Treachery at Lancaster Gate

Chapter 1

Pitt stood in the middle of the street looking at the smoldering ruins of the house. The fire brigade had thoroughly hosed the small bursts of flame here and there, and the water had puddled on the floor and settled into the craters left by the bomb that had detonated approximately forty-five minutes ago. It was midday but the sky was still clouded with smoke and the stench of it was everywhere.

Pitt moved out of the way as two ambulance men lifted a wounded man onto a makeshift litter and carried him out to the waiting ambulance. The horses were shifting their weight impatiently. They knew the smell of burning in the early winter air and each crash of collapsing timber startled them, though they waited obediently.

“That’s it, sir,” the white-faced constable said to Pitt, blinking rapidly. Perhaps it was the smoke that stung the man’s eyes, but more probably it was emotion. All of the men who had been caught in the explosion were police: five of them altogether. “That’s the last of them out.”

“Thank you.” Pitt acknowledged the words. “How many dead?”

“Hobbs and Newman, sir. We didn’t move the bodies.” The constable coughed and tried to clear his throat. “Ednam, Bossiney, and Yarcombe are pretty badly injured, sir.”

“Thank you,” Pitt repeated. His mind was teeming with thoughts, and yet he could not come up with anything to say that would give any real comfort to the constable. Pitt was head of Special Branch, that discreet part of Security that dealt with threats to the nation-sabotage, assassinations, bombings, any form of terrorism. He had seen destruction and violent death more times than he cared to remember. In fact, before Special Branch he had been in the regular police, dealing primarily with cases of murder.

But this was a deliberate attack directed specifically at the police: colleagues he had known and worked with over the years. He could remember Newman getting married, Hobbs’s first promotion. Now he had to search this wreckage for their bodies.

He turned and started to move slowly, picking his way so as not to disturb what was left of the situation-the evidence, if it could be called such. They already knew it was a bomb blast. Two people had been close enough to witness it. They had heard the explosion and seen the rubble flying, and then the flames as the wood caught fire. Now they were sitting in the back of an ambulance as one of the drivers finished binding up a gash in an arm caused by flying glass. There were shards everywhere from exploded windows. Both of the witnesses looked battered and shocked, but Pitt would have to interview them.

He spoke to the man first. He looked to be in his sixties, white-haired, dressed in a formal coat. Likely he had been on his way back home from church. There were cuts on the right side of his face, and a burn across his cheek, as if a piece of flaming wood had caught him. His right side was smeared with dust and there were small burns in the fabric of his clothes.

“On my way home from church, God help us,” the man said shakily after Pitt had introduced himself and apologized for disturbing him. “What kind of people would do this?” He was frightened, and trying desperately not to show it in front of the woman. His wife, Pitt assumed. He must have been walking on the outside, as a man would, and she had been closer to the blast and was more seriously hurt. It was her arm the ambulance man was binding.

“Did you see anyone else in the street?” Pitt asked. “Anyone at all? Any witnesses might help.”

“No…no, I didn’t. We were talking to each other,” the man replied. “Who would do this? What do they want?”

“I don’t know, sir. But we’ll find out,” Pitt promised. The ambulance man caught Pitt’s eye, his glance indicating that Pitt should hurry. Blood was already beginning to seep through the bandage on the woman’s arm as he added another layer, and she looked pale.

Pitt handed his card to the man. He didn’t see any point in delaying them further. “Thank you. That’s all for now. If you remember anything, please let us know.” He wished them well, and with a nod to the ambulance man he walked back toward the house. It was time to go in and look at the bodies, gather whatever evidence there was.

He skirted around a block of fallen masonry, picking his way carefully. He could taste burning in the air, and yet it was cold.

“Sir!” a fireman called out. “You can’t come in here! It’s…”

Pitt kept on walking, his feet crunching on broken glass. “Commander Pitt,” he introduced himself.

“Oh…well, watch where you put your feet, sir. And your head.” He glanced upward at a broken beam that was hanging at a crazy angle, swaying a little, as if it could become detached and fall off any moment. “You still shouldn’t ought to be here,” he added.

“The dead men?” Pitt requested.

“It’s dangerous in here,” the man pointed out. “They’ll not be going nowhere, sir. Best you let us get them out. The blast killed them, sir. No doubt about that.”

