Resurrection Row (13 page)

Then as he stared at himself in the mirror, making the final adjustment to his appearance, he remembered his visit to Charlotte. He had never been inside a house of working people before, not something on a level with a tradesman’s house, like Pitt’s. All things considered, it was odd how comfortable he had felt, and how little Charlotte had changed. Of course, it would have been different if he had stayed there long! But for that hour or so, the surroundings had been unimportant.

But what Charlotte had said was a totally different matter. She had asked him if he thought Alicia capable of murdering her husband in all but as many words. Charlotte had always been frank to the point of tactlessness; he smiled even now to recall some of the more socially disastrous incidents.

The image smiled back at him from the mirror.

Of course, he denied it—Alicia would never even think of such a thing! Old Augustus had been a bore; he talked endlessly and fancied himself an expert on the building of railways, and since his family had made money in their construction perhaps he was. But it was hardly a subject to pontificate on interminably over the dinner table. Dominic had never met a woman yet who cared in the slightest about railway construction, and very few men!

But that does not move to murder! Actually to kill someone, you have to care desperately over something, whether it is hate, fear, greed, or because they stand in the way between you and something you hunger for—he stopped, his hand frozen on his collar. He imagined being married to some sixty-year-old woman, twice his age, boring, pompous, with all her dreams in the past, looking forward to nothing more than a sinking into slow, verbose old age—a relationship without love. Perhaps one day, or one night, the need to escape would become unbearable, and if there were a bottle of medicine on the table, what would be simpler than to dose a little too much? How easy just to step it up a fraction each time, until you got the amount that was not massive but just precisely enough to kill?

But Alicia could never have done that!

He pictured her in his mind, her fair skin, the curve of her bosom, the way her eyes lit up when she laughed—or when she looked at him. Once or twice he had touched her more intimately than mere courtesy required, and he felt the quick response. There was a hunger underneath her modesty. There was something about her, perhaps a mannerism, a way of holding her head, that reminded him of Charlotte; he was not sure how. It was indefinable.

And Charlotte cared enough to kill! That he was as sure of as his own reflection in the glass. Morality would stop her—but never indifference.

Was it possible Alicia really had killed Augustus—and the old lady knew it? If that were so, then he was bound up in it, the catalyst for the motive.

Slowly he undid the tie and took off the black coat. If that were so, and it could be—it was not completely impossible—then it would be better for everybody, especially Alicia, if he did not go today. The old lady would be waiting for it, waiting to make some stinging remark, even to accuse outright!

He would send flowers—tomorrow; something white and appropriate. And then perhaps the day after he would call. No one would find that odd.

He changed from the black trousers into a more usual morning gray.

He did send the flowers the next morning and was appalled at the price. Still, as the icy wind outside reminded him, it was the first day of February, and there was hardly a thing in bloom. The sun was shining fitfully, and the puddles in the street were drying slowly. A barrow boy whistled behind a load of cabbages. Today funerals and thoughts of death seemed far away. Freedom was a precious thing, but every man’s gift, not something that needed fighting for. He walked briskly round to his club and was settled behind his newspaper when a voice interrupted his half thought, half sleep.

“Good morning. Dominic Corde, isn’t it?”

Dominic had no desire for conversation. Gentlemen did not talk to one in the morning; they knew better, most especially if one had a newspaper. He looked up slowly. It was Somerset Carlisle. He had met him only two or three times, but he was not a man one forgot.

“Yes. Good morning, Mr. Carlisle,” he replied coolly. He was lifting his paper again when Carlisle sat down beside him and offered him his snuffbox. Dominic declined; snuff always made him cough. To sneeze was acceptable; lots of people sneezed when taking snuff, but to sit coughing with one’s eyes running was merely clumsy.

“No, thank you.”

Carlisle put the snuff away again without taking any himself.

“Much pleasanter day, isn’t it,” he remarked.

“Much,” Dominic agreed, still holding onto the paper.

“Anything in the news?” Carlisle inquired. “What’s happening in Parliament?”

“No idea.” Dominic had never thought of reading about Parliament. Government was necessary; any sane man knew that, but it was also intensely boring. “No idea at all.”

Carlisle looked as nonplussed as courtesy would allow. “Thought you were a friend of Lord Fleetwood?”

