Cherchez les Femmes:

Someone’s in the Kitchen With Charlotte: Classic

Detective Fiction, Victorian Womanhood, and the Private

Sphere in Anne Perry's Charlotte Pitt Series"

The relatively recent explosion in historical detective

fiction featuring women sleuths reflects an ongoing feminist

concern with unvoiced, marginalized women, the domestic spaces

they inhabit, and the public spaces they influence. As Gubar and

Gilbert note in No Man’s Land (1987), such genres as science

fiction and fantasy “liberate the political imagination to

consider the possible instead of the probable” (115-6), a point

that is certainly valid for historical detective fiction as well;

one of the strong points of this fiction is its firm positioning

in the realm of the imaginative probable. Anne Perry’s Charlotte

and Thomas Pitt series works particularly well in this aspect.

No impossibilities exist in these novels; Charlotte Pitt does not

step so far out of a woman’s conventional roles as to be

unbelievable, nor is she so effective at solving the mysteries

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all on her own that we find her a character impossible to

accept1.

Perry has grounded the Pitt series in late Victorian times,

and speaks in skillfully woven detective narratives of women’s

place in Victorian society and from a feminist position which

manifests in her penchant for revealing women’s lives. The series

works extremely well because the private, that is, the domestic

sphere, was both well defined and occupied by women, and Perry

both uses and subverts the ideology. Elizabeth Langland’s

Nobody’s Angels: Middle Class Women and Domestic Ideology in Victorian Culture

argues that far from being passive captives of the generally

accepted “Angel in the House” ideology, middle class women

controlled the dissemination of certain knowledges and thus

helped ensure middle class hegemony in mid-Victorian England”

(9). In Perry’s Victorian detective novels, women, rather than

being passive onlookers, cloistered literally or figuratively,

hidden away in boudoirs, or confined as “angels” to the home,

become active participants in the crime-solving process.

While Lynn Gorham contends that “Women were told that they

must remain within the domestic sphere both because their duties

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were to be performed there and because contact with the wider

world would damage their ability to perform those duties” (4),

Langland sees women as far more active in maintaining middle

class hegemony. She contends that women served as “adjunct[s] to

a man’s commercial endeavours” and were also concerned with “the

acquisition of social and political status” (8). Whether either

of these views were true, for all Victorian women, at all times,

is, of course, debatable. How many contemporaneous Victorian

women accepted the division and how many did not is open to

question, as well. While Lynn Abrams contends, “It is only in

prescriptive literature that the bourgeois woman, who idly spent

her days exercising her creative talents, socialising with other

women and supervising the servants, can be found. In reality most

middle-class women were active both within and outside the home,”

most sources agree that as many as two-thirds of Victorian middle

and upper middle class women did not work outside the home,

leaving relatively few venues for outside involvement, other than

charity work (Ideals). To a degree, Jan Marsh disagrees with

Abrams, and her description of the activities of Victorian women

is echoed by Anne Perry in almost every book she writes:

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However, the majority of upper- and middle-class women never worked outside the home. . . . the notion of idle, unoccupied Victorian ladies is something of a myth. Women ran the house, undertaking domestic work and child care themselves, as well as supervising the servants employed to cook, clean, carry coal and run errands.

While middle class women would certainly have been occupied with

the hands on running of a household, I doubt that the women of

the gentry or aristocracy undertook much domestic work or

supervision of servants. And it is in this world that many of

Perry’s crimes take place. Although Charlotte fits Marsh’s

description perfectly, her sister Emily, who married into the

aristocracy, can be as idle as she wishes. Certainly the idea of

the private/public sphere is well enough recognized in the

literature of the time to use in discussing the many ways in

which Anne Perry uses the public/private sphere, to subvert

societal expectations in her Victorian mysteries.

Anne Perry’s women characters, Charlotte Pitt, her sister

Emily Radley (formerly Lady George Ashworth), Lady Vespasia

Cummings-Gould, and even Gracie, Charlotte’s maid, function

effectively as female “private” investigators. They employ

“women’s knowledge,” in some cases simple domestic knowledge, or

an understanding of the subtle mores of the socialscape, or an

affinity with women’s problems that Pitt lacks. Not only is it

territory within which men are not particularly knowledgeable, it

is also territory from which representatives of the public

sphere, i.e. the constabulary, are either restricted or excluded

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on two counts. For one thing they are male, and for another they

are not of an appropriate class. Although Pitt refuses to go to

the tradesmen’s entrance, as is expected, rarely does he have

access to the private rooms of the houses at which he calls.

Charlotte, Emily and Vespasia in particular, on the other hand,

do have access to the private rooms.

Perry’s privileging of the private calls attention to an

easily defined space and is easily linked to the classic

detective novel, a type of detective fiction also concerned with

the intersections of private and public space. George Grella

defines the classic detective novel as follows:

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The typical detective story presents a group of people

assembled at an isolated place -- generally an English

country house -- who discover that one of their number has

been murdered. They summon the local constabulary, who are

completely baffled; they find no clues or entirely too many,

everybody or nobody has the means, motive, and opportunity to

commit the crime, and nobody seems to be telling the truth.

To the rescue comes an eccentric, intelligent, unofficial

investigator who reviews the evidence, questions the

suspects, constructs a fabric of proof, and in a dramatic

final scene, names the culprit (5).

Grella makes two other comments important to Perry’s novels: he

defines the classic detective novel as “one of the last outposts

of the comedy of manners,” and notes that “The police [. . .] are

ordinary, bourgeois citizens who intrude into a closed,

aristocratic society” in which they are unsuccessful because they

are unable to “comprehend the complex and delicate social code.

The amateur detective, conversely, always is socially acceptable

and comprehends the code of the society he [or as the case may

be, she] investigates” (88). Substitute the enclaves of

privilege within London, and an investigator not known to be an

investigator, indeed, one whose entire success depends on being a

truly “private” investigator, and Perry’s detective novels fit

reasonably well within this definition.

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The classic detective novel thus works particularly well for

Perry’s purposes, which I take to be foregrounding women in a

role more imbued with agency than is generally recognized.

