Belgrave Square (33 page)

“No sir, not that I knows of. If you want ’im we can send a message. I spec’s ’e’s ’round Clerkenwell way. Far as I know ’e’s workin’ out o’ there lately.”

“No—no, I don’t want him. I just wondered. You’d better send Mr. Urban up.”

“Yessir, right away sir.”

Drummond had barely sat behind his desk when there was a sharp knock on the door, and as soon as he spoke, Urban came in. He looked pale and angry, more tense than Drummond could remember seeing him in the short time since he moved from Rotherhithe.

“What is it?”

Urban stood stiffly, his face strained, his hair untidy as if he had recently pushed his fingers through it.

“I’ve just been informed, sir, that the director of public prosecutions has written to the commissioner of police to inquire if Constables Crombie and Allardyce were committing perjury when they gave testimony against Mr. Horatio Osmar in the matter of his being accused of public indecency—sir!”

“What?” Drummond was stunned. He had been half expecting something unpleasant on the Weems case, some other public figure involved, or worse still, another member of the police. This was totally unforeseen, and ridiculous. “That’s absurd!”

“Yes sir, I know.” Urban’s expression did not change. “There was no explanation, simply a formal letter; the director of public prosecutions seems to be taking it all quite seriously. We have to make a proper response, sir, a formal answer, and then I presume there will be an investigation and possibly charges.”

Drummond put his hands up to his face. “If this wasn’t happening I would find difficulty believing it. What on earth is the man dreaming of?” He looked up at Urban. “I suppose you are quite sure? There’s no possibility Crombie and Allardyce were mistaken, saw something a bit odd and leaped to a conclusion without grounds?”

“No sir,” Urban replied without hesitation. “I asked them that. They are quite sure he had his trousers undone and she had her blouse open at the front and they were struggling around with each other in a way likely to cause offense to anyone passing. Whatever they were actually doing, there is no doubt what it looked like to an average person close enough to see them at all.”

“What a damned nuisance no one thought to ask the fellow who brought in the case. He might have corroborated it.”

“Or not,” Urban pointed out.

“Well if he hadn’t we’d have dropped the charges in the first place,” Drummond said testily. “All right. I’ll deal with it. You were involved from the beginning, you’d better leave it alone now. I’ll see they send someone from another station.”

“Yes sir.” Urban still sounded angry, but he accepted the inevitable.

“Damn!” Drummond said softly when he had gone. Why were they wasting good men’s time on such idiotic things when there were real and dreadful crimes to solve, and even rising violence to try to prevent. Although thank heaven there had been nothing this year to equal the horror and subsequent panic of the Trafalgar Square riots two years ago which had come to be known as Bloody Sunday. But the ugly rumors of anarchists and other fomenters of treason were still there just under the surface.

Drummond tried to think of anything he knew about Horatio Osmar. There was little enough, an undistinguished government career. His name had seldom been mentioned in connection with any major legislation, and even when it had it was only as a supporter or opponent, never as having innovated anything. He was a rather self-important little
bon viveur.

What on earth made him think he could get away with it? Why was he now having questions asked in the House, and the Home Secretary upsetting the director of public prosecutions and the police commissioner and trying to raise a scandal about police perjury? Why did anyone take any notice of him? Many people protested innocence; it was instinctive. Others were not able to pursue it this far. Why Osmar?

What would Eleanor Byam think if she knew he was spending his time not pursuing the murderer of William Weems as he had promised her, but trying to find out beyond doubt whether two of his young constables had witnessed an ex-junior minister behaving indecently on a park bench, or if they had perhaps overreacted to a rather silly scene of scuffling around trying to open a locket around a young woman’s neck?

Byam had brought Drummond in to help him in case he were accused of murder. Osmar had brought the D.P.P. in for a case of public indecency. But had it been done in the same fashion, in the name of the same brotherhood? It was a thought which brought a chill to his body and a rising feeling that was not unlike sickness. What was he, or any of them, being used for? He had assumed that Osmar was guilty.
He had equally assumed that Byam was not. In his own mind Osmar’s use of influence was corrupt. He had considered himself to be helping a brother in extreme difficulty.

