“They suggest a personal quarrel to me.” Moorgate swallowed. “Had he a love affair of some sort? Perhaps a jealous husband is involved.”
“Who hanged him?” Pitt raised his eyebrows. “Is that your usual experience, Mr. Moorgate?”
“I have no ‘usual experience,’ ” Moorgate said coldly. “I am a solicitor, not a barrister. And please keep your voice down. You are making a spectacle of us! Murders are rare in my practice. And I have very little idea of what jealous husbands or lovers do when they find they are betrayed.”
“Something hot-blooded or physically violent,” Pitt replied with a twisted smile, aware of the crowd around them. It was not his voice which had aroused their interest. “Shoot if they have a gun,” he went on. “Stab if a knife is available, which is not hard to find. If a spontaneous fight breaks out, then they strike, or even throttle. To go to a man’s home taking a length of hemp, and then remove the chandelier, presumably either before he arrives, or while you have him unconscious, or bound, then string him up by the neck and hang him till he is dead—”
“For God’s sake, man!” Moorgate exploded furiously. “Have you no decency at all?”
“Calls for a great degree of premeditation and cold-blooded planning,” Pitt finished relentlessly.
“Then it was some other motive,” Moorgate snapped. “Regardless, it was nothing to do with any case of mine, and I cannot help you.” He put his ale down at last, slopping on the table to his intense annoyance. “I should advise you to look very closely into the wretched man’s personal life, if I were you. Perhaps he owed money. Usurers can be violent if they are cheated. I really have no notion, but it is your task, not mine, to discover the truth. Now, if there is nothing further, I must return to my chambers. I shall shortly have clients awaiting me.” And without concerning himself with whether Pitt had any further questions or not, he rose to his feet, knocking the table and slopping the ale mug still further. He inclined his head stiffly, and took his leave.
Barton James, the barrister for the defense, was a very different man, taller, leaner, of a more distinguished and assured appearance. He received Pitt in his chambers and enquired courteously for his health, then invited him to be seated.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Pitt?” he said with interest. “Does it concern the death of poor Samuel Stafford?”
“Indirectly, yes.” Pitt had decided to be more circumspect this time, at least to begin with.
“Indeed?” James raised his eyebrows. “In what way can I assist? I knew him, of course, but only very slightly. He was an appeal judge; it is some time since he sat at trial. I have not pleaded before him for fifteen or sixteen years.”
“But you took one of your most celebrated cases to appeal before him.”
“Several,” James agreed. “That does not constitute a relationship. I am not aware of knowing anything at all which has relevance to his death. But by all means, ask me what you wish.” He sat back, smiling agreeably. His manner was assured, his voice excellent. Pitt could imagine him commanding a courtroom, holding a jury with the power of his personality. How hard had he pleaded for Aaron Godman? What passion or conviction had he used on his behalf?
With an effort he brought his mind back to the present, and the slow building up to the questions that mattered.
“Thank you, Mr. James. You see, it is not only the murder of Mr. Stafford I am investigating, but there seems to be another murder linked to it.” He saw James’s eyes widen. “That of Constable Paterson.”
“Paterson? Is that the young officer who was on the Farriers’ Lane case?” James asked, a tiny muscle flicking on his brow.
“Yes.”
“Oh dear. Are you quite sure it is connected? Policework can be very dangerous, as I am sure you do not need me to tell you. Might it not be a coincidence? The Farriers’ Lane case was closed some five years ago. Oh, I know Miss Macaulay keeps trying to arouse interest in it again, but I am afraid she is in a hopeless cause. It is only her devotion to her brother which drives her. She has no hope of success.”
“You are quite certain he was guilty?”
James shifted minutely in his seat. “Oh indeed, quite certain. I am afraid there was no doubt.”
“Did you think so at the time?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Did you think so at the time?” Pitt repeated, watching James’s face, the long patrician nose, the mouth on the verge of humor, the careful eyes.
James pushed out his lower lip in a rueful expression.
“I would like to have thought him innocent, of course, but I confess, as the case proceeded it became more and more difficult.”
“You believed the verdict a true one?”
“I did. So would you, had you been there, Mr. Pitt.”
“But you lodged an appeal.”
“Naturally. It was what Godman wished, and his family. It is natural to try every possible step, however slight the chance of success, when a man is to be hanged. I warned them of the unlikelihood of its being granted. I held out no false hopes, but nevertheless, of course I did my best. As you know, it was refused.”
“The grounds were insufficient?”
James shrugged. “The medical examiner, Humbert Yardley—a very reliable man, no doubt you know him?—did seem to change his mind about the weapon. It is not like him to do that. Possibly with the horror of the whole affair—it was a spectacularly gruesome crime, as you must know—he may temporarily have lost his customary cool-headedness.” He leaned back in his chair again, his face a trifle puckered. “It was an outrage in a very extraordinary sense, you know. The man was not only murdered, but crucified. The newspapers made banner headlines. All sorts of very deep and violent emotions were roused. In some quarters there were anti-Jewish riots. Pawnshops were broken into and vandalized. Men who were known to be Jewish were attacked in the streets. It was all extremely ugly.”
He smiled with bitter humor. “I was even subjected to considerable abuse myself for defending him. I had the expensive and embarrassing experience of being pelted with rotten fruit and eggs when passing through Covent Garden. Thank God it wasn’t Billingsgate!”
Pitt hid a smile. He had walked by the fish market on a warm day. “Did you ever think him innocent, Mr. James?”
“I assumed him innocent, Mr. Pitt. That is my duty. Not the same thing. But my own thoughts are irrelevant.” He looked at Pitt gravely. “I did the best for him I could. And I do not believe any barrister in the land would have obtained an acquittal. The evidence was overwhelming. He was actually seen not half a mile from the spot, at the relevant time, and quite clearly, by someone who knew him by sight. Then there was the evidence of the street urchin who delivered the message for him which brought Blaine through Farriers’ Lane, and of the idlers who saw him leave the lane, covered with blood.”
“Did the urchin identify him?” Pitt said quickly. “I thought he was uncertain.”
James pushed out his lips thoughtfully. “Yes—I suppose stretching a point, he was. And if you stretch the point even further, so were the idlers. And quite literally, they may have exaggerated the blood. It is hard to know what a man sees at the time, and what his imagination paints in afterwards, with the knowledge of hindsight.” He shook his head, smiling again. “But the flower seller knew him by sight, and had no doubt at all. He actually stopped and spoke to her, which shows either an extraordinary cool head or an arrogance that amounts to the insane.”
“And you have no doubt as to his guilt,” Pitt pressed.
James frowned. “You speak as if you do. Have you discovered something not available to us at the time?”
It was an interesting choice of words. He had taken care to guard against the implication that he could have been remiss. Discreetly, by implication rather than openly, he was defending himself.