apparent indifference, or even laughter.
“I have no reason yet, sir, to suppose she was anything but a chance victim, and therefore her life story need not be inquired into so far. Perhaps if you would tell me where you were on that evening, and if you saw or heard anything that might help us?”
“I was here,” Fulbert replied with slightly raised eyebrows. He was more reminiscent of Afton than of Diggory, having something of Afton’s faintly supercilious expression, features that should have been handsome, but were not. Diggory, on the other hand, was less well constructed, but there was a pleasingness in the irregularity, character in the stronger, darker brows, something altogether warmer.
“All evening,” Fulbert added.
“In company, or alone?” Pitt asked.
Fulbert smiled.
“Didn’t Afton say I was with him, playing billiards?”
“Were you, sir?”
“No, as a matter of fact, I wasn’t. Afton’s several inches taller than I am, as I dare say you’ve noticed. It irritates the hell out of him that he can’t beat me, and Afton in a bad temper is more than I care to put up with.”
“Why don’t you let him beat you?” The answer seemed obvious.
Fulbert’s light-blue eyes opened wide, and he smiled. His teeth were small and even, too small for a man’s mouth.
“Because I cheat, and he’s never been able to work out how. It’s one of the few things I do better than he does,” he answered.
Pitt was a little lost. He could not imagine any pleasure in a competition to see who could cheat the best. But then he did not enjoy games himself. He had never had time in his youth, when he might have learned the skills. Now it was too late.
“Were you in the billiard room all evening, sir?”
“No, I thought I just told you that! I wandered round the house a bit, library, upstairs, into the butler’s pantry and had a glass of port, or two.” He smiled again. “Long enough for Afton to have nipped out and raped poor Fanny. And since she was his sister, you’ll be able to add incest to the charge-” He saw Pitt’s face. “Oh, I’ve offended your sensibilities. I forgot how puritanical the lower classes are. It’s only the aristocracy and the guttersnipes who are frank about everything. And on reflection, perhaps we are the only ones who can afford to be. We are so arrogant we think no one can shift us, and the guttersnipes have nothing to lose. Do you really imagine my painfully self- righteous brother crept out between billiard balls and raped his sister in the garden? She wasn’t stabbed with a billiard cue, was she?”
“No, Mr. Nash,” Pitt said coldly and clearly. “She was stabbed with a long knife, sharp point and probably single-edged.”
Fulbert shut his eyes, and Pitt was glad he had hurt him at last.
“How revolting,” he said quietly. “I didn’t go out of the house, which is what you want to know, nor did I see or hear anything odd. But you can be damned sure that if I do, I’ll look a good deal harder! I suppose you’re working on the hypothesis it is some lunatic? Do you know what a hypothesis is?”
“Yes, sir, and so far I am merely collecting evidence. It is too early for hypotheses.” He deliberately used the plural to show Fulbert that he knew it.
Fulbert observed and smiled.
“I’ll lay you odds two to one it is not! I’ll lay you it’s one of us, some nasty, grubby little secret that snapped through the civilized veneer-and rape! She saw him, and he had to kill her. Look into the Walk, Inspector, look at us all very, very carefully. Sift us through a small sieve, and comb us with a fine-tooth comb-and see what parasites and what lice you turn up!” He giggled very lightly with amusement and met Pitt’s angry eyes squarely, brilliantly. “Believe me, you’ll be amazed what there is!”
Charlotte was waiting anxiously for Pitt all afternoon. From the time she had put Jemima upstairs for her afternoon sleep, she found herself repeatedly glancing at the old brown clock on the dining room shelf, going up to it to listen for the faint tick to make sure it was still going. She knew perfectly well it was foolish, because he could not return before five at the very earliest, and more likely six.
The reason for her concern was Emily, of course. Emily was newly with child, her first, and, as Charlotte could remember only too well, those first months could be very trying. Not only did one feel a natural unsureness at one’s new condition, but there were nausea and the most unreasonable depressions to overcome.
She had never been to Paragon Walk. Emily had invited her, naturally, but Charlotte was not sure if she had really wished her to go. Ever since they were girls, when Sarah had been alive, and they had lived in Cater Street with Mama and Papa, Charlotte’s lack of tact had been a social liability. Mama had found umpteen suitable young men for her, but Charlotte had had no ambitions, like the others, to make her curb her tongue and seek to impress. Of course, Emily loved her, but she was also aware that Charlotte would not be comfortable in the Walk. She could not afford the clothes, nor the time from her household tasks. She knew none of the gossip, and her life would soon be seen to be utterly different.
Now she wished she could go, to see for herself that Emily was quite well and not afraid because of the appalling crime. Of course her sister could always remain at home, go out only with a servant, and in daylight, but that was not the real terror. Charlotte refused to remember or think of that.
It was after six when she finally heard Pitt at the door. She dropped the potatoes she was straining in the sink and knocked over the salt and pepper on the edge of the table running out to meet him.
“How’s Emily?” she demanded. “Have you seen her? Have you discovered who killed that girl?”
He closed her in a hard hug. “No, of course I haven’t. I’ve barely begun. And yes, I saw Emily, and she seemed quite well.”
“Oh.” She pulled away. “You haven’t discovered anything! But you know at least that George had nothing to do with it, don’t you?”
He opened his mouth to answer, but she saw the indecision in his eyes before he found the words.
“You don’t!” It came out as an accusation. She was aware even as she said it, and she was sorry, but there was no time to apologize now. “You don’t know! Why haven’t you found out where he was?”
He moved her aside gently and sat down at the table.
“I asked him,” he said. “I haven’t had time to check yet.”
“Check?” she was at his elbow. “Why? Don’t you believe him?” Then she knew that was unfair. He did not have the choice of belief, and anyway belief was not what she needed, not what Emily needed. “I’m sorry.” She touched his shoulder with her hand, feeling the hardness of it under his coat. Then she moved away back to the sink and picked up the potatoes again. She tried to keep her voice casual, but it came out ridiculously high. “Where did he say he was?”
“At his club,” he replied. “Most of the time. He can’t remember how long he was there, or precisely which other clubs he went to.”
She went on mechanically dishing the potatoes, the fine-chopped cabbage and the fish she had been so careful to bake in cheese sauce. It was something she had only just learned how to make successfully. Now she surveyed its perfection without interest. Perhaps it was foolish to be afraid. George might be able to prove exactly where he had been all the time, but she had heard about men’s clubs, the games, the conversations, people sitting around drinking, or even asleep. How could anyone remember who had been there at a particular time, or even a particular evening? How was one evening different from another to recall it with surety?
It was not that she thought George might have killed the girl, nothing so appalling as that, but she knew from the past what damage even suspicion can do. If George was telling the truth, he would resent it if Emily did not utterly and immediately believe him. And if he had evaded the truth, left out something, like a flirtation, a foolish party, some excess in drink, then he would feel guilty. One lie would lead to another, and Emily would become confused and in the end perhaps suspect him even of the crime itself. The truth could be full of so many uglinesses. It was unforeseeably painful to strip away the small deceits that made life comfortable and allowed you not to see what you preferred to pretend you did not know.
“Charlotte,” Pitt’s voice came from behind her. She forced the fear out of her mind and served the food. She set it on the table in front of him.
“Yes?” she said innocently.
