No Graves as Yet_ A Novel - Anne Perry [33]
The cold ran through him. Was that it? In the quiet office someone had overheard him? That had been enough. Who? He tried to recall who else had been there, but one late night blended into another. He had heard footsteps, voices deliberately kept low so as not to disturb others. He might not have recognized them then; he certainly could not now.
But he could find out, discreetly. He could at least trace the possibly treasonous behavior among his own colleagues—when even a week ago he would have trusted them all without hesitation.
When he arrived in the morning everything was familiar: the cramped spaces, the echoing wooden floor, the black telephones, the dust motes in the air, the worn surfaces, and the harsh desk lamps, unnecessary now in the sunlight through the windows. Clerks bustled back and forth, shirtsleeves grimy from endless papers and ink, collars stiff and often a trifle crooked.
They wished him good morning and offered their condolences, shy and awkward and, for all he could see, intensely sincere. He thanked them and went to his own small room, where books were wedged into too small a case and papers were locked in drawers. The inkwell and blotting papers were just as usual, not quite straight on his desk, two pens lying beside them. The blotting paper was clean. He never left anything that might be decipherable.
He fished for his keys to unlock the top drawer. At first it did not slide in easily, but took a moment of fiddling. He bent to look more closely, and that was when he saw the finest of scratches on the metal around the keyhole. It had not been there when he left. So someone had searched here, too.
He sat down, his thoughts racing, clouded and skewed by guilt. There was no doubt left in him that it was his words overheard that had sent the assassin after John and Alys Reavley.
His desk was piled with more and more information on the Curragh Mutiny. It was Thursday, July 9, before Calder Shearing sent for him and Matthew reported to his office a little after four o’clock. Like all rooms in the Intelligence Service, it was sparsely furnished, nothing more than the necessities, and those as cheap as possible, but Shearing had added nothing of his own, no family pictures, no personal books or mementos. His papers and volumes for work were untidily stacked, but he knew the precise place of every one of them.
Shearing was not a tall man, but he had a presence more commanding than mere size. His black hair was receding considerably, but one barely noticed it because his brows were heavy and expressive and his eyes were dark and thick-lashed. His jutting nose was a perfect curve and his mouth sensitive, if unsmiling.
He regarded Matthew, assessing his recovery from bereavement and hence his fitness for duty. His question was only a matter of courtesy.
“How are you, Reavley? All matters taken care of?”
“For the time being, sir,” Matthew answered, standing to attention.
“Again, are you all right?” Shearing repeated.
“Yes, sir, thank you.”
Shearing looked at him a moment longer, then was apparently satisfied. “Good. Sit down. I expect you have caught up with the news? The king of the Belgians is on a state visit to Switzerland, which might be of significance but is more probably a routine affair. Yesterday the government said it might accept the House of Lords’ amendment to the Home Rule bill, excluding Ulster.”
Matthew had heard the news, but no details. “Peace in Ireland?” he asked, slightly sarcastically.
Shearing looked up at him, his expression incredulous. “If that’s what you think, you’d better take more leave. You’re obviously not fit for work!”
“Well, a step in the right direction?” Matthew amended.
Shearing pulled his mouth into a thin line. “God knows! I can’t see a partition in Ireland helping anyone. But neither will anything else.”
Matthew’s mind raced. Was that what the conspiracy document concerned—dividing Ireland into two countries, one independent Catholic, the other Protestant and still part of Britain? Even the suggestion of it had already brought