Southampton Row Read online

  The flippant answer died on Pitt’s tongue. What Narraway was asking of him seemed all but impossible. Had he any idea of the real power of the Inner Circle? It was a secret society of men sworn to support each other above all interests or loyalties apart. They existed in cells, no one man knowing the identities of more than a handful of others, but obedient to the demands of the Circle. He knew of no instance in which one had betrayed another to the outside world. Internal justice was immediate and lethal; it was the more deadly because one never knew who else was Circle. It could be your superior, or some ordinary clerk of whom you took little notice. It could be your doctor, your bank manager or even your clergyman. Only one thing were you certain of, it was not your wife. No woman was allowed any part in it or knowledge of it whatever.

  “I know the seat is Liberal,” Narraway was going on. “But the political climate at the moment is turning extreme. The Socialists are not only noisy but making actual headway in some areas.”

  “You said Voisey was standing as a Tory,” Pitt pointed out. “Why?”

  “Because there will be a Conservative backlash,” Narraway replied. “If the Socialists go far enough, and mistakes are made, then it could sweep the Tories into power for a long time—quite long enough for Voisey to become Lord Chancellor. Even Prime Minister one day.”

  The thought was cold and ugly, and certainly too real to dismiss. To turn away from it as far-fetched was to hand Voisey the ultimate weapon.

  “You said Parliament rises in four days?” Pitt asked.

  “That’s right,” Narraway agreed. “You’ll start this afternoon.” He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Pitt.”

  “What?” Charlotte said incredulously. She was standing at the bottom of the stairs facing Pitt as he had come in through the front door. Her face was flushed with exertion, and now temper.

  “I have to stay because there’s going to be a general election,” he repeated. “Voisey’s going to stand!”

  She stared at him. For a moment all the memories of Whitechapel came back, and she understood. Then she closed it from her mind. “And what are you supposed to do about it?” she demanded. “You can’t stop him from standing, and you can’t stop people from voting for him if they want to. It’s monstrous, but it is we who made him into a hero because it was the only way to stop him. The republicans won’t even speak to him now, let alone elect him. Why can’t you let them deal with him? They’ll be furious enough to shoot him! Just don’t stop them. Arrive too late.”

  He tried to smile. “Unfortunately, I can’t rely on their doing that efficiently enough to be of any use to us. We have only about ten days.”

  “You have three weeks’ holiday!” She bit back sudden tears of disappointment. “It’s not fair! What can you do? Tell everybody he’s a liar, that he was behind the conspiracy to overthrow the throne?” She shook her head. “Nobody even knows there was one! He’d have you sued for slander, or more likely locked up as a lunatic. We made sure everyone believed he practically single-handedly did something wonderful for the Queen. She thinks he’s marvelous. The Prince of Wales and all his friends will be behind him.” She sniffed fiercely. “And no one will beat them—not with Randolph Churchill and Lord Salisbury as well.”

  He leaned against the newel post. “I know,” he admitted. “I wish I could tell the Prince of Wales how close Voisey came to destroying him, but we have no proof now.” He reached forward and touched her cheek. “I’m sorry. I know I haven’t much chance, but I have to try.”

  The tears brimmed over her cheeks. “I’ll unpack in the morning. I’m too tired to do it now. What on earth am I going to tell Daniel and Jemima—and Edward? They’ve been looking forward to it so much—”

  “Don’t unpack,” he interrupted. “You go . . .”

  “Alone?” Her voice rose to a squeak.

  “Take Gracie. I’ll manage.” He did not want to tell her how much it was for her safety. At the moment she was angry and disappointed, but in time she would realize he was challenging Voisey again.

  “What will you eat? What will you wear?” she protested.

  “Mrs. Brody can cook something for me, and do the linen,” he answered. “Don’t worry. Take the children, enjoy it with them. Whether Voisey wins or loses, there’s nothing I can do after the results are in. I’ll come down then.”