Precisely because her characters are fictional and not historical

or realistic, per se they are less constrained than actual

historical personages might be.2 Linking the conventions of the

classic detective novel with Victorian domestic ideology,

specifically that of the “separate spheres,” works to

re/envision, and effectively subvert the absent presence of women

in history.3

If the women are empowered by having knowledge that men do

not have, cannot access, and do not understand, the effect must

be to shift the paradigms of power away from the masculine, the

arena of public, and toward the feminine, the arena of the

private. In a very cogent comment, Langland notes the importance

of the “trivial world of etiquette, household management and

charitable visiting” which “reveals how effectively power may

operate when its manifestations appear insignificant and

inconsequential” (8). Certainly it is in these arenas that

Charlotte operates. Perry takes great care to not only provide

the details of dress and society more commonly found in a novel

of manners but also grounds each novel firmly in everyday life.

Her novels faithfully reflect Victorian society from the

gradations of class, the status of women, the lives of the

respectable and the unrespectable, to the social minutiae of

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calling, and the vagaries of fashion. As Langland points out, the

minutiae are what is important – calling at an inappropriate

time, or having the wrong dress would mark a woman as an

outsider; for Charlotte’s purposes, this would be fatal (32-3).

Thus, Perry not only details everyday life with a very sharp eye

for detail, but also privileges the private sphere over the

public sphere, which is present but filtered through private

eyes, so to speak. Using most of the conventions of the classic

detective fiction, which concerns itself more with the private,

i.e. places and motivations, allows Perry’s fictional characters

to behave in a credible fashion.

Charlotte Ellison marries Inspector Thomas Pitt of the

Metropolitan Police, a love match which leaves her family and

friends aghast. She very soon finds herself taking an active role

in her husband’s cases, which conveniently enough, almost always

concern murders committed in upper-class society for motives that

are frequently concerned with the private rather than the public

sphere. If Perry's detective novels are to work, after all,

Charlotte cannot be isolated from her family; the premise is that

Pitt, despite being a gamekeeper's son, has had a good education

and acquired upper-class diction, which is why, even though he

remains socially unacceptable, he is assigned to upper-crust

murders. Several highly convenient plot devices come into play:

Charlotte is neither shunned nor cast off by her horrified

family, as well might happen; her younger sister Emily, who has

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looks, brains and social cunning, carries out a successful

campaign to marry Lord George Ashworth. She becomes nearly as

avid and sharp a sleuth as Charlotte, and has the good fortune to

meet and be accepted by the iconoclastic but extremely well

connected Lady Vespasia Cummings-Gould. Being accepted in society

as a relative of Lady Ashworth and as Lady Cumming-Gould’s niece

is of enormous use to both Charlotte and Thomas, as such

acceptance allows Charlotte at least to penetrate the private.

The whole entire point of their sleuthing activities is that

Perry’s P. I .’s are taken to be something other than they are.

Charlotte misrepresents herself at various times as someone’s

young woman cousin up from the country, Emily’s single sister,

Emily’s married sister, a young woman with an interest in

military affairs, or a social reformer -- anything, that is, but

1 I am thinking her of such improbable historical romances wherein thegirl defies her whole family and marries the man (occasionally a low born squire) and not only is successful, but keeps her front teeth!Both Charlotte and Emily are, for example, constrained by their husbands, certainly to a greater degree than a contemporary woman could accept. They are both aware of who wears the pants in the family and must often employ feminine wiles or work a round their husbands. 2 This does not imply that her research or detail is inaccurate; it isnot. It is more like such series as “Murder, She Wrote” or any ongoing series. How many times can Charlotte possibly masquerade before someone recognizes her?

3. By this comment, I mean to indicate, not that women did not exist and were not important, but that the patriarchal histories tended to ignore any contribution, which was, of necessity of the domestic or indirect deployment of power.

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what she actually is, the wife of Inspector Thomas Pitt.

Charlotte must masquerade as a member of Society, in which she

no longer actually belongs, in order to penetrate the private

spaces of the upper class. As the speaker notes, when Charlotte

prepares to investigate a particularly sordid murder in Bluegate

Fields, “If she could meet the Waybournes socially, when they were

not guarding themselves against the vulgarity and intrusions of

the police, she might learn something that would be of use to

Pitt. [. . . ] there were always people who would, as a matter of

course, know of relationships that would never be discussed with

persons of the lower order, such as professional investigators”

(32).

Perry’s detectives are in many ways exemplars of classic

investigators. Perry’s women talk to people, observe their

reactions closely, pry about in suspects’ dresser drawers, listen

to private speech, countercheck their alibis against information

accumulated, and confront the suspects, often in a drawing room

or at a social occasion, thereby eventually proving the innocence

of the unjustly accused and ensnaring the guilty. By so doing,

since they generally function in a social milieu, a private

domestic sphere; they exercise power in a way approved for

Victorian women, despite the essential public nature of their

activities.

Thus, due to her own very respectable birth, Emily’s very

successful marriage, and the connections that match brought,

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Charlotte is able to deploy the separate spheres of influence,

that demarcation so beloved of Victorian culture, to not only use

her skill in a more or less approved fashion, but Perry, by

setting the crime within the domestic, within the private, within

women’s territory, and invoking the indirect genteel method of

gathering evidence, is able to subvert the historical silencing

of women by using the detective conventions to reconfigure the

spheres of power and empower the woman as detective.

Paragon Walk, Bluegate Fields, Rutland Place, Silence in Hanover Close,

Pentecost Alley, and Seven Dials are novels in which the women either

solve the crime or are responsible for carrying out social

justice. In these novels, Charlotte penetrates private spaces to

uncover the hidden domestic secrets which provide the solution to

the crime.

