The Whitechapel Conspiracy

chapter SIX
Charlotte opened the morning newspaper more out of loneliness than any real interest in the political events which filled it as the various parties prepared for the coming election. They were very hard on Mr. Gladstone, berating him for ignoring all issues except Irish Home Rule and apparently abandoning any effort towards achieving the eight-hour working day. But she did not expect the newspapers to be fair.

There was tragic news of a railway crash at Guisley, in the north. Two people had been killed and several injured. Doctors were on their way.

The New Oriental Bank Corporation had been compelled to withdraw funds and suspend certain payments. The price of silver was seriously down. They had sustained losses in Melbourne and Singapore. The liquidation of the Gatling Gun Company had affected them badly. A hurricane in Mauritius was the crowning blow.

She did not read the rest of it. Her eye moved down the page, and in spite of herself was caught by the dark type announcing that John Adinett was to be executed at eight o'clock that morning.

Instinctively she glanced at the kitchen clock. It was a quarter to eight. She wished she had not opened the paper until later, even half an hour would have been enough. Why had she not thought of that, counted the days and been careful not to look?

Adinett had killed Martin Fetters, and the more Charlotte learned about Fetters the more she believed she would have liked him. He had been an enthusiast, a man who grasped at life with courage and enjoyment, who loved its color and variety. He had a passion to learn about others, and it seemed from his writings that he was equally eager to share what he knew so that anyone else could see the same enchantment he did. His death was a loss not only to his wife-and to archaeology and to curators of ancient artefacts-but to anyone who knew him and to the world in general.

Still, ending the life of Adinett did not improve anything. She doubted it would even deter anyone else from future crime. It was the certainty of punishment which stopped people from killing, not the severity. Each one presumed he or she would get away with it, so the penalty was irrelevant.

Gracie came in from the back door, where she had been collecting herrings from the fishmonger's boy.

"These'll do dinner for us," she said briskly, swirling through the kitchen and putting the dish into the larder. She continued talking to herself absentmindedly about what would do for which meal, how much flour or potatoes they had left, and if the onions would last. They had used a lot of onions lately to flavor very plain food.

She had been preoccupied recently. Charlotte thought it had to do with Sergeant Tellman. She knew he had been at the house the other evening, even though she had not seen him herself. She had heard his voice and deliberately not intruded. Having Tellman sitting in the kitchen, exactly as if Pitt were still at home, made her sense of loneliness even more overwhelming.

She was happy for Gracie, and she was very well aware, rather more than Gracie was herself, that Tellman was fighting a losing battle against his feelings for her. Just at the moment she found it difficult to make herself seem cheerful about anything. Missing Pitt was hard enough. The evenings seemed endless when she was not listening for his step. There was no one to tell about her day, even if it had been entirely uneventful. The high point might have been something as trivial as a new flower in the garden, or a piece of gossip, perhaps a joke. And if things somehow went wrong, perhaps she would not mention it, but the knowledge that she could made all the irritation seem temporary, something that could be ignored. It was odd how happiness unshared was only half as great, and yet any kind of misfortune alone was doubled.

But far worse than loneliness was her anxiety for Pitt, the ordinary day-to-day worry as to whether he was eating properly, was warm enough, had anyone to wash his clothes. Had he found somewhere even remotely comfortable and kind to live? The real misery in her mind was for his safety, not only from anarchists, dynamiters or whoever he was looking for, but from his secret and far more powerful enemies in the Inner Circle.

The clock chimed and she was dimly aware of it. Gracie riddled the stove and put more coal on the fire.

Charlotte tried not to think, not to imagine, and during the day she was quite good at it. But at night, the moment her mind was blank, the fears came rushing in. She was emotionally exhausted and physically not tired enough. She had never been to Spitalfields, but she pictured it all too easily, narrow dark streets with figures lurking in doorways, everything damp and flickering with movement, as if it were only waiting to catch the unwary.

She woke too many times in the night, aware of every creak in the house, of the empty space beside her in the bed, wondering where he was, if he were awake also, feeling his loneliness.

Sometimes the fact that she had to pretend she was all right for the children's sake seemed an impossible task, at other times it was a discipline for which she was grateful. How many women down the centuries had pretended while their men were away at war, exploring unknown lands, at sea carrying goods over the oceans, or simply had run away because they were feckless and disloyal? At least she knew Pitt was none of these things and he would return when he could-or when she could find some answer to why Adinett had murdered Martin Fetters that was strong enough so even the members of the Inner Circle would have to believe it and the world in general would have no doubt left.

She closed the newspaper and pushed her chair away from the table just as Daniel and Jemima came into the room, eager for breakfast before going to school. There would be plenty to do today, and if not, then she would find it, or create it.

The kitchen clock rang a single chime. It was a quarter past eight. It had rung eight o'clock and she had not heard it. John Adinett would be dead now, his body, broken-necked-like Martin Fetters-being removed, ready for an unhallowed grave, and his soul to answer for his acts before the judge who knows all things.

She smiled at the children and began to prepare breakfast.

It was just after ten o'clock and she was sorting out the linen cupboard for the second time that week when Gracie came upstairs to tell her that Mrs. Radley had called-except that that was unnecessary, because Emily Radley, Charlotte's sister, was only a step behind Gracie. Emily looked devastatingly elegant in a dark green riding habit with a small, dark, hard-brimmed hat with a high crown, and a jacket cut so superbly it flattered every line of her slender figure. She was a trifle flushed from exertion, and her fair hair had come loose and had gone into curls in the damp air.

"Whatever are you doing?" she asked, surveying the piles of sheets and pillowcases strewn around.

"Sorting the linen for mending," Charlotte answered, suddenly aware of how shabby and untidy she looked compared with her sister. "Have you forgotten how to do that?"

"I'm not sure that I ever knew," Emily said airily. As Charlotte had married socially and financially beneath her, so Emily had married correspondingly above. Her first husband had possessed both title and fortune. He had been killed some time ago, and after a period of mourning, and loneliness, Emily had married again, this time to a handsome and charming man who owned almost nothing. It was Emily's ambition which had driven him to stand for a seat in Parliament and eventually to win it.

