order to savor his victory.
No. Let him read it in the newspapers and nurse his defeat alone. Perhaps privacy was the best he could offer.
That was something Paterson would be spared, poor devil. He would not have to face the public embarrassment. Although what was that, compared with the private guilt?
And what about the officers of the courts? Thelonius Quade had doubted all the time, so much so that he had even considered in some way invalidating the proceedings so a mistrial would be called. But in the end his trust in the law had prevailed. How much would he blame himself for that?
And the appeal judges. Was some suspicion of haste, of emotion governing judgment, what had driven Mr. Justice Boothroyd to retirement and drink? Or might it have happened anyway? Did he see something, perceive a lie, a doubt in the transcript of the original trial, and not have the courage to say so? It would take a brave man, in the climate of the time, to tell the law and the public that it had convicted the wrong man, the case was not over at all. There was no closing the file and putting it in the past, no saying that, yes, it was a tragedy, but it was resolved, could be forgotten, with honor.
Forgetting would be sought in vain, and there was no honor for anyone.
The first person Pitt resorted to again was Juniper Stafford. He found her still in black, but this time it was plain, even dull. It was still an expensive cloth and well cut, but it was fashionable rather than possessing any character and it no longer rustled when she moved; nor was her perfume more than the pleasing scent of cleanliness. She looked truly bereaved in every sense. In seeing her face he was intensely aware of loss, even of failure. It was not Samuel Stafford she mourned, and perhaps not even Adolphus Pryce. He felt it was something in herself, a belief, a dream which had died, and the self-knowledge which had taken its place was a bitter fruit.
“Good morning, Inspector Pitt,” she said without interest. “Do you have some news? My maid tells me the afternoon newspapers say that you have arrested another man for the murder of Kingsley Blaine. I assume he murdered Samuel also, and for some reason they have not mentioned it. It seems an odd omission.” She stood in the center of the morning room. The fire cast a glow on her cheeks, but it could not put life into her eyes, or mobility in her expression.
“The omission was necessary, Mrs. Stafford,” he replied. She had assumed Harrimore guilty, as indeed he had himself, but Juniper did not even ask why. Did she suppose Stafford had threatened him with discovery, or did she no longer particularly care? “Prosper Harrimore did not kill the judge,” he said aloud.
She frowned very slightly. “I don’t understand. That’s ridiculous. If he didn’t, then who did? And why?” The first very faint flicker of humor lit her eyes, totally without fear. “You cannot have returned because you imagine it was I—or Mr. Pryce. You have very effectively proved that it was not, by helping us to blame each other.” She turned a little away from him. “I will not say you made it happen, that would be to give you too much credit—or blame. Had we been stronger, had we the love we imagined we had, you could not have done such a thing.” She brushed her hand over her skirt, removing a fleck of thread. “So why have you come?”
He was sorry for her, in spite of the contempt he had felt before. Disillusion is one of the bitterest of all griefs.
“Because I am driven back to the beginning again,” he replied candidly. “All the information I thought I had is of little use. The judge’s death appears, after all, to have had nothing to do with the Farriers’ Lane case. Or if it does, it is a connection I haven’t seen, and still cannot see now. There is nothing for me to do but go back to the physical details and reexamine each one to see if I have missed something, or misinterpreted it.”
“How tedious.” she said without feeling. “I can repeat everything I told you before, if you believe it may be helpful.” And without waiting for him to reply, in a monotone she recited the events of the last day of Stafford’s life, from seeing him at breakfast through Tamar Macaulay’s visit, his agitation, to his leaving to go and interview Joshua Fielding and Devlin O’Neil again. She told him of Stafford’s return, his preoccupation, which was not particularly unusual, the dinner they had shared.
“And he was perfectly well then?” he interrupted. “He was not sleepy, unusually inattentive? He ate well, without complaint of pain or discomfort?”
“Yes, he ate excellently. And we were served from the same dishes. There was nothing he took which I did not. More, of course, but just the same dishes. He cannot have been poisoned in this house, Mr. Pitt.”
“No, I had already concluded that, Mrs. Stafford. Besides, we found the traces of opium in his flask. I wondered if he could have taken anything from it already, before the meal, that’s all. I am checking everything …”
“I can see you are totally lost,” she agreed with a flicker of a smile.
He could not entirely blame her, although her amusement stung. It was he who had shed light on a truth that maimed her so much. Without him she might never have seen her love for Pryce as anything less than a great passion. She would have to have been a woman of great generosity not to have hated him for it.
“May I speak with the valet, please?” he asked.
“Of course. He is still here, although I shall have to dismiss him presently. I have no need for his services.” She reached for the bell rope embroidered in silk, and pulled it to summon a servant.
But the valet could tell him nothing useful. He had not seen the flask that evening, nor did he think that the judge had drunk from it. It was not his habit to use the flask when in his own home where he could send for a drink from the decanter merely by ringing a bell. Nor could any of the other servants add anything to what they had already said. He could feel their unspoken contempt that after this time, and all the questions, he was reduced to going over old facts he had known all along, and still he found no pattern from which he could deduce an answer. He was disgusted himself, and discouraged and angry.
The next person he saw was Judge Livesey, but he had to wait until the middle of the afternoon and find him in his chambers between other engagements. Livesey looked surprised to see him, but not disconcerted.
“Good afternoon, Inspector. What may I do for you on this occasion? I hope you have no further disasters to report.” He said it with a smile, but there was no ease in his face, and certainly no humor. He looked tired; the purplish smudges under his eyes and the creases in his face from his nose to the corners of his lips were deeper, his mouth set in harder lines. Pitt remembered how harsh the news of Harrimore’s arrest would be to him. The Godman appeal had been one of the achievements of his career. The dignity and assurance with which he had conducted it had earned him considerable praise both from the general public and, which would be sweeter, from his peers. Now, when it was too late, he was proved tragically wrong.
“No,” Pitt said quietly. “No, there is nothing new, thank God. I am still back with the first crime for which I was called in. I am no further forward in learning who killed Mr. Stafford than I was at the beginning.”