It is easy to see Charlotte or Emily working to good

advantage in these situations, mingling, listening, catching the

false notes, observing the slightest nuances of body language,

and eventually figuring out the motive for murder. It is quite

understandable how Charlotte’s husband could not obtain this

information. Thomas Pitt, kindly described as disheveled, his

collar awry, his coat unevenly buttoned, his coat pockets stuffed

with odds and ends, and his hair standing on end, simply cannot

be portrayed balancing a tea-cup, ears pricked for social

innuendoes. Pitt will never idle the afternoon away, consuming

scandalous goings-on along with cucumber sandwiches, whipped

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cream pastries, and tea. Nor might Pitt recognize the seemingly

trivial scraps of knowledge as significant. But if Charlotte does

not, Emily or Vespasia certainly will. And once Charlotte is

within the private domestic space, despite the elaborate rituals

involved in paying calls, she can gather the information Thomas

needs to weave a comprehensible story out of the disparate scraps

of information he has. Although Pitt does not always appreciate

her “meddling,” Charlotte is extremely valuable to him,

especially when his superiors constrain him from upsetting some

noble suspect or another and he cannot, therefore, obtain

directly the information necessary to solve a crime. Especially

in the earlier works, Charlotte must “work around” Pitt, even

though he is perfectly aware that her knowledge of social

conventions and her superior access are extremely useful. While

Pitt can function superbly in the public sphere and the

rookeries, the equivalent of Chandler’s “mean streets” and has no

qualms whatsoever about confronting either noble suspects or his

superior officers, he is often at a loss to understand women’s

behavior or upper-class social convention. What is more, Pitt has

no access to private domestic space; he is received, grudgingly,

in the antechambers of the truly private domestic space; his

interviews are in rooms that share a public/private function,

such as a hall, a morning room, or a back parlor, whereas upper-

class visitors who call at accepted social times are usually

shown into the withdrawing room or boudoir. In Silence in Hanover

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Close, for example, the footman eyes Pitt’s attire swiftly and

decides that “He [Pitt] was not library material; the morning

room was good enough for him” (165). What is more, Pitt’s

interviews with the family are usually either observed or

mediated by the head of the household; in addition, his known

public status effectively bridles the tongues of those to whom he

speaks.

The murders in Paragon Walk, complex though the plot is, are

caused by simple jealousy. Rutland Place, Bluegate Fields, and Silence in

Hanover Close all have plots in which murders are committed to

hide the social sins of incest, pederasty, and transvestism,

respectively. All of these sins are uncovered and brought to

light in the domestic sphere. Incest and pederasty, while social

“crimes,” are also public transgressions; transvestism is a

private concern, until it leads to murder most foul. But while

the private sphere may easily become the public space, the

private sins public transgressions, both the perpetrators and

their families make every effort to keep the two categories

separate. For one thing, social ruin will follow swiftly upon the

revelation of the social sins, whether these sins are criminal

acts or not; and social ruin, as Charlotte points out to Pitt, is

a fate infinitely worth than death.

Charlotte’s ability to “read” the domestic provides Thomas

with the information needed to solve the crimes. Paragon Walk is a

text in which the action takes place entirely within an area

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supposedly exempt from sordid crimes by virtue of its class

exclusivity. AI don’t know what things is coming to, [says the

reporting constable] what with General Gordon killed by that

there dervish, and now we got a rapist loose in Paragon Walk.

Shockin’ I call it [. . .]” (3). The inhabitants of Paragon

Walk, are, of course, certain that this outrage is perpetrated by

some fiendish, lower-class outsider. Pitt is called in to

investigate the rape-murder of the first victim, the virginal

Fanny Nash. As this crime is followed by a second murder, another

rape, and then a suicide, evidently committed by Hallam Calley,

Fanny’s rapist-murderer, out of remorse, it becomes more and more

apparent that far from some outside lunatic, these crimes are the

work of a resident of Paragon Walk. Charlotte and Emily soon

discover many ugly secrets, among them a Satanic cult to which

the erstwhile innocent Fanny belonged. At the root of the

murders, though, is something private; the murderess has killed

Fanny, her sister-in-law and ward, in a fit of jealousy. Jessamyn

Nash never allows anyone to profit by her discards; one of the

clues to her guilt is that she never gives her cast-off dresses

to the maid. This clue is one that it is unlikely Pitt will

uncover; even if he did, he might not realize the importance of

such a seemingly trivial piece of information. When she is

finished with Calley, she still cannot stand to let anyone else

have him. Fanny, raped by Calley, comes to Jessamyn, who stabs

her in a jealous rage. Thus the rape and murder, which seem to be

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one crime, are actually separate, and the motive is that most

personal one of jealousy. Charlotte patches the story together

from pieces of information and acute observations of Jessamyn’s

anger and possessiveness and an understanding of women which Pitt

lacks. Furthermore, Charlotte can unobtrusively penetrate the

private space in ways which Pitt cannot; as Lady Ashworth’s

sister, she is accepted into the intimacies of the Walk’s

inhabitants almost without question. Indeed, while Jessamyn Nash

suspects that Charlotte is a social climber, attempting to gate-

crash an exclusive enclave, she never once suspects either that

Charlotte is investigating those very same inhabitants or that

she is a policeman’s wife. As in so many of Perry’s narratives,

all of the motives and evidence are readily available to someone

who understands both the social codes and the extent to which the

residents of Paragon Walk will go to keep their guilty secrets in

the private sphere. Pitt assumes that the rape and murder are one

crime and thus targets the men. It is Charlotte, looking for

domestic clues, with ready access to all the private space, who

realizes not only why Jessamyn stabbed Fanny but also how.

Jessamyn stabbed Fanny with a fruit knife, washed it off and put

it back. Such as item, sitting openly out next to a bowl of

fruit, part of the domestic scene, would easily be overlooked.

These are early days and early crimes, however: once Charlotte

has revealed the murderess, she is more than happy to turn her

over to Pitt.

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In Bluegate Fields, Arthur Waybourne, the adolescent son of Sir

Anstey and Lady Waybourne, is found drowned in the sewers of

Bluegate Fields, a highly unsavoury district much given to male

and female prostitution. The coroner discovers that he was

actually drowned in bath-water, which argues a private place. A

further examination reveals the first stages of syphilis. Mr.

