Traitors Gate

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.”

Pitt listened patiently. So far this was of no help to him at all. He tried to imagine the heat of the African plains, the courage of these men and the greed that drew them.

“Of course there were other people seeking mineral concessions as well,” Matthew went on. “We very nearly lost them.”

“We?” Pitt interrupted.

Matthew grimaced. “As far as one can call Cecil Rhodes ‘we.’ He was—is—acting with the blessing of Her Majesty’s government. We had a standing agreement, the Moffatt Treaty, made with Lobengula in February of the same year, that he would not give away any of his territories, I quote, ‘without the previous knowledge and sanction’ of the British government.”

“You say we nearly lost them,” Pitt brought the conversation back to the point. “Because of information going to the Germans?”

Matthew’s eyes widened very slightly. “That’s curious. The German Embassy certainly, but it began to look as if the Belgians might have known about it too. All of Central and East Africa is swarming with adventurers, hunters, mining prospectors and people hoping to be middlemen in all sorts of ventures.” He leaned a little further forward across the desk. “Rudd was successful because of the advent of Sir Sidney Shippard, deputy commissioner for Bechuanaland. He is a great supporter of Cecil Rhodes, and believes in what he is trying to do. So does Sir Hercules Robinson at the Cape.”

“What do you know that without question has passed from the Colonial Office to the German Embassy?” Pitt pressed. “For the time being, exclude suspicions. Tell me the information, and I’ll find out how it came in, by word of mouth, letter, telegram, who received it and where it went after that.”

Matthew reached out his hand and touched a pile of papers beside him.

“I have several things here for you. But there are other things also, which have very little to do with the Foreign Office, matters of money. A great deal of this rests on money.” He looked at Pitt to see if he understood.

“Money?” Pitt did not know what he meant. “Surely money would be useless in buying land from native kings? And the government would equip explorers and scouts going to claim land for Britain?”

“No! That’s the point,” Matthew said urgently. “Cecil Rhodes is equipping his own force. They are well on their way even now. He put up the finance himself.”

“One man?” Pitt was incredulous. He could not conceive of such wealth.

Matthew smiled. “You don’t understand Africa, Thomas. No, actually he’s not putting up all of it, but a great deal. There are banks involved, some in Scotland, and particularly Francis Standish. Now perhaps you begin to see the sort of treasures we are speaking of: more diamonds than anywhere else in the world, more gold, and a continent of land owned by people who live in the dark ages as far as weapons are concerned.”

Pitt stared at him, ideas uncertain in his mind, cloudy images, remembered words of Sir Arthur’s about exploitation, and the Inner Circle.

“When men like Livingstone went in, it was completely different,” Matthew continued, his face bleak. “They wanted to take medicine and Christianity, get rid of ignorance, disease and slavery. They may have gained a certain immortality out of it, but they didn’t look for anything for themselves. Even Stanley wanted glory more than any kind of material reward.

“But Cecil Rhodes wants land, money, power, and more power. We need men like him for this stage in the development of Africa.”

His face shadowed over even more. “At least I think we do. Father and I argued about it. He thought the government should have taken a larger part in it and sent over our own men, openly, and to the devil with what the Kaiser or King Leopold thought. But of course Lord Salisbury never really wanted anything to do with it right from the beginning. He would have left Africa alone, if he could, but circumstances and history would not allow.”

“You mean Britain is doing it through Cecil Rhodes?” Pitt still could not believe what Matthew seemed to be saying.

“More or less,” Matthew agreed. “Of course there is quite a lot of other money as well, from London and Edinburgh. It is that information which has reached the German Embassy, at least some of it.”

They heard footsteps in the corridor outside, but whoever it was did not stop.

“I see.”

“Only part of it, Thomas. There are a lot of other factors as well: alliances, quarrels, old wars and new ones. There are the Boers to consider. Paul Kruger is not a man ever to overlook with impunity. There is all the heritage of the Zulu Wars. There is Emin Pasha in Equatoria, and the Belgians in the Congo, the Sultan of Zanzibar in the east, and most of all there is Carl Peters and the German East Africa Company.” He touched the pile of papers at his elbow again. “Read these, Thomas. I cannot allow you to take them with you, but it will show you what you are looking for.”

“Thank you.” Pitt reached his hand for them, but Matthew did not pass them across.

“Thomas …”

“Yes.”

“What about Father? You said you would look into the accident.” He was embarrassed, as if he were criticizing, and hated it, but was compelled by conviction to do it. “The longer you leave it, the harder it will be. People forget, they become afraid when they have time to realize that there are those who …” He took a deep breath and his eyes met Pitt’s. They were bright hazel, full of pain and confusion.

“I have already started,” Pitt said quietly. “I spoke to Sturges when I was in Brackley. He is convinced the business with the pups was Danforth’s mistake. Danforth sent a letter saying he didn’t want them, he’d changed his mind. At least it purported to come from Danforth, whether it did or not, but Sturges saw it, it was addressed to him. It had nothing to do with Sir Arthur.”

“That’s something.” Matthew grasped onto it, but the anxiety did not leave his face. “But the accident? Was it deliberate? It was a warning, wasn’t it?”

“I don’t know. No one else saw it, as far as Sturges knows, though both the smith and the wheelwright saw the horseman careering up the street at a breakneck gallop, apparently completely out of control. But even a bolting horse won’t usually charge into another it can clearly see, or go close enough for the rider to catch someone else with his whip. I think it was deliberate, but I don’t know any way of proving it. The man was a stranger. No one knows who he was.”