But what else did the Inner Circle do? These were only two very dissimilar instances. What were all the others? Who judged what was corrupt and what was honorable? And who was at the heart of it?

A little before three in the afternoon there was another knock on his door. As soon as he spoke, it opened to admit a youngish man, perhaps in his late thirties, handsome in a most unusual fashion. His face in repose might have been considered very ordinary, nose much too bony and prominent, eyes wide set and very fine, thick hair waving back from a good brow, cheeks very lean. It was his mouth which was remarkable, delicate lipped, sensuous, and when he smiled possessed of extraordinary, illuminating charm. It was a face about which Drummond instinctively had profound reservations, and yet he wanted to like it. It should have been a strong face, with those remarkable bones, and yet there was something in the balance of it that made him doubt.

“Superintendent Latimer,” the man introduced himself. “I have been sent over from the Yard to look into this miserable matter of the two constables who say they saw Horatio Osmar misbehaving on a park bench.”

“Latimer?” Drummond said with a chill passing through him like a sudden shiver. “Clarence Latimer?”

The man’s face remained perfectly bright. “Yes. Do you know me?”

Drummond swallowed and forced himself to smile. “Heard your name.” He shrugged. He was stung by the man’s imputation that the constables’ word was doubtful, but he kept his voice level.

“If they say they saw him, then I accept that they did,” he said with only a hint of sharpness. “They are both reliable men who have never previously overstated their case.”

“Oh personally I don’t doubt it,” Latimer agreed easily. “But officially I have to look into it. I’ll begin by speaking to them. Are they around the station, or should I send to have them come in?”

“No need.” Drummond’s mind was still racing with
thoughts to tell Pitt. It was his worst fear about the list realized. “We were expecting you. They are on duties around the station, and you can see them as you wish. I’ll be surprised if they tell you anything beyond what they have said all along.”

“So shall I, but I have to ask.” Latimer shrugged. “Never know, they might come up with some detail that pushes it a little one way, or the other. Then I’ll find this wretched girl, what’s her name?”

“Beulah Giles.”

“Right. May I send someone to bring her here?”

“Certainly.”

“Good. From what I’ve heard, nobody has really questioned her so far. Is that really so?”

Drummond kept his mind on the subject with difficulty. “Yes. The magistrate threw the case out before she was called to the stand.”

“Well, well. Pity. She might have cleared up the whole matter.”

“Quite. That is very possibly why she was not called,” Drummond said acidly.

Latimer flashed him a broad, beautiful smile. “No doubt.” And he excused himself and left.

Drummond took a piece of paper and wrote a brief note to Pitt with Clarence Latimer’s name, rank and whereabouts. He left it sealed, with the desk sergeant, to be given to Pitt the first moment he set foot in the station.

At four o’clock the hansom arrived carrying Miss Beulah Giles, this afternoon dressed in a cotton print gown considerably lower at the bosom than the one she wore on her visit to the courtroom. By then, the Bow Street station was more than fully occupied with three recently arrested street robbers, with violence, a pickpocket caught in the act with his accomplice, and a man who had been charged with setting up an illegal cock fight. There was no room in which Latimer could interview Miss Giles, and he declined to keep her waiting for an indefinite period until there should be a suitable space. He considered the best alternative was to get back into another hansom and take her to Scotland Yard where his own office would be available, and he could be assured of quiet
and suitable surroundings. At the time no one thought anything further about the matter.

When Pitt arrived at Bow Street after having spent a miserable morning at Clerkenwell, he was immediately handed Drummond’s note. He read it with a sinking in the bottom of his stomach, but no surprise. He knew there was a Latimer at the Yard, he had not known his given name. Now he had no alternative but to begin his investigation of him.

As with the others, he started with his home. He already knew from the list where he lived; the difficulty was to think of an acceptable excuse for calling. Latimer was his senior. If he was clumsy or offensive he could very well find himself in a very unpleasant situation. Duplicity would inevitably be discovered unless he were extremely fortunate, and could find evidence to clear Latimer almost straightaway. The only alternative he could think of was to tell a great deal of the truth, simply to twist his own part in it a little.

