Pentecost Alley - Anne Perry [154]
“Two of them?” Charlotte was highly skeptical. “Blackmail over what? Because he visited a prostitute? We don’t speak of it openly, but we know that men do. If they didn’t, then there wouldn’t be any prostitutes.”
“We know it happens,” Emily corrected her, “to someone else! What about if it is your husband? What if he has some of these unusual appetites? If he were important enough, it could ruin him. Let’s say he had a very fortunate marriage in view, or already achieved, and was dependent upon the goodwill of his father-in-law for more preferment? Or he needs a son and heir, and his wife is unlikely to give him one if she knows of his behavior?”
“Good,” Charlotte agreed. “That makes sense. Why both Ada and Nora? And why torture them? Why not simply kill them and get out as soon as possible? The longer he’s there, the more risk he runs of being discovered. Is the torture part of what he does anyway? No, it can’t be. No prostitute is going to have her fingers and toes broken whatever you pay her. Tied up, doused in cold water perhaps, but not injured.”
Tallulah was still very pale, and she sat hunched in her pretty chair.
“Proof,” she said thoughtfully. “She had proof of his behavior, and he tortured her to try to make her give it to him.”
“But she didn’t … because she had given it to Nora for safekeeping!” Charlotte finished.
“What sort of proof?” Emily pressed, but her voice was rising in eagerness. At last there was something which made at least a little sense. “Pictures? Letters? A statement from a witness? What else?”
“Statement from a witness,” Charlotte answered. “Paintings wouldn’t mean anything; they’re not evidence. No one would take photographs of such a thing. I mean, how could you? You have to sit still for ages for photographs. And who writes letters to prostitutes? It would have to be something to do with a witness. Maybe it happened before? Perhaps there are lots of women who know, and she had statements from all of them?”
“Then where are they now?” Tallulah looked from one to the other. “Does he have them, or did Nora hide them too well from him?”
“What we have to do,” Charlotte said decisively, sitting more uprightly, “is to learn all we can about Nora and Ada. That’s where the answer is. First we need to have proof they even knew each other. We need to find everything in common in their lives, and then see if we can find any other women who knew this man. They would give us a proper description of him. They might even know his name.”
“Marvelous!” Tallulah stood up. “We’ll begin straightaway. Jago will help us. He knew Ada McKinley. He’ll know where we can start, and he might even help us to gain people’s trust so they will talk to us.”
“I …” Emily looked at Charlotte, uncertain how to say what she needed to without hurting irreparably.
“What?” Tallulah demanded.
Charlotte’s mind raced. “Don’t you think that would be rather an unfair way to do it?” she said, making it up as she went along.
“Unfair?” Tallulah was confused. “To whom? The women? We’re looking for a man who murdered two of them! What has fairness to do with it?”
“Not to the women. To Jago.” Charlotte’s brain cleared. “He is their priest. He shouldn’t compromise his work with the people by being seen to help us. After all, he has to stay there as their friend long after we’ve gone.” She could only think of the hideous possibility that it was Jago himself who had killed the women. Who was more vulnerable to blackmail than a priest with a taste for prostitutes? He could be the one sort of man whose image would not survive the accusation that he had slept with a street woman, or even more than one. His work would be finished, not only in Whitechapel but in the Church anywhere.
“Oh.” Tallulah relaxed. “Yes, I suppose so. We had better go alone. We can find it easily enough. I’d rather we went in the daytime.” She flushed uncomfortably. “In the evening …”
“Of course,” Emily agreed quickly. “It will all be sufficiently unpleasant and difficult without our being considered as rivals.”
Tallulah giggled nervously, but it was agreed.