Pitt searched his face, trying to read the man’s feelings behind the repeating of simple and terrible facts. He saw nothing he was sure of. Did Narraway deal in death so often, in other people’s grief, that it no longer marked him? Or could he not afford to feel, in case it swayed judgments that had to be made in the interest of all, not simply those for whom he cared? The closest look at Narraway’s clever, line-seamed face told him nothing. There was passion there, but was it of the heart or only the mind?
“How did he die?” Pitt asked aloud.
Narraway raised his eyebrows in surprise that Pitt should want to know. “He was one of the three who was killed during the reconnaissance at White Mfolozi. They ran straight into a rather well-laid Zulu ambush.”
“Yes, I saw that in the records. But why is Kingsley pursuing it through a woman like Maude Lamont?” Pitt asked. “And why now? Mfolozi was thirteen years ago!”
Anger flashed in Narraway’s eyes, then pain. “If you had lost anyone, Pitt, you would know that the hurt doesn’t go away. People learn to live with it, to hide it, most of the time; but you never know what is going to wake it again, and suddenly, for a space, it is out of control.” His voice was very quiet. “I’ve seen it many times. Who knows what it was? The sight of a young man whose face reminded him of his son? Another man who has the grandchildren he doesn’t? An old tune. . anything. The dead don’t go away, they just fall silent for a while.”
Pitt was aware of something intensely personal in the room. These words were not practical, they were from the passion of the moment. But the shadow in the eyes, the set of Narraway’s lips, forbade the intrusion of any words that touched them.
Pitt affected not to have noticed.
“Is there any connection between Kingsley and Charles Voisey?” he asked.
Narraway’s dark eyes widened suddenly. “For God’s sake, Pitt, don’t you think I’d tell you that if I knew?”
“You might prefer me to find it for myself. .”
Narraway jerked forward, the muscles of his body locked. “We haven’t time for games!” he said between his teeth. “I can’t afford to give a damn what you think of me! If Charles Voisey gets into Parliament there’ll be no stopping him until he has the power to corrupt the highest office in the land. He’s still head of the Inner Circle.” A shadow crossed his face. “At least I think he is. There is another power there. I don’t know who it is. . yet.”
He held up his hand, finger and thumb an inch apart. “He came that close to losing it! We did that, Pitt! And he won’t forget it. But we didn’t finish him. He will have a new Number Two, and Three, and I haven’t the faintest idea who they are. It is a disease eating at the bowels of the true government of the land, whichever party sits in Westminster. We can’t deal without power-and we can’t deal with it! It’s a balancing act. If we stay one step ahead, keep changing often enough, weed out the infection of madness as soon as we recognize it, the delusion that you can do anything and get away with it, that you’re infallible, untouchable, then we win-until next time. Then we start all over again, with new players and a new game.”
He threw himself back in the chair suddenly. “Find the connection between Kingsley and Charles Voisey yourself, whether it has to do with that woman’s death or not. And be careful, Pitt! You were a detective before for Cornwallis, a watcher, a judge. For me you’re a player. You too will win-or lose. Don’t forget that.”
“And you?” Pitt asked a little huskily.
Narraway flashed him a sudden smile that lit his face, but his eyes were hard as coal. “Oh, I intend to win!” He did not say he would die before letting loose his hold, like an animal whose jaws do not unlock even in death. He did not need to.
Pitt rose to his feet, muttered a few words of acknowledgment, and went outside, his mind whirling with unanswered questions, not about Kingsley or Charles Voisey, but about Narraway himself.
He returned home briefly, and on the footpath at the end of Keppel Street heard a voice addressing him.
“Afternoon, Mr. Pitt!”
He turned around, startled. It was the postman again, smiling, holding out a letter for him.
“Good afternoon,” he replied hastily, a sudden excitement inside him, hope surging that it was from Charlotte.
“From Mrs. Pitt, is it?” the postman asked cheerfully. “Somewhere nice, is she?”
Pitt looked down at the letter in his hand. The writing was so like Charlotte’s, and yet it was not, and the postmark was London. “No,” he said, unable to keep the disappointment out of his voice.
“She’s only been gone a day or two,” the postman comforted him. “Takes a while from farther off. You tell me where she’s gone, I’ll tell you ’ow long it’ll take for ’er letter ter get ’ome.”
Pitt drew in his breath to say “Dartmoor,” and then looked at the man’s smiling face, and sharp eyes, and felt the coldness well up inside him. He forced himself to remain calm, and it took such an effort that it was a moment before he could reply.
The postman waited.
“Thank you,” Pitt said then answered with the first place that came to his mind: “Whitby.”
“Yorkshire?” The man looked extraordinarily pleased with himself. “Oh, that shouldn’t be more than two days at the most this time of year, maybe only one. You’ll ’ear soon, sir. Maybe they’re ’aving too much fun ter get down ter writing. Good day, sir.”
“Good day.” Pitt swallowed, and found his hands shaking as he tore open the letter. It was from Emily, dated the previous afternoon.
Dear Thomas,
Rose Serracold is a friend of mine, and after visiting her yesterday I feel that I know certain things which may be of some meaning to you.
Please call upon me when you have the opportunity.
Emily
He folded it up and slipped it back into the envelope. It was the middle of the afternoon, a time when she would normally be out visiting, or receiving calls, but there would be no better opportunity, and perhaps what she had to say would help. He could not afford to decline any chance at all.
He turned around and walked back towards Tottenham Court Road again. Half an hour later he was in Emily’s sitting room and she was telling him, with awkward phrases and some self-consciousness, of her quarrel with Rose Serracold. She spoke of her growing conviction that Rose was so deeply afraid of something that she was impelled to visit Maude Lamont in spite of the danger of ridicule, and that she had, if not deceived him, at least omitted to tell Aubrey anything about it.
Emily’s warning had produced anger in her to the point of endangering their friendship.
When she finished she stared at him, her eyes filled with guilt.
“Thank you,” he said quietly.
“Thomas. .” she began.
“No,” he answered before she could ask any further. “I don’t know whether she killed her or not, but I cannot look the other way, no matter who gets hurt. All I can promise is that I will cause no more pain than I have to, and I hope you knew that already.”
“Yes.” She nodded, her body stiff, her face pale. “Of course I did.” She took a breath as if to say something more, then changed her mind and offered him tea, which he did not accept. He would have liked to accept-he was tired and thirsty, hungry also if he thought about it-but there was too much emotion between them, too much knowledge for it to be comfortable. He thanked her again and took his leave.
That evening Pitt telephoned Jack’s political offices to find out where he was going to speak, and on being informed of the place, he set out to join him, first to listen, feel the political temper of the crowd, then maybe to judge from it more accurately what Aubrey Serracold faced.
And he admitted he was also increasingly concerned for Jack himself. It was going to be a far closer election than last time. Many Liberals could lose their seats.
He arrived as some two or three hundred people were gathering, mostly men from the nearby factories, but also a good number of women, dressed in drab skirts and blouses grained with the sweat and dirt of hard work. Some were even as young as fourteen or fifteen, others with skins so tired and gaunt, bodies so shapeless, that it was hard to tell how old they were. They might have been the sixty that they looked, but Pitt knew very well it was more likely they were still under forty, just exhausted and poorly fed. Many of them would have borne too many children, and the best would have been given to them, and to the men.
