Free Farrier's Lane by Anne Perry Page B

apparently, yours.”
    “Or possibly Mr. Stafford’s; he wished to see O’Neil again.”
    “That does not mean that he doubted him, Mr. Pitt.” He lifted his broad shoulders a little. “As I have already said to you, Stafford had no intention whatever of reopening the Blaine/Godman case. There are no grounds to question any part of it. The conduct of the original trial was exemplary, and there is no new evidence whatever.” He smiled, drumming his fingers on the leather desk top. “Stafford had no new evidence. He spoke to me yesterday himself. His intention was to prove Godman’s guilt yet again, beyond even Tamar Macaulay’s ability to question.” He looked at Pitt fixedly. “It is for everyone’s benefit, even Miss Macaulay herself, that she should at last accept the truth and allow herself to turn her attention to her own life, her career, or whatever she counts of value. For the rest of us, we should stop doubting the law and calling into question its efficacy or integrity.”
    “He told you this?” Pitt asked, uncertainty in his mind, weighing what Juniper Stafford had said, and Pryce. “As late as yesterday?”
    “Not entirely yesterday,” Livesey said patiently. “Over a period of time, and yesterday he did not change any part of it. He reaffirmed it, both by what he said and what he omitted to say. There was no change in his mind, and he certainly had discovered nothing new.”
    “I see.” Pitt spoke only to acknowledge that he had heard. In truth, he did not see at all. Pryce had seemed so certain Stafford intended to reopen the case, and why should he have any interest in wishing Pitt to believe that, were it not true? Pryce had prosecuted, and seemed to feel a certain responsibility for the conviction. He would not want it overturned now.
    And yet if Stafford had had no intention of reopening the case, why should anyone kill him?
    Perhaps they had not, and it was some obscure diseasewith poisonlike symptoms, and either he was unaware of it himself or he had chosen not to tell his wife, possibly not realizing how serious it was.
    Livesey seemed to seize Pitt’s thoughts. The judge’s face was grave, all the impatience washed away as if it had been trivial, a momentary and shallow thing. Now he was returned to reality, which concerned him.
    “If he was not reopening the case, why should anyone kill him?” Livesey said quietly. “A justified question, Mr. Pitt. He was not reopening the case, and even if he were, there is no one with anything to fear from it, except Tamar Macaulay herself, because it would have reawakened the public to her brother’s disgrace and raised the whole matter in people’s minds again. She cannot wish that, when there is no hope of exoneration.” He smiled without humor or pleasure, only an awareness of the loss and wasted tears.
    “I think the poor woman has been so steeped in her own crusade for these many years it has gained its own impetus, apart from any reality. She has lost sight of the truth of the case,” he continued. “She is no longer thinking of evidence, only of her own desire to vindicate her brother. Love, even family love, can be very blind. We so easily see only what we wish to, and with the person absent, as happens with the dead, there is nothing to remind us of reality.” His lips tightened. “The vision consumes. It has become like a religion with her, so important to her she cannot let go. She is a little intoxicated with it. It has taken the place of husband and child with her. It is really very tragic.”
    Pitt had seen such obsession before. It was not impossible to believe. But it did not answer the question of who had killed Stafford, if he had been killed.
    “Do you think Stafford told her as much?” he asked, looking up at Livesey.
    “And she killed him in rage because he had disappointed her?” Livesey bit his lip, frowning. “It strains the credulity, to be candid. She is obsessed, certainly, but I do not think she is so