by Anne Perry
“I’ll do everything I can,” Pitt replied. To have made a promise he did not know if he could keep would be a second betrayal. Sturges was not a child to be given words of comfort instead of the truth.
“Aye. Well, if there’s aught I can do, or anyone here, you know where we are. Now you’d best be getting back to the baked meats, or you’ll be missed.”
“I’ll find Charlotte and bring her to meet you.”
“Aye. You said you’d do that, so be about it then.”
In the morning Pitt was back in his office at Bow Street. He was barely through the door when Inspector Tellman came in, his lantern face dour and resentful as always. He had been forced to respect Pitt, both superficially in his manner, and genuinely because of his ability. However he still felt affronted that Pitt, whom he viewed as socially little better than himself, and professionally no better at all, should have been promoted to the senior position when Micah Drummond resigned. Drummond had been a gentleman, and that made all the difference. He expected gentlemen to be given superior posts; it was no reflection of their ability. For Pitt to have been given it he took personally.
“Good morning, Mr. Pitt,” he said sharply. “Missed you yesterday, sir. Quite a few things to report.” He made it sound as if he had been waiting there all night.
“Good morning, Tellman. I was at a family funeral in Hampshire. What have you got?”
Tellman pursed his lips, but made no reference to the bereavement. That happened to everyone. It stirred emotions in him, but he was certainly not going to allow Pitt to know about them.
“Those people you had the men check up on,” he replied. “Bit difficult when we don’t know what we are looking for, or why. They’re all very respectable seeming gentlemen. What are they supposed to have done?”
“That is what I need to find out,” Pitt replied tersely. He disliked not being able to tell the man as much truth as he knew. His instinct was to trust Tellman, but he dare not take the chance. The Circle could be anywhere.
“Blackmail,” Tellman said darkly. “Makes it hard. You can blackmail a man for dozens of different things, but I suppose mostly it’s cheating, theft or fornicating with someone he shouldn’t.” His expression did not change, but his contempt seemed to fill the room. “Although with gentlemen, it’s not easy for the likes of us to know who he shouldn’t, and who doesn’t matter a damn,” he added. “Some gentlemen swap wives and mistresses around like lending a good book. It’s all right, so long as nobody actually catches you reading it. Doesn’t even matter if they know you got it. Everyone knows what the Prince of Wales does, and who cares?”
“You could keep a particular eye for debt,” Pitt suggested, ignoring the social comment. He was already well familiar with Tellman’s views. “Anyone with a style of living that his income doesn’t seem to support.”
“Embezzlement?” Tellman said with surprise. “What can you embezzle from the Colonial Office?” His voice became heavily sarcastic. “Sorry, Tailor, old boy, can’t pay me bill the usual way this month, but have a couple of telegrams from Africa, that should see you right.” Then quite suddenly his face changed and his eyes lit with knowledge. “Geez! That’s it, isn’t it? There’s information gone missing! You’re after a traitor! That’s why you are not saying anything….”
“I’m still not saying anything,” Pitt said, masking his surprise at Tellman’s acuity and facing him with a long, level stare. “You must suppose what you will, and keep it to yourself. The assistant commissioner would be very angry if he thought we mentioned such a possibility, and I think the Prime Minister would be even angrier.”
“Did you get called to see the Prime Minister?” Tellman was impressed, in spite of himself.
“No. I have never met the Prime Minister, and the only place I have been to in Downing Street is the Colonial Office. You still haven’t told me what you have found out.”
Tellman looked sour. “Nothing that seems of any relevance. Jeremiah Thorne is as virtuous as is possible. Seems to be devoted to his wife, who is exceedingly plain, and spends a lot of money on some teaching foundation to do with women. It is highly disapproved of, except by the very moderns, but that might be scandalous at the worst. It isn’t illegal and she doesn’t do it secretly. In fact she is quite brazen about it. No one could blackmail her over it; she’d probably thank them for the notoriety.”
Pitt already knew that to be true.
“What else?”
