Betrayal at Lisson Grove (Treason at Lisson Grove)

The tap came again, and he looked at the shadow outside. He could just see the features of a man’s face beyond, unmoving, as if he wished to be recognized. Narraway thought for a moment of Pitt, but he knew it was not him. He was in France, and this man was not as tall.

It was Stoker. He should have known that straightaway. It was ridiculous to be standing here in the shadows as if he were afraid. He went forward, unlocked the French doors, and opened them wide.

Stoker came in, holding a bundle of papers in a large envelope, half hidden under his jacket. His hair was damp from the slight drizzle outside, as if he had walked some distance. Narraway hoped he had, and taken more than one cab, to make following or tracing him difficult.

“What are you doing here, Stoker?” he said quietly, for the first time this evening drawing the curtains closed. It had not mattered before, and he liked the presence of the garden at twilight, the birds, the fading of the sky, the occasional movement of leaves.

“Brought some papers that might be useful, sir,” Stoker replied. His voice and his eyes were perfectly steady, but the tension in his body, in the way he held his hands, betrayed to Narraway that he knew perfectly well the risk he was taking.

Narraway took the envelope from him, pulled out the papers, and glanced down at them, riffling through the pages swiftly to see what they were. Then he felt the breath tighten in his chest. They referred to an old case in Ireland, twenty years ago. The memory of it was powerful, for many reasons, and he was surprised how very sharply it returned.

It was as if he had last seen the people only a few days ago. He could remember the smell of the peat fire in the room where he and Kate had talked long into the night about the planned uprising. He could almost bring back the words he had used to persuade her it could only fail, and bring more death and more bitterness with it.

Even with his eyes open in his mind he could see Cormac O’Neil’s fury, and then his grief. He understood it. But for all its vividness, it had been twenty years ago.

He looked up at Stoker. “Why these?” he asked. “This case is old, it’s finished.”

“The Irish troubles are never finished,” Stoker said simply.

“Our more urgent problem is here now,” Narraway replied. “And possibly in Europe.”

“Socialists?” Stoker said drily. “They’re always grumbling on.”

“It’s a lot more than that,” Narraway told him. “They’re fanatic. It’s the new religion, with all the fire and evangelism of a holy cause. And just like Christianity in its infancy, it has its apostles and its dogma—and its splinter groups, quarrels over what is the true faith.”

Stoker looked puzzled, as if this were all true but irrelevant.

“The point,” Narraway said sharply, “is that they each consider the others to be heretics. They fight one another as much as they fight anyone else.”

“Thank God,” Stoker said with feeling.

“So when we see disciples of different factions meeting in secret, working together, then we know it is something damn big that has patched the rifts, temporarily.” Narraway heard the edge in his own voice, and saw the sudden understanding in Stoker’s eyes.

Stoker let out his breath slowly.

“How close are we to knowing what they’re planning, sir?”

“I don’t know,” Narraway admitted. “It all rests on Pitt now.”

“And you,” Stoker said softly. “We’ve got to sort this money thing out, sir, and get you back.”

Narraway drew in his breath to answer, and felt a sudden wave of conviction, a helplessness, a loss, an awareness of fear so profound that no words were adequate.

Stoker held out the papers he had brought. “We can’t afford to wait,” he said urgently. “I looked through everything I could that had to do with informants, money, and Ireland, trying to work out who’s behind this. This case seemed the most likely. Also, I’m pretty sure someone else has had these papers out recently.”

“Why?”

“Just the way they were put back,” Stoker answered.

“Untidy?”

“No, the opposite. Very neat indeed.”

Now Narraway was afraid for Stoker. He would lose his job for this; indeed, if he were caught, he could even be charged with treason himself. Regardless, he wanted to read the pages, but not with Stoker present. If this were the act of personal loyalty it seemed, or even loyalty to the truth, he did not want Stoker to take such a risk. It would be better for both of them not to be caught.

“Where did you get them?” he asked.

Stoker looked at him with a very slight smile. “Better you don’t know, sir.”

Narraway smiled back. “Then I can’t tell,” he agreed wryly.

Stoker nodded. “That too, sir.”

There was something about Stoker calling him sir that was stupidly pleasing, as if he were still who he had been this morning. Did he value such respect so much? How pathetic!

He swallowed hard and drew in his breath. “Leave them with me. Go home, where everyone expects you to be. Come back for them when it’s safe.”

“Sorry, sir, but they have to be back by dawn,” Stoker replied. “In fact, the sooner the better.”