Gracie disappeared downstairs again.

Charlotte turned her back and resumed folding pillowcases and piling them neatly where they had originally been.

"Is Thomas still away?" Emily asked, lowering her voice a little.

"Of course he is," Charlotte replied, a trifle sharply. "I told you, it's going to be a long time, I don't know how long."

"Actually you told me very little," Emily pointed out, taking one of the pillowcases herself and folding it neatly. "You were rather mysterious and sounded upset. I came to see if you were all right."

"What are you going to do about it if I'm not?" Charlotte started on one of the sheets.

Emily picked up the other end. "Give you the opportunity to pick a quarrel and be thoroughly beastly to someone. It looks as if that is what you need this moment."

Charlotte stared at her, ignoring the sheet. Emily was being bright, but beneath the glamorous surface there was anxiety in her eyes-and no humor underlying the smart retort.

"I'm all right," Charlotte said more gently. "It's Thomas I'm worried about." She and Emily had shared in many of his past cases, and Emily knew the passion and the loss that could be involved. She was no stranger to fear, and she already knew of the Inner Circle. Charlotte could not tell her where Pitt was, but she could tell her why.

"What is it?" Emily sensed that there was more than she had been led to believe before, and now her voice was sharp with anxiety.

"The Inner Circle," Charlotte said very quietly. "I think Adinett was one of them-in fact, I'm sure he was. They won't forgive Thomas for convicting him." She took a shivering breath. "They hanged him this morning."

Emily was very somber. "I know. There was more in some of the newspapers about whether or not he was really guilty. No one seems to have any idea why he would do such a thing. Doesn't Thomas have any clues?"

"No."

"Well, isn't he trying to find out?"

"He can't," Charlotte said quietly, looking down at the linen on the floor. "He's been removed from Bow Street and sent... into the East End... to look for anarchists."

"What?" Emily was aghast. "That's monstrous! Who have you appealed to?"

"No one can do anything about it. Cornwallis already tried everything he could. If Thomas is somewhere in the East End, where nobody knows, anonymous, at least he is as safe from them as he can be."

"Anonymous in the East End?" Emily's face showed only too clearly her horror and all the dangers her imagination foresaw.

Charlotte looked away. "I know. Anything could happen to him, and it would be days before I'd even hear."

"Nothing will happen to him," Emily said quickly. "And I can see that he's safer there than still where they can find him." But there was more courage in her voice than conviction. She hurried on. "What can we do to help?"

"I've been to see Mrs. Fetters," Charlotte replied, mimicking the same positive tone. "But she doesn't know anything. I'm trying to think what to do next. There has to be some connection between the two men that they quarreled over, but the more I learn about Martin Fetters, the more he seems an unusually decent man who harmed no one."

"Then you aren't looking in the right places," Emily said frankly. "I assume you have tried all the obvious things: money, blackmail, a woman, rivalry for some position or other?" She looked puzzled. "Why were they friends anyway?"

"Travel and political reform, so far as his wife knows." Charlotte finished folding the last of the sheets. "Do you want a cup of tea?"

"Not especially. But I'd rather sit in the kitchen than stand here in the linen cupboard," Emily responded. "Does anyone quarrel seriously over travel?"

"I doubt it. And they didn't even travel to the same places. Mr. Fetters went to the Near East, and Adinett went to France, and he had been to Canada in the past."

"Then it's politics." Emily followed her down the stairs and along the corridor to the kitchen. She said hello to Gracie in a matter-of-fact way. In no one else's house would she have spoken to the maid, but she knew of Charlotte 's regard for her.

Charlotte put on the kettle. "They both wanted reform," she went on.

Emily sat down, nicking her skirts expertly so they were not crushed. "Doesn't everyone? Jack says it's getting pretty desperate." She looked down at her hands on the table, small and elegant, and surprisingly strong. "There have always been rumblings of unrest, but it's a lot worse now than even ten years ago. There are so many foreigners coming into London and not enough work. I suppose there have been anarchists for years, but there are more of them now, and they are very violent."

Charlotte knew that. It was in the newspapers often enough, including the trial of the French anarchist for the assassination of Carnot. And she knew that in London they were largely in the East End, where the poverty was worst and the dissatisfaction the highest. That was the official excuse for sending Pitt there.

"What?" Emily said quickly, seeing her sister's expression. "What is it?"

"Are they really a danger, do you think? I mean, more than the individual lunatic?"

Emily considered for a moment before answering. Charlotte wondered whether it was to search for the right words, to examine her knowledge, or worst of all, if it were a matter of tact. If it were the last, then the instinctive answer must be very ugly. It was not Emily's nature to be indirect, which was quite different from being devious, at which she was brilliant.

"Actually," she said quietly when Gracie had brewed the tea and brought it, "I think Jack is really worried, not about anarchists, who are only individual madmen, but about the feeling everywhere. The monarchy is very unpopular, you know, and not just with the sort of people you would expect, but with some who are very important and perhaps you would not think."

"Unpopular?" Charlotte was puzzled. "In what way? I know people think the Queen should do far more, but they've said that for thirty years. Does Jack think it's any different now?"

"I don't know that it's different." Emily was very grave. She chose her words carefully, weighing them before she spoke. "But he says it is much more serious. The Prince of Wales spends an enormous amount of money, you know, and most of it is borrowed. He owes all over the place, and to all kinds of people. He doesn't seem to be able to stop himself, and if he realizes what harm it is doing, then he doesn't care."

"Political harm?" Charlotte asked.

"Eventually, yes." Emily lowered her voice. "There are some people who think that when the old Queen dies that will be the end of the monarchy."

