by Anne Perry
She had already written him a very carefully worded letter reminding him who she was, and that she had befriended Fanny Hilliard and grown fond of her on the several occasions on which they had met, so much so that Fanny had confided in her some of her present troubles. Therefore she would be most grateful if in the interests of compassion, Mr. Carswell would do her the honor of taking luncheon with her, so they might discuss how best to be of assistance to that charming but unfortunate young woman, for whom it seemed they both had some affection.
It was not intended as a threat—apart from anything else she would not have betrayed Fanny’s confidence in her—but on the other hand she did not wish Carswell simply to send a note to decline and say that he wished her well, but he had not the time to indulge in luncheons, much as he might care to.
She had been quite shameless in asking Emily for the means to pay both for the hansom ride there and back, and for luncheon at a public restaurant should Carswell accept, and not offer to pay for them both. She had also written to Emily and had Gracie post the letter on the previous evening. She had been unequivocal.
Dear Emily,
I am sure you are quite as desirous as I am that all should work out as well as possible between Fitz and Fanny Hilliard, albeit our interests are not precisely the same, but perhaps close—I do care very much that Jack should be selected for Parliament, and I am sure he will succeed when he is there. However you know as well as I that in the process poor Fanny seems to have suffered greatly. She is innocent of the charge, for which you will have to accept my word—one day I may be able to tell you the truth, which is quite remarkable. In the meantime I am going to do what I can to set matters right—for which I shall need a small sum, sufficient to take a hansom cab into the city, and back again, and treat a certain gentleman to luncheon, in an effort to get him to assist by making the truth known—to Fitz at least, if no one else.
I trust totally that you will help, therefore I shall take the money from my housekeeping, and rely on you to replace it.
Your loving sister, Charlotte
She sat in the hansom with every confidence that at least the mechanics of her plan would work. What was far more in the balance was whether she would find the words to persuade Addison Carswell to jeopardize everything he possessed in order to help Fanny, especially when there was no certainty that it was what Fanny herself wished.
In fact, as she jolted along, Charlotte began to have doubts that what she was doing was wise. She could not foresee the outcome, but she was perfectly sure Fanny loved Fitz and desired that he should know the truth about her and Carswell, and that Fanny herself would not tell him.
She reached the courthouse long before she was ready, and was obliged to alight, pay the cabby and either stand on the pavement and cause people to wonder and perhaps be accosted by peddlers, newsboys shouting the scandal of the latest case, or beggars in need of assistance she could not afford to give, or else to go straight in.
She wrapped her coat a little tighter around her, not because it was cold, but instinctively in a kind of protection, as though she was chilled and vulnerable, and ascended the steps.
Inside the courthouse was busy and impersonal. There were many nervous women clutching coats and shawls around themselves, pale faced, watching every passerby, hesitant to speak and yet seemingly wishing to. Shabby men waited, hands in pockets, eyes furtive. Bailiffs and clerks hurried past carrying piles of papers, gowns flying, wigs making them look either important or slightly ridiculous, depending on one’s own purpose and fears.
Charlotte spoke to one who was going a little less swiftly.
“Excuse me, sir—”
He swung to a stop, turning on his heel and staring at her with brisk arrogance.
“Yes ma’am?” He wore wire-rimmed pince-nez and blinked at her through them.
“I have a letter to deliver urgently to Mr. Addison Carswell.” She stated her business without preamble. “To whom may I give it to make certain it reaches him before luncheon?”
“He is in court, ma’am!”
“I assumed that, or I would have attempted to give it to him myself.” She held his eyes without flickering and he seemed somewhat taken aback. It was not what he expected from young women, or indeed any women at all.
“It is important,” she said firmly.
“Is it personal, ma’am?” He was still dubious.
“It is personal to Mr. Carswell,” she replied with a very slight edge to her voice, hoping it would put him off asking anything further about it. “Not to me.”
“Indeed. Then I will take it for you.” He held out his hand.
“Before luncheon,” she repeated, passing it to him.
“Certainly,” he agreed, taking it and putting it in his pocket, then with a nod proceeding on his way.
There was nothing further she could do but find a seat and compose herself to wait for an answer. Usually she enjoyed watching people, their faces, their clothes, their attitudes towards one another, and speculating in her imagination as to what they were like, their occupations, relationships. But in this place there was so much anxiety, hopelessness and underlying fear that it was too harrowing. She sat instead and whiled away the time wondering about Lord and Lady Byam, and Lady Byam’s relationship with Micah Drummond, and what manner of person Lord Anstiss might be if one knew him as a friend and were not overawed by him, indeed how Laura Anstiss had seen him!
She was quite lost in this when the lawyer’s clerk returned and stood in front of her with rather more courtesy than previously.
“Mrs. Pitt? Mr. Carswell requested me to give you this.” And he held out an envelope for her.