  “There’ll be no time left!” she said angrily. “Results go on coming in for weeks!”

  “He’s standing for a London seat. It’ll be one of the first.”

  “It could still be days!”

  “Charlotte, I can’t help it!”

  Her voice was barely controlled. “I know! Don’t be so damnably reasonable. Don’t you even mind? Doesn’t it infuriate you?” She swung her hand violently, fist tight. “It isn’t fair! They have loads of other people. First they throw you out of Bow Street and send you to live in some wretched rooms in Spitalfields, then when you save the government and the throne and heaven knows what else, they reinstate you—then throw you out again! Now they’re taking your only holiday . . .” She gasped for breath and it turned into a sob. “And for what? Nothing at all! You can’t stop Voisey if people are stupid enough to believe him. I hate Special Branch! It seems they don’t have to answer to anyone! They do whatever they like and there’s nobody to stop them.”

  “A bit like Voisey and the Inner Circle,” he replied, trying to smile very slightly.

  “Just like him, for all I know.” She met his eyes squarely, but there was a flash of light in hers, in spite of her attempts to hide it. “But nobody can stop him.”

  “I did once.”

  “We did!” she corrected him sharply.

  This time he did smile. “There’s no murder now, nothing for you to solve.”

  “Or you!” she countered immediately. “What you mean is it’s all about politics and elections, and women don’t even vote, much less campaign and stand for Parliament.”

  “Do you want to?” he said with surprise. He was happy to talk about any subject, even that one, rather than tell her how he feared for her safety once Voisey knew he was involved again.

  “Certainly not!” she retorted. “But that’s got nothing to do with it!”

  “An excellent piece of logic.”

  She poked a stray piece of hair back into its pin. “If you were at home and spent more time with the children you’d understand it perfectly.”

  “What?” he said with total disbelief.

  “The fact that I don’t want it doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be allowed it—if I did! Ask any man!”

  He shook his head. “Ask him what?”

  “Whether he would let me, or anybody else, decide whether he could or not,” she said in exasperation.

  “Could or could not do what?”

  “Anything!” she said impatiently, as if it had been obvious. “It’s one lot of people making rules for another lot of people to live by, when they wouldn’t accept them themselves. For heaven’s sake, Thomas! Haven’t you ever told children to do something, and they’ve said to you, ‘Well, you don’t!’ You may tell them they’re impertinent and send them upstairs to bed, but you know it’s unfair, and you know they know it too.”

  He blushed hot at one or two memories. He forbore from drawing any similarities between the public’s attitude to women and parents’ towards children. He did not want to quarrel with her. He knew why she spoke as she did. He felt the same anger and disappointment choking inside himself, and there were better ways of showing it than temper.

  “You’re right!” he said unequivocally.

  Her eyes opened wide for a moment in surprise, then in spite of herself she started to laugh. She put her arms around his neck and he took hold of her, drawing her body to his, caressing her shoulder, the soft line of her neck, and then kissing her.

  Pitt went to the station with Charlotte, Gracie and the children. It was a huge, echoing place crowded with people hurrying in all directions. It was the terminus for the Lond
on and South Western line, and the air was loud with the hiss of escaping steam, clanging doors, feet on the platform walking, running, shuffling, wheels of luggage trolleys, shouts of greeting and farewell, an excitement of adventure. It was full of beginnings and endings.

  Daniel jiggled up and down with impatience. Edward, fair-haired like Emily, tried to remember the dignity of being Lord Ashworth, and succeeded for a full five minutes before racing along the platform to see the fires roaring as a stoker poked more coal into the bottom of a vast engine. The stoker looked up, smiling at the boy before wiping his hand across his brow and beginning again.

  “Boys!” Jemima muttered under her breath with a glance at Charlotte.

  Gracie, still not much larger than when she had entered their employ as a thirteen-year-old, was dressed up for traveling. It was the second time she had been away from London on holiday, and she was managing to look very experienced and calm, except for the brilliance of her eyes and the flush in her cheeks—and the fact that she clung on to her soft-sided bag as if it were a life preserver.