Charlotte was startled. "Really?" It was a surprisingly unpleasant thought. She was not quite sure why she minded. It would take some of the color out of life, some of the glamour. Even if you never saw the countesses and the duchesses, if there was no way in the world you would ever be a lady, far less a princess, it would make things a little grayer if they should not exist anymore. People would always have heroes, real or false. There was nothing essentially noble about the aristocracy. But then the heroes who would be put in their places would not necessarily be chosen for their virtue or achievement; it might as easily be for wealth or beauty. Then the magic would be gone for no reason, no gain.

All of which was a silly argument, and she knew it. What mattered was the change, and a change born of hatred was frightening because so often it was done without thought or knowledge. So much could not be foreseen.

"That's what Jack says." Emily was watching her closely, her tea forgotten. "And what bothers him the most is that there are powerful interests who are royalist and will do anything to keep things as they are... and I mean anything!" She bit her lip. "When he said that, I pressed him what he meant, and he wouldn't answer me. He went quiet and sort of... into himself, the way he does if he isn't well. It seems an odd thing to say, but I think he was afraid." She stopped abruptly, looking down at her hands again, as if she had said something of which she was ashamed. Perhaps she had not meant to reveal so much of what was vulnerable, and therefore private.

Charlotte felt chilled. There was too much to be afraid of already. She wished to know more, but there was no point in pressing Emily. If she had been able to tell her then she would have done so. It was an ugly and lonely thought. "You don't realize how much you value what you have, with all its problems, until someone threatens to destroy it and put his own ideas in its place," she said ruefully. "I don't mind a little change, but I don't want a lot. Can you have a little change, do you suppose? Or does it have to be all or nothing? Do they have to smash everything in order to make any of it different?"

"That depends on the people," Emily replied with a tight, sad little smile. "If you'll bend, then no. If you won't, if you do a Marie Antoinette, then perhaps it's either the crown or the guillotine."

"Was she really so stupid?"

"I don't know. It's just an example. No one's going to behead our Queen. At least I don't imagine so."

"I don't suppose the French imagined so either," Charlotte said dryly. "I wish I hadn't thought of that!"

"We aren't French." Emily's voice was firm, even angry.

"Tell Charles I," Charlotte retorted, picturing in her mind Van Dyke's sad, brilliant portrait of that unfortunate man, stubborn to his beliefs right to the scaffold.

"That wasn't a revolution." Emily retreated to the literal.

"It was a civil war. Is that any better?" Charlotte argued.

"It's only talk! Politicians having nightmares. If it wasn't over that, it would be something else- Ireland, taxes, an eight-hour day, or drains." She shrugged elegantly. "If there isn't something awful to solve, why would we need them?"

"We probably don't... at least, most of the time."

"That's what they're afraid of." Emily stood up. "Do you want to come with us to the National Gallery and see the exhibition?"

"No, thank you. I'm going to see Mrs. Fetters again. I think you may be right-it's probably politics."

***

Charlotte arrived at Great Coram Street a little after eleven o'clock. It was a most unsuitable time for calling on anyone, but this was not a social visit, and it had the one advantage that she would be excessively unlikely to run into anyone else and have to explain her presence.

Juno was delighted to see her and made no pretense to conceal it. Her face was full of relief that she should have company.

"Come in!" she said enthusiastically. "Do you have any news?"

"No, I'm sorry." Charlotte felt guilty that she had achieved nothing more. After all, this woman's loss was far greater than her own. "I have thought a great deal, but to no avail, except more ideas."

"Can I help?"

"Perhaps." Charlotte accepted the offered seat in the same lovely garden room as before. Today it was cooler and the door was closed. "It seems that ambition for political reform was the obvious thing that Mr. Fetters and John Adinett had in common and about which they both cared very deeply."

"Oh, Martin cared intensely," Juno agreed. "He argued for it and wrote many articles. He knew a lot of people would feel the same, and he believed it would come."

"Do you have any of the articles?" Charlotte asked. She was not sure what use it would be to see them, but there was nothing better she could think of.

"They will be among his papers." Juno stood up. "The police went through them, of course, but they are all still in his desk in the study. I... I haven't had the heart to read them again myself." She spoke softly, with her back to Charlotte, and she went straight out and across the hall to the study, leading the way in.

It was a smaller room than the library, and without the tall windows and sunlight, but it was still pleasant and very obviously well used. A single bookcase was full, and there were two more volumes on the leather inlaid desk. Shelves behind were stacked with papers and folios.

Juno stopped, the light going from her face. "I don't know what we could find here," she said helplessly. "The police didn't find anything more than the odd note regarding a meeting, and two or three written when John... Mr. Adinett... went to France once. They weren't in the least personal, just very vivid descriptions of certain places in Paris, mostly to do with the Revolution. Martin had written some articles about the same places, and Adinett was saying how much more they meant to him with Martin's vision than they had before." Her voice thickened with emotion as she remembered such a short time ago when so much had been different.

She walked over to the shelves behind the desk and pulled out a number of periodicals, sifting through the pages. "There are all sorts of articles in here. Would you like to read them?"

"Yes, please," Charlotte accepted, again because she knew of no better place to start. She would glance at them, no more.

Juno passed them across. Charlotte noticed on the covers a line saying that they were published by Thorold Dismore. She opened the first and began to read. It was written from Vienna, by Martin Fetters, as he walked about the city and stood in the places where the revolutionaries of the '48 uprising had struggled to force the simpleminded Emperor Ferdinand's government into some kind of reform of the crushing laws, the burden of taxes and the inequalities.

She had intended only to skim through, catch a flavor of his beliefs, but she could not omit a sentence. The words leapt vividly to life with a passion and a grief that held her so completely she forgot the study in Great Coram Street, and Juno sitting a few feet away. She heard Martin Fetters's voice in her mind and saw his face full of enthusiasm for the courage of the men and women who had fought. She felt his outrage at their defeat in the end, and a longing that someday their goals would be achieved.

She turned to the next one. This was written from Berlin. In essence it was the same. The love of the beauty of the city and individuality of the people was there, the story of their attempts to curb the military power of Prussia, and in the end, their failure.