Jerome, the curmudgeonly tutor, is accused of the murder, based

not on police work but on the allegations of two of his pupils,

the dead boy’s brother and cousin. The fathers refuse to allow

their sons to be questioned by the police, claiming invasion of

privacy. Jerome is convicted, apparently quite properly, in a

public trial, on unsubstantiated knowledge from the private

sphere. The dead boy’s family can draw a deep breath of relief;

an outsider, also accused of molesting his other pupils, is

safely convicted, and life can return to normal. Jerome refuses

to confess and vehemently denies any molestation. Eugenie, his

wife, is certain that her husband is innocent; naturally,

Charlotte becomes involved in helping her.

Charlotte does not believe Jerome is guilty and pushes Pitt

to reconsider his solution. The upper echelons of the police

force are satisfied that Jerome committed the crime and do not

wish to upset the members of the upper crust. Superintendent

Athelstan forbids Pitt to carry the investigation any further.

Thus, Pitt has reached the limits of the public sphere. Whatever

hidden knowledge exists in the inaccessible private sphere, the

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public sphere regards the matter as settled. Charlotte insists on

Jerome’s innocence, and Pitt brings the conversation to a swift

and complete halt:

“That is the end of the matter! I do not wish to

discuss the matter any further. Where is my dinner,

please? I am tired and cold, and I have had a long and

extremely unpleasant day. I wish to be served my dinner

and eat it in peace!” (Bluegate 111).

It may seem that the public sphere, represented by Thomas Pitt,

police inspector, wins out over the private, represented by a

mere wife/domestic servant, but such a reading reckons without

Charlotte’s well known persistence.

Once Charlotte decides to pursue a course of action, Pitt

often must surrender to domestic force majeure. Says Charlotte,

sitting demurely with her sewing, the picture of proper

domesticity,

“Let's imagine Jerome is innocent and he is telling the

truth! What do we know for a fact?” [ . . ] He smiled sourly

at the “we.” But there was no purpose in trying to evade

talking about it. He could see she was going to talk about it

to the bitter end. (Bluegate 145)

Pitt finally re-opens the investigation when he discovers that

one of his police inspectors has more or less invited a witness

into perjury. But he cannot unravel the mess and discover who

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murdered Arthur. It is Charlotte, visiting the Swynford’s home,

who asks Titus, the victim’s young cousin, a few questions and

discovers that he has no clear idea of sexual abuse. All his

father ever asked was whether Jerome “touched” him in any way and

Titus, without any idea of what is at stake, answers yes. It is

this private testimony that has woven a rope for Jerome’s neck

and Charlotte’s ability to infiltrate the private sphere which

leads to the solution. What is more, Lady Benita Waybourne and

Mrs. Callantha Swynford put their heads together and come up with

the actual identity of the molester/murderer, though as Callantha

says to Charlotte, “It will do you no good [. . . ] because I

do not think there is any way you will ever be able to prove it,

but I believe it was my cousin, Esmond Vanderley, who was

Arthur’s seducer.” (Bluegate, 263). Thus, despite the location of

the corpse and the public prostitutes who swore to the guilt of

the tutor, this is a very private crime, one that takes place in

the private realms of the family and the bedroom and not at a

male prostitute’s rooms in Bluegate Fields. And it is in the

private space that the truth lies; the effect of the women

solving the crime again deconstructs the importance of the public

and foregrounds the private.

The sin/crime of pederasty is solved by a convenient and

unprovable murder; Mortimer Swynforth reports that Esmond

Vanderley, his brother-in-law, has had a shooting accident. With

a hunting rifle. In London. In a drawing room. Pitt immediately

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realizes two things: Swynford has shot his brother-in-law to

preserve his social status, and Pitt will never be able to prove

it. While it is Pitt who decides to call Vanderley’s murder a

suicide in order to exact at least social retribution, it is

Charlotte who discovers the truth. Pitt can carry out some form

of justice, but without Charlotte’s ability to access private

knowledge, no solution could have been reached. In Rutland Place,

the sixth of the series, Mrs. Wilhelmina Spencer-Brown has been

poisoned, and only a Rutland Place inhabitant could possibly have

murdered her. As is typical of Grella’s comments, everyone has a

motive and an alibi, and no one is telling the truth. The truths

uncovered are both petty and significant. Mina, the murdered

woman, was a collector of other people’s petty secrets. Not all

the secrets, however, are petty. At the root of the murder of

Mina is both incest and abortion. Tormod Lagarde has not only

engaged in an incestuous relationship with his sister, Eloise,

but also forced her to have an abortion. Eloise, in turn, pushes

him off a carriage, which results in his crippling and eventual

death. Tormod had poisoned Mina to prevent her from disclosing

his relationship with his sister; social ruin would follow such a

revelation, and his plans to marry the rich widow Amaryllis

Denbigh would certainly not come to fruition. Despite Pitt’s

belief that Eloise killed Mina, Charlotte, observing the

residents and their reactions, and particularly Eloise’s, comes

to the conclusion that Tormod murdered Mina, and Eloise killed

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her brother. Charlotte, however, feels he received his just

deserts and does not turn the “murderess” over to justice. Thus

Charlotte chooses to keep private what happened in the private

sphere rather than exposing the whole sordid mess to the

attention of the public sphere. She deliberately conceals the

fact that another murder has taken place, choosing to protect

Eloise. As a “private” investigator, she can do so; the instant

she tells Pitt, the matter becomes public. Charlotte, by choosing

to remain silent, privileges private knowledge over public

revelation.

“Are you going to tell the police?” Eloise asked quietly.

“No. He killed Mina -- he would have been hanged for that

anyway. It was wrong to kill him, but it’s done now. I shall

never speak of it again” (Rutland 216)

In Rutland Place, it is the women’s voices who matter: Eloise,

pushed to the breaking point by the murder of the only child she

will ever have; Mina, poking and prying and hinting, and

Charlotte, whose voice decides what is just and what is not. Who

in either sphere has any power at all but Charlotte? “I shall

never speak of it again” is not only authoritative discourse, but

discourse defined by the private sphere. And her power, such as

it is, derives from private knowledge and not public law.

