Long Spoon Lane by Anne Perry Page A

had known it already, but here in this quiet room it seemed more real. He had been careful to go to Tellman’s rooms to see him, and at dusk when the streets were busy and half-lit. There was no one else he could trust, especially at Bow Street. War does not allow you to spare your friends and send only strangers into battle.
    “I know that,” he said aloud. “And so does he.”
    “Then get on with it,” Narraway said quietly. “I want to know who was behind this bombing. Was Landsborough the leader? Where did the money come from for the bombs? And above all, now that Landsborough’s dead, who’s the new leader? By the way, who did kill Landsborough?”
    “I don’t know,” Pitt replied. “Carmody and Welling behave as if they believe it was one of us, which suggests it was someone they don’t know. A rival anarchist? One of Simbister’s men?”
    “Which means one of Wetron’s?” Narraway said almost under his breath. “Find out, Pitt. I want to know.”
     

     
    Pitt spent the rest of the day in the bombed-out ruins of Myrdle Street. He made several more inquiries about Grover, but no one was willing to say much about him beyond verifying that he had lived in the center house, and of course was now homeless, as were they all. Yes, he was a policeman. Their faces had closed expressions, defensive, and he thought also that there was fear. No one spoke ill of him, but there was a coldness in their eyes, without sympathy. It tended to confirm rather than disprove what Carmody had said.
    Deep in thought, walking along the Thames Embankment, he was pleasantly half-aware of the steamboats on the river, which were crowded with people enjoying themselves, wearing hats with streamers and waving to the shore. There was a band playing somewhere just beyond the curve where he could not see them. Street peddlers were selling lemonade, ham sandwiches, and various kinds of sweets. It was all exactly as London should be late on a summer afternoon. The breeze carried the smell of salt with the incoming tide, the sounds of laughter, music, horses’ hooves on the cobbles, and the faint, background surge of water.
    “Good evening, Pitt. All looks very normal, doesn’t it.”
    Pitt stopped abruptly. He knew the voice even before he turned. Charles Voisey, knighted by the Queen for his extraordinary personal courage in killing Mario Corena and saving the throne of England from one of Europe’s most passionate and radical republicans. Now he was a member of Parliament as well.
    What Her Majesty did not and would never know was that Voisey had then been the head of the Inner Circle, on the point of achieving his ambition to overthrow the monarchy and become the first president of a republican Britain.
    However, it was Mario Corena who had precipitated that act intentionally, forcing Voisey into killing him in order to save his own life. It had offered Pitt the chance to make Voisey seem the savior of the throne, and thus the betrayer of his own followers. For that Voisey would never forgive him, even though he had crossed sides brilliantly, almost without hesitation, using his newfound status as royal favorite to stand for Parliament, and win. Power was the prize. Only the Inner Circle had ever known his republican goal. To everyone else he was a brave, resourceful, and loyal man.
    Now Pitt looked at him standing on the footpath, smiling. He remembered his face vividly, as if he had seen him only minutes ago. He was distinguished but far from handsome. His pasty skin splashed with freckles, his long nose a trifle crooked. But as always, his eyes shone with brilliant intelligence, and he also seemed mildly amused.
    “Good evening, Sir Charles,” Pitt replied, surprised to find his breath catching in his throat. This meeting could not be by chance.
    “You are not an easy man to find,” Voisey continued, and as Pitt started to move again, he fell into step beside him, the breeze in their faces. “I imagine the bombing in