by Anne Perry
Why would Talulla kill him? He was her uncle. But then how often was murder a family matter? She knew from Pitt’s cases in the past, very much too often. The next most likely answer would be a robbery, but any thief breaking in would have set the dog into a frenzy.
But then why would Talulla kill Cormac, and why now? Not purely to blame Narraway, surely? How could she even know that he would be there to be blamed?
The answer to that was obvious: it must have been she who had sent the letter luring Narraway to Cormac’s house. She of all people would be able to imitate his hand. Narraway might recall it from twenty years ago, but not in such tiny detail that he would recognise a good forgery.
But that still left the question as to why she had chosen to do it now. Cormac was her uncle; they were the only two still alive from the tragedy of twenty years ago. Cormac had no children, and her parents were dead. Surely both of them believed Narraway responsible for that? Why would she kill Cormac?
Was Narraway on the brink of finding out something that she could not afford him to know?
That made incomplete sense. If it were true, then surely the obvious thing would be to have killed Narraway?
She recalled the look on Talulla’s face as she had seen Narraway standing near Cormac’s body. She had been almost hysterical. She might have a great ability to act, but surely not great enough to effect the sweat on her lip and brow, the wildness in her eyes, the catch in her voice as it soared out of control? And yet never once had she looked at Cormac’s body, as if she could not bear to — or she already knew exactly what she would see? She had not gone to him even to assure herself that he was beyond help. That must be because she already knew it. There had been nothing in her face but hate — no grief, no denial.
Charlotte was riding through the handsome streets of Dublin as if it could have been any city on earth. She was oblivious of the sights and sounds, except for a moment of sudden surprise as cold rain spattered through the open window, wetting her face and shoulder.
How much of this whole thing was Talulla responsible for? What about the issue of Mulhare and the embezzled money? She could not possibly have arranged that.
Or was someone in Lisson Grove using Irish passion and loyalties, old wounds opened up again, to further their own need to remove Narraway? If that were possible, not just a part of her fevered imagination, then who else was involved? Who could she ask? Were there any of Narraway’s supposed friends actually willing to help him? Or had he wounded or betrayed them all at one time or another, so that when it came to it they would take their revenge? He was totally vulnerable now. Could it be that at last they had stopped quarrelling with each other long enough to conspire to ruin him? Did they hate him more than they loved any kind of honesty? People justified hate in all sorts of ways. It could suspend normal morality. She knew that.
Perhaps that was a superficial judgement and one she had no right to make. What would she have felt, or done, were it all the other way around: if Ireland were the foreigner, the occupier in England? If someone had used and betrayed her family, would she be so loyal to her beliefs in honesty or impartial justice? Perhaps — but perhaps not. It was a question she could not answer except with hope that was meaningless without reality.
But Narraway was still innocent of killing Cormac, and, Charlotte realised as she said that to herself, she thought he was no more than partially guilty of the downfall of Kate O’Neil. The O’Neils had tried to use him, turn him to betray his country. They might well be furious that they had failed, but had they the right to exact vengeance for losing?
She needed to ask help from someone, because alone she might as well simply give up and go back to London, leaving Narraway to his fate, and eventually Pitt to his! Before she reached Molesworth Street and even attempted to explain the situation to Mrs Hogan, which she must do, she had decided to ask Fiachra McDaid for help.
‘What?’ McDaid said incredulously when Charlotte found him at his home and told him what had happened.
‘I’m sorry.’ She gulped and tried to regain her composure. She had thought herself in perfect control, and realised she was much further from it than she imagined. ‘We went to see Cormac O’Neil. At least Victor said he was going alone, but I followed him, just behind-’
‘You mean you found a carriage able to keep up with him in Dublin traffic?’ McDaid frowned.
‘No, no, I knew where he was going. I had been there the evening before myself.’
‘To see O’Neil?’ He looked incredulous.
‘Yes. Please. . listen.’ Her voice was rising again and she made an effort to calm it. ‘I arrived moments after he did. I heard the dog begin to bark as he went in, but no shot!’
