Cater Street Hangman (7 page)

“I’m sorry to have to tell you when you are alone, Miss Ellison, but we cannot afford to waste time. Perhaps you would like to sit down?”

Instinctively she refused.

“No, thank you,” she said stiffly. “What is it you want?”

“I’m sorry, I have bad news. We have found your maid, Lily Mitchell.”

Charlotte tried to stand quite still, upright, although her knees were weak. She could feel the blood drain from her face.

“Where?” her voice was a squeak. This wretched man was staring at her. She did not normally dislike people on sight—no, perhaps that was not quite true—but this man certainly inspired it. “Well?” she said, keeping her voice level.

“In Cater Street. Perhaps you had better sit down?”

“I’m perfectly all right, thank you.” She tried to freeze him with a glance, but he seemed oblivious to it. Quite firmly he took her arm and guided her backwards into one of the hardbacked chairs.

“Would you like me to call one of your maids?” he offered.

That incensed her. She was not so feeble she could not conduct herself decently, even in the face of shocking news.

“What is it you wish to do that cannot wait?” she said with great control.

He wandered slowly round the room. Really, the man had no manners at all. Still, what could you expect of the police? He probably could not help it.

“Your butler reported last night that she had gone out walking with a man called Jack Brody, a clerk of some sort. What time did you require her to come home?”

“Half past ten, I think. I’m not sure. No, maybe ten o’clock. Maddock could tell you.”

“With your permission, I shall ask him.” It sounded more like a statement than a request. “How long was she in your employ?”

It all sounded so final, so much in the past.

“Four years, about. She was only nineteen.” She heard her voice drop suddenly, and a sharp memory of Emily came back to her, Emily as a baby, Emily learning to walk. It was ridiculous. Emily had nothing in common with Lily, except that they were both nineteen.

The wretched policeman was staring at her.

“You must have known her fairly well?”

“I suppose so.” She realized just how little she did know. Lily was a face around the house, something she was used to. She did not know anything about the girl behind the face at all, what she cared about, or was afraid of.

“Had she ever stayed out before?”

“What?” She had temporarily forgotten him.

He repeated the question.

“No. Never. Mister—?” She had forgotten his name, too.

“Pitt, Inspector Pitt,” he filled in for her.

“Inspector Pitt, was she—was she strangled, like the others?”

“Garroted, Miss Ellison, with a strong wire. Yes, exactly like the others.”

“And—and was she also—mutilated?”

“Yes. I’m sorry.”

“Oh.” She felt weakness overwhelm her, and horror, and pity.

He was watching her. Apparently he saw nothing but her silence.

“With your permission, I’ll go and speak to the other servants. They probably knew her better than you did.” There was something in his tone of voice that implied she did not care. It made her angry—and guilty.

“We don’t pry into our servants’ lives, Mr. Pitt! But in case you think we are not concerned, it was I who sent Maddock for the police last night.” She coloured with anger as soon as she had said it. Why on earth was she trying to justify herself to this man? “Unfortunately you were not able to find her then!” she added sharply.

He accepted the rebuke silently, and a moment later he was gone.

Charlotte stood staring at the easel. The painting which had seemed delicate and evocative a quarter of an hour ago was now only so many gray-brown smudges on paper. Her mind was full of blurred images, dark streets, footsteps, fighting for breath, and above all fear, and the dreadful, intimate attack.

She was still staring at the easel when her mother came in. Emily’s voice floated from the hall.

“I’m sure it will look perfectly dreadful if she leaves it as loose as that. I shall appear to be quite fat! It’s so unfashionable.”

Caroline had stopped, staring at Charlotte.

“Charlotte, my dear, what is it?”

Charlotte found her eyes filling with tears. In an agony of relief she ran into her mother’s arms and almost crushed her, holding her so tightly.

“Lily. Mama, she’s been strangled, like the others. They found her in Cater Street. There’s a terrible policeman here now, this moment! He’s talking to Maddock and the servants.”

Caroline touched her hair gently. It was an infinitely soothing gesture.

“Oh dear,” she said softly. “I was so afraid of that. I never really imagined Lily had run off; I suppose I just wanted to think so because it was so much preferable to this. Your Papa will be so angry at having the police here. Does Sarah know?”

“No. She’s upstairs.”

