An Anne Perry Christmas_ Two Holiday Novels - Anne Perry [10]
“How?” she asked.
“Gwendolen left a letter behind,” he explained. “It is sealed, and will remain so. It is addressed to her mother, Mrs. Naylor, who lives near Inverness, in the far north of Scotland. We could post it, but that would be a harsh way for a mother to find out that her child has destroyed the life she labored to give.”
Vespasia was appalled. “You mean they would have to go to this unhappy woman and give her the letter? That's…” She was lost for words. Isobel would never do it! Neither would Bertie Rosythe. They would neither of them have the heart, or the stomach, for it. Not to mention making the journey to the north of Scotland in December.
Omegus raised his eyebrows. “Do you expect to be forgiven without pain, without a pilgrimage that costs the mind, the body, and the heart?”
“I don't think it will work.”
“Will you at least help me try?”
She looked at him standing, lean, oddly graceful, the lines deeper in his face in the morning light, and she could not refuse. “Of course.”
“Thank you,” he said solemnly.
hat?” Lord Salchester said with stinging disbelief when they were gathered together at the luncheon table. The first course was finished when Omegus requested their attention and began to explain to them his plan.
“Preposterous!” Lady Warburton agreed. “We all know perfectly well what happened. For heaven's sake, we saw it!”
“Heard it,” Sir John corrected.
She glared at him.
“Actually,” he went on. “It's not a bad idea at all.”
Lady Warburton swung around in her chair and fixed him with a glacial eye. “It is ridiculous. And if we find Mrs. Alvie guilty, as we will do, what difference will that make?”
“That is not the end of the issue,” Omegus exclaimed. Vespasia saw him struggling to keep the dislike from his face. “In medieval times not all crimes were punished by execution or imprisonment,” he went on. “Sometimes the offender was permitted to make a pilgrimage of expiation. If he returned, which in those dangerous times very often he did not, then the sin was considered to have been washed out. All men were bound to pardon it and take the person back among them as if it had not occurred. It was never spoken of again, and he was trusted and loved as before.”
“A pilgrimage?” Peter Hanning said with disbelief, derision close to laughter in his voice. “To where, for heaven's sake? Walsingham? Canterbury? Jerusalem, perhaps? Anyway, travel is a relative pleasure these days, if one can afford it. I'm not a religious man. I don't care a fig if Mrs. Alvie, or anyone else, makes a journey to some holy place.”
“You have missed the point, Peter,” Omegus told him. “I shall choose the journey, and it will not be a pleasure. Nor will it be particularly expensive. But it will be extremely difficult, particularly so for anyone who bears guilt at all for the death of Gwendolen Kilmuir. And if we profess any claim to justice whatsoever, we will not decide in advance who that is.”
“I agree,” Sir John said immediately.
“So do I,” Vespasia added. “I agree to both justice and forgiveness.”
“And if I don't?” Lady Warburton asked sharply, looking across at Vespasia, her brow creased with dislike, her mouth pinched.
Vespasia smiled. “Then one would be compelled to wonder why not,” she replied.
“I agree,” Blanche Twyford said. “Then it need never be spoken of beyond these walls. It will stop gossip among others who were not here, and any slander they may make against any of us, letting their imaginations build all manner of speculation. If we are all bound by what we agree, and the punishment is carried out here, the matter is ours. Surely you agree, don't you?”
“I suppose, if you put it that way,” Lady Warburton said reluctantly.
Lord Salchester agreed also.
Omegus looked at Bertie, the question in his face.
“Who is to be the judge of this?” Bertie asked dubiously. Today his elegance seemed