The Cater Street Hangman - Anne Perry [103]
“Do you wish me to call her in here?” she asked, thinking she would be able to control the situation if she were there to prevent any slips of the tongue. “She won’t lie to me either.”
Pitt looked at her, eyes narrowed very slightly.
“Please don’t trouble yourself. Besides, I think she might well be reticent in front of you. I don’t wish to question her in Mrs. Dunphy’s presence either, only to confirm with Mrs. Dunphy first, and then use the information to press Dora. If she did something you would not approve of, she won’t say so in front of you, but she might tell me, alone.”
She wanted to argue, to find some reason to be present, but she could think of nothing that sounded honest. Yet she must prevent his learning of Papa and the woman. She believed he would feel, as she did, that it was a betrayal, a moral dishonesty that one might try to pardon with one’s mind, but could never forget. Respect was gone; one could not trust again.
That was foolish. Pitt was a man, and would no doubt feel as other men did that such things were quite ordinary and to be accepted—as long as women did not do the same, of course. Perhaps she was afraid unnecessarily. Murder was quite a different thing from adultery, to men.
“How is your sergeant?” she asked, in an attempt to delay him until she could think of a reason to prevent him from seeing Dora alone.
“Getting better, thank you.” If he was surprised he did not show it.
“Do you have to have another sergeant now?” she went on.
“Yes.” He smiled. “You would like him; he’s quite an entertaining character. A little like Willie.”
“Oh?” The interest she expressed was quite genuine. And it was a few minutes’ respite. “I see Willie as a very uneasy policeman.”
“Oh, Dickon was uneasy to begin with, but he was obliged to find work very early, and naturally found dishonest employment easier to come by. He gained an excellent knowledge of the underworld, and then, after an extremely narrow squeak, decided it might be safer to profit from his expertise on the side of the law rather than against it.” He grinned broadly. “Actually he fell rather seriously in love with a girl socially above him. He promised her he would become respectable if she would marry him. So far he’s kept at it.”
“Why did he have to go out to work so young?” she was interested to know, as well as still wishing to keep him from the kitchen. The memory of Willie’s wry face was clear, and in her mind she saw this Dickon with the same features.
“His father died at a hanging, in ’forty-seven or ’forty-eight, and his mother was left with five children of which he was the youngest; and the other four were girls.”
“Oh no! However did she manage? How irresponsible of him to commit a crime that got him hanged!” She could think only of the poor woman with five children to feed.
“He wasn’t hanged,” Pitt corrected her. “He was killed at a hanging. They used to have public hangings then, and they were considered quite a sporting event.”
She did not believe him. “Hanging? Don’t be ridiculous. What kind of a person would wish to see some wretched creature taken out to a gibbet and hanged?” She swallowed hard, flaring her nose in disgust.
“Many kinds,” he answered seriously. “It used to be quite a spectacle; hundreds of people came to watch, and others came to pick their pockets, to gamble, to sell their muffins and winkles and hot chestnuts in winter. And, of course, the odd dogfight to warm them up.
“The poor crowded into the square, while the quality, the gentlemen, booked rooms in nearby houses with front windows—”
“That’s obscene!” she said fiercely. “It’s disgusting!”
“They let them for very high rents,” he continued as if she had not spoken. “Unfortunately the excitement of the actual hanging often spilled over into the crowd, and fights broke out. Dickon’s father was beaten to death in one of these.”
He smiled bleakly at her horror. “They don’t have public hangings anymore. Now let