Bethlehem Road (27 page)

“Sometimes those who cannot create enjoy the power to destroy,” Vespasia went on. “It is all they have. After all, what else is much of violence? Think back on the crimes you yourself have helped to solve. Look at most domination of one person over another: the fishwife or the washerwoman could have told such people that it would not produce the admiration or the love or the peace they desired, but one hears what one wishes to.”

“But anarchists are noisy, Aunt Vespasia. They don’t want anarchy alone! And Thomas says the police are aware of a great many of them, and none seems to have been involved with the Westminster Bridge murders. After all, there is no political power in anonymous acts, is there! One has to own up to them at some point in order to reap the reward.”

“One would presume so,” Vespasia agreed, part of her reluctant to let go of the idea of some unknown assailant lashing out wildly for a cause. It was less ugly to her than the possibility of a friend, even a relative of the intended victim prepared to murder three people in order to mask the one murder that might implicate them. “Is it possible there is some connection between the three that we have not thought of?” she pressed.

“They are all M.P.s,” Charlotte said bleakly. “Thomas has not been able to discover anything further. They have no business connections, they are not related, they are not in line for any one position, for that matter they are not even of the same party! Two are Liberal, one Tory. And they have no political or social opinions in common, not even regarding Irish Home Rule, Penal Reform, Industrial or Poor Law Reform—nothing, except that they are all against extending the electoral franchise to women.”

“So are most people.” Vespasia’s face was pale, but sixty years’ training showed in her hands, resting elegantly in her lap over the wisp of her lace handkerchief. “Anyone planning to kill members of Parliament for that reason is going to decimate both houses.”

“If it is personal, then we had better begin to consider very seriously who might have motive,” Charlotte said gently. “And pursue them in ways that would be impossible for Thomas. I have already made the acquaintance of Lady Hamilton, and although I find it hard to believe it was she, there may be some connection.” She sighed with unhappy memories. “And of course sometimes the truth is hard to believe. People you have liked, still do like, can have agonies you never conceived, fears that haunted them until they escaped all reason and turned to violence, or old wounds so terrible they cannot leave them behind. Revenge obsesses them beyond everything else—love, safety, even sanity.”

Vespasia did not reply; perhaps she was thinking of the same people, or at least one of them, for whom she too had cared.

“And there is young Barclay Hamilton,” Charlotte said. “Although there seems to be a profound emotion troubling him regarding his father’s second marriage, I don’t know what should lead him to murder.”

“Nor I,” Vespasia conceded quietly, a weariness in her that she overcame with difficulty. “What of Etheridge? There is a great deal of money.”

“James Carfax,” Charlotte replied. “Either he himself, or his wife, in order to keep him from going to other women, or even leaving her altogether.”

“How tragic,” Vespasia sighed. “Poor creature. What a terrible price to pay for something that is in the end merely an illusion, and one that will not remain for long. She will have destroyed herself to no purpose.”

“Or if indeed he has had other relationships,” Charlotte said, thinking aloud, “some other love, or infatuation, perhaps ...” she trailed off.

“Quite possibly he had had affairs with other women,” Vespasia agreed dourly. “But even in the unlikely event they had husbands who were offended by it, to cut the throats of three members of Parliament and hang them on Westminster Bridge seems oblique, and excessive to a degree!”

Charlotte was suitably crushed. It was absurd. Had it been Etheridge alone it might have made sense. “It doesn’t seem to be a crime of passion,” she said aloud. “Indeed it does not appear to make any kind of sense!”

“Then there is only one conclusion,” Vespasia said grimly. “There is either a passion or a reason of which we are not aware. Certainly if it is a passion, it was not momentary, but rather extremely sustained, and therefore I would suppose it is one of great depth.”

“Someone has been done a wrong so terrible it corrodes their souls like a white-hot acid,” Charlotte offered.

Vespasia stared at her. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell Charlotte not to be melodramatic; then she glimpsed for an instant the horror of what such a thing might be, and remained silent.