Silence in Hanover Close works on much the same model. Pitt’s

efforts to solve a three-year-old burglary/murder meet with a

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spectacular lack of success. The actual point of the

investigation, however, is to determine whether Veronica York,

the widow of the murdered Robert York, is in any way implicated,

and whether any link exists between York’s murder and sensitive

material “missing” from the Foreign Office. As her late husband

was employed in the Foreign Office, as is Julian Danvers, her

prospective second husband, what is really required is that Pitt

adroitly and quietly investigate whether or not she is guilty of

murder or adultery -- or any other improprieties. And, of course,

this is an impossible assignment: The York family is a very old

one, and the last thing they will discuss with Inspector Pitt is

whether their only son was murdered by his wife or his wife’s

lover. As it turns out, other circumstances exist which make it

certain that Pitt will receive no cooperation whatsoever; indeed,

by the last third of the novel, he has come too close to exposing

the truth and is locked up for murder. Close though Pitt comes to

the actual turn of events, he still could not have accessed the

secrets the York household will kill to maintain. As Charlotte,

discussing the case with the newly widowed Emily points out, “I

don’t know how Thomas will be able to make any inquiries. It is

hardly the thing a policeman can ask of her social

acquaintances.” Emily replies, “Of course we will find out. We

have done nothing but bake cakes and stitch seams for six months,

and I am ready to scream with it. We shall prove Veronica York’s

impeccable reputation, or ruin it entirely” (Silence 27). Neither

Charlotte nor Emily is necessarily interested in who murdered

Robert York: behind their lighthearted banter, they intend to

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investigate Veronica York privately, rather than have a public

official do so. As Charlotte points out, even if an investigation

uncovers nothing at all, society will automatically assume her

guilty of some crime, even if it is only the social crime of

having been investigated.

As the reader might expect, uncovering the truth of the York

murder is up to Charlotte and Emily. Emily, enlisting Jack Radley

in the cause, makes the division between the private and the

public perfectly clear. “No one will speak in front of the police

as they might with us, nor would the police understand the shades

of meaning if they did” (Silence 30). Jack readily agrees to

help, and he, Emily, Charlotte, and Aunt Vespasia engage in an

investigation, which before it ends, almost destroys the York

household, exposes some very raw emotions, unveils the source of

the missing information, clears Veronica of any “impropriety,”

almost results in Thomas Pitt being hanged for murder, and does

result in Emily deciding to marry Radley. Private and public

concerns are so interskeined in this plot that only private

methods of arriving at the truth have a chance of working. Pitt,

as an outsider, has no chance at all of arriving at the truth.

Charlotte, Emily and Vespasia carry out various deceptions to

eventually arrive at the very unsavory explanation for the

“murder” of Robert York. Charlotte masquerades as Miss Elisabeth

Barnaby, Jack Radley’s country cousin. Emily, since she is in

strict mourning and cannot directly engage the Yorks, decides to

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masquerade as Amelia Gibson and apply for the position of

Veronica York’s maid. Since Dulcie, Veronica’s previous maid,

talked to Pitt, a representative of the public space and was

shortly thereafter found dead on the public pavement after being

pushed from a private window, this employment is not without its

risks. Aunt Vespasia hosts the dinner which reveals the sordid

truths, and Jack, in order to stay in touch with Emily, disguises

himself as a chimney sweep. While the deceit has its humorous

side, all of the characters except for Vespasia are figures who

can penetrate the private sphere almost completely unremarked.

Who cares what is said in front of a maid? Who notices a chimney

sweep? Miss Barnaby is a welcome guest in the house, unlike

Charlotte Pitt, who were her true identity known, would be

decidedly unwelcome.

Much of Pitt’s investigation centers on “Cerise,” a mystery

woman who may have been Veronica York or a murderous spy. When

Pitt is arrested for the murder of the prostitute he thinks is

Cerise, he is imprisoned and faces trial and possible hanging. It

is obvious to Charlotte that the answers lie, not in the public

sphere but in the house in Hanover Close. With no assistance

whatsoever coming from the public sphere, Charlotte must take

action. When she goes to see him, she “lie[s] as easily as if he

had been a child instead of a man, someone to be protected and

comforted . . .”(286), just as she lies to Jemima and Daniel,

saying that their father is away on a special job rather than in

23

jail. This action also invokes the idea of the private sphere,

the woman’s duties to her children. Treating Pitt as a child in

need of comforting lies makes Pit’s helplessness very apparent;

inevitably, it increases Charlotte’s sense of agency and ability

to act independently. And of course, since she cannot act

effectively in the public sphere, she must use her understanding

of the private sphere.

Aware of time running out, she decides to provoke a reaction.

She writes notes to her suspects and ties them with a cerise

ribbon. Then, having gained access to the York’s as Miss Barnaby,

she slips away, dresses as Cerise, and confronts Garrad Danver.

That same evening, she witnesses Loretta confront Garrad and

realizes that Garrad loved “Cerise,” and that Loretta is obsessed

with Garrad. Her next move is to ask Vespasia to host a dinner

for her suspects where she plans to increase the pressure until

someone cracks. The denouement, in the most approved classical

tradition, takes place at this dinner party where the unwitting

suspects are assembled. Loretta reveals that she killed both the

prostitute and Dulcie, the maid, which still leaves Robert York’s

murder unaccounted for.

Ironically, none of the actions are concerned with an

actual spy, but all hide private sins. The elusive figure of

“Cerise” turns out to be, not a courtesan-spy, but Robert York,

who is a secret transvestite; the missing documents from the

Foreign Office are the result, not of a spy-ring, but of Loretta

24

York’s infatuation with and blackmail of Garrad Danver; Robert

York’s “murder” is unintentional -- committed by his wife when

she discovers that he is Cerise and not an intruder from outside.

Veronica York tells Charlotte, now revealed as Charlotte Pitt,

this last bit of information when they are alone. She expects

Charlotte to tell her husband:

“I suppose they will hang me.”

To her amazement, Charlotte answered immediately and without

a quiver. “I don’t see why they should.”

