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from Shaw now, or if in common humanity he should allow whatever religious comfort there might be and defer his own questions. Perhaps he would actually learn more of Shaw by watching him with those who knew him and had known his wife.
    “Inspector?” Lindsay pressed him.
    “Of course,” Pitt conceded, although from the expression of defiance and something close to alarm in Shaw’s face, he doubted the vicar’s religious comfort was what he presently desired.
    Lindsay nodded and the manservant withdrew, a moment later ushering in a mild, very earnest man in clerical garb. He looked as if he had been athletic in his youth, but now inhis forties had become a little lax. There was too much diffidence in him for good looks, but there was nothing of malice or arrogance in his regular features and rather indecisive mouth. His surface attempt at calm masked a deep nervousness, and the occasion was obviously far from being his element.
    He was accompanied by a woman with a plain, intelligent face, a little too heavy of eyebrow and strong of nose to be appealing to most people, but a good-natured mouth. In contrast to her husband she projected an intense energy, and it was all directed towards Shaw. She barely saw Lindsay or Pitt, and made no accommodation to them in her manner. Murdo was invisible.
    “Ah … hem—” The vicar was plainly confused to see the police still there. He had prepared what he was going to say, and now it did not fit the circumstances and he had nothing else in reserve. “Ah … Reverend Hector Clitheridge.” He introduced himself awkwardly. “My wife, Eulalia.” He indicated the woman beside him, waving his hand, thick wristed and with white cuffs a size too large.
    Then he turned to Shaw and his expression altered. He was apparently laboring under some difficulty. He wavered between natural distaste and alarm, and hard-won resolution.
    “My dear Shaw, how can I say how sorry I am for this tragedy.” He took half a step forward. “Quite appalling. In the midst of life we are in death. How fragile is human existence in this vale of tears. Suddenly we are struck down. How may we comfort you?”
    “Not with platitudes, dammit!” Shaw said tartly.
    “Yes, well—I’m sure …” Clitheridge floundered, his face pink.
    “People only say some things so often because they are true, Dr. Shaw,” Mrs. Clitheridge said with an eager smile, her eyes on Shaw’s face. “How else can we express our feelings for you, and our desire to offer consolation.”
    “Yes quite—quite,” Clitheridge added unnecessarily. “I will take care of any—any, er … arrangements you careto—er … Of course it is soon—er …” He tailed off, looking at the floor.
    “Thank you,” Shaw cut across. “I’ll let you know.”
    “Of course. Of course.” Clitheridge was patently relieved.
    “In the meantime, dear doctor …” Mrs. Clitheridge took a step forward, her eyes bright, her back very straight under her dark bombazine, as if she were approaching something exciting and a little dangerous. “In the meantime, we offer you our condolences, and please feel you may call upon us for anything at all, any task that you would prefer not to perform yourself. My time is yours.”
    Shaw looked across at her and the ghost of a smile touched his face. “Thank you, Eulalia. I am sure you mean it kindly.”
    The blush deepened in her face, but she said no more. The use of her Christian name was a familiarity, particularly in front of such social inferiors as the police. Pitt thought from the lift of Shaw’s brows that even now he had done it deliberately, an automatic instinct to sweep away pretense.
    For a moment Pitt saw them all in a different light, six people in a room, all concerned with the violent death of a woman very close to them, trying to find comfort for themselves and each other, and they observed all the social niceties, masked all the simplicity of real emotion with talk of letters and