Charlotte pursued her own line. “Or there is a motive we have not seen, perhaps because we do not know the facts, or the people, or because it is too ugly to us, and we have refused to see it. All we know of what those three men had in common was a fierce disapproval of the movement to extend the franchise to women.”

“Hamilton’s disapproval was not fierce,” Vespasia corrected automatically, but there was no lightness in her voice; it need not be said between them that Hamilton’s death may have been a mistake, due to the assumption, in the dim light on the bridge, that he was Etheridge. “It could be others trying to blacken the reputation of the women fighting for suffrage,” Vespasia went on, “knowing they would be blamed.”

“Oblique, and excessive to a degree,” Charlotte repeated Vespasia’s own words, then instantly regretted the impertinence. “I’m sorry!”

Vespasia’s face softened for a moment in recognition of the emotion. “You are quite right,” she conceded. “If somewhat cruel in your manner of observation.” She stood up and went to the window, gazing out at the sunlight in the garden, slanting pale and brilliant on the tree trunks and the first red shoots of the rose leaves. “We had best pursue what we can. Since we fear Florence Ivory may indeed be guilty, it would be profitable for you to form a further opinion of her character. You might call upon her again, if you will.”

Charlotte looked at Vespasia’s slender back, stiff under her embroidered lace dress, her shoulders so thin Charlotte was reminded quite painfully of how old she was, how fragile; she remembered that with age one does not cease to love or to be hurt, nor feel any less vulnerable inside. Without waiting to allow self-consciousness to prevent her, she went over and put her arms round Vespasia, regardless of whether it was a liberty or not, and held her tight as she would have a sister or a child.

“I love you, Aunt Vespasia, and there is nothing I would like in the world more than one day to become a little like you.”

It was several moments before Vespasia spoke, and when she did her voice was hesitant and a little throaty. “Thank you, my dear.” She sniffed very delicately. “I am sure you have made an excellent beginning—both the good and the bad. Now if you would be so good as to let go of me, I must find my handkerchief.” She did, and blew her nose in a less ladylike manner than usual, with her back to Charlotte. “Now!” she said briskly, stuffing the totally inadequate piece of cambric and lace up her sleeve. “I shall use the telephone to speak to Nobby and have her call upon Lady Mary Carfax again; I shall renew some political acquaintances who may be able to tell me something of use; you will call upon Florence Ivory; and then tomorrow we shall meet here at two o’clock and go together to express our condolences to the widow of Cuthbert Sheridan. It may even be that it was he who was the intended victim.” She tried hard to keep hope out of her voice—it had a certain indecency—and failed.

“Yes, Aunt Vespasia,” Charlotte said obediently. “Tomorrow at two o’clock.”

Charlotte set out for her visit to Florence Ivory with little pleasure. Indeed, the fear was strong inside her that she would either learn nothing at all or that her present anxieties would be strengthened and she would feel a greater conviction that Florence was both capable of such murders and likely to have committed them, with the help perhaps of Zenobia’s niece Africa Dowell. She herself hoped she might find that they were not at home.

She was to be disappointed. They were at home and willing to receive her; in fact, they made her welcome.

“Come in, Miss Ellison,” Africa said hastily. Her face was pale, but there were spots of color high on her cheeks, and smudges of shadow under her eyes, from fear and too little sleep. “I am so glad you have called again. We were quite concerned lest this latest horror should have turned you from our cause. The whole matter is a nightmare.” She led Charlotte towards the charming sitting room, with its flowered curtains and its plants. Sunlight streamed through the windows, and three blue hyacinths filled the room with a perfume so heady, at another time it would have distracted the attention.

Now however Charlotte had eyes and thoughts only for Florence Ivory, who sat in a rattan chair with cushions of green and white, a raffia basket in her hands, which she was mending. She looked up at Charlotte with a face more guarded than her companion’s.

“Good afternoon, Miss Ellison. It is very civil of you to call. May I presume from your presence that you are still engaged in our cause? Or have you come to tell me that you now consider it past help?”

Charlotte was a little stung; there was in Florence’s turn of phrase a whole array of assumptions which she found offensive.

