Twenty-One Days (Daniel Pitt #1)(51)

‘Daniel!’ Her face was alight with pleasure and she hugged him immediately. He felt the warmth of her and responded. Since he had lived away from home, he had missed her enthusiasm, her interest in everything, even her desire to be involved in whatever was his latest interest. He had never known anybody more alive. It had driven him frantic, and frequently embarrassed him when he was a child. But he looked back on it now with pleasure.

He hugged her in return. ‘Hello, Mama. Sorry to come without warning, but I have to talk to Father rather urgently about something very serious. And it’s a case I can’t tell you about, so don’t ask me. I know I’m interrupting, but it won’t wait.’

‘Oh!’ She seemed about to add more, but the gravity in his face, even perhaps a degree of pain, kept her from arguing. She could be amazingly discreet at times, which still surprised him. ‘I’ll fetch him. He’s in the study.’

‘I’d rather go in to him there,’ he said. ‘It’s . . .’

‘Serious?’ she asked, the light slipping out of her face. ‘Before dinner?’

‘Please.’ He wanted to talk as if everything were normal and not tell her he was too nervous to eat. He thought he had more control than that. He had stood up in court and defended a man, knowing that the man would live or die, depending on his success. He might even have turned the tide for Graves, temporarily. Was that an achievement, or a disaster? But telling his father about Graves’ accusations was different. It struck at the root of who his family was, who he was himself. And Graves knew it! He had seen that in his eyes, the knowledge of leaving a deep wound. It was what he had meant to do.

Charlotte did not press him any further. She might ask Pitt afterwards, but that was up to them.

She took him to the study door, knocked, and then went in. ‘Thomas? Daniel is here to see you about something very important. He says it’s better to get it over with before dinner.’ She held the door open for Daniel.

Pitt was sitting at his desk. As usual, there were papers spread all over it. None of them would be secret. Those did not leave the office. Even so, Daniel did not glance at any of them, but straight at his father.

Pitt was tall and loose-limbed. He had improved on his natural untidiness a little over the years, but not a great deal. His hair was still too long and unruly, and lately there was a good deal of grey in it. Actually, it became him. It gave him a certain gravitas he had lacked before. He looked at Daniel steadily for several seconds.

‘You’d better sit down and tell me what it is,’ he said at last. ‘And if you are going to ruin your mother’s dinner. I hope you have already informed her?’

‘I don’t know . . .’

Pitt saw the concern in his face. ‘Tell me . . .’

Daniel sat down in the chair opposite the desk. He still did not know how he was going to approach this. He had thought of half a dozen ways on the journey here, and cast them all aside. Was the whole thing foolish, and he should not bother his father? Or was this going to be a turning point in the family, the beginning of a damage that would never be undone, never be completely healed over?

Pitt was waiting, a shadow in his face now.

Should Daniel start with Marcus fford Croft? Or defending Graves, and the outcome? Or go straight to Graves’ accusation?

‘Daniel?’

‘I have a defendant accused of a murder,’ he began. ‘I was only assisting at the trial, because the lawyer who was doing it had met with a street accident.’ He was making a mess of it already.

Pitt did not interrupt.

Daniel took a breath and started again. ‘The accused was found guilty and sentenced to be hanged. There are seventeen days left. Sixteen, tomorrow. Marcus put the senior lawyer into finding grounds to appeal in law, and me on finding grounds in fact . . . like another major suspect . . .’

‘And have you found one?’ Pitt asked quietly.

It was the moment when Daniel had to tell him the truth. There was no evading it, other than lying.

‘Not by name, but by a major motive, which I’m afraid makes a lot of sense.’

‘Afraid? Why? What is it?’

This was the moment beyond which he could not retreat.

Daniel looked away, and then back at his father. ‘Have you ever heard of Russell Graves?’

‘No. Who is he?’

‘You’ve never heard of him? No one you know has ever even mentioned his name?’

‘No. Why should they have? Who is he?’ Pitt asked. A flicker of anxiety crossed his face.

Daniel saw it. ‘He is a particularly unpleasant biographer. Likes to rip the mask off people we have regarded as heroes, for one reason or another.’

‘It happens,’ Pitt replied, his voice almost without inflection, giving away nothing. ‘Every good man, or woman, has their detractors. Some see them as saints, and rob them of their humanity. Others cannot believe in a quality they don’t have themselves, and want to force us to see their flaws. Usually, we sort them out. But you cannot suppress opinions, and we shouldn’t try. Why do you mention Graves in particular?’ He frowned. ‘Isn’t that the man who murdered his wife, and then disfigured her face?’

Daniel swallowed. ‘Yes. Except he claims he didn’t. But whether he did or not, the book he’s planning to write will have given him a great number of enemies who would be glad to see him hang, but even more than that, totally dishonoured. Although I’m afraid that his hanging may well make some people of a certain sort want to read what he has written.’