Ashworth Hall - Anne Perry [89]
She felt guilty. It was too late to draw any of it back. She had betrayed Doll, who had already suffered so much. But what if Mrs. Greville had killed her husband? She had good reason, if she knew what he had done. And Gracie could not lie to Pitt, and saying nothing would be the same as a lie. She owed him far more than that, and Charlotte too. She could never forgive herself if she knew the truth and Pitt were blamed for failure, when all the time Gracie could have told him what he needed to find the answer.
And Pitt also had no choice. He sat all through dinner turning over in his mind what Gracie had told him. He was only vaguely aware of the conversation around him, of Emily bright-eyed and nervous, trying to watch everyone and the servants at the same time, of Jack being immeasurably more genial than he must have felt, and of Charlotte looking a little pale, not eating much, and trying to fill in the gaps in the conversation.
He took no pleasure in the food on his own plate, exquisite as it was, food he could normally only imagine. Gracie’s words filled his thoughts and drove out everything else. It was one of the most wretched stories he had ever heard, and only over the gooseberry tart and iced meringues did he realize with surprise that he had never doubted it. It was a reflection on his personal estimate of Ainsley Greville that he had not even considered that Gracie had been lied to. It was too much like the man revealed in the letters in the study in Oakfield House. The arrogance was there, the callousness towards women. He would regard Doll as his own, paid for with every week’s wages. That he had used her was bad enough, if not as uncommon as one would wish. Forcing her to have the child aborted or face a life alone on the streets was beyond forgiveness.
He could not ignore it, neither could he forget it, and it was too powerful a motive for murder for him to leave it unexamined.
He excused himself from the table before the port was passed. He went to the servants’ hall to find Wheeler. If he had no knowledge of it, it would be brutal to tell him. But murder was brutal, so were the fear, misery and suspicion that fell on innocent people, their lives taken apart, then other, irrelevant, secrets torn open.
“Yes sir?” Wheeler said with a frown when Pitt took him aside to the butler’s pantry, Dükes being occupied in the withdrawing room.
Pitt closed the door. “I wouldn’t ask you this if it were not necessary,” he began. “I regret it, and if I can keep it from going any further, then I will.”
Wheeler looked anxious. He was really a very agreeable man, perhaps younger than Pitt had supposed earlier, when he had first seen him on the morning of Greville’s death. He was serious, but there was something gentle in his face, and perhaps in other circumstances he could laugh or dance like anyone else.
“Wheeler, you must know Mrs. Greville’s maid, Doll?”
Wheeler’s expression changed almost imperceptibly, perhaps no more than a tightening of muscles.
“Doll Evans? Yes, sir, of course I do. She’s a very good girl, hardworking, good at her job, never gives any trouble.”
Pitt sensed the defensiveness in Wheeler. The answer had been too quick. Was he fond of her, or simply protecting his own household?
“Did she have an illness about three years ago?” Pitt asked.
Wheeler was guarded. A sharpness in his eyes betrayed a need to be careful. Pitt was sure in that moment that he did know.
“She was ill for a while, yes sir.” He did not enquire why Pitt asked.
“Do you know what she suffered from?”
There was a slight flush of pink in Wheeler’s cheeks.
“No sir. It was not my place to ask, and she did not say. That kind of thing is personal.”
“Was she changed in any way when she recovered?” Pitt pressed.
Wheeler’s face smoothed out until it was bland, almost defiant, but the long-trained courtesy did not vanish, only became remote, a thing of habit.
“Was she?” Pitt asked again.
Wheeler looked