He wrote from Paris, perhaps the article to which John Adinett had referred in the letters Pitt had found. This piece was longer, filled with an intimate love of a glorious city stained with terror, a hope so vivid it hurt, even through the printed words on the page. Fetters had stood where Danton had lived, followed his last ride in the tumbrel to the guillotine, where Danton had been at his greatest, where he had already lost everything and seen the Revolution consume its own children in body-and more dreadfully, in spirit.

Fetters had stood on the Rue St. Honore outside the carpenter's home where Robespierre had lodged, who sent so many thousands to their bloody deaths and yet never saw the engine of destruction until he rode to it himself, for the last time.

Fetters had walked in the streets where the students manned the barricades for the '48 revolution that gained so little and cost so much. Charlotte found tears thick in her throat when she finished it, and she had to force herself to pick up the next piece. And yet had Juno interrupted her, asked for them back, she would have felt robbed and suddenly alone.

Fetters wrote from Venice, which he found the most beautiful city on earth, even under the Austrian yoke, and from Athens, once the greatest city republic of all, the cradle of the concept of democracy and now a shell of its ancient glory, its spirit defiled.

Finally he wrote from Rome, again of the revolution of '48, the brief glory of another Roman republic, snuffed out by the armies of Napoleon III, and the return of the Pope, the crushing of all the passion for freedom and justice and a voice for the people. He wrote of Mazzini, living in the papal palace, in one room, eating raisins, and of his fresh flowers every day. He wrote of the deeds of Garibaldi and his fierce, passionate wife, who died after the end of the siege, and of Mario Corena, the soldier and republican who was willing to give everything he owned for the common good: his money, his lands, his life if need be. If only there had been more like him, they would not have lost.

She put down the last paper on the desk, but her mind was filled with heroism and tragedy, past and present alive together, and above all the inescapable presence of Martin Fetters's voice in her mind, his beliefs, his personality, his fierce, life-giving love of individual liberty within a civilized whole.

Surely if John Adinett had known him as well as everyone said he did, he must have had an overwhelming reason for killing such a man, something so powerful it could conquer friendship, admiration, the common love of ideals? She could not think what such a thing could be.

Then a thread of thought came, like a shadow passing across the sun. Could they have been wrong about murder after all? Had Adinett told the truth all along?

She kept her eyes down so Juno would not see the doubt in her. It was as if she had betrayed Pitt that the thought had even existed.

"He wrote brilliantly," she said aloud. "I not only feel as if I have been there and learned what happened in those streets, but as if I cared about it almost as much as he did."

Juno smiled very slightly. "He was like that... so alive I couldn't have imagined he would ever die, not really." Her voice was gentle, far away. She sounded almost surprised. "It seems ridiculous that for everybody else the world goes on just the same. Part of me wants to put straw down on the streets and tell everyone they must drive slowly. Another part wants to pretend it never happened at all, he's just away somewhere again, and he'll be back in a day or two."

Charlotte looked up at her and saw the struggle in her face. She could understand it so easily. Her own loneliness was only a fraction of this. Pitt was all right; he was just a few miles away in Spitalfields. If he gave up the police force he could come home any day. But that would answer nothing. Charlotte had to know that he had been right about Adinett, and why, and she had to prove it to everyone.

Perhaps Juno had to know just as urgently, and the darkness in her face was fear as to what she might find out about her husband. There had to be something vast... and at least to Adinett, unendurable.

And secret! He had gone to the gallows rather than speak of it, even to excuse himself.

"We had better look further," she said at last. "What we want may not be here in this room, but it is the best place to begin." It was also the only place, so far.

Juno bent obediently and opened the desk drawers. For one of them Juno sent to the kitchen for a knife, and then pried it open, splintering the wood.

"A pity," she said, biting her lip. "I don't suppose it can be mended, but I didn't have the key."

They began there since it was the only one specifically protected from intrusion.

Charlotte had read three letters before she started to see a pattern. They were carefully worded; the casual glance would have found nothing remarkable in them-in fact, they were rather dry. The subject matter was theoretical: the political reform of a state which had no name, whose leaders were spoken of personally rather than by office. There was no drama, no passion, only ideals; as if it were an exercise of the mind, something one writes for an examination.

The first letter was from Charles Voisey, the appeals judge.

My dear Fetters,

I read your paper with the greatest interest. You raise many points with which I agree, and some I had not considered, but on weighing what you have to say, I believe you are quite right in your thinking.

There are other areas in which I cannot go as far as you do, but I understand the influences which have affected you, and in your place I might share your view, even if not the extremity of it.

Thank you for the pottery, which arrived safely, and now graces my private study. It is a most exquisite piece, and a constant reminder to me of the glories of the past, and the spirits of great men to whom we owe so much... as you have said, a debt for which history will hold us accountable, even if we ourselves do not.

I look forward to conversing with you further,

Your ally in the cause,

Charles Voisey

The next one was in a similar tone; it was from Thorold Dismore, the newspaper proprietor. It too was largely in admiration for Fetters's work, and requested that he write a further series of articles. It was very recently dated, so presumably the articles were yet to be written. There was a rough draft of Fetters's acceptance. There was no way of telling whether the final had been sent or not.

Juno held out a letter from the pile she had taken, her eyes filled with distress. It was from Adinett. Charlotte read:

My dear Martin,

What a marvelous piece you have written. I cannot praise you enough for the passion you display. It would be a man devoid of all that distinguishes the civilized from the barbaric who would not be fired by what you have said, and determined at all costs to spend all his strength and his substance in creating a better world.

I have shown it to various people, whom I will not name, for reasons you will know, and they are as profound in their admiration as I am.

I feel there is real hope. It is no longer a time merely of dreams.

I shall see you on Saturday.

John

Charlotte looked up.

Juno stared at her, her eyes wide and hurt. Then she passed over a sheaf of notes for further articles.

