Rutland Place (8 page)

A few moments later they were in Rutland Place, and Pitt looked with interest at the quiet, gracious façades of the houses, set back a little from the pavement, areaways immaculate, some shaded by trees, windows catching the light. A carriage was drawn up outside one, and a footman was handing a lady down, closing the door behind her. Farther along another was leaving, harness glinting in the sun. One of those houses was Caroline’s. Pitt had never been there; it was a tacit understanding that such a call would be comfortable for neither the occupants nor Pitt. They met occasionally, but on neutral territory where no comparisons could be made, even though it would be the last thing either had intended.

The hansom stopped, and they climbed out and paid the fare.

“Eleven,” Harris said as they mounted the step.

The door opened even before they reached it and a footman hastened them in as forcefully as was consistent with his dignity. One did not desire police to wait on the doorstep so the whole neighborhood was aware one had been obliged to call them in! It was more than his promotion was worth to be clumsy in the handling of such a matter.

“Inspector Pitt,” Pitt announced himself quietly, conscious of the presence of tragedy, whatever its nature turned out to be. He was used to death, but it never failed to move him, and he still did not know what to say in the face of loss. No words could make any difference. He hated to sound trite or unfeeling, yet feared he often did, simply because he felt it from the outside. He was an intruder, a reminder of the darkest possibilities, the ugliest explanation.

“Yes, sir,” the footman said formally. “You’ll be wanting to speak to Dr. Mulgrew, no doubt. A carriage had been sent for Mr. Spencer-Brown, but he is not home yet.”

“Do you know where he is?” Pitt asked merely as a matter of course.

“Yes, sir. He went to the city as usual. He has several interests, I believe. He is on the board of directors of a number of important business houses, and a newspaper. If you will come this way, sir, I will show you to the morning room where Dr. Mulgrew is waiting.”

Pitt and Harris followed him along the hall toward the back of the house. Pitt eyed the furnishings and noted that a great deal of money had been invested in them, whether purely for appearance’s sake or not. If the Spencer-Browns had any financial worries, a few of the pictures on the staircase and hall would have given them an income the like of which Pitt could have lived on for several years. He had come to be a fair judge of the price of a painting in the course of his professional connections with the art world.

The morning-room fire was banked high, and Mulgrew stood so close to it Pitt fancied he could smell his trousers singeing in the heat. He was a stocky man with white, heavy hair and a fine white mustache. At present his eyes were watery and his nose distinctly red. He sneezed loudly as they came in, and withdrew a large handkerchief from his pocket.

“Cold,” he said in completely unnecessary explanation. “Filthy thing. No cure for it. Never has been. Name’s Mulgrew. I suppose you are the police?”

“Yes, sir. Inspector Pitt and Constable Harris.”

“How do you do. Hate a spring cold—nothing worse, except a summer one.”

“I understand the parlormaid found Mrs. Spencer-Brown dead when she came to inquire about the afternoon’s arrangements?” Pitt asked. “Did the maid call you?”

“Not precisely.” Mulgrew put his handkerchief away. “She told the butler, which is natural, I suppose. Butler came to look for himself, then sent the footman round for me. Only live round the corner. I came straightaway. Wasn’t a thing I could do. Poor creature was stone dead. I used the telephone to call a friend of mine, William Wardley. He sent a message to you.” He sneezed again and whipped out his handkerchief.

“You ought to take something for that,” Pitt said, moving a step back. “Hot drink and a mustard poultice.”

“No cure for it.” Mulgrew shook his head and waved his hands. “No cure at all. Poison, but I can’t say what yet—not for certain.”

“You are quite sure?” Pitt did not want to insult him by questioning his competence too obviously. “Couldn’t be any form of illness?”

Mulgrew narrowed his eyes and looked at Pitt closely.

“Couldn’t take my oath on it, but don’t want to wait until I can before I tell you! Too late for you to see the scene if I do! Not a fool, you know?”

Pitt found himself wanting to smile and had to force his mouth into a more appropriate expression.

“Thank you!” It seemed the most civil thing to say. “I take it you are Mrs. Spencer-Brown’s regular physician?”

“Yes, naturally. That’s why they called me. Perfectly healthy woman. Usual small ailments from time to time, but then haven’t we all?”