Caroline pushed her away gently.

“Then we had better collect ourselves and prepare to face a good deal of unpleasantness. I shall have to write to Lily’s parents. It is only right that they should hear from a member of the family, someone that knew Lily. And we were responsible for her. Now go upstairs and wash your face. And you had better tell Sarah. Where did you say this policeman was?”

Inspector Pitt returned in the evening, when Edward and Dominic were home, and insisted on speaking to them all again. He was very persistent and authoritative.

“I’ve never heard of such nonsense!” Edward said furiously when Maddock came to announce him. “The fellow’s impertinence is beyond words. I shall have to speak to his superior. I will not have women involved in this sordid affair. I shall speak to him alone. Caroline, girls, please withdraw until I send Maddock for you.”

They all stood up obediently, but before they could reach the door, it opened and the untidy figure of Pitt came striding in.

“Good evening, ma’am,” he bowed to Caroline. “Evening,” he said and took in everyone else, his eyes lingering a moment longer on Charlotte, to her annoyance. Sarah turned to look at her with disgust, as if she were somehow responsible for this creature coming into the drawing room.

“The ladies are just leaving,” Edward said stiffly. “Will you be so good as to stand aside and let them pass.”

“How unfortunate,” Pitt smiled cheerfully. “I had hoped to speak to them in your presence, for moral support, as it were. But if you prefer I speak to them alone, then of course—”

“I prefer that you do not speak to them at all! They can know nothing of this affair whatsoever, and I will not have them distressed.”

“Well, of course we shall be very grateful for anything that you know, sir—”

“I know nothing either! I don’t interest myself in the romantic affairs of servant girls!” Edward snapped. “But I can tell you all that the family knows of Lily. I can tell you about her service record, her references, where her family lives, and so on. I imagine you will want to know that?”

“Yes, although I don’t suppose it’s in the least relevant. However, I do require to speak to your wife and daughters. Women are very observant, you know; and women observe other women. You would be surprised how much might miss your eye, or mine, but not theirs.”

“My wife and daughters have more to interest them than the romances of Lily Mitchell.” Edward’s face was growing redder and his hands were clenched.

Sarah moved a little closer to him.

“Really, Mr. . . .” She dismissed his name. “I assure you, I know nothing whatsoever. You would be better employed questioning Mrs. Dunphy, or Dora. If Lily confided in anyone, it would be one of them. Find this wretched man she was walking out with.”

“Oh, Mrs. Corde, we already have done. He says he left Lily at the end of the street, within sight of this house, at ten minutes before ten. He had to be back at his lodgings himself at ten o’clock, or be locked out.”

“You’ve only got his word for that,” Dominic spoke for the first time. He was leaning back in one of the chairs, looking a little flushed, but the most composed of them all. Charlotte’s heart lurched as she turned to him. He looked so calm; Papa was ridiculous beside him.

“He was in his lodging-house by ten o’clock,” Pitt replied, looking down at Dominic with a faint pucker between his eyes.

“Well, he could have killed her before ten o’clock, couldn’t he?” Dominic persisted.

“Certainly. But why should he?”

“I don’t know,” Dominic crossed his legs. “That’s up to you to find out. Why should anyone?”

“That’s right,” Sarah moved closer to Dominic, visibly allying herself with his theory. “You should be there, not here.”

“At least he had the discretion not to come in daylight,” Emily whispered to Charlotte. “Poor Sarah’s frying!”

“Don’t be spiteful,” Charlotte whispered back, although silently she agreed, and she knew Emily knew it.

“You believe it was him, do you, Mrs. Corde?” Pitt raised his eyebrows.

“Of course! Who else would it be?”

“Who indeed?”

“I think it’s perfectly obvious,” Edward found his tongue again. “They had some sort of lovers’ quarrel, and he lost his temper and strangled her. We’ll make all the arrangements for the funeral, of course. But I don’t think you need to bother us again. Maddock can tell you anything else you need to know of a practical nature.”

“Not strangled, sir, garotted.” Pitt held his hands up, pulling tight an invisible wire. “With a wire he just happened to be carrying, no doubt in case of such a contingency.”

Edward’s face was white.

“I shall report you to your superiors for impertinence!”

Charlotte felt an idiotic desire to giggle. No doubt it was hysteria.

