Belgrave Square - Anne Perry [4]
Byam invited them to be seated, which out of politeness they both accepted, but he himself seemed unable to relax. He walked slowly back and forth across the cream-and-pink Chinese carpet and without waiting to be asked, began his explanation for having sent for them.
“I learned this morning from a friend in the Clerken-well police station …” He looked down at the floor, his expression hidden from them, his fingers locked behind his back. “A man for whom I had done some small service …” He turned and began back again, still not looking at them. “That the body of one William Weems had been found dead in his rooms in Cyrus Street. He was shot, I believe; at this point they have no idea with what manner of gun, except that it was at close quarters, and some type of large-barrelled weapon.” He breathed in and out. “A sporting gun seems possible.”
Drummond opened his mouth, perhaps to ask why anyone should suppose Byam to be interested in the death of Weems, or to suggest he leave the forensic facts, which would be better expounded in Clerkenwell, and continue with his own connection. In the event Byam was standing with his back half to them, staring at the sunlight on the spines of the leather-bound, gold-tooled books on the shelf, and Drummond said nothing.
“Normally it would be a sordid crime which would have no interest to me, except to deplore it,” Byam went on with obvious effort, turning again and beginning his way back to the far table. “But in this case I am acquainted with Weems in the most unpleasant circumstances. Through a servant, with whom he had some relationship—” he stopped and touched an ornament as if straightening it “—he learned of a tragedy in the past in which I played a regrettable part, and he was blackmailing me over it.” He stood rigid, his back to them, the light so bright it shone on his hair and picked out the fabric of his jacket, making it look faintly dusty in the brilliant room.
Drummond was obviously stunned. He sat motionless in the green leather sofa, his face stiff with amazement. Pitt guessed he had been expecting a quarrel, or at worst a debt, and this both startled and embarrassed him.
“For money?” he asked quietly.
“Of course,” Byam replied, then immediately seemed to recollect himself. “I’m sorry, yes indeed for money. Thank God he did not want favors of any other kind.” He hesitated, and neither Pitt nor Drummond interrupted the prickling silence. Byam kept his back to them.
“I presume you are going to ask me what the matter was for which I was willing to pay a man like Weems to keep his silence. You have a right to know, if you are to help me.” He took a deep breath; Pitt saw his slender shoulders rise and fall. “Twenty years ago, before I was married, I spent some time at the country home of Lord Frederick Anstiss, and his wife, Laura.” His beautiful, well-modulated voice was husky. “Anstiss and I were good friends, indeed I may say we still are.” He swallowed. “But at that time we were almost as close as brothers. We had many interests in common, both in pursuits of the mind and in such physical pleasures as shooting, riding to hounds, and the raising of good horses.”
No one in the room moved. The clock on the mantel chimed the quarter hour, its intrusion making Pitt start.
“Laura, Lady Anstiss, was the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,” Byam went on. “She had skin as pale as a lily, indeed an artist painting her portrait entitled it The Moonflower. I’ve never seen a woman move with such grace as she had.” He hesitated again, obviously finding the words with which to tear open so old and private a wound difficult. “I was very foolish. Anstiss was my friend, and my host, and I betrayed him—only in word, you understand, never deed!” His voice was urgent, as though he cared intensely that they believe him, and there was a ring of candor in it that surpassed even his present anxiety and self-conscious discomfort.
Drummond murmured something inaudible.
“I suppose I paid court to her,”