However, for all her frankness, she was unable to offer him any assistance about the reasons for Mina’s death. She found the idea of suicide pitiful, expressing her sorrow that anyone should reach such depths of despair, but she did not deny that sometimes it did happen. On the other hand, since she had not known Mina well, she was aware of nothing at all to bring her to such a state. Theodora herself was a widow with two children, which reduced her social connections considerably, and she preferred to devote her time to her home and children rather than making social calls or attending soirées and such functions; therefore she heard little gossip.
Pitt left no wiser, and certainly no happier. If he could feel certain that there was some unresolved tragedy, as Tormod Lagarde had seemed convinced, then he would be satisfied to leave it decently alone. On the other hand, Ambrosine Charrington had been sure that such a thing was utterly out of character. If it had been some preposterous accident, should he persist until he had done all he could to discover precisely what? Did he owe it to Mina herself? To be buried in a suicide’s grave was a disgrace, a stigma not easy to bear for her survivors. And did he perhaps owe it to Alston Spencer-Brown to show him that his wife had not been so unhappy as to prefer death to life? Might not Spencer-Brown go on torturing himself with hurt and confusion in the belief that she had loved someone else and found life insupportable without him? And other people—would they believe something secret and perhaps obscure about Alston that had driven his wife to such an end?
Was it possible that no matter how ugly, or how expensive, the facts were better? The truth deals only one wound, but suspicions a thousand.
Because Theodora had mentioned that Amaryllis and she were sisters, Amaryllis Denbigh was a complete surprise to Pitt. Without giving it conscious thought, he had been expecting someone similar, and it was a faintly unpleasant readjustment to meet a woman younger, not only in years but jarringly so in fashion, manner, and deportment.
She met him with cool civility, but the spark of interest was in her eyes and in the suppressed tightness of her body. He never for a moment feared that she might decline to talk. There was something hungry in her, something seeking, and yet at the same time contemptuous of him. She had not forgotten that he was a policeman.
“Of course I understand your situation, Inspector—Pitt?” She sat down and arranged her skirts with white fingers that stroked the silk delicately; he could almost feel its rippling softness himself, as if it slid cool beneath his own skin.
“Thank you, ma’am.” He eased himself into the chair across the small table from her.
“You are obliged to satisfy yourself that there has been no wrong done,” she reasoned. “And naturally that requires you to discover the truth. I wish I could be of more assistance to you.” Her eyes did not leave his face, and he had the feeling she knew every line of it, every shade. “But I fear I know very little.” She smiled coolly. “I have only impressions, and it would be less than fair to represent them as facts.”
“I sympathize.” He found the words hard to say, for no reason that he could frame. He made an effort to concentrate his mind upon Mina, and his reason for being here. “Yet if anyone had known facts, surely they would have prevented the tragedy? It is precisely because there are only impressions and understandings that have come with the wisdom of hindsight that these things occur so startlingly, and we are left with mysteries and perhaps unjust beliefs.” He hoped he was not being sententious, but he was trying to follow her own line of reasoning and convince her to speak. He believed he could judge what to trust and what to discard as malicious or unrelated.
“I had not thought of it like that.” Her eyes were round and blue and very direct. She must have looked much like this in feature and expression when she was still in pigtails and dresses to her knees: the same frankness, the same slightly bold interest, the same softness of cheek and throat. “Of course you are quite right!”
“Then perhaps you would be kind enough to tell me of your impressions?” he invited, disliking himself for it even as he spoke. He despised the sort of mischievous speculation that he was encouraging—indeed would listen to with the same eagerness as a gossip selecting dirt to relish and refine before whispering it with laughter and deprecation to the next hungry ear.
She was too subtle to excuse herself again; to do so would imply she needed excuse. Instead she fixed her eyes on a bowl of flowers on a side table against the wall and began to speak.
“Of course Mina—that is, Mrs. Spencer-Brown—was very fond of Mr. Lagarde, as I expect you know.” She did not look back at him. The temptation was there; he saw it in the tightening of her neck, but she resisted it. “I do not, for one moment, mean to imply anything improper. But there are always people who will misunderstand even the most innocent of friendships. I have wondered once or twice if there was someone who so misunderstood Mina’s regard, and perhaps was caused great unhappiness by it.”
“Such as who?” he asked, a little surprised. It was a possibility he had not thought of: a simple misunderstanding leading to jealousy. He had only considered an unrequited love.
“Well, I suppose the obvious answer is Mr. Spencer-Brown,” she replied, facing him at last. “But then the truth is not always the obvious, is it?”
“No,” he agreed hastily. “But if not him, then who?”
She breathed a deep sigh and appeared to reflect for a few moments.
“I really don’t know!” She lifted her head suddenly as if she had newly made up her mind about something. “I imagine it is possible—” She stopped. “Well, all sort of other things—other people? I know Inigo Charrington was very attached to Eloise at one time. She would not even consider him. I’ve no idea why! He seems pleasing enough, but to her it was as if he did not exist in that sense. She was civil enough to him, naturally. But then one is!”
“I don’t see what that has to do with Mrs. Spencer-Brown’s death,” he said frankly.
“No.” She gave him a wide, blue look. “Neither do I. I expect it has nothing at all. I am only seeking possibilities, people who might have said something at one time or another which could have given rise to misunderstanding. I did tell you, Inspector, that I knew nothing! You asked me for my impressions.”
“And your impression is that Mrs. Spencer-Brown was in normally good spirits as far as you knew?” Without intending to, he had used Tormod’s words.
“Oh yes. If something happened to distress her, it must have occurred quite suddenly, without any warning. Maybe she learned something appalling?” Again her eyes were wide and round.
“Mr. Lagarde says she was not at all upset when she left his house,” he pointed out. “And from the hour her servants have reported, it appears she went straight home.”
“Then perhaps she met someone in the street? Or there was a letter waiting for her when she arrived?”
A letter was something that had not occurred to him. He should have asked the servants if there had been any messages. Perhaps Harris had thought of it.
It was too late to cover his mistake; she had seen it in his face. Her smile became surer.