Pitt would have liked the excuse not to look at the bodies, but there was none. He might learn nothing useful, but it would be a beginning of facing the reality and coming to terms with it.

He was standing in front of the fireman. The man was pale-faced, apart from the black ash smudges on his cheeks. His uniform was filthy, and wet. When he had time to think about it, he would realize he was cold as well.

“The bodies?” Pitt nudged him as gently as he could.

“That way, sir,” the man said reluctantly. “But be careful. You’d be best not to touch anything. Bring the whole lot down on top o’ yourself.”

“I won’t,” Pitt responded, beginning the awkward journey, trying to avoid tripping. If he fell he would almost certainly bang into a jutting wall strut, a piece of smashed furniture, or something dangling from where the ceiling used to be.

The floorboards were half up, torn by the blast. It must have been a large bomb and, to judge by the burning and the angles of the broken wood, he was near the center of it. What on earth had happened here in a quiet house on a pleasant London street near Kensington Gardens? Anarchists? London was full of them. Half the revolutionaries in Europe had either lived here or passed through. In this year of 1898 there had been less terrorist activity than in the recent past, but now, almost at the close of the year, it seemed Special Branch’s sense of ease was misplaced. Was this the dying blow, or the first outrider of another storm? Nihilists in Europe had assassinated President Carnot of France, Tsar Alexander II of Russia, the Spanish prime minister, Canovas del Castillo, and, earlier this year, the empress Elisabeth of Austria-Hungary. Perhaps the violence was now coming here to England as well?

In front of Pitt there was a body, or what was left of it. Suddenly he could not swallow, and he thought for a moment that he was going to be sick. One leg was entirely gone, one side of the chest caved in under part of a beam from the rafters. But the man’s face was oddly unmarked. Pitt could recognize Newman.

He would have to go and see Newman’s widow, say all the usual words of grief. It would not help, but its omission would hurt.

He stared at the body. Did it tell him anything, other than what the fireman had already said? There was no smoke on Newman’s face. His left arm was mostly gone, but when Pitt looked more closely he saw his right hand was clean. Did that mean he was already inside here when the bomb went off? He had not battled his way through smoke and rubble. Why had he come here? Trouble reported? An alarm of some sort? Following someone? A meeting already arranged? An ambush?

He turned and moved away, dizzy for a moment. He took a deep breath, steadied himself, and pressed on.

The second body was half-obscured by fallen plaster and wood, but it was far less obviously damaged. There was little smoke or dust on Hobbs’s face and his pattern of freckles was easily recognizable. Pitt studied him as dispassionately as he could, trying to learn something from the way the debris lay around him. The police surgeon would be able to tell him more, but it appeared that Hobbs had been caught by surprise, and much further from the site of the explosion than Newman.

Pitt was still staring at the surroundings when he heard footsteps somewhere behind him. He turned and saw the familiar figure of Samuel Tellman picking his way through the plaster, water, and charred wood. Tellman had been Pitt’s sergeant when they were both at Bow Street. It had taken them a long time to be comfortable with each other. Tellman had distrusted anyone with a background as humble as Pitt’s but who spoke like a gentleman. To him it seemed that Pitt’s accent was affected, as if Pitt thought himself superior. Pitt felt no reason to explain that his speech was the product of having been educated along with Sir Arthur Desmond’s son at the country estate where his father had been gamekeeper. When his father had been transported to Australia for a crime he had not committed, Pitt’s mother had remained as laundress, and Sir Arthur had seen the young Pitt as a companion to his son and a spur to excel him in class. The whole story was a wound that still ached on his father’s behalf, and it wasn’t something he wished to discuss with Tellman. But years of working together had taught them a mutual respect, and loyalty.

“Good afternoon, sir.” Tellman stopped beside him.

“Good afternoon, Inspector,” Pitt replied.

Tellman stared down at the body. “I’m your liaison with the police, sir.”

Pitt had expected someone to provide liaison, partly because he was Special Branch and not in the regular police, but mostly because the victims were the police’s own men. The internal loyalty of the police force was not unlike that of soldiers in an army at war. An officer facing danger had to have an absolute trust in those who stood beside him, or at his back.