“Mr. Hathaway seems to be a very proper gentleman who lives quietly, alone, taking his pleasures rather seriously. Reads a lot, goes to the theater now and then, takes long walks in the fine weather.” Tellman recited it dryly, as if the man were as boring as the details. “He knows a lot of people, but does not seem to have more than a passing acquaintance with them. Dines out once a week at his club. He is a widower with two grown sons, also eminently respectable, one in the Colonial Service and the other in the church.” Tellman’s mouth curled down at the corners. “His tastes are good, he likes quality, but not excessively expensive. He seems to live well within his salary. No one has an ill word to say about him.”
Pitt drew in a deep breath. “And Aylmer? Is he a paragon of virtue as well?”
“Not quite.” There was a shadow of humor at the back of Tellman’s bleak expression. “Face like a burst boot, but fancies the ladies all the same. Quite a charmer in a harmless sort of way.” He shrugged. “At least it is harmless from all I have been able to find out so far. I’m still looking into Mr. Aylmer. Spends quite a lot of money—more than I can see the source of so far.”
“More than his Colonial Office salary?” Pitt asked with a quickening interest, and at the same time a pang of regret.
“Looks like it,” Tellman replied. “Of course he could have been saving up, or he might even have private means. Don’t know yet.”
“Any ladies in particular?”
“A Miss Amanda Pennecuick. Very nice-looking young lady indeed, and very well bred.”
“Does she return his interest?”
“Apparently not. Although that has not yet deterred him.” He looked at Pitt with amusement. “If you are thinking she is pursuing Mr. Aylmer in order to get information out of him, she’s very clever at it. From all I could see, she is trying to avoid him, and not succeeding.”
“She wouldn’t wish actually to succeed, only to appear to try,” Pitt pointed out, “if she were doing as you suggest. Find out about Miss Pennecuick. See who else her friends are, her other admirers, her background, any connection she might have with …” He stopped. Should he mention Germany?
Tellman waited. He was far too quick to be deceived. He knew the reason for Pitt’s hesitation, and the resentment of it was plain in his eyes.
“Africa, Belgium or Germany,” Pitt finished. “Or anything else that’s unusual, for that matter.”
Tellman put his hands in his pockets. It was not intended insolence as much as instinctive lack of respect.
“You missed out Peter Arundell and Robert Leicester,” Pitt prompted.
“Nothing interesting,” Tellman replied. “Arundell is a clever young man from a good family. Younger son. Oldest got the title, next one bought a commission in the army, third one went into the Colonial Office, that’s him, youngest one got the family living somewhere in Wiltshire.”
“Family living?” Pitt was momentarily confused.
“Church,” Tellman said with satisfaction that he had left Pitt behind. “Well-to-do families often own the living and can give it to whoever they like. Bring in quite a lot, some of those country parishes. Lot of tithes. Where I grew up the priest had three livings, and hired a vicar or a curate for each one. Himself, he lived in Italy on the proceeds. They don’t do that anymore, but they used to.”
It was on the edge of Pitt’s tongue to say he knew that, but he refrained. Tellman would probably not believe him anyway.
“What about Arundell?” he asked. “What sort of a man is he?” It did not matter. H
e had no access to the information on Zambezia.
“Just what you’d expect,” Tellman replied. “Rooms in Belgravia, attends a lot of Society functions, dresses well, dines well, but a good deal of it at other people’s expense. He is a bachelor and highly eligible. All the mothers with unmarried daughters are chasing after him, except those with something higher in their sights. He’ll no doubt marry well in the next few years.” Tellman finished with a slight downturn of his mouth. He despised what he knew of Society and never lost an opportunity to say so.
“And Leicester.”
Tellman grunted. “Much the same.”
“Then you’d better get on with Amanda Pennecuick,” Pitt instructed. “And Tellman …”
“Yes sir?” It was still sarcasm underlying his voice, not respect, and his eyes were too direct.
“Be discreet.” He met Tellman’s look with equal candor and challenge. No further explanation was necessary. They were utterly different in background and values. Pitt was from the country with the innate respect, even love, for the landed gentry who had made and preserved his world, and who had personally given him so much. Tellman was from the city, surrounded by poverty, and hated those born to wealth, most of whom he considered idlers. They had created nothing, and now only consumed without returning. All he and Pitt had in common was a dedication to police work, but that was sufficient for a complete understanding, at least on that level.