‘It would bark.’ The frown deepened on his brow. ‘It barks for anyone except Cormac, or perhaps Talulla. She lives close by and looks after it if Cormac is away, which he is from time to time.’
‘Not the cleaning woman?’ she said quickly.
‘No. She’s afraid of it.’ He looked at her more closely, his face earnest. ‘Why? What does it matter?’
She hesitated, still uncertain how far to trust him. It was the only evidence she had that protected Narraway. Perhaps she should keep it to herself.
‘I suppose it doesn’t,’ she said, deliberately looking confused. Then, as coherently as she could, but missing out any further reference to the dog, she told him what had happened. As she did, she watched his face, trying to read the emotions in it, the belief or disbelief, the confusion or understanding, the loss or the triumph.
He listened without interrupting her. ‘They think Narraway shot Cormac? Why, for God’s sake?’
‘In revenge for Cormac having ruined him in London,’ she answered. ‘That’s what Talulla said. It makes a kind of sense.’
‘Do you think that’s what happened?’ he asked.
She nearly said that she knew it was not, then realised her mistake just in time. ‘No,’ she spoke guardedly now. ‘I was just behind him, and I didn’t hear a shot. But I don’t think he would do that anyway. It doesn’t make sense.’
He shook his head. ‘Yes it does. Victor loved that job of his. In a way it was all he had.’ He looked in conflict, emotions twisting his features. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t mean to imply that you are not important to him, but I think from what he said that you do not see each other so often.’
Now she was angry. She felt the anger well up inside her, knotting her stomach, making her hands shake, her voice thick as if she were a little drunk. ‘No. We don’t. But you’ve known Victor for years. Was he ever a fool?’
‘No, never. Many things, good and bad, but never a fool,’ he admitted.
‘Did he ever act against his own interest, hot-headedly, all feelings and no thought?’ She could not imagine it, not the man she knew. Had he once had that kind of runaway passion? Was this supreme control a mask? She found the thought oddly alien, destroying some part of him she would not have wished different.
McDaid laughed abruptly, without joy. ‘No. He never forgot his cause. Hell or heaven could dance naked past him and he would not be diverted. Why?’
‘Because if he really thought Cormac O’Neil was responsible for ruining him in London, for setting up what looked like embezzlement and seeing that he was blamed, the last thing he would want was Cormac dead,’ she answered. ‘Then he couldn’t tell who helped him, how it was done or where to find the proof of it. It would be-’
‘I see,’ he interrupted. ‘I see.You’re right. Victor would never put revenge ahead of getting his job back. Vindicating himself would be the best revenge anyway.’
‘So someone else killed Cormac and made it look like Victor,’ Charlotte concluded. ‘That would be their revenge, wouldn’t it.’ It was a statement, not a question.
‘Yes,’ he agreed, his eyes bright, his hands loosely beside him.
‘Will you help me find out who?’ she asked.
He gestured to one of the big leather chairs in his gracious but ve
ry masculine sitting room. She imagined wealthy gentlemen’s clubs must be like this inside: worn and comfortable upholstery, lots of wood panelling, brass ornaments — except these were silver, and uniquely Celtic.
She sat down obediently.
He sat opposite her, leaning forward a little. ‘Have you any idea who already?’
Her mind raced. How should she answer, how much of the truth reveal? Could he help at all if she lied to him?
‘I have lots of ideas, but they don’t make any sense,’ she replied, prevaricating. ‘I know who hated Victor, but I don’t know who hated Cormac.’
A moment of humour touched his face, and then vanished. It looked like self-mockery.
‘I don’t expect you to know,’ she said quietly. ‘Or you would have warned him. But perhaps with hindsight you might understand something now. Talulla is Sean and Kate’s daughter, brought up away from Dublin after her parents’ deaths.’ She saw instantly in his eyes that he had known that.
‘She is, poor child,’ he agreed.
‘You didn’t tell Victor that, did you?’ It sounded more like an accusation than she had intended it to.
