Half Moon Street - Anne Perry [114]
“Please sit down, Lewis,” she replied, sitting herself in the worn, leather armchair in front of the fireplace. “It is kind of you to spare me your time. I would not have interrupted you were it not an issue of great importance.”
“Of course, Mrs. Fielding.” He sat opposite her. “Whatever I can do.”
She wished now that she had had sons as well as daughters. She had no acquaintance with sixteen-year-old boys. Her own brothers had been older than she, and their adolescence had been an impenetrable mystery to her. But there was no retreat now, except complete failure . . . cowardice. She could hardly send Pitt to do this, although he would certainly have been better at it. He was not the one who had heard Lewis’s remarks about Ophelia or seen the look in his eyes.
She must somehow continue to be direct enough to allow no misunderstanding, and yet spare him as much embarrassment as possible. She had no desire to humiliate him, and no need to. It might even destroy the very purpose for which she had come. Looking into his earnest young face, polite, not really interested, smooth-cheeked still, guileless, she had no words ready that would be subtle.
“Lewis, I did not tell your mother the whole truth; that is up to you, if you wish. The matter my son-in-law is investigating is very serious indeed . . . it is murder.”
“Is it?” He was not shocked or alarmed. There was a quick flare of interest in his blue eyes. But then he almost certainly had no conception of what that word meant in reality. He would know the facts, not the loss, the horror, the fear that it brought, the sense of pervading darkness.
“I’m afraid so.”
He straightened up a little, and his voice lifted. “What can I do to help, Mrs. Fielding?”
She felt a twinge of guilt for what she was about to do, and also the certainty that she must destroy in him the illusion of adventure that filled him at the present.
“When I was here a few days ago and we were speaking, you made a remark from which I now believe you might know something of use,” she said.
He nodded to indicate he was listening.
“In order for you to help,” she went on, “I need to tell you something about this crime . . . something which is not known to anyone except the police and the person who committed the murder . . . and to me, because I was told by the police. It is confidential, do you understand?”
He nodded more eagerly. “Yes, yes, of course I do. I won’t tell anyone, I swear.”
“Thank you. I am afraid this is very distressing. . . .”
“That’s all right!” he assured her, taking a deep breath and sitting very stiffly. “Please don’t worry about it.”
She wanted to smile, but it would have been too easily misunderstood. He was so very young, and unaware.
“The murdered man was struck on the head,” she began solemnly, watching his face. “Then he was dressed in a green velvet gown . . . a woman’s gown . . .” She saw him flinch and a look of incomprehension fill his eyes. “Then he was laid in a small, flat-bottomed boat, a punt, and his wrists and ankles were chained to the boat.”
The color drained out of his skin, leaving him white. His breathing was audible.
“And it was scattered with flowers,” she finished. “Only his knees were drawn up a little, in a parody of pleasure.” There was no need to go on. It was painfully apparent from the scarlet of his cheeks and the hot misery in his eyes that he had seen the picture and it was indelible in his memory.
“Where did you see it, Lewis?” she said softly. “I need to know. I’m sure you must realize that the murderer also saw it, and it is not the kind of picture that is easily found.”
He swallowed, his throat jerking.
“I think you know that,” she went on. “It is carefully posed. It is not the way women really behave, it is a pretend thing, for people who take pleasure in hurting others. . . .” She saw him wince but she did not stop. “There are people whose appetites are sick, who are not capable of fulfillment in the way most of us are, and they do these sorts of things, cruel and terrible things, regardless of how they torture others.