Dominic was flattered; friend was perhaps overstating it a little, but he had met him lately, and they had struck up an acquaintance. They both liked riding and driving a team. Dominic had perhaps less courage than Fleetwood, but far more natural skill.

“Yes,” he identified guardedly, because he was not sure why Carlisle asked.

Carlisle smiled, sitting back in the chair easily and stretching his legs. “Thought he’d have talked politics with you,” he said casually. “Could be quite a weight in the House, if he wished. Got a following of young bloods.”

Dominic was surprised; they had never discussed anything more serious than good horses, and of course the occasional woman. But come to think of it, he had mentioned a number of friends who had hereditary titles; whether they ever attended was quite another thing. Half the peers in England went nowhere nearer the House of Lords than the closest club or party. But Fleetwood did have a large circle, and it was not an exaggeration to say that Dominic was now on the fringes of it.

Carlisle was waiting.

“No,” Dominic replied. “Horses, mostly. Don’t think he cares much about politics.”

Carlisle’s face flickered only very slightly. “Dare say he doesn’t realize the potential.” He raised his hand and signaled to one of the club servants and, when the man arrived, looked back at Dominic. “Do join me for luncheon. They have a new chef who is quite excellent, and I haven’t tried his specialty yet.”

Dominic had intended having a quiet meal a little later, but the man was pleasant enough, and he was a friend of Alicia’s. Also, of course, an invitation should never be turned down without sound reason.

“Thank you,” he accepted.

“Good.” Carlisle turned to the servant with a smile. “Come for us when the chef is ready, Blunstone. And get me some of that claret again, same as last time. The bordeaux was awful.”

Blunstone bowed and departed with murmurs of agreement.

Carlisle allowed Dominic to continue with his newspaper until luncheon was served; then they repaired to the dining room and were halfway through a richly stuffed and roasted goose garnished with vegetables, fruit, and delicate sauce when Carlisle spoke again.

“What do you think of him?” he inquired, eyebrows raised.

Dominic had lost the thread. “Fleetwood?” he asked.

Carlisle smiled. “No, the chef.”

“Oh, excellent.” Dominic had his mouth full and found it hard to reply gracefully. “Most excellent. I must dine here more often.”

“Yes, it’s a very comfortable place,” Carlisle agreed, looking round at the wide room with its dark velvet curtains, Adam fireplaces on two sides with fires burning warmly in each. There were Gainesborough portraits on the blue walls.

It was something of an understatement. It had taken Dominic three years to get himself elected as a member, and he disliked having his achievement taken so lightly.

“Rather more than comfortable, I would have said.” His voice had a slight edge.

“It’s all relative.” Carlisle took another forkful of goose. “I dare say at Windsor they dine better.” He swallowed and took a sip of wine. “Then, on the other hand, there are thousands in the tenements and rookeries within a mile of here who find boiled rats a luxury—”

Dominic choked on his goose and gagged. The room swum before him, and for a moment he thought he was going to disgrace himself by being sick at the table. It took him several seconds to compose himself, wipe his mouth with his napkin, and look up to meet Carlisle’s curious eyes. He could not think what to say to him. The man was preposterous.

“Sorry,” Carlisle said lightly. “Shouldn’t spoil a good meal by talking politics.” He smiled.

Dominic was completely unguarded. “P-politics?” he stammered.

“Most distasteful,” Carlisle agreed. “Much pleasanter to talk about horseracing, or fashion. I see your friend Fleetwood has adopted that new cut of jacket. Rather flattering, don’t you think? I shall have to see if I can get my tailor to do something of the sort.”

“What in hell are you talking about?” Dominic demanded. “You said ‘rats.’ I heard you!”

“Perhaps I should have said ‘workhouses.’ ” Carlisle chose the words carefully. “Or pauper-children laws. So difficult to know what to do. Whole family in the workhouse, children in with the idle or vagrant, no education, work from waking to sleeping—but better than starvation, which is the alternative, or freezing to death. Have you seen the sort of people that get into the workhouses? Imagine how they affect a child of four or five years old. Seen the disease, the ventilation, the food?”