Matthew’s face tightened. “And I suppose the same will be true of the underground railway. We’ll never prove that either. From everything we can learn, no one he knew was with him.” He looked down. “Clever. They know how to do it so if you say anything, tell anyone, it sounds absurd, like the ramblings of someone who has been eating opium, or lives permanently in his cups.” He looked up suddenly, panic in his eyes. “It begins to make me feel helpless. I’m not consumed with hatred anymore. It has turned into something a lot more like fear, and a terrible weariness, as if it is all pointless. If it was anyone but Father, I might not even try.”

Pitt understood the fear. He had felt it himself in the past, and now its cause was real. He also understood the enveloping exhaustion, now that the first shock of grief was over. Anger is a very depleting emotion; it burns up all the strength of the mind and the body. Matthew was tired, but in a while he would be renewed, and the anger would return, the sense of outrage, the passionate desire to protect, to prove the lie and restore some semblance of justice. He hoped profoundly that Harriet Soames was wise enough and generous enough to be gentle with him, to wait with patience for him to work his way through the tiredness and the confusion of feelings, that she would not just at that moment seek anything from him for herself beyond trust and the knowledge that he was willing to share all he was able to.

“Don’t do anything alone,” Pitt said very seriously.

Matthew’s eyes widened a fraction, surprise and question in them, then after a moment, even a shadow of humor.

“Do you think I’m incompetent, Thomas? I’ve been fifteen years in the Foreign Office since we knew each other. I do know how to be diplomatic.”

It had been a clumsiness of words rather than thought, and a desire to protect him which still lingered from youth.

“I’m sorry,” Pitt apologized. “I meant that we could duplicate our efforts, and not only waste time but cause suspicion by it.”

Matthew’s face relaxed into a smile. “Sorry, Thomas. I am oversensitive. This has hit me harder than I could have foreseen.” He gave Pitt the papers at last. “Look at these in the room next door, then give them back to me when you have finished.”

Pitt rose and took them. “Thank you.”

The room provided him was high ceilinged and full of sun from the long window, also facing the park. He sat in one of the three chairs and began. He made no notes but committed to memory the essence of what he needed. It took him to the middle of the day to be certain he knew precisely where to look to trace the information he could be quite certain had reached the German Embassy. Then he rose and returned the papers to Matthew.

“Is that all you require?” Matthew asked, looking up from his desk.

“For the moment.”

Matthew smiled. “How about luncheon? There is an excellent public house just ’round the corner, and an even better one a couple of hundred yards along the street.”

“Let’s go to the even better one,” Pitt agreed with an attempt at enthusiasm.

Matthew followed him to the door and along the corridor to the wide stairs down and into the bright busy street.

They walked side by side, occasionally jostled by passersby, men in frock coats with top hats, now and then a woman, highly fashionable, carrying a parasol and smiling and nodding to acquaintances. The street itself was teeming with traffic. Coaches, carriages, hansoms, broughams and open landaus passed by every few minutes, moving at a brisk trot, horses’ hooves rapping smartly, harnesses jingling.

“I love the city on a fine day,” Matthew said almost apologetically. “There is such life here, such a sense of purpose and excitement.” He glanced sideways at Pitt. “I need Brackley for its peace, and the feel of permanence it has. I find I always remember it so clearly, as if I had only just closed my eyes from seeing it, smelling the sharp coldness of winter air, the snow on the fields, or the crackle of frost under my feet. I can breathe in and re-create the perfume of the summer wind from the hay, the dazzle of sunlight and the sting of heat on my skin, the taste of apple cider.”

A handsome woman in pink and gray passed by and smiled at him, not as an acquaintance, but out of interest, but he barely noticed her.

“And the glancing light and sudden rain of spring,” he went on. “In the city it’s just wet or dry. There’s no bursting of growth to see, no green haze over the fields, no strong, dark furrows of earth, no awareness at once of the turning seasons, and the timelessness of it all because it has happened since the creation, and presumably always will.”

A coach rumbled by, close to the curb, and Matthew on the outside stepped in hastily to avoid being hit by the jutting lamps.

“Fool!” he muttered under his breath.

They were a dozen yards from the crossing.

“My favorite time was always autumn,” Pitt said, smiling with recollection. “The shortening days, golden at the end where the long light falls across the stubble fields, the piled stooks against the sky, clear evenings where the clouds fall away towards the west, scarlet berries in the hedgerows, wild rose hips, the smell of wood smoke and leaf mold, the blazing colors of the trees.” They came to the curb and stopped. “I loved the bursting life of spring, the flowers, but there was always something about autumn when everything is touched with gold, there is a fullness, a completion….”

Matthew looked at him with a sudden, intense affection. They could have been twenty years younger, standing together at Brackley, gazing across the fields or the woods, instead of at Parliament Street, waiting for the traffic to allow them to cross.

A hansom went by at a brisk clip and there was a space. They set out smartly, side by side. Then out of nowhere, swinging around the corner, a coach and four came careering over the curb edge, horses wild-eyed, frightened and squealing. Pitt leaped aside, pushing Matthew as hard as he could. Even so Matthew was caught by the near side front wheel and sent sprawling across the road to fetch up with his head barely a foot from the gutter and the curb edge.

Pitt scrambled to his feet, whirling around to catch sight of the coach, but all that was visible was the back of it as it disappeared around the corner of St. Margaret Street heading towards the Old Palace Yard.

Matthew lay motionless.

Pitt went over to him. His own leg hurt and he was going to be bruised all down his left side, but he was hardly aware of it.

