Seven Dials - Anne Perry [137]
“The commanding officer,” Sandeman answered. “General Garrick. The place burned like an inferno, but there must have been something left.” He swallowed. His face was sheened with sweat. “Anyone looking at them would know they died of gunshots, and it couldn’t have been an accident.”
“Who else knows about it?” Narraway asked, his voice wavering.
“No one,” Sandeman replied. “General Garrick covered it up, and the imam buried the bodies. They were all wrapped up in shrouds, and he conducted all the appropriate prayers and rites.”
“And that is what drove Stephen Garrick mad?” Narraway continued. “Guilt? Or fear somebody one day would come after him for vengeance?”
“Guilt,” Sandeman replied without hesitation. “In his nightmares he relived it. It was the men and women we murdered who came after him.”
Narraway stared back at him, unblinking. “And you, do the dead pursue you as well?”
“No,” Sandeman replied, meeting his eyes, hollow and haunted by pain, but unflinching. “I let them catch me. I admitted my guilt. I can’t ever undo what I did, but I shall spend whatever is left of my life trying to give back something. And if whoever killed Lovat comes after me, they will find me here. If they kill me, then so be it. If you want to arrest me, I shan’t resist you. I think I am of more use here than at the end of a rope, but I shan’t argue the case.”
Charlotte could feel the ache in her chest tighten so hard it almost stopped her breathing.
“God is your judge, not I,” Narraway said simply. “But if I need you again, you would be wise to be here.”
“I shall be,” Sandeman answered.
“And repeat this to no one else,” Narraway added, his voice suddenly harsher than before, a note of threat in it. “I make a very bad enemy, Mr. Sandeman. And if you whisper even a word of this story to any man alive, I shall find you, and the end of the noose would seem very attractive to you in comparison with what I will do.”
Sandeman’s eyes widened. “Good God! Do you think it is something I repeat willingly?”
“I’ve known men who tell their crimes over and over, seeking absolution for them,” Narraway replied. “If you repeat this, it may cost a thousand times as many lives as you have already taken. If you feel tempted to seek some kind of release by confession, remember that.”
A look of irony as deep cutting as a knife to the heart covered Sandeman’s face. “I believe you,” he said. “I imagine that is why you do not arrest me.”
An answering flash softened in Narraway, but only for a moment. “Oh . . . and mercy also,” he responded. “Or perhaps it is justice? What could anyone else do to you that will equal the honesty with which you punish yourself?” He turned and walked very slowly back across the hallway towards the outside door, and Pitt took Charlotte by the arm. She tugged away from him long enough to look at Sandeman, to smile at him and know that he had seen her and understood, then she allowed herself to be led outside as well.
None of them spoke until they reached Seven Dials itself, and turned along Little Earl Street towards Shaftesbury Avenue.
It was Charlotte who broke the silence. “Surely the murder of Lovat has to be connected with this?” she said, looking at one then the other of them.
Narraway’s face was blank. “For it to be otherwise would be a coincidence to beggar belief,” he answered. “But that does not take away our difficulty. In fact, it adds a dimension so appalling it would be better to allow Ryerson to hang than to—” He stopped because Pitt had grasped hold of him and swung him around so sharply Charlotte almost collided with them both.
Narraway took Pitt’s hand off his arm with a strength that amazed Pitt and made him wince.
“The alternative,” Narraway said between his teeth, “is to allow the truth to be brought out—and see the whole of Egypt go up in revolt. After the Orabi rising, the bombardment of Alexandria, then Khartoum and the Mahdi, the place is like tinder. One spark and it could all ignite. We would lose the Suez Canal, and with it not only trade in Egypt but in