Ashworth Hall - Anne Perry [9]
“He’s been threatened,” Pitt agreed quietly. “And there has been at least one attempt.”
Tellman was unimpressed. “Did more than ‘attempt’ to poor Denbigh, didn’t they? Or don’t that matter anymore?”
The room was so quiet Pitt could hear the scribbling of the sergeant’s quill on the paper. It was cold, so the windows were closed against the noises of the street. Beyond the door two men were talking in the passageway, their words inaudible, only the murmur of voices coming through the heavy wood. “This is the same case, only the other end of it,” he said grimly. “The politician concerned is involved in the Irish Problem, and this weekend is an attempt at least to begin a solution. It is extremely important that there be no violence.” He smiled at Tellman’s challenging eyes. “Whatever you think of him personally, if he can bring Ireland a single step closer to peace, he’s worth the effort to preserve.”
The ghost of a smile flickered over Tellman’s face.
“I suppose so,” he said grudgingly. “Why us? Why not local police? They’d be far better at it. Know the area, know the locals. Spot a stranger where we wouldn’t. I’m good at solving murders once they’ve happened, and I want to catch the bastard who killed Denbigh. I dunno a thing about preventing one at political parties. And with respect, Mr. Pitt, neither do you!” He put the “with respect” into his words, but there was not a shred of it in his voice. His next question betrayed his thoughts. “I suppose you agreed to it? Didn’t ask for it, did you?”
“No, I didn’t. And it was an order,” Pitt replied with a smile which was at least half a baring of the teeth. “I have no choice but to obey orders given me by a superior, just as you have now, Tellman.”
This time Tellman’s amusement was real.
“Run out on Denbigh, are we, and going to skulk around some lordship’s house instead, keeping an eye on peddlers and footpads and strangers lurking in the flower beds? A bit beneath the superintendent o’ Bow Street Station, isn’t it … sir?”
“Actually,” Pitt replied, “the party is to be held at my sister-in-law’s country house, Ashworth Hall. I shall be going as a guest. That is why it has to be me. Otherwise I should stay here on the Denbigh case and send someone else.”
Very slowly Tellman looked up and down Pitt’s lanky, untidy figure, his well-tailored jacket pulled out of shape by the number of odd articles stuffed into his pockets, his clean white shirt with tie slightly askew, and his hair curling and overlong.
His face was almost expressionless. “Oh, yes?”
“And you will be going as my valet,” Pitt added.
“What?”
The sergeant dropped his pen and splurted ink all over the page.
“You will be going as my valet,” Pitt repeated, keeping all emotion from his voice.
For an instant Tellman thought he was joking, exercising his rather unreliable sense of humor.
“Don’t you think I need one?” Pitt smiled.
“You need a damn sight more than a valet!” Tellman snapped back, reading his eyes and realizing suddenly that he meant it. “You need a bleedin’ magician!”
Pitt straightened up, squared his shoulders and pulled his lapels roughly level with each other.
“Unfortunately, I shall have to make do with you, which will be a grave social disadvantage. But you might be more use to the politician concerned—at least in saving his life, if not his sartorial standards.”
Tellman glared at him.
Pitt smiled cheerfully. “You will report to my home by seven o’clock on Thursday morning in a plain dark suit.” He glanced down at Tellman’s feet. “And new boots, if those you are wearing are all you have. Bring with you clean linen for six days.”
Tellman stuck out his lean jaw.
“Is that an order?”
Pitt raised his eyebrows very high. “Good heavens, do you think I’d be taking you if it weren’t?”
“When?” Charlotte Pitt said in incredulity when she was told. “When did you say?”
“This coming weekend,” Pitt repeated, looking very slightly abashed.
“That’s impossible!”
They were standing in the parlor of their