She kept close beside Tellman as they turned north out of the High Street. He had said they were going to Brick Lane, because Pitt would pass that way on his journey to the silk factory where he worked. This was Whitechapel. She thought about what the name meant literally, and how ludicrous a name it was for this grimy, industrial area with its narrow streets; dust; gray, broken windows; dogleg alleys; chimneys belching smoke; smells of drains and middens. Its history of horror lay so close beneath the surface it was sharp and painful in the heart.
Tellman was walking quickly, not to seem out of place among the men hurrying to the sugar factories, warehouses and yards. She had to trot to keep up with him, but perhaps here that was appropriate. Women did not walk beside their men at this time of day, as if they were courting couples.
There was a burst of raucous laughter. Someone smashed a bottle, and the thin tinkle of glass was startlingly unpleasant. She thought not of the loss of something useful, as she would at home, but of the weapon the jagged ends would make.
They were in Brick Lane now.
Tellman stopped. She wondered why. Then, with a lurch of her heart she saw Pitt. He was on the other side of the road, walking steadily, but unlike the other men, looking from side to side, listening, seeing. He was dressed shabbily; his coat was torn at the back, sitting crookedly as usual. And instead of his beautiful boots that Emily had given him, he had old ones with the left sole loose and string for laces. His hat was dented at the side of the brim. It was only by the familiarity of his walk that she recognized him before he turned and saw her.
He hesitated. He would not expect to see her here-he probably had not even been thinking of her-but perhaps something about the way she stood attracted him.
She started forward, and Tellman caught her arm. For an instant she resented it and would have torn herself loose, then she realized that running across the street would draw attention to her, and so to Pitt, and she allowed herself to be held back. People around here knew Pitt. They would ask who she was. How could he answer? It would start gossip, questions.
She stood with one foot on the curb, her face hot with embarrassment.
Her brief movement had been enough. Pitt had recognized her. He sauntered across the street, dodging between the carts, behind a dray and in front of a costermonger’s barrow. He reached them and after the merest nod to her, he spoke as if to Tellman.
“What are you doing here?” he said softly, his voice jagged with emotion. “What’s happened?”
She stared at him, memorizing every line of him. He looked tired. His face was freshly shaved but there was a grayness to his skin, and a hollowness around his eyes. She felt her chest tight with the ache to comfort him, to take him home to his own house, to warmth and a clean kitchen, the smells of linen and scrubbed wood, the quietness of the garden with its scent of damp earth and cut grass, doors that closed out the world for a few hours-above all, to hold him in her arms.
But far more urgent than that was the need to show people that he had been right, to prove it so they would have to acknowledge it, to heal the old wound of his father’s shame. She was angry, hurt, helpless, and she did not know what to say or how to explain herself to make him understand, so he would be as pleased to see her as she was just to be close to him, see his face and hear his voice.
“A lot’s happened,” Tellman was saying quietly. He only called Pitt “sir” if he was being insolent, so he had no need to guard his tongue for unintentional betrayal now. “I don’t know it all, so it would be better for Mrs. Pitt to tell you. But it’s things you have to know.”
Pitt caught the edge of fear in Tellman’s voice, and his anger evaporated. He looked at Charlotte.
She wanted to ask how he was, if he was all right, what his lodgings were like, if they were kind to him, was his bed clean, had he enough pillows, how was the food, was it enough. Most of all, she wanted him to know she loved him and missing him was more painful, more deeply lonely than she could have imagined, in every way: for laughter, for conversation, for sharing the good and bad of the day, for touching, just for knowing he was there.
Instead she began with what she had been rehearsing in her mind, and probably Tellman could have told him just as well. She was very succinct, very practical.
“I’ve been visiting Martin Fetters’s widow…” She ignored the startled look on Pitt’s face and went on quickly before he could interrupt. “I wanted to find out why he was killed. There has to be a reason…” She stopped again as a group of factory women went past them, talking together loudly, looking at Pitt, Tellman and Charlotte with undisguised curiosity.
Tellman shifted his weight uncomfortably.
Pitt moved a step away from Charlotte, leaving her seeming to belong to Tellman.
One of the women laughed and they moved on.
A vegetable cart rumbled down the street.
They could not stand here talking for long, or it would be remembered, and endanger Pitt.
“I read most of his papers,” she said briefly. “He was a passionate republican, even prepared to help cause revolution. I believe that was why Adinett killed him, when he discovered what Fetters meant to do. I imagine he didn’t dare trust the police. No one might have believed him-or worse, they might have been part of it.”
Pitt was stunned. “Fetters was…” He took a long, deep breath as the meaning became clear of all she had said. “I see.” He stood silently for long moments, staring at her. His eyes moved down her face as if he would recall every detail of it, touch her mind beyond.
Then he recalled himself to the present, the crowded street, the gray footpath and the urgency of the moment.
Charlotte found herself blushing, but it was a sweet warmth that ran through the core of her.
“If that is so, we have two conspiracies,” he said at last. “One of the Whitechapel murderer to protect the throne at any cost at all, and another of the republicans to destroy it, also at any cost, perhaps an even more dreadful one. And we are not sure who is on which side.”
“I told Aunt Vespasia. She asked to be remembered to you.” She thought as she said it how inadequate those words were to convey the power of the emotions she had felt from Vespasia. But as she looked at Pitt’s face she saw that he understood, and she relaxed again, smiling at him.
“What did she say?” he asked.
“To be careful,” she replied ruefully. “There’s nothing I can do anyway, except keep on looking to see if we can find the rest of Martin Fetters’s papers. Juno is certain there are more.”
“Don’t ask anyone else!” Pitt said sharply. He looked at Tellman, then realized the pointlessness of expecting him to prevent her. Tellman was helpless, frustrated, and it was plain in his expression, a mixture of hurt, fear and anger.
“I won’t!” she promised. It was said on the spur of feeling, to stop the anxiety she could see consuming him. “I won’t speak to anyone else. I’ll just visit with her and keep on looking inside the house.”
He breathed out slowly.
“I must go.”
She stood still, aching to touch him, but the street was full of people. Already they were being stared at. In spite of all sense she took a step forward.
Pitt put out his hand.
A workman on a bicycle whistled and shouted something unintelligible at Tellman, but it was obviously bawdy. He laughed and pedaled on.
Tellman took Charlotte by the arm and pulled her back. His fingers hurt.
Pitt let out a sigh. “Please be careful,” he repeated. “And tell Daniel and Jemima I love them.”
She nodded. “They know.”
He hesitated only a moment, then turned and crossed the street again, away from them, not looking back.
Charlotte watched him go, and again heard laughter from a couple of youths on the farther corner.
“Come on!” Tellman said furiously. This time he took her wrist and yanked her around, almost off balance. She was about to say something very curt indeed when she realized how conspicuous she was making them. She had to behave as people expected or it would look even worse.
“I’m sorry,” she said, and followed him dutifully back down towards the Whitechapel High Street. But her steps were lighter and there was a singing warmth inside her. Pitt had not touched her, nor she him, but the look in his eyes had been a caress in itself, a touch that would never fade.
