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But if either Charles or Imogen were drawn into this further, if they actually had a part in it, or if Imogen were on the same path of destruction as Elissa Beck. . He pushed the thought away from him. It was in Imogen’s hectic face and brilliant eyes that he had truly seen Elissa. He must tell Hester. There was no alternative. He must also tell her that Kristian had not spoken the truth about his time on the day of the murder, whether by accident or intent.
He went up the steps and unlocked the front door. Inside, the gas lamps hissed faintly and their light spread warmth over the outlines he knew so well he could have drawn them perfectly for anyone, the folds of the curtains, the exact shape and position of the two chairs they had saved so carefully to buy. The round table had been a gift from Callandra. There was a bowl of bright leaves and berries on it now, echoing every shade of red in the Turkish rug. It was a little chilly, and the fire was laid but not lit yet. Hester was economizing, until he came home. She would simply have put a shawl around her shoulders, and perhaps another around her knees.
The kitchen door was open. She was standing in front of the small cooking range, stirring a pot, a wooden spoon in her hand, her sleeves rolled up. In the warmth of the room, and the steam, the loose hair that had escaped from the pins was twisting into a soft curl.
She turned as she heard his step and his shadow fell across the doorway. She smiled at him. Then, before he was quick enough to conceal it, she saw the shadow in his eyes.
“What?” she asked, her other hand lifting the saucepan off the heat so it should not burn while she removed her attention from it.
He had not intended to tell her immediately, but the longer he waited, the more certain she would be that there was something wrong. It was unnerving to be so easily read. It was a position he had never intended to be in. It was part of the cost of intimacy, perhaps even of friendship.
“What is it?” she repeated. “Kristian?”
“Yes. .”
She stiffened, the color draining from her face. She put the pan down, in case she dropped it.
“I followed his actions on the evening of the murders,” he said quietly. “He wasn’t where he said. He had the times wrong.”
The muscles in her neck tightened, as if she were expecting a blow.
“Not necessarily a lie,” he continued. “He may just be mistaken.”
There was an edge to her voice. “That’s not all, is it?”
“No.” Should he tell her about Charles and Imogen now, deal with it all in one terrible stroke? Perhaps honesty was the only healing thing left.
“What else?” she asked.
He knew she was still thinking of Kristian. He answered that first, and because it led so naturally into having seen Imogen. “I went to Swinton Street, to a gambling house the constable told me about.” He saw her wince very slightly. He had no idea she found gambling so repellent. Did she not understand it at all? There was a puritan streak in her that he loved only because it was part of her. He both admired it and was infuriated by it. In the beginning of their acquaintance he had thought it hypocrisy, and despised it. Later he had taught himself to tolerate it. Now again he found it oddly narrow and without compassion. But he did not want to quarrel. Perhaps it was memory of her father’s speculation, and ruin, which hurt. Although that was hardly gambling, only what any man in business might do, and much of his actual loss was nobly motivated. He had been duped by a man of the utmost dishonor.
She was waiting for him to continue, as if she was afraid to press him.
“Elissa used to go there fairly often,” he went on. “She lost a great deal. Even when she won, she put her money back on the table again and played it.”
Hester was looking puzzled, a slight frown on her face. “I suppose that’s the way gamblers are. If they could stop when they won it wouldn’t be a problem. Poor soul. What an idiotic way to destroy yourself-and those who love you.”
“I thought you were going to say ’and those you love,’ ” he observed.
“I was,” she replied. “And then I thought it’s really the other way. I think Kristian may have loved her more than she loved him. It looks as if she may have lost that ability. If she did love him enough, surely she would never have gone on until she stripped him of almost everything.”
“It’s a compulsion,” he tried to explain. She had not seen the faces of the gamblers, the avid eyes shining with appetite, the rigid bodies, the hands clenched, breath held as they waited for the card or the dice to fall. It was a lust beyond control. “They can’t help it,” he added aloud. He was thinking of Imogen, trying to soften the thought in her for when she had to face it within her own family.
“Perhaps not.” She did not argue as he had expected her to. “But it still kills love.”
“Hester, love is. .” He did not know how to finish.
“What?” she asked.
“Different things.” He was still seeking to explain. “Different things for one person from another. It’s not always obvious. You can love and. .”
“If your love remains, you don’t place your own needs before theirs,” she said simply. “You might, with moral duties, but not with appetite. Maybe they can’t help it. I don’t know. But if something takes away your ability to sacrifice your own wants for the sake of someone else, then it has robbed you of honor and love. They aren’t just nice warm feelings, they are a willingness to act for someone else’s good before your own.”
He did not answer. He was surprised by what she had said, and even more that he had no argument with any part of it. He could still see Imogen’s pale face and bright eyes and the hectic excitement in her.
“I’m not saying she could help it,” Hester went on. “I don’t know if she could or not. I think after Vienna something inside her was changed. The reason doesn’t alter what she did to Kristian.”
“What?”
