He was admitted to Cornwallis’s office immediately and found him standing, as so often, by the window overlooking the street. Cornwallis turned as Pitt came in. He looked pale, and there were dark shadows around his eyes and a thin tenseness in his lips.
“Good morning,” he said quickly as Pitt closed the door. “Come in.” He waved in a very general way towards the chairs in front of the desk, but remained standing, balanced as if he would begin to pace back and forth the moment he had Pitt’s total attention. “Do you know of Sigmund Tannifer?”
“No.”
Cornwallis was staring at him. His body was rigid, his hands behind his back. “He’s a banker, very prominent in the City, very powerful man in financial circles.”
Pitt waited.
As if driven by compulsion, Cornwallis began to pace: five strides one way, turn smartly, five strides the other. The office could have been the quarterdeck sailing before the wind into battle.
“He called me last night,” he began, speaking jerkily. “He sounded … distressed.” He reached the end and turned again, glancing at Pitt. “Wouldn’t say what it was, but asked me about the Bedford Square business. Asked me who was in charge of the case.” He swiveled around and came back. “When I told him you were, he asked if he could see you … privately … as soon as possible-in fact, this morning.” He started back again, hands still locked behind him. “I asked him if he had any information regarding it. Thought he might have been burgled or know someone who had … someone in Bedford Square.” He stopped, his eyes puzzled, his face almost bruised looking. “He said he didn’t know anything about it. It was another matter, private and very grave.” He reached over to the desk and passed Pitt a slip of paper. “This is his address. He is at home, waiting for you.”
Pitt took the paper and glanced at it. Tannifer lived in Chelsea.
“Yes sir. I’ll go now.”
“Good. Thank you.” Cornwallis stood still at last. “Let me know what it is. I’ll be back by the time you are … I daresay.”
“Back?” Pitt asked.
“Ah … yes.” Cornwallis let out his breath slowly. “Have to go to my club … the Jessop Club. Don’t really want to, can’t spare the time.” He smiled fleetingly, an effort to hide his reluctance. He was dreading it, as if already his friends and colleagues would somehow know what was in the letter and believe it, or at best wonder. “Have to,” he went on explaining. “On a committee for charity. Too important not to go. For children.” He looked vaguely embarrassed as he said it, and turned quickly to pick up his hat and follow Pitt out of the door.
Pitt took a hansom and rode, again deep in thought, to Queen Street, just off the Chelsea Embankment. It was a beautiful neighborhood, near the Botanical Gardens, just past the facade of the Chelsea Hospital and the wide space of Burton’s Court. The end of the street opened directly onto the river, which was blue and gray, sparkling in the sun.
He knocked on the door of the number he had been given, and when the footman answered he presented his card. He was shown across the stone-flagged hall with scattered Persian rugs. The walls were hung with an array of historical weapons, from a crusader’s two-handed sword through a Napoleonic saber to two pairs of dueling pistols and two rapiers. Within moments he was taken into an oak-paneled study, where he was left for no more than five minutes before the door opened and a tall man with receding dark hair came in. He was of striking appearance, although there was too much power in his features for handsomeness, too much flesh.
Pitt guessed him to be in his middle fifties, and extremely prosperous. His clothes were perfectly cut and of fabric which draped as if there could be silk in it. There was a sheen to his cravat as if it, too, were silk.
“Thank you for coming, Superintendent. I am much obliged. Please be comfortable.” He indicated the well- worn dark chairs, and as soon as Pitt was seated, he sank into the opposite one, but did not relax. He remained upright, his hands joined together. He was not openly nervous, but he was apparently deeply worried over something.
Several questions came to Pitt’s mind, but he did not speak them aloud. He would leave Tannifer to say what he wished without prompting.
“I understand that you are investigating this miserable business in Bedford Square?” Tannifer began tentatively.
“Yes,” Pitt agreed. “My sergeant is presently looking into the life of the dead man to see if we can learn what he was doing there. His usual area was Holborn. He sold bootlaces on the corner of Lincoln’s Inn Fields,”
“Yes.” Tannifer nodded. “I read in the newspapers that he was an old soldier. Is that true?”
“It is. Do you know something about him, Mr. Tannifer?”
Tannifer smiled. “No … I’m afraid I know nothing at all.” The smile vanished. “It was only the suggestion in the press regarding poor Balantyne’s possible involvement which made me wish to see you. You are obviously a man of sensitivity and discretion, in whom Cornwallis has the greatest trust, or he would not have assigned you to such a matter.” He was regarding Pitt narrowly, weighing him in his own judgment.
Pitt did not feel any response was required. A denial dictated by modesty would be inappropriate now. Obviously, Tannifer had looked into the subject.
Tannifer pursed his lips.
“Mr. Pitt, I have received a most disturbing letter. One might call it blackmail, except that nothing is asked for, as yet.”
Pitt felt almost winded with shock. It was the last thing he had expected. This affluent banker in front of him had none of the haunted look that Cornwallis had, but perhaps that was because he had not yet realized the full import of what the letter meant. The strain, the fear, the sleepless nights would come.
“When did you receive it, Mr. Tannifer?” he asked.
“Last post yesterday evening,” Tannifer replied quietly. “I informed Cornwallis straightaway. I know him slightly, and I felt I could take the liberty of going to him directly, even to troubling him at his home.” He took a very deep breath and let it out, consciously easing his shoulders. “You see, Mr. Pitt, I am in a very delicate position. My entire ability to follow my career, to be of service to anyone, depends upon trust.” He watched Pitt’s face to see if he understood. A look of doubt flashed across his eyes. Perhaps he was expecting too much.
“May I see the letter?” Pitt asked.
Tannifer bit his lip, moving uncomfortably in his chair, but he did not argue.
“Of course. It is there, on the corner of the desk.” He indicated it with his hand as if he were reluctant even to touch the thing again himself.
Pitt rose and picked the envelope off the polished surface where it was lying. The name and address were cut out of letters from newspapers, but with such painstaking precision, and glued so carefully, that at a glance it seemed to be printed as if by amachine.
The postmark was “Central London,” the previous evening.
He opened it up and read the single sheet he found inside.
Mr. Tannifer,
You have grown rich and respected by exercising your financial skills, all with the money of others. It is based upon their trust in you, in your unquestioned honesty. Would they feel the same if they were to know that once you were far less scrupulous, and prospered your own fortune using funds embezzled from your clients?
Warburton and Pryce, I believe. I do not know the sum, perhaps you no longer even know it yourself. Perhaps you never did. Why count what you will never repay? Have you a sense of the absurd?
You must have, or you would not allow other men to trust you with their money. I would not!
Perhaps one day no one will.
And that was all. The meaning was perfectly plain, as it had been in Cornwallis’s letter. And like his, nothing was asked for, no precise, explicit threat was made; but the ugliness, the malice and the danger were extremely clear.
Pitt looked across at Tannifer, who was watching him almost unblinkingly.
“You see!” Tannifer’s voice was harsh, rising a little as if the veneer were thin. “He doesn’t ask for anything, but the threat is there.” He leaned forward across the desk, pulling his jacket out of shape. “It is completely untrue! I have never stolen a halfpenny in my life. I daresay with sufficient time and a careful enough audit of the bank’s books I could prove it.”
He stared at Pitt, searching his eyes, his face, as if desperate to see some hope or understanding.
“But the very fact that I would, or thought I had to, would make people wonder why,” he went on. “The