Pitt nodded. It would be good to work with Tellman again-but he wished it were on anything other than this.

“Looks like they were right here when it went off,” Pitt observed. “Newman must have been closest to it.”

“Yes. I saw. What kind of a bloody lunatic would do this?” Tellman’s voice was tight, as if he were controlling it with difficulty. “I want freedom for all men, and food, and houses, and the right to come and go as I please. But what the hell good does something like this do? Which anarchists did this, anyway? Spanish? Italian? French? Russian? Why in God’s name do all the bloody lunatics in Europe come and live in London?” He turned to face Pitt. “Why do we let them?” His face was white, two spots of color in his lean cheeks, anger in his eyes. “Don’t you know who they are? Isn’t that what Special Branch is supposed to be for, to prevent exactly this from happening?”

Pitt hunched his shoulders and drove his hands deeper into his pockets. “I don’t make the policy, Tellman. And yes, I know who a lot of them are. Mostly they just talk.”

The disgust and the pain in Tellman’s face were more powerful than words. “I’ll find them and hang them-whatever you want to do about it.” It was a challenge.

Pitt did not bother to answer. He understood the emotion behind the words. Right at this moment he felt much the same. He might feel differently when he learned who was responsible. Some of the men branded as anarchists had done no more than protest for decent pay, enough to feed their families. A few of them had been imprisoned, tortured, and even executed, simply for protesting against injustice. Driven far enough, he might have done the same.

“Why were these men here?” he asked Tellman. “Five of them, at this quiet house right on the park? It can’t have been an inquiry. You don’t need five men for that. There’s no one else dead or hurt, so the house must have been empty. What were they doing?”

Tellman’s expression tightened. “I don’t know yet, but I mean to find out. But if the investigation was to do with anarchists, they would have told Special Branch what was going on. So it must be something else.”

Pitt did not take that totally for granted as Tellman seemed to, but it was not the time to argue. “Anything known about this address?” he asked instead.

“Not yet.” Tellman looked around him. “What about the bomb? Bombs are your business. What was it made of? Where was it put? How did they let it off?”

“Dynamite,” Pitt told him. “It always is. Detonating it is simple enough with a fuse. Just make it long enough so that you can get away before the blast.”

“Just like that? That’s all?” Tellman asked bitterly.

“Well, there are more complicated ones, but it seems unlikely they would be used for this purpose.”

“Complicated how?” Tellman demanded.

“Upside-down bombs, for example,” Pitt said patiently as they both turned and made their way gingerly back toward the open air. The stench of burned wood and plaster was overpowering, filling the head, stinging the nose and throat. “You make a container with two halves, carefully perforated. Keep it up the right way and it’s safe. Turn it upside down and it explodes.”

“So you carry it in the right way up, and hope someone turns it over?”

“Make it into a parcel. Put the strings tied on the other side, or the name of the sender, or anything else you like,” Pitt answered, stepping over a fallen beam. “It works very well.”

“Then I suppose it’s a miracle we don’t all get blown to hell.” Tellman lashed out and kicked a loose piece of wood, which flew through the air and crashed against one of the few walls still standing.

Pitt understood the violence. He had known some of these men also, and hundreds of others just like them, working hard at an often thankless job, underpaid for the danger it too often involved. He had done it himself for long enough.

“Dynamite is controlled,” he said as they stepped out onto the pavement. The street had been closed and there was no traffic. One fire engine still remained. The ambulances were gone. The closed-in wagon for the morgue was waiting at the curb. Pitt nodded to the attendant and the police surgeon. “I don’t think we can learn anything more,” he said quietly. “Give me your report when you can.”

“Yes, sir,” the police surgeon responded, taking it as his cue to enter the bombed building.

“Controlled,” Tellman said sarcastically. “By whom?”

“It’s not for sale,” Pitt replied, walking slowly along the pavement away from the still-smoldering wreckage. “They use it in quarries, and occasionally in demolition. You’d either steal it from there, or buy it from someone else who had stolen it.”

“Like anarchists,” Tellman said sourly. “Back to where we started.”

“Probably,” Pitt agreed. “But as you pointed out, Special Branch is unaware of any current police investigation to do with an anarchist group. And this doesn’t fit the usual profile.”

