Farrier's Lane Read Online Free

Mrs. Stafford?” he asked.
    Her eyes widened. “Yes—yes, he did. A silver one. I gave it to him some four or five years ago. Why?”
    “Did he fill it himself?”
    “I imagine so. I really don’t know. Why, Mr. Pitt? Do you … do you wish to see it?”
    “I already have it, thank you. Do you know if he drank from it this evening?”
    “I didn’t see him, but it is most likely he did. He—he liked a small—” She stopped, her voice shaking and uncertain. She required a moment or two to regain her composure.
    “Can you tell me what he did during the day, Mrs. Stafford, all that you know.”
    “What he did?” She looked doubtful. “Well, yes, if you wish. But I don’t understand why—”
    “It is possible that he was poisoned, Mrs. Stafford,” Livesey said gravely, still standing near the door. “It is a most distressing thought, but I am afraid we must face it. Of course the medical examiner may find some disease of which we are unaware, but until that time we have to act in a way that takes account of all possibilities.”
    She blinked. “Poisoned? Who would poison Samuel?”
    Pryce fidgeted from one foot to the other, staring at Juniper, but he did not interrupt.
    “You can think of no one?” Pitt drew her attention back again. “Do you know if he was presently engaged in a case, Mrs. Stafford?”
    “No—no, he was not.” She seemed to find it easier to speak while her mind was concentrating on practical details and answers to specific questions. “That woman came to see him again. She has been pestering him for severalmonths now. He seemed most upset by her, and after she left, he went out almost immediately.”
    “What woman, Mrs. Stafford?” Pitt said quickly.
    “Miss Macaulay,” she replied. “Tamar Macaulay.”
    “The actress?” He was startled. “Do you know what she wanted?”
    “Oh yes, of course.” Her eyebrows rose as if the question were unexpected. She had assumed Pitt would know. “About her brother.”
    “What to do with her brother, Mrs. Stafford?” Pitt asked patiently, reminding himself she was desperately newly bereaved, and should not be required to make sense as others might. “Who is her brother? Is he presently lodging an appeal?”
    A flicker of hard, almost bitter humor lit her face for a moment.
    “Hardly, Mr. Pitt. He was hanged five years ago. She wishes—wished Samuel to reopen the case. He was one of the judges of his appeal, which was denied. It was a very terrible murder. I think if the public could have hanged him more than once, they would have.”
    “The Godman case,” Livesey put in behind Pitt. “The murder of Kingsley Blaine. I daresay you recall it?”
    Pitt thought for a moment. A vague recollection came back to him, of horror and outrage, articles in the paper, one or two very ugly incidents in the street, Jews being mobbed. “In Farriers’ Lane?” he said aloud.
    “That’s right,” Juniper agreed. “Well, Tamar Macaulay was his sister. I don’t know why they had different names, but actors aren’t ordinary people anyway. You never know what is real with them, and what is not. And of course they are Jews.”
    Pitt shivered. There seemed a sudden coldness in the room, as if a breath of hate and unreason had come in through the open door, but Livesey had closed it. He looked at Charlotte and saw in her eyes a shadow of fear, as if she too had felt something new and dark.
    “It was a very shocking case,” Livesey said quietly, his voice grave and with an edge of anger in it. “I don’t knowwhy the poor woman didn’t leave it alone and let it die in everyone’s memory, but some compulsion drives her to keep on raising it, trying to get it reopened.” His face was dark with distaste, as if he would step back from the useless pain of it, did not duty prevent him. “She had some lunatic idea it would clear his name.” He lifted his heavy shoulders a fraction. “Whereas, of course, the truth is the wretched man was as guilty