Brunswick Gardens (6 page)

“No, I can’t.”

“And you don’t have either, do you.” That was a challenge, a statement she desperately wanted to be true.

“Not so far.”

“Good! I’ll get the curate for you.” She went out with quick, light steps, and Pitt was left alone to turn over in his mind the peculiar situation in which he found himself. It seemed, from Tryphena’s evidence, and that of the maid and the valet, as if Unity Bellwood had quarreled violently with Ramsay Parmenter, and after being highly abusive, stormed out of the room in temper. He had followed her, continuing the quarrel, and there had been some sort of struggle at the top of the stairs. She had called out, and then had fallen with such impetus she had pitched right to the bottom and broken her neck. It was absurd to enter into a physical struggle over issues of theories of God and the origin of man. It was the last way on earth to prove either argument true. Any bodily conflict between a middle-aged clergyman and a young female scholar was unseemly and held elements of farce. Clarice, the one person who disbelieved it, was certainly right.

And yet it seemed undeniably what had happened.

He did not hold any hope that the young curate would be any use whatever. He would probably support Ramsay Parmenter, out of professional and religious loyalty, and disclaim any knowledge of the whole matter.

The door opened and a startlingly handsome man came in. He was slender, almost Pitt’s height, dark haired with fine aquiline features and a mouth of humor and sensitivity. He was wearing a clerical collar.

“Hello, Thomas,” he said quietly, closing the door behind him.

Pitt was so stunned for a moment he could not find speech.
The man was Dominic Corde, the widower of Pitt’s wife’s sister, who had been murdered nearly ten years before, when Charlotte and Pitt had first met. If Dominic had not remarried, then presumably they were still brothers-in-law.

Dominic walked over to the chair by the fireplace and sat down. He looked noticeably older than when Pitt had last seen him. He must be at least forty now. There were fine lines around his brow and around his eyes. The furrows from nose to mouth were deeper, and there were a few gray hairs at his temples. The brashness and the smoothness of youth were gone. Pitt thought, with some reluctance, that it became him. He had not entirely forgotten that when he and Charlotte had met, Charlotte had been in love with Dominic.

“I can’t believe it,” Dominic said gravely, watching Pitt. “Ramsay Parmenter is a serious and compassionate man dedicated to learning and a life in the church. Unity Bellwood could be enough to try the patience of a saint, at times, but it is outside reality to imagine that Reverend Parmenter would deliberately have pushed her downstairs. There has to be some other explanation.”

“Accident?” Pitt asked, finding his tongue at last but still standing. “How well do you know him?” What he meant, what was racing through his head, was: What on earth are you doing here in this house, taking holy orders? You, of all people! You who were married to Sarah and seduced maids and at the very least flirted inexcusably with other young women.

Dominic almost smiled, but the smile died on his lips before it was real.

“Ramsay Parmenter helped me when I was close to despair,” he said earnestly. “His strength and patience, his calm belief and endless kindness, brought me back from the brink of self-destruction and set me on the best path possible. For the first time I can remember, I am looking towards a future with purpose and use to others. Ramsay Parmenter taught me that—and by example, not word.”

He looked up at Pitt.

“I know it is your job to learn what happened here this morning, and you are honor-bound to do that, wherever it leads you. But you want the truth, and that will not include Ramsay Parmenter indulging in violence against another person, even Unity, no matter how far she provoked him.” He leaned forward a little, his face creased with urgency. “Think about it, Thomas! If you are a rational man and are trying to persuade someone of the reality and the purpose and the beauty of God, the very last thing you would do is attack them. It makes no conceivable sense.”

“Religious emotion very seldom makes sense,” Pitt reminded him, sitting in the opposite chair. “Didn’t you have to study that before you were allowed to wear that collar?”

Dominic flushed very slightly. “Yes, of course I did. But this is 1891, not the sixteenth century. We are in an age of reason, and Ramsay Parmenter is one of the most reasonable men I have ever known. When you have spoken with him more, you will know that, too. I cannot tell you anything about what happened. I was in my bedroom reading, preparing to go out and visit parishioners.”

“Did you hear Miss Bellwood call out?”

“No. My door was closed, and my room is in the other wing of the house.”

“Mrs. Whickham seems to believe her father could be guilty. And both the maid and the valet heard Unity call out his name,” Pitt pointed out.

Dominic sighed. “Tryphena will be much distressed at Unity’s death,” he said sadly. “They were very fond of each other. She admired Unity enormously. In fact, I think she adopted quite a few of Unity’s beliefs.” He took a deep breath. “The servants I cannot explain. I can only say that they must be mistaken. I don’t know how.” He was obviously confused by their evidence. He searched for something to explain it away and found nothing. He looked deeply unhappy.

Pitt could understand torn loyalties, the sense of shock at sudden death. It left most people physically shaken, emotionally raw, and mentally lacking the ability to think with their normal ease or to follow reason.

“I am not going to arrest him,” he said aloud. “There is insufficient evidence for that. But I must pursue it. There is too much to indicate murder for me to walk away.”

“Murder!” Dominic was ashen. He stared across at Pitt with eyes almost black. “That’s …” He dropped his head into his hands. “Oh, God … not again!”