“Matthew!” He could hear the panic rising in his voice and there was a sick terror in his stomach. “Matthew!” There was no blood. Matthew’s neck was straight, no twisting, no awkward angle, but his eyes were closed and his face white.

A woman was standing on the pavement sobbing, her hands up to her mouth as if to stifle the sound.

Another woman, elderly, came forward and knelt down beside Matthew.

“May I help?” she said calmly. “My husband is a doctor, and I have assisted him many times.” She did not look at Pitt, but at Matthew. She ignored the permission she had not yet received, and touched Matthew’s cheek lightly, taking her gloves off, then put her finger to his neck.

Pitt waited in an agony of suspense.

She looked up at him after a moment, her face quite calm.

“His pulse is very strong,” she said with a smile. “I expect he will have a most unpleasant headache, and I daresay several bruises which will no doubt be painful, but he is very much alive, I assure you.”

Pitt was overwhelmed with relief. It was almost as if he could feel the blood surge back into his own body and life into his mind and his heart.

“You should have a stiff brandy yourself,” the woman said gently. “And I would recommend a hot bath, and rub your bruises with ointment of arnica. It will help, I promise you.”

“Thank you. Thank you very much.” He felt momentarily as if she had saved their lives.

“I suppose you have no idea who the driver was?” she went on, still kneeling at the roadside by Matthew. “He should be prosecuted. That sort of thing is criminal. It was only by the grace of God your friend avoided the curbstone, or he would have cracked his head open and might very well have been killed.”

“I know.” Pitt swallowed hard, realizing with force how true that was. Now that he knew Matthew was alive, he could see it more sharply, and begin to understand all that it meant.

She looked at him curiously, her brow puckered, sensing there was much more to it than the accident she had seen.

Other people were beginning to gather around. A stout man with splendid side-whiskers came forward, elbowing his way.

“Now then, what’s happened here?” he demanded. “Need a doctor? Should we call the police? Has anyone called the police?”

“I am the police.” Pitt looked up at him. “And yes, we need a doctor. I’d be obliged if anybody would send for one.”

The man looked doubtful. “Are you indeed?”

Pitt went to fish in his pocket and produce his card, and to his disgust found that his hands were shaking. He pulled out the card with difficulty and passed it to the man without bothering to see his reaction.

Matthew stirred, made a little choking sound which turned into a groan, then opened his eyes.

“Matthew!” Pitt said stiffly, leaning forward, peering at him.

“Bloody fool!” Matthew said furiously. He shut his eyes in pain.

“You should lie still, young man,” the elderly lady advised him firmly. “We are sending for a doctor, and you should receive his counsel before you make any attempt to rise.”

“Thomas?”

“Yes … I’m here.”

Matthew opened his eyes again and focused them on Pitt’s face. He made as if to speak, then changed his mind.

“Yes, exactly what you are thinking,” Pitt said quietly.

Matthew took a very deep breath and let it out in a shudder. “I shouldn’t have taken offense when you told me to be careful. I was childish, and as it turns out, quite mistaken.”

Pitt did not reply.

The elderly lady looked around at the man with the whiskers. “May we take it that someone has been dispatched for a doctor, sir?” she enquired in much the manner a good governess might have used towards an indifferent butler.

“You may, madam,” he replied stiffly, and moved away, Pitt was certain, in order to perform that task.

“I am sure that with a little help I could stand up,” Matthew said. “I am causing something of an obstruction here, and making a spectacle of myself.” He began to struggle to climb to his feet and Pitt was not able to prevent him, only to give him his arm and then catch him as he swayed and lost his balance. He clung on for several seconds before his head cleared and he was able, with concentration, to regain himself and stand, not unaided, but at least upright.

“I think we had better call you a hansom to take you home, and then send for our own physician as soon as possible,” Pitt said decisively.

“Oh, I don’t think that is necessary,” Matthew argued, but was still swaying a trifle.

“You would be exceedingly unwise to ignore that advice,” the elderly lady said severely. Now that Pitt and Matthew were both standing, she was considerably beneath their height, and obliged to look up at them, but her assurance was such that it made not the slightest difference. Pitt at least still felt as if he were in the schoolroom.

Matthew must have felt similarly, because he offered no argument, and when Pitt hailed a cab and it drew in, he thanked the lady profusely. They both took their leave and climbed in.

Pitt accompanied Matthew to his rooms and saw that the doctor was sent for, then went into the small sitting room to consider what he had read from the papers in the Foreign Office until the doctor should have been and delivered his opinion. Matthew was happy to relax and lie on his bed.

“A very ugly accident,” the doctor said, some fifty minutes later. “But fortunately I think you have suffered no more than a slight concussion and some unpleasant bruising. Did you report the matter to the police?”

He was standing in Matthew’s bedroom. Matthew was lying on the bed looking pale and still very shocked and Pitt was standing beside the door.

“Mr. Pitt is a policeman,” Matthew explained. “He was beside me when it happened. He was knocked over as well.”

“Were you? You said nothing.” The doctor looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Do you need any attention, sir?”

“No thank you, just a few bruises,” Pitt dismissed it. “But I’m obliged for your concern.”

“Then I presume you will be reporting the matter to your superiors. To drive like that, to injure two men and simply keep on going, is a criminal offense,” the doctor said sternly.

“Since neither of us knows who it was, nor do any of the other people in the street, there is very little that can be done,” Pitt pointed out.

Matthew smiled wanly. “And Superintendent Pitt has no superiors, except the assistant commissioner. Do you, Thomas?”

The doctor looked surprised, and shook his head.

