Murder on the Serpentine

by Anne Perry

  “You will look after her, won’t you?” Charlotte said, and instantly wished she had not. “I’m sorry, of course you will.” Emily did not bother to reply, but took Charlotte’s arm and they walked closely together along the street.

  CHARLOTTE LOOKED VERY CONTRITE, almost as if she was afraid of Pitt’s anger. She stood in front of him in the sitting room, her back to the French doors and the burning colors of the sunset garden behind her. Her face was grave.

  “What is it?” he demanded.

  “I broke my word,” she said quietly. “Or maybe…Anyway, I took the risk.”

  “What did you do?” He was afraid to ask, but he had to. He found his mouth dry as he waited.

  “I found out where Delia was the night Halberd was killed.” She swallowed. “And I spoke to the young man she was with. It isn’t what you think. Actually, she was very brave. She knew what Kendrick was doing and that it concerned getting guns for the Boers, though she couldn’t prove it.”

  He felt fear for her, even anger at the risk she must have taken, and at the same time a swell of pride at her spirit. This was the Charlotte he had fallen in love with, but her courage had frightened him so much less then. She had been fascinating, exasperating, funny at times, but there was a distance between them. He was still separate. He could survive on his own. Now she was woven inextricably into the fabric of his being. She was the center of all that mattered to him.

  “What happened to him, the young man?” he asked huskily.

  “Nothing. He’s perfectly well, for the moment,” she said quickly. “But you must see him, Thomas. His name is Joseph Bentley. He was a soldier in the Boer War and is terrified there will be another one—I mean specifically afraid, not just generally. He now works for Wills and Sons. It is a gentlemen’s outfitter; I have the address and where he lives in lodgings. Please, Thomas, he can prove to you that Delia could not have killed Halberd. Quite apart from having been somewhere else, which he will swear to, she was trying to do the same thing as Halberd! Just neither of them knew it of the other. We may never know, but I think she was closer than he to revealing the truth. It’s just that Halberd must have tipped Kendrick’s hand somehow.” She went on, barely taking a breath. “He wasn’t afraid of Kendrick, when he should have been.”

  “She was?” he asked, his voice catching in his throat. “He didn’t save her, poor woman.”

  “We can save her reputation,” Charlotte said quickly. “You can’t let Kendrick get away with killing her so hideously, then making it look as if it were suicide! And you have to make sure nothing happens to Joseph Bentley, please.”

  Perhaps some other time he would tell her how foolish she had been to take such risks. Or he might simply tell her how much he loved her, and how empty life would be if she was killed by someone who caught her before she could catch them.

  “I told him that you would find him, and he must speak to you,” she went on. “But secretly…and very soon. Don’t let him be killed too!”

  “I won’t,” he promised. “I’ll go to his lodgings tonight.”

  “Thomas, I’m—”

  “Sorry. I know. We’ll talk about it some other time…maybe.” If he had any sense, he would tell her how recklessly she had behaved. Above all, she had broken a promise. He took a deep breath. “Thank you.”

  He saw the fear slip away from her like shedding a dark cloak and letting it fall to the floor. She smiled at him, widely, beautifully, then hurried past him and out of the door toward the kitchen.

  —

  PITT FOUND THE ADDRESS Charlotte had given him with little difficulty. He asked the landlady for Joseph Bentley, and was told he had gone out for supper and could probably be found at the local public house, the Triple Plea, a couple of streets to the east.

  Pitt chose to walk, and it took him no more than ten minutes. Inside, it was crowded and noisy, as might be expected. He bought a tankard of cider, and while drinking it looked carefully around the room to see if he could find Bentley. Several young men were talking and laughing together. One, clean-shaven and with neatly trimmed hair, was sitting alone with a thick, crusty sandwich and a glass of ale. Pitt made his way over toward him, quite casually, as if looking for a place to sit.

  “Bentley?” he said quietly when he was within a couple of feet of him.

  The young man was startled, and looked as if he was going to deny it.

  “My wife spoke to you yesterday,” Pitt continued. “She and her sister.”

  The young man looked apprehensive, puzzled.