He looked down for a moment, then back up at her. ‘No. I thought she had suffered enough over that.’
‘Another one of your innocent casualties,’ she observed, remembering what he had said during their carriage ride in the dark. Something in that had disturbed her, a resignation she could not share. All casualties still upset her; but then her country was not at war, not occupied by another people, half friend, half enemy.
‘I don’t make judgements as to who is innocent and who guilty, Mrs Pitt, just what is necessary, and only that when I have no choice.’
‘Talulla was a child!’
‘Children grow up.’
Did he know, or guess, whether Talulla had killed Cormac? She looked at him steadily, and found herself a little afraid. The intelligence in him was overwhelming, rich with understanding of terrible irony. And it was not himself he was mocking: it was her, and her naivety. She was quite certain of that now. He was a thought, a word ahead of her all the time. She had already said too much, and he knew perfectly well that she was sure Talulla had shot Cormac.
‘Into what?’ she said aloud. ‘Into a woman who would shoot her uncle’s head to pieces in order to be revenged on the man she thinks betrayed her mother?’
That surprised him, just for an instant.Then he covered it. ‘Of course she thinks that,’ he replied. ‘She can hardly face thinking that Kate went with him willingly. In fact if he’d asked her, maybe she would have gone to England with him. Who knows?’
‘Do you?’ Charlotte said immediately.
‘I?’ His eyebrows rose. ‘I have no idea.’
‘Is that why Sean killed her, really?’
‘Again, I have no idea.’
She did not know whether to believe him or not. He had been charming to her, generous with his time and excellent company, but behind the smiling facade he was a complete stranger. She had no idea what was going on in his thoughts, no certainty at all that it was not something alien, and unbearable.
‘More incidental damage,’ she said aloud. ‘Kate, Sean, Talulla, now Cormac. Incidental to what, Mr McDaid? Ireland’s freedom?’
‘Could we have a better cause, Mrs Pitt?’ he said gently. ‘Surely Talulla can be understood for wanting that? Hasn’t she paid enough?’
But it didn’t make sense, not completely. Who had moved the money meant for Mulhare back into Narraway’s account? Was that done simply in order to lure him to Ireland for this revenge? Why so elaborate? Wouldn’t the kind of rage Talulla had be satisfied by killing Narraway herself? Why on earth make poor Cormac the sacrifice? Wasn’t that complicated and in the end pretty pointless? If she wanted Narraway to suffer, she could have shot him so he would be disabled, mutilated, die slowly. There were plenty of possibilities.
This might well be part of the picture, but it certainly was not all of it.
And why now? There had to be a reason.
McDaid was still watching her, waiting.
‘Yes, I imagine she has paid enough,’ Charlotte answered his question. ‘And Cormac? Hasn’t he too?’
‘Ah, yes. . poor Cormac,’ McDaid said softly. ‘He loved Kate, you know. That’s why he could never forgive Narraway. She cared for Cormac, but she would never have loved him. . mostly I suppose, because he was Sean’s brother. Cormac was the better man, I think. Maybe in the end, Kate thought so too.’
‘That doesn’t answer why Talulla shot him,’ Charlotte pointed out.
‘Oh, you’re right. Of course it doesn’t. .’
‘Another casualty of war?’ she said with a touch of bitterness. ‘Whose freedom do you fight for at such a cost? Is that not a weight of grief to carry for ever?’
His eyes flashed for a moment, then the anger was gone again. But it had been real.
‘Cormac was guilty too,’ he said grimly.
‘Of what? Surviving?’ she asked.
‘Yes, but more than that. He didn’t do much to save Sean. He barely tried. If he’d told the truth, Sean might have been a hero, not a man who murdered his wife in a jealous rage.’
‘Perhaps to Cormac he was a man who murdered his wife in a jealous rage,’ Charlotte pointed out. ‘People react slowly sometimes when they are shattered with grief. It takes time for the numbness to wear off. Cormac might have been too shocked to do anything useful. What could it have been anyway? Didn’t Sean himself tell the truth as to why he killed Kate?’