“Pity. People like that should be prosecuted. Like to see the man made to walk everywhere from now on. Still, there are a lot of things I’d like to see, and won’t.” He turned to Matthew. “Take a day or two’s rest, and call on me again if the headache gets any worse, if your vision is affected, or if you are sick.”

“Thank you.”

“Good day, Sir Matthew.”

Pitt conducted him out and returned to Matthew’s room.

“Thank you, Thomas,” Matthew said grimly. “If you hadn’t pushed me I’d have been mangled to bits under those hooves. Do I presume it was the Inner Circle, warning me?”

“Or both of us,” Pitt replied. “Or someone with a great deal of money at stake in Africa. Although I think that’s less likely. Or it may have been simply an accident, and quite impersonal.”

“Do you believe that?”

“No.”

“Neither do I.” Matthew made an attempt to smile. His long face with its hazel eyes was very pale indeed, and he made no effort to hide the fact that he was frightened.

“Leave it for a day or two,” Pitt said quietly. “We can’t accomplish anything by getting hurt or killed ourselves. Stay here. We’ll think what our next move should be. We must make it count. This is not a battle where we can afford blows that do no damage.”

“Not a lot I can do … just yet.” Matthew winced. “But I’m damned well going to think of nothing else.”

Pitt smiled and took his leave. He could do no more now, and Matthew needed to sleep. He left with his mind still whirling and full of dark thoughts and fears.

It was nearly four o’clock when he walked across Downing Street and up the steps of the Colonial Office. He asked to see Linus Chancellor, and was told that if he was prepared to wait, that would be possible.

As it turned out, he waited only half an hour, and then was shown into Chancellor’s office. He was sitting at his desk, his broad brow puckered with interest and anxiety, his eyes keen.

“Afternoon, Pitt,” he said without standing. He waved to the chair near the desk and Pitt took it. “I presume you have come to report your findings so far? Is it too soon to look for a suspect? Yes, I can see by your face that it is. What have you?” His eyes narrowed. “You look awkward, man. Very stiff. Are you hurt?”

Pitt smiled ruefully. In truth he was beginning to hurt very much. He had almost ignored his own injuries in his fear for Matthew. Now they were too sharp to be forgotten.

“I was hit by a coach a few hours ago, but I very much doubt it had anything to do with this.”

Chancellor’s face reflected real concern and a degree of shock. “Good God! You don’t mean there is a possibility that someone deliberately tried to kill you?” Then his face tightened and a bleak, almost venomous look came into his eyes. “Although I don’t know why I should be surprised. If a man will sell out his country, why should he balk at killing someone who looked like exposing him at it? I think my scale of values needs a little adjusting.”

He leaned back in his chair, his face taut with emotion. “Perhaps violence offends our sensibility so profoundly we tend to think of it as worse than the unseen corruption of betrayal, which in some very essence is immeasurably worse. It is murder behind the smiling face, the thrust in the back”—his fist clenched as if he were dealing the blow himself—“when you are turned elsewhere, and then the sudden realization that all trust may be misplaced.

“It is robbery of everything that makes life worthwhile, the belief in good, the love of friends, honor itself. Why would I think he would not indulge in a simple push in a crowd? A man falls off the curb under the wheels of a carriage?” He looked at Pitt with concern on the surface over a passionate anger beneath. “Have you seen a physician? Should you be up and walking around? Are you sure there is no serious injury?”

Pitt smiled in spite of himself. “Yes, I have seen a doctor, thank you.” He was stretching the truth. “I was with a friend who was considerably more hurt than I, and we shall both be well enough in a few days. But I appreciate your concern. I saw Sir Matthew Desmond this morning and he gave me details of the information which reached the Germans. I read it in the Foreign Office and left it there, but I can recall the essence of it, and I would be obliged if you could tell me if there is any common source or link, or at least anyone who would be excluded from possibility because they could not have known.”

“Of course. Relate it to me.” Chancellor leaned back in his seat and folded his hands, waiting.

With concentration Pitt recalled all the information he had gleaned from Matthew’s papers, set it in an orderly fashion, progressing from one category to the next.

When he had finished Chancellor looked at him with puzzlement and renewed anxiety.

“What is it?” Pitt asked.

“Some of that is information I did not know myself,” Chancellor replied slowly. “It doesn’t pass through the Colonial Office.” He let the words fall on silence, and stared at Pitt to see if he grasped the full implication of what he had said.

“Then our traitor has help, witting or unwitting,” Pitt concluded reluctantly. Then a new thought came to him. “Of course that may be his weakness….”

Chancellor saw what he meant instantly. The spark of hope leaped in his eyes and his body tensed. “Indeed it may! It gives you somewhere to start, to search for proofs, communications, perhaps even payments, or blackmail. The possibilities are considerable.”

“Where do I begin?”

“What?” Chancellor was startled.

“Where else may the other information have come from?” Pitt elaborated. “What precisely is it that does not pass through this office?”

“Oh. Yes, I see. Financial matters. You have included details here of the various loans and guarantees given MacKinnon and Rhodes, among others. And backing from the City of London and from bankers in Edinburgh. The generalities any diligent person with a knowledge of finance might learn for himself, but the times, conditions, precise amounts could only have come from the Treasury.”

His lips tightened. “This is very ugly indeed, Pitt. It seems there is a traitor in the Treasury as well. We shall owe you a great deal if you uncover this for us, and manage to do it discreetly.” He searched Pitt’s eyes. “Do I need to warn you how damaging this could be to the entire government, not only to British interests in Africa, if it becomes public that we are riddled with treason?”