  Pitt pulled a neighboring stool to the table and sat down. Now he looked at the young man openly, as though he had been invited.

  “I am Thomas Pitt, head of Special Branch. Are you Joseph Bentley or not?”

  “Yes, sir, I am,” the young man answered as if he were still a soldier in front of a superior officer.

  “Good. When I have finished my cider I’m going to stand up, and you are going to finish your ale, go out the door, and walk to your lodgings. I will follow you. Be as inconspicuous about it as you can. And don’t run away. I don’t want to waste time hunting you down—but I will.” It was a warning, and he meant it to be taken as such. “It would make you very noticeable, and I may not be the first to find you.”

  “I’ve no intention of running away, sir,” Bentley answered with a flare of anger.

  Pitt smiled. “Good.” He finished his cider, stood up, and made his way to the door.

  Five minutes later, Bentley left also, walking past Pitt without turning, and continued on his way back to his lodgings.

  A further ten minutes and they were together in the small, extremely tidy bedroom Bentley rented. The bed was made with military precision and the two or three dozen books he had on the shelves were placed according to subject, not size or color of binding.

  “Tell me what you told Mrs. Pitt and Mrs. Radley,” Pitt asked. “I already know most of it, but I want details.”

  “I have no proof, sir,” Bentley said immediately. “I know Mrs. Kendrick couldn’t have killed Sir John Halberd, because she was with me until about one o’clock in the morning.” His face flushed a dull red. “It was for information, sir, nothing else. It was…” He stopped, uncertain how to continue.

  “Special Branch, Mr. Bentley.” Pitt looked into his eyes. “I’m interested in treason, not romance with a dead woman who was, I believe, betrayed and then murdered to hide whatever it was she discussed with you.”

  All the color drained out of Bentley’s face, leaving him a chalky white.

  “Yes, sir. I’m very sorry indeed about that. She was a brave woman and she cared a lot about what was right. I told her all I knew.”

  “Now tell me.”

  Pitt had already shown Bentley his identification. There was no reason to hesitate. Quietly, but very clearly, Bentley described how he had met Delia Kendrick through Sir John Halberd, who had shopped at the gentlemen’s outfitters where Bentley worked. His conversation with Delia had naturally turned to his own experiences in the Boer War. He told her he had served from beginning to end, only being lightly wounded; he had, however, known physical exhaustion and privation. And far more deeply marked into him than that, he had seen other men horribly wounded. Some had died quickly, others after hours—or even days—of pain. His face showed the grief of his memories, the friends he had lost, some to death, others to injuries that would heal over but from which they would never recover: lost limbs, lost sight. The devastation these weapons wrought on a man. In many cases, their wounds were deeper than that: destruction of the mind, their confidence in certain values torn apart. There were nightmares that made them afraid to sleep, irrational guilt about friends they could not save. Too often it was loss of faith in life itself that haunted them.

  “We can’t do that again, sir,” Bentley said with passion sharp in his voice and his eyes unwavering. “I’m willing to fight for my country, sir, and die for it, if need be. But I’m not going to kill men and women again just becaus
e they want to rule their own land in their own way. So do I, sir. I don’t want some Dutchman coming over here to England telling me what to do, or what I can’t do. I’d fight him as long as I had breath. And I wouldn’t blame him if he’d felt the same about me.” He sat motionless, waiting for Pitt to respond, ready for anger, willing to argue.

  Pitt was not sure he disagreed with Bentley, but that was not the issue now. “And Mrs. Kendrick felt the same?” he asked.

  “Yes, sir, I think so. But she was upset because she believed her husband was helping the Boers to buy the best rifles in the world from the Germans—the Mauser company. She didn’t know too much about them at first, but I told her what I knew. She thought he’d used his friendship with the Prince of Wales to get himself in favor over there. The Germans like the prince, as he is half German himself, I suppose. And he speaks their language, and likes their food and all. And of course Mr. Kendrick and he both love horses. Mrs. Kendrick said her husband was gifted like that. Almost the only thing he put before himself was a really good horse, and he’s had a few.”

  “What about Sir John Halberd?”

