“Cor, that bleedin’ thing weighs a ton!” Harry said furiously. “Feels like it ’ad a load o’ bricks in it. You don’t suppose they put suffink else in there, do you?”
“Like w’ot?” Arthur sniffed.
“I dunno! You want to look?”
Arthur hesitated for a moment; then curiosity overcame him, and he lifted one of the corners of the lid. It was not screwed and came up quite easily.
“God all-bloody-mighty!” Arthur’s face under the dirt went sheet-white.
“W’ot’s the matter?” Harry moved toward him instinctively, stubbing his toe on the coffin corner. “Damn the flamin’ thing! W’ot is it, Arfur?”
“ ’E’s in ’ere!” Arthur said huskily. His hand went up to his nose. “Rotten as ’ell, but ’e’s ’ere all right.”
“ ’E can’t be!” Harry said in disbelief. He came round to where Arthur was standing and looked in. “You’re bloody right! ’E is ’ere! Now w’ot in ’ell’s name do you make o’ that?”
Pitt was considerably shaken when he heard the news. It was preposterous, almost incredible. He did up his muffler, pulled his hat down over his ears, and strode out into the icy streets. He wanted to walk to give himself time to compose his mind before he got there.
There were two corpses-because the corpse from the church pew was still in the mortuary. Therefore one of them was not Lord Augustus Fitzroy-Hammond. His mind went back over the identification. The man from the cab outside the theatre had been identified only by Alicia. Now that he thought about it, she had been expecting it to be her husband. Pitt himself had as much as told her it was. She had only glanced at him and then looked away. He could hardly blame her for that. Perhaps her eyes had seen only what had been told them, and she had not actually examined him at all?
On the other hand, the second corpse, the one in the church pew, had been seen not only by Alicia but by the old lady, the vicar, and lastly by Dr. McDuff, who one would presume was reasonably used to the sight of death, even if not three weeks old.
He crossed the street, splashed with dung and refuse from a vegetable cart. The child who normally swept the crossing had bronchitis and was presumably holed up somewhere in one of the innumerable warrens behind the facade of shops.
Therefore the most reasonable explanation was that the second corpse was Lord Augustus, and the first was someone else. Since the grave of Mr. William Wilberforce Porteous had also been robbed, presumably it was his corpse they had buried in St. Margaret’s churchyard!
He had better make arrangements for the widow to see it-and properly this time!
It was half-past six and the wind had dropped, leaving the fog to close in on everything, deadening sound, choking the breath with freezing, cloying pervasiveness, when Pitt drove in a hansom cab with a very stout and painfully corseted Mrs. Porteous, flowing with black, toward the morgue where the first corpse was now waiting. They were obliged to travel very slowly because the cabby could not see more than four or five yards in front of him, and that only dimly. Gas lamps appeared like baleful eyes, swimming out of the night, and vanished behind them into the void. They lurched from one to the next, as alone as if it had been an ocean with no other ship upon it.
Pitt tried to think of something to say to the woman beside him, but rack his brains as he might, there seemed nothing at all that was not either trivial or offensive. He ended by hoping his silence was at least sympathetic.
When the cab finally stopped, he got out with inelegant haste and offered her his hand. She weighed heavily upon it, a matter of balance rather than degree of distress.
Inside, they were greeted by the same cheerfully scrubbed young man with his glasses forever sliding down his nose. Several times he opened his mouth to remark on the extraordinariness of the circumstance, never having had the same corpse twice in this manner, then cut himself off halfway, realizing that his professional enthusiasm was in poor taste and might be misunderstood by the widow-or Pitt, for that matter.
He pulled back the sheet and composed his face soberly.
Mrs. Porteous looked straight at the corpse, then her eyebrows rose and she turned to Pitt, her voice level.
“That is not my husband,” she said calmly. “It’s nothing like him. Mr. Porteous had black hair and a beard. This man is nearly bald. I’ve never seen him before in my life!”
5
Since the unnamed corpse was in the morgue, there was no reason why Augustus should not be reinterred. Of course, it would have been ludicrous to have yet another ceremony, but it was felt indecent not at least to observe the occasion in some manner. It was a show of sympathy for the family, and perhaps of respect not so much for Augustus as for death itself.
Alicia naturally had no choice but to go; the old lady decided first that she was too unwell because of the whole miserable affair, then later that it was her duty to pay a final farewell-and please God it was final! She was attended, as always, by Nisbett, in dourest black.
Alicia was in the morning room waiting for the carriage when Verity came in from the hall. She was pale, and the black hat made her look even younger. There was an innocence about her that had often caused Alicia to wonder what her mother had been like, because Verity possessed a quality that had nothing to do with Augustus, and she was as unlike the old lady as a doe is unlike a weasel. It was an odd thought, but in the darkness of the night Alicia had even talked to the dead woman as if she had been a friend, someone who could understand loneliness, and dreams that were fragile but so very necessary. In Alicia’s mind, that first wife who had died at thirty-four had been very like herself.
Because of her, the ridiculous conversation in the dark, she could almost feel as if Verity were her own daughter, although there was only a handful of years between them.
“Are you sure you wish to come?” she asked now. “No one would misunderstand if you preferred not to.”
Verity shook her head a little. “I’d love not to come, but I can’t leave you to do it alone.”
“Your grandmother is coming,” Alicia replied. “I shan’t be alone.”
Verity gave a dry little smile; it was the first time Alicia had seen it. She had grown up a lot since her father’s death, or perhaps she had only now felt the freedom to show it.
“Then I shall definitely come,” she said. “That is worse than alone.”
At another time Alicia might have made some protest as a matter of form, but today the hypocrisy seemed emptier than ever. It was a time for substance, and form was irrelevant.
“Thank you,” she said simply. “It will be much less unpleasant for me if you are there.”
Verity gave a sudden, flashing smile, almost conspiratorial; then, before Alicia could make an answer, they both heard the old woman’s stick banging in the hall as she came toward them. Nisbett opened the door wide, right back on its hinges, and the old woman stood in the entrance, glaring. She examined both of them closely, every article of their clothing from black hats and veils to black polished boots, then nodded.
“Well, are you coming then?” she demanded. “Or do you mean to stand there all morning like two crows on a fence?”
“We were waiting for you, Grandmama,” Verity replied instantly. “We would not leave you to come alone.”
The old lady snorted. “Huh!” She looked venomously at Alicia. “I thought perhaps you were waiting for that Mr. Corde you are so fond of! Not here this time, I see. Perhaps he is afraid for his skin! After all, you seem to bury husbands more often than most!” She grabbed at Nisbett’s arm and went out, whacking the door lintel with her stick as if it might have moved out of her way were it more aware of its duty.
“It would hardly be appropriate for Mr. Corde to have come.” Alicia could not help defending him, explaining, even though the old lady was out of hearing and Verity had said nothing but lowered her eyes. “It is a very private affair,” she added. “I expect no one but the family, and perhaps a few of those who knew Augustus well.”
“No, of course not,” Verity murmured. “It would be silly to expect him.” Nevertheless there was a ring of disappointment in her voice, and as Alicia followed her outside and into the black-draped carriage, she could not