“No,” Pitt said simply, rising to his feet. “I shall do everything in my power to deal with it discreetly, even secretly if possible.”

“Good. Good.” Chancellor sat back and looked up at Pitt, his handsome, volatile face released of some of its tension at last. “Keep me aware of your progress. I can always make a few minutes in the day to see you, or in the evening if necessary. I don’t imagine you keep exact hours any more than I do?”

“No, sir. I shall see you are acquainted with my progress. Good day, Mr. Chancellor.”

Pitt went immediately to the Treasury, but it was nearly five o’clock, and Mr. Ransley Soames, the man he needed to see, had already left for the day. Pitt was tired and aching profoundly. He was not sorry to be thwarted in his diligence, and able to stop a hansom in Whitehall and return home.

He had debated whether or not to tell Charlotte the full extent of the incident with the coach. It would be useless trying not to mention it at all. She would be aware that he was hurt the instant she saw him, but it would not be necessary to mention the gravity of it, or that Matthew had been injured even more. He decided it would only worry her to no purpose.

“What happened?” she pressed him the moment he had finished telling her the barest outline. They were sitting in the parlor with a hot cup of tea. Both children were upstairs, having had their meal. Jemima was doing homework. There were only four more years to go before the examinations which would decide her educational future. Daniel, two years younger, was still excused such rigorous study. At five and a half he could read quite tolerably, and was learning multiplication tables by heart, and a great deal more spelling than he desired. But at this time in the early evening he was permitted simply to play. Jemima was endeavoring to master a list of all the Kings of England from Edward the Confessor in 1066 to the present Queen in 1890, which was a formidable task. But when it was time for her examinations she would be required to know not only their names and order of succession, but their dates and the outstanding events of their reigns as well.

“What happened?” Charlotte repeated, watching him closely.

“A coach had apparently run out of control, and brushed me when it came ’round the corner at close to a gallop. I was knocked over, but not hurt more than a few bruises.” He smiled. “It is really nothing serious. I wouldn’t have told you at all, except I don’t want you to fear I am crippled with old age just yet!”

There was no answering smile in her face.

“Thomas, you look dreadful. You should see a doctor, just to make sure….”

“It is not necessary.”

She made as if to stand up. “I think it is!”

“No, it isn’t!” He heard the edge to his voice, and was unable to curb it. He sounded sharp, frightened.

She stopped, looking at him with a pucker between her brows.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I have already seen a doctor.” He told her the same stretching of the truth he had told Chancellor. “There is nothing at all except a few bruises, and a sense of shock and anger.”

“It is not all. Why did you go to a doctor?” she asked, looking at him narrowly.

It was too complicated to lie, and he was too tired. It was only to protect her that he had evaded it. He wanted to tell her.

“Matthew was with me,” he replied. “He was more seriously hurt. The doctor came for him. But he will be all right,” he added quickly. “It was simply that he was insensible for a few moments.”

She looked at him closely, her eyes clouded with worry.

“Was it an accident, Thomas? You don’t think the Inner Circle came after Matthew as well, do you?”

“I don’t know. I doubt it, because dearly as I would like to think he is a danger to them, I don’t.”

She looked at him doubtfully, but said no more on the matter. Instead she went to run him a hot bath and find some ointment of arnica.

“Good morning, Superintendent.” Ransley Soames made it a question, although the wording was not such. He was a good-looking man with regular features and thick, wavy, fair hair brushed back off his brow. His nose was rather high at the bridge and his mouth had a hint of softness in it. Without self-discipline he might have been indulgent. As it was he had a considerable presence and he looked at Pitt steadily and with gracious interest. “What may I do for you?”

“Good morning, Mr. Soames,” Pitt answered, closing the office door behind him and accepting the seat offered. Soames was sitting behind a high and very finely carved desk, a red box to one side, closed and with its ribbons tied. “I apologize for troubling you, sir, but I am enquiring, at the request of the Foreign Office, into certain information which has been very seriously misdirected. It is necessary that we know the source of the information, and all who may have been privy to it, in order to rectify the error.”

Soames frowned at him. “Your language is very diplomatic, Superintendent, one might even say obscure. What sort of information are you referring to, and where has it gone that it should not?”

“Financial information regarding Africa, and I should prefer at this point not to say where it has gone. Mr. Linus Chancellor has asked that I be as discreet as possible. I expect you understand the necessity for that.”

“Of course.” But Soames did not look as if he thought well of being included in the proscription. “You will also understand, Superintendent, if I require some confirmation of what you say … simply as a formality?”

Pitt smiled. “Naturally.” He produced a letter of authority Matthew had given him, with the Foreign Secretary’s countersignature.

Soames glanced at it, recognized Lord Salisbury’s hand, and sat up a little straighter. Pitt noticed a certain tension in him. Perhaps he was becoming aware of the gravity of the matter.

“Yes, Superintendent. Precisely what is it you wish to learn from me? An enormous amount of financial information passes across my desk, as you may appreciate. More than a little of it is to do with African matters.”

“That which concerns me is to do with the funding of Mr. Cecil Rhodes’s expedition into Matabeleland, which is presently taking place, among other things.”

“Indeed? Are you not aware, Superintendent, that the greatest part of that has been funded by Mr. Rhodes himself, and his South Africa Company?”

“Yes sir, I am. But it was not always so. It would help me greatly if you could give me something of the history of the finances of the expedition.”

Soames’s eyes widened.

“Good gracious! Going back how far?”

The window was open, and amidst the faint rumble of traffic came the sound of a hurdy-gurdy, then it was gone again.

“Let us say, the last ten years,” Pitt replied.