  Pitt knew they must go. It was for their safety, and he wanted to be free of anxiety and certain he could face Voisey with the knowledge they were where he could never find them. But he still felt an ache of sadness inside himself as he called a porter over and instructed him to put their luggage into the van, giving him threepence for his trouble.

  The porter tipped his cap and piled the cases onto his trolley. He whistled as he pushed it away, but the sound was lost in the roar of a belch of steam, the sliding of coal off the shovels into the furnaces, the guard’s shrill whistle blast as an engine jolted forward and began to pick up speed, pulling out.

  Daniel and Edward raced each other along the platform, looking for the least occupied compartment, and came back waving their arms and whooping with triumph.

  They put their hand baggage inside, then came to the door to say good-bye.

  “Look after each other,” Pitt told them after he had hugged them all, including Gracie, to her surprise and pleasure. “And enjoy yourselves. Have every bit of fun you can.”

  Another door clanged shut and there was a jolt. “Time to go,” Pitt said, and with a wave he stepped back as the carriage lurched and juddered, the couplings locked, and it moved forward.

  He stood watching, seeing them leaning out of the window, Charlotte holding them back, her face suddenly bleak with loneliness as she was pulled away. Clouds of steam billowed upwards and drifted towards the vast, many-arched roof. There were smuts in the air and the smell of soot and iron and fire.

  He waved until they were out of sight as the train curved around the track, then he walked as fast as he could back along the platform and out into the street. At the cab rank he climbed into the first hansom and told the driver to take him to the House of Commons.

  He sat back and composed his mind to what he would say when he got there. He was south of the river now, but it would not take him long, even in the mid-morning traffic. The Houses of Parliament were on the north bank, perhaps thirty minutes away.

  He had always cared intensely about social injustice, the pain of poverty and disease, ignorance and prejudice, but his opinion of politicians was not high and he doubted that they would address many of the issues that troubled him unless forced into it by individuals with a passion for reform. Now was a good time to reassess that rather hasty judgment and learn a great deal more about both the individuals and the process.

  He would begin with his brother-in-law, Jack Radley, Emily’s second husband and the father of her daughter, Evangeline. When they had first met, Jack had been a charming man without either title or sufficient money to make any mark in society, but with the wit and the good looks to be invited to so many houses that he enjoyed an elegant life of considerable comfort.

  After marrying Emily, Jack had felt an increasing emptiness in that way of existence, until on an impulse he had stood for Parliament and surprised everyone, especially himself, by winning. It might have been the tide of political fortune, or that his seat was in one of the many constituencies where corruption determined the outcome, but he had since become a politician of some thought and more principle than his earlier years might have led anyone to foresee. During the Irish affair in Ashworth Hall he had shown both courage and an ability to act with dignity and good judgment. At the least he would be able to give Pitt information of a more detailed nature, and perhaps more accurately, than Pitt could gain from a public source.

  He reached the House of Commons, paid the cabdriver and went up the steps. He did not expect to be able to walk straight in, and was preparing to write a small note on one of his cards and have it taken to Jack, but the policeman at the door knew him from his days at Bow Street, and his face lit with pleasure.

  “Morning, Mr. Pitt, sir. Nice to see you, sir. No trouble ’ere, I ’ope?”

  “None at all, Rogers,” Pitt replied, grateful he could recall the man’s name. “I want to see Mr. Radley, if possible. It is a matter of some importance.”

  “Right you are then, sir.” Rogers turned and called over his shoulder. “George! Take Mr. Pitt up ter see Mr. Radley, will yer? Know ’im? Honorable Member for Chiswick.” He looked back at Pitt. “You go with George ’ere, sir. ’E’ll take yer up, because yer can get lost in ten minutes in this rabbit warren of a place.”

