Treachery at Lancaster Gate Read Online Free PDF

something on you?”
    “Turn them in, right? Who to?” Jimmy asked with disgust. “Yer lost the wits yer was born with, Mr. Pitt. They’re bent all the way up, or as high up as I’m likely to get.”
    Pitt felt his chest tighten and the smell of beer was suddenly sour.
    “Revenge bombing?” he said with disbelief.
    Jimmy’s voice was heavy with disapproval. “Course not. In’t you listenin’ at all? I dunno what it’s for. But nobody’s weepin’ a lot o’ tears over a few coppers getting blown up. Not like they would if it was butchers or bakers or ’ansom cab drivers. Nobody’s going ter take risks ter find out for yer.”
    Pitt frowned. “Doesn’t make a lot of sense, Jimmy. You give information about a sale of opium to the police, someone will go, but you can’t know in advance who it will be. Revenge is personal. If you kill the wrong ones, then the right ones will come after you. You’ve tipped your hand.”
    Jimmy shrugged. “Think wot yer like, Mr. Pitt. Some o’ them coppers is as bent as a dog’s ’ind leg. I’m tellin’ yer.”
    “You’ll have to do more than tell me, you’ll have to prove it.”
    “I’m stayin’ out of it!” Jimmy said fervently, and lifted up his beer, avoiding Pitt’s eyes.
    Pitt shook his head, paid the bill, and went outside into the rain.
    He arrived back at Lisson Grove a couple of fruitless hours later. He was followed within fifteen minutes by Stoker, who looked as cold and fed up as Pitt felt, his face bleached with tiredness.
    “Nothing?” Pitt guessed as Stoker closed the door.
    “Nothing I like,” Stoker replied, walking across the short space to the chair opposite Pitt’s desk and sitting down in it. “We have a reasonable chance of tracing the dynamite, but it might take time, so that if he comes from the Continent he could well be back there by then. But he could be within a day anyhow.”
    “Anything to suggest it’s a foreign anarchist, though?”
    “No. To be honest, sir, it sort of smells more like a homegrown one with a grudge.” Stoker watched Pitt’s expression carefully as he said the words, waiting for his reaction.
    “Then you’d better start looking more closely at those anarchists we know,” Pitt conceded. “Something’s changed, and we’ve missed it. Any ideas?”
    Stoker drew in a deep breath, and let it out. “No, sir. Frankly, I haven’t. We’ve got men in all the cells we know about, and they’ve heard nothing beyond the usual complaining about pay, conditions, the vote, the trains, just the usual. Everybody hates the government, and thinks they could do it better themselves. Most of them hate people who’ve got more money than they have, until they get more money. Then they hate the taxes.”
    “Something different—anything,” Pitt said quietly. “Any change or shift in pattern, someone new, someone old leaving…”
    Stoker looked exhausted. There were deep lines in his bony face.
    “I’m looking, sir. I’ve got every man hunting, but if they ask too many questions they’ll be under suspicion, sir. Then we’ll get nothing, except maybe some more good men killed.”
    “I know. And make damn sure you’re not one of them!”
    Stoker smiled a little uncomfortably. He knew what Pitt was referring to. Almost two years ago, on an earlier case, he had met a woman named Kitty Ryder. In searching for her he had become fascinated, and when he had at last met her he had fallen in love. Now he had plucked up the courage to ask her to marry him, and the wedding was set. She knew what he did to earn his living, and that the dangers were considerable. She understood and did not complain. Nevertheless, Pitt was determined that Stoker would go to his wedding alive and well, and on time.
    “No, sir,” Stoker agreed. “I know better than to rush it.”
    —
    P ITT CAME HOME LATE and had barely finished his evening meal when the doorbell rang. Charlotte answered it; when she returned to the kitchen, she was not