Silence in Hanover Close - Anne Perry [137]
“But she was!” Charlotte was nonplussed. Whatever she had expected, it was not this! “She was a great beauty! Oh, not traditional, certainly, we knew that. But she was extraordinary; people noticed her. She was very graceful, she had style, panache. She could never have scrubbed floors!”
He stood firm. “You’re wrong, ma’am. She may ’ave ’ad character; since I never saw ’er alive I couldn’t tell. But she were quite ordinary to look at. ’Er skin weren’t particular. Bit sallow. She ’ad good ’air, if yer like it black, an’ she was definitely on the thin side. In fact, I’d say skinny. No ma’am beggin’ yer pardon again, but I seen ’er, and she were ordinary.”
Charlotte stood still on the pavement. A carriage went by at a spanking pace, its brief wind tilting her hat. Then the woman was not Cerise—she must be someone else. Someone else had been killed to put Pitt, and all of them, off her trail. Perhaps it was only a fortunate accident that Pitt had found her at just that moment and had been arrested for her murder—or was that, too, part of the plan? She must be even more important than they had thought.
Then a startling idea came into Charlotte’s mind. It was horrifying, perhaps mad, certainly dangerous—but there seemed to be nothing else left.
“Thank you, Constable Maybery,” she said aloud. “Thank you very much. Please give my love to Thomas, if— if you’re allowed to. And please, don’t mention this conversation. It will only worry him.”
“All right, ma’am, if that’s what you want.”
“Yes, most definitely, please. Thank you.” And she turned round and hurried away towards the nearest omnibus stop. The new idea spun crazily in her mind. There must be something better, something saner and more intelligent—but what? There was no time to wait. There was no one left to question, no physical evidence to produce like a rabbit out of a hat, to force a confession. The only thing was to startle someone violently, forcing a betrayal—and she could think of no other way than the wild idea forming in her mind now.
She did not go home but to Jack Radley’s rooms in St. James’s. She had never been there before, but knew the address from writing to him. Normally he spent as little time there as possible, preferring to be someone’s guest in one of the fine town houses. It was both more pleasant and easier on his frugal finances. But he had promised he would be available as long as this crisis lasted, and she did not hesitate to call upon him.
The building was a good second best, and not an address one would be embarrassed to mention. She asked the porter in the hall and was told courteously, with only the slightest frown, that Mr. Radley’s rooms were on the third floor, and the stairs were to her left.
Her legs were tired when she got there, and there was no view to reward her effort, since his rooms were at the back. She knocked sharply on the door. If he was not there she would have to leave a note. She shifted from one foot to the other impatiently in the few minutes till the door opened—in fact she had been on the point of rattling the handle.
“Charlotte!” Jack looked startled, caught out; then self-concern vanished and he welcomed her in. “What is it? Has something happened?”
She had little time to look round. A few weeks ago she would have been consumed with curiosity—a person’s home said much about them—but now she had neither the time nor the need. Doubts of Jack had died without