telling of the truth? Would he not have built guards for himself against just this eventuality, knowing there was always a chance? And would that not have shown in all else that he did?
Would he have allowed Pitt to know of it?
Or was he so arrogant he thought he could use Pitt, and Pitt would never realize?
That was such a distortion of the man Pitt perceived that he discarded the notion as close to impossible.
That left the question, did the blackmailer believe it was true or did he simply know that Cornwallis could not prove its untruth?
Beckwith was dead, according to Cornwallis. But had he relatives alive, someone to whom he had told the story, perhaps boasting a little, elaborating on his own part until he appeared the hero, and this person had taken him at his word, as perhaps a son or a nephew might do?
Or for that matter, a daughter. Why not? A woman was as capable as any man of cutting out letters from newspapers and framing a threat.
While he was there, Pitt decided, he should find all he could of the rest of Cornwallis’s naval career, and all there was available on Samuel Beckwith as well, particularly if he had a family still alive, and where they might be now.
More argument and more persuasion were necessary before he was given a very abbreviated summary of Cornwallis’s career, only those things which were largely a matter of public knowledge anyway, such as any other naval personnel might know from their own observation.
He had been promoted and changed ship within two years. In 1878 and 1879 he had been in the China Seas, involved with distinction in the bombardment of Borneo against the pirates.
Within a year after that he had had his own command. He had sailed in the Caribbean and been involved in several actions of a minor nature, largely skirmishes to do with slavers still operating out of West Africa.
He had retired from the sea in 1889 with distinction and an unblemished record. There was a list of ships on which he had served and the ranks he had held, nothing more.
Pitt compared it with Samuel Beckwith’s career, which had been cut short by death at sea, carried overboard by a spar broken loose in a gale. He had never married, and left behind a sister, living in Bristol at the time of his death. His effects and his back pay had been sent to her. She was listed as a Mrs. Sarah Tregarth. Her address was given.
But Beckwith had been unable to read or write. The letter sent to Cornwallis was quite articulate and contained several complex words. Had Sarah Beckwith learned such an art in spite of her brother’s inability?
A discreet letter to the Bristol police would confirm that.
Now Pitt looked at the names of the ships on which Cornwallis had served and copied down a dozen or so names of other men who had served at the same times, including the captain of the
Next he showed his list to the man who had so far assisted him and asked for the addresses of all those who were not currently at sea.
The man looked at Pitt narrowly, then read through them.
“Well, he was killed in action about ten years ago,” he said, biting his lip. He moved to the next one. “He’s retired and gone to live in Portugal or somewhere. He’s in Liverpool. He’s here in London.” He looked up. “What do you want all these men for, Superintendant?”
“Information,” Pitt replied with a tight smile. “I need to know the truth about an incident in order to avert a considerable wrong … a crime,” he added, in case the man should miss the urgency of it or doubt his right to involve himself.
“Oh. Oh, yes sir. It’ll take me a little while. If you’d come back in an hour or so?”
Pitt was hungry, and even more he was thirsty. He was delighted to accept the suggestion and go out and buy himself a ham sandwich from a stall, and a cup of strong tea. He stood in the sun on the street corner enjoying them, watching the passersby. Nursemaids in starched aprons wheeled perambulators. Their older charges rolled hoops or pretended to ride sticks with horses’ heads. A small boy played with a spinning top and would not come when he was told. Little girls in frilly pinafores mimicked their elders, walking daintily, with heads high. He thought with a wave of tenderness of Jemima and how quickly she had grown up. Already she was beginning to be self- conscious, aware of coming womanhood. It felt like only months ago she had been struggling to walk, and yet it was years.
When he had first met Balantyne she had not even been born. And she had been stumbling with speech, often unintelligible to anyone but Charlotte, when Balantyne had lost his only daughter in the most fearful way possible.
Memory of that turned the sandwich in his mouth to sawdust. How could a man bear such grief and survive? He wanted to rush home and make doubly, triply sure Jemima was all right … even hold her in his arms, watch her all the time, make any decisions for her, decide where she should go and who befriend.
Which was ridiculous. It would make her hate him-rightly so.
How did anyone endure having children and watching them grow up, make mistakes, get hurt, perhaps even destroyed, suffer pain worse, more inexplicable, than death? Had Augusta been any help to Balantyne, any comfort at all? Had their common grief brought them closer together at last or merely driven them each into greater isolation, even more alone in their grief?
What was this new tragedy? Perhaps he shouldn’t have left it to Tellman to investigate. And yet he could not abandon Cornwallis.
He threw away the rest of his sandwich, drank the last of his tea, and strode back to the Admiralty. There was no time for standing around.
He began with Lieutenant Black, who had served as first officer with Cornwallis in the China Seas. He was home on shore leave and might be called back to sea quite soon. He lived in South Lambeth, and Pitt took a hansom over the river.
He was fortunate to find Lieutenant Black at home and willing to speak with him, but unfortunate in that what Black had to say was so punctiliously honorable it conveyed very little at all. His professional loyalty to a brother officer was so great as to rob his comments, even his memories, of any individuality or meaning. It conveyed much of Black himself, his perception of events, his fierce patriotism and allegiance to the service in which he had spent all his adult life, but Cornwallis remained only a name, a rank and a series of duties well performed. He never became a man, good or bad.
Pitt thanked him and looked for the next name on his list. He took another hansom and went north over the Victoria Bridge to Chelsea, watching the pleasure boats in the river full of women in pale dresses with bright hats and scarves and men with bare heads in the sun, children in sailor suits, eating toffee apples and striped peppermint sticks. The music of a hurdy-gurdy drifted loudly on the air, along with shouts, laughter and the swish of water.
He found Lieutenant Durand a very different man, lean, sharp featured, roughly the same age as Cornwallis, but still a serving officer.
“Of course I remember him,” he said sharply, leading Pitt into a very pleasant room filled with naval memorabilia, probably from several generations, and overlooking a garden full of summer flowers. It was obviously a family home, and judging from the portraits Pitt had glimpsed in the hall, he came from a long and distinguished line of naval officers, going back long before Trafalgar and the days of Nelson.
“Sit down.” Durand indicated a well-worn chair and sat in one opposite it himself. “What do you want to know?”
Pitt had already explained his reasons, but this time he must phrase it more skillfully and learn something of the man. “What qualities made him a good commanding officer?”
Durand was obviously surprised. Whatever he had been expecting, it was not this.
“You assume I thought he was a good commander,” he said with raised eyebrows, looking at Pitt very directly and with amusement. His face was burned by wind, his eyebrows fair and sparse.
“I assumed you would say so,” Pitt replied. “I was wanting something a little less dry. Was I mistaken?”
“Loyalty before honesty. Is that no use to you?” The faint thread of humor was still there. He sat with his back to the window, leaving Pitt to face the garden and the sunlight.
“None at all.” Pitt sat back in the chair. It was very comfortable. “Sometimes it is all I can find.”
