Anne Perry - Highgate Rise

“Thank you, Josiah. It is a relief to me to know you will be there to sustain Prudence.”

“Of course,” Hatch agreed. “It is a man’s godly duty to support women through their times of grief and affliction. They are naturally weaker, and more sensitive to such things. It is their gentleness and the purity of their minds which make them so perfectly suited to motherhood and the nurturing of tender youth, so we must thank God for it. I remember dear Bishop Worlingham saying so much to that effect when I was a young man.”

He did not look at any of them, but to some distance of his own memory. “I shall never cease to be grateful for the time in my youth I spent with him.” A spasm of pain crossed his face. “My own father’s refusal to allow me to enter the church was almost offset by that great man’s tutelage of me in the ways of the spirit and the path of true Christianity.”

He looked at his wife. “Your grandfather, my dear, was as close to a saint as we are like to see in this poor world. He is very sadly missed-sadly indeed. He would have known precisely how to deal with a loss like this, what to say to each of us to explain divine wisdom so we should all be at peace with it.”

“Indeed-indeed,” Clitheridge said inadequately.

Hatch looked at Lindsay. “Before your time, sir, which is your misfortune. Bishop Augustus Worlingham was quite remarkable, a great Christian gentleman and benefactor to uncounted men and women, both materially and spiritually. His influence was incalculable.” He leaned forward a fraction, his face creased with earnestness. “No one can say how many are now following a righteous path because of his life here on this earth. I know of dozens myself.” He stared at Lindsay. “The Misses Wycombe, all three of them, went to nurse the sick entirely on his inspiration, and Mr. Bartford took the cloth and set up a mission in Africa. No one can measure the domestic happiness resulting from his counsel on the proper place and duties of women in the home. A far wider area than merely Highgate has been blessed by his life …”

Lindsay looked nonplussed, but did not interrupt. Perhaps he could think of nothing adequate to say.

Shaw clenched his teeth and looked at the ceiling.

Mrs. Hatch bit her lip and glanced nervously at Shaw.

Hatch plunged on, a new eagerness in his voice, his eyes bright. “No doubt you have heard of the window we are dedicating to him in St. Anne’s Church? It is planned already and we need only a little more money. It is a representation of the bishop himself, as the prophet Jeremiah, teaching the people from the Old Testament; with angels at his shoulders.”

Shaw’s jaw clenched, and he refrained from saying anything with apparent difficulty.

“Yes-yes, I heard,” Lindsay said hastily. He was patently embarrassed. He glanced at Shaw, now moving as if he could barely contain the pent-up energy inside him. “I am sure it will be a beautiful window, and much admired.”

“That is hardly the point,” Hatch said sharply, his mouth puckering with anger. “Beauty is not at issue, my dear sir. It is the upliftment of souls. It is the saving of lives from sin and ignorance, it is to remind the faithful what journey it is we make, and to what end.” He shook his head a little as if to rid himself of the immediacy of the very solid materiality around him. “Bishop Worlingham was a righteous man, with a great understanding of the order of things, our place in God’s purpose. We permit his influence to be lost at our peril. This window will be a monument to him, towards which people will raise their eyes every Sunday, and through which God’s holy light will pour in upon them.”

“For heaven’s sake, man, the light would come through whatever window you put in the wall,” Shaw snapped at last. “In fact you’d get most of it if you stood outside in the graveyard in the fresh air.”

“I was speaking figuratively,” Hatch replied with suppressed fury in his eyes. “Must you see everything in such earthbound terms? At least in this terrible time of bereavement, lift your soul to eternal things.” He blinked fiercely, his lips white and his voice trembling. “God knows, this is dreadful enough.”

The momentary quarrel vanished and grief replaced anger. Shaw stood motionless, the first time he had been totally still since Pitt had arrived.

“Yes-I-” He could not bring himself to apologize. “Yes, of course. The police are here. It was arson.”

“What?” Hatch was aghast. The blood fled from his face and he swayed a little on his feet. Lindsay moved towards him in case he should fall. Prudence swung back and held out her arms, then the meaning of what Shaw had said struck her and she also stood appalled.

“Arson! You mean someone set fire to the house intentionally?”

“That is right.”

“So it was”-she swallowed, composing herself with difficulty-“murder.”

“Yes.” Shaw put his hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry, my dear. But that is what the police are here for.”

For the first time both she and Hatch turned their attention to Pitt with a mixture of alarm and distaste. Hatch squared his shoulders and addressed Pitt with difficulty, ignoring Murdo.

“Sir, there is nothing whatsoever that we can tell you. If indeed it was deliberate, then look to some vagabond. In the meantime, leave us to bear our grief in private, in the name of humanity.”

It was late and Pitt was tired, hungry and weary of pain, the stench of stale smoke, and the itch of ash inside his clothes. He had no more questions to ask. He had seen the forensic evidence and learned what little there was to be concluded from it. It was no vagabond responsible; it was carefully laid with intent to destroy, probably to kill-but by whom? Either way the answer would lie in the hearts of the people who knew Stephen and Clemency Shaw, perhaps someone he had already seen, or heard mentioned.

“Yes sir,” he agreed with a sense of relief. “Thank you for your attention.” He said this last to Shaw and Lindsay. “When I learn anything I shall inform you.”

“What?” Shaw screwed up his face. “Oh-yes, of course. Goodnight-er-Inspector.”

Pitt and Murdo withdrew and a few minutes later were walking up the quiet street by the light of Murdo’s lantern, back towards Highgate Police Station, and for Pitt a long hansom ride home.

“Do you reckon it was Mrs. Shaw or the doctor they were after?” Murdo asked after they had gone a couple of hundred yards and the night wind was blowing with a touch of frost in their faces.

“Either,” Pitt replied. “But if it was Mrs. Shaw, then it seems so far only Mr. and Mrs. Dalgetty, and the good doctor himself, knew she was at home.”

“Lot of people might want to kill a doctor, I suppose,” Murdo said thoughtfully. “I imagine doctors get to know a lot of folks’ secrets, one way or another.”

“Indeed,” Pitt agreed, shivering and quickening his pace a little. “And if that is so, the doctor may know who it is-and they may try again.”

Charlotte had done half the linen and her arm was tired with the weight of the flatiron. She had stitched three pillowcases and mended Jemima’s best dress. Now she had stuffed it in her needlework basket and pushed it all away where it could not be seen, at least not at a casual glance, which was the most Pitt would give the corner of the room when he came in.

It was already nearly nine o’clock and she had long been straining at every creak and bump waiting for him. Now she tried to take her mind from it, and sat on the floor in a most undignified position, reading Jane Eyre. When Pitt did come at last she was quite unaware of it until he had taken off his overcoat and hung it up and was standing in the doorway.