Dominic remembered his own childhood: a nurse, recalled only hazily, mixed in his mind with his mother, a governess, then school—with long summer holidays; rice pudding, which he loathed, and afternoon teas with jam, especially raspberry jam. He remembered songs round the piano, making snowballs, playing cricket in the sun, stealing plums, breaking windows, and receiving canings for insolence.

“That’s ridiculous!” he said sharply. “Workhouses are supposed to be temporary relief for those who cannot find legitimate work for themselves. It is a charitable charge on the parish.”

“Oh, very charitable.” Carlisle’s eyes were very bright, watching Dominic’s face. “Children of three or four years old in with the flotsam of society, learning hopelessness from the cradle onwards; those that don’t die of disease from rotten food, poor ventilation, cross infection—”

“Well, it should be stopped!” Dominic said flatly. “Clean the places up!”

“Of course,” Carlisle agreed. “But then what? If they don’t go to schools of some sort, they never learn even to read or write. How can they ever get out of the circle of vagrant to workhouse, and back again? What can they do? Sweep crossings summer and winter? Walk the streets as long as their looks last and then turn to the sweatshops? Do you know how much a seamstress earns for sewing a shirt, seams, cuffs, collars, buttonholes, and four rows of stitching down the front, all complete?”

Dominic thought of the prices of his own shirts. “Two shillings?” He hazarded a guess, a little on the mean side, but then Carlisle had suggested as much.

“How extravagant!” Carlisle said bitterly. “She would have to sew ten for that!”

“But how do they live?” The goose was going cold on Dominic’s plate.

Carlisle turned his hands up. “Most of them are prostitutes at night, to feed their children; and then when the children are old enough, they work as well—or else it is all back to the workhouse, and there’s your cycle again!”

“But what about their husbands? Some of them have husbands, surely?” Dominic was still looking for rationality, something sane to explain it.

“Oh, yes, some of them do,” said Carlisle. “But it’s cheaper to employ a woman than a man; you don’t have to pay her much, so the men don’t get the work.”

“That’s—” Dominic searched for a word and failed to find one. He sat staring at Carlisle over the congealing goose.

“Politics,” Carlisle murmured, picking up his fork again. “And education.”

“How can you eat that?” Dominic demanded; it was repulsive to him now, an indecency, if what Carlisle said was true.

Carlisle put it into his mouth and spoke round it. “Because if I were not to eat every time I think of sweated labor, uneducated children, the indigent, sick, filthy, or destitute, I should never eat at all—and what purpose would that serve? Parliament. I ran for it once and failed. My ideas were remarkably unpopular with those who have the vote. Sweated labor doesn’t vote, you know—female, mostly, too young, and too poor. Now I have to try the back door— House of Lords, people like St. Jermyn, with his bill, and your friend Fleetwood. They don’t give a damn about the poor, probably never really seen any, but an eye to a cause—great thing, a cause.”

Dominic pushed his plate away. If this were true, not a piece of melodramatic luncheon conversation designed to shock, then something ought to be done by people like Fleetwood. Carlisle was perfectly right.

He drank the end of the wine and was glad of its clean bite; he needed to wash his mouth out after the taste that had been on his tongue. He wished to God he had never seen Somerset Carlisle; the man was uncouth to invite him to a meal and then discuss such things. They were thoughts that were impossible to get rid of.

Pitt’s superiors had meantime directed his attention to a case of embezzlement in a local firm, and he was returning to the police station after a day of questioning clerks and reading endless files he did not understand when he was met at the door by a wide-eyed constable. Pitt was cold and tired, and his feet were wet. All he wanted was to go home and eat something hot, then sit by the fire with Charlotte and talk about anything, as long as it was removed from crime.

“What is it?” he said wearily; the man was practically wringing his hands with anxiety and pent-up apprehension.

“It’s happened again!” he said hoarsely.

Pitt knew, but he put off the moment. “What has?”

“Corpses, sir. There’s been another corpse. I mean one dug up like, not a new one.”

Pitt shut his eyes. “Where?”

“In the park, sir. St. Bartholomew’s Green, sir. Not really a park, just a stretch o’ longish grass with a few trees and a couple o’ seats. Found on one o’ the seats, ’e was, sitting up there like Jackie, bold as you like—but dead, o’ course, stone dead. And ’as been for a while, I’d say.”