passion of any sort.”
Charlotte could not give up. “Tell me about the other people in the Park.”
“There are several who would be of no interest to you; they are away for the winter. Of those who are here, I can see no reason why any should be involved, but you may as well consider them. Sir Desmond and Lady Cantlay you have already met; they are pleasant enough, quite harmless, I should have judged. If Desmond has anything more to him, he should be on the stage; he is the finest actor I have seen. Gwendoline may be a little bored, like many women of her station with everything provided for her and nothing to complain of, but if she took a lover it would most assuredly not have been Augustus, even had he unbent himself so far as to be willing. He was a great deal more boring than Desmond.”
“Could it have anything to do with money?” Charlotte was clutching at extremes.
Vespasia’s eyebrows went up. “Not likely, my dear. Everyone in the Park has more than adequate means, and I don’t believe anyone lives significantly beyond them. But if one is temporarily embarrassed, one goes to the Jews, not to Augustus Fitzroy-Hammond. And there are no fortunes to be inherited, except by the widow.”
“Oh.” It was disappointing. As always, it led back to Dominic and Alicia.
“The St. Jermyns were well acquainted,” Vespasia continued. “But I cannot conceive of any reason why they should wish him harm. In fact, Edward St. Jermyn is far too involved in his own affairs to have time or effort for anyone else’s.”
“Romantic
Vespasia pulled a small, dry face. “Certainly not. He is a member of the House of Lords and has great ambitions for office. At the moment he is drafting a private member’s bill to reform conditions in workhouses, particularly with regard to children. Believe me, Charlotte, it is very much needed. If you have any idea of the suffering of children in such places, that may well affect them all their lives- He will achieve a great thing if he succeeds, and a good deal of regard throughout the country.”
“Then he is a reformer?” Charlotte said eagerly.
Vespasia looked at her down her long nose. She sighed a little wearily, “No, my dear, I fear he is no more than a politician.”
“You are being unkind! That is quite cynical!” Charlotte accused.
“It is quite realistic. I have known Edward St. Jermyn for some time, and his father before him. Nevertheless, it is an excellent bill, and I am giving it every support I can. Indeed, we were discussing it when Thomas came here last week. I see he did not mention it.”
“No.”
“He seemed to feel strongly about it; in fact, I felt it was hard for him to be civil. He looked at my lace and Hester’s silk as if it had been a crime in itself. He must see a great deal more of poverty than any of us imagine, but if we did not buy the clothes, how would the seamstresses get even the few pence they do?” Her face tightened, and for the first time all the wit was gone out of her voice. “Although Somerset Carlisle says that even sewing eighteen hours a day, till their fingers bleed, they still do not earn enough to live. Many of them are driven to the streets, where they can make as much in a night as they would in a fortnight on the sweatshop floor.”
“I know,” Charlotte said quietly. “Thomas seldom speaks of it, but when he does I cannot rid myself of the visions it brings for nights afterwards: twenty or thirty men and women huddled together in a room, probably below the street, with no air and no sanitation, working, eating, and sleeping there, just to make enough to cling to life. It is obscene. God alone knows what a workhouse must be like, if they still prefer the sweatshop. I feel so guilty because I do nothing-and yet I go on doing nothing!”
Vespasia’s face warmed to her honesty. “I know, my dear. Yet there is very little we can do. It is not an isolated instance, or even a hundred instances; it is a whole order of things. You cannot relieve it by charity, even had you the means. It needs law. And to initiate laws, you must be in Parliament. That is why we need men like Edward St. Jermyn.”
For some time they sat silently; then at last Charlotte brought herself back to the thing that she could accomplish, or at least could try. “That doesn’t answer why Lord Augustus was dug up, does it?”
Vespasia took the last cake. “No, not in the least. Nor do I think the other people in the Park will enlighten the situation. Somerset Carlisle never showed anything for Augustus beyond the courtesy required of good manners; he, like St. Jermyn, is far too occupied with the bill. Major Rodney and his two sisters are very retiring. They are maiden ladies and will assuredly remain so. They busy themselves with domestic chores, largely of a refined nature, such as fine sewing and the making of endless preserves, and I think rather a lot of homemade wine from quite dreadful ingredients like parsnips and nettles. Perfectly appalling! Not that I have tasted it above once! Major Rodney has left the army now, of course, and collects butterflies, or something small that crawls around on dozens of legs. He has been writing his memoirs of the Crimea for the last twenty years. I had no idea so much had happened out there!”
