something close to reluctance, even though she was pleased to hear Pitt return. She had been right in the middle of a dramatic scene between two lovers.
Jemima raced downstairs in her nightgown calling out “Papa! Papa!”
Charlotte smiled and went to the door. Daniel, retaining his masculine dignity, was coming down slowly, grinning.
“You are early,” Charlotte observed as Pitt kissed her, then turned his attention temporarily to the children. Jemima was telling him excitedly about a lesson she had learned on Queen Elizabeth and the Spanish Armada. Daniel, at the same time, was trying to explain about steam engines and a wonderful train he wanted to see, and better still, to ride on. He had even learned the fare, and his face was bright with hope.
It was nearly an hour before Pitt was alone with Charlotte and could tell her the extraordinary news of the events in Brunswick Gardens.
“Do you really think the Reverend Parmenter lost his temper completely and pushed her down the stairs?” she asked with surprise. “Can it be proved?”
“I don’t know.” He stretched out further, balancing his feet on the fender. It was his favorite position. His slippers were scorched every winter. She was always buying new ones.
“Could she have fallen?” she asked. “People do fall downstairs … sometimes.”
“They don’t shout out ‘No, no!’ and someone’s name if they slip,” he pointed out. “And there was nothing there to trip over. The stairs are black wood, no carpet or stair rods to be loose.”
“One could trip over a skirt, if the hem were down …” she said thoughtfully. “Was it?”
“No. I looked at that. It was perfect.”
“Or even one’s own feet,” she went on. “Were the shoes all right? Nothing loose or broken, no wobbly heels or loose laces? I’ve tripped over my own feet before now.”
“No wobbly heels or laces at all,” he said with a slight smile. “Only a dark stain, which Tellman says comes from something spilled in the conservatory, and that means Mallory Parmenter lied about having seen her this morning.”
“Perhaps he was out of the conservatory for some reason for those few moments?” she suggested. “She went in, but she missed seeing him.”
“No, he wasn’t, or he would have trodden in the same thing when he went out,” he reasoned. “And he hadn’t. Tellman checked for that, too.”
“Does that mean anything?” she asked.
“Probably not, except that he was frightened and told a stupid lie. He didn’t know she called out.”
“Could she have called out ‘No, no,’ to one person and called the Reverend to help her?” she said quickly. “I mean ‘No, no!’ and then his name to call him to come to her?”
He sat up a little, his attention sharpening. “Possibly … just possibly. I shall at least hold it in mind. He admits quarreling with her very badly, but he swears he did not leave the study.”
“Why would Mallory want to kill her? The same reason?”
“No … he’s very dedicated to his calling, at least he appears so, but he has no doubts.” He stared into the fire, watching as the coals settled. He would have to put more on in a few minutes. “It seems from the little I know so far as if Parmenter was very troubled in his faith, and it was Unity Bellwood’s intellectual challenge to religion which angered him. Mallory seems to have no such conflict.”
“Well, who else is there?”
He pursed his lips and stared back at her; she could not read the expression in his eyes. They were bright and gray, and very clear.
“Who is there?” she repeated, a shiver of apprehension running through her.
“One of the daughters who disliked Unity, but not a great deal, so far as I know … and the curate.”
She dismissed the daughter. She knew him well enough to be certain it was the curate who was on his mind.
“Goon!”
He hesitated for a moment, as if unsure how to tell her. He drew in his breath and let it out slowly. “The curate is Dominic Corde …”
For just an instant, gone again before it was there, she thought he was making a bad joke, then she knew he was serious. There was a furrow between his brows that was only there when something troubled him and he did not understand it.
“Dominic! Our Dominic?” she said.
“I had never thought of him as ‘ours,’ but I suppose you could say so,” he agreed. “He has taken the cloth … can you imagine it?”