“What do you wish to know? I cannot possibly recount to you the entire matter. I shall be here all day.” Soames looked both surprised and irritated, as if he found the request unreasonable.

“I only need to know who dealt with the information.”

Soames sighed. “You are still asking the impossible. Mr. Rhodes first tried to secure Bechuanaland from the Cape. Back in August of ’eighty-three he addressed the Cape Parliament on that issue.” He sat back farther in his chair, folding his hands across his waistcoat. “It was the gateway to the enormous fertile northern plains of Matabeleland and Mashonaland. But he found Scanlen, the prime minister, to be quite uninterested. The Cape Parliament was in debt to an immense degree with a railway obligation of some fourteen million pounds, and having just suffered a war with Basutoland which had been a crippling additional expense. It was at that time that Rhodes first turned to London for finances … unwillingly, I may say. Of course that was during Mr. Gladstone’s Liberal government. Lord Derby was Foreign Secretary then. But he was no more interested than had been Scanlen of the Cape.” Soames regarded Pitt narrowly. “Are you familiar with all this, Superintendent?”

“No sir. Is it necessary that I should be?”

“If you are to understand the history of the financing of this expedition.” Soames smiled belatedly, and continued. “After our fearful losses at Majuba, Lord Derby wanted nothing to do with it. However, the following year there was a complete turn in events, largely brought about by fear of the Transvaal pushing northwards and eclipsing our efforts, our very necessary efforts for the safety of the Empire, the sea lanes ’round the Cape, and so on. We could not afford to allow the Cape ports to fall solely into the hands of the Afrikaners. Are you following me?”

“Yes.”

“Kruger and the other Transvaal delegates sailed to London the following year, ’eighty-four, to renegotiate the Pretoria Convention. Part of this agreement—I won’t bore you with the details—included Kruger letting go of Bechuanaland. Boer freebooters were moving northward.” He was watching Pitt closely to see if he understood. “Kruger double-crossed Rhodes and annexed Goshen to the Transvaal, and Germany entered the scene. It became increasingly complicated. Do you begin to see how much information there is, and how difficult to ascertain who knew what?”

“I do,” Pitt conceded. “But surely there are usual channels through which information passes which concerns Zambezia and Equatoria?”

“Certainly. What about the Cape, Bechuanaland, the Congo and Zanzibar?”

The sounds from the open window seemed far away, like another world.

“Exclude them for the time being,” Pitt directed.

“Very well. That makes it easier.” Soames did not look any less concerned or irritated. His brow was furrowed and there was a tension in his body. “There are only myself, Thompson, Chetwynd, MacGregor, Cranbourne and Alderley who are aware of all of the areas you mention. I find it hard to think that any of them have been careless, or allowed information to pass to anyone unauthorized, but I suppose it is possible.”

“Thank you.”

Soames frowned. “What do you intend to do?”

“Pursue the matter,” Pitt replied with a noncommittal smile. He would have Tellman deal with it, see if there were any connections between one of these men and Miss Amanda Pennecuick, among other things.

Soames was regarding Pitt steadily. “Superintendent, I presume the information has been used inappropriately, for personal gain, speculation of some sort? I trust it in no way jeopardizes our position in Africa? I am aware of how serious it is.” He leaned forward. “Indeed it is imperative that we obtain Zambezia and the entire Cape-to-Cairo route. If it falls to the wrong powers, God alone knows what harm may be done. All the work, the profound influence of men like Livingstone and Moffatt, will be overtaken by a tide of violence and religious barbarism. Africa may be bathed in blood. Christianity could be lost in the continent.” His face looked bleak and sad. It was obviously something he believed in profoundly and without question.

Pitt felt a sudden wave of sympathy for the man. It was so far from the opportunism and the exploitation Sir Arthur had feared. Ransley Soames at least had no part in the Inner Circle and its manipulation. Pitt could like him for that alone. It was an overwhelming relief. After all, he was to be Matthew’s father-in-law.

“I’m sorry. I wish I could say that it were,” he answered gravely. “But it has been passed to the German Embassy.”

The color drained from Soames’s face and he stared at Pitt in horror. “Information … accurate information? Are you sure?”

“It may not yet have done any irreparable harm,” Pitt strove to reassure him.

“But … who would do such a … a thing?” Soames looked almost desperate. “Will the Germans press in from Zanzibar with armies? They do have men, weapons, even gunboats there, you know? There has already been rebellion, suppression and bloodshed!”

“That may be enough to prevent them pressing inland just yet,” Pitt said hopefully. “In the meantime, Mr. Soames, thank you for this information. I shall take this with me.” He rose to his feet and was at the door before he took a sudden chance. After all, Harriet Soames was a young woman of fashion and society. “Sir, are you by any chance familiar with the name of Miss Amanda Pennecuick?”

“Yes.” Soames looked startled. “Whatever makes you ask such a question? She can have nothing to do with this. She is a friend of my daughter’s. Why do you ask, Superintendent?”

“Is she acquainted with any of the gentlemen on this list?”

“Yes, yes I believe so. Alderley has met her in social circumstances in my house, that I am aware of. He seems very taken with her. Not unnaturally. She is an unusually charming young woman. What has that to do with the financial information on Africa, Superintendent?”

“Possibly nothing.” Pitt smiled quickly and opened the door. “Thank you very much, sir. Good morning.”

The following day was Sunday, and for Nobby Gunne it was the happiest day she could remember. Peter Kreisler had invited her to go down the river with him, and had hired a small pleasure boat for the afternoon. They were to return by carriage through the long, late spring evening after supper.

