Highgate Rise by Anne Perry

cannot abide. I want a proper cause, something to do better than pontificate on the state of others. You never did answer me properly when I asked you what Thomas was doing at the moment.”
    “Indeed.” Vespasia looked at Charlotte hopefully also. “What is he doing? I trust he is not in Whitechapel? The newspapers are being very critical of the police at the moment. Last year they were loud in their praises, and all blame went to the mobs in Trafalgar Square in the riots. Now the boot is on the other foot, and they are calling for Sir Charles Warren’s resignation.”
    Emily shivered. “I imagine they are frightened—I think Ishould be if I lived in that sort of area. They criticize everyone—even the Queen. People are saying she does not appear enough, and the Prince of Wales is far too light-minded and spends too much money. And of course the Duke of Clarence behaves like an ass—but if his father lives as long as the Queen, poor Clarence will be in a bath chair before he sees the throne.”
    “That is not a satisfactory excuse.” Vespasia’s lips moved in the tiniest smile, then she turned to Charlotte again. “You have not told us if Thomas is working on this Whitechapel affair.”
    “No. He is in Highgate, but I know very little about the case,” Charlotte confessed. “In fact it has only just begun—”
    “The very best place for us to become acquainted with it,” Emily said, her enthusiasm returning. “What is it?”
    Charlotte looked at their expectant faces and wished she had more to tell.
    “It was a fire,” she said bleakly. “A house was burned and a woman died in it. Her husband was out on a medical call—he is a doctor—and the servants’ wing was the last to be damaged and they were all rescued.”
    “Is that all?” Emily was obviously disappointed.
    “I told you it was only the very beginning,” Charlotte apologized. “Thomas came home reeking of smoke and with fine ash in his clothes. He looked drained of all energy and terribly sad. She was supposed to have gone out, but it was canceled at the last moment.”
    “So it should have been the husband who was at home,” Vespasia concluded. “I assume it was arson, or Thomas would not have been called. Was the intended victim the husband—or was it he who set the fire?”
    “It would seem that he was the intended victim,” Charlotte agreed. “With the best will in the world, I cannot see any way in which we could”—she smiled with a touch of self-mockery —“meddle.”
    “Who was she?” Emily asked quietly. “Do you know anything about her?”
    “No, nothing at all, except that people spoke well of her. But then they usually do of the dead. It is expected, even required.”
    “That sounds totally vacuous,” Vespasia said wearily. “And tells neither Thomas nor us anything about her at all-only that her friends are conventional. What was her name?”
    “Clemency Shaw.”
    “Clemency Shaw?” Vespasia’s voice quickened with recognition. “That name is familiar, I believe. If it is the same person, then she is—was—indeed a good woman. Her death is a tragedy, and unless someone else takes over her work, a great many people will suffer.”
    “Thomas said nothing of any work.” Charlotte was acutely interested herself now. “Perhaps he doesn’t know. What work was it?”
    Emily sat forward in her chair, waiting eagerly.
    “It may not be the same person,” Vespasia warned.
    “But if it is?”
    “Then she has begun a fight to get certain laws changed regarding the ownership of slum housing,” Vespasia answered gravely, her face expressing what she knew from her own experience of the near impossibility of overcoming such vested interests. “Many of the worst, where there is appalling overcrowding and no sanitation at all, are owned by people of wealth and social standing. If it were more readily known, some minimal standards might be enforced.”
    “And who is in its way?” Emily was practical as