“I shall not give up, Mrs. Ivory, until the matter is either won or lost, or until I find some evidence of your guilt which makes pursuing-it further morally impossible,” she replied crisply.

Florence’s remarkable face, with its widely spaced eyes full of haunting intelligence, seemed for a moment on the edge of laughter; then reality asserted itself and she gestured to the chair opposite and invited Charlotte to be seated.

“What else can I tell you? I knew Cuthbert Sheridan only by reputation, but I have met his wife on a number of occasions. In fact I may have been instrumental in her joining the movement for women’s suffrage.”

Charlotte observed the pain in the woman’s face; saw the irony in the eyes, the bitterness in the mouth, the small, bony hands clenched on the raffia basket. “May I presume that Mr. Sheridan did not approve?” she asked.

“You may,” Florence agreed dryly. She regarded Charlotte closely, and her expression gradually became one of barely disguised contempt. Only her need for help and a residue of good manners concealed it at all. “It is a subject which produces great emotion, Miss Ellison, of which you seem to be largely unaware. I have no idea what your life has been. I can only assume you are one of those comfortable women who are satisfactorily provided for in all material ways and are happy to pay for your keep with a docile temperament and skill in keeping a home—or organizing others who do it for you—and that you consider yourself fortunate to be in such a position.”

“You are quite right—you do have no idea what my life has been!” Charlotte said extremely sharply. “And your assumptions are impertinent!” As soon as the words were out of her mouth she remembered how this woman had suffered, had lost her children, and she realized with a flood of shame that perhaps she was precisely as comfortable as Florence had accused her of being. She had little money, certainly, but what part of life’s ease or joy was that? She had enough. She had never been hungry, and she was not so often cold. She had her children, and Pitt treated her not as a possession, which in law she had indeed been until only recently, but as a friend. As she sat in the green and white chair with the sun coming in through the garden windows and the air full of the scent of the hyacinths, she realized with a powerful gratitude that she had freedom an uncounted number of women would have given all their silks and servants to possess.

Florence was staring at her, and for the first time since they had met, there was confusion in her face.

“I apologize,” Charlotte said with great difficulty. She found this woman highly irritating, profound as her pity for her was. “My rudeness was unnecessary, and in some ways you are perfectly correct. I cannot truly understand your anger, because I have not been a victim of the wrongs of which you speak. Please tell me.”

Florence’s eyebrows rose. “For goodness’ sake, tell you what? The social history of women?”

“If that is the issue,” Charlotte replied. “Is that why these men were killed?”

“I’ve no idea! But if I had done it, it would be!”

“Why? For a vote on who sits in Parliament?”

Florence’s tolerance snapped, and she stood up sharply, the raffia basket and needle falling to the carpet. She faced Charlotte with stinging condescension.

“Do you think you are intelligent? Capable of learning? Do you have emotions, even passions? Do you know anything about people, about children? Do you even know what you want for yourself?”

“Yes of course I do,” Charlotte said instantly.

“Are you sure you are not just an overgrown child?”

Now Charlotte was equally angry. She rose as well, the color burning in her cheeks. “Yes I am perfectly sure!” she hissed back through her teeth. “I am very perceptive about people, I have learned a great deal about many things, and I am quite capable of making wise and sensible judgments. I make mistakes sometimes, but so does everyone. Being adult doesn’t make you immune to error, it just makes those errors more important, and gives you more power to cover them up!”

Florence’s face did not soften in the least. “I agree. I am every bit as sure as you that I am no child, and I resent profoundly being treated as one, and having my decisions made for me by either my father or my husband, as if I had no will or desire of my own, or as if what they wanted was always the same as what I wanted for myself, or could be relied upon to be in my best interest.” She swung round and went behind the chair, leaning forward over the back of it, the muslin of her dress straining across her thin body. “Do you suppose for one second that the law would be as it is if those who made it were answerable to us as well, instead of only to men? Do you?”

Charlotte opened her mouth to reply, but Florence cut her off.

“Do you give your mother a gift at Christmas, or on her birthday?”

“What?”