Anne Perry - Silence in Hanover Close

Quickly she stepped back into the arms of a vine-and almost fainted with horror at the first instinctive thought that the clinging touch was human. She swallowed a shriek, realizing the truth, and with an effort pulled herself together and stepped out smartly, only to come face to face with Aunt Adeline. She swore under her breath, feeling idiotic and knowing her hair was disheveled, her cheeks scarlet.

“Are you all right, Miss Barnaby?” Adeline raised her eyebrows. “You look a little distressed.”

Charlotte took a deep breath. Only a really good lie would serve.

“I feel such a fool,” she began with what she hoped was a disarming smile. “I was trying to see a flower overhead, and I overbalanced. I do beg your pardon.” She put her hand to the trailing strands of her hair. “And then I got caught in a vine and I couldn’t get loose. But I haven’t hurt the plant.”

“My dear, of course you haven’t.” Adeline smiled bleakly, her eyes like brown velvet boot buttons. Charlotte had no idea whether the woman believed a word of what she had said. “I think perhaps it is time we had some tea. Shall I call Julian and Veronica, or will you?”

“I, er. .” Without thinking Charlotte moved to block the path. “I’m sure they’ll come in a few moments.”

Adeline’s gaze was steady and skeptical.

“I wondered if it was bougainvillea,” Charlotte said abruptly. “Such a wonderful shade of cerise. Is that not the color you said you saw Veronica wearing one night?”

Adeline looked startled. “That was not Veronica.” For once she dropped her usually clear, fine voice, perhaps her most attractive feature. “I’m perfectly sure of that.”

“Oh, I must have misunderstood you. I assumed …” Her words trailed away; she did not know how to finish. She had been trying to surprise something out of Adeline, while preventing her from going into the conservatory and seeing that wildly immodest embrace. And it was not only for Veronica she wished it, but for Adeline herself. Perhaps no one had ever held her so, or would do now.

“Oh no,” Adeline said with a tiny shake of her head. “Her walk was quite unlike Veronica’s. You can tell a great deal about a woman by the way she walks, and her walk was unique. There was a grace in it, a daring. She was a woman who had power and knew it-and yet, I think, she had much to be afraid of. If she were to allow herself to be afraid.”

“Oh,” Charlotte faltered. “Then-who?”

Adeline’s face reflected wisdom, pain, and the merest shadow of humor. “I do not know, Miss Barnaby, and I do not ask. There are many old loves, and old hates, that are better left unspoken.”

“You surprise me!” Charlotte’s words were suddenly sharp, almost accusatory. “I had thought you were more candid than that.”

Adeline’s plain, sensitive mouth tightened. “The time for candor is past. You have no idea what pain may lie behind these things. A little blindness can allow them to ease, where to speak may make answer inevitable.” She inclined her head towards the interior of the conservatory. “Now you have done your good turn for the day, Miss Barnaby. Either you will call Veronica, or I shall.”

“I will,” Charlotte said obediently, her mind in a whirl. Had Cerise been a lover of Julian’s? Did Veronica know, or guess; was that the ghost she was fighting-an old mistress? Was that why she allowed herself such abandon before an engagement was even announced, let alone a marriage?

If so, then who had killed Robert York, and why?

They were back to treason. Could it possibly be that Veronica herself was hunting her husband’s murderer? Could it be Julian who had killed Robert, and did she know it? Was that the terror consuming her-and what lay between her and Loretta?

“Veronica!” Charlotte said aloud. “Miss Danver says that tea will be served in a few minutes. Veronica!”

Pitt chose to walk to Mayfair. It was not a pleasant day; a flat, gray sky closed over the city like a heavy lid and the wind scythed across the park, stinging his skin above his muffler. It crept into the space round his ears and its coldness hurt, making his body tighten against it. Carriages rattled along Park Lane but he saw no one on foot. It was too cold for pleasure; the street vendors knew there would be no business for them here where residents could afford to ride.

He walked because he was going to the Danvers’, and he was putting off arriving there as long as he could. Dulcie was dead, so there was no one left to ask about Cerise except Adeline Danver. Part of the chill inside him was guilt-Dulcie’s bright, frank face came back to his mind far too easily. If only he had taken the precaution of closing the library door before allowing her to speak! He still did not know which of her two remarks had caused her death-the mention of Cerise, or of the missing necklace. But Pitt’s investigation of Piers York’s affairs had proved him to be more than financially secure, and in spite of his remark to Dulcie, he did not seem to have claimed for the gems.

All inquiries into other friends of Robert York who might have acquired debt and turned to amateur burglary had also proved fruitless so far. Nor had Pitt succeeded in tracing many of the servants who had been employed in Hanover Close at the time, and dismissed soon after. The butler had taken a position in the country, the valet had gone abroad, the maids had disappeared into the vast mass of female labor in London and its environs.

He stopped; he was outside the Danvers’ house already. The air was damp, raw in the throat, with the sour smell of too many fires jetting smoke out into the leaden sky. He could not stand around like a vagrant. Someone held a thread that eventually wound back to murder. If he picked at it, teased it, he thought he might find an end lying with Adeline Danver.

She received him civilly, but with undisguised surprise. He had formed a very clear picture of her in his mind from Charlotte’s description; nevertheless he was taken aback by the sharp intelligence in her rather round eyes under their wispy brows. She was a plainer woman than Charlotte had implied: her nose was tip-tilted and narrow, her chin very receding. It was only when she spoke in a voice of remarkable timbre and diction that he saw her beauty.

“Good afternoon, Inspector. I have no idea how I might be of assistance, but of course I shall try. Please do be seated. I don’t believe I have ever met a policeman before.” She regarded him with open curiosity, as if he were some exotic species of creature imported for her entertainment.

For the first time in years Pitt felt self-conscious; he seemed all hands and feet and coattails. He sat down gingerly, trying to arrange himself with some neatness, and failing.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“Not at all.” Her eyes never wavered from his face. “I assume it is about poor Robert York’s death? That is the only crime with which I have even the remotest connection-and believe the, it is remote. But I knew him, of course, although there are many others who knew him far better.” She smiled very slightly. “I suppose I have the advantage of being an observer of life, rather than a player, so perhaps I have seen something that others may have missed.”

He felt transparent, guilty of great insensitivity. “Not at all, Miss Danver.” He smiled very faintly. He was not at all sure he should try to be charming-he might end up making a complete fool of himself. “I approach you because I have a very specific question in mind, and you are the person in the house least likely to have any involvement with this event, and therefore to be embarrassed by it, or distressed.”

“You take trouble to be tactful,” she said with a slight nod of approval. “Thank you for not insulting my intelligence with an idle courtesy. What event do you imagine I may know of? I confess I cannot think what it might be.”