by Anne Perry
With the difficulty of it almost choking him, he replied, “How much detail would you like, sir? There are regular sources up and down the country who give us information, and we have connections in France, Germany, and Austria with relation to this particular event. We have our own people, and we also have relations with the equivalent to Special Branch that most European countries have, in one form or another.” He watched Tregarron’s face and saw a flash of anxiety. Perhaps it was a sudden realization that Pitt was better informed than he had supposed.
“Most of what we hear is merely observation of people we know altering their habits or movements,” he continued. “People they talk to, places they frequent. Such changes can be indicative of planning …”
“Don’t treat me like some policeman in training, Pitt!” Tregarron snapped. “I have neither the desire to become a detective, nor the time. For God’s sake, man, do your job! You are supposed to be commander of the Branch, not some young constable on the beat!”
Pitt clenched his teeth. “I am giving you my opinion based on the evidence, Lord Tregarron. You asked me for the details. They are a collection of small observations made of changes in habit; of people asking unusual questions; new alliances between people who have no known past in common; people spending money for no obvious reason; unusual patterns of travel; information about known dissidents meeting each other and dealing with new people; evidence of guns or dynamite being moved; people disappearing from their usual haunts and turning up elsewhere. Even, on occasion, people dying unexpectedly in accidents or murdered. Do you want me to continue?”
Tregarron’s face was slightly pink. “I wish you to tell me why you think any of this points to the attempted murder of some wretched minor prince of the Austrian Empire while he is traveling on one of our trains on his way to visit our queen. I can’t understand why it is all so plain to you. You seem to expect me to put this man off without any other reason beyond the uncertainty, perhaps the jitters, of our very new head of Special Branch.”
There was a slight curl of contempt on his lip, which he did not bother to hide.
“It looks to me as if you’ve lost your nerve, man!” he went on. “Promoted beyond your ability. I told Narraway that, at the time. You’re an excellent second-in-command—the best. I’ll give you your due. But you are not born or bred to lead! I’m sorry you pushed me into the position where I am obliged to tell you so to your face.” He did not sound sorry as much as simply angry.
“You may be right, sir,” Pitt said stiffly, struggling to get his breath. “On the other hand, Lord Narraway may be. We had both better hope that his assessment of what abilities are required to lead Special Branch is better than yours.” He rose to his feet. “If not, then we can expect some extremely unpleasant consequences, beginning with an assassination in London, a serious embarrassment for Her Majesty, and possibly an icy relationship with the Austro-Hungarian Empire, with a demand for reparations. Good day, sir.”
Tregarron shot to his feet. “How dare you—” He stopped suddenly.
Pitt stood still, his eyes wide, waiting.
Tregarron took a deep breath. “How dare you imply that I do not take this threat seriously?” He slammed his fist into the bell on his desk. A minute later there was a brief tap on the door, and Jack came in, closing it behind him and stopping just inside the room.
“Yes, sir?” he said unhappily, deliberately avoiding Pitt’s glance.
“Come in,” Tregarron barked.
Jack walked a few steps closer and then stopped again. “Yes, sir?”
Tregarron stared at him. “Pitt seems to believe that Duke Alois Habsburg is the possible target of an assassination attempt, albeit an ignorant, messy, and pointless one. He doesn’t know who the would-be assassin is, nor the purpose of the exercise, only that the outcome would be very ugly indeed.”
“It would be, sir,” Jack agreed, “and it would also give Austria an enormous weapon to use against us for years to come.”
“For God’s sake, I can see that!” Tregarron snapped. “The point is, we can’t jump at every shadow. We have to exercise our critical judgment, not dance around like puppets on strings to the tune of every fear, real or not, likely or not, even possible or not. What is your assessment of this one, Radley? Do you agree with Pitt, on the basis of this host of minor alterations in behavior of informants, spies, and general hangers-on? Or do you think that they are part of the climate at large and that we should hold steady and not lose our nerve?”
Pitt was seething. “I certainly did not recommend losing our nerve, sir,” he said hoarsely.
