Belgrave Square - Anne Perry [134]
“But he liked you?” Emily pressed with a fine grasp of what was important. “What did he say? Jack, don’t keep us in suspense!”
His smile broadened. “He invited me to join a most select society which does a great deal of good work, often secretly. They provide funds for many charities, strive to fight inequity and injustice, even some of the more dangerous and ugly facets of crime.”
“It sounds excellent!” Emily was enthusiastic. “Are you going to join?”
“No!” Charlotte said with vehemence so sharp both Jack and Emily turned to her with incredulity. “No,” she said more moderately. “You must know a great deal more about it before you join anything.”
“Charlotte! It is a society wholly dedicated to doing good,” Emily said reasonably. “What could possibly be wrong with that?” She turned around to Jack again. “Isn’t it?”
“Yes of course it is,” Jack agreed. “And from what Lord Anstiss says, it would be the most powerful single step I could take to ensure the support of those who really matter in the political and social world.”
Charlotte wanted to muster an argument, but all she could think of was Pitt’s fears for Micah Drummond, his misery over the corruption he had uncovered, and the deeper corruption he so far only suspected.
“And what do they want from you in return?” she demanded. “What loyalty? What sacrifice of your independence, perhaps in time of your conscience?”
“Nothing.” Jack was surprised and mildly amused. “It is a society for doing good, Charlotte!”
“But secret?” she persisted.
“Not secret,” he corrected. “Discreet. Surely that is how charity should be, done quietly, modestly and without seeking recognition?”
“Yes.” She was reluctant to admit it not because what he said was untrue, but because she feared so much more. “But Jack, there may be other things. Thomas is dealing with a society at the moment …”
Emily looked at her with skepticism. “He is investigating the murder of a usurer, you told me.”
“Yes, but he has uncovered a society as well …” She was out of her depth and floundering. She was not prepared to tell them of the police corruption. It was too indefinite in form as yet, and too painful. In some basic way she felt it reflected on Pitt, on his profession, and she did not wish them to know if it could be avoided.
“London is full of societies,” Jack said more quietly, aware that her concern for him was real. “This one is very honorable, I promise you.”
“What is it called?”
“I don’t know—Anstiss did not tell me.”
“Be careful.”
“I will be. I give you my word.” He stood up. “Now it is past time Emily went to bed, and you too I am sure. Would you prefer to go home in the carriage now, or stay here until morning and go then? You are very welcome, you know, always.”
“Thank you, but I will go now. I would prefer to be there when Thomas leaves in the morning.”
Jack smiled and took Emily’s hand in his. “Then good night, my dear.”
Pitt listened as he had breakfast to all that Charlotte related to him of the evening before, which was only impressions of conversation, emotions and fears, and the conviction that Micah Drummond had learned to love Eleanor Byam, with all the pain and conflict that that meant. She did not mention Anstiss’s invitation to Jack to join the society. She would not burden him with that yet.
Pitt did not say anything, but he knew she understood his silence. He kissed her, long and gently, and went out into the hot, dusty street to find an omnibus and travel slowly to Scotland Yard and resume his investigations of Latimer’s cases. From there he spent a miserable day going from one old underworld source to another, through filthy alleys, up steps of rotting wood into rookeries where rats scuttled at the sound of his feet, squeaking, their claws rattling on the boards and their little eyes red in the shadows. Refuse lay heaped in slowly sagging piles and the gutters stank in the heat. He swatted ineffectually at some of the flies, and gave all