Anne Perry - Belgrave Square

“So you paid him.” Drummond did not frame it as a question, the answer had already been given.

“Yes,” Byam agreed. “He didn’t ask a lot, twenty pounds a month.”

Pitt concealed his smile. Twenty pounds a month would have beggared him, and any other policeman except those like Drummond with private means. He wondered what Drummond thought of the yawning difference between Byam’s world and most men’s, or if he was even aware of it.

“And do you believe Weems might have kept this letter, and record of your payments in some way traceable to you?” Drummond said with slight puzzlement.

Byam bit his lip. “I know he did. He took some pains to tell me so, as a safeguard to himself. He said he had records of every payment I had made him. Whatever I said, no one would be likely to believe it was interest upon a debt-I am not in a position to require loans from usurers. If I wished further capital I should go to a bank, like any other gentleman. I don’t gamble and I have more than sufficient means to live according to my taste. No-” For the first time he looked at Pitt. “Weems made it very plain he had written out a clear record of precisely what I had paid him, the letter itself, together with all the details he knew of Laura Anstiss’s death and my part in it-or what he chose to interpret as my part. That is why I come to you for your help.” His eyes were very direct. “I did not kill Weems, indeed I have done him no harm whatever, nor ever threatened to. But I should be surprised if the local police do not feel compelled to investigate me for themselves, and I have no proof that I was elsewhere at the time. I don’t know precisely what hour he was killed, but there are at least ninety minutes yesterday late evening when I was alone here in the library. No servant came or went.” He glanced briefly at the window. “And as you may observe it would be no difficulty to climb out of this bay window into the garden, and hence the street, and take a hansom to wherever I wished.”

“I see,” Drummond agreed, and indeed it was perfectly obvious. The windows were wide and high, and not more than three feet above the ground. Any reasonably agile man, or woman for that matter, could have climbed out, and back in again, without difficulty, or rousing attention. It would be simple to look out far enough to make sure no one was passing outside, and the whole exercise could be accomplished in a matter of seconds.

Byam was watching them. “You see, Drummond, I am in a predicament. In the name of fellowship”-he invested the word with a fractionally heavier intonation than usual-“I ask you to come to my aid in this matter, and use your good offices to further my cause.” It was a curious way of phrasing it, almost as if he were using a previously prescribed formula.

“Yes,” Drummond said slowly. “Of course. I-I’ll do all I can. Pitt will take over the investigation from the Clerkenwell police. That can be arranged.”

Byam looked up quickly. “You know through whom?”

“Of course I do,” Drummond said a trifle sharply, and Pitt had a momentary flash of being excluded from some understanding between them, as if the words had more meaning than the surface exchange.

Byam relaxed fractionally. “I am in your debt.” He looked at Pitt directly again. “If there is anything further I can tell you, Inspector, please call upon me at any time. If it has to be in my office in the Treasury, I would be obliged if you exercised discretion.”

“Of course,” Pitt agreed. “I shall simply leave my name. Perhaps you could answer a few questions now, sir, and save the necessity of disturbing you again?”

Byam’s eyes widened almost imperceptibly as if the immediacy took him aback, but he did not argue.

“If you wish.”

Pitt sat forward a little. “Did you pay Weems on request, or on a regular and prearranged basis?”

“On a regular basis. Why?”

Beside Pitt, Drummond shifted position a fraction, sitting back into the cushions.

“If Weems was a blackmailer, you may not have been the only victim,” Pitt pointed out courteously. “He might have used the same pattern for others as well.”

A flicker of annoyance crossed Byam’s face at his own stupidity.

“I see. Yes, I paid him on the first day of the month, in gold coin.”

“How?”

“How?” Byam repeated with a frown. “I told you, in gold coin!”

“In person, or by messenger?” Pitt clarified.

“In person, of course. I have no wish to raise my servants’ curiosity by dispatching them with a bag of gold to a usurer!”

“To Clerkenwell?”

“Yes.” Byam’s fine eyes widened. “To his house in Cyrus Street.”

“Interesting-”

“Is it? I fail to see how.”

“Weems felt no fear of you, or he would not have allowed you to know both his name and his whereabouts,” Pitt explained. “He could perfectly easily have acted through an intermediary. Blackmailers are not usually so forthright.”

The irritation smoothed out of Byam’s expression.

“No, I suppose it is remarkable,” he conceded. “I had not considered it. It does seem unnecessarily rash. Perhaps some other victim was not so restrained as I?” There was a lift of hope in his voice and he regarded Pitt with something close to appreciation.

“Was that the only time you went to Cyrus Street, sir?” Pitt pursued.

Drummond drew in his breath, but then changed his mind and said nothing.

“Certainly,” Byam replied crisply. “I had no desire to see the man except when it was forced upon me.”

“Did you ever have any conversation with him that you can recall?” Pitt went on, disregarding his tone and its implications. “Anything at all that might bear on where he obtained information about you, or anyone else? Any other notable people he might have had dealings with, either usurious or extortionate?”

A shadow of a smile hovered over Byam’s lips, but whether at the thought or at Pitt’s use of words it was impossible to tell.

“I am afraid not. I simply gave him the money and left as soon as I could. The man was a leech, despicable in every way. I refused to indulge in conversation with him.” His face creased with contempt-Pitt thought not only for Weems, but for himself also. “Now I suppose it might have been an advantage if I had. I’m sorry to be of so little use.”

Pitt rose to his feet. “It was hardly foreseeable,” he said with equally dry humor. “Thank you, my lord.”

“What are you going to do?” Byam asked, then instantly his features reflected annoyance, but it was too late to withdraw the question; his weakness was apparent.

“Go to the Clerkenwell police station,” Pitt replied without looking at Drummond.

Slowly Drummond stood up also. He and Byam faced each other in silence for a moment, both seemed on the verge of speech which did not come. Perhaps the understanding was sufficient without it. Then Byam simply said thank you and held out his hand. Drummond accepted it, and with Byam giving Pitt only the acknowledgment required by civility, they took their leave. They were shown out by the same footman, who was now considerably more courteous.

In another hansom clopping along out of the quiet avenues of Belgravia towards the teeming, noisy streets of Clerkenwell, Pitt asked the blunt questions he would have to have answered if there was to be any chance of success.

“Who do you know, sir, that you can have a murder case taken away from the local Clerkenwell station without questions asked?”

Drummond looked acutely uncomfortable.

“There are things I cannot answer you, Pitt.” He looked straight ahead at the blank inside wall of the cab. “You will have to accept my assurance that it can be done.”