Tregarron’s glance did not waver from Jack. “You recommended telling Duke Alois not to come,” he retorted. “That is losing our nerve, Pitt. That is telling the emperor Franz Josef, and the rest of the world, that we cannot manage to protect visiting princelings from mass murder in a train wreck, so they had better stay in Vienna, or Budapest, or wherever the devil it is they come from—where they have the ability to keep their trains safe!”
“Where it is not Britain’s responsibility if they are killed or not,” Pitt countered.
Jack’s face went white. He still avoided Pitt’s eyes.
“Then what do we do?” Tregarron demanded. “Do we make him welcome, or do we tell Her Majesty that we cannot protect her great-nephew, or whatever he is, and she had better tell him to stay at home?”
“We would be the laughingstock of Europe, my lord,” Jack replied very quietly. “I think we should give Commander Pitt all the extra men he may need, regardless of the cost and the inconvenience, in order to protect Duke Alois.”
Tregarron looked at him with surprise and some disbelief. “You think this whole thing could be real?”
“No, sir,” Jack answered. “I think it is so unlikely as to be all but impossible, but we cannot afford to ignore it. Commander Pitt has twenty years’ experience with intrigue and murder, and if we ignore his warnings we will be entirely to blame if something should happen. Our position then would be untenable.”
“But bloody unlikely!”
“Yes, my lord, unlikely, but not impossible.”
“I’m obliged for your advice.” Tregarron turned to Pitt, looking at him sourly. “I suppose you have to come to me with what you judge to be some serious threats, but I can’t be second-guessing you at every turn. You’re supposed to make your own judgments. As soon as you get a little more used to your position, I expect you to do so. Good day.”
Pitt was too furious to speak. He inclined his head very slightly, then turned on his heel and strode out.
Jack caught up with him in the corridor a dozen yards beyond Tregarron’s door.
“I’m sorry,” he said in little more than a whisper. “But he does know what he’s talking about, and the evidence is pretty thin.”
“Of course it is,” Pitt said between his teeth. “People don’t leave a trail that leads back to them. If they did, we wouldn’t need police, let alone Special Branch.” He did not slacken his pace, and Jack had to lengthen his own stride to keep up with him.
“Come on, Thomas,” he said reasonably. “You can’t expect a man in Tregarron’s position to accept a story as basically unlikely as this one, unless you have real evidence. He knows Austria, and he gets regular reports from all the people we have there, and a few others as well. He’s damned good at his job.”
Pitt stopped abruptly and swung around to face Jack. “Would you have said that, in those words, if it had been Narraway who’d come to you with suspicions? Or might you have given him the courtesy of assuming that he also was good at his job?”
The color flushed up Jack’s face. “I’m sorry. That was incredibly clumsy of me. I—”
Pitt smiled bleakly. “No, it was regrettably honest. And that is not a quality you can afford to exercise if you hope to rise in the diplomatic corps. One day you may also be damned good at your job, but it isn’t today.” He started to walk again.
“Thomas!” Jack grabbed him
by the arm, hard, forcing him to stop. “Listen. I think you are jumping at shadows, and after the business in St. Malo, and then Ireland and what happened to Narraway, I don’t entirely blame you. But you can’t force Tregarron to go against his own knowledge of the people and the country. If you really believe something is threatened, then I’ll arrange for you to see Evan Blantyre at short notice. I’ll tell him it’s a matter of urgency, even that there could be very unpleasant consequences if we make a bad judgment.” He looked at Pitt expectantly, his eyes wide, his stare direct.
Pitt felt churlish. It hurt that he had to be offered, as if he had never met Blantyre, a meeting that would have been instantly granted to Narraway. Was it his lack of experience, and the fact that Narraway was indisputably a gentleman, while he was not? Or was it that Narraway had amassed a wealth of knowledge about so many people that no one dared defy him? Whatever the case, none of this was Jack’s fault, and Pitt knew he would be a fool to squander the few advantages he had: the strength of family and the bonds of friendship, which Narraway had never possessed.