Charlotte hid a smile.
“And there is a portrait artist,” Vespasia continued, “Godolphin Jones, but he has been absent for some little while, in France, I believe, so he could not have dug up Augustus. And I can think of no possible reason why he should wish to.
“The only other person,” she concluded, “is an American called Virgil Smith! Quite outrageous, of course. Society will abhor him if he is brazen enough to remain here next Season, but then on the other hand he is laden with money from something quite uncouth, like cattle, out in wherever it is he comes from, so they will not be able to refrain from courting him at the same time. It should be greatly entertaining. Except that I hope the poor creature does not get too hurt. He really is very good-natured and seems to be quite without airs, which is such a change. Of course, his manners and his appearance are both disasters, but money covers a multitude of sins.”
“And kindness even more,” Charlotte pointed out.
“Not in Society!” Vespasia stared at her. “Society is all to do with what seems, and nothing to do with what is. That is one of the reasons you will find it uncommonly difficult to discover whether Augustus was killed, by whom, or why-and still less if anybody cares!”
While Charlotte was sitting in Vespasia’s carriage being driven home, feeling self-conscious but utterly pampered, turning over in her mind the fruits of the journey, or rather the lack of them, in the churchyard of St. Margaret’s two gravediggers were standing in the rain for a moment’s respite from the long and heavy duty of preparing the earth to receive Augustus Fitzroy-Hammond yet again.
“I dunno, ’Arry,” one of them said, wiping the drop off the end of his nose. “I’m beginning to think as I could make me livin’ purely out o’ this, just buryin’ ’is lordship. No sooner does we ’ave ’im down there as some great fool goes an’ digs ’im up again!”
“I know what you mean,” Harry sniffed. “I dreams about this, I does! Spend me life goin’ in an’ out o’ this bleedin’ grave. You should ’ear what my Gertie says about it! She says it’s only them wot’s murdered as won’t rest, an’ I tell you, Arfur, I’m beginnin’ to think as she’s right! I don’t suppose this is the last time we’ll be in an’ out of ’ere!”
Arthur spat and took up his spade again. The next blow hit the coffin lid. “Well, I’ll tell you this, ’Arry, it’s the last time I will! I don’t want no truck wiv murder, or them w’ot’s been murdered. I don’t mind buryin’ nice decent corpses what ’ave died natural. I’ll bury as many of them as you like. But there’s two things as really gets me. One is babies-I ’ate buryin’ kids-and the other is them w’ot’s been murdered. An’ I already buried this one twice! If’n ’e don’t stay there this time, they needn’t ask me to do ’im again-’cos I shan’t! Enough’s enough. Let the rozzers find out ’oo done ’im in, then maybe ’el’ll stay there, that’s w’ot I say.”
“Me too,” Harry agreed vehemently. “I’m a patient man, God knows I am. In this line you gets to see a lot o’ death, you gets to know w’ot’s important and w’ot ain’t. We all comes to this in the end, and some folks as forgets that might do better if they remembered. But my patience is wore out, and I won’t stand by for no murder. I agree wiv yer, let the rozzers bury ’im theirselves next time. Do ’em good, it would.”
They had cleaned the earth off the lid of the coffin and climbed out of the grave again for the ropes.
“I suppose they’ll want this thing all cleaned up fit to look at?” Arthur said with heavy disgust. “They’ll ’ave another service for ’im, like as not. They must be fair sick o’ payin’ their last respecs.”
“Only it ain’t last-is it?” Harry asked drily. “It’s second to last, or third, or fourth? Who knows when ’e’ll stay there? ’Ere, take the other end o’ this rope, will you?”
Together they eased the ropes under the coffin, heaving on its weight, and worked in silence except for grunts and the occasional expletive till it was laid on the wet earth beside the gaping hole.