“Won’t you tell them?”

“No-no-I don’t think there is any point. [ . . .]. I don’t

know if its right, but I think I know how you might have

felt.”(344).

As in Rutland Place, the voice of ultimate authority is

Charlotte’s voice. Not only has she solved the crime, she has

done so without Thomas and has also decided that Veronica York

will be free to live her life out. Thomas, who has been

languishing in jail, accused of killing ACerise,” and thus unable

to function in the public at all, is released due to Charlotte’s

effort in the private. More than most of Perry’s works, this

novel emphasizes the importance of the private and the women who

occupy it, understand it and use it for their own purposes.

Charlotte can function as a private investigator not because she

has learned investigative technique from her husband but because

she has learned social rules and behavior and knows what lies

25

behind the public masks; Emily can pass as a maid because she has

watched her own lady’s maid and can adroitly use the maid’s role

to effectively investigate in the private sphere. Thus, the

private space and the women who understand it are central to the

solution. Not only do Charlotte, Emily and Vespasia privilege the

private; they also completely co-opt the public. The crime is

solved, not by the institutions whose job it is, but by Charlotte

and company. In the final scenes, in a privileging of the role of

the private, Lady Vespasia Cumming-Gould calls her friends at the

Home Office and procures Pitt’s immediate release.

During the course of the Pitt’s marriage, they have bought

several homes, always improving their standard of living. The

house as the center of warmth and a refuge has grown in

importance to both Charlotte and Thomas. Charlotte spends much

time making their homes habitable, and Thomas is often described

as hastening home or feeling his heart lighten as he approaches

home; the kitchen is frequently described as holding the warmth

of the house, and the kitchen, of course, is where Charlotte is

most frequently occupied. Perry makes the importance of the

kitchen unmistakable; at one time or another Lady Emily Radley,

Lady Vespasia Cummings-Gold, Assistant Commissioner John

26

Cornwallis, and Victor Narraway, Head of Special Branch, sit in

the kitchen for tea. Using the kitchen so positively subverts the

public-private division of space. As Langland comments, kitchens

were supposed to be away from the public spaces of the house;

odors were unacceptable and cold food preferable (42). Perry’s

use of the kitchen as the heart of the home deconstructs both

this attitude and the use of space.

In The Hyde Park Headsman, Charlotte has fallen in love with

the Keppel Street house, which is in need of much work, and, at

least at first, she is somewhat less than her usual involved self

in Thomas’ case. In fact, she is much more concerned with the

state of the plaster. The description of the house, with its

French doors, garden with apple trees, lawn, and withdrawing

room indicates not only Pitt’s rise in rank but the importance of

the home. The house might be the catastrophe Emily descries,

rather than the disaster Charlotte will make into something fine,

but Charlotte is clearly more involved with the private sphere

than is usual. When Pitt is dismissed from his position, which

threatens the house and their rising status, Charlotte

investigates, going so far as to break and enter in search of

27

proof of murder. Yet again the motive for murder lies in the

private sphere. Dulcie Arledge murders her husband for the chance

of a life with her newly widowed lover. Charlotte, however, asks

Pitt whether he will regain his old position.

Pentecost Alley showcases both Charlotte’s investigative skills

and the importance of matters domestic. Even though Thomas has,

at the time, gained promotion to the Superintendency of Bow

Street, he is still not a “gentleman,” and the women’s social

knowledge remains important. Pitt has come to a dead end in

attempting to trace the torture and murder of two prostitutes. A

Hellfire Club badge, engraved with the name Finlay FitzJames is

found in the bed of Ada McKinley, a prostitute who has apparently

been tortured and murdered. This evidence indicates that

FitzJames, son of the autocratic and powerful Augustus FitzJames,

is involved in the death, but neither Pitt, nor Inspector Ewart,

who worked the earlier case, can make sense of the case, and Pitt

hits dead end after dead end. Safe in the privilege that wealth

and power bring, the FitzJames can easily fob Pitt off. He is

dismissed as a public servant, who has no chance to access any

private knowledge. Aware that he cannot access the private

28

knowledge he needs, Pitt himself considers that Charlotte could

be of great help in this case, as could Emily; these thoughts

validate the importance of the private sphere and the women who

inhabit it. As he thinks, “Had there been time, it was the type

of investigation Charlotte might have helped with, and had done

so excellently in the past. It needed subtlety and acute

observation . . . Perhaps Emily was the one to ask. She moved in

society and might hear whispers which would at least tell him in

what direction to look” (127). Quite coincidentally, Emily has

already made the acquaintance of Tallulah FitzJames and decides

to help her on both a private and a public scale: Tallulah is in

love with Jago Jones, formerly a member of The Hellfire Club, and

now a minister who cares for the extreme poor. He has no time for

flighty, pleasure-loving, wealthy Tallulah, as he has turned his

back on a life of pleasure some six or seven years before.

Moreover, she is worried that a very shrewd policeman is pursuing

her brother Finlay for the murder of a prostitute. Emily enlists

Charlotte’s aid in checking whether Tallulah’s claim that she

can alibi Finlay for the night in question could be true.

Tallulah foolishly attended a very racy party, where opium was

29

being smoked, saw her nearly insensible brother, but lied about

her whereabouts. She can not now claim to have seen Finlay, for

who would believe here? Charlotte and Emily investigate the house

and decide it is possible that Tallulah is telling the truth.

Emily has already had a fake Hellfire Club badge made; she

intends to conceal it and somehow provoke another search. In

addition, she and Tallulah meet Rose Burke, the prostitute who

provided the identification of Finlay. They lie about being

friends of Ada’s and claim the butler who ruined Ada and forced

her to the streets has committed his crime again; as a result

Rose loses her certainty about Finlay FitzJames’ presence. In

this case, Emily and Tallulah have used private knowledge and

private means to subvert public justice. Ada’s pitiful domestic

tragedy is used to gain Rose’s sympathy, and Emily and Tallulah’s

access to private means procure the substitute brooch.

