three nights. We'll question all the street vendors again.''
Drummond looked at him with a flicker of hope in his eyes. 'You think we might still find something?'
'I don't know.'' Pitt would not patronize him with groundless optimism. 'But it's the best we have.'
255
'You'll need at least six more constables-that's all the men I can spare. Where do you want them?'
'They can question the cabbies, beat constables, and witnesses, and help with the M.P.s. I'll start this afternoon, find the street vendors tonight.'
'I'll see some of the M.P.s myself.' Reluctantly Drum-mond moved away from the fire and took his wet overcoat off the hook where he had hung it. 'Where shall we begin?'
The long, chill afternoon's work yielded nothing new. The following day Pitt began again, the only difference being that Charlotte had told him in a few sad words that the feeling between Barclay Hamilton and his father's wife was not the jealousy or the loathing they had supposed, but a profound and hopeless love. It brought him no satisfaction, only a respect for the honor which had kept them apart over so many years, and a sharp and painful pity.
He was so suddenly grateful for his own good fortune that it was like a bursting inside him, a flowering so riotous there was barely room for all the blooms.
He found the flower seller near the bridge, a woman with broad hips and a weathered face. It was impossible to guess her age, it might have been a healthy fifty or a weary thirty. She had a tray of fresh violets, blue, purple, and white, and she looked at him hopefully when she saw his purposeful approach. Then she recognized him as the policeman who had questioned her before, and the light faded from her face. . 'I can't tell yer nuffin' more,' she said before he spoke. 'I sell flars ter them as wants 'em, an' 'as the odd word wiv gennelmen as is civil, n' more. I didn't see nuffin' w'en them men was murdered, poor souls, 'cept the same as I always sees, nor no cabbies stop, nor any workin' girls, 'ceptin' those I already told yer abaht. An' Freddie wot sells 'ot pies an' Bert as sells san'wiches.'
Pitt fished in his pocket and pulled out a few pence and 256
offered them to her. 'Blue violets, please-or-just a moment, what about the white ones?'
'They's extra, cos they smells sweeter. White flars orften does. Ter make up fer the color p'raps?'
'Then give me some of each, if you will.'
'There y'are, luv-but I still didn't see nuffin.' I can't 'elp yer. Wish I could!'
'But you remember selling flowers to Sir Lockwood Hamilton?'
'Yeah, course I do! Sold 'im flars reg'lar. Nice gent 'e was, poor soul. Never 'aggled, like some as I could name. Some gents wot 'as fortunes'll 'aggie over a farvin'.' She sighed heavily, and Pitt imagined her life; a quarter of a penny on a bunch of flowers meant a difference to her, and she was only mildly indignant that men who ate nine-course dinners as a way of life would argue with her over the cost of a slice of bread.
'Do you remember that night? It was an unusually late sitting.'
'Bless yer, they 'as late sittin's an' late sittin's,' she said with a wink rather more like a twitch. 'Wot was they sittin' over, eh? An argy-bargy, new laws fer us all-or a good bottle o' port wine?'
' 'It was a fine night, nice enough to walk home with pleasure. Go over it all again in your mind for me. Please. Did you have supper? What did you eat? Did you buy it from someone here?'
'That's right!' she said with sudden cheer. 'I got some pickled eels an' a slice of 'ot bread down Jacko's stand, 'long the Embankment.''
'Then what? What time was that?'
'Dunno, luv.'