“Thank you.” She took it, surprised to find her fingers clumsy and shaking a little. She waited until he was gone again, bustling away full of importance, before she pulled her gloves off and tore it open. She read:
Dear Mrs. Pitt,
I fear I can contribute very little to Miss Hilliard’s happiness, but I shall be pleased to meet you and hope you will be my guest for luncheon at midday. If you request a clerk to bring you to my chambers I shall escort you to a suitable establishment where we may dine. I request that you will be punctual, because as you may appreciate, my time is circumscribed by the necessities of the court.
Faithfully yours, Addison Carswell
She folded it and put it in her reticule. She had thought to carry a fob watch her father had given her many years ago, against the possibility of having to keep an exact appointment and not being easily within sight of a public clock.
At five minutes before twelve she sought a clerk and was conducted to Cars well’s chambers, and at noon precisely he emerged looking composed but extremely pale. He saw her immediately and his features set, his chin hardened and his mouth thinned into a straight line.
Charlotte was not surprised, although it was an unpleasant feeling. She had worded her request in such a way that he might well think she meant to blackmail him. And indeed if William Weems had done so before, then he could hardly be blamed for such a fear.
“Good day, Mrs. Pitt,” he said levelly. “I am obliged to you for being punctual. May I escort you to luncheon? There is an excellent chophouse ’round the corner where we may sit discreetly without being overheard, and they will serve us without delay.” He did not offer her his arm.
“Thank you, that would be very satisfactory,” she accepted, unreasonably annoyed by an assumption on his part which she had just admitted was quite fair. She walked out, head high, precisely in step with him.
The chophouse was as he had said, noisy, busy with people at almost every table, mostly men and all in dark and sober dress. Waiters passed nimbly, swinging trays on their shoulders and setting dishes and tankards down with flair. When Charlotte and Carswell were seated and Carswell had ordered for them both, he came to the point without the pretense of courtesies. She had no time to look around her any further, which would normally have been most interesting. She had never been in a choph
ouse before. She assumed the other tables were filled with lawyers and their clients all talking earnestly, heads bent.
“You mentioned Miss Hilliard, Mrs. Pitt,” he said coldly. “And that you had formed an affection for her. I am quite aware of what unkind gossip has been said of her, and it is not something I propose to discuss with you. I am extremely sorry it has happened.” His eyes were miserable but there was no evasion in them, no flinching from her. “But I know of nothing I can do to repair it. I am sure you are aware that denial would accomplish nothing.”
She felt a considerable pity for him, and no dislike. Even more urgent to her, she had a very real regard for Regina, and knew very well the situation of the other daughters, and their hopes of marriage, indeed their need for it. But she also felt for Fanny, who was being pushed into a position where she alone suffered.
She steeled herself and took the irretrievable step.
“I would not expect you to deny it easily, Mr. Carswell,” she said with a tiny smile. “It is a miserable thing to have people believe, especially since it cannot but hurt your wife and your daughters, and ruin Miss Hilliard in society—which I know is not everything. The circle of people who have heard the rumor is small enough, and there may be other alliances open to her, in time …”
She took a deep breath and went on. “And ugly as it is, it is far better than the truth.” She saw him pale, but his expression barely changed and his eyes never left hers. She knew from the icy hardness in them that he was now quite certain in his mind that she had come to extort money. The contempt in him could almost be felt across the white-clothed table and the knives and forks.
He remained silent.
She was about to continue when the waiter brought them their meals and set them down.
Carswell thanked him grimly and dismissed him.
“I am sure you have some point, Mrs. Pitt. I would be obliged if you would reach it.”
A flicker of anger moved in her.
“I know that Fanny is your daughter, Mr. Carswell. I do not expect you to tell the world so; it would ruin your—your present wife and your other daughters, and Fanny herself would never wish that. Which indeed you know, since she left all that she hoped for and retreated to her home in disgrace, rather than explain herself and tell anyone, even Herbert Fitzherbert.”
He was staring at her without blinking. At the table behind him a young man was waving a legal document in the air, its red seal catching the light, its ribbons flapping. A waiter passed by with two tankards of ale on a tray.
“What is it you want of me, Mrs. Pitt?” Carswell asked her between clenched teeth.
“I want you to consider telling Herbert Fitzherbert the truth,” she replied. “He loves Fanny, and is prepared to marry her in spite of the scandal, but she will not trust even him and defend herself. I find it very hard that he will always think her a woman of no virtue, and in time it may come to sour his regard for her and cause suspicion between them. He has forfeited his opportunity to Parliament; his love for her is of greater value to him. But I fear she will not tell him the truth herself, in order to protect you, and she will not marry him as long as he does not know it but believes her your mistress.”
She picked up her glass by the stem, and then put it down again.
“Also her brother deserves to know. Why should she endure his contempt as well? She will become quite isolated and believed immoral by those she cares for most, and all to protect you and your new family. Is that something you can live with happily, Mr. Carswell?”
His face was pink, his eyes wretched. He fought off the most horrible decision a moment longer by facing the lesser.
“And what is your intent, Mrs. Pitt? Why do you concern yourself with this? You have known Fanny only a very short time. I find it hard to believe your emotion is so engaged.”