He forced the resentment out of his mind.
“Thank you,” he accepted. “That’s an excellent suggestion.”
JACK WENT BACK TO Tregarron’s office with sharply conflicting emotions. He was certain he had done the right thing in promising to arrange for Pitt to speak in depth with Evan Blantyre right away, yet at the same time, he believed that Tregarron would not approve it. He was not even sure why. To some extent Pitt was overreacting, but that was better than reacting too little, or too late. Belittling him and making him doubt his own judgment helped no one.
He reached Tregarron’s door again and tapped lightly. On the command to enter, he went back in.
Tregarron was at his desk. Papers on a different subject were spread out in front of him. He looked up at Jack, his expression still slightly angry.
“I’d like you to look through these and give me your opinion, Radley,” he said, pulling the papers together more neatly. “I think Wishart is right, but I’m predisposed to that view anyway. Do you know Lord Wishart? Good chap. Very sound.”
“No, sir, I don’t,” Jack replied, holding out his hand and taking the papers.
“Must introduce you some time.” Tregarron’s smile lit his face, giving it a unique charm. “You’ll like him.”
“Thank you, sir.” Jack was flattered. Many people wanted very much to meet Lord Wishart, and few did. Emily would be delighted. He could picture her face when he told her. Then he had a sudden, uncomfortable feeling that it was a sop, for having been so abrasive toward Pitt. Tregarron was quite aware that Pitt was Jack’s brother-in-law. He wanted to say something further, but he had no clear idea what it would be.
He looked down at the papers Tregarron had given him. They were to do with a proposed British diplomatic mission to Trieste, one of the Italian cities still under Austrian rule. This matter was largely cultural, with some mention of Slovenia. It was complicated, as was every issue that dealt with the Austrian Empire.
He saw an opinion written in Tregarron’s flowing hand and read the first two sentences. Then he went back and reread it, thinking he had made a mistake. It was in direct contradiction to information Tregarron had received only yesterday.
“By this afternoon, Radley,” Tregarron prompted.
Jack looked up. Should he question what he had just read, or would it be seen as exceeding his duty, perhaps even criticizing Tregarron himself? He decided to say nothing. There would be an explanation for it, some additional fact of which he was not yet aware. If he read the whole report, it would explain the apparent anomaly.
“Yes, sir,” he replied, forcing himself to meet Tregarron’s eyes and smile briefly. “Thank you.”
Tregarron nodded and bent his attention to the papers on the desk again.
WORD FROM BLANTYRE CAME more rapidly than Pitt had expected. He had thought their meeting would be arranged the following day, at the earliest, but Blantyre asked for him that same afternoon.
Pitt grasped his coat and, forgetting his hat, went out to catch the next passing hansom. He ran up the steps two at a time, arriving a little breathlessly at Blantyre’s office door. Uncharacteristically for him, he straightened his tie, eased his shoulders to help his jacket lie a little more gracefully, and then raised his hand to knock.
The knock was answered almost immediately. A secretary ushered him in and, without any waiting at all, he found himself in Blantyre’s office. They shook hands, and then Blantyre motioned for him to be seated.
“Sorry for the haste,” Blantyre apologized. “I have another appointment I couldn’t shelve, and tomorrow I have one meeting after another. Tell me as briefly as you can, and still make any sense of it, what you know and what you’ve deduced.”
Pitt had already prepared what he meant to say during the hansom ride. He began without a preamble.
“We followed all the leads you gave us, and we are almost certain of the identities of the men asking questions about the timetables, signals, and points. There are various pieces of further information, observations of new and unlikely alliances formed by people we know as troublemakers and sympathizers with anarchy or violent change. Such evidence as we have indicates that the intended target is Duke Alois Habsburg, as you said.”
Blantyre nodded. “What is the weight of the evidence now, in your judgment?”
“Too serious to ignore,” Pitt said without hesitation. “It may be an extraordinary collection of coincidences, but surely that happens once in a hundred times, or less.”
