“Do you think we can keep him in sight?” Pitt asked.
“Yes, sir.” Gower did not hesitate.
“Right.” The decision was clear in Pitt’s mind. “Stay back then. We’ll split up if we have to.”
The ferry hung back until Wrexham had climbed up the narrow steps and all but disappeared. Then, scrambling to keep up, Pitt and Gower went after him.
They were careful to follow from more of a distance, sometimes together but more often with a sufficient space between them.
Yet Wrexham now seemed to be so absorbed in his own concerns that he never looked behind. He must have assumed he had lost them when he crossed the river. Indeed, they were very lucky that he had not. With the amount of waterborne traffic, he must have failed to realize that one ferry was dogging his path.
At the railway station there were at least a couple of dozen other people at the ticket counter.
“Better get tickets all the way, sir,” Gower urged. “We don’t want to draw attention to ourselves from not paying the fare.”
Pitt gave him a sharp look, but stopped himself from making the remark on the edge of his tongue.
“Sorry,” Gower murmured with a slight smile.
Once on the platform they remained close to a knot of other people waiting. Neither of them spoke, as if they were strangers to each other. The precaution seemed unnecessary. Wrexham barely glanced at either of them, nor at anyone else.
The first train was going north. It drew in and stopped. Most of the waiting passengers got on. Pitt wished he had a newspaper to hide his face and appear to take his attention. He should have thought of it before.
“I think I can hear the train . . .,” Gower said almost under his breath. “It should be to Southampton— eventually. We might have to change . . .” The rest of what he said was cut off by the noise of the engine as the train pulled in, belching steam. The doors flew open and passengers poured out.
Pitt struggled to keep Wrexham in sight. He waited until the last moment in case he should get out again and lose them, and, when he didn’t, he and Gower boarded a carriage behind him.
“He could be going anywhere,” Gower said grimly. His fair face was set in hard lines, his hair poking up where he had run his fingers through it. “One of us better get out at every station to see that he doesn’t get off at the last moment.”
“Of course,” Pitt agreed.
“Do you think West really had something for us?” Gower went on. “He could have been killed for some other reason. A quarrel? Those revolutionaries are pretty volatile. Could have been a betrayal within the group? Even a rivalry for leadership?” He was watching Pitt intently, as if trying to read his mind.
“I know that,” Pitt said quietly. He was by far the senior, and it was his decision to make. Gower would never question him on that. It was little comfort now, in fact rather a lonely thought. He remembered Narraway’s certainty that there was something planned that would make the recent random bombings seem trivial. In February of last year, 1894, a French anarchist had tried to destroy the Royal Observatory at Greenwich with a bomb. Thank heaven he had failed. In June, President Carnot of France had been assassinated. In August, a man named Caserio had been executed for the crime. Everywhere there was anger and uncertainty in the air.
It was a risk to follow Wrexham, but to seize on an empty certainty was a kind of surrender. “We’ll follow him,” Pitt replied. “Do you have enough money for another fare, if we have to separate?”
Gower fished in his pocket, counted what he had. “As long as it isn’t all the way to Scotland, yes, sir. Please God it isn’t Scotland.” He smiled with a twisted kind of misery. “You know in February they had the coldest temperature ever recorded in Britain? Nearly fifty degrees of frost! If the poor bastard let off a bomb to start a fire you could hardly blame him!”
“That was February, this is April already,” Pitt reminded him. “Here, we’re pulling into a station. I’ll watch for Wrexham this time. You take the next.”
“Yes, sir.”
Pitt opened the door and was only just on the ground when he saw Wrexham getting out and hurrying across the platform to change trains for Southampton. Pitt turned to signal Gower and found him already out and at his elbow. Together they followed, trying not to be conspicuous by hurrying. They found seats, but separately for a while, to make sure Wrexham didn’t double back and elude them, disappearing into London again.
But Wrexham seemed to be oblivious, as if he no longer even considered the possibility of being followed. He appeared completely carefree, and Pitt had to remind himself that Wrexham had followed a man in the East End only hours ago, then quite deliberately cut his throat and watched him bleed to death on the stones of a deserted brickyard.
“God, he’s a cold-blooded bastard!” he said with sudden fury.
A man in pin-striped trousers on the seat opposite put down his newspaper and stared at Pitt with distaste, then rattled his paper loudly and resumed reading.
Gower smiled. “Quite,” he said quietly. “We had best be extremely careful.”
One or the other of them got out briefly at every stop, just to make certain Wrexham did not leave this train, but he stayed until they finally pulled in at Southampton.
Gower looked at Pitt, puzzled. “What can he do in Southampton?” he said. They hurried along the platform to keep pace with Wrexham, then past the ticket collector and out into the street.
The answer was not long in coming. Wrexham took an omnibus directly toward the docks, and Pitt and Gower had to race to jump onto the step just as it pulled away. Pitt almost bumped into Wrexham, who was still standing. Deliberately he looked away from Gower. They must be more careful. Neither of them was particularly noticeable alone. Gower was fairly tall, lean, his hair long and fair, but his features were a trifle bony, stronger than average. An observant person would remember him. Pitt was taller, perhaps less than graceful, and yet he moved easily, comfortable with himself. His hair was dark and permanently untidy. One front tooth was a little chipped, but visible