‘He barely said anything,’ McDaid admitted, this time looking down at the floor, not at her.
‘Stunned too,’ she said. ‘But someone told Talulla that Cormac should have saved her father, and she believed them. Easier to think of your father as a hero betrayed, rather than a jealous man who killed his wife in a rage because she cuckolded him with his enemy, and an Englishman at that.’
McDaid looked at her with a momentary flare of anger. Then he masked it so completely she might almost have thought it was her imagination.
‘It would seem so,’ he agreed. ‘But how do we prove any of that?’
She felt the coldness sweep over her. ‘I don’t know. I’m trying to think.’
‘Be careful, Mrs Pitt,’ he said gently. ‘I would not like you to be a casualty of war as well.’
She managed to smile just as if she did not even imagine that his words could be as much a threat as a warning. She felt as if it were a mask on his face: transparent, ghostly. ‘Thank you. I shall be careful, I promise, but it is kind of you to care.’ She rose to her feet, very careful not to sway. ‘Now I think I had better go back to my lodgings. It has been a. . a terrible day.’
When she reached Molesworth Street again, Mrs Hogan came out to see her immediately. She looked awkward, her hands winding around each other, twisting her apron.
Charlotte addressed the subject before Mrs Hogan could search for the words.
‘You have heard about Mr O’Neil,’ she said gravely. ‘A very terrible thing to have happened. I hope Mr Narraway will be able to help them. He has some experience in such tragedies. But I quite understand if you would prefer that I move out of your house in the meantime. I will have to find something, of course, until I get my passage back home. I dare say it will take me a day or two. In the meantime I will pack my brother’s belongings and put them in my own room, so you may let his rooms to whomsoever you wish. I believe we are paid for another couple of nights at least?’ Please heaven within a couple of days she would be a great deal further on in her decisions, and at least one other person in Dublin would know for certain that Narraway was innocent.
Mrs Hogan was embarrassed. The issue had been taken out of her hands and she did not know how to rescue it. As Charlotte had hoped, she settled for the compromise. ‘Thank you, that would be most considerate, ma’am.’
‘If you will be kind enough to lend me the keys, I’ll do it straight away.’ Charlotte held out her hand.
/> Reluctantly Mrs Hogan passed them over.
Charlotte unlocked the door and went inside, closing it behind her. Instantly she felt intrusive. She would pack his clothes, of course, and have someone take the case to her room, unless she could drag it there herself.
But far more important than shirts, socks, personal linen, were whatever papers he might have. She wondered if he had committed anything to writing and whether it would even be in a form she could understand. If only she could at least ask Pitt! She had never missed him more. But then of course if he were here, she would be at home in London, not trying desperately to carry out a task for which she was so ill-fitted. This was not some domestic crime that could be pieced together at leisure. She was in a foreign country where she did not really know anyone, and the dreams and beliefs were alien. Above all, she was the enemy, and justly so. The weight of centuries of history was against her.
She opened the case, then went to the wardrobe and took out Narraway’s suits and shirts, folded them neatly and packed them. Then, feeling as if she were prying, she opened the drawers in the chest. She took out his underwear and packed it also, making sure she had his pyjamas from under the pillow in the bed. She included his extra pair of shoes, wrapped in a cloth to keep them from marking anything, and put them in as well.
She collected the toiletries, picking some long, black and grey hairs from his hairbrush. What a personal thing a hairbrush was. And a toothbrush, razor, and small clothes brush. He was an immaculate man. How he would hate being locked up in a cell with no privacy, and probably little means to wash.
What few papers there were were in the top drawer of the dresser. Thank heaven they were not locked in a briefcase. But that probably indicated that they would mean nothing to anyone else.
Back in her own room, with Narraway’s case propped in the corner, Charlotte looked at few notes he had made. They were a curious reflection on his character, a side of him she had not even guessed at before. They were mostly little drawings, very small indeed, but very clever. They were little stick men, but with such movement in them, and with perhaps only one characteristic that told her who they were.