“From my own experience of Austro-Hungarian affairs, which is considerable, I still think it’s extremely unlikely. But ‘unlikely’ isn’t good enough; we must be sure it’s impossible. I need more details, and I haven’t time to get them now, or to give this appropriate thought.” Blantyre frowned and stood up. “Can you come to dinner at my home this evening? You and your wife would be most welcome. We can allow the ladies to retire to the withdrawing room, and we can talk at length, and you can tell me all the details you are free to discuss, bearing in mind that I also serve the government, and Her Majesty. I know how to keep a secret. Between us we should be able to judge the gravity of the threat, so you may react appropriately.”
Pitt rose to his feet feeling as if a great weight had been taken from him. He had found an ally: perhaps the one man in England able to help him assess the value of his information.
“Thank you, sir,” he said with profound feeling. “We would be delighted.”
Blantyre held out his hand. “No need to be particularly formal, but we’ll make a pleasure of it all the same. Eight o’clock is a trifle early, but we will need the time. This matter may, after all, be very grave.”
Pitt took his leave and walked down the corridor rapidly, smiling. It had been more than a professional success. A man of substance and high office had treated him with the same dignity as he would have treated Narraway. There had been no condescension in his manner. For the first time in a while, Pitt was happy as he went down the stairs and out into the bitter wind knifing along the street.
WHILE PITT WAS SPEAKING with Evan Blantyre, Charlotte had decided that she should telephone Emily, no matter how awkward she felt. Though the quarrel had been primarily Emily’s fault, one of them had to make the first move toward reconciliation, before the rift became too deep. Since Emily apparently was not going to do it, then she must. She was the elder anyway; perhaps it was her responsibility.
When she picked up the receiver to put the call through, she half hoped Emily would be out making calls. Then she could satisfy herself with the virtue of having made the attempt, without actually having to negotiate some kind of peace.
But the footman at the other end brought Emily to the telephone within moments of Charlotte being connected.
“How are you?” Emily asked guardedly.
“Very well, thank you,” Charlotte replied. They could have been strangers speaking to each other. The planned conversati
on disappeared from her head. “And you?” she asked, to fill the silence.
“Excellent,” Emily answered. “We are going to the theater this evening. It is a new play, supposed to be very interesting.”
“I hope you enjoy it. Have you heard from Mama and Joshua lately?” Joshua Fielding, their mother’s second husband, was an actor. It seemed a reasonable thing to ask. At least it stopped the silence from returning.
“Not for a couple of weeks,” Emily replied. “They are in Stratford. Had you forgotten?”
Charlotte had, but she did not wish to admit it. There was a touch of condescension in Emily’s tone. “No,” she lied. “I imagine they have telephones, even there.”
“Not in theatrical boardinghouses,” Emily replied. “I thought you would know that.”
“You have the advantage of me,” Charlotte said instantly. “I have never had occasion to inquire about one.”
“Since your mother frequents them, and you seem to be concerned for her welfare, perhaps you should have,” Emily returned.
“For heaven’s sake, Emily! It was a simple question—something to say.”
“I’ve never known you to be at a loss for something to say.” Emily’s tone was still critical.
“There is a great deal you have never known,” Charlotte snapped. “I was hoping for an agreeable conversation. Clearly that isn’t going to happen.”
“You were hoping I was going to say something to Jack about helping Thomas in his present predicament,” Emily corrected her.
Charlotte heard the defensiveness in Emily’s voice, and hesitated for a moment. Then temper and loyalty to Pitt got the better of her.
“You overestimate my opinion of Jack’s abilities,” she said coldly. “Thomas will get himself out of any difficulties there may be. I am sorry I disturbed you. This is obviously a conversation better held at another time, perhaps some distance in the future when you are less defensive.”
She heard Emily’s voice calling her name sharply, but she had already moved the receiver away from her ear. This was only going to hurt more the longer she continued talking. She replaced the instrument in its cradle and walked away with a tightness in her throat. It would be better to find something useful to do.