Charlotte read them with growing misgiving, then alarm. The mention of reform became more and more specific. The Roman revolution of '48 was referred to with passionate praise. The ancient Roman Republic was held as an ideal and kings as the pattern of tyranny. The invitation to a modern republic, after the overthrow of the monarchy, was unmistakable.

There were oblique references to a secret society whose members were dedicated to the continuation of the royal house in its power and wealth, by any means at all, and the implication was there that even the shedding of blood was not beyond them if the threat was serious enough.

Charlotte put down the final sheet and looked across at Juno, who sat white-faced, her shoulders slumped.

"Is that possible?" Juno asked hoarsely. "Do you think they really planned a republic here in England?"

"Yes..." It seemed a brutal answer, but a denial would have been a lie neither of them could have believed.

Juno sat quite still, leaning a little on the desk, as if she needed its strength to support her. "After... after the Queen dies?"

"Perhaps."

Juno shook her head. "That's too soon. It could be any day. She's into her seventies. What about the Prince of Wales? What are they going to do about him?"

"There's nothing said here," Charlotte answered very quietly. "I think they would be too careful to commit that to writing, if there is a plan, not just dreaming. Especially if there is a secret society, as they say."

"I understand reform." Juno searched for words. "I want it too. There's terrible poverty and injustice. Funny how they don't mention women." She tried to smile, but it was too difficult. "They don't say anything about us having more rights or more voice in decisions, even for our own children." She shook her head, her lips quivering. "But I don't want this!" She gestured with one hand as if to push it away. "I know Martin admired republics, their ideals, their equality, but I never had the slightest idea he wanted one for us! I don't... I don't want so much change." She gulped. "Not so violently. I like too much of what we have. It is who we are... who we have always been." She looked at Charlotte pleadingly, willing her to understand.

"But we are the fortunate ones," Charlotte pointed out. "And we are a very small minority."

"Is that why he was killed?" Juno asked the question that hung between them. "Adinett was actually a member of this other society, the secret one, and he murdered Martin because of this... plan for a republic?"

"It would explain why he said nothing, even in his own defense." Charlotte 's mind was racing. Was the Inner Circle monarchist? Was that what it was about, and Adinett had discovered what his friend planned, that his idealism was not merely about the glories of the past or the tragedies of '48, but meant something urgent and immediate for the future?

Even if it were true, how could that help Thomas?

Juno was still sitting and staring across the room. Something inside her had crumbled. The man she had loved for so many years had suddenly moved, revealing another dimension which altered everything that was already perceived, making it radically different, dangerous... perhaps irredeemably ugly.

Charlotte was sorry, desperately sorry, and she wanted to say so, but that would be condescending, as if she had uncovered this situation alone, relegating Juno to a spectator, a sufferer, not a protagonist.

"Do you have a safe?" she said aloud.

"Do you think there's more in it?" Juno asked miserably.

"I don't know, but I think you should keep these letters and papers there, since this drawer won't lock anymore. You shouldn't destroy them yet, because we are only guessing what they mean. We may be wrong."

There was no light in Juno's eyes. "You don't believe that, and neither do I. Martin cared intensely about reform. Even now I can look back and remember things he said about republics as opposed to monarchies. I've heard him criticize the Prince of Wales and the Queen. He said that if the Queen had been answerable to the people of Britain, like any other holder of office, she would have been dismissed years ago. Who else can afford to abandon their job because they lost a husband or wife?"

"No one," Charlotte agreed. "And there are plenty of other people who say the same. I think I do myself. That doesn't mean I would rather have a republic... or even if I would, that I would do anything to make that happen."

Juno gathered the papers together, frowning slightly. "There's no proof in these," she said quietly, as if the words hurt her and she had to force them out.

Charlotte waited, uncertain, her mind fumbling towards the next conclusion. Before she reached it Juno spoke.

"There are other papers somewhere, ones that are more specific. I have to find them. I have to know what he meant to do... as if it were only what he wished for."

Charlotte felt the tightness inside her. "Are you sure?"

"Wouldn't you have to know?" Juno asked.

"Yes... I... I think so. But I meant are you sure there is anything more to find?"

"Oh, yes." There was no doubt in Juno's voice. "These are only bits of something, notes. I may be entirely wrong about what Martin was working on, but I know the way he worked. He was meticulous. He never trusted solely to memory."

"Where would it be?"

"I don't-"

They were interrupted by the maid, who had come to say that Mr. Reginald Cleave had called, and begged her pardon for the inconvenience of the hour, but he would very much like to see her, and commitments he could not escape made the traditional time impossible for him.

Juno looked startled. She turned to Charlotte.

"I'll wait wherever you wish," Charlotte said quickly.

Juno swallowed. "I will receive him in the withdrawing room," she told the maid. "Give me five minutes, then show him in." As soon as the maid had gone she turned to Charlotte. "What on earth can he want? He defended Adinett!"

"You don't have to see him." Charlotte spoke out of compassion, but she knew it was the refusal of an opportunity to learn more. Juno was exhausted, frightened of what she might discover, and profoundly alone. "I'll go and tell him you are unwell if you wish."

"No... no. But I should be grateful if you would remain with me. I think that would be quite seemly, don't you?"

Charlotte smiled. "Of course."

Cleave looked startled when he was shown in and saw two women present. It was immediately apparent that he had not met Juno before and was for a moment uncertain which she was.

"I am Juno Fetters," Juno said coolly. "This is my friend, Mrs. Pitt." There was a challenge in her voice, the lift of her chin. He must remember the name and not fail to associate it.

Charlotte saw the recognition in his eyes, and the flare of anger.

"How do you do, Mrs. Fetters. Mrs. Pitt. I had no idea you were acquainted." He bowed very slightly.

Charlotte regarded him with interest. He was not particularly tall but he gave an impression of great size because of his powerful shoulders and heavy neck. It was not a face she liked, but there was no mistaking the intelligence in it, or the immense strength of will. Was he no more than a passionate advocate who had lost a case, he believed unjustly? Or was he a member of a secret and violent society prepared to commit private murder or public riot and insurrection to achieve its ideals?

