Cardington Crescent - Anne Perry [44]
It was opened by a middle-aged maid with a plain, wise face, at the moment creased with pity. She stared up at Pitt grimly, quite prepared to stand her ground and defy him. She would protect Emily at any cost, and Pitt could see it in the shape of her shoulders and the square planting of her feet.
“I’m Thomas Pitt,” he said loudly enough for Emily, beyond the door, to hear him. “My wife is Lady Ashworth’s sister. She will be here soon, but I must speak to Lady Ashworth first.”
The maid hesitated, looked him up and down with a measured gaze, and made up her mind. “Very well. I suppose you’d best come in.” She stood aside.
Emily was sitting up on the bed, fully dressed in a gown of dark blue—she had nothing black with her. Her hair was loose at the back of her neck and she was almost as pale as the pillows behind her. Her eyes were cavernous with shock.
He sat down on the bed and took her hand, holding it in both of his. It felt limp and small as a child’s. There was no point in saying he was sorry. She must know that, must see it in his face and feel it in his touch.
“Where’s Charlotte?” she asked shakily.
“Coming. Aunt Vespasia sent her carriage; she’ll be here soon. But I have to ask you some questions. I wish I didn’t, but wishing doesn’t change things.”
“I know.” She sniffed, and the tears escaped her will and ran down her cheeks. “Dear heaven, do you think I don’t know!”
Pitt could feel the maid behind his shoulder, alert and defensive, ready to drive him out the moment he threatened Emily, and he loved her for it.
“Emily, George was deliberately killed by someone in this house. You know I have to find out who.”
She stared at him. Perhaps part of her mind had understood that already, or at least rejected all the other possibilities, but she had not actually faced it as bluntly as that. “That means—the family, or Jack Radley!”
“I know. Of course it is conceivable we could turn up a reason among the servants, but I don’t believe it.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Thomas! Why on earth would one of Uncle Eustace’s servants murder George? They hardly even knew of him a month ago. Anyway, why would any servant murder anyone in the house? It’s a nice thought, but it’s stupid.”
“Then it is one of the eight of you,” he said, watching her face.
She breathed out slowly. “Eight? Thomas! Not me! You can’t—” She was so white he thought she was going to faint, even lying against the pillows as she was.
He gripped her hand harder. “No, of course I don’t. Nor do I think it was Aunt Vespasia. But I have to find out who did, and that involves finding out the truth about a lot of things.”
She said nothing. Behind him he could hear the maid winding her hands in her apron. Silently he blessed the woman again, and Vespasia for providing her.
“Emily—could Jack Radley have imagined that you might one day marry him, were you free to?”
“No ...” Her voice faded away and her eyes left his, then came back. “Not from anything I said. I—I flirted a little—a very little. That’s all.”
He thought that was less than the truth, but it did not matter now. “Is there anything else?” he persisted.
“No!” Then she realized that he was no longer thinking only of Jack Radley but of anyone. “I don’t know. I can’t think why anyone should want to kill George. Couldn’t it possibly have been an accident, Thomas?”
“No.”
She looked down at her hand, still in his. “Could it have been meant for someone else, and not George?”
“Who? Does anyone else have coffee first thing in the morning?”
Her voice was hardly even a whisper. “No.”
There was no need to pursue the conclusion; she understood as well as he did.
“What about William March, Emily? Could he have been jealous enough to kill George over his attentions to Sybilla?”
“I don’t think so,” she said honestly. “He showed no sign of even having noticed, much less caring.