“But this was a coach, closed in, with a driver on a box?”
“Yes … yes, it was.”
“Anyone inside?”
“Not that I saw.”
“And the horses were at a gallop?”
“Yes.”
“Then they were good horses, and fresh?”
“Yes,” Greville said, his eyes on Pitt’s face. “I see what you mean. They had not come far. We should have pursued the matter further. We might have found out whose they were, and who owned or bred them for that occasion.” His lips tightened. “It is too late now. But if anything further should happen, it will be in your hands, Superintendent.” He rose to his feet. “Thank you, Commissioner. I am much in your debt also. I realize I have given you little notice, and you have accommodated me excellently.”
Pitt and Cornwallis both rose also and watched as Greville inclined his head, walked straight-backed to the door and left.
Cornwallis turned to Pitt.
“I’m sorry,” he said before Pitt could speak. “I only heard this morning myself. And I am sorry you will have to hand over the Denbigh case to someone else, but there is no help for it. You are obviously the only person who can go to Ashworth Hall.”
“I could leave it with Tellman,” Pitt said quickly. “Take someone else as ‘valet.’ There could hardly be anyone worse!”
A shadow of a smile crossed Cornwallis’s face.
“There could hardly be anyone who would dislike it more,” he corrected Pitt. “But he will make an excellent job of it. You need your best man there, someone you know well and who can think for himself in a new situation, adapt, have the personal courage if there should be another threat to Greville’s life. Leave Byrne in charge here. He’s a good, steady man. He won’t let it go.”
“But …” Pitt began again.
“There isn’t time to bring in anyone else,” Cornwallis said gravely. “For political reasons they have conducted it this way. This is a highly delicate time for the Irish situation altogether.” He looked at Pitt steadily to see if he understood. He must have realized that he did not, because he went on after only a moment’s hesitation. “You are aware that Charles Stewart Parnell is the most powerful and unifying leader the Irish have had for many years. He commands respect from almost all sides. There are many who believe that if there can be any lasting peace effected, he is the one man all Ireland will accept as leader.”
Pitt nodded slowly, although already he knew what Cornwallis was going to say. Memory came back like a tide.
Cornwallis looked tight-faced and a trifle confused. Moral matters of a personal nature were subjects he did not enjoy addressing. He was a very private man, not at ease with women because his long years at sea had deprived him of their company. He held women in a greater respect than most warranted, judging them to be both nobler and more innocent than they were, and a great deal less effectual. He believed, as did many men of his age and station, that women were emotionally fragile and free from the appetites that both fired and, at times, degraded men.
Pitt smiled. “The Parnell-O’Shea divorce,” he said for him. “I suppose that is going to be heard after all. That is what you are referring to?”
“Indeed,” Cornwallis agreed with relief. “It is all most distasteful, but apparently they are bent on pursuing it.”
“You mean Captain O’Shea is, I presume?” Pitt said. Captain O’Shea was not a very attractive character. According to the account which was more or less public, he seemed to have connived at his wife’s adultery with Parnell—indeed, to have put her in his way—for O’Shea’s own advancement. Then when Katie O’Shea had left him entirely for Parnell, he had made an open scandal of it by suing for divorce. The matter was to be heard any day now. The effect it would have on Parnell’s parliamentary and political career could only be guessed at.
What it would do to his support in Ireland was also problematical. He was of Anglo-Irish Protestant landowning descent. Mrs. O’Shea was born and raised in England, from a highly cultured family. Her mother had written and published several three-volume novels. She too was Protestant But Captain William O’Shea, looking and sounding like an Englishman, was Irish by lineage and an unostentatious Catholic. The possibilities of passion, betrayal and revenge were endless. The stuff of legend was in the making.
Cornwallis was embarrassed by it. It was something he could not ignore, but it was full of elements of personal weakness and shame which should have been kept decently private. If a man behaved badly in his personal life, he might be ostracized by his peers; one might cease even to recognize him in the street. He might be asked to resign from his clubs, and if he had a whit of decency left he would preempt that necessity by doing it beforehand. But he should not display his weakness to the public gaze.
“Does the O’Shea case have any bearing on the meeting at Ashworth Hall?” Pitt asked, returning them to the purpose at hand.
“Naturally,” Cornwallis replied with a frown of concentration. “If Parnell is publicly vilified and details of his affair with Mrs. O’Shea are disclosed which put him in an unsympathetic light, a betrayer of his host’s hospitality, rather than a hero who fell in love with an unhappy and ill-used wife, then the leadership of the only viable Irish political party will be open to anyone’s ambition. I gather from Greville that both Moynihan and O’Day would not be averse to grasping for it. Actually, O’Day at least is loyal to Parnell. Moynihan is far more intransigent.”
“And the Catholic Nationalists?” Pitt was confused. “Isn’t Parnell a Nationalist too?”
“Yes, of course. No one could lead an Irish majority if he were not. But he is still Protestant. The Catholics are for nationalism, but under different terms, far closer to Rome. That is a great deal of the issue: the dependence upon Rome; the religious freedom; old enmities dating back to William of Orange and the Battle of the Boyne, and God knows what else; unjust land laws; the potato famine and mass emigration. I am not honestly sure how much of it is just remembered hate. According to Greville, another major bone of contention is the Catholic demand for