She looked at his face, his eyes, and had no idea.

"What may I do for you, Mr. Gleave?" Juno asked with a little shiver in her voice.

Gleave's eyes moved from Charlotte 's back to hers.

"First, may I offer my condolences upon your loss, Mrs. Fetters? Your husband was a fine man in every respect. No one else's grief can match yours, of course; nevertheless, we are all the poorer for his passing. He was a man of high morality and great intellectual gifts."

"Thank you," she said politely, her expression almost bordering on impatience. They both knew he had not come to tell her this. It would have been better said in correspondence, more memorable and less intrusive.

Gleave lowered his gaze, as if he felt awkward.

"Mrs. Fetters, I care very much that you should know that I defended John Adinett because I believed him innocent, not because were he guilty I would have imagined any excuse whatever for what he did." He looked up quickly. "I still find it almost impossible to imagine that he could have done such a thing. There could have been... no... reason!"

Charlotte realized with a shiver that he was watching Juno intently, his eyes fixed upon her face so completely he must see even the faintest flicker of breath, the wavering of her gaze for an instant. He watched as an animal watches its prey. He had come to learn how much she knew, if she had found anything, guessed or suspected.

Charlotte willed Juno to tell him nothing, to be bland, innocent, even stupid if necessary. Should she intervene, take matters into her own hands? Or would that tell him she was afraid, which could only be because she knew something? She drew in her breath and let it out again.

"No," Juno said slowly. "Of course he wouldn't. I admit, I don't understand it either." She allowed herself to relax, deliberately, starting with her hands. She even smiled very slightly. "I always saw them as the best of friends." She added nothing more, leaving him to pick up the thread.

It was not what he had expected. For a moment uncertainty flashed in his face, then it was gone. His expression eased.

"That is what you saw also?" He smiled back at her, avoiding Charlotte 's gaze. "I wondered if perhaps you had any perception as to what may have gone so tragically wrong... not evidence, of course," he added hastily, "or you would have spoken of it to the appropriate authorities. Just thoughts, intuition even, born of your understanding of your husband."

Juno said nothing.

Gleave's voice was unctuous, but Charlotte saw the flash of doubt again. He had not expected the conversation to go this way. He was not controlling it as he had intended. Juno was obliging him to speak more because she offered less. Now he had to explain his interest.

"I apologize for pursuing it, Mrs. Fetters. The case troubles me still because it seems so... unresolved. I..." He shook his head a little. "I feel as if I failed."

"I think we all failed to understand, Mr. Gleave," Juno replied. "I wish I could clarify it for you, but I am afraid I cannot."

"It must be very troubling for you also." His voice was full of sympathy. "It is part of grief to wish to understand."

"You are very kind," she said simply.

A flare of interest quickened in him, so faint as to be almost indiscernible, but Charlotte knew Juno had made a mistake. She had been careful rather than frank. Should she intervene? Or would that only make it worse? Again she hovered on the edge of speech. What was Gleave? Simply a defense lawyer who had lost a client he felt to be innocent, and perhaps for which his peers held him accountable? Or a member of a powerful and terrible secret society, here to judge how much the widow knew, if there were papers, evidence they needed to destroy?

"I confess," Juno went on suddenly, "I should like to know why... what..." She shook her head, and her eyes filled with tears. "Why Martin died. And I don't! It doesn't make any sense at all."

Gleave responded the only way possible to him. "I am so sorry, Mrs. Fetters. I did not mean to distress you. It was clumsy of me to have raised the subject at all. Do forgive me."

She shook her head. "I understand, Mr. Gleave. You had faith in your client. You must be distressed also. There is nothing to forgive. In truth, I would have liked to ask you if you know the reason, but of course even if you did, you would not be free to say so. Now at least you have made it plain you know no more than I do. I am grateful for that. Perhaps now I shall be able to let it go and think of other things."

"Yes... yes, that would be best," he agreed, and for the first time he looked fully at Charlotte. His eyes were dark, clever, searching her mind, perhaps warning her also.

"Delighted to have met you, Mrs. Pitt." He added nothing more, but meanings unsaid hung in the air.

"And you, Mr. Gleave," she responded charmingly.

As soon as he was gone and the door closed behind him, Juno turned to her. Her face was pale and her body was trembling.

"He wanted to know what we have found," she said huskily. "That's why he came... isn't it?"

"Yes, I think so," Charlotte agreed. "Which means you are right in there is something more. And he doesn't know where it is either... but it matters!"

Juno shivered. "Then we must find it! Will you help me?"

"Of course."

"Thank you. I shall think where to look. Now, would you like a cup of tea? I would!"

***

Charlotte had not told Vespasia what had happened to Pitt. At first she was embarrassed to, although it was in no way due to his negligence, rather the opposite. Still, she felt it a blow she would rather not allow anyone else to know of, particularly someone whose opinion Pitt cared about as much as he did Vespasia's.

However, now the whole matter had become one she was unable to carry alone, and there was no one else she could trust both as to loyalty and ability to understand the issues and be able to advise on what next to do.

Therefore she arrived on Vespasia's doorstep the morning after having visited Juno Fetters. She was shown in by the maid. Vespasia was at breakfast, and invited Charlotte to join her in the yellow-and-gold breakfast room, at least for tea.

"You look a little harassed, my dear," she observed gently, spreading her wafer-thin toast with a smear of butter and a large dollop of apricot preserves. "I presume you have come to tell me about it?"

Charlotte was glad not to pretend. "Yes. Actually it happened three weeks ago, but I only realized how serious it was yesterday. I really have no idea what to do."

"Does Thomas not have an opinion?" Vespasia frowned and allowed her toast to go unregarded.

"Thomas has been removed from Bow Street and put into Special Branch to work in Spitalfields." Charlotte let the words pour out with all the distress she felt, the wondering and the fear she had to hide from the children, even in part from Gracie.

