Belgrave Square - Anne Perry [38]
At that moment the door opened again and the second constable came in with a young woman held firmly by both hands. She was very handsome in a bold and buxom fashion. Her fair brown hair was falling forward uncoiled out if its pins and her dress was crooked and open at the top. It was not possible to tell if this had happened in her struggle with the constable, or whether he had found her in this disarray.
“Constable Crombie, I presume?” Pitt said dryly.
“Yes sir.” The constable was out of breath and out of countenance. He was not accustomed to having to struggle with young women of any birth or gentility, even of the most general sort, and the episode embarrassed him. It showed in his earnest young face.
“Is the lady under arrest?” Pitt asked.
“Yes sir. She was in the park with that gentleman.” He indicated Horatio Osmar, who was glaring ferociously at them and about to burst into indignant speech again. “They were be’aving in a manner likely to offend any decent people,” the constable went on suddenly. “Doin’ things best done in their own bedrooms, sir, or in their own sitting rooms at worst.”
“How dare you.” Osmar could contain himself no longer. “That’s a scandalous slander, sir.” He struggled to free himself and failed. “We were nothing of the kind. You insult Miss Giles, and I will not stand for it—be warned!”
“We saw what we saw, sir,” the constable said stolidly.
“You saw what you imagine you saw, sir.” Osmar’s voice was raised very considerably and by now the nearer occupants of the station were also aware of the commotion. One of the inner doors opened and a uniformed inspector came out into the room. He was a tall man, almost as tall as Pitt, fair haired with a strong, blunt face.
“What’s the problem, Constable?” He addressed Crombie directly, not immediately realizing that Pitt, not in uniform, was also an officer.
Crombie was visibly relieved.
“Oh Mr. Urban, sir; I’m glad as you’re ’ere. Allardyce and me arrested this lady and gentleman for improper be’avior in the park. They was bein’ indecently familiar with each other on one o’ the park benches, sir; disarrangin’ each other’s clothes, and ’ands where they shouldn’t ’a bin, ’cept in private.”
“That is untrue,” Osmar said angrily. “Quite untrue. You are apparently unaware who I am, sir.” He jerked his jacket down with both hands, now suddenly free. “I am Horatio Osmar, late a minister in Her Majesty’s government.”
Urban’s eyes opened only a fraction wider; the remainder of his expression did not change at all.
“Indeed sir. And the lady?”
The young woman opened her mouth to speak, but Osmar answered before she could.
“Miss Beulah Giles, a totally respectable young acquaintance of mine. A lady of irreproachable reputation and unquestioned virtue.”
Urban looked at Pitt. “And you, sir?”
“Thomas Pitt, inspector of detectives; but this case is nothing to do with me. I came to report an entirely different matter to Mr. Drummond.”
This time Urban’s expression did change. Politeness turned into undisguised interest. “So you’re Thomas Pitt. I’ve only just moved to Bow Street, but I’ve heard of you. Samuel Urban—” He held out his hand.
Pitt took it and was held in a firm, warm grip.
“I’ll leave you to sort this out,” he said with a smile. “It looks like a difficult affair.” And with that he turned and went past the duty desk and up the stairs to tell Drummond that he had still learned nothing to implicate, nor to clear, Lord Sholto Byam. It was not until he was at the top of the stairs that he stopped, almost tripping over the step, a cold chill inside him. Samuel Urban. That was the name on Weems’s list for a huge amount of money.
He went on along the wide corridor towards Drummond’s room.
* * *
Horatio Osmar and Beulah Giles were kept in police cells overnight and the next day taken before the police court. Micah Drummond did not attend, but he told Urban that he wished to be kept informed at all points. It was not a light thing to charge an ex-minister of the