  “He knew about it too. Was right on the very tail of it, she said.”

  “Did you meet her after that fateful night? Did she say who killed Halberd?”

  “She thought it could have been her husband behind it, but that he wouldn’t risk doing it himself. But then, on the other hand, she thought he also wouldn’t risk paying someone else to do it for him, in case they betrayed him later, or blackmailed him about it.”

  “It might have been one or the other,” Pitt said thoughtfully. “Unless she was wrong, and it was someone else altogether. But I don’t believe that.”

  “She seemed very sure it was him, sir. Said Halberd would have told the Queen, and that would have been the end of Kendrick.” Bentley lifted his chin a little, meeting Pitt’s eyes. “I know she’s an old lady, but she’s the Queen, and we have pledged our loyalty to her as long as she’s alive. And I suppose to King Edward VII after her. I…I think Mrs. Kendrick was close to proving what she knew, Mr. Pitt. And that’s not just because I don’t want to think she did that to herself, although I don’t.”

  “No,” Pitt agreed. “Neither do I. She was sharp-tongued and opinionated, but she was brave. It seems she lost her first husband to betrayal.”

  “Yes, she said that,” Bentley agreed, his voice very low. “I wish she’d been more careful. Can you get him, sir? I’d like to see him on the end of a rope, the way he did to her. If I can help, I want to.”

  “Do you?”

  “Yes, sir, I do.”

  An idea was beginning to form in Pitt’s mind, not clear yet but the beginning of a plan.

  “Then I think you can. Have you considered working in Special Branch?”

  There was a flicker of emotion in Bentley’s face, both fear and excitement. “I…I couldn’t, sir. Not if there’s going to be another war. I’d be called up again. I’d have to go.”

  “No, you wouldn’t. I can deal with that, if you want. Sometimes the work is very routine, a bit like police work. At others it’s fast, difficult, and dangerous, but it all matters very much.”

  “Bit like being a soldier, then,” Bentley said with a smile. There was hope in his voice, and a fear of disappointment.

  “I imagine so,” Pitt agreed. “I’ve never been a soldier. The big difference is that there is no uniform, usually no weapons, and you can discuss it with no one, not even your closest friends or family.” He watched Bentley’s face, his eyes, the slight tightening of his lips. “Do you understand?”

  “Yes, sir. Most soldiers don’t talk about it, either, sir. Don’t want your family thinking of you like that—dirty, scared, exhausted, willing to stick a bayonet into another man’s guts. Better to say nothing than tell them a lot of lies. Just let it be, is my way.”

  Pitt nodded.

  “Were you always Special Branch, sir?” Bentley asked.

  “No, I was a policeman most of my life. Robberies, then murders. Now it’s treason and anarchy, bombs, betrayals…and still murders.”

  “Yes, sir, I’d like to do that. Especially if we can prove to everybody that Mrs. Kendrick didn’t kill anyone.” The sadness was there for a moment, then he fought it away. “When do you want me to start, sir?”

  “Tomorrow morning, send your current employer a letter of apology. Don’t mention us. Just say urgent family business. Special Branch will make up what you lose in your salary. Report to Mr. Stoker at eight o’clock tomorrow morning at Lisson Grove. I will tell him to expect you. Take care of yourself, Bentley. Get yourself new lodgings. Give your landlady notice, but no forwarding address. Find a room nearer to Lisson Grove. If you have family, tell them you have changed jobs, but not the nature of the new one. Don’t take this lightly, Bentley, I mean it.” He looked at the young man’s face to make certain he understood, and saw a momentary flicker of sadness.

  “I’ve got no family, sir. My ma and pa died a while ago, and my brother was killed in South Africa.”

  “In the war?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m sorry. Now tell me everything else that Mrs. Kendrick told you and then we’ll start tomorrow to see what we can do to stop there being another war—or if we can’t stop it, at least let it be without Mauser’s guns!”

  “Yes, sir. And…thank you, sir.”

  “I hope you’ll still thank me in a year’s time.”