“Did he also kill Chloe Abernathy?” Pitt enquired, “and the Hiltons’ maid as well? Or have we two hangmen loose in Cater Street?”

They stared at him in silence. He was a ludicrous figure in their quiet withdrawing room—with ludicrous, ugly, and frightening suggestions.

Charlotte felt Emily’s hand creep into hers, and she was glad to hang on to it.

No one answered Pitt.

Chapter Four

T
HE FOLLOWING DAY
was one of the worst that Charlotte could ever recall. Everyone was feeling wretched, although it showed variously in different people. Papa was shorter-tempered than usual, and very full of authority. Mama was endlessly seeing to practical details, as if sorting out the kitchen and the housework would somehow alter other events. Sarah kept repeating the comments of social acquaintances until Charlotte finally lost her temper and told her in no uncertain terms to be quiet. Dominic already was quiet, to the point of silence. Emily seemed least affected, her mind obviously on other things. The only good thing to be said was that Grandmama was still staying with Susannah, and as yet was not in a position to offer comment.

Since it was a Saturday there was no work, and no one felt like going out for any other purpose.

The vicar sent a small note, by messenger, to express his regrets.

“Very courteous of him,” Sarah said, glancing at it when her father had read it.

“It’s the least he could do,” Charlotte said irritably. The very thought of the vicar was enough to make her spit.

“You don’t expect him to come in person over a servant,” Sarah was also annoyed now. “Besides, there really isn’t anything he can do.”

Charlotte searched for an argument to that, and could not find one. She saw Dominic’s amused dark eyes on her, and felt the blood rush to her face. If only she could stop that happening! It made her feel so foolish.

Caroline came in at that moment, her face coloured from rushing, her hair a little astray. Edward looked up.

“What on earth have you been doing, my dear? You look like—there’s something on your nose.”

She brushed at it automatically, and made it worse.

Charlotte took a handkerchief and removed the mark from her. It was flour.

“Have you been cooking?” Edward asked with pained surprise. “What’s the matter with Mrs. Dunphy?”

“She’s got a headache. I’m afraid all this business has hit her very hard. She was fond of Lily, you know. Anyway, I rather like cooking. I came because I just remembered I promised to take a receipt for vegetable soup to Mrs. Harding, and I wondered if two of you would take it for me this afternoon?”

Charlotte liked Mrs. Harding. She was a sharp-tongued but very long-memoried old lady with endless recollections about all sorts of people she had known in her somewhat colourful youth, before she had married above herself, and settled to wealth and respectability. Charlotte doubted all the stories were true, but they were hugely entertaining.

“I’ll be happy to go, Mama,” she offered quickly.

“You must take Sarah or Emily with you.” Caroline looked at them both.

“I’m busy,” Emily replied. “I have sewing to do, since we are a maid short. There is linen to be mended.”

“And if Mrs. Dunphy is sick,” Sarah added, “then I shall stay at home and see if there is anything I can do for her. Perhaps I can talk with her, take her mind off it.”

Charlotte gave her a withering stare. She knew perfectly well her reasons were not to do with Mrs. Dunphy. Sarah thought Mrs. Harding was a disreputable old gossip, and she did not wish to know her socially. As far as the gossip went, she was perfectly correct. But had her stories been a little more up to date they might well have found her a readier audience.

“Charlotte doesn’t need company,” Edward said tartly. “It’s less than two miles away. Go straight there, Charlotte, and return as soon as it is civil for you to do so. I doubt there will be any need to explain. I expect the news is all over the neighbourhood. And don’t gossip! Old Mrs. Harding is an inveterate busybody. Give her the receipt, and wish her well, and then come home again.”

“I won’t have the girls walking in the street alone,” Caroline said firmly. “Either someone goes with her, or Mrs. Harding will have to wait. The streets are too dangerous.”

“Nonsense, Caroline! She’ll be perfectly safe,” Edward sat up straighter. “It’s broad daylight.”

“It was broad daylight when Mrs. Waterman’s maid was attacked!” Caroline rejoined. “I wonder you didn’t tell us about that, so we as well as the servants might have been warned.”

“My dear Caroline, where is your sense of proportion? This lunatic, whoever he is, attacks servant girls, girls of loose morals. No one could take Charlotte to be such a creature!”

