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had lived a long time, known many loves and hurts. Little escaped her understanding.
    He knew she would recognize a lie. “Yes. He was married to Charlotte’s sister, before she died.”
    “Good gracious.” If she read anything more into it than that, she was far too tactful to say so. “So he is a widower. I don’t recall his mentioning it.”
    Pitt did not want to talk about Dominic. He knew it would have to come, but he was not ready yet. “Tell me about the rest of Gadstone Park?” he asked.
    She looked a little surprised.
    He pulled a small, ironic face. “I can’t imagine Alicia dug him up,” he said, meeting her eyes. “Or Dominic?”
    Her body relaxed, altering the line of the high lace neck. “No,” she sighed wearily. “Of course not. They would be the last ones to wish him back. It would appear, unless the whole thing is fortuitous after all, that either one of them murdered Augustus or someone believes they did.”
    “Tell me about the other people in the Park,” he repeated.
    “The old lady is a fearful creature.” Vespasia seldom minced words. “Sits upstairs in her bedroom all day devouring old love letters, and letters of blood and military vainglory from Waterloo and the Crimea. In her own eyes she is the last of a great generation. She savors over and over again every victory in her life, real or imagined, up to the last minute, so she can wring life dry before it is snatched away from her. She doesn’t like Alicia, thinks she has no courage, no style.” A sudden dry twist lit up her face. “I really don’t know whether she would like her better or worse if she thought her capable of having murdered Augustus!”
    Pitt hid a smile by turning it into a grimace. “What about the daughter, Verity?”
    “Nice girl. Don’t know where she gets it from; must be her mother’s side. Not especially good-looking, but quite a bit of life to her, underneath the well-drilled manners. Hope they don’t marry her off before she has a little fun.”
    “How does she get on with Alicia?”
    “Well enough, so far as I know. But you needn’t look at her; she would have no idea where to employ a grave robber, and she could hardly do it herself!”
    “But she might prompt someone else,” Pitt pointed out. “Someone in love with her—if she thought her stepmother had murdered her father.
    Vespasia snorted. “Don’t believe it. Far too devious. She’s a nice child. If she thought such a thing she would have come out and accused her, not gone around persuading someone to desecrate her father’s grave. And she seems genuinely fond of Alicia, unless she’s a far better actress than I take her for.”
    Pitt had to agree. The whole thing was preposterous. Perhaps, after all, it was the work of a lunatic and the fact that it was the same body both times only a grotesque mischance. He said as much to Vespasia.
    “I tend to disbelieve in coincidences,” she replied reluctantly, “but I suppose they do occur. The rest of the Park are ordinary enough, in their way. Lord St. Jermyn I cannot fault; neither can I like him, in spite of the fact that it is he who will sponsor our bill through Parliament. Hester is a good woman making the best of an indifferent situation. They have four children, whose names I cannot remember.”
    “Major Rodney is a widower. He was not at the interment, so you have not seen him yet. He fought in the Crimea, I believe. No one can recall his wife, who must have died thirty-five years ago. He lives with his maiden sisters, Miss Priscilla and Miss Mary Ann. They talk too much and are always making jam and lavender pillows, but are otherwise perfectly pleasant. There is nothing to say about the Cantlays. I believe they are precisely what they seem to be: civil, generous, and a little bored.
    “Carlisle is a dilettante; plays the piano rather well, tried to get into Parliament and failed, a bit too radical. Wants to reform. Good family, old money.”
    “The only one of any