Pitt, having indeed found the badge and lost his main

witness, is forced to conclude that FitzJames is innocent. Ada’s

pimp is convicted and hanged, and everyone is extremely relieved,

Pitt’s superior, John Cornwallis, going so far as to say that the

murder of a prostitute by her pimp is “in a sense – almost a

30

domestic matter” (226).

The plot thickens when Nora Gough, a second prostitute is

found murdered and tortured in the exact manner as Ada McKinley;

Pitt discovers the murderer of the second prostitute is Rose

Kelly, the woman who lost her lover to the murdered woman, but he

still has no idea why the death scenes are identical.

Emily, Tallulah and Charlotte mount their own investigation,

masquerading as prostitutes who are looking for rooms. It is in

the private domestic spaces, in the kitchens, that they finally

uncover the truth. Charlotte learns that an earlier murder

occurred, six years ago, with the same aspects of torture; her

information, privately uncovered, gives Pitt has the wherewithal

he needs to solve the case. That they do so sitting in the

kitchen chatting with brothel-keepers about the room rates still

reflects private space. It is the domestic space of the kitchen

that matters, women among women. Charlotte’s information leads to

the exposure of Inspector Ewart, who was bribed by Augustus

FitzJames to hide the incriminating evidence. In addition,

Police Surgeon Lennox’s young sister “Mary Smith” is the original

prostitute, who was tortured and strangled by Finlay FitzJames.

31

Lennox, in pursuit of private vengeance, as Ewart was in pursuit

of private success, set each murder up to imitate his sister’s

murder and implicate Finlay FitzJames, who did indeed kill

Lennox’s sister. When FitzJames is arrested and hauled off to the

public jail from the bastions of privilege, one sees, yet again,

the importance of women and women’s talk and accrued knowledge.

In the novels following Pentecost Alley, Charlotte’s role

diminishes; although the private sphere remains significant as

the importance of the political increases. In Ashforth Hall,

Charlotte assists Emily with the house party from hell, a meeting

on the Irish Question and the near collapse of the meetings

following murder; while she is helpful on the social front, she

is not investigating as she has done in earlier novel; indeed, it

is Gracie who provides the clue that solves the murder. In

Brunswick Gardens, Charlotte is only peripherally involved. Her

former brother-in-law, Dominic Corde, is one of three suspects in

the murder of Unity Bellwood, a rather unpleasant depiction of

the “New Woman.” The plot thickens when a second murder, that of

Dominic’s mentor Ramsey Parmenter follows. It is, however,

Charlotte’s private knowledge of her own infatuated and obsessive

32

feelings for Dominic and her ability to search Vita Parmenter’s

bedroom that finally results in Vita’s apprehension for murder.

Charlotte finds a broken heel in the potted palm, which explains

an evidential contradiction, and a trifling collection of

Dominic’s belongings in Vita’s bureau drawer. Her understanding

of the private sphere helps solves the murder, though we see that

she is not as central to the investigation.

In Bedford Square, again, she plays a less central part,

although both Vespasia and Gracie function in the private sphere

to solve both murder and blackmail. Blackmail, of course, is a

crime that takes private knowledge and harms the victim with

threats to make that knowledge public. Charlotte attempts to aid

her old friend General Brandon Ballantyne disprove a

blackmailer’s accusations that he showed cowardice in the face of

an enemy. Pitt is investigating who murdered the man found on the

steps of Ballantyne’s home in possession of the General’s

snuffbox. As the plot unfolds, more and more influential men

admit to the same situation. Neither Charlotte or Thomas can

discover any meaningful connection among the victims, and are not

having their usual successes, as neither can find any proof or

33

set of facts that leads to a solution.

Vespasia is trying to help her god-daughter, Theodosia,

prove that her husband, Leo Cadell, was not the blackmailer. He

committed suicide, but she cannot accept such a solution. It is

Vespasia who finds a letter at his home, among his private

correspondence and realizes that all the blackmailees are members

of a committee of the Jessup Club concerned with funding an

orphanage. General Ballantyne has raised concerns about the money

going to the orphanage; he believes that too little money is

being requested for the children’s maintenance. Pitt has checked

the orphanage, the books, etc., and can find no reason for

blackmail. In fact, the public face of the orphanage is beyond

reproach.

Pitt returns home, and in a continuing motif, goes to the

heart of the home, the kitchen. The warm space, the scrubbed

wood, the pleasant smell of drying laundry, the tea kettle

simmering, the smell of food cooking, all reveal the importance

of the intimacy of the home. Pitt reports his findings – which

reflect an orderly public face. Gracie responds “Then you was

took proper” (314). Pitt, despite his certain knowledge of the

34

horrible lives of the poverty-stricken endure in London still

cannot believe her.

“They were happy and healthy, playing.”

Gracie responds, “”Til they get placed . . . There’s good

money in that. Sell an ‘ealthy kid for quite a bit . .

‘specially if you got a reg’lar supply, like” (315).

The “kitchen” knowledge provide the solution. Sigmund Tannifer,

one of the members of the Committee, has sold the orphans into

virtual slavery. Confronting the Tannifers, Pitt says “ I’m sorry

you had to know that, Mrs. Tannifer. But the proceeds from this

trade are what has finished this beautiful house and bought the

silk gown you are wearing” When her husband says “They were not

children of people like us,” Parthenope shoots her husband,

reveals that she killed Leo Cadell, believing he was blackmailing

her husband, and then turns the pistol on herself (325). Thus,

although Pitt has indeed discovered the truth and would arrest

Tannifer, the verdict and penalty are again rendered privately.

In this novel, as in many others, the private and the

public are hard to separate. Tannifer certainly uses private

information for private gain, but his victims reflect the public

35

sphere. His wife, a denizen of the private sphere, shoots him for

using his public role to live luxuriously within the private

sphere. Although Charlotte is not an active presence, the

importance of the private sphere does not diminish, as Vespasia

and Gracie contribute their various private knowledge.