“What about Chloe Abernathy? She wasn’t a servant!”

“Yes, I was surprised about her myself. I had always considered her to be proper enough, if somewhat light-headed. It shows how one can be deceived.”

“Because she was killed?” Caroline said with a lift of amazement in her voice.

“Precisely.”

That is a completely circular argument, Charlotte thought, almost forgetting herself so far as to say so. “You are saying she was killed because she was immoral, and she was immoral because she was killed!” she finished aloud.

“I am saying she was killed because she kept immoral company,” Edward looked at her with a frown, “and the fact that she was killed proves it. Are you frightened to go out alone?” This time there was concern in his voice. He was not unkind.

“Yes,” she said honestly. “I would prefer not to.”

Dominic stretched out his legs, and then stood up swiftly.

“If you like, I’ll come with you. I doubt I should be of any assistance whatsoever here, either with the linen or with Mrs. Dunphy, and certainly not in the kitchen.”

The journey with Dominic was marvellous, in spite of the heat which beat down from the August sun, and up in waves from the pavement. Mrs. Harding was delighted to see them, although for once her flow of gossip seemed to have been cut off at the source. Perhaps it was the very masculine presence of Dominic. She offered them refreshments, and they were glad to accept a lemonade before parting. She understood but regretted their need for haste; at least she said so, but Charlotte had the distinct feeling Dominic’s presence hampered her, although she obviously admired him—as indeed what woman would not?

On the way home Dominic himself had seemed a little put out at her reticence. He said he had heard she was the best gossip in the district, and was greatly disappointed in her. Charlotte tried to explain what she felt to be the reason and ended up by regaling him with the best stories she could remember, to his vast entertainment. He laughed with pure delight, and Charlotte was blissfully, painfully as happy as she had ever been.

They arrived home to find Sarah in a rage, Papa white-faced, Emily silent, and Mama absent in the kitchen.

The happiness vanished as if a door had been closed on it, though Dominic was still smiling, as if he had not felt the change.

“What’s the matter with everyone?” he asked, going over to open the French windows. “You need some air. It’s a perfect day.” Then he swung round, his face clouded. “You’re not still thinking about Lily, are you? I’m sure she wouldn’t want or expect us to stay glum for the rest of the summer.”

“This is hardly the rest of the summer, Dominic,” Sarah said tartly. “But it has nothing to do with Lily, at least not in the way you mean. The wretched police have been here again.”

Charlotte felt only anger, until she saw her father’s face. He seemed less angry than genuinely distressed.

“What for, Papa? Haven’t we told them all we know?”

He frowned, looking away from her.

“It appears they are not satisfied that it was this fellow she was walking out with or, if it was not him, then some lunatic.”

“Well, they can’t imagine it has anything to do with us,” Dominic said incredulously.

“I don’t know what they imagine,” Edward replied sharply. “I personally think they are using it as an excuse to be inquisitive, to exercise their curiosity.”

“What have they been asking?” Charlotte looked from one to the other of them. “Surely if they are impertinent we don’t have to answer them? Send them out of the house.”

“It’s all very well for you to speak!” Sarah snapped. “You were not here.”

“You could have been out, if you’d been prepared to come with me.” Charlotte was quite mild. She was delighted that Dominic had come instead, but a hint of resentment over the spoilt afternoon lingered at the back of her mind.

“Don’t worry, you haven’t escaped anything,” Sarah tossed her head a little. “They are coming back to see you.”

“I don’t know anything!”

“And Dominic.”

Charlotte turned to Edward. “Papa, what can I tell them? I never even saw Lily that day, that I can recall.” She felt a quick stab of shame. “And I didn’t know her very well at any time.”

“I don’t know what they want.” Once again Edward’s anxiety was more apparent than his irritation. “They asked all sorts of odd questions, about myself, and Maddock, and they were very keen to speak to Dominic.”

Dominic frowned, and a flicker of concern crossed his face.

“What about the other victims—apart from Lily?”

“Don’t be foolish!” Sarah said sharply. “They can hardly consider you had anything to do with it, except perhaps that you may have noticed something, some odd person hanging around the street perhaps. After all, you do travel up and down the street almost every day.”