“Yes, Mr. Pitt,” he said with something close to a smile, and turned on his heel and left.
Just under half an hour later Assistant Commissioner Farnsworth sent for Pitt to come to his office. The note was written in such terms there was no question about obeying, and Pitt went from Bow Street and caught a hansom along the embankment to Scotland Yard to report.
“Ah.” Farnsworth looked up from his desk when Pitt was shown in. He waited until Pitt had closed the door before he continued. “This matter at the Colonial Office. What have you found?”
Pitt was reluctant to tell him how very little it was.
“They are all outwardly without fault,” he replied. “Except possibly Garston Aylmer.” He saw Farnsworth’s face quicken with interest, but took no notice. “He has something of a weakness in his regard for a Miss Amanda Pennecuick, which is apparently not returned. He is a remarkably plain man, and she is unusually handsome.”
“Not an uncommon occurrence,” Farnsworth said with obvious disappointment. “That’s hardly suspicious, Pitt, simply one of life’s many disappointments. Being plain, or even downright ugly, has never stopped anyone from falling in love with the beautiful. Very painful sometimes, but a tragedy, not a crime.”
“A great deal of crime springs from tragedy,” Pitt answered him. “People react differently to pain, especially the pain of wanting something out of reach.”
Farnsworth looked at him with a mixture of impatience and contempt. “You can steal anything from a meat pie to a diamond necklace, Pitt, but you cannot steal a woman’s affection. And we are not talking about a man who would descend to thieving.”
“Of course you cannot steal it.” Pitt was equally derisive. “But it is sometimes possible to buy it, or to buy a very good semblance of it. He wouldn’t be the first plain man to do that.”
Farnsworth disliked agreeing with him, but he was forced to do so. He had too much knowledge of life to argue the issue.
“Selling information to the Germans for money to get her gifts, or whatever she wants?” he said reluctantly. “All right. Look into it. But for God’s sake be discreet, Pitt. He’s probably a perfectly decent man simply in love with the wrong woman.”
“I was thinking also of the possibility that Miss Pennecuick may have an interest in Germany, and rather than Aylmer selling information for money, she might be drawing it from him as the price of her favor. Unlikely, but we have nothing better yet.”
Farnsworth chewed on his lower lip. “Find out all you can about her,” he ordered. “Who she is, where she comes from, who else she associates with.”
“I have Tellman on it.”
“Never mind Tellman, get on it yourself.” Farnsworth frowned. “Where were you yesterday, Pitt? No one saw you all day.”
“I went to Hampshire to a family funeral.”
“I thought your parents died a long time ago?” There was challenge in Farnsworth’s voice as well as question.
“They did; this was a man who treated me like a son.”
Farnsworth’s eyes were very hard, clear blue.
“Indeed?” He did not ask who that man was, and Pitt could not read his face.
“I believe you went to the inquest on Sir Arthur Desmond,” he went on. “Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“Why?” Farnsworth’s eyebrows rose. “There’s no case there. Tragedy that a man of his standing should end that way, but illness and age are no respecters of persons. Leave it alone now, Pitt, or you’ll only make it worse.”
Pitt stared at him.
Farnsworth misunderstood his surprise and anger for incomprehension.
“The least that is said about it, the least will have to be known.” He was irritated by Pitt’s slow-wittedness. “Don’t let the whole sorry matter drag out before his friends and associates, never mind the general public. Let it all be forgotten, then we can remember him as the man he used to be, before all this obsession began.”
“Obsession?” Pitt said thinly. He knew he would achieve nothing by pursuing it with Farnsworth, and yet he could not help himself.
“With Africa,” Farnsworth said impatiently. “Saying there were conspiracies and secret plots and so on. He thought he was being persecuted. It’s quite a well-known delusion, but very distressing, very sad. For heaven’s sake, Pitt, if you had any regard for him at all, don’t make it public. For his family’s sake, if nothing else, let it be buried with him.”