Now she sat in the small craft on the bright water, the sun in her face, the breeze just cool enough to be pleasant, and the sounds of laughter and excited voices drifted across the river as women in pale muslin dresses, men in shirtsleeves, and excited children leaned over the rails of excursion boats, or looked down from bridges or across from either bank.

“All London seems to be out today,” she said happily as their boatman steered dexterously between a moored barge and a fishing trawler. They had boarded at Westminster Bridge under the shadow of the Houses of Parliament, and were now well down the outgoing tide beyond Blackfriars, almost to the Southwark Bridge, with London Bridge ahead of them.

Kreisler smiled. “A perfect May day, why not? I suppose the virtuous are still in church?” They had earlier heard the sound of bells drifting across the water, and he had already pointed out one or two elegant Wren spires in the distance.

“I can be just as virtuous here,” she replied with questionable truth. “And certainly a great deal better tempered.”

This time he made no effort to hide his amusement. “If you are going to try to convince me you are a conventional woman, you are far too late. Conventional women do not paddle up the Congo in canoes.”

“Of course not!” she answered happily. “They sit in pleasure boats on the Thames, and allow gentlemen of their acquaintance to take them up to Richmond or Kew, or down to Greenwich for the afternoon….”

“Would you rather have gone up to Kew? I hear the botanical gardens are among the wonders of the world.”

“Not in the least. I am perfectly happy going to Greenwich. Besides, on a day like this, I fear all the world and his aunt will be at Kew.”

He settled a little more comfortably in his seat, relaxing back in the sun and watching the myriad other craft maneuvering the busy waterway, and the carriages and omnibuses on the banks, the stalls selling peppermint drinks, pies, sandwiches and cockles, or balloons, hoops, penny flutes and whistles, and other toys. A girl in a frilly dress was chasing a little boy in a striped suit. A black-and-white dog barked and jumped up and down in excitement. A hurdy-gurdy played a familiar tune. A pleasure boat passed by, its decks lined with people, all waving towards the shore. One man had a red bandanna tied around his head, a bright splash of color in a sea of faces.

Nobby and Kreisler glanced at each other. Speech was not necessary; the same amusement was in both their faces, the same wry enjoyment of humanity.

They had passed under the Southward Bridge. The old Swan Pier was to the left, London Bridge ahead, and then Custom House Quay.

“Do you suppose the Congo will ever become one of the great waterways of the world?” she said thoughtfully. “In my mind’s eye I can only see it as a vast brown sliding stream hemmed in by a jungle so immense it covers nations, and just isolated canoes paddling a few miles from village to village.” She trailed her hand gently in the water. The breeze was warm on her face. “Man seems so small, so ineffectual against the primeval strength of Africa. Here we seem to have conquered everything and bent it to our will.”

“We won’t ever conquer the Congo,” he said without hesitation. “The climate won’t let us. That is one of the few things we cannot tame or subdue. But no doubt we will build cities, take steamboats there and export the timber, copper and everything else we think we can sell. There is already a railway. In time I expect they will build another from Zambezia to the Cape, to take out gold, ivory and whatever else, more efficiently.”

“And you hate the idea,” she said with gravity, all the laughter vanished.

He looked at her steadily. “I hate the greed and the exploitation. I hate the duplicity with which we cheat the Africans. They’ve cheated and duped Lobengula, the king of the Ndebele in Mashonaland. He’s illiterate, of course, but a wily old devil, I think perhaps even intelligent enough to understand some of his own tragedy.”

The ebbing tide had them well in its grip and they passed under London Bridge. A girl in a large hat was staring down at them, smiling. Nobby waved to her and she waved back.

Custom House Quay was to their left, and beyond it Tower Hill and the Great Tower of London with its crested battlements and flags flying. Down at the water’s edge was the slipway of Traitors Gate, where the condemned had been delivered by boat to their execution in days past.

“I wonder what he was like,” Kreisler said quietly, almost as if to himself.

“Who?” Nobby asked, for once not following his thoughts.

“William of Normandy,” he answered. “The last conqueror to subdue these lands and subjugate its people, set up his fortresses across the hills, and with armed soldiers to keep order and take profit from the land. The Tower was his.” They were sliding past it as he spoke, on the swift ebbing water; the boatman had little to do to keep their speed.

She knew what Kreisler was thinking. It had nothing to do with William of Normandy or an invasion over eight centuries ago. It was Africa again, and European rifles and cannons against the assegais of the Zulu impis, or the Ndebele, British formations across the African plains, black men ruled by white as the Saxons had been by the Normans. Only the Normans were blood cousins, allied by race and faith, different only in tongue.

She looked at him and held his gaze steadily. They were passing St. Catherine’s Dock and heading towards the Pool of London. On either side of the river there were docks, wharves, and stairs going to the water’s edge. Barges were moored, others moved out slowly into the stream and went up towards further docks, or down towards the estuary and the sea. Pleasure boats were fewer now; this was the commercial shore. Here was trade with all the world.

As if having taken her thoughts, he smiled. “Cargoes of silk from China, spices from Burma and India, teak and ivory and jade,” he said, lying back a little farther. The sun on his brown face caught the pale color of his hair where it was already bleached by a far fiercer light than that of this gentle English afternoon with its dappled water. “I suppose it should be cedars of Lebanon and gold from Ophir! It won’t be long before it’s gold from Zimbabwe and mahogany and skins from Equatoria, ivory from Zanzibar and minerals from the Congo. And they will be traded for cotton from Manchester, and guns and men from half Europe. Some will come home again, many won’t.”