Accordingly he arrived at Beaufort Gardens in Knights-bridge. It was a discreet residential area, quiet in the patchy afternoon sun, parlormaids in stuff dresses and crisp aprons making ready to receive callers, children out walking with nursemaids, little girls very pretty and sedate in white, lace-trimmed pinafores over their dresses, little boys in sailor suits, hopping up and down, itching to be allowed to run.

A fishmonger’s boy pushed a cart along the roadway, whistling cheerfully. A postman came past with the third delivery of mail. Pitt crossed the street just before an open landau came around the corner, its mistress on her way to pay a visit to some even more elegant address. The coachman and footmen wore livery of frock coats, striped waistcoats, shining top hats with black leather cockades, and brilliantly polished boots. A spotted Dalmation dog trotted in step behind, its brass collar and insignia shining in the sun.

Pitt smiled briefly, but without pleasure.

Superintendent Latimer was doing very well for himself to live in such an area. There was the possibility, of course, that he had either inherited money or married a woman of substantial means. Both were circumstances Pitt would have to inquire into. Preliminary questions in Bow Street had elicited nothing, but he had not expected they might since Latimer was based at the Yard.

He rang the front doorbell at number 43, and after a moment the door was opened by a housemaid in a smart uniform. At least, Pitt judged her to be a housemaid; he noticed a feather duster tucked discreetly behind the hall table, as if she had put it down so she might change roles to answer the door. It was a small thing, but a sign that Mrs. Latimer cared very much about appearances. She lived in a street where most people could afford a separate parlormaid, and she could not.

“Yes sir?” the maid said politely. She looked no more than seventeen or eighteen, but of course she had probably been in service for four or five years and was well used to her job.

“Good morning,” Pitt replied in a businesslike manner. “My name is Pitt. I apologize for disturbing Mrs. Latimer so early, but certain matters have arisen which it is necessary I discuss with her. Will you be kind enough to inform her that I am here?” He produced his card, on which he had added by hand his police rank.

The girl colored in annoyance at herself for not having remembered to bring the silver tray on which visitors could place their cards, but she had been caught by surprise. She had not been expecting social calls for at least another thirty minutes. There were exact times for the well-bred to do such things, and Mrs. Latimer’s acquaintances knew what to do, and what not to do. She took the card in her hand.

“Yes sir. If you’ll wait here I’ll ask if Mrs. Latimer will see you,” she said with disapproval.

“Of course,” he agreed. Either there was no morning room, or else it was not available.

She scurried away and he looked around the hall. Architecturally it was spacious, but it was filled by its furniture and pictures, a stag’s head on the wall, a stuffed stoat in a glass case on a table to the right, and two stuffed birds in another case to the left, a large hat and umbrella stand and a magnificent carved table with a mirror behind it. The carpets were also excellent and in very fine condition. They could not have been more than a year or two old. They were all signs of affluence.

Was the rest of the house so richly furnished? Or was this the part which visitors saw, and had been dressed accordingly,
at the expense of the private rooms? He knew from long experience that hallways and reception rooms were indications of aspiration, of how people wished to be perceived, not of reality.

Mrs. Latimer came down the staircase and he was aware of her long before she had reached the bottom. She was a remarkably striking woman, slender, of average height but with hair so very fair it seemed almost luminous as it caught the light from the chandeliers. Her skin was unusually pale, and as flawless as a child’s. Indeed her wide eyes and light brows gave her face a look of innocence astounding in a grown woman, and Pitt found his planned words fleeing from him as too brusque and worldly for this ethereal creature.

She came down the last steps and stopped some distance from him. She was dressed in a muslin gown of lilacs and blues on white. It was extremely elegant, but he found it jarring on his taste because it seemed so impractical, so designed merely to be gazed at rather than for any physical or purposeful use, as if the being within it were not entirely human. He preferred a woman more immediately flesh and blood, like himself.