again. “I just … thought it would be very difficult to prove it.”
Pitt stood up.
“Are you going to tell FitzJames?” Ewart asked. “Put the family’s mind at rest.”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
“Good.” He smiled, a curious, half-bitter expression. “I’m very pleased. You deserve that.”
“Good,” Augustus FitzJames said tersely when Pitt informed him that Ella Baker had been arrested and charged with the murder of Nora Gough. “I assume you will charge her with the death of the other woman as well?”
“No. There’s no evidence of that, and she doesn’t admit to it,” Pitt replied. Once again they were in the library, and this time the fire was lit, casting a warmth in the chilly evening.
“Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter.” Augustus was not particularly interested. “She’ll hang for the second one. Everyone will know she committed the first as well, since they were apparently identical. Thank you for coming to inform me, Superintendent. You have done an excellent job … this time. Pity about the man … er … Costigan. But there’s nothing to be done about it.” His tone was dismissive. He rocked very gently back and forth on the balls of his feet. “Sort of man we’re all better without anyway. Filthy trade, living on the immoral earnings of women. Belonged in jail, if not on the end of a rope. Might have finished up there sooner or later anyway.”
If Pitt had not been responsible for Costigan’s death, he would have retaliated with his opinion of such thoughts, the deep horror they inspired in him, but his own part was too profound.
“Did Ella Baker ever work for you, Mr. FitzJames?” he asked, tangled threads, questions unanswered still tugging at the back of his mind.
“Don’t think so.” Augustus frowned. “In fact, I’m sure she didn’t. Why?”
“I wondered how she obtained your son’s belongings in order to leave them at the scene of her crimes, and above all, why she should want to.”
“No idea. Stole them, I expect,” Augustus said tersely. “Hardly matters now. Thank you for coming yourself, Superintendent. It is good to know the police are not as incompetent as some of our most lurid and ill-informed newspapers would have us believe.” He pursed his lips. “Now, if you will excuse me, I have an appointment this evening. Good day to you.”
Pitt opened his mouth to protest further, but Augustus had already reached for the bell rope to summon the butler to show Pitt out, and there was nothing more he could say. Augustus was obviously unprepared to discuss the matter any further.
“Good evening, Mr. FitzJames,” Pitt replied, and had to leave as the butler opened the door and smiled at him.
12
Pitt returned home late and tired, but it was the weariness of victory, even if there were still aspects of the case which puzzled him profoundly and which he feared he would now never resolve. It was already dark and the gas lamps were haloed with mist. There was a damp in the air, and a smell of rotting leaves, turned earth and the suggestion of the first frost.
He opened his front door and as soon as he came in the hallway he saw Charlotte at the top of the stairs. She was dressed in a very plain skirt and blouse, looking almost dowdy, and her hair was coming out of its pins. She came down so quickly he was afraid she was going to slip and fall.
“What is it?” he asked, seeing the eagerness in her face. “What’s happened?”
“Thomas.” She took a deep breath. She was too full of her own news to notice that he also had something urgent to say. “Thomas, I did a little investigating myself. It was all quite safe….”
The very fact that she mentioned safety told him immediately that it was not.
“What?” he demanded, facing her when she was on the bottom step. “What did you do? I assume Emily was with you?”
“Yes.” She sounded relieved, as if that were a good thing, something in mitigation. “And Tallulah FitzJames. Listen to me first, then be furious afterwards if you must, but I found out something really important, and terrible.”
“So did I,” he retorted. “I discovered who killed Nora Gough, and why, and obtained a confession. Now, what did you discover?”
She was startled.
“Who?” she demanded. “Who, Thomas?”
“Another prostitute. A woman named Ella Baker.” He outlined how they had assumed it was a man because of the coat, and how she had been able to disappear without anyone’s seeing her. They were still standing in the hall at the bottom of the stairs.
“Why?” she asked, her face reflecting none of the sense of victory he expected.
“Because Nora took the man she was going to marry, her escape from the life she had. And maybe she even loved him as well.” He put his hands up and touched her shoulders, holding her gently. “I’m sorry if I spoiled your news. I know you want to investigate for my sake, and I am not ungrateful.” He bent to kiss her, but she pulled away, frowning.
“Why did she kill Ada McKinley?”
“She denies it,” he replied, aware as he said it of the weight of dissatisfaction heavy inside him. It was a thin victory, and the substance of it seemed weaker every hour he thought of it.
“Why?” she asked. “That doesn’t make any sense, Thomas. They can’t hang her twice!” Her face was very pale, even in the glow of the gaslight from the hall chandelier. “Or three times.”
“No, of course they can’t,” he agreed. “What do you mean ‘three times’? There were only two murders.”
“No there weren’t.” Her voice was barely audible. “That’s what I was going to tell you that we found out. There was a third, about six years ago … a young girl, just a beginner. She had only been on the streets for a week or two. She was killed in Mile End, exactly the same way as the others … the garter, the fingers and toes, the cross-buttoned boots, even the water … everything. They never found who did it.”
He was stunned. For long seconds he stood motionless, as if he had not truly understood what she had said, and yet it filled his mind. Another crime, six years ago, in Mile End. It had to be the same person. Hadn’t it? There could not possibly be two … three people who would commit exactly the same gruesome, senseless murder, three people unconnected? And who was the first victim? Why had he not heard of her? Why had Ewart not known, and told him?
“I’m sorry,” Charlotte said very quietly. “It doesn’t help, does it?”
He focused his eyes again, looking at her.
“Who was she? Do you know anything about her?”
“No. Only that she was new on the streets. I didn’t learn her name.”
His mind was still whirling.
“Couldn’t Ella Baker have killed her too?” Charlotte asked. “Maybe she tried to take something from her? Did she say why she wanted to implicate Finlay?”
“No.” He turned and walked towards the parlor. He was suddenly cold standing in the hall, and very tired. He wanted to sit down as close to the fire as he could.
She followed him and sat opposite, in her usual chair.
The fire was burning a little low. He put more coal on it, banking it high and prodding it with the poker to make it burn up more rapidly.
“No,” he went on. “She denied it. Claimed she had never heard of the FitzJameses, and Augustus said he had never heard of her.” He sat back in his chair again. The flames were mounting in the fireplace as the new coal caught, the heat growing, tingling the skin. “And Ewart doesn’t care,” he added. “He’s so damned glad it’s over, without having to arrest FitzJames, he doesn’t want to know anything more about it.”
“And Mr. Cornwallis?”
“I haven’t seen him yet. It was late by the time I’d been to the FitzJameses’. I’ll tell him in the morning. And speak to Ella Baker again. Perhaps I’d better find out about the other crime first. Six years ago?”
