Farriers' Lane - Anne Perry [74]
“I did not have any part in it, Miss Macaulay,” Charlotte pointed out. “I have no guilt in thinking he may have been innocent, only grief. The guilt will come if I do not do what I can now to find out the truth, both of the death of Kingsley Blaine and the death of Judge Stafford.”
Tamar smiled openly for the first time. It was a gesture full of charm, lighting her face and changing its whole aspect.
“What an extraordinary creature you are. But then I suppose you would have to be, to have married a policeman.”
Charlotte was surprised. She had not realized Tamar would have any appreciation of her affairs, or what they involved.
“Oh—Joshua told me,” Tamar explained with amusement. “I gather your mother told him.” She glanced around and saw that Caroline had left them. “I imagine that is where she has gone now. Possibly tact—or …” She lifted her slight shoulders expressively, but said nothing more.
Charlotte had a moment of discomfort, wondering if Caroline were making a fool of herself, being too bold, but there was no way in which she could retrieve it now without making her situation even worse. There was nothing she could profitably do but pursue the case.
“Do you know anything about the death of Kingsley Blaine that did not come out in court?” she asked bluntly. “Anything you told Judge Stafford which could have caused him to reopen the matter?”
Tamar shook her head. “Nothing that wasn’t in the appeal. The medical evidence was shaky. Humbert Yardley, the examiner, began by saying that the wound which killed Kingsley …” Her face tightened, the soft skin around her mouth almost white. She kept her voice level with an effort. “… Was caused by something longer than a farrier’s nail. Then later he said it could have been an unusual nail.”
“Was such a nail found?”
“No, but the police said he could have disposed of it anywhere—down the nearest drain. It was only the uncertainty on which we raised the appeal. We tried other things; the coat which no one found, the necklace. But they were explained away. They said the coat was picked up by a tramp, and that I kept the necklace.”
“Didn’t the flower seller also change her mind?” Charlotte asked.
“Yes—but only before the trial, not once they put her on the witness stand. God help her, she was only a simple person, and once it was fixed in her mind, she was too afraid of the police to argue.”
“Miss Macaulay”—Charlotte looked at her gently, trying to convey in her face that she was asking only because she had to—“apart from love for your brother, why do you believe, in the face of so much, that he was innocent?”
“Because Aaron had no reason to kill Kingsley,” Tamar replied, her eyes brilliant, wry, candid. “They said that Kingsley had seduced me and was playing with my affections, and Aaron killed him in revenge for me. But that was nonsense. Kingsley loved me, and was going to marry me.” She said it quite quietly, as if it were a simple matter of fact and she did not care if Charlotte believed her or not.
Charlotte was shaken with total surprise, and yet her immediate reaction was not disbelief. Had Tamar been more emotional, more urgent to convince her, she might have doubted, but her simple statement, as of something long familiar to her, left her with no instinct to fight against it.
“But he was already married,” she said, not to disprove it, but to seek explanation. “What was he going to do about that?”
Tamar bit her lip, for the first time shame in her face. “I did not know that then.” She lowered her eyes. “To begin with I did not take him seriously.” She shrugged. “One doesn’t. Young men with time to spare and a roving eye come to the theater in hundreds. They only want a little entertainment, a little excitement, and then to go home to their wives as society expects of them. It was months before I could believe Kingsley was different. By then I had learned to love him, and it was too late to alter my feelings.” She looked up quickly, her expression defensive. “Of course you will say I should have asked if he was married,