come to me for?”
“Because you might have seen something odd that day, noticed someone unusual hanging around-” Even as he said it he knew it was hopeless. She was too shocked to recall anything, and he himself did not believe it had been a tramp or a casual vagrant. It was too careful; it spoke of a deep hatred, or insatiable greed, or fear of some intolerable loss. It came back to his mind again with renewed force: what did Stephen Shaw know-and about whom?
“I didn’t see nothin’.” She began to weep, dabbing at her eyes, her voice rising again. “I mind me own business. I don’t ask no questions an’ I don’t listen be’ind no doors. An’ I don’t give meself airs to think things about the master nor the mistress-”
“Oh?” Pitt said instantly. “That’s very commendable. I suppose some cooks do?”
“ ’Course they do.”
“Really? Like what, for example?” He endeavored to look puzzled. “If you were that sort, what may you have wondered?”
She drew herself up in virtue and glared at him over the top of her large hand, wrapped around with the sodden handkerchief.
“Well, if I were that sort-which I in’t-I might ’ave wondered why we let one of the maids go, when there weren’t nothin’ wrong wiv ’er, and why we ’aven’t ’ad salmon like we used to, nor a good leg o’ pork neither-an’ I might ’ave asked Burdin why we ’aven’t ’ad a decent case o’ claret come inter the ’ouse in six months.”
“But of course you didn’t,” Pitt said judiciously, hiding the shadow of a smile. “Dr. Shaw is very fortunate to have such a discreet cook in his household.”
“Oh, I don’t know as I can cook for ’im anymore!” She started sniffing again violently. “Jenny’s given ’er notice an’ as soon as she’s fit she’ll go back ’ome ter Somerset where she comes from. An’ Doris in’t no more’n a chit of a thing-thirteen mebbe. An’ poor Mr. Burdin’s so bad who can say if ’e’ll ever be the same again? No, I got ter be in a respectable ’ouse, for me nerves.”
There was no purpose in arguing with her, and for the time being Shaw had no need of servants-there was no house for them to live in or to wait upon. And apart from that, Pitt’s mind was racing with the very interesting fact that the Shaws had apparently reduced their standard of living recently, to the degree that the cook had noticed it and it had set her mind wondering.
He stood up, wished her well, thanked the niece, and took his departure. Next he went in search of Jenny and Doris, neither of whom were burned more than superficially and more suffering from shock and fright and some considerable pain, but not in danger of relapse, as might be the case with Burdin.
He found them in the parsonage, in the care of Lally Clitheridge, who needed no explanation of his call.
But even after careful questioning they could tell him nothing of use. They had seen no one unusual in the neighborhood; the house had been exactly as it was at any other time. It had been a very ordinary day until they were roused, Jenny by the smell of smoke as she lay awake, thinking of some matter she blushed to recall and would not name, and Doris by Jenny’s screams.
He thanked them and went out as dusk was falling and walked briskly southwards to Woodsome Road and the home of the woman who came in daily to do the heavy work, a Mrs. Colter. It was a small house but the windows were clean and the step scrubbed so immaculately he avoided putting his boots on it out of respect.
The door was opened by a big, comfortable woman with a broad-cheeked face, an ample bosom, and an apron tied tightly around her waist, the pocket stuffed full of odds and ends and her hair trailing out of a hasty knot on the back of her neck.
“Who are you?” she said in surprise, but there was no ill nature in it. “I dunno you, do I?”
“Mrs. Colter?” Pitt removed his rather worn hat, now a little crooked in the crown.
“That’s me. It don’t tell me who you are!”
“Thomas Pitt, from the Metropolitan Police-”
“Oh-” Her eyes widened. “You’ll be about poor Dr. Shaw’s fire, then. What a terrible thing. She was a good woman, was Mrs. Shaw. I’m real grieved about that. Come in. I daresay you’re cold-an’ ’ungry, mebbe?”
