She came farther into the room and he was aware of a subtle perfume about her, elusive, less sweet than lavender. She moved with a rustle of silk like a breath in leaves, and yet her gown looked like barathea. If she grieved for Samuel Stafford, it was an emotion overpowered by that other emotion which so elated her and made the blood run more swiftly and high in her cheeks. Even so, that did not necessarily mean any guilt in her husband’s death.
“I don’t know what else I can tell you to help.” She was looking at him very directly. “I know almost nothing of his cases, only what the general public can read. He did not discuss them.” She smiled, her eyes puzzled. “Judges don’t, you know. It is not an ethical thing to do. And I doubt any man would discuss such things with his wife.”
“I know that, ma’am,” he conceded. “But women are very observant. They understand a lot that is not said, especially about feelings.”
She shrugged very slightly in acknowledgment. “Please sit down, Mr. Pitt.”
She sat first, gracefully, a little sideways on one of the large chairs, her skirts falling naturally in a sweeping arc around her. The art of being totally feminine came to her so easily she attended to such details without conscious thought.
Pitt sat opposite her.
“I should be most grateful if you would tell me everything you can remember about the day your husband died,” he requested.
“Again?”
“If you please. Perhaps with hindsight you may see something new, or I may understand the relevance of something I did not grasp the first time.”
“If you think it will be helpful.” She looked resigned. If there were anxiety in her he could not see it, and he searched her smooth face for anything beyond sadness and confusion at the memory.
Detail by detail she retold him exactly what she had said the first time: their rising; breakfasting; Stafford’s spending some time in his study with various letters; Tamar Macaulay’s visit; the raised voices, not in anger but in vehemence of feeling; then her departure; and very shortly afterwards, Stafford’s departure also, saying he wished to interview again the people concerned in the Farriers’ Lane murder. Juniper had not seen him after that until he returned in the evening, deep in thought, preoccupied and speaking only briefly, telling her nothing at all.
They had dined together, eating the same food from the same serving dishes, then changed into formal dress and left for the theater.
During the interval Stafford had excused himself and gone to the smoking room, and returned to his box only just in time for the curtain going up again. What had happened after that, Pitt was as aware of as she.
“Surely it must be someone involved in the Farriers’ Lane case, Mr. Pitt?” she said with a frown. “It is repugnant to accuse anyone, but in this case it seems unavoidable. Poor Samuel discovered something, I have no idea what, and when they realized that, they—they murdered him. What other possibility is there?”
“Everything I have been able to learn indicates the verdict in that case was perfectly correct,” he replied. “The conduct of the case may have been hurried, and there undoubtedly seems to have been far too much ugly emotion, but the outcome remains unaltered.”
For the first time there was a spark of anxiety in her dark eyes. “Then there must be some fact which Samuel discovered, something deeply hidden. After all,” she argued, “it took him many years to find it. Even the court of appeal failed to, so it cannot be easy. It is hardly surprising you have not learned it in so short a time.”
“If he had been sure of it, Mrs. Stafford, would he not have told someone?” he asked, meeting her gaze. “He had more than adequate opportunity. He saw Judge Livesey alone that day, and yet said nothing about it.”
Again there was that faint flush on her cheeks, the merest pinkening of the skin.
“He spoke to Mr. Pryce about it.”
“That is what Mr. Pryce says,” Pitt agreed.
She took a deep breath, hesitated at the edge of saying something, and then changed her mind. She looked down at her hands in her lap, then up at Pitt again.
“Perhaps Judge Livesey is lying.” Her voice was husky and the color was now deep in her skin.
“Why should he do that?” Pitt asked levelly.
“Because his reputation would be in jeopardy if the appeal were wrong after all.” Now her words were hasty, falling over each other as if her tongue would not obey her. “It was a very infamous case. He gained immensely in stature for his handling of it, the dignity and sureness of his dispatch. People felt safer because of his presence on the bench. Forgive me, Inspector, but you do not understand what it means for a judge of appeal to go back on his considered verdict. He would be admitting he was wrong, that he did not discover all the facts of the case; or worse, that his assessment of them was incorrect, and unwittingly connived at a terrible injustice. I doubt there would be any official censure, but that is hardly what matters. It is the public shame, the loss of all confidence in him which would be so appalling. His judgments would never stand in the same way again; even his past cases would not have the weight they used to.”
“But surely that would apply to Judge Stafford equally, if the verdict were overturned for a reason they could have known at the time?” Pitt reasoned. “And if it were something they could not have known, then they were in no way at fault.”
She was about to argue, certainty in her face and patience to explain to him. Then confusion overtook it. “Well, I—I suppose so. But why should Mr. Pryce lie about it? He was prosecuting counsel. It was his duty to obtain a conviction if he could. He is in no way to blame if the defense was inadequate or the judgment faulty.”
He watched her closely. “There is always the possibility it had nothing to do with the Farriers’ Lane case, Mrs. Stafford.”
She blinked, the shadow of fear plain in her eyes now.
“Then he would have even less reason to lie,” she argued.
“Unless the motive were personal.” He hated doing this. It was like an animal toying with its prey. For all the gravity of the crime, he felt no satisfaction in the end of the chase. He could not feel the anger that would have
