Anne Perry - Traitors Gate

“Oh, I don’t think that is necessary,” Matthew argued, but was still swaying a trifle.

“You would be exceedingly unwise to ignore that advice,” the elderly lady said severely. Now that Pitt and Matthew were both standing, she was considerably beneath their height, and obliged to look up at them, but her assurance was such that it made not the slightest difference. Pitt at least still felt as if he were in the schoolroom.

Matthew must have felt similarly, because he offered no argument, and when Pitt hailed a cab and it drew in, he thanked the lady profusely. They both took their leave and climbed in.

Pitt accompanied Matthew to his rooms and saw that the doctor was sent for, then went into the small sitting room to consider what he had read from the papers in the Foreign Office until the doctor should have been and delivered his opinion. Matthew was happy to relax and lie on his bed.

“A very ugly accident,” the doctor said, some fifty minutes later. “But fortunately I think you have suffered no more than a slight concussion and some unpleasant bruising. Did you report the matter to the police?”

He was standing in Matthew’s bedroom. Matthew was lying on the bed looking pale and still very shocked and Pitt was standing beside the door.

“Mr. Pitt is a policeman,” Matthew explained. “He was beside me when it happened. He was knocked over as well.”

“Were you? You said nothing.” The doctor looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Do you need any attention, sir?”

“No thank you, just a few bruises,” Pitt dismissed it. “But I’m obliged for your concern.”

“Then I presume you will be reporting the matter to your superiors. To drive like that, to injure two men and simply keep on going, is a criminal offense,” the doctor said sternly.

“Since neither of us knows who it was, nor do any of the other people in the street, there is very little that can be done,” Pitt pointed out.

Matthew smiled wanly. “And Superintendent Pitt has no superiors, except the assistant commissioner. Do you, Thomas?”

The doctor looked surprised, and shook his head.

“Pity. People like that should be prosecuted. Like to see the man made to walk everywhere from now on. Still, there are a lot of things I’d like to see, and won’t.” He turned to Matthew. “Take a day or two’s rest, and call on me again if the headache gets any worse, if your vision is affected, or if you are sick.”

“Thank you.”

“Good day, Sir Matthew.”

Pitt conducted him out and returned to Matthew’s room.

“Thank you, Thomas,” Matthew said grimly. “If you hadn’t pushed me I’d have been mangled to bits under those hooves. Do I presume it was the Inner Circle, warning me?”

“Or both of us,” Pitt replied. “Or someone with a great deal of money at stake in Africa. Although I think that’s less likely. Or it may have been simply an accident, and quite impersonal.”

“Do you believe that?”

“No.”

“Neither do I.” Matthew made an attempt to smile. His long face with its hazel eyes was very pale indeed, and he made no effort to hide the fact that he was frightened.

“Leave it for a day or two,” Pitt said quietly. “We can’t accomplish anything by getting hurt or killed ourselves. Stay here. We’ll think what our next move should be. We must make it count. This is not a battle where we can afford blows that do no damage.”

“Not a lot I can do … just yet.” Matthew winced. “But I’m damned well going to think of nothing else.”

Pitt smiled and took his leave. He could do no more now, and Matthew needed to sleep. He left with his mind still whirling and full of dark thoughts and fears.

It was nearly four o’clock when he walked across Downing Street and up the steps of the Colonial Office. He asked to see Linus Chancellor, and was told that if he was prepared to wait, that would be possible.

As it turned out, he waited only half an hour, and then was shown into Chancellor’s office. He was sitting at his desk, his broad brow puckered with interest and anxiety, his eyes keen.

“Afternoon, Pitt,” he said without standing. He waved to the chair near the desk and Pitt took it. “I presume you have come to report your findings so far? Is it too soon to look for a suspect? Yes, I can see by your face that it is. What have you?” His eyes narrowed. “You look awkward, man. Very stiff. Are you hurt?”

Pitt smiled ruefully. In truth he was beginning to hurt very much. He had almost ignored his own injuries in his fear for Matthew. Now they were too sharp to be forgotten.

“I was hit by a coach a few hours ago, but I very much doubt it had anything to do with this.”

Chancellor’s face reflected real concern and a degree of shock. “Good God! You don’t mean there is a possibility that someone deliberately tried to kill you?” Then his face tightened and a bleak, almost venomous look came into his eyes. “Although I don’t know why I should be surprised. If a man will sell out his country, why should he balk at killing someone who looked like exposing him at it? I think my scale of values needs a little adjusting.”

He leaned back in his chair, his face taut with emotion. “Perhaps violence offends our sensibility so profoundly we tend to think of it as worse than the unseen corruption of betrayal, which in some very essence is immeasurably worse. It is murder behind the smiling face, the thrust in the back”-his fist clenched as if he were dealing the blow himself-“when you are turned elsewhere, and then the sudden realization that all trust may be misplaced.

“It is robbery of everything that makes life worthwhile, the belief in good, the love of friends, honor itself. Why would I think he would not indulge in a simple push in a crowd? A man falls off the curb under the wheels of a carriage?” He looked at Pitt with concern on the surface over a passionate anger beneath. “Have you seen a physician? Should you be up and walking around? Are you sure there is no serious injury?”

Pitt smiled in spite of himself. “Yes, I have seen a doctor, thank you.” He was stretching the truth. “I was with a friend who was considerably more hurt than I, and we shall both be well enough in a few days. But I appreciate your concern. I saw Sir Matthew Desmond this morning and he gave me details of the information which reached the Germans. I read it in the Foreign Office and left it there, but I can recall the essence of it, and I would be obliged if you could tell me if there is any common source or link, or at least anyone who would be excluded from possibility because they could not have known.”

“Of course. Relate it to me.” Chancellor leaned back in his seat and folded his hands, waiting.

With concentration Pitt recalled all the information he had gleaned from Matthew’s papers, set it in an orderly fashion, progressing from one category to the next.

When he had finished Chancellor looked at him with puzzlement and renewed anxiety.

“What is it?” Pitt asked.

“Some of that is information I did not know myself,” Chancellor replied slowly. “It doesn’t pass through the Colonial Office.” He let the words fall on silence, and stared at Pitt to see if he grasped the full implication of what he had said.

“Then our traitor has help, witting or unwitting,” Pitt concluded reluctantly. Then a new thought came to him. “Of course that may be his weakness….”

Chancellor saw what he meant instantly. The spark of hope leaped in his eyes and his body tensed. “Indeed it may! It gives you somewhere to start, to search for proofs, communications, perhaps even payments, or blackmail. The possibilities are considerable.”

“Where do I begin?”

“What?” Chancellor was startled.