Bedford Square - Anne Perry [142]
Pitt went through all the cupboards and drawers himself. Cadell had been a fastidious man, well dressed, as Pitt would have expected, but considering his position and his income, certainly not extravagant. Almost all his suits were formal; there was little of a more casual nature.
Didcott kept a diary of events Cadell attended in order that he might make sure every garment was ready, clean and pressed, when it should be required and that there were always sufficient clean shirts to hand. Pitt read it carefully, going back over the previous three months. If Cadell had kept every appointment, and Didcott assured Pitt that he had, then his schedule allowed very little time indeed for self-indulgence of any sort. It was difficult to see when he could have had time to go to Shoreditch, or anywhere else, to overspend money on private vices.
It also appeared, incidentally, that he had very seldom been to the Jessop Club lately, not above three times in the previous eight weeks, at least according to Didcott’s diary. Perhaps Pitt should go to the club and ask there? Maybe it was irrelevant, but it was a silly little fact that did not fit the picture.
He went downstairs and outside to the mews, where he found the coachman, but even with the most detailed questioning, he also could offer nothing of use. He had driven Cadell regularly over the previous eight years and had never taken him to Shoreditch, or anywhere like it. He looked at Pitt with wide, sad eyes, and seemed confused by almost everything Pitt said.
It seemed that if Cadell had gone on any private journeys, he had done so by hansom or some other form of public transport, or less likely, with an associate.
Was that the answer, a conspiracy?
With whom?
He should go through all the papers again. Reread everything to see if there was any indication of another person, another mind involved.
He was offered luncheon, and accepted it, eating it in the servants’ hall. They treated him civilly enough, but their grief was very obvious, and they spoke little.
He returned to his task, and it took him the rest of the afternoon, going through every drawer and cupboard. He even leafed through books from the shelves in the study, the only room in the house which was private to Cadell and not touched by any of the servants except in his presence. It was where he had kept certain of his work when he had brought it home.
Pitt questioned all the servants about the posting of a letter on the day before Cadell’s death, or that morning, but no one knew of a letter, to Dunraithe White or anyone else.
There was no glue in the study desk drawer. There was notepaper, but it was of a different texture and a slightly different size from that of the letters. It would seem Cadell had not written them at home. Could he really have done it at the Foreign Office? Or was there a third place, one they knew nothing of?
The only other thing that caught Pitt’s attention was a note on the side of Cadell’s appointment diary: “Balantyne still worried about Kew He is not a fool. I should take it seriously.”
He thanked Theodosia and left to go to Bedford Square. He had been to Kew himself. Charlotte had spoken to Balantyne also, but perhaps there was something Pitt could ask that would elicit an explanation as to why the General was concerned that made some kind of sense.
He did not believe it, but he could not leave it undone.
As he was shown in by the footman he was greeted with icy disdain by Augusta. She was dressed in a gray striped gown and looked magnificent. Pitt was jolted by memory of the past, her courage and resolution, her grief, and the loneliness that must haunt her solitary hours. There was no happiness in her, only cold strength. There was something admirable about her, something frightening, and not a little that evoked a sense of pity.
“What tragedy is it this time, Mr. Pitt?” she enquired, coming towards him with a remarkably graceful step for a woman of her