Treachery at Lancaster Gate by Anne Perry Page B

see what he hoped to see, and be blind to something uglier. I don’t know if he would necessarily report a man’s error, if he believed it to be genuine. Trust goes both ways. If you take advantage of a man’s error, he’ll take advantage of yours, and we can none of us afford that.”
    “Naïve? Is that what you’d call him?” Cotton smiled, showing his teeth. “A loyalty that inclines him to look the other way? An idealist who doesn’t see his men’s weaknesses? Dangerous, don’t you think? Do you operate like that, Pitt? Special Branch Commander Pitt? Is that who has our country’s safety in his hands? A man who puts protecting his men from their faults before catching the bombers who would sink our country under a tide of violence and chaos?”
    Cotton had taken a step too far, and he knew it the instant he saw the change in Pitt’s face.
    “My junior officers make mistakes,” Pitt answered. “If they don’t learn not to, they stay junior. What about yours? You say Ednam was a loyal bully. What about Yarcombe, Bossiney? The others?”
    “I don’t tell tales on dead men.” Cotton shuffled his chair forward again and looked at Pitt directly across the desk. He was not used to being questioned, even though Pitt outranked him.
    “Never investigated a murder then, have you?” Pitt responded.
    “Is that what this is? Two murders?” Cotton asked.
    “Isn’t it? And three attempted?”
    “Looks like it. All right, I’ll give you all I know on those five men. And you’d better bloody well bring me back someone to answer for them!”
    Pitt stood up. “Thank you.” He knew that in a sense he had accepted a challenge.
    —
    H E MET T ELLMAN AGAIN the day after to hear what more he had learned. He summarized the reports that Cotton had given him, the good and the bad.
    Tellman’s face grew tighter and a flush mounted up his thin cheeks.
    “He said that about his own men?” he asked when Pitt had finished. The disgust in his voice was palpable.
    Pitt understood at least in part. He knew the weaknesses of his own men. He was of little use to them if he did not. He knew their skills and their inabilities. He also had a strong feeling for the directions in which their fears lay, and what most stretched their courage, where their blind spots were, and who worked well with whom. He knew some of their temptations. But he would never have spoken of these faults to anyone else.
    “I pressed him,” he said as some excuse for Cotton. “We have to know exactly who was crooked, and to what extent.”
    “I do know!” Tellman said instantly. He was speaking out of bravado, and Pitt was quite aware of it. In fact, this was predictable from Tellman.
    “No you don’t,” he contradicted. “At least I hope to God you don’t! If you knew that of them and did nothing, then you’re part of it.” Even as he said it, he knew that Tellman’s reaction would be instant defense.
    Tellman’s body was rigid, his face white but for the spots of color burning in his cheeks. “I’m damn well not part of it!” he shouted. “I’ve never taken a thing that wasn’t mine. I’ve never arrested anyone with more violence than was necessary, and I’ve certainly never hit a man that was down, or cuffed. And if you don’t know that, then you’re a fool! And you shouldn’t be in charge of a newspaper stand, never mind a body of men that risk their lives to carry out your orders. You’re a fool…and a bitter, damaged man!” The words came out rasping, as if their passage through his throat hurt him.
    Pitt swallowed hard. He was taken aback by Tellman’s rage, although perhaps he should have expected it.
    “I know my men, and I trust them,” he replied as levelly as he could, but he heard his own emotion roughen his tone. “They know that. They know I also know their weaknesses, as I daresay they know mine. The difference is that it’s my responsibility not to put them in the path of the things they can’t handle. I