“Maybe it was a random attack, a cell that is so damn crazy they don’t care who they hurt.” Tellman stared across toward the bare trees in Kensington Gardens, a black fretwork against the sky. “I suppose you know what you’re doing, letting terrorists stay in Britain.” He didn’t inflect it as a question, but he might as well have. “Personally I’d rather they went home and blew up their own cities.”

“Speak to the firemen.” Pitt did not bother answering the challenge. “See if they can tell you anything useful. We can see from poor Newman’s body roughly where the bomb went off, but the pattern of burning might locate the site even more closely.”

“And how will that help?”

“It probably won’t, but you know as well as I do that you don’t prejudge the evidence. Get it all. You know what to look for. And find out whatever you can about who lives in this house, what they look like, when they come and go, who visits them, what they say they do and, if possible, what they really do.”

“You don’t need to tell me how to do police work,” Tellman said angrily. He stood still and looked at Pitt for several seconds, then turned away. The grief was clear in his face.

“I know,” Pitt said quietly. “Sorry…”

He remembered Newman at his wedding, the way his young bride had looked at him. No one should end up as he was now.

“I’m going to the hospital,” he said gruffly. “One of the injured men might be able to tell me why they went to that house.”

He walked smartly toward the Bayswater Road, where he could get a hansom quickly. He needed to feel as if he were doing something with a purpose. St. Mary’s in Paddington was not far, a few minutes’ ride up Westbourne Terrace to Praed Street and he would be there.

There was a stationary cab close to the curb, as if the driver had known he would be needed. “St. Mary’s Hospital, Paddington,” Pitt said as he got in.

“Yes, sir,” the driver replied gravely. “You’ll be wanting me to hurry,” he added.

“Yes, if you please.” Pitt desperately wanted to speak to the injured men, if they were still conscious and not in the operating theater-or dead.

It seemed like an endless journey, and yet in other ways far too short.

Pitt got out, paid the driver, and thanked him.

“Ye’re welcome, sir. You just catch the bastards!” the driver called after him.

Pitt half turned and raised his hand in a swift acknowledgment. There was nothing he could promise.

The doctor in charge told him that he couldn’t see the patients. They were still in great pain and heavily dosed with morphine.

Pitt explained again who he was. It was one occasion when a uniform with plenty of buttons and braid would have helped.

“Special Branch,” he said yet again. “This was a bombing. Right in the middle of London. We have to catch the perpetrators and stop them before they do it again. So it’s vital that I speak to these men, if they are able.”

The doctor’s face paled and he bit back his insistence. “Then be quick, Mr. Pitt. These men are in a bad way.”

“I know that,” Pitt said grimly. “I’ve just been looking at the dead.”

The doctor winced, but did not say anything more. Instead he led Pitt briskly along the corridor to a very small ward where three beds were occupied by men in different states of treatment. Two of them appeared to be unconscious, but could have been merely silent, motionless in suffering.

The most senior of the injured was Ednam, and he was awake, watching Pitt as he approached. His face was bruised and there was a dark red, angry burn across his left cheek. His left arm was bandaged from the shoulder to the wrist and his leg was propped up and also heavily bandaged, so whatever treatment it had received was concealed. Pitt guessed it was broken, and probably burned as well. When Pitt asked quietly if he could speak to him, Ednam looked back guardedly, taking a moment or two to recognize him. Then he relaxed a fraction, with just an easing of the muscles around his mouth.

“I suppose.” His voice was dry. Clearly his throat hurt, and probably his chest, from inhaling the smoke.

“If you can tell me anything,” Pitt prompted.

“If I’d known there was a bloody bomb I wouldn’t ’ave gone!” Ednam retorted bitterly.

“Why did you go?” Pitt asked. “And with four other men? That’s a big force. What were you expecting to find?”

“Drugs. Opium, to be exact. Big buy there, we were told.”

“By whom? Did you find any evidence of it?”

“We barely had time to look!”

Pitt kept his voice soft. “Was anyone else there?”

“Apart from us? Not that I saw,” Ednam answered. “But the information came from a good source. At least…one we’ve trusted before.” His voice was now little above a whisper. The effort to speak cost him dearly. “Newman and Hobbs are dead, aren’t they?”

“Yes.”

Ednam swore until he couldn’t get his breath anymore.