  —

  PITT WAS AT LISSON Grove early enough to tell Stoker that he had recruited Bentley. “We need him for this,” he added. “And I think he may turn out to be a good recruit. We need someone to replace Firth.”

  “Firth was very experienced, sir,” Stoker said cautiously. “This Bentley might need a lot of training.”

  “Then we’ll give it to him. He’s been in the army and served in the Boer War. I took a fresh look at his record late last night. Reclaimed a favor and woke up a few friends. He’s a good man. And, Stoker, make sure he changes his lodgings, sooner rather than later. Nothing to be forwarded.”

  “Yes, sir. You think Kendrick will go after him?”

  “Wouldn’t you, in his place?”

  “Yes, sir, I’ll see to it today. Give him a hand. Get to know him a bit.”

  “Do it. He should be here in fifteen minutes. I’m going to look for more evidence. See if I can shake something loose, now we know Halberd’s murderer wasn’t Delia.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  —

  PITT RE-EXAMINED WITNESS STATEMENTS and all the physical evidence of Halberd’s death, but nothing new emerged. Almost anyone could have arranged to meet him at the Serpentine, or followed him there and made it seem like a chance encounter. The question was, had Halberd gone there expecting to meet a different someone? Who else knew, and could have intervened, preventing the right person from coming?

  Surely it had to do with Halberd’s knowledge of the Mauser rifle deal? Would he have gone alone to meet Kendrick? Did he imagine that in some way he was safe, just because it was a London park and perhaps not so very late?

  What had he found that was so urgent? How had Kendrick learned of it? If Delia knew, had she spoken to anyone else? Had she gone out before Kendrick, or after? Pitt knew from Charlotte how she had dressed, but what about Kendrick? Had he gotten wet—even a sleeve or a trouser leg? Would Kendrick’s valet tell Pitt? He had traveled to the park in a hansom, according to Delia’s maid.

  These were things to find out.

  What evidence had implicated Delia? Since it was not her, then either the evidence had been misunderstood, or it had been deliberately manufactured to blame her. When, how, and by whom?

  Pitt began the awkward task of mapping Delia’s last few days alive. Before he could even begin, he had to obtain permission from Kendrick. Since Delia’s guilt was all surmise and supposition, and she herself was dead and could neither confess nor deny anything, there was an element of decency that suggested the whole matter be left
alone.

  It would be different if Kendrick wished to prove her innocence. But he had presented himself as accepting completely that she was guilty and had killed herself in despair.

  How should Pitt approach him? Kendrick was far too clever to outwit easily, and far too sure of himself to bluff. Pitt had no legitimate reason even to inquire into Delia’s death, and Kendrick knew it. If there were anything to investigate, it would be for the police to follow up, rather than anyone from Special Branch. Kendrick had faultlessly crafted it to be precisely that way.

  There was no evidence that Delia had killed Halberd—she hadn’t! But with her connection to him, and her apparent suicide, everyone believed it. What decent man would not now bury her in peace and leave Kendrick to grieve, untroubled by intrusive and prurient questions?

  Pitt still had the Halberd case to solve. He knew Delia could not have killed him, and he believed that Kendrick had. But what had Kendrick learned that precipitated Halberd’s murder that night, not before or after? That question applied to all murders. Why at that time?

  He could search for the answer in Halberd’s life. Had he ever had an affair with Delia? If so, then someone would know of it. In searching her recent past, he might find what had really caused her murder. And if he was right, it would tie Kendrick to German guns and the ever-increasing likelihood of another Boer war. Apart from his murder of Halberd, and of Delia, Kendrick must be stopped for that reason alone.

  If Pitt was to get the sort of information he needed, he would have to bring pressure to bear on people, more pressure than Kendrick could, or perhaps already had. The place to begin was Narraway’s files. He must know what was in them, whatever it was; how it made him feel was irrelevant. A pre-emptive strike might be necessary. He must know all the vulnerabilities Narraway had known, and use them as circumstances dictated. He would protect anyone he could, and do his best to see that no information fell into other hands.

  He spent several miserable hours sitting at his desk with tea and sandwiches. The records yielded what he had expected: meticulous details of errors, weaknesses, and misjudgments.