and scrambled out.
“Thank you.” He paid the man generously, almost as a superstitious offering to fortune. And before he would have time to think, and doubt himself, he knocked on the door.
As before, it was opened by the surly maid.
“Oh—it’s you,” she said with a twist of her lip. “Well, you’d better come in, although what Mrs. Bridges’ll say I don’t know. This is a respectable ’ouse, and she don’t like her lodgers to ’ave callers in a reg’lar way. Least not as you’d say was followers, like.”
Drummond blushed. “Maids have followers,” he said tartly. “Ladies have acquaintances, or if seeking their hands in marriage, then suitors. If you wish to retain your position, I would remember the difference, and keep a civil tongue in your head!”
“Oh! Well, I—”
But she got no further. He brushed past her and went quickly down the bare corridor towards the back, and Eleanor’s rooms. Once there he knocked more loudly than he had intended, and after the briefest moment heard footsteps on the other side. The door swung open and the maid saw him and her face flooded with pleasure, even relief.
“Oh sir, I’m so glad as you’ve come. I was so afraid you might not be back.”
“I promised you I would,” he said quietly, liking the woman enormously for her loyalty. “Is Mrs. Byam in?”
“Oh, yes sir. She don’t often go nowhere. In’t really nowhere to go.”
“Will you ask her if she will see me?”
She smiled, and kept up the fiction. “O’ course, sir. If you’ll wait ’ere.” There was no morning room or library, only a tiny anteroom, less than a hall, but he stood as she had requested while she disappeared, and came back only a moment later, her face full of hope.
“Yes sir, if you’ll come this way.” She took his hat, coat and stick and hung them up, then she led him again into the small sitting room full of Eleanor’s things. He did not even hear her leave.
Eleanor was standing by the window and he knew immediately she had not remained seated because she felt at a disadvantage. In some subtle way she was afraid of him.
Instead of anger he felt sympathy. He was afraid too, of the hurt she could do him if she refused.
“How nice to see you, Micah,” she said with a smile. “You look very well, in spite of the weather. Is the case progressing at last?”
“Yes,” he said with slight surprise. “Yes, it is. Pitt knows who did it, and why.”
Her dark eyebrows rose. “You mean it was not Aaron Godman?”
“No—no, it wasn’t.”
“Oh, the poor man.” Her voice dropped and her face was bleak with the pain she imagined. “How dreadful.” She looked out of the window at the wet walls of the next building. “I always thought hanging was barbaric. This makes it doubly so. How must his family feel?”
“They don’t know yet. We cannot prove who it was.” Drummond wanted to go over to her, but it was too soon. With an effort of will he remained where he was. “I am quite sure Pitt is right, or at least, I should say, Charlotte. It was she who came upon the answer. But there is no proof and, as yet, no evidence that would convince a jury.”
“But Godman is innocent?”
“Oh yes. The proof of that is quite good enough.”
She looked at him quickly. “What are you going to do?”
This time he smiled. “Very little. Pitt will do it.”
“I don’t understand. I know Pitt will do the actual questioning of people. I can recall enough to know that. But surely the decisions are yours?” A flicker of self-mocking humor passed across her face, and a host of memories.
“That depends when the solution comes, although I expect it will not take long from now. He is angry enough, and sad enough, to give it a passionate attention.”
“I still do not understand. You seem to be meaning something far more than you are saying.” There was a question in her voice and anxiety in her eyes. “Do you wish me to know, or …?” She left it unfinished.
“Yes, of course I do. I’m sorry.” It was ridiculous to be playing games with her, or with himself. He should have the courage to put it to the test. He breathed in deeply and let it out again. “I have given the commissioner my resignation, effective one month from now. And I have recommended Pitt to succeed me. I think he will do it better than anyone else. He will make mistakes, but he will also be more likely than any of the others to achieve something positive.”
She looked startled. “You have resigned! But why? I know you have lost a certain interest, but surely it will come back. You cannot just give up.”
“Yes, I can, when there are other things which are of more importance to me.”
She stood still, looking at him very gravely, the question in her eyes.
Now was the time. There was no point in trying to be indirect or to surprise her. “Eleanor, you already know that I love you, and that I wish to marry you. When I asked you before, you pointed out that it would cost me my career, and you said that that was the reason you refused. Now it no longer stands in the way. Marrying you could not harm me, it would only bring me the greatest possible happiness. You cannot refuse me now, unless it would not bring the same happiness to you—” He stopped, realizing he had said all he meant, so it would be clumsy to press too hard, to repeat.
She stood still, her face a little flushed, her eyes very solemn but a very slight smile about her mouth. For
