Catherine.”
Narraway did not know how to respond to that. How had Pitt dealt with the reality of people, the details of their lives that stayed in the mind? He thought of Catherine lying on the floor, and the ornaments in the room. Had she chosen them, put them there because they pleased her, or reminded her of someone she cared for?
“You have not told me what it is you wish of me, Mrs. Hythe,” he said, bringing the conversation back to the practical.
“Every detail he finds makes it clearer that Catherine was fond of my husband,” she answered. “And that they liked and trusted each other, and met … often.” She swallowed with a tightening of her throat that looked painful. “He believes that she let her attacker in herself, and that could only be because she knew him-”
“Yes,” he cut in. “There was no break-in.”
She lowered her eyes. “I know that too. But I also know that my husband is a good man-not perfect, of course, but decent and kind. He felt sorry for her and he liked her, no more than that.” She looked up at Narraway earnestly. “If they were having an affair, perhaps I would have hated her for it and-if I were crazy enough-wished her harm. But I could not have raped her. And my husband didn’t either.”
She gave a little shiver. “On the other hand, her husband could have, but that doesn’t work either, does it, as he was at a party while she was being attacked. Don’t mistake me; I care very much that you catch whoever did this. I think any woman would. It was a terrible way to die.” She took a deep breath and continued. “But in spite of his kindness to her, the small gifts he gave her, the times they met at one exhibition or another, my husband was
Narraway was brutal, to get it over with: “And if he found her fascinating, flattering to his vanity, a beautiful older woman with sophistication and intelligence, and she suddenly rebuffed him?” he asked. “How would he react to that? Are you certain that it would not be with anger?”
Color burned up her face, but she did not look away from his gaze. “You don’t know Alban, or you wouldn’t ask that. I’m aware you think I am being idealistic and naïve. I’m not. He has his faults, as do I, but losing his temper is not one of them. Sometimes I wish he would. For some time, I am ashamed to say, I thought him something of a coward because he was so gentle.” She winced. “Now I risk seeing him hanged for a crime he could never even imagine committing. I think perhaps he even helped her with something that troubled her, although I don’t know what. He never mentioned it to me. Don’t let him be destroyed for that.”
Narraway stared at her, trying to assess if she truly believed what she said, or if, even more than to convince him, she was trying to convince herself.
“Are you positive you have no idea what it was?” he urged. This was a new thought and perhaps worth pursuing.
She looked down at her hands for a moment, weighing her answer before she spoke.
“Alban is a banker. I know he is young yet, but he knows a great deal about business, especially investment. I … well, I think it may have something to do with that, investments, in Africa, the Boers, and Leander Jameson. I know Alban read a lot about the raid, and the difference it might make to people if Dr. Jameson is found guilty. He listened to Mr. Churchill, and his talk of the possibility of war.”
Narraway drew in his breath to interrupt her. Surely she was being fanciful, desperate to say or do anything to defend her husband, and was tossing out any idea she could think of, even if it was ridiculous? But then, maybe it wasn’t ridiculous. Quixwood was a man involved in major finances. He might have made an investment that his wife feared was risky, even potentially ruinous. Was it conceivable that she had sought advice behind his back, from an independent source?
And she might have feared Quixwood would see that as a betrayal, a complete failure of loyalty to him, a lack of belief in his judgment.
It sounded desperately unlikely that a woman such as Catherine-beautiful, dependent, without any knowledge of international affairs, let alone of finances-would have undertaken to learn such things, and from a young man like Alban Hythe, no less, not her learned husband.
Narraway wanted Alban to be innocent, as did Maris Hythe, albeit for different reasons. Were they not both reaching too far, grasping for impossible answers and refusing to see what was right in front of them?
She looked at him, breathing in as if to say something else. Then she changed her mind and some of the light faded from her eyes.
Knowing he would regret the words even as he said them, Narraway spoke. “I’ll do all I can to follow this lead, Mrs. Hythe. I shall see Knox straightaway.”
She blinked hard and smiled. “Thank you, Lord Narraway. You are very kind.”
He did not feel kind as he waited for Knox in the police station the following day; in fact, he felt particularly foolish. When Knox finally came in, hot and tired, his boots covered in dust, his face tightened when he saw Narraway.
“I don’t know anything more, my lord.” There were smudges of weariness under his eyes, and when he took his hat off his hair stuck up in spikes. “I can tell you half a dozen places where she met with this Alban Hythe, but I can’t tell you for certain whether it was by accident or arranged.” He put his hat on the hat rack. “They turned up at an awful lot of the same events. Hard to see it as always accidental like. They were things she was interested in, but far as I can tell, he hadn’t been, until he met her.” He sat down heavily in the chair opposite Narraway.
“Do you really think they were having an affair passionate enough to cause him to rape her and beat her like that if suddenly she ended it?” Narraway asked, allowing his doubt to reflect in his expression.
“No,” Knox said frankly. “But somebody raped her. It looks like it’s Alban Hythe, and there’s nothing to show it wasn’t him, except my own feeling that he’s a decent young man. But haven’t you ever been wrong about a gut feeling?”
“Yes,” Narraway admitted. “Sometimes seriously. I suppose you’ve looked into his background? And, also, how on earth did he have time to wander around art galleries and National Geographic luncheons and exhibitions of crafts from God knows where? I certainly don’t!”
“Nor I,” Knox said ruefully. “But I’m not a venture banker with fancy clients to please. And apparently he’s very good at his job indeed.”
Narraway was startled. “Is that what he says he was doing? Taking clients out?”
Knox gave a bitter smile. “Yes. He quite willingly offered me the names of some of the clients concerned, and I contacted them. Of course they didn’t discuss their business, but they affirmed that they had dealings with him, and that they were quite often made in social surroundings-usually over a damn good lunch or dinner. It seems that introductions are made in such places. He mentioned an exhibition of French art, in particular, where certain British investors met with French wine growers, all very casually. Pleasantries were exchanged, and then agreements about very large sums of money were made.”
“That would hardly involve Catherine Quixwood,” Narraway pointed out. “It could be an explanation for one or two meetings, not more.”
“Three or four maybe,” Knox corrected. “Quixwood himself is one of the investors.”
Narraway was puzzled. He could not see how this explained what appeared to be a very personal friendship with Catherine. Unless, of course, Maris Hythe’s extraordinary idea had some truth in it?
He pursued it with Knox because he very much wanted an answer that exonerated Catherine from any type of wrongdoing, and Alban Hythe as well. He acknowledged to himself that he also was angry enough, wounded enough, that he wanted someone to be provably in the wrong. He needed someone to be punished for the pain and the humiliation she had suffered.
“What does Quixwood say of him?” he asked aloud.
“Nice young man, and good at his job-in fact, gifted at it,” Knox replied unhappily. “He seemed very distressed at the thought that Hythe could be guilty.” He sighed. “It would be a very personal kind of betrayal, both for Quixwood, and for Mrs. Hythe. But then rape is, when the people know each other. I sometimes wonder which is worse, to be attacked so intimately by a complete stranger, or by someone you had trusted.”
“But you still don’t think Hythe is guilty?” Narraway pressed again.
Knox looked up again, meeting Narraway’s eyes. “Have you ever been really surprised by who was a traitor, or an anarchist, Lord Narraway? Did you have that kind of sense for judging people, regardless of evidence, or what anyone else said?”