“Had she any medicine that you know of which she might have taken in excess, by accident?”

“Nothing I’ve given her. Only ever had the occasional cold or fit of the vapors. No cure for them, you know? Just part of life—best to put up with it gracefully. A little sympathy, if you can get it, and a good sleep.”

Pitt again controlled his desire to smile at the man.

“What about anyone else in the house?” he asked.

“What? Oh. Doubt she’d be stupid enough to take anyone else’s medicine. Not a silly woman, as women go! But then I suppose she could have, at that. Not a lot of sense when it comes to medicine, most people.” He sneezed again, fiercely. “Gave Mr. Spencer-Brown some stuff for pain in the stomach. Though I think he brings it on himself for the most part. Tried to tell him that and got a flea in my ear for my trouble.”

“Pain in his stomach?” Pitt inquired.

“Diet, mostly.” Mulgrew shook his head and blew his nose. “Eats all the wrong things, no wonder it gives him a pain. He’s an odd fellow—no use for that either!” He looked at Pitt out of the corner his eye, as if waiting to be argued with.

“Quite,” Pitt said. “Anything in this stuff of Mr. Spencer-Brown’s that could have killed anyone if taken in excess?”

Mulgrew pulled a face. “I suppose so—if you mixed the whole lot and drank it.”

“No possibility of an overdose by accident? If Mrs. Spencer-Brown had a stomach pain, for example, and thought she would relieve it by borrowing some of her husband’s medicine?”

“Told him to keep it locked in his cabinet, but I suppose if he didn’t, she could have taken it. Still, don’t think she could take enough to kill herself by mistake.”

“Instructions on the bottle?”

“Box. It’s a powder. And yes, of course there are. Don’t go handing out poisons willy-nilly, you know.”

“Poisons?”

“Has belladonna in it.”

“I see. But we don’t know what she died of yet. Or at least if we do, you haven’t said so?” He watched hopefully.

Mulgrew looked at him over the top of his handkerchief and blew his nose solemnly. He fished in his pocket for another and failed to find one. Pitt pulled out his own spare and soberly handed it over.

“Thank you.” Mulgrew took it. “You’re a gentleman. That’s what makes me unhappy. Can’t swear to it yet, but I’ve a strong suspicion it was belladonna that killed her. Looks like it. Apparently she didn’t complain of feeling unwell. She had just come in from making an early call somewhere close by, and she was dead within fifteen or twenty minutes of going into the withdrawing room. All pretty sudden. No vomiting, no blood. Not much in the way of convulsions. You can see the dilated pupils, dry mouth—just what you’d expect from belladonna. Heart stops.”

Suddenly the reality hit. Pitt could almost feel it himself: a woman dying alone, the tightness of breath, the pain, the world receding, leaving her to face the darkness, the paralysis, and the terror.

“Poor creature,” Pitt said aloud, surprising himself.

Harris coughed in embarrassment.

Mulgrew’s face softened, and a flicker of appreciation showed in his eyes as he looked at Pitt.

“Could have been suicide,” he said slowly. “At least in theory. Don’t know of any reason, but then one usually doesn’t. God only understands what private agonies go on behind the polite faces people show. So help me,
I
don’t!”

There was nothing for Pitt to say; silence was the only decent answer. He must remember to send Harris to find Mr. Spencer-Brown’s medicine box and see precisely how much was gone.

“Do you want to see her?” Mulgrew asked after a moment.

“I suppose I had better,” Pitt said.

Mulgrew walked slowly to the door, and Pitt and Harris followed him out into the hall, past the footman standing gravely to attention, and into the withdrawing room, curtains drawn in acknowledgment of death.

It was a large room, with elegant, pale-covered chairs and sofas in a French style, bowed legs and lots of carved wood. There was much petit-point embroidery in evidence, artificial flowers made of silk in profuse arrangements, and some pleasant pastoral watercolors. In other circumstances, it would have been a charming, if rather overcrowded, room.

Wilhelmina Spencer-Brown was on the chaise longue, her head back, eyes wide, mouth open. There was none of the peace of sleep about her.

Pitt walked over and looked, without touching. There was no spirit left, no privacy to invade, no feelings to hurt, but still he regarded the woman as if there were. He knew nothing about her, whether she had been kind or cruel, generous or mean, brave or a coward; but for himself as much as for her, he wished to accord her some dignity.