“I need to know your source,” Pitt urged, leaning forward a little. “Either he set you up or someone else set him up.”

“I don’t know his name. He calls himself Anno Domini.”

“What?”

“Anno Domini,” Ednam repeated. “I don’t know if he’s religious or what. But we’ve had a few good tips from him before.”

“How? Do you talk with him? Get letters?”

“Letters, just a line or two. Delivered by hand.”

“Addressed to you?”

“Yes.”

“By name?”

“Yes.”

“Telling you what?”

“Where a purchase will be or where drugs are stashed.”

“How many arrests have you made on this information?”

Ednam’s eyes did not leave Pitt’s face.

“Two. And found about two hundred pounds’ worth of opium.”

More than enough to establish trust; in fact, enough to raise the funds to buy a small house. Pitt could not blame Ednam for following the lead. He would have himself.

“Do you think he was setting you up?” he asked. “Or was someone else using him?”

Ednam thought for a few moments, his face tense with concentration. “I think someone else was using him,” he said at last. “But it’s just a guess. Find who’s behind this. I want to see them hang.”

“I’ll try,” Pitt promised. It was one of the rare moments when he agreed. Usually he found hanging a repulsive idea, regardless of the crime. It was an act of revenge that reduced the law to the same level of barbarism as those who had broken it.

He walked over to the bed opposite and found Bossiney. Pitt spoke to him only a few moments. He was very badly burned and must have been in savage pain, drifting in and out of consciousness.

Pitt walked over to the nurse in the corner of the ward. She gave him a bleak smile but would not confirm or deny anything; she had hope that he would survive, but would not commit herself to more. Her emotional exhaustion from witnessing such pain was marked on her face.

Finally Pitt went to the bed closest to the window, where Yarcombe lay staring at the ceiling, his face blank. A glance told Pitt that his right arm was missing from the elbow downward. Pitt struggled for something to say and could find nothing that was remotely adequate. His own right hand clenched till his nails bit into the flesh of his palm, a sweet reminder that it was there, real and alive.

“I’m sorry,” he said awkwardly. “We’ll get them.”

Yarcombe turned his head very slightly till his eyes focused on Pitt. “Do that,” he replied in a whisper. “They set us up!” He added something more, but it was unintelligible.

Pitt left the hospital with his head pounding and a vague, sick feeling in his stomach.

He arrived back at the Special Branch offices at Lisson Grove to find a message waiting for him to report to Commissioner Bradshaw of the Metropolitan Police. It did not surprise him. Bradshaw would be deeply upset about the bombing and remiss in his duty if he did not contact the head of Special Branch. Pitt had wanted to return to Lisson Grove only to see if there was any further information he could give to Bradshaw.

Stoker knocked on his door almost as soon as Pitt had closed it and looked at the papers on his desk.

“Sir?” Stoker said as soon as he was inside. He was a man of few words, but this was brief, even for him.

“Nothing more,” Pitt replied. “They are hurt very badly. Yarcombe lost part of his arm. Nobody can say if they’ll live or not. Ednam doesn’t look fatal but you can’t tell what’s inside. Or how bad the shock will be. He says they went there on a tip-off that there would be a big opium sale. They expected a degree of resistance, and they didn’t want anyone escaping with the proof.”

“Was there a sale?”

“No.”

“Any idea who set them up?”

“The tip came from a man they know only as Anno Domini.”

“What?” Stoker looked startled.

“Anno Domini,” Pitt repeated. “No idea why. But Ednam said he’s been reliable before.”

“Setting them up for this,” Stoker said straightaway.

“Could be. Tellman’s our police liaison. You’d better check on all the potential bombers we know of.”

“Already started, sir. Nothing useful so far. But I suppose if it was someone we know, we’d have had wind of it before.” He made a grimace of unhappiness. “At least I damn well hope we would! We’ve got enough men infiltrated into their groups. I’ve already spoken to Patchett and Wells. They don’t know a thing. But dynamite’s easy enough to get, if you have the right connections.”