For a moment both of them remembered Sarah, and the other dead women in Cater Street, and the fear and the suspicion, the crumbling of relationships and the pain.

“I’m sorry,” Pitt said, barely above a whisper. “There is no choice.”

Dominic did not speak.

The coals settled in the fire.

2

A
FTER PITT LEFT
, Dominic Corde was acutely aware of the distress which at least to some extent had been masked during the presence of strangers. Unity’s body had been removed. The police had seen everything they needed to and notes had been taken of the scene. Now the house was unnaturally quiet. The curtains and blinds were closed in decent respect for death, and to signify to all passersby and potential callers that this was now a house of mourning.

No one had wanted to continue with normal pursuits until the last formalities were completed. It looked callous—or worse, as if they might be afraid of something. Now they stood in the hall, self-conscious and unhappy.

Clarice was the first to speak.

“Isn’t it absurd? So much has happened and yet everything looks the same. Before this, I had a dozen things to do. Now every one of them seems rather pointless.”

“Nothing is the same!” Tryphena said angrily. “Unity has been murdered in our house by a member of our family. Nothing is ever going to be the same again. Of course everything you were going to do is pointless! How could it have meaning?”

“We don’t really know what happened …” Mallory began
tentatively, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “I think we should not rush into saying things …”

Tryphena glared at him, her eyes red-rimmed, the tears standing out in them.

“If you don’t know, it is because you refuse to look at it. And if you start preaching to me I shall scream. If you come up with your usual platitudes about the mysteries of God and abiding God’s will for us, I swear I’ll throw something at you, and it will be the heaviest and sharpest thing I can find.” She was struggling for breath. “Unity had more courage and honesty than all the rest of you put together. Nobody can ever replace her!” She turned on her heel and ran across the mosaic floor and up the stairs, her heels loud on the wood.

“You might,” Clarice murmured, presumably referring to Tryphena’s replacing Unity. “I think you’d do it rather well. You’ve got just the same sort of wild ideas and you never listen to anyone else or look where you’re going. In fact, you’d be perfect.”

“Really, Clarice!” Mallory said impatiently. “That is uncalled for. She is distraught.”

“She’s always distraught about something,” Clarice muttered. “She lives her life being distraught. She was beside herself when her marriage with Spencer was arranged. Then when she decided he was a bully and a bore, she was even more beside herself. And she still wasn’t satisfied when he died.”

“For heaven’s sake, Clarice!” Mallory was aghast. “Have you no decency?”

Clarice ignored him.

“Aren’t you distressed?” Dominic asked her quietly.

She looked at him, and the anger melted out of her face. “Yes, of course I am,” she admitted. “And I didn’t even like her.” She looked at her father, who was standing near the newel post. He was still very pale, but he seemed to have regained at least some of his composure. He was usually a man of great calm, and reason always prevailed over emotion, self-indulgence,
or any kind of indiscipline. So far he had avoided meeting anyone’s eyes. Naturally he was aware of what Stander and Braithwaite had told the police, and he must be wondering what the rest of his family made of the extraordinary charge. Now he could no longer put off some kind of communication.

“I don’t think there is anything new to be said.” His voice was husky, thin, totally lacking its usual timbre, his face white. “I don’t know what happened to Miss Bellwood. I sincerely trust that no one else in the house does either. We had best continue with our duties as far as possible in the circumstances, and bear ourselves with dignity. I shall be upstairs in my study.” And without waiting for any reply, he turned and left them, walking with measured and rather heavy tread.

Dominic watched him with a mixture of sadness and guilt because he knew of no way to help him. His admiration for Ramsay Parmenter was profound, and it had never been long absent from his mind. Ramsay had found him at a time of acute distress—
despair
would not be too strong a word for it. It was Ramsay’s patience and strength he had leaned on, and which had helped him eventually to find his own. Now, when Ramsay needed someone to believe in him and to offer a hand to lift and sustain him, Dominic could think of nothing to say or do.

“I suppose I might as well continue my studies, too,” Mallory remarked miserably. “I don’t even know what time it is. I don’t know why the maid muffled the clock. It’s not as if a member of the family were dead.” He shook his head and walked away.

Clarice left without explanation, going to the side door to the garden and closing it behind her, leaving Vita and Dominic alone.

“Did I do the right thing?” Vita asked softly, her voice little more than a whisper as she looked up at him. She was an extraordinary woman, not beautiful in an accepted way—her eyes were too large, her mouth too wide, her whole face a little short.
And yet the longer one looked at her, the more beautiful she became, until the classic features of other women seemed too thin, too elongated, possessed of a uniformity which became tedious. “Should I have told that policeman nothing?”

He wanted to comfort her. She was in a most appalling situation, a dilemma no one should have to face. With the faith he had found in these last years, how could he advocate lying, even to protect a husband? The greatest loyalty of all must be to the right. That was never a question. The difficulty was in knowing what was the right, which of all the ways was the least evil. For that, one needed to be able to see the outcome, and too often it was impossible.

“Did you hear her cry out?” he asked.

“Of course I did.” She looked at him with clear, steady eyes. “Do you imagine I would say such a thing if I had not? I did not mean it was not true, I meant should I have kept silent?”