Pitt stepped in, wiping his feet carefully on the mat before going onto the polished linoleum floor. He almost bent and took his boots off, as he would have done at home. A smell of rich stew assailed him, delicate with onions and the sweetness of fresh carrots and turnips.
“Yes,” he said with feeling. “Yes I am.”
“Well I don’t know as I can ’elp you.” She led the way back and he followed after. To sit in a room with that aroma, and not eat, would be very hard. Her generous figure strode ahead of him and into the small, scrubbed kitchen, a huge pot simmering on the back of the stove filling the air with steam and warmth. “But I’ll try,” she added.
“Thank you.” Pitt sat down on one of the chairs and wished she meant the stew, not information.
“They say it were deliberate,” she said, taking the lid off the pot and giving its contents a brisk stir with a wooden ladle. “Although ’ow anybody could bring theirselves to do such a thing I’m sure I don’t know.”
“You said ‘how,’ Mrs. Colter, not ‘why,’ ” Pitt observed, inhaling deeply and letting it out in a sigh. “You can think of reasons why?”
“In’t much meat in it,” she said dubiously. “Just a bit o’ skirt o’ mutton.”
“You have no ideas why, Mrs. Colter?”
“ ’Cos I in’t got the money for more, o’ course,” she said, looking at him as if he were simple, but still not unkindly.
Pitt blushed. He was well used enough to poverty not to have made such an idiotic remark, or one so condescending.
“I mean why anyone should set fire to Dr. and Mrs. Shaw’s house!”
“You want some?” She held up the ladle.
“Yes please, I would.”
“Lots o’ reasons.” She began to dish up a generous portion in a large basin. “Revenge, for one. There’s them as says ’e should’a looked after Mr. Theophilus Worlingham better’n ’e did. Although I always thought Mr. Theophilus would wind ’isself up into a fit and die one day. An’ ’e did. But then that don’t mean everyone sees it that way.” She put the bowl down in front of him and handed him a spoon to eat with. It was mostly potatoes, onions, carrots and a little sweet turnip with a few stray ends of meat, but it was hot and full of flavor.
“Thank you very much,” he said, accepting the bowl.
“Don’t think it’d ’ave much to do wiv it.” She dismissed the notion. “Mr. Lutterworth was fair furious with Dr. Shaw, on account of ’is daughter, Miss Flora, nippin’ ter see ’im all hours, discreet like, not through the reg’lar surgery. But Mrs. Shaw weren’t worried, so I don’t suppose there were nothin’ in it as there shouldn’t ’a bin. Leastways, not much. I think Dr. Shaw and Mrs. Shaw kept their own ways a lot. Good friends, like, but maybe not a lot more.”
“That’s very observant of you, Mrs. Colter,” Pitt said doubtfully.
“Need more salt?” she asked.
“No thank you; it’s perfect.”
“Not really.” She shook her head.
“Yes it is. It doesn’t need a thing added,” he assured her.
“Don’t take much ter see when people is used ter each other, and respects, but don’t mind if the other gets fond o’ someone else.”
“And Dr. and Mrs. Shaw were fond of someone else?” Pitt’s spoon stopped in midair, even the stew forgotten.
“Not as I know of. But Mrs. Shaw went off up to the city day after day, and ’e wished ’er well and never cared nor worried as who she went wiv; or that the vicar’s wife came all over unnecessary every time Dr. Shaw smiled at ’er.”
This time Pitt could not dismiss his amusement, and bent his head over the dish at least to conceal the worst of it.
“Indeed?” he said after another mouthful. “Do you think Dr. Shaw was aware of this?”
“Bless you, no. Blind as a bat, ’e is, to other people’s feelin’s o’ that nature. But Mrs. Shaw, she saw it, an’ I think she were kind o’ sorry for ’er. ’E’s a bit of a poor fish, the Reverend. Means well. But ’e’s no man, compared wi’ the doctor. Still,” she sighed, “that’s ow it is, in’t it?” She regarded his empty bowl. “You want some