Pitt did not argue. Unfortunately what Stoker said was true, hard as they tried to prevent it. “I’m going to see Bradshaw,” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

Pitt was shown into Bradshaw’s office immediately. This time there was no pretense at being busy with more important things, as there had been on occasion. Bradshaw was a good-looking man in his early fifties. His thick hair had little gray in it and he had not yet developed any surplus body weight. He was well dressed, as always, but creases of tension marred the smoothness of his face.

“How are the men, Pitt?” he began without ceremony the moment Pitt was in and had closed the door. He waved toward one of the elegant chairs but did not bother with an invitation.

“Two dead, sir,” Pitt replied, walking over toward the desk, his feet silent on the heavy Turkish rug. “Newman and Hobbs. Ednam, Bossiney, and Yarcombe injured. Yarcombe lost part of an arm. Too early to say if they’ll recover.”

Bradshaw winced. “It’s police who were killed,” he said sharply. “It was a police case.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you know what it was about?”

“A very large opium sale.”

Bradshaw’s face paled, the muscles in his jaw tight. “Opium,” he said quietly. “Have you…have you any idea who is involved?”

“Not yet…”

“Why is Special Branch taking the case?” His voice was hard-edged, challenging. “What evidence have you that it’s terrorists? Do you know who’s behind it? Did you know before?”

“No, sir. We were not consulted until after the bomb went off this morning. It was one of their informers who lured them to the meeting, and with information that caused them to bring five men, rather than just a couple.”

“They had an informer? How do you know that?”

“I got it from Ednam when I saw him in hospital.”

“Poor devil,” Bradshaw said softly. “Who is this informer?”

“Always communicates by letter. Calls himself Anno Domini.”

“Educated man?” Bradshaw looked surprised.

“Possibly,” Pitt said.

“I presume you’re looking for this man?”

“Yes, sir. And working with the police.”

“But what are you doing?” Bradshaw pressed.

“Looking at all our contacts, asking our usual informers…”

“Do your anarchists deal in opium?”

“Possibly. And they certainly deal in dynamite.”

Bradshaw sighed. “Yes, of course they do. Damn them.” He regarded Pitt bleakly, his face filled with pain. “I suppose you’ve inherited a network of spies from Victor Narraway? You must have some ideas. Or am I out of date?”

Pitt had a retaliation on the tip of his tongue, but he knew better. “We’ll do our best, Commissioner,” he said gently. “And I will keep you aware of any progress we make. On a day-to-day basis, I will be working with Inspector Tellman.”

Bradshaw nodded. “Anything you want that we can help with…” he said grimly. “But I imagine you have your own men.” It was not a question. He had no liking for Special Branch, and no wish to lend any of his force to do their work.

The first thing Pitt did was to visit the families. It was the worst duty in all police or Special Branch work, and it could not be passed off to anyone else.

It was late when Pitt arrived home in Keppel Street, just off Russell Square. The streetlamps were haloed by a faint mist, which softened the outlines of the houses, blurring boundaries between them.

He was exhausted. He had stopped back at Lisson Grove and heard from Stoker the daily reports coming in: the threats, attacks, rivalries, anything that would give them a place to start. He had found no reference to the address in Lancaster Gate, and no one at all using the sobriquet Anno Domini.

As Pitt climbed the steps to the familiar door, a sense of peace fell over him, as if he could leave the violence and the grief of the day behind him. He slipped his key in the lock and went inside, closing it with a slight noise deliberately. He wanted somebody to know he was home, even though it was late and seventeen-year-old Jemima and fourteen-year-old Daniel would already have eaten, and possibly even gone to bed. Charlotte would have waited up for him. She always did.

The light was warm and bright in the hall.

The parlor door opened and she stood there, the lamplight on her hair bringing out its auburn tones. She came toward him, concern in her face.

He took off his hat and coat and hung them up where they could dry out, then turned and kissed her gently.

“You’re cold,” she said, touching his cheek. “Have you eaten anything? Would you like a roast beef sandwich and a cup of tea?”

He suddenly realized he was hungry and, sensing his response before he spoke it, she turned and led the way to the kitchen. It was always his favorite room anyway. It smelled of clean-scrubbed wood, of the freshly ironed linen hanging on the airing rail winched up to the ceiling, sometimes of new bread. There was a large wooden table in the center, and a Welsh dresser in the corner with blue-and-white ringed plates arranged on it, and a few jugs. Copper pans gleamed on hooks on the wall.

