Whitechapel Conspiracy

“I need to know.” Charlotte heard the raw edge of urgency in her own voice. She had intended not to betray herself so completely, but seeing Juno’s grief had unlocked her own. “It is the only way I can prove to them that it was a just verdict, and Thomas wasn’t being arrogant or irresponsible, and there was no prejudice in his actions. He was following the evidence in a case and he was right. I don’t want anyone who matters being allowed an inch of room to doubt that.”

“How are you going to do it?”

“Find out all I can about John Adinett and—if you will help me—about your husband, so that I know not only what happened but I can prove why it did.”

Juno took a deep breath and steadied herself, looking at Charlotte gravely. “I want to know what happened myself. Nothing will stop me missing Martin or make me feel any better about it, but if I understood it I should be less angry.” She shook her head a little. “I wouldn’t be so confused, and maybe I would feel as if there was some sense to it. It is all so … unfinished. Is that an absurd thing to say? My sister keeps telling me I should go away for a while, try to forget about it … I mean, about the way it happened. But I don’t want to. I need to know why!”

Outside in the garden the birds were singing and the breeze brought in the scent of grass.

“Did you know Mr. Adinett well? Did he call here often?”

“Quite often. At least once or twice a month, sometimes more.”

“Did you like him?” She wanted to know because she needed to understand the emotions involved. Did Juno feel betrayed by a friend, or robbed by a man who was relatively a stranger? Would she be angered if Charlotte probed critically into their lives?

Juno thought for a few moments before replying, weighing her words. The question seemed to cause her some difficulty.

“I am not entirely certain. At first I did. He was very interesting. Apart from Martin, I had never heard anyone speak so vividly about travel.” Her face lit with memory. “He had a passion about it, and he could describe the great wildernesses of Canada in such a way that their terror and beauty came alive, even here in the middle of London. One had to admire that. I found I wanted to listen to him, even if I didn’t always want to meet his eye.”

It was a curious choice of words, and Charlotte found it highly expressive. She had not been to the trial so she had only newspaper pictures to re-create a picture of Adinett in her mind, but even in photographs there was a stern quality to his face, an ability to exercise self-control, and perhaps to mask emotion, which she could well imagine might be uncomfortable.

What sort of a man had he been? She could not recall having to find the truth of a murder when both the people most closely involved were unknown to her. Always in the past it had been a question of deducing which of several people were guilty. This time she knew who, but she would never meet him or be able to sense any part of his reality except through the observations of others.

She had read that he was fifty-two, but from a newspaper photograph she had no idea whether he was tall or short, dark or medium of coloring.

“If I were to look for him in a crowd, how would you describe him?” she asked.

Juno thought for a moment. “Military,” she answered, certainty in her voice. “There was a kind of power in him, as if he had tested himself against the greatest danger he knew and found he was equal to it. I don’t believe he was afraid of anyone. He … he never showed off, if you know what I mean. That was one of the things Martin most admired about him.” Again her eyes filled with tears, and she blinked them away with annoyance. “I respected it too,” she added quickly. “It was a kind of strength of character that is unusual, and both frightening and attractive at the same moment.”

“I think I understand,” Charlotte said thoughtfully. “It makes people seem invulnerable, a little different from ourselves. Well, from me, anyway. I catch myself talking too much now and again, and I know it is the need to impress.”

Juno smiled, her face suddenly warm and alive. “It is, isn’t it! Because we know our own weaknesses, we think other people can see them also.”

“Was he tall?” Charlotte realized suddenly that she was speaking in the past tense, as if he were already dead, and he was not. Somewhere he was alive, sitting in a cell, probably at Newgate, waiting the legal three Sundays before he could be hanged. The thought made her feel sick. What if they were all wrong, and he was innocent?

Juno was unaware of what was in Charlotte’s mind, even of the change inside her.

“Yes, far taller than Martin,” she replied. “But then Martin wasn’t very tall, only an inch or two more than I.”

There was no reason why she should be, but Charlotte was startled. She realized she had formed a picture of him quite differently. If there had been a photograph in the newspapers, she had not seen it.

Perhaps Juno noticed her surprise. “Would you like to see him?” she asked tentatively.

“Yes … please.”