Read Online The Hyde Park Headsman by Anne Perry - Free Book Online

again. “You have been misinformed, I assure you.”
    “No one is uncomplicated,” Pitt replied with a wry smile. “But I accept what you say. I have formed no impression of him at all yet.”
    Jones’s lips twitched very slightly. “If Captain Winthrop had a secret life he hid it with a subtlety and brilliance he did not display in his ordinary way. Believe me, I do wish I could offer anything of assistance, but I don’t know where to begin.”
    “Was he popular with women as well?” Pitt asked.
    Jones hesitated. Again the sounds of the yard intruded, the clank of chains, the creak of straining ropes as the water rose and fell, timber against timber, men shouting, and always themew of the gulls. “No, not as much as perhaps I might have suggested,” Jones went on. “Inadvertently, I mean. The sort of party I was referring to was strictly officers, not women. He was a seaman. I don’t think he found the company of women easy.” He blushed a delicate pink and his eyes moved away from Pitt. “One has so little social life, one gets out of practice in the sort of light conversation suitable for women.”
    Pitt had a vivid picture in his mind of a broad, blunt-faced man, hearty, outwardly confident, totally in command, quick to laughter on the surface, but underneath the superficial bonhomie, perhaps filled with darker emotions, fears, self-doubts, even guilt, a man who spent most of his life in a totally masculine world.
    Had he a mistress? He looked at the fair, earnest face opposite him. Lieutenant Jones would not tell him even if he knew. But if it were some love or hate here in Portsmouth, would they have followed him to London, rather than committing the crime here?
    “Lieutenant Jones, when did Captain Winthrop leave for London?”
    “Er—ten days ago,” Jones replied, watching Pitt’s face again.
    It was not necessary for either of them to point out that a quarrel in Portsmouth ten days ago was not likely to have resulted in a violent murder in London nine days afterwards.
    “All the same,” Pitt went on. “I’d like you to tell me all you can of his last few days here, whom he saw, anything out of the ordinary that was said or done. Have there been any unusual disciplinary decisions in the last few months?”
    “Nothing involving Captain Winthrop,” Jones replied, still a small pucker between his brows. “You are mistaken, Superintendent. The answer to this tragedy does not lie in anything that happened here.”
    Pitt was inclined to believe him, and after he had pursued one or two more questions he thanked Lieutenant Jones and excused himself, but he still remained in Portsmouth for several more hours, asking more questions, seeing the local police, public house landlords, even a brothel keeper, before catching his train back to London.
    The following morning he found Tellman waiting for him. “Good morning, sir. Learn anything in Portsmouth?” he asked, his hard, bright eyes searching Pitt’s face.
    “A little,” Pitt replied, going up the stairs with Tellman behind him. “He left there eleven days ago. Nine days before he was killed. Doesn’t seem likely anyone from there followed him up. Most of his closest associates are accounted for that night anyway.”
    “Not surprising,” Tellman said bluntly as Pitt opened his office door and went in. “Could have sent le Grange down to find that out.” He closed the door and stood in front of Pitt’s desk.
    Pitt sat down and faced him. “Send him down to check on what everyone says,” he agreed. “I wanted to find out about Winthrop himself.”
    “Cheerful sort of person, according to his neighbors,” Tellman said with satisfaction. “Always got a good word. Kept to himself most of the time, family man. Liked his home when he was not at sea.”
    “Scandal?”
    “Not a breath. Model gentleman in every way.” Tellman looked faintly smug.
    “And what have you learned?” Pitt asked, opening his eyes wide. “Where was he killed?