“I am aware of what you suppose, Mr. Carswell, and given your connection with Weems it is not unreasonable.” She saw his face blanch and a look of incredulity come over it. Then slowly realization came to him. “Pitt—Mrs. Pitt? You cannot be …”
All the world of social differences was there in his unspoken words: the gulf between Charlotte as Emily’s sister, receiving society, dancing, dining, visiting the opera; and as the wife of Pitt, a policeman calling at people’s houses to ask about the murder of a usurer in the back streets of Clerkenwell.
She swallowed back the sharp defense that came leaping to her tongue. With icy dignity, still less now would she permit him to think she would stoop to blackmail.
“I am,” she agreed. “And yes my emotion is engaged on Fanny’s behalf. It seems someone’s needs to be. Yours is not.”
He flushed hotly.
“That is unfair, Mrs. Pitt! Surely you must have some idea what it would do to my present family if such a thing were to become known? They are totally innocent, just as innocent of any wrong as Fanny. I have four daughters and a son. Would you have them ruined for Fanny’s sake?” His voice shook a little and Charlotte realized with sudden pity how appallingly difficult it was for him to be telling such intimate details of his life to someone who was not only a stranger, but an unsympathetic one.
“It is my error,” he went on, looking not at her but at his plate. Neither of them could eat. “I married Fanny’s mother when I was twenty and she seventeen. We thought we loved each other. She was so very pretty, full of life and laughter …” For a moment his face softened. “Like Fanny herself.” He sighed. “For four years everything was happy; Fanny was born, and then James. Then when James was still a baby, Lucy changed completely. She became infatuated with a dance teacher, of all things. I suppose I was absorbed in my work. I was an aspiring lawyer then, trying to take all the cases I could, and finding it hard to make sufficient money to keep us well—and I was ambitious.”
Charlotte took a bite of her meal, but her attention was undivided.
“I left her too much alone, I accept. And I was not yet in that place in society or income where I could offer her the pastimes she wished.” He shrugged. “She left her home and went off with the dancing master, taking the children with her.”
Charlotte was stunned. She knew the law regarding errant wives and their children.
“Did you not require that she at least leave the children in your custody?” she asked in surprise. “Even if you did not wish her back.”
He blushed. “No. I thought of it—and the embarrassment of admitting that my wife had run off with a dancing master. It hurt that I should lose my children, but what could I offer them? A nurse to care for them while I was working. She loved them and was a good mother.”
“And the dancing master?”
“It did not last.” There was pity both in his face and in his voice. “In two years he died of typhus, which was perhaps less cruel than if he had deserted her. She was living in the house off the Kennington Road, which he owned, and it became hers.” He colored with awareness of guilt. “Of course I should have divorced her, but I was ashamed of the scandal. And since I was in law, my friends would have known and I could not bear their pity. I could not afford to entertain, and with two nursing children Lucy had not had the inclination to accept invitations which we could not return. They did not know I was married, and so I simply said nothing.”
“What about her parents?” Charlotte asked.
“Lucy was an orphan. Her guardian, an elderly uncle, had nothing more to do with her personally after our marriage. He considered finding her a husband a discharge to his duty towards her.”
“And you did not take her back? Or your children?”
“Neither Lucy nor I had any desire to live under one roof anymore. And it would have been cruel and pointless for me to demand the children. I had no wife at that time who could raise them, and as I have already admitted, I did not wish the world to know of my unfortunate relationship.” He looked up at her, his eyes soft in spite of the misery in them. “And by then I had met Regina, and learned to love her in a way I had not loved Lucy.
I was desperate she should not know of any earlier marriage. Her parents would never have looked upon me favorably. It was hard enough to persuade them I could provide for her adequately as it was …” He stopped, looking up at her.
It was not an attractive story and he was painfully aware of it, yet she could very easily understand how it had happened. Told in the space of a few minutes it was bereft of the shock, the sense of humiliation and loneliness; the young man fall of overwhelming inadequacy, fearing ridicule, coming home tired to the house where so shortly before he had been met by wife and children, now finding only servants, polite, distant and unsympathetic.
At last he had simply denied it, pushed it from his mind. Then when happiness had offered itself in the form of Regina, he had grasped it, paying the necessary price. And now twenty-three years later the price had suddenly become so very much higher, and not only he had to pay it, but Fanny—or else Regina and his other children.
“Did you pay Weems?” she asked without warning. His face was slack with surprise.
“No. As God is my judge, I never even knew the man.”
“But you let Horatio Osmar off. You threw the case out without calling Beulah Giles.”
“That had nothing to do with Fanny or my first marriage—or with Weems or his murder.”
“No.” She was about to add that it had everything to do with the secret society of the Inner Circle, when Pitt’s warning about their power rang sharply in her mind, and she bit the words back. “No,” she said again. “I did not think so, but I had to ask. What are you going to do about Fanny and Herbert Fitzheibert?”
“What are you going to do, Mrs. Pitt?”
“Nothing. I have already done all I can. It is your decision.”