Silence in Hanover Close - Anne Perry [70]
Pitt knew there were hotels, restaurants, and theaters where such assignations could be kept, places where if a gentleman saw an acquaintance both men would have enough tact to overlook the meeting, neither wishing it referred to. These places were dotted round the borders of fashionable London, in the Haymarket, Leicester Square, Piccadilly. He knew where to find them and the touts and doormen to ask.
“Cabbie!” he shouted into the street, catching his breath as the fog threatened to choke him, making him cough. “Cabbie!”
A hansom slowed up and stopped, harness dripping, horse’s head down, driver’s voice disembodied in the gloom.
“Haymarket,” Pitt requested, and climbed in.
It was the following day, the fog still clamped heavily over the city, acrid in the throat, sharp to the nose, before he found his first success. He was in a private hotel a little off Jermyn Street near Piccadilly. The doorman was a richly mustached ex-soldier, with liberal ideas on morality and an injury from the Second Ashanti War which prevented him from doing any physical labor. He was also illiterate, which precluded any clerical work. He was quite amenable to answering Pitt’s questions, for a consideration. Ballarat had been very little help with information or influence, but he had given Pitt as much financial license as he could.
“You’re goin’ back a bit, guv,” the doorman said cheerfully. “But sure I remember ’er. Right ’andsome she was, an’ always wore them sort o’ colors. Looks wicked on most people, but suited ’er summink marvelous. Black ’air and dark eyes she ’ad, an’ graceful as a swan. Tall woman, not a lot o’ shape to ’er, but she ’ad summink special all the same.”
“What sort of something?” Pitt said curiously. He wanted to know what this man thought, his judgment; even with his limited vocabulary, his opinion would be worth a great deal. He knew street women, he watched them every night, and he saw their clients too. He would see them working and yet not be part of it. Few of them would fool him.
The man pulled a slight face as he considered. “Quality,” he said at last. “She ’ad a quality about ’er; never acted like she was ’ustling people, anxious like; it was always them as was after ’er; she didn’t give a cuss.” He shook his head. “It were more’n that, though. It were—it were like she were doin’ it fer fun. Yeah, that’s it—she ’ad fun! She never laughed, not out loud, she ’ad too much class for that. But she were laughing inside, like.”
“Did you ever talk to her?” Pitt pursued.
“Me?” He looked a little surprised. “No, I never did. She didn’t say a lot, and always spoke quiet like. Only saw ’er, oh, maybe ’alf a dozen times.”
“Can you remember who she was with?”
“Different blokes. Elegant—she liked ’em real elegant, didn’t like any scruff. And money o’ course, but then so do they all. No one without a bit o’ real money comes ’ere.” He gave a short laugh.
“Can you describe any of them?”
“Not so’s you’d know ’em again, no.” He smiled.
“Try a little,” Pitt pressed him.
“You couldn’t pay me that much, guv. You goin’ ter give me another job when they throw me out of ’ere an’ black me name?”
Pitt sighed. He had known before he started that describing the woman was very different from being indiscreet about her clients. Clients had money, position, they expected privacy and no doubt bought it for a generous price. Selling the secrets of one would lose the trust of all. “All right,” he conceded. “Be general. Old or young, dark, fair or gray, what sort of height and build?”
“Yer goin’ ter search all London, guv?”
“I can eliminate a few.”
The doorman shrugged. “If yer like. Well, those as I can recall was older, above forty. Don’t think she took ’em fer the money; dunno why, but I ’ad the feelin’ she could afford ter pick and choose.”
“Gray?”
“None I recalls. An’ none ’efty—all on the slim side.” He moved closer to Pitt. “Look, guv, for all I know it could ’ave bin the same gent. It don’t pay me ter peer into their faces! They comes ’ere discreet—that’s what they pays for! Like I said, she