  “Thank you, Rogers,” Pitt said with sincerity. “That’s very good of you.”

  It was indeed a tangle of passages and stairways with offices at every turn and people coming and going, all distracted with their own business. He found Jack alone in a room which was obviously shared with someone else a good deal of the time. He thanked his guide and waited until he had left before closing the door and turning to speak.

  Jack Radley was approaching forty, but a man of very good looks and natural warmth which made him seem younger. Now he was surprised to see Pitt, but he set aside the newspapers he had been reading and faced him with curiosity.

  “Sit down,” he invited him. “What brings you here? I thought you were going to take a long-overdue holiday. You have Edward with you!” There was a shadow behind his eyes, and Pitt realized with a bitter humor that he was aware of the injustice of Pitt’s present position with the Special Branch and afraid that Pitt was going to ask for his help in reversing it. It was something he could not do, and Pitt knew that even better than he did.

  “Charlotte has taken the children,” Pitt replied. “Edward was full of excitement and ready to drive the train himself. I have to stay here for a while. As you know, there’s going to be an election in a few days.” He allowed a flash of humor in his face, and then lost it again. “For reasons I cannot explain, I need some information on the issues . . . and some of the people.”

  Jack drew in his breath.

  “Special Branch reasons.” Pitt smiled at him. “Not personal.”

  Jack colored slightly. He was not often wrong-footed by anyone, least of all Pitt, who was unused to political debate and the thrust and cut of opposition. Perhaps Jack had forgotten that the questioning of suspects held many of the same elements, the obliqueness, the study of face and gesture, the anticipation and the ambush.

  “What issues?” Jack asked. “There’s Home Rule for Ireland, but then there has been for generations. It’s no better than it ever was, although Gladstone’s sticking to it. It’s brought him down once already, and I think it will certainly cost him votes again, but no one can pry him loose from it, though God knows enough have tried.” He pulled a slightly rueful face. “But rather less often argued about is Home Rule for Scotland—or Wales.”

  Pitt was startled. “Home Rule for Wales?” he said incredulously. “What backing is there for that?”

  “Not a great deal,” Jack admitted. “Or Scotland, either, but it is an issue.”

  “Surely it won’t affect the London seats?”

  “It might, if you were arguing for it.” Jack shrugged. “Actually, on the whole, the people most against such th
ings are those geographically the farthest from them. Londoners tend to think Westminster should rule everything. The more power you have, the more you want.”

  “Home Rule, at least for Ireland, has been on the agenda for decades.” Pitt set it aside temporarily. “What else?”

  “The eight-hour day,” Jack replied grimly. “That’s the biggest, at least so far, and I don’t see anything else equaling it.” He looked at Pitt with a slight frown. “What is it, Thomas? A plot to overthrow the Old Man?” He was referring to Gladstone. There had already been attempts on his life.

  “No,” Pitt said quickly. “Nothing so overt.” He wished he could tell Jack the whole truth, but for Jack’s sake as much as his own, he could not. Any betrayal must not be blamed on him. “Corrupt constituences, some dirty fighting.”

  “Since when did Special Branch care about that?” Jack said skeptically, leaning back a little in his chair, his elbow inadvertently knocking over a pile of books and papers. “They are supposed to be stopping anarchists and dynamiters, especially Fenians.” He frowned. “Don’t lie to me, Thomas. I’d rather you told me to mind my own business than fob me off with an evasion.”

  “It’s not an evasion,” Pitt replied. “It’s a particular seat, and so far as I know, it has no Irish dimension, nor any dynamiters.”

  “Why you?” Jack said levelly. “Is it anything to do with the Adinett case?” He was referring to the murder which had so infuriated Voisey and the Inner Circle they had taken their revenge on Pitt by having him dismissed from Bow Street.

  “Indirectly,” Pitt admitted. “You are almost at the point where you would rather be told to mind your own business.”

  “Which seat?” Jack said, perfectly calmly. “I can’t help you if I don’t know.”