“Have you ever met Lobengula?” she asked curiously.

He laughed, looking up quickly. “Yes … I have. He’s an enormous man, nearly twenty-two stones in weight, and over six feet tall. He wears nothing except a Zulu ring ’round his head and a small loincloth.”

“Good heavens! Really? So big?” She regarded him closely to see if he was joking, although she knew almost certainly he was not.

His smile was steady, but his eyes were full of laughter. “The Ndebele are not a building people like the Shona, who created the city of Zimbabwe. They live by cattle raising and raiding, and making only villages of grass huts covered with dung….”

“I know the sort,” she said quickly, and memory returned so she could almost smell the dry heat in spite of the rushing and slapping of water all around her and the bright reflections dancing in her eyes.

“Of course you do,” he apologized. “Forgive me. It is so rare a treat for me to be able to speak with someone who needs no explanation or word pictures to imagine what I’m describing. Lobengula holds a very formal court. Anyone seeking audience with him has to approach him crawling on hands and knees—and remain so throughout.” He pulled a face. “It can be a very hot and exhausting experience, and not necessarily with any pleasure or profit at the end. He can neither read nor write, but he has a prodigious memory … for all the good that will do him dealing with Europe, poor devil.”

She waited in silence. Kreisler was lost in thoughts of his own and she was content to allow it. She had no sense of being excluded; it was perfectly companionable. The light, the sound of the water, the wharves and warehouses of the Pool of London slipped by, and the shared dreams of the past in another land, the shared fears for its future as a different kind of darkness loomed over it.

“They duped him, of course,” he said after a while. “They promised they would bring no more than ten white men to work in his country.”

She sat upright suddenly, her eyes wide with disbelief.

“Yes.” He looked at her through his lashes. “Unbelievable to you or me, but he accepted it. They also said they would dig nowhere near towns, and that they and their people would abide by the laws of the Ndebele, and behave generally as Lobengula’s subjects.” The bitterness crept in only at the end.

“And the price?” she asked quietly.

“A hundred pounds a month, a thousand Martini-Henry breech-locking rifles and a hundred thousand rounds of ammunition, and a gunboat on the Zambezi.”

She said nothing. They were passing Wapping Old Stairs on their left as they sped downriver. The Pool of London was teeming with boats, barges, steamers, tugs, trawlers and here and there the odd pleasure boat. Would the brown, jungle-crusted Congo ever be like this, teeming with civilization and the goods of the world to be bought and sold, and consumed by men and women who had never left their own counties or shires?

“Rudd set off at a gallop to take the news to Rhodes in Kimberley,” Kreisler went on, “before the king realized he had been cheated. The fool almost died of thirst in his eagerness to carry the news.” There was disgust in his voice, but the only emotion registered in his face was a deep and acutely personal pain. His lips were stiff with the intensity of it as if it resided with him all the time, and yet for all his leanness of body and the strength she knew was there, he looked vulnerable.

But it was a private pain. She was perhaps the only person with whom he had or could share the full nature of it and expect any degree of understanding, yet she knew not to intrude into intimacy. Part of the sharing was the delicacy of the silence between them.

They were past the Pool and the London Docks and leaving Limehouse. Still the wharves and stairs lined either side, massive warehouses with painted names above them. The West India Docks were ahead, and then Limehouse Reach and the Isle of Dogs. They had already passed the old pier stakes sticking above the receding water, where in the past pirates had been lashed till the incoming tide drowned them. They had both seen them, glanced at each other, and said nothing.

It was very comfortable not to have to search for speech. It was a luxury she was not used to. Almost everyone else she knew would have found the silence a lack. They would have been impelled to say something to break it. Kreisler was perfectly happy just to catch her eye now and then, and know that she too was busy with the wind, the smell of salt, the noise and bustle around them, and yet the feeling of being detached from it by the small space of water that separated them from everyone else. They passed through it with impunity, seeing and yet uninvolved.

Greenwich was beautiful, the long green swell of ground rising from the river, the full leaf of the trees and the park beyond, the classical elegance of Vanburgh’s architecture in the hospital and the Royal Naval Schools behind.

They went ashore, rode in an open trap up to the park and then walked slowly side by side through the lawns and flowers and stood under the great trees listening to the wind moving gently in the branches. A huge magnolia was in full bloom, its tulip flowers a foam of white against the blue sky. Children chased each other and played with hoops and spinning tops and kites. Nursemaids in crisp uniforms walked, heads high, perambulators in front of them. Soldiers in scarlet tunics lounged around, watching the nursemaids. Lovers, young and less young, walked arm in arm. Girls flirted, swinging parasols and laughing. A dog capered around with a stick in its mouth. Somewhere a barrel organ was playing a musical tune.

They had afternoon tea, and talked of frivolous things, knowing that darker matters were always there, but understood; nothing needed explaining. The sadness and the fear had all been shared and for this warm, familiar afternoon it could be left beneath the surface of the mind.

In the sunset, with the moth-filled air cooling and the smell of earth and leaves rising from the pathway, they found the carriage which was to take them on the long ride back westwards. He handed her in, and they drove home with only an occasional word as the dusk deepened. The light flared in apricot and amber and turquoise over the river, making it look for a brief moment as if it could have been as magical as the lagoons of Venice, or the seaway of the Bosphorus, the meeting of Europe and Asia, instead of London, and the heart of the greatest empire since Caesar’s Rome.

Then the color faded to silver, the stars appeared to the south, away from the stir and lamps of the city, and they moved a little closer together as the chill of darkness set in. She could not remember a sweeter day.