Pitt met his eyes squarely and did not look away.
“Sir Matthew does not believe his father was mad, or so forgetful or careless as to have taken laudanum in the middle of the afternoon, and in such a quantity as to kill himself.”
“Not unnatural,” Farnsworth dismissed it with a slight movement of his well-manicured hand. “It is always hard to accept that those we love are mentally deranged. Wouldn’t have cared to think it of my father. I have every sympathy with him, but it has nothing to do with the facts.”
“He may be right,” Pitt said stubbornly.
Farnsworth’s lips thinned. “He’s not right, Pitt. I know more about it than you do.”
It was on the edge of Pitt’s tongue to argue with him, then he realized that over the last ten years his knowledge of Sir Arthur was sporadic at best, although Farnsworth could not know that. Still, it left him in a fragile position to argue.
His thoughts would not have shown in his face, but something of his emotions must have. Farnsworth was watching him with growing certainty, and something like a bitter amusement
“Just what is your personal knowledge of Sir Arthur, Pitt?”
“Very little … lately.”
“Then believe me, I have seen him frequently and he was unquestionably suffering from delusions. He saw conspiracies and persecutions all over the place, even among men who had been his friends for years. He is a man for whom I had a high regard, but feelings, however deep or honorable, do not change the truth. For friendship’s sake, Pitt, let him rest in peace, and his memory be as little damaged as possible. In kindness you must do that.”
Still Pitt wanted to argue. Sturges’s weather-beaten face came sharply to his mind. Or was his judgment just loyalty, an inability to believe that his master could have lost touch with reality?
“Right,” Farnsworth said briskly. “Now get on with the job in hand. Find out who is passing information from the Colonial Office. Give it your entire attention, Pitt, until it is finished. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, of course I understand,” Pitt said, while still in his head determining not to leave the dea
th of Arthur Desmond as it was, a quietly closed matter.
5
“WHAT IT AFFECTS MOSTLY is treaties,” Matthew said with a frown, regarding Pitt over his desk at the Foreign Office. He looked a little less harrowed than at the funeral in Brackley, but the shadow was still there at the back of his eyes and in the pallor of his skin. There was a tension in his body which Pitt knew too well to ignore or misread. The past was still intimate, for all that had happened since, and the experiences which separated them.
If anyone had asked him for dates, he could not have given them, nor even the events that one might have considered important. But the memories of emotion were as powerful as if they had happened yesterday: surprise, understanding, the desire to protect, the confusion and the learning of pain. He could recall vividly the death of a beloved animal, the first magic and surprise of love, the first disillusionment, the fear of change in people and places that framed one’s life. These things he and Matthew had faced together, in some things at least, he a year the sooner, so when Matthew’s turn came, he had already experienced them, and shared his emotions with an acuteness no one else could.
He knew now that Matthew was still just as deeply hurt over his father’s death; only his outward command of himself was better, as the sense of shock wore away. They were sitting in his wide office with its polished oak furniture, pale green carpet, and deep windows overlooking St. James’s Park.
“You mentioned the treaty with the Germans,” he answered. “What I really need is to know what the information is, as far as you can tell me. That is the only way I am going to have a chance to trace where it came from, and through whose hands it passed.”
Matthew’s frown deepened. “It isn’t quite as cut and dried as that. But I’ll do what I can.”
Pitt waited. Outside somewhere in the street a horse whinnied and a man shouted. The sun made bright patterns through the window and onto the floor.
“One of the things that stands out most is the agreement made with King Lobengula, late in the year before last,” Matthew began thoughtfully. “’eighty-eight. In September Rhodes’s delegation, led by a man called Charles Rudd, rode into the king’s camp in Bulowayo—that’s in Zambezia. They are the Ndebele tribe.” His fingers drummed on the desk softly as he spoke. “Rudd was an expert in mining claims, and apparently quite ignorant about African rulers and their customs. For that purpose he had along a fellow called Thompson, who spoke some language understood by the king. The third member of the party was called Rochfort Maguire, a legal man from All Souls’ College in Oxford.”
