Pentecost Alley - Anne Perry [129]
“No.” Pitt met his eyes candidly. “No, I didn’t then. I just thought I hadn’t read him very well.” He tried desperately to clear his mind and remember exactly what he had felt as he had talked to Costigan, seen his face, felt his terror and self-pity. How honest had he been? How much was he influenced by relief and an inner determination to prove the case so they could all escape the shadow of having to pursue Augustus FitzJames’s son?
“He never denied killing her,” he went on, staring across the dining room table at Cornwallis. The food was almost ignored. Gracie was standing by the kitchen door, a clean cloth in her hand for holding hot dishes, but she was listening as intently as any of them.
“But he always denied torturing her,” Pitt continued painfully. “And no matter how hard I pressed, he always denied knowing anything about FitzJames, or the badge, or the cuff link.”
“Did you believe him?” Vespasia asked quietly.
Pitt thought for a long time before replying. There was silence in the room. No one moved.
“I suppose I did,” Pitt said at last. “As it wouldn’t have gone on worrying me. At least … I didn’t believe he could have done it alone, or that he had any reason to.”
“Then we’re back to where we started,” Cornwallis said, looking from one to the other of them. “It doesn’t make sense. If it was not Costigan, and there can be no doubt it is not him this time, then who can it be? Is it someone we have not thought of? Or can it be what I think we are all dreading, and FitzJames is guilty of both crimes?”
“No, he isn’t guilty,” Charlotte said, looking at the table in front of her.
“Why not?” Vespasia asked curiously, setting down her fork on her plate. “What do you know, Charlotte, which makes you speak with such certainty?”
Charlotte was thoroughly uncomfortable, and Pitt knew why, but he did not intervene.
“Tallulah FitzJames saw him the night Ada McKinley was killed,” Charlotte replied, lifting her eyes to meet Vespasia’s.
“Indeed?” Vespasia said with caution. “And why did she not say so at the time? It would have saved a great deal of trouble.”
“She couldn’t say so because she was somewhere she should not have been,” Charlotte replied unhappily. “And she had already lied about it, so no one would have believed her anyway.”
“That does not surprise me overmuch.” Vespasia nodded. “But it would seem that you believe her. Why?”
“Well … actually, Emily does.” Charlotte bit her lip. “It was Emily she told. Finlay really is a pretty good wastrel, and not a particularly worthy person. But he didn’t kill Ada.”
“Was no one else at this place who would testify?” Cornwallis asked, looking at Charlotte, then at Pitt. “Why did they not come forward? Surely Finlay would have asked them to? Or if he really did not remember where he was, why did his sister not ask them to speak? The whole issue could have been cleared up immediately!” He was puzzled and there was an edge of anger in his voice.
Vespasia turned to Charlotte, food now entirely forgotten. “Just what sort of a place was this that no one is prepared to admit having been there? I confess, my curiosity is aroused. Do we live in such a very squeamish age? I cannot think of anywhere whatever that a robust young man would be too delicate to admit having attended. Was it a dogfight, or a bare-knuckle boxing match? A gambling den? A brothel?”
“A party where they drank too much and took opium,” Charlotte replied in a very small voice.
Cornwallis’s expression darkened.
Vespasia bit her lip; her eyebrows arched. “Stupid, but not so very extraordinary. I would not deny having been in such a place if I could save a man’s life by admitting to it.”
Charlotte said nothing, but Pitt knew that it was not doubt so much as indecision as to how she could phrase what she meant.
Cornwallis, who did not know her, was watching Vespasia.
“Then if we could find these people,” he said decisively, “we could at least clear FitzJames of the first crime, and by inference, of the second also.” He turned to Pitt. “Did you know