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It takes a moment for me to figure out what he means. A moment forallof us to figure it out, our brains so focused on Annis.
Mrs. Young.Shit! Yes. The gravedigger’s wife. The woman in prison for his murder.
“Is she still here?” I ask.
The constable looks confused by the question. “Yes, ma’am.”
His confusion tells me that, despite two more viable suspects in custody, no one is rushing to free Mrs. Young. She’s going to need someone to advocate on her behalf and hurry that process along. I’m sure Isla would take the reins there, but she’s distracted and doesn’t seem to make the connection herself.
“I do not believe we shall need to speak to her,” Isla says. “The investigation is past that point.”
I remember the night I spent in an Edinburgh jail. The horror of it. Gray had come as soon as he could, but that wait had seemed endless.
“May I speak to her?” I murmur to McCreadie. “I know that until there is a formal arrest made for her husband’s murder, I cannot say anything about that, but perhaps I might offer some reassurances.”
“Of course,” he says.
“Yes,” Isla says. “Of course. I did not even think of that. The poor woman. I could go with you.”
“No, you speak to Annis. I will be along in a moment.”
I glance at McCreadie, who nods to the constable. “Would you escort Miss Mitchell to Mrs. Young and then bring her to see Lady Leslie with us?”
“Certainly, sir.”
FORTY-FIVE
My sojourn in an Edinburgh jail had actually taken place in a holding cell at a police office. I’d been thrown in with other women either sleeping it off or awaiting a charge. This is different only in the sense that I find Mrs. Young in a cell by herself. Otherwise, it’s as dismal as the subterranean holding cell at the police office. She’s in a cramped little cell with only a pot to piss in. Fine, she also has a wooden bench and a moth-eaten blanket, but otherwise, it’s her and the bucket… and the rats and the shouts of the other inmates and the sickening smell of unwashed bodies and bodily fluids.
I’m hoping for a room where we can talk, but that’s not happening. I’m left at the door to her cell as the constable steps aside.
“Mrs. Young,” I say.
She’s sitting on the bench and, God, she’s young. I should have expected that after speaking to her stepdaughter, but Mrs. Young looks like a girl herself, a pretty, dark-haired pixie drowning in her prison dress. Her stepdaughter said she was an art model, and I can see why. There’s an ethereal beauty to her. When she looks up, her eyes meet mine, big blue eyes with the wariness of some forest creature.
“Mrs. Young?” I say again. “I’m Mallory Mitchell. I spoke to your”—do they use stepdaughter yet?—“husband’s daughter and your boys the other day.”
With that, the wariness vanishes, and she’s off the bench in a blink, gathering the too-long skirt as she rushes to the bars.
“Eliza and the boys?” she says. “Are they well?”
“They are,” I say. “Very worried about you, but Eliza is taking care of everything.”
Her face lights up in genuine affection. “She is such a good girl.”
“I’m sorry this happened to you,” I say. “I know it’s horrible, but I wanted to assure you that the police are continuing to investigate other suspects for your husband’s murder. They haven’t stopped now that you’ve been arrested. I know both of the criminal officers and an outside investigator, and they are working on theories that do not involve you, and they’re making progress on those theories.”
It takes her a moment to parse out what I’ve said, and I’m about to reword it when she nods.
“They do not presume it is me,” she says. “They are making progress, as you say?”
“They are.”
“Will the police come to speak to me? I am not certain how I can help, but no one seems to be interested in asking questions, nor listening to my story.”
I want to get back to Isla. I want to speak to Annis. But I cannot dash off on this poor woman in these wretched circumstances. I’ve suggested that the investigation is currently focused on the possibility of another suspect… and now I can’t spend five minutes hearing her side of the story? It’ll sound like false assurances, when it only means that we’re beyond the stage where anything she can add will help.
Five minutes. I can and will give her five minutes.
