Long Spoon Lane - Anne Perry [36]
He stepped inside and unlaced his boots without calling out to tell her he was home. There was no point in saying anything about Voisey if he decided not to ally with him. And if he accepted his offer, it would be far easier for Charlotte if she did not have to know. He told her the things that mattered; he always had. They had first met because of a murder. She was observant, wise, and she understood women as he never would. What was often more important in his investigations, she understood her own social class in a way that he, as an outsider, did not. Many times it had been her observation that had shown him some vital point, an anomaly, a motive, a pattern of thought.
Still, he protected her from some things, and the need to work with Voisey must be one of them. Not that he had made up his mind. He wanted to refuse. Every instinct was against it.
He walked softly down the corridor to the kitchen. The lights were on and he could hear the chink of crockery.
But every time he was on the brink of dismissing the idea of working with Voisey, Wetron’s smooth, passionless face came into his mind, and he knew that Voisey might be right about him. He might be playing for the ultimate police office, holding the law in his own hands, with the power to corrupt almost limitless. And perhaps allying with Voisey was the only way to defeat him.
He could never trust Voisey, of course! But could he use him, just for this one purpose? The gain was worth the risk. Or perhaps more honestly, the loss would be too great not to try.
He opened the kitchen door and went in.
All through supper he did not mention it, nor did he say anything about police corruption. Charlotte would hear the pain in him and it would hurt her too. She would know that all the words, the holding him in her arms, the gentleness and the trust would not alter the reality he still had to face.
When the meal was over and the plates cleared away he leaned back in his armchair in the parlor and watched her as she sat with her head bent. The lamplight on the side of her face cast the shadow of her lashes on her cheek. Her slender hands pulled the needle through the linen she was mending, and he was glad he had not disturbed her peace.
There was no sound in the room but the slight tick of her needle against the thimble as she stitched. The sight, the near silence but for the needle, and the faint whicker of the flames—it was uniquely, perfectly comfortable. It was safety, companionship, the kind of unspoken ease that was the real prize at the end of each day, more than food or warmth, more than time in which to do whatever he wished. It was the certainty that it all mattered. Whether they agreed or differed, they were on a crusade for something they both cared about. Victorious or defeated, full of energy or too tired to think, she was there with him.
It was stupid to frighten her with the prospect of working with Voisey, or the ugliness of police corruption. And anyway, if he thought about it carefully, with judgment, weighed all the possibilities, he might find another, better solution.
Jack Radley would be the person to ask. He was Pitt’s brother-in-law, the husband of Charlotte’s sister Emily. He was a member of Parliament also, and gaining in experience. Pitt would go to the House of Commons in the morning and ask him. Tonight he put the matter out of his mind, and let the warmth deepen inside him, driving out everything else.
“Tanqueray,” Jack said with an edge to his voice. He had chosen to meet Pitt not in his office, where he might be interrupted by clerks, Parliament officials, and other members, but outside on the terrace overlooking the river. With their backs to the great Gothic palace of Westminster and the tower of Big Ben, they would look like anyone else, and might largely escape recognition.
“Is it true?” Pitt asked quietly. A couple