Treason at Lisson Grove - Anne Perry [17]
“Who?” Croxdale asked.
“Pieter Linsky and Jacob Meister,” Narraway replied.
Croxdale stiffened, straightening up a little, his face keen with interest. “Really? Then perhaps not all is lost.” He lowered his voice. “Tell me, Narraway, do you still believe there is some major action planned?”
“Yes,” Narraway said without hesitation. “I think West’s murder removes any doubt. He would have told us what it was, and probably who else was involved.”
“Damn! Well you must keep Pitt there, and the other chap, what’s his name?”
“Gower.”
“Yes, Gower too. Give them all the funds they need. I’ll see to it that that meets no opposition.”
“Of course,” Narraway said with some surprise. He had always had complete authority to disburse the funds in his care as he saw fit.
Croxdale pursed his lips and leaned farther forward. “It is not quite so simple, Narraway,” he said gravely. “We have been looking into the matter of past funds and their use, in connection with other cases, as I daresay you know.” He interlaced his fingers and looked down at them a moment, then up again quickly. “Mulhare’s death has raised some ugly questions, which I’m afraid have to be answered.”
Narraway was stunned. He had not realized the matter had already gone as far as Croxdale, and before he had even had a chance to look into it more deeply, and prove his own innocence. Was that Austwick’s doing again? Damn the man.
“It will be,” he said now to Croxdale. “I kept certain movements of the funds secret, to protect Mulhare. They’d have killed him instantly if they’d known he received English money.”
“Isn’t that rather what happened?” Croxdale asked ruefully.
Narraway thought for a moment of denying it. They knew who had killed Mulhare, but it was only proof they lacked; the deduction was certain in his own mind. But he did not need another moral evasion. His life was too full of shadows. He would not allow Croxdale to provoke him into another. “Yes.”
“We failed him, Narraway,” Croxdale said sadly.
“Yes.”
“How did that happen?” Croxdale pressed.
“He was betrayed.”
“By whom?”
“I don’t know. When this socialist threat is dealt with, I shall find out, if I can.”
“If you can,” Croxdale said gently. “Do you doubt it? You have no idea who it was here in London?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“But you used the word betrayed,” Croxdale persisted. “I think advisedly so. Does that not concern you urgently, Narraway? Whom can you trust, in any Irish issue?—of which, God knows, there are more than enough.”
“The European socialist revolutionaries are our most urgent concern now, sir.” Narraway also leaned forward. “There is a high degree of violence threatened. Men like Linsky, Meister, la Pointe, Corazath, are all quick to use guns and dynamite. Their philosophy is that a few deaths are the price they have to pay for the greater freedom and equality of the people. As long, of course, as the deaths are not their own,” he added drily.
“Does that take precedence over treachery among your own people?” He left it hanging in the air between them, a question that demanded answering.
Narraway had seen the death of Mulhare as tragic, but less urgent than the threat of the broader socialist plot that loomed. He knew how he had guarded the provenance of the money, and did not know how someone had made the funds appear to return to Narraway’s own personal account. Above all he did not know who was responsible, or whether it was done through incompetence—or deliberately in order to make him look a thief.
“I’m not yet certain it was betrayal, sir. Perhaps I used the word hastily.” He kept his voice as level as he could; still, there was a certain roughness to it. He hoped Croxdale’s less sensitive ear did not catch it.
Croxdale was staring at him. “As opposed to what?”
“Incompetence,” Narraway replied. “And this time we covered the tracks of the transfers very carefully, so no one in Ireland would be able to trace