“Have you seen all you wish?” he asked Mulgrew without turning around.

“Yes,” Mulgrew replied.

Pitt eased her forward a little so she appeared to have been relaxing, folded her hands although he could not unclench them, and closed her eyes.

“She was here only fifteen or twenty minutes before the maid found her like this?” he asked.

“So she says.”

“So whatever it was, it acted quickly.” He turned and looked around; there was no glass or cup to be seen. “What did she eat or drink?” He frowned. “It doesn’t seem to be here now. Did the maid remove anything?”

“Asked her.” Mulgrew shook his head. “She says not. Doesn’t seem like a flighty girl. Don’t see why she should lie. Too shocked when she found her mistress dead to think of tidying up, I would imagine.”

“So she didn’t take it here,” Pitt concluded. “Pity. That would have made it easier. Well, you’ll have to do a postmortem and tell me what it was, and if possible how much, and when.”

“Naturally.”

Pitt looked at the body once more. There was nothing else to learn from it. There were no signs of force, but then since she had been alone he would not have expected any. She had taken the poison willingly; whether or not she had known what it was remained to be discovered.

“Let’s go back to the morning room,” he suggested. “I can’t see anything here to help us.”

Gratefully, they returned to the fire. The house was not cold, but there was a chill in the mind that communicated itself to the flesh.

“What sort of woman was she?” Pitt asked when the door was closed. “And don’t hide behind professional confidences. I want to know if this was suicide, accident, or murder, and the sooner I do, with the fewest questions of the family, the easier it will be for them. And they’ll have enough to bear.”

Mulgrew pulled an unhappy face and blew his nose on Pitt’s handkerchief.

“I can’t imagine an accident,” he said, staring at the floor. “Not a silly woman—very capable, in her own way, very quick, noticed things. Least absentminded woman I ever knew.”

Pitt did not like the sort of question he had to ask, but there was no way to avoid it, or to make it sound any better.

“Do you know of any reason why she might have taken her own life?”

“No, or I’d have said so.”

“She looks as if she was an attractive woman, feminine, delicate. Could she have had a lover?”

“I daresay, if she’d wanted one. But if you mean do I know of one, no, I don’t. Never heard any gossip about her whatsoever— even in confidence.” He gave Pitt a very direct look.

“What about her husband?” Pitt pressed. “Could he have had a woman, a mistress? Could she have been driven to suicide over that?”

“Alston?” Mulgrew’s eyebrows shot up in surprise at the idea. Obviously it was one he had never considered before. “I should think it highly unlikely. Bloodless sort of creature. Still—you never know—the flesh is full of surprises! Nothing odder about the human animal than his predilections in that area. I’m fifty-two years old, and I’ve been a doctor for twenty-seven of them. Nothing ought to surprise me—but it does!”

Other, uglier thoughts occurred to Pitt, thoughts about other men—boys, even children. Knowledge of such a thing might drive a wife to feel her life was insupportable. But that was only a wild speculation.

Then again there were other thoughts, perhaps more likely, things that Charlotte had spoken about: thefts, a sense of being watched. Could this woman have been the thief and then, when she realized the watcher knew about it, have killed herself in the face of the overwhelming shame? Society was cruel; it seldom forgave, and it never, ever forgot.

Pitt was touched by a breath of misery as cold as January sleet.

Poor woman.

If he discovered that to be the truth, he would find some way to avoid saying so.

“Don’t lay too much on what I say, Inspector.” Mulgrew was looking at him soberly. “I don’t mean anything by it—just generalizing.”

Pitt blinked. “That’s all I took it for,” he said carefully. “Just that nothing is certain when we come to such things.”

There was a commotion out in the hall, a rising and falling of voices, and then the door burst open.

They all turned simultaneously, knowing what it was and dreading it. Only Harris stood straight up, because he knew he would not have to say anything.

Alston Spencer-Brown faced them, bristling with shock and anger.

“Who the devil are you, sir?” He glared at Pitt. “And what are you doing in my house?”

Pitt accepted the anger for what it was, but there was still no way of dealing with it that took away the hurt or the embarrassment afterward.

“Inspector Pitt,” he said without pretense. “Dr. Mulgrew called me, as was his duty.”