After Pitt is transferred to the Special Branch, his

position, in effect undercover, leaves much less room for

Charlotte’s participation.4 This pattern continues through the

following books. Charlotte is not involved in Half Moon Street at

all, although she is integral in The Whitechapel Conspiracy, where she

unearths Charles Voisey as the Head of the dread Inner Circle,

but peripheral at best in Southampton Row, as she is in Dartmoor

for most of the novel.

Much like Pentecost Alley, Seven Dials turns around a plot of long

secret crimes with far reaching consequences. Unlike Pentecost Alley,

however, Charlotte’s involvement is almost purely domestic, that

is to say, concerned with the private sphere. She and Gracie are

trying to find Tilda Garvie’s missing brother, valet to Stephen

Garrick, both of whom have evidently disappeared; it is not a

police matter at all, simply a matter of a sister who has not

seen her brother in three weeks and cannot get information as to

4 In The Whitechapel Conspiracy.

36

where he might be. Although Charlotte is unaware of it, her

investigation is closely tied to Pitt’s: Garrick is one of the

perpetrators of the secret crime, a religious massacre in Egypt;

in fact, his guilt has literally driven him insane. Charlotte and

Gracie cannot find Martin Garvie because both he and his master

have been committed to Bedlam. The course of her investigation

does take her to the unsalubrious slum of Seven Dials, where

Charlotte eventually persuades Reverend Sandeman to disclose the

whereabouts of Garvie.

On a parallel course, Pit is trying solve the politically

sensitive murder of Edwin Lovat, also one of the “guilty four.”

The suspects are an Egyptian national, Ayesha Zakhari and Savile

Ryerson, a British minister. Both are implicated in the murder

and Zakhari is Ryerson’s beloved mistress. Victor Narraway,

Pitt’s superior, fears that the murder is politically motivated

and may cause rebellion to flare up in Egypt, with disastrous

effects on cotton imports.

Charlotte’s investigation, which started as a matter of

tracing a servant, again provides the solution. Once Charlotte

tells Pitt that Sandeman has told her that Garrick and Garvie are

in Bedlam, the pieces fall into place, as Sandeman is one of the

guilty four. Pitt and Narraway get them out and bring them to the

Pitt’s home as a safe refuge. Stephen Garrick is a pitiable mess,

37

and it is Charlotte who cares for him. Here we see the kitchen,

again representative of the heart of the home, and Charlotte as

“the Angel in the House.” Her attitude, cradling him in her arms

as he wept during questioning is exactly what would be expected.

Pitt watches her “with a fierce pride, remembering the stiff

protected young woman she had been . . . Now her compassion made

her more beautiful than he had ever dreamed she could be” (283-

4). It is not her part in solving the crime but her compassion in

the role of nurturing woman that makes Pitt proud. As Narraway

takes Garrick to a safer place, he “turned desperately for one

last look,” and “Pitt realized it was Charlotte he clung to, not

the house” (285). Although Thomas, Charlotte and Narraway

discover what happened by questioning Sandeman, Charlotte’s role

is over. In the last two novels, she is further marginalized. As

Pitt thinks in Buckingham Palace Gardens, “Since joining Special

Branch, he could no longer tell her [Charlotte] the details of

his cases, which meant that she was unable to help in the

practical ways she used to when he dealt with simple murders.”

(168). Vespasia and Gracie increase in importance, thus

preserving the importance of women and their agencies. In Long

38

Spoon Lane and Buckingham Palace Gardens, respectively, it is Vespasia

and Gracie who function in Charlotte’s place to provide Pitt with

the knowledge he needs to solve the cases.

Thus, Perry uses the classical detective formula in

narratives which foreground the private sphere and the women who

operate in it to re/map and re/envision their sense of identity

and their sense of agency. Because the historical is rendered so

precisely and in such detail, the women sleuths become not only

engaging characters, characters with whom we can identify, but

provide a way to imagine the women of the Victorian Age as well.

Since Perry gives women interests in the public life of the time,

while foregrounding the importance of the domestic, she makes

these women realistic enough to at least make readers question

what women did in Victorian times and what kinds of power they

exercised. Charlotte Pitt, her sister Emily, Vespasia Cummings-

Gould and Gracie Phipps, all of whom are supposed to be contained

and silenced within the boundaries of the private sphere and

entirely without influence on anything happening in the public

sphere, use the knowledge of the private sphere to solve crimes;

by so doing, they privilege not only the supposedly powerless

private sphere over the powerful public sphere, but they empower

the women who deploy the public sphere in the interests of truth,

justice and the Victorian way.

39

40

Works Cited

Abrams, Lynn. “Ideals of Womanhood in Victorian Britain.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/trail/victorian_britain/women_home/i

deals_womanhood_05.shtml Published: 2001-08-09 Accessed 10-04-09

Gilbert, Sandra M., and Susan Gubar. The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination. New Haven:Yale UP, 1979.

Gorham, Deborah. The Victorian Girl and the Feminine Ideal. Bloomington, Indiana

UP, 1982.

Grella, George. “The Formal Detective Novel,” 5. Dimensions of Detective Fiction, eds. Larry N. Landrum, Ray B. Browne and Pat Browne. (Bowling Green: Bowling Green U Popular P, 1976).

84-102

Langland, Elizabeth. Nobody’s Angels: Middle Class Women and Domestic Ideology in Victorian Culture

Marsh, Jan. “Gender Ideology and Separate Spheres.” http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/periods_styles/19thcentury/gender_health/gender_ideology/index.html n.d. Accessed 10-04-09.

Perry, Anne. Bedford Square. New York: Ballantine, 1999.

---. Bluegate Fields. New York: Fawcett Crest, 1984.

---. Brunswick Gardens. New York: Fawcett Crest, 1998.

---. Buckingham Palace Gardens. New York: Ballantine, 2008.

---. The Hyde Park Headsman. New York: Fawcett Crest, 1994.

---. Paragon Walk. New York: Fawcett Crest, 1981.

---. Pentecost Alley. New York: Fawcett Crest, 1996.

---. Rutland Place New York: Fawcett Crest. 1983.

---. Silence in Hanover Close. New York: Fawcett Crest, 1988.

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---. Seven Dials. New York: Ballantine, 2003.

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