Cardington Crescent - Anne Perry [106]
“Get me a cup o’ tea, Dora,” Mrs. Mapes ordered. “An’ you make sure Florrie is doin’ the pertaters fer supper.”
“Yes, Mrs. Mapes, ma’am.”
“An’ bring the good pot!” Mrs. Mapes called after her, then turned back to smile at Pitt. “Now wot’s yer business, Mr. Pitt? Yer can trust me. I’m the soul o’ discretion.” She held her finger up to her nose. “Clarabelle Mapes ’ears ev’rythin’ an’ tells nuffin’.”
He knew already that if he had hoped to trick her or intimidate her he was foredoomed to failure. She was one of life’s survivors—a venturer, not a victim. Behind all the thrusting flesh and the curls and smiles she was as careful as a miser and suspicious as a dog in strange territory. He decided to appeal to her greed and at the same time see what effect surprise might have on her. Guilt he did not imagine, but there was a measure of fear deeper than mere caution that would have meaning to her.
“I’m afraid Mrs. March is dead,” he said watching her closely.
But her face did not alter by a shadow or hairsbreadth of movement. “Wot a shame,” she said expressionlessly, her black eyes meeting his squarely. “I ’ope as it wasn’t in pain, poor thing.”
“She didn’t go easily,” he parried.
But there was not a tremor in her. “Not many of us do.” She shook her head, and the black curls bounced. “Very civil of you ter tell me, Mr. Pitt.”
He pressed on. “There’ll be a postmortem.”
“Will there? An’ wot’s that?”
“The doctors will examine her body to decide exactly why she died. Cut her open if necessary.” He locked his eyes on hers, trying to see inside her, to get beyond the gross, shining exterior—and failed.
“’Ow disgustin’,” she said without flinching. Her sharp, curved nose wrinkled a little but the distaste was assumed; she had seen infinitely worse—anyone who lived in St. Giles had. “Wouldn’t yer think doctors’d ’ave suffin better ter do than cut up someone as is already dead? Can’t ’elp ’er now, poor thing. Be better ter doctor them as is livin’—not that that’s a lot o’ use, often as not.”
Pitt felt he was losing ground rapidly.
“They have to,” he plunged on. “Something of a mystery about her death.” That was literally true, even if the implication was not.
“Often is.” She nodded again, and there was a rap on the door, followed by yet another girl, of about ten, bringing the awaited tea on a painted lacquer tray, chipped in several places. But in pride of place was a silver teapot, which from his experience on robbery detail Pitt judged to be genuine Georgian. The child staggered awkwardly under its weight, her spindly arms shaking. Even as she left again her eyes were fixed hopelessly on the currant cakes on the china plate.
“’Ave a drop o’ suffin ter refresh yer?” Mrs. Mapes offered when the door was closed, and fished in a cupboard beside her, twisting her huge bulk in the chair till it creaked. She brought up an unmarked green glass bottle from which she poured what from the smell could only be gin.
Pitt refused quickly. “No, thank you. Too early. I’ll just have the tea.”
“Often is a mystery, death,” she said, finishing her previous train of thought. “Please yerself, Mr. Pitt.” And she poured a generous dollop into her own cup before adding tea, milk, and sugar. She passed a good-quality china cup across to Pitt and invited him to help himself as he wished. “But only the rich as gets doctors ter cut them up afterwards. Stupid, I calls it! As if slicin’ up corpuses is goin’ ter tell anyone the secrets o’ life an’ death!”
He gave up on the postmortem. Obviously it did not frighten her, and he was beginning to believe she had no hand in any abortion that could be traced to the March household. And yet Sybilla had kept her address, and there was no conceivable possibility of it being a social acquaintance. What did this fearsome woman do to provide for herself?
He glanced round the room. By St. Giles standards it was comfortable bordering on luxurious, and Mrs. Mapes herself all too clearly ate well. But the children he had seen looked half starved and were dressed in shabby hand-me-down clothes, ill-fitting