Free Betrayal at Lisson Grove by Anne Perry Page A

could leave well before dawn.
    Narraway knocked on the spare-room door and heard Stoker’s voice answer him. By the time he had opened the door Stoker was standing beside the bed. In the light from the landing it was clear that the quilt was barely ruffled. One swift movement of the hand and it was as if he had never been there.
    Stoker looked at Narraway questioningly.
    ‘Thank you,’ Narraway said quietly, the emotion in his voice more naked than he had meant it to be.
    ‘It told you something,’ Stoker observed.
    ‘Several things,’ Narraway admitted. ‘Someone else has been judiciously editing the account since Buckleigh wrote his marginal notes, altering the meaning very slightly, but enough to make a difference.’
    Stoker came out of the room and Narraway handed him the envelope. Stoker put it under his jacket where it could not be seen, but he did not fold it, or tuck it into his belt so the edges could be damaged. It was a reminder of the risk he was taking in having it at all. He looked very directly at Narraway.
    ‘Austwick has taken your place, sir.’
    ‘Already?’
    ‘Yes, sir. Mr Pitt’s over the Channel, you’ve no friends at Lisson Grove any more. At least not who’ll risk anything for you. It’s every man for himself,’ Stoker said grimly. ‘I’m afraid there’s no one for sure who’ll help Mr Pitt either, if he gets cut off, or in any kind of trouble.’
    ‘I know that,’ Narraway said with deep unhappiness over the fact that he could no longer protect Pitt also from the envy or distrust of those who were part of the Establishment before Narraway took him on.
    Stoker hesitated as if he would say something else, then changed his mind. He nodded silently, and went down the stairs to the sitting room. He felt his way across the floor without lighting the gaslamps. He opened the french doors and slipped out into the wind and the darkness.
    Narraway locked the door behind him and went back upstairs. He undressed and went to bed, but lay awake, staring up at the ceiling. He had left the curtains open and gradually the faintest softening of the spring night made a break in the shadows across the ceiling. The glimmer was almost invisible, just enough to tell him there was movement, light beyond.
    Only a matter of hours had passed since Austwick had come into Narraway’s office. Narraway had thought little enough of it: a nuisance, no more. Then Croxdale had sent for him, and everything had changed. It was like going down a steep flight of stairs, and finding the last step was not there. You were plunged into a void, arms flailing, and there was nothing at all to catch on to.
    He lay until daylight, realising with a pain that amazed him how much of himself he had lost. He was used to getting up whether he had slept or not. Duty was a relentless mistress, but suddenly he knew also that she was a constant companion, loyal, appreciative, above all never meaningless.
    Without her he was naked, even to himself, let alone to others. He was accustomed to being not particularly liked. He had had too much power for that, and he knew too many secrets. But he had never before not been needed.

Chapter Three

    Charlotte sat by the fire in the parlour alone, her armchair opposite Pitt’s. It was early evening. The children were in bed. There was no sound except now and then the settling of ashes as the wood burned through. Occasionally she picked up a piece of the mending that was waiting to be done – a couple of pillowcases, a pinafore of Jemima’s. More often she simply stared at the fire. She missed Pitt, but she understood the necessity of his having pursued whoever it was to France. She also missed Gracie, the maid who had lived with them since she was thirteen and, now in her twenties, had finally married the police sergeant who had courted her so diligently for years.
    Charlotte took up the pinafore and began stitching the hem where it had fallen, doing it almost as much by feel as by sight. The