There was no point in arguing. Either Pitt did it or someone else would. And, in spite of the case being far from proved, there was justice in what Athelstan said. Other answers were possible, even though Pitt knew in his mind they were unlikely. Jerome had every likely trait; his life and his circumstances were susceptible to the emptiness, the warping. It needed only the physical hunger-and no one could explain whence that might grow or whom it might tempt.
And if Jerome had been driven to murder once, he could, as he felt the police coming closer to him, easily be forced to panic, to run or, far worse, to kill again. •
Pitt stood up. He had nothing to fight Athelstan with, but then, perhaps there was nothing to fight him about either.
'Yes, sir,' he acceded quietly. 'I'll take Gillivray and go tomorrow morning, as soon as it won't cause a stir.'' He looked
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at Athelstan wryly, but Athelstan saw no humor in Pitt's statement.
'Good,' he said, sitting back with satisfaction. 'Good man. Be discreet-family's been through a bad time, very bad. Get it over with now. Warn the man on the beat to keep an eye tonight, but I don't suppose he'll run. Not close enough yet,'
'Yes, sir,' Pitt said, going to the door. 'Yes, sir.'
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Pitt set out the following morning with Gillivray, bright and spring-stepped beside him. He hated Gillivray for his demeanor. An arrest for so intimately personal a crime was only the middle of a tragedy, the time when it became public and the wounds were stripped of their privacy. He wanted to say sbme-thing to lacerate Gillivray's comfortable, clean-faced satisfaction, something to make him feel the real, twisting pain in his own belly.
But no words came to mind that were broad enough to encompass the reality, so he strode on in silence, faster and faster with his long, gangling legs, leaving Gillivray to trot inelegantly to keep up. It was a small satisfaction.
The footman let them in with an air of surprise. He had the look of a well-bred person who observes someone else commit a gross breach of taste, but whose own code obliges him to pretend not to have noticed.
'Yes, sir?' he inquired without permitting them inside.
Pitt had already decided he ought to inform Waybourne before actually making the arrest; it would be easier as well as courteous, a gesture that might well repay itself later-they were far from the end. There was high suspicion, justification that necessitated arrest. There was only one reasonable solution, but there were hours of investigation before they could expect proof. There were many things still to be learned, such as where the crime had taken place, and why precisely now? What had precipitated the explosion into violence?
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'It is necessary that we speak to Sir Anstey,' Pitt replied, meeting the footman's eyes.
'Indeed, sir?' The man was flat-faced, as expressionless as a china owl. 'If you care to come in, I shall inform Sir Anstey of your request. He is at breakfast at the moment, but perhaps he will see you when he is finished.' He stepped back and permitted them to pass, closing the door behind him with smooth, silent weight. The house still smelled of mourning, as though there were lilies somewhere just out of sight, and baked meats left over. There was a dimness from half-drawn blinds. Pitt was reminded of the pain of death again, that Waybourne had lost a son, a boy scarcely out of childhood.
' 'Will you please tell Sir Anstey that we are ready to make an arrest,' he said. 'This morning. And we would prefer to acquaint him fully with the situation beforehand,' he added less coldly. 'But we cannot afford to wait.'
The footman was startled out of his calm at last. Pitt was irritably pleased to see his jaw sag.
'An arrest, sir? In the matter of Mr. Arthur's death, sir?'
'Yes. Will you please tell Sir Anstey?'
'Yes, sir. Of course.' He left them to make their own way into the morning room, went smartly toward