"Worst of all, he has to live there. I haven't seen him. I can't even write to him because I don't know where he is! He writes to me-but I can't answer!"

"I'm so sorry, my dear," Vespasia said, sorrow filling her face. If she was angry also, it came second. She had seen too much injustice to be surprised anymore.

"It is partly in revenge for his testimony against John Adinett," Charlotte explained. "And partly to protect him... from the Inner Circle."

"I see." Vespasia bit into the toast delicately. The maid brought fresh tea and poured it for Charlotte.

When the maid had gone, Charlotte resumed her story. She told Vespasia how she had determined to find the motive for Martin Fetters's death, and had gone to visit Juno for that purpose. She recounted as exactly as she could recall what she had read in the papers in Fetters's desk, and then spoke of Gleave's visit.

Vespasia remained silent for several minutes.

"This is extremely unpleasant," she said at length. "You are quite right to be afraid. It is also highly dangerous. I am inclined to share your opinion as to the purpose of Reginald Gleave's visit to Mrs. Fetters. We must assume that he has a profound vested interest in the matter and may be prepared to pursue it regardless of what means may be necessary."

"Including violence?" Charlotte made it only half a question.

Vespasia made no pretense. "Assuredly, if there is no other opportunity open to him. You must be extremely discreet."

Charlotte smiled in spite of herself. "Anyone else would have said I must leave it alone."

The light shone in Vespasia's silver eyes. "And would you have?"

"No..."

"Good. If you had said yes it would either have been a lie, and I should not care to be lied to, or it would have been the truth, and I should have been very disappointed in you." She leaned forward a little across the polished table. "But I mean the warning very seriously, Charlotte. I am not certain how much there is at stake, but I think it is a very great deal. The Prince of Wales is ill-advised, at best. At worst he is a spendthrift and careless of his reputation for financial honesty. Victoria has long since lost her sense of duty. Between them they have invited republican sentiment to flourish, and it has done so. I had not realized it was so close to violence, or involved men as much admired as Martin Fetters. But what you have discovered would explain his death as nothing else so far has done."

Charlotte realized she had been half hoping Vespasia would say she was mistaken, that there was some other, more personal answer, and society as they were familiar with it was in no danger. Her agreement swept away the last pretense.

"Is it the Inner Circle who support the monarchy at any cost?" Charlotte asked, lowering her voice in spite of the fact there was no one to overhear them.

"I don't know," Vespasia admitted. "I do not know what their aims are, but I have no doubt they are willing to follow them regardless of the rest of us."

"I think it is best you keep silent," Vespasia went on gravely. "Speak to no one. I believe Cornwallis is an honorable man, but I do not know it beyond doubt. If what you have suggested is true, then we have stumbled into something of immense power, and one murder more or less will be of no consequence at all, except to the victim and those who loved him or her. I hope Mrs. Fetters will do the same."

Charlotte felt numb. What had begun as her private sense of outrage at injustice to Pitt had developed into a conspiracy that could threaten everything she knew.

"What are we going to do?" she asked, staring at Vespasia.

"I have no idea," Vespasia confessed. "At least not yet."

After Charlotte had left, looking confused and deeply unhappy, Vespasia sat for a long time in the golden room, staring out of the window and across the lawn. She had lived through the whole of Victoria 's reign. Forty years ago England had seemed the most stable place in the world, the one country where all the values were certain, money kept its worth, church bells rang on Sundays, and parsons preached of good and evil and few doubted them. Everyone knew their places and largely accepted them. The future stretched out ahead endlessly.

That world was gone, like summer flowers.

She was startled how angry she was that Pitt should have been robbed of his position and his life at home, and sent to work in Spitalfields, almost certainly uselessly. But if Cornwallis was the man Vespasia judged him to be, then at least Pitt was relatively safe from the vengeance of the Inner Circle; that was one good thing.

She no longer received the vast number of invitations she once had, but there were still several from which to choose. Today she could attend a garden party at Astbury House, if she wished to. She had meant to decline, and had even said as much to Lady Weston yesterday. But she knew various people who would be there-Randolph Churchill and Ardal Juster, among others. She would accept after all. Perhaps she would see Somerset Carlisle. He was one man she would trust.

***

The afternoon was fine and warm, and the gardens were in full bloom. It could not have been a better day for a party in the open air. Vespasia arrived late, as was her habit now, and found the lawns bright with the silks and muslins of beautiful gowns, the cartwheels of hats decked with blossom, swathed with gauze and tulle, and like everyone else she was in constant danger of being skewered by the point of some carelessly wielded parasol.

She wore a gown of two shades of lavender and gray, and a hat with a brim which swept up like a bird's wing, arching rakishly to one side. Only a woman who did not care in the slightest what others thought would dare to choose such a thing.

"Marvelous, my dear," Lady Weston said coldly. "Quite unique, I'm sure." By which she meant it was out of fashion and no one else would be caught wearing it.

"Thank you," Vespasia said with a dazzling smile. "How generous of you." She glanced up and down Lady Weston's unimaginative blue dress with total dismissal. "Such a wonderful gift."

"I beg your pardon?" Lady Weston was confused.

"The modesty to admire others," Vespasia explained, then, with another smile, flicked her skirt and left Lady Weston furious, knowing she had been bested and only now realizing how.

Vespasia passed the newspaper proprietor Thorold Dismore, whose keen face was sharp with heightened emotion. He was talking with Sissons, the sugar manufacturer. This time Sissons too seemed to be driven by some vigor and enthusiasm. He was barely recognizable as the same man who had been such a thundering bore with the Prince of Wales.

Vespasia watched for a moment with interest at the change in him, wondering what they could be discussing which could so engage them both. Dismore was passionate, eccentric, a crusader for causes in spite of being born to wealth and position. He was a brilliant speaker, a wit at times, if not on the subject of political reform.

Sissons was self-made and had seemed leaden of intellect, socially inept when faced with royalty. Perhaps he was one of those who simply freeze when in the presence of one in direct line to the throne. With some people it was genius which paralyzed them, with some beauty, with a few it was rank.