A new and appalling thought occurred to Charlotte. Could the police possibly be idiotic, blind enough to think one of them—? Dominic and Papa were out frequently, passed Cater Street—.

Sarah saw it in her face.

“I shall soon disabuse them of that lunacy,” she said furiously. “I know Dominic far too well. He is not the sort of man even to look at servant girls, much less accost them. He is not some creature of uncontrollable passions. He is a civilized man. Such a thing would not enter into his head.”

Charlotte turned to Dominic and saw for an instant in his face a look of hurt, of deep frustration, as if he had glimpsed and then lost something of inestimable value. She did not know then what momentary dream of sensuality or danger he had seen, and missed.

It was just over an hour later when Pitt returned, this time bringing with him a man Charlotte had not seen before, a man who was very briefly introduced to her as Sergeant Flack. He was a slight man of hardly average height, but looked even smaller beside Pitt. He remained absolutely silent, but his eyes wandered all over the room with consuming interest.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Pitt,” Charlotte said calmly. She was determined not to be ruffled by him, and to dismiss him as soon as possible. “I’m sorry you have taken the trouble to return, since I’m quite sure I can tell you nothing more. However, of course I will answer any questions you wish to ask.” Perhaps that was a little rash. She must not let him be impertinent.

“You would be surprised what is sometimes useful,” Pitt replied. He turned to his sergeant and briefly directed him to the kitchen to question Maddock, Mrs. Dunphy, and Dora.

He looked back to Charlotte. He seemed to be totally at ease, which in itself was irritating. He ought to have been a little . . . a little impressed. After all, he was a mere policeman and in the house of those considerably superior to him socially.

“What is it you wish to know?” she said coldly.

He smiled charmingly.

“The name and whereabouts of the lunatic who is garotting young women in the streets of this neighbourhood,” he replied. “Of course that is presuming it is one person, and not a crime, and then another crime in imitation.”

She was surprised into facing him, meeting his eyes.

“Whatever do you mean?”

“That sometimes people hear of a crime, especially if it is a gruesome one, and it gives them the idea to solve their own problems in the same manner: to dispose of someone that is in the way, from whose death they could benefit, financially or otherwise, and,” he snapped his fingers, “you have a second murder, or a third, or whatever. The second murderer hopes the first will be blamed.”

“You make it sound so matter-of-fact,” she said with distaste.

“It is a matter of fact, Miss Ellison. Whether it is this fact or not, I have to enquire—but not until I have exhausted some of the more obvious possibilities.”

“What possibilities do you mean?” she asked and then wished she had not. She did not desire to encourage him. And to be honest, she was a little afraid of the answer.

“Three young women have been garotted in this area over the last few months. The first thing that comes to mind is that there is a maniac loose.”

“I would have thought that was the answer,” she said with some relief. “Why should you imagine any other? Why don’t you take your enquiries to the sort of place where you will find such people—I mean the sort of people who are likely to—” she fumbled for the exact phrase she wanted “—the criminal classes!”

“The underworld?” he smiled a little derisively. There was bitter amusement and a little patronage in his tone. “What sort of a place do you imagine the underworld is, Miss Ellison? Something I find by opening a sewer manhole?”

“No, of course not!” she snapped. “I have no knowledge of it myself, of course. It hardly comes within my social sphere! But I know perfectly well that there is a world of criminal classes whose standards are totally different—” she raked him up and down with a withering stare, “—at least from mine!”

“Oh, very different, Miss Ellison,” he agreed, still smiling, but there was a hardness in his eyes. “Although whether you are referring to moral standards, or standards of living you didn’t say. But perhaps it doesn’t matter—they are not as far apart as the words imply. In fact I have come to think they are usually symbiotic.”

“Symbiotic?” she said in disbelief.

He misunderstood her, supposing she did not know the meaning of the word.

“Each dependent upon the other, Miss Ellison. A relationship of coexistence, of mutual feeding, interdependence.”

“I know what the word means!” she said furiously. “I question your choice of it under the circumstances. Poverty does not necessarily produce crime. There are plenty of poor people who are as honest as I.”

At that he broke into a genuine grin.

“You find that amusing, Mr. Pitt?” she said icily. “I spoke forgetting that you do not know me well enough for that to be any standard. But at least you know that I do not garotte young women in the street!”