afterwards. He loved her for it. He would lose something of infinite value if she were different, more guarded, more sensible. But it was still a liability.
There were papers piled on the desk in front of him, reports waiting to be made sense of, but still his mind was on Charlotte.
Where was she? How could he find out without placing her in further danger? Who was he absolutely certain he could trust? A week ago, he would have sent Gower. Unwittingly he would have been giving them the perfect hostage.
Should he contact the Dublin police? That would hardly be helpful if Narraway were under suspicion of embezzlement.
Perhaps anonymity was Charlotte’s best defence, but his own helplessness was almost like a physical pain. He knew nothing, he had all the forces of Special Branch at his fingertips, and no idea whom he could trust.
There was a knock on his door. The moment he answered it Austwick came in, looking grave and slightly smug. He had more papers in his hand.
Pitt was glad to be forced back into the present. ‘What have you?’ he asked.
Austwick sat down without being asked. Pitt knew he would not have done that with Narraway.
‘More reports from Manchester,’ Austwick replied. ‘It does begin to look as if Latimer is right about this factory in Hyde. They are making guns, in spite of their denials. And then there’s the mess-up in Glasgow. We need to pay more attention to that, before it gets any bigger.’
‘Last report said it was just young people protesting,’ Pitt reminded him. ‘Narraway had it marked as better left alone.’
Austwick pulled his face into a grimace of distaste. ‘Well, I think Narraway’s mind was hardly on the country’s interests over the last while. Unfortunately we don’t know how long his. . inattention had been going on. Read it yourself and see what you think. I’ve been handling it since Narraway went, and I think he may have made a serious misjudgement. And we can’t afford to ignore Scotland either.’
Pitt swallowed his response. He did not trust Austwick, but he must not allow him see that. All this felt like wasting time, of which he had far too little.
‘What about the other reports from Europe on the socialists?’ he asked. ‘Anything from Germany? And what about the Russian
‘Nothing significant,’ Austwick replied. ‘And nothing at all from Gower.’ He looked at Pitt steadily, concern in his eyes.
Pitt kept his expression perfectly composed. ‘He won’t risk communication unless he has something of value to report. It all has to go through the local post office.’
Austwick shook his head. ‘I think it’s of secondary importance, honestly. West may have been killed simply because they discovered he was an informant. It would have been revenge rather than anything important he was going to tell you.’
He shifted his position a little and looked straight at Pitt. ‘There have been rumblings about great reform for years, you know. People strike postures and make speeches, but nothing serious happens, at least not here in Britain. I think our biggest danger was three or four years ago. There was plenty of unrest in the East End of London, which I know you are aware of, though a lot of it was just before you joined the Branch.’
That was a reminder of how recent Pitt was to this job. He saw the flicker of resentment in Austwick’s eyes as he said it. He wondered for a moment if the unease he was aware of was personal ambition thwarted rather than anything to do with political unrest. Then he remembered Gower bending over West’s body on the ground, and the blood. Either Austwick had nothing to do with it, or he was better at masking his emotions than Pitt had judged. He must be careful.
‘Perhaps we’ll escape it,’ he said aloud.
Austwick shifted in his chair again, as if finding it difficult to be comfortable. ‘These are the reports in from Liverpool, and you’ll see some of the references to Ireland. Nothing dangerous as yet, but we need to make note of some of these names, and watch them.’ He pushed across more papers and Pitt bent to read them.
The afternoon followed the same pattern: more reports, both written and verbal. A case of violence in a town in Yorkshire looked as if it were political and turned out not to be. A government minister had been robbed in Piccadilly, and investigating it took up the rest of the day. The minister had been carrying sensitive papers. Fortunately it was not Pitt’s decision as to how seriously he should be reprimanded for carelessness. It was, however, up to him to decide with what crime the thief should be charged.
He weighed it with some consideration. He questioned the man, trying to judge whether he had known his victim was in the government, and if so that his attache case might contain government papers. He was uncertain, even after several hours, but Narraway would not have asked advice. If he could not deal with such an event without help, then he was far from equal to the position.
Pitt decided that the disadvantages of letting the public know how easy it was to rob an inattentive minister outweighed the possible error of letting a man be charged with a lesser crime than the one he had intended to commit.
He went home in the evening tired and with little sense of achievement.
It changed the moment he opened the front door and Daniel came racing down the hall to greet him.
‘Papa! Papa, I made a boat! Come and look.’ He grasped Pitt’s hand and tugged at him.
Pitt smiled and followed him willingly down to the kitchen where the rich smell of dinner cooking filled the air. Something was bubbling in a big pan on the stove and the table was littered with pieces of newspapers and a bowl of white paste. Minnie Maude was standing with a pair of scissors in her hands. As usual, her hair was all over the place, pinned up over and over again as she had lost patience with it. In pride of place in the centre of the mess was a rather large papier-mache boat, with two sticks for masts and several different lengths of tapers for bowsprit, yardarms and a boom.
Minnie Maude looked abashed to see him, clearly earlier than she had expected.
‘See!’ Daniel said triumphantly, pointing to the ship. ‘Minnie Maude showed me how to do it.’ He gave a little shrug. ‘And Jemima helped a bit. . well. . a lot.’
Pitt felt a sudden and overwhelming warmth rush up inside him. He looked at Daniel’s face shining with pride, and then at the boat.
‘It’s magnificent,’ he said, emotion all but choking his voice. ‘I’ve never seen anything better.’ He turned to Minnie Maude, who was standing wide-eyed. She was clearly waiting to be criticised for playing when she should have been working towards having dinner on the table for him.
‘Thank you,’ he said to her sincerely. ‘Please don’t move it until it is safe to do so without risk of damage.’
‘What. . what about dinner, sir?’ she asked, beginning to breathe again.
‘We’ll clear the newspapers and the paste, and eat around it,’ he answered. ‘Where’s Jemima?’
‘She’s reading,’ Daniel answered instantly. ‘She took my
‘’Cos they’re boring,’ Jemima answered from the doorway. She had slipped in without anyone hearing her come along the corridor. She looked past Pitt at the table, and the ship at the centre. ‘You’ve got the masts on! That’s beautiful.’ She gave Pitt a radiant smile. ‘Hello, Papa. Look what we made.’
‘I see it,’ he replied, putting his arm around her shoulder. ‘It’s magnificent.’
‘How is Mama?’ she asked, an edge of worry in her voice.
‘Well,’ he answered, lying smoothly and holding her a little closer, ‘she’s helping a friend in bad trouble, but she’ll be home soon. Now let’s help clear the table and have dinner.’
Afterwards he sat alone in the parlour, as the silence settled over the house. Daniel and Jemima had gone up to bed. Minnie Maude had finished in the kitchen and went up as well. He heard every creak of her tread on the stairs. Far from being comforting, the absence of all voices or movement made the heaviness swirl back in again like a fog. The islands of light from the lamps on the wall created deeper shadows. He knew every surface in the room. He also knew they were all immaculately clean, as if Charlotte had been there to supervise this new girl whose only fault was that she was not Gracie. But she was good; it was only the familiarity she lacked. The papier-mache ship made him smile. It wasn’t a trivial thing, it was very important indeed. Minnie Maude Mudway was a success.
He sat in the armchair, thinking of Jemima and her pride, Daniel’s happiness, for as long as he could. Finally