Still, she was curious to know what they held in common that so engrossed them.

She was never to know. She found herself face-to-face with Charles Voisey, whose eyes were narrowed against the sun. She could not read the emotion in his face. She had no idea whether he liked or disliked her, admired or despised her, or even dismissed her from his thoughts the moment she was out of sight. It was not a feeling she found comfortable.

"Good afternoon, Lady Vespasia," he said politely. "A beautiful garden." He looked around them at the profusion of color and shape, the dark, trimmed hedges, the herbaceous borders, the smooth lawn and a stand of luminous purple irises in bloom with the light through their curved petals. It was lazy in the warmth, dizzy with perfume. "So very English," he added.

So it was. And even as they stood there she remembered the heat of Rome, the dark cypresses, the sound of falling water from the fountains, like music in stone. During the days her eyes had been narrowed against the lush sun, but in the evening the light was soft, ocher and rose, bathing everything in a beauty that healed over the scars of violence and neglect.

But that was to do with Mario Corena, not this man in front of her. It was a different battle, different ideals. Now she must think of Pitt and the monstrous conspiracy of which he was one of the victims.

"Indeed," she replied with equally distant courtesy. "There is something particularly rich about these few weeks of high summer. Perhaps because they are so brief and so uncertain. Tomorrow it may rain."

His eyes wandered very slightly. "You sound very reflective, Lady Vespasia, and a trifle sad." It was not quite a question.

She looked at his face in the unforgiving sunlight. It found every flaw, every trace left by passion, temper, or pain. How much had it hurt him that Adinett had hanged? She had heard a raw note of rage when he had spoken at the reception, before the appeal. And yet he had been one of the judges who had been of the majority opinion, for conviction. But since it had been four to one, had he voted against, it would have betrayed his loyalty without altering the outcome. That must have galled him to the soul!

Was he driven by personal friendship or political passion? Or simply a belief in John Adinett's innocence? The prosecution had never been able even to suggest a motive for murder, let alone prove one.

"Of course," she replied noncommittally. "Part of the nature of one's joy in summer's fleeting beauty is the knowledge that it will pass too soon, and the certainty that it will come again, even if we will not all see it."

He was watching her intently now, all pretense of casual politeness gone. "We do not all see it now, Lady Vespasia."

She thought of Pitt in Spitalfields, and Adinett in his grave, and the unnamed millions who did not stand amid the flowers in the sun. There was no time to play.

"Very few of us do, Mr. Voisey," she agreed. "But at least it exists, and that is hopeful. Better flowers bloom for a few than not at all."

"As long as we are of the few!" he returned instantly, and this time there was no disguising the bitterness in his face.

She smiled very slowly; there was no anger in her for his rudeness. It had been an accusation.

Doubt flickered in his eyes that perhaps he had made an error. She had wished him to show his hand, and he had done so. It cost him an effort; he was not a man who smiled superficially, but his face relaxed now, and he smiled at her widely, showing excellent teeth.

"Of course, or how else would we speak of them, except in dream? But I know you have worked for reforms, as I have, and injustice outrages you also."

Now she was uncertain. He was not an easy man, but perhaps it was a rare integrity which made him so. It was not impossible.

Had Adinett killed Martin Fetters to prevent a republican revolution in England? That was a very different thing from reform by changing the law, by persuasion of the people who had the power to act.

She smiled back at him, and this time she meant it.

A moment later they were joined by Lord Randolph Churchill, and the conversation was no longer personal. With an election so close, naturally politics arose: Gladstone and the whole troubled issue of Irish Home Rule, the rise of anarchy across Europe, and dynamiters here in London.

"The whole East End is like a powder keg," Churchill said softly to Voisey, apparently having forgotten Vespasia was still within earshot. "It will only take the right spark and it will all go up!"

"What are you doing?" Voisey asked, his voice full of concern, his brow puckered.

"I need to know who I can trust and who I can't," Churchill replied bitterly.

A cautious expression flickered in Voisey's face. "You need the Queen to come out of seclusion and start pleasing the public again, and the Prince of Wales to pay his debts and stop living as if there were no tomorrow-and no reckoning."

"Given all that I shouldn't have a problem," Churchill rejoined. "I knew Warren, and Abberline to a degree, but I'm not sure of Narraway. Clever, certainly, but I don't know where his loyalties are, if it comes to it!"

Voisey smiled.

A group of young women passed, laughing together, glancing sideways and hastily composing themselves to a more decorous manner. They were pretty, fair-skinned and blemishless, dressed in pastel laces and muslin, skirts swirling.

Vespasia had no hunger to be their age again, for all its hope and innocence. Her life had been rich, her regrets were few; there had been an act of selfishness or stupidity here and there, but never for anything she had failed to grasp, nothing flinched from out of cowardice-although perhaps there should have been.

She did not find Somerset Carlisle and was conscious of a feeling of disappointment, suddenly aware that she had been standing a long time. She was about to excuse herself and leave when she was aware of hearing Churchill's voice again just beyond a rose arbor. He was speaking hurriedly, and she could barely distinguish the words.

"... refer to it again! It has been dealt with. It won't happen again."

"It had damned well better not!" another voice said in hardly more than a whisper, the emotion in it so intense the voice was unrecognizable. "Another conspiracy like that could mean the end-and I don't say that lightly!"

"They're all dead, God help us," Churchill replied hoarsely. "What did you think we were going to do-pay blackmail? And where do you imagine the end of that would be?"

"In the grave," came the response. "Where it belongs."

At last Vespasia turned away. She had no idea of the meaning of what she had overheard.

Ahead of her, Lady Weston was telling an admirer about Oscar Wilde's latest play, Lady Windermere's Fan. They both laughed.

Vespasia moved out into the sunlight and joined them, for once actually intruding into someone else's conversation. It was sane, trivial, funny, and she desperately needed to be part of it. It was brightly glittering and familiar. She would hold on to it as long as she could.