For years it had been the heart of the house. All kinds of people had sat here long into the night, talking of plans, easing defeats, helping one another to believe in victory. Gracie had come here as a maid when she was still a child. She was married to Tellman now, but there were moments when Pitt still missed her, as if he could hear her voice and she were only in the pantry or the hall, and might come around the corner at any moment. Now it was Minnie Maude who had taken her place, but she had not Gracie’s sharp tongue, or bright, stubborn courage-not yet.

He pulled out a chair and sat down as Charlotte moved the kettle over onto the hottest part of the oven hob, and began to slice the beef.

“No horseradish,” he reminded her. It was part of a ritual. He never had horseradish. He liked pickle.

She nodded very slightly. “It was in the evening newspapers. They didn’t give names. Did you know any of them?”

He hesitated, but only for a moment. “Yes. Newman was one of them. I…I told his wife.”

Charlotte stood motionless for a moment, the tears filling her eyes. “Oh, Thomas, I’m sorry! I remember her at her wedding-she was so happy! This is terrible.” She swallowed, trying to control her emotion. “And the others?”

“I’ve seen them, but Newman was the only one I really knew.”

“Are the injured ones going to be all right?”

“It’s too early to say. One of them lost an arm.”

Charlotte didn’t try to say anything comforting, and he was glad of it. She cut the bread, spread a little butter, then laid the beef thickly, adding pickle. The kettle boiled. She warmed the teapot, put in three spoons of tea, then added water and carried it all to the table.

“What are they saying in the papers?” he asked as he picked up the sandwich and bit into it. The taste was rich and sharp.

“That it’s the work of anarchists,” she replied. “That people are frightened, and everything seems so uncertain. It’s as if there is violence in the air and you never know quite where the next attack is coming from.” She poured the tea ready for him and a cup for herself. “I suppose that’s the aim of anarchists, isn’t it? The kind of fear that disables people and makes them do stupid things.” It was not a question. It was what she believed. She said it aloud because she wished him to know she understood.

He swallowed his mouthful and took another.

“In thirteen months we’ll be into the 1900s.” She sipped her tea. “A lot of people seem to think it will be a different century, really different. Darker and more violent. But why should it change? It’s only a date on a calendar. If anything, it’s perhaps a self-fulfilling prophecy-we’ll make it happen by thinking about it so much.”

He was too tired to discuss it, but he recognized the fear in her voice. She wanted an answer, not a palliative.

“Things are changing,” he agreed quietly. “But they always are.”

“Small things.” She shook her head. “Not big, like the changes people want in Europe. America hasn’t yet signed a peace treaty with Spain, and there’s going to be even more trouble in South Africa. We shouldn’t be fighting there, Thomas. We’re not right.”

“I know.”

“There are assassinations, bombings,” she went on. “We haven’t had that before, not all over the place. People are restless about poverty and injustice. They want change, but they’re going about it in all the wrong ways.”

“I know that, too. We’re doing what we can. This looks like an opium sale gone wrong.”

“Two police killed and three badly injured!” Charlotte protested. “They weren’t shot, that whole building was blown up!” Then she saw his face. He had done what he could to clean the ash and soot out of his hair, but he had not had a chance to put on a clean shirt. There was not only soot but scorch marks on his cuffs, and he must smell of charred wood.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I suppose I’m as frightened as everybody else, except that I’m frightened for you, too.”

“That I won’t catch them?” he asked, then instantly wished that he hadn’t. What could he say to undo it?

“That, too,” she said candidly. “But also for you not to be hurt.”

“I’ve been in the police since before we met, and I’ve not been seriously hurt yet.” He smiled. “Scared stiff a time or two. And one way or another, we’ve solved most of the big cases.”

She nodded slightly and smiled, keeping her eyes on his.

Nevertheless he was worried. He had men embedded in all the major anarchist groups he knew of, and there had not been even a murmur of an atrocity like the bombing at Lancaster Gate. Nothing at all. He had been completely blindsided. Would Victor Narraway have known? Pitt had been promoted on Narraway’s own recommendation, when Narraway had been dismissed. Had Narraway overestimated him?

He reached out across the table and put his hand over Charlotte’s, but he did not say anything. He felt her fingers curl up and close around his.