Nobody did. Learning to accept defeat and not let it damage you was part of life, even for children. It was adults who sometimes forgot that.
They arrived at the back door of Kendrick’s house a few moments after Somerset Carlisle had been admitted at the front. The scullery maid was reluctant to let them in, but Emily gave some rash promises she might later regret, and the woman who had been Delia’s lady’s maid came out of her own room and spoke to them in the housekeeper’s sitting room. She was younger than they had expected, in her twenties, and clearly profoundly shaken.
Emily was very gentle. “You must be feeling quite ill,” she said sympathetically. “The sooner you can get away from this house of tragedy, the better. Once you are no longer needed here, you may certainly come and assist at Ashworth House, until you find a new place where a proper lady’s maid is required.”
“But what can I do to…? I’m not a parlor maid,” the young woman stammered.
“I’m sure you are excellent at laundry work, and can give my staff some help,” Emily said easily. “But first you need to recover yourself a bit. This is probably the most awful thing you will ever experience.”
Charlotte was willing to stand back and leave it to Emily. She was merely reinforcement if one of Kendrick’s staff or Kendrick himself should come in. Still, this should be as quick as possible. Carlisle might be able to keep Kendrick’s attention only so long.
Emily came to the point as soon as the young woman, whose name was Stella, had composed herself. Already her most practical anxiety had lifted. She had a temporary place to go. She would not have to return all the way to her parents in Devonshire, and then begin over again.
Emily mentioned that there were cruel rumors circulating about Delia, no doubt born of envy, but nonetheless it was better that they put an end to them.
The tears slid down Stella’s face. “I heard them,” she said wretchedly. “And I never thought as Miss Delia would do anything like that. Downright wicked, what some people will say. But she wasn’t here the night Sir John was killed. They neither of them was.”
“Do you know where she went?” Emily asked, her voice gentle.
“No, I don’t,” Stella admitted miserably. “But she wasn’t in the park. That I know ’cause it were wet, and her boots didn’t have any mud on them, nor leaves nor grass. Nor her skirt neither.”
Charlotte smiled, then said, “Did she take her own carriage, or was wherever she went close enough to walk to? Or perhaps Mr. Kendrick took the carriage?”
“No, he didn’t. He took a hansom,” said Stella. She looked frightened now. Perhaps the valet had told her that Kendrick’s boots had mud on them, and cut grass? Or she had seen them herself.
“What did Mrs. Kendrick wear?” Emily asked quickly.
“It was one of her more ordinary dresses,” Stella said.
Charlotte could feel her stomach knotting. They were trespassing beyond anything excusable to Pitt now. She might as well risk it all.
“Do you know who she went to meet? If we could find the person she saw, they could clear her name of this terrible accusation. It is an awful thing when you cannot clear someone’s name because the accusation is all in hints and whispers, and the person you are talking about is not here to defend themselves.”
“I know he’s a soldier, because she said so. His name is Joe Bentley. He is in one of them regiments named like electrics.”
“Do you know his rank?” Emily asked.
Stella shook her head. “He’s just young. He’s maybe a sergeant, or like that.”
“Electrical?” Emily frowned. “But is he a fighting soldier?”
“Fusiliers?” Charlotte asked.
“That’s right, I think he knows a lot about weapons.” Stella’s face lit momentarily, then darkened. “It weren’t no affair. It was about something! I don’t want you to go saying she was having an affair with a man what was nearly young enough to be her son.”
Charlotte put her hand on Stella’s arm. “We only want to be able to say we know where she was, and it had nothing whatever to do with Sir John Halberd’s death. And since she didn’t kill him, she wouldn’t have taken her own life in remorse for it. This Joe Bentley might have been the son of a friend, or maybe related to her son-in-law. There are all sorts of reasons that are no one else’s concern, but perfectly respectable.”
Emily pulled a card out of her reticule and gave it to Stella.
“When you are ready to move, please give the carriage driver this address. I should be ready to make you welcome, and my staff will see that you are given a room and sufficient duties for you to feel you are earning your way.”
Charlotte stood up. “Thank you, Stella. You may have performed a last and most valuable service for your mistress.”
Charlotte and Emily affected not to see the tears on Stella’s face. She did her best to smile as they made as dignified a departure as they could. They went out of the back door, thanking the footman, then in the street went to inform Carlisle’s coachman that they were getting themselves home.
“You will look after her, won’t you?” Charlotte said, and instantly wished she had not. “I’m sorry, of course you will.” Emily did not bother to reply, but took Charlotte’s arm and they walked closely together along the street.