Traitors Gate - Anne Perry [138]
It was after nine o’clock when Pitt stood in Ransley Soames’s hallway. The butler looked at him with curiosity.
“I am afraid it is a matter which cannot wait,” Pitt said gravely. He had brought Tellman with him, in case the scene became uglier than he could handle alone, but he had left him outside, reluctant to call him unless it became unavoidable.
“I will see if Mr. Soames is able to receive you,” the butler replied. It was not the customary euphemism, but it served the same purpose.
He was gone only a few moments and returned with an expressionless face.
“If you care to come this way, sir, Mr. Soames will see you in the study.”
But actually it was a further ten minutes before Soames appeared. Pitt waited in the quiet, pale green room set with ornate furniture, too many pictures and photographs, and a potted plant which had been overwatered. Normally he might have looked at the bookcases. They were usually indicative of a man’s character and interests. But today he could not concentrate his mind on more than the immediate future. He saw two rather idealistic books concerning Africa. One was a novel by H. Rider Haggard, the other a collection of letters from a missionary.
The door opened and Soames came in, closing it behind him. He looked mildly irritated, but not concerned.
“How may I help you, Mr. Pitt?” he said tersely. “I imagine it is urgent, or you would not have come to my home on a Saturday morning.”
“Yes, Mr. Soames, it is,” Pitt acknowledged. “There is no pleasant way of dealing with this, so I shall be direct. I have cause, sir, to know that it is you who has been passing financial information from the Treasury to someone in the Colonial Office, for them to pass on to the German Embassy.”
The blood rushed scarlet to Soames’s face, and then after a moment of terrible silence, fled, leaving him pasty white. He opened his mouth to say something, perhaps a denial, but the words died on his tongue. He might have had some conception of the guilt in his face, and how futile, even ridiculous, such a denial would be.
“It—it’s not …” he began, and then faltered to a stop. “You don’t understand,” he said wretchedly. “It’s not …”
“No,” Pitt agreed. “I don’t.”
“It is not accurate information!” Soames looked as if he were in danger of fainting, his skin was so white, and there was a chill sweat standing out on his lip and brow. “It was to mislead Germany!”
Pitt hovered for a moment on the edge of believing him, then realized how easy that was to say, and how unlikely.
“Indeed,” he said coldly. “Perhaps you will give me the names of the government ministers who are aware of this. Regrettably they do not include the Foreign Secretary, the Colonial Secretary, or the Prime Minister.”
“It was not done … like … like that.” Soames looked agonized and his eyes were desperate, and yet there was somewhere a shred of honesty in them. Was it a terrified last attempt to convince himself?
“Then you had better explain precisely how it was done, and who else is involved,” Pitt suggested.
“But you know …” Soames stared at him, for the first time realizing that he did not know just how much Pitt was aware of, nor had he so far explained how he had learned it.
“If it is not what I think, Mr. Soames, then you will have to tell me precisely what it is,” Pitt said, retrenching his position quickly. “It looks to me like simple treason, the handing over of privileged government information to someone you knew would pass it to Britain’s enemies, or at best rivals. What consideration you received in return is a matter yet to be discovered.”
“None!” Soames was indignant. “Good God, there is … that is a heinous suggestion! I passed on information to a man of subtlety and brilliance who distorted it just sufficiently to be misleading, but not so much as to be unbelievable. Not against Britain’s interests, but very much to preserve them, in both East and Central Africa, but also in the North Sea. I would not expect you to understand….”
“Heligoland,” Pitt said succinctly.
Soames was transparently surprised. “Yes. Yes, that is right.