record, than the woman. He has more to lose.”
“What about the husband or father?”
Pitt shook his head. “Unlikely. If he didn’t know about it beforehand, then he would probably be the one she was most anxious to keep it from. If he then discovered it, or learned it from her, the last way to keep it discreet would be to murder the doctor and cause all his affairs to be investigated by the police.”
“Come on, Pitt,” Drummond said dryly. “You know as well as I do that people in the grip of powerful emotions don’t think like that-or half our crimes of impulse would never be committed, probably three quarters. They don’t think; they feel-overwhelming rage, or fear, or simply contusion and a desire to lash out at someone and blame them for the pain they are suffering.”
“All right,” Pitt conceded, knowing he was right. “But I still think there are lots of other motives more probable. Shaw is a man of passionate convictions. I believe he would act on them, and devil take the consequences-”
“You do like him,” Drummond said again with a wry smile, and knowledge of some unspoken hurt in his own past.
No reply was called for.
“He may have knowledge of a crime,” Pitt said instead, following his own thoughts. “A death, perhaps of someone in terminal illness and great pain-”
“A merciful killing?” Drummond’s expression quickened. “Possible. And occurring to me as someone who likes him less and perhaps has a clearer view, he may have assisted in a killing for less unselfish reasons, and the principle mover has grown nervous lest his accomplice becomes careless, or more likely from your description of Shaw as a man with nerve and passion, blackmail him. That would be an excellent cause for murder.”
Pitt would like to have denied such a thought, but it was eminently logical, and to dismiss it would be ridiculous.
Drummond was watching him, his eyes curious.
“Perhaps,” Pitt agreed aloud, and saw a small smile curl Drummond’s lips. “But knowledge gained simply because of his professional skill is in my opinion more likely.”
“What about a purely personal motive?” Drummond asked. “Jealousy, greed, revenge? Could there be another woman, or another man in love with his wife? Didn’t you say he was expecting to be at home, and she not?”
“Yes.” Pitt’s mind was filled with all sorts of ugly possibilities, dark among them the Worlingham money, and the pretty face of Flora Lutterworth, whose father resented her frequent, private visits to Dr. Shaw.
“You need to have a great deal more.” Drummond stood up and walked over towards the window, his hands in his pockets. He turned to face Pitt. “The possibilities are numerous-either for the murder of the wife, which happened, or for the murder of Shaw, which may have been attempted. It could be a very long, sad job. Heaven knows what other sins and tragedies you’ll find-or what they will do to hide them. That’s what I hate about investigation-all the other lives we overturn on the way.” He poked his hands deeper into his pockets. “Where are you going to begin?”
“At the Highgate police station,” Pitt replied, standing up also. “He was the local police surgeon-”
“You omitted to mention that.”
Pitt smiled broadly. “Makes the knowledge without complicity look a trifle more likely, doesn’t it?”
“Granted,” Drummond said graciously. “Don’t get carried away with it. What then?”
“Go to the local hospital and see what they think of him there, and his colleagues.”
“You won’t get much.” Drummond shrugged. “They usually speak well of each other regardless. Imply that any one of them could have made an error, and they all close ranks like soldiers facing the enemy.”
“There’ll be something to read between the lines.” Pitt knew what Drummond meant, but there was always the turn of a phrase, the overcompensation, the excessive fairness that betrayed layers of meaning and emotion beneath, conflicts of judgment or old desires. “Then I’ll see his servants. They may have direct evidence, although that would be a lot to hope for. But they may also have seen or heard something that will lead to a lie, an inconsistency, an act concealed, someone where they should not have been.” As he said it he thought of all the past frailties he had unearthed, foolishness and petty spites that had little or nothing to do with the crime, yet had broken old relationships, forged new ones, hurt and contused and changed. There were occasions when he hated the sheer intrusion of investigation. But the alternative was worse.
“Keep me advised, Pitt.” Drummond was watching him, perhaps guessing his thoughts. “I want to know.”
“Yes sir, I will.”
Drummond smiled at the unusual formality, then nodded a dismissal, and Pitt left, going downstairs and out of the front doors to the pavement of Bow Street, where he caught a hansom north to Highgate. It was an extravagance, but the force would pay. He sat back inside the cab and stretched out his legs as far as possible. It was an agreeable feeling bowling along, not thinking of the cost.
The cab took him through the tangle of streets up from the river, across High Holborn to the Grey’s Inn Road, north through Bloomsbury and Kentish Town into Highgate.
At the police station he found Murdo waiting for him impatiently, having already sifted through all the police reports of the last two years and separating all those in which Shaw had played a significant part. Now he stood in the middle of the room, uncarpeted, furnished with a wooden table and three hard-backed chairs. His fair hair was ruffled and his tunic undone at the neck. He was keen to acquit himself well, and in truth the case touched him deeply, but at the back of his mind was the knowledge that when it was all over Pitt would return to Bow Street. He would be left here in Highgate to resume working with his local colleagues, who were at present still acutely conscious of an outsider, and stung by resentment that it had been considered necessary.
“There they are, sir,” he said as soon as Pitt was in the door. “All the cases he had the slightest to do with that could amount to anything, even those of disturbing the Queen’s peace.” He pointed his finger to one of the piles. “That’s those. A few bloody noses, a broken rib and one broken foot where a carriage wheel went over it, and there was a fight afterwards between the man with the foot and the coachman. Can’t see anybody but a madman murdering him over that.”
“Neither can I,” Pitt agreed. “And I don’t think we’re dealing with a madman. Fire was too well set, four lots of curtains, and all away from the servants’ quarters, none of the windows overlooked by a footman or a maid up late, all rooms that would normally be closed after the master and mistress had gone to bed, no hallways or landings which might be seen by a servant checking doors were locked or a maid fetching a late cup of tea for someone. No, Murdo, I think our man with the oil and the matches is sane enough.”
Murdo shivered and his face lost a little of its color. “It’s a very ugly thing, Mr. Pitt. Someone must have felt a great passion to do it.”
“And I doubt we’ll find him in this lot.” Pitt picked up the larger pile which Murdo had sorted for him. “Unless it’s a death Shaw knew something very odd about. By the way, did you look into the demise of the late Theophilus Worlingham yet?”
“Oh, yes sir.” Murdo was eager now. Obviously it was a task he had performed well and was waiting to recount it.
Pitt raised his eyebrows expectantly.
Murdo launched into his account, and Pitt sat down behind the desk, crossing his legs.
“Very sudden,” Murdo began, still standing and hunching his shoulders a trifle in dramatic concentration. “He had always been a man of great physical energy and excellent health, what you might call a ‘muscular Christian’ I believe-” He colored slightly at his own audacity in using such a term about his superiors, and because it was an expression he had only heard twice before. “His vigor was a matter of some pride to him,” he added as explanation, as the thought suddenly occurred to him that Pitt might be unfamiliar with the term.
Pitt nodded and hid his smile.
Murdo relaxed. “He fell ill with what they took to be a slight chill. No one worried unduly, although apparently Mr. Worlingham himself was irritated that he should be no stronger than most. Dr. Shaw called upon him and prescribed aromatic oils to inhale to reduce the congestion, and a light diet, which did not please him at all, and that he should remain in bed-and give up smoking cigars, which also annoyed him very much. He made no comment as to a mustard plaster-” Murdo screwed up his face in surprise and shook his head. “That’s what my mam always used on us. Anyway, he got no better, but Shaw didn’t call again. And three days later his daughter Clemency, the one who was murdered, visited and found him dead in his study, which is on the ground floor of his house, and the
