Highgate Rise - Anne Perry [157]
“We should not speak ill of the dead, Stephen,” Angeline said after clearing her throat. “It is most unchristian, and quite unnecessary. I am sure we were all very fond of Mr. Lindsay and thought only the best of him.”
“No you didn’t,” he contradicted her. “Did you know he married an African woman? Black as the ace of spades—and beautiful as the summer night. And he had children—but they are all still in Africa.”
“Really, Stephen—this is quite irresponsible!” Celeste stepped forward and took him firmly by the elbow. “The man is not here to defend himself—”
Shaw shook her loose, bumping her abruptly.
“God darnmit, he doesn’t need a defense!” he shouted. “Marrying an African is not a sin! He did have sins—plenty of them—” He flung his arms expressively. “When he was young he was violent, he drank too much, he took advantage of fools, especially rich ones, and he took women that most certainly weren’t his.” His face screwed up with intensity and his voice dropped. “But he also had compassion, after he’d learned pain himself: he was never a liar, nor a bigot.” He looked around at them all. “He never spread gossip and he could keep a secret to the grave. He had no pretensions and he knew a hypocrite when he saw one—and loathed all forms of cant.”
“I really think—” Clitheridge began, flapping his hands as if he would attract everyone’s attention away from Shaw. “Really—I—”
“You can pontificate all you like over everyone else.” Shaw’s voice was very loud now. “But Amos was my friend, and I shall speak of him as he really was. I’m sick of hearing platitudes and lies, sick and weary to my heart of it! You couldn’t even speak of poor Clem honestly. You mouthed a lot of pious phrases that meant nothing at all, said nothing of what she was really like. You made her sound as if she were a quiet, submissive, ignorant little woman who wore her life away being obedient, looking after me and doing useless good works among the parish poor. You made her seem colorless, cowardly of spirit and dull of mind. She wasn’t!” He was so furious now, and so torn by grief, that his face was suffused with color, his eyes were bright and his whole body trembled. Even Celeste dared not interfere.
“That was nothing like Clem. She had more courage than all the rest of you put together—and more honesty!”
With difficulty Pitt tore his attention from Shaw and looked around at the other faces. Was there any one of them reflecting fear of what Shaw was going to say next? There was anxiety in Angeline’s face, and distaste in Celeste’s, but he could not see the dread that would have been there had they known of Clemency’s discovery.
There was nothing in Prudence’s profile either, and nothing in the half outline of Josiah except rigid contempt.
“God knows how she was born a Worlingham,” Shaw went on, his fist clenched tight, his body hunched as if waiting to explode into motion. “Old Theophilus was a pretentious, greedy old hypocrite—and a coward to the last—”
“How dare you!” Celeste was too angry to consider any vestige of propriety left. “Theophilus was a fine, upright man who lived honestly and charitably all his life. It is you who are greedy and a coward! If you had treated him properly, as you should have, both as his son-in-law and as his doctor, then he would probably be alive today!”
“Indeed he would,” Angeline added, her face quivering. “He was a noble man, and always did his duty.”
“He died groveling on the floor with fistfuls of money spread all around him, tens of thousands of pounds!” Shaw exploded at last. “If anybody killed him, it was probably whoever was blackmailing him!”
There was a stunned and appalled silence. For deafening seconds no one even drew breath. Then there was a shriek from Angeline, a stifled sob from Prudence.
“Dear heaven!” Lally spoke at last.
“What on earth are you saying?” Lutterworth demanded. “This is outrageous! Theophilus