Pitt let out a yell of pain and fear, but it was swallowed up in the shriek of the train whistle. Now steam billowed around them. He charged forward, head down, and caught Victor in the chest. All his weight was on one foot as he reached to strike again. He lost his balance and fell backward. The railing caught him in the middle of his back and the weight of the cutlass carried him still farther. His foot slipped on the wet metal of the bridge.
Pitt scrambled after him, trying to grasp his arm, but it slipped out of his hands. His legs came up, catching Pitt and knocking him off balance.
With a scream of surprise, and then momentary terror, Victor toppled over and disappeared into the headlights of an oncoming train.
The sound of the impact was lost in the roar of the engine and the shrill screech of the whistle. For a blazing second the engine driver’s white face was imprinted on Pitt’s mind, and then it was all over. He stood gripping the rail with shaking hands, his body cold and his mind illuminated with a harsh, clear understanding, and an undeniable pity.
Victor was gone. His rage and his pain were unreachable now.
Then as the steam cleared and he turned, he saw another figure behind where he had stood. She was moving forward, clasping the rail and pulling herself along like a blind person in the dark, her face ashen.
He stared at her in horror. Suddenly it was all clear. It was she Victor had been shouting at, not Pitt at all. That fearful emotion had been directed at her, and all the terror and pain of the past.
“I didn’t know!” The words were torn out of her. “Not until tonight. I swear!”
“No,” he answered, so overwhelmed with pity his voice was barely a whisper in his throat.
“It was his father, you see,” she went on, desperate he should understand. “He beat me. He wasn’t a wicked man, he just couldn’t control his temper. I always used to tell Victor it was all right, that it didn’t hurt. I thought it was the right thing to do!” A look of confusion and despair filled her, obliterating even grief for the moment. “I thought I was protecting him. I thought it would be all right, do you see? I didn’t want him hating his father, and Samuel wasn’t bad—just …” An anguished pleading filled her. Her eyes searched his face, willing him to believe her. “He did love us, in his way, I know he did. He told me so … often. It was my fault he got so angry. If I had been …”
“It’s over,” he said, moving towards her. He could not bear any more. Down below them the train had stopped, billowing steam, and there were men running along the platform and shouting. She should not see this. Someone should take her away. Someone should try to do something for the terrible pain in her. “Come.” He held her by the arm and half dragged her towards the steps. “There’s nothing else here now.”
That same morning Charlotte had gone straight from breakfast to see Emily. They were sipping lemonade together, sitting on the terrace in Emily’s garden. It was a mild sunny day, and apart from that, they chose to be out of earshot of any possible hovering servant. The situation was desperate. Plans must be made which were better not overheard. Jack would disapprove intensely, he would be bound to, with his new responsibilities. But apart from the desire to know the solution to the problem, far more urgently than that, they must do everything possible to defend Pitt.
“How on earth can we find out the identity of someone’s lover?” Charlotte said desperately, sipping her lemonade. “We can’t follow her.”
“That is impractical,” Emily pointed out. “And anyway it would take far too long. It might be days before they see each other again. We must do something more rapid than that.”
“But if she doesn’t see him?” Charlotte said desperately.
“Then we must make her!” Emily had lost none of her resolution. One unexpected victory had filled her with confidence. “We must send her a letter, or something of that sort. An invitation, purporting to come from him.”
“She will know it was not his handwriting,” Charlotte pointed out. “Beside that, people who are in love usually have a special way of communicating with each other, some term of endearment, or pet name or the like.”
Emily frowned at her.
“Apart from that,” Charlotte went on. “Even if she answered it, that would not tell us who he is.”
“Don’t be obstructive,” Emily said with a touch of asperity. “We should have to word it so that she would go to him, and then we should know who he was.”
“And he would equally know who we were,” Charlotte finished for her. “They would then know there was something very peculiar going on. It would look like the most vulgar of curiosity. We might do more harm than good.” She set down her lemonade glass. “Don’t forget that establishing who he is is only the beginning. To have an admirer is not a crime, in fact if you are discreet, it is not really even regarded as a sin.”
Emily glared at her. “Do you want to solve this or not?”
Charlotte did not even bother to answer her.
“I don’t think Dulcie will betray herself,” she said thoughtfully, taking up her lemonade again. It really was delicious, and most refreshing. “But he might”
“But we don’t know who he is,” Emily retorted. “Before we know that, we have to trace him—through her.”
“I am not sure that that is necessarily true.”
Emily drew her brows together with suddenly sharpened concentration. “Do you have an idea?”
“Possibly. Let us consider what qualities he must possess.”
“To be a lover?” Emily looked incredulous. “Don’t be absurd. He must be virile—that’s about all. Everything else is purely a matter of taste.”
“You are being simplistic,” Charlotte said acidly. “I mean what is it that makes sense of murdering Aidan Arledge now, instead of sooner, or later, or better still, not at all? Most people who are lovers don’t murder a spouse. Why did it happen this time, and why now?”
Emily sat silent for several minutes, carefully eating a piece of fudge before she replied.
“Circumstances have changed,” she answered at length. “That is the only thing that makes sense.”
