Once in the street again and the bright sharp wind and the sun, she ran down towards the place where the omnibuses stopped. Now she must go back home and catch up with some of her work. And with luck, Tellman would come this evening and she could tell him what she had found out. He would be impressed-very impressed. She was singing a little song to herself as she stood in the queue.
“You went where?” Tellman demanded, his thin face pale, his jaw tight.
“ Cleveland Street,” Gracie replied, pouring the tea. “I’ll follow Remus tomorrow.”
“You won’t! You’ll stay here and do the work you’re supposed to do, where you’re safe!” he retorted harshly, leaning forward across the table. There were shadows under his eyes and a smudge on his cheek. She had never seen him look so tired.
He was certainly not going to tell her what she could or could not do… but on the other hand, it gave her a pleasant, warm, almost comfortable feeling that he was concerned that she not be in danger. She could hear the edge of fear in his voice and knew that it was real. It might make him furious, and he might very well deny it the next minute, but he cared very much what happened to her. It was in his eyes, and she recognized it with a little bubble of pleasure.
“Don’t yer wanna ’ear wot I found out?” she asked, aching to tell him.
“What?” he said grudgingly, sipping the tea.
“There were a girl called Annie Crook, ’oo were the daughter o’ William Crook wot died in St. Pancras.” Her words fell over each other. “An’ she were kidnapped from the tobacconist’s in Cleveland Street about five year ago and took ter Guy’s ’Ospital, w’ere the poor creature were called mad, an’ no one ever seed ’er again.” She had the cake out but in her excitement she had forgotten to cut him a slice. “It were somebody called Sir William wot said as she were mad, an’ ’e couldn’t ’elp ’er no more. An’ someone else just asked about ’er too. I reckon as that were Remus. An’ that’s not all! There were a young man kidnapped from the artist’s place in Cleveland Street the same time, a real fine-lookin’ feller wi’ good clothes, a gentleman. ’E were taken out kickin’ an’ struggling poor soul.”
“Do you know who he was?” He was too elated with the information to remember his anger-or the cake. “Any idea at all?”
“The lad at the pipe-maker’s thought ’e were Annie’s lover,” she answered. “But ’e don’t know fer sure. But ’e said as she were a decent girl, Catholic, an’ I shouldn’t spread scandal about ’er, ’cos it wouldn’t be right or true.” She took a deep breath. “Maybe their families did it ’cos she were Catholic an’ ’e weren’t?”
“What could that have to do with Adinett?” He frowned, pursing his lips.
“I dunno yet. Gimme a chance!” she protested. “But there’s a lot o’ people wot’s off their ’eads, poor devils. There’s the feller wot died up in Northampton too. D’yer reckon as there’s madness somewhere where it really matters, then? Maybe Mr. Fetters knew about it too?”
He was quiet for several minutes. “Maybe,” he said at last, but there was no lift in his voice.
“Yer scared, in’t yer?” she said softly. “That mebbe it don’t ’ave nothin’ ter do wi’ Mr. Pitt, an’ we aren’t ’elpin’ ’im?” She wished she could say something to comfort him, but it was the truth, and they were in it together, neither pretending.
He was on the point of denying it; she could see it in his face as he drew in his breath. Then he changed his mind.
“Yes,” he admitted. “Remus thinks he’s on a big story, and I wish I believed it was the reason Adinett killed Fetters. But I can’t see any way Fetters fits into it at all.”
“We will!” she said determinedly, breaking the rule she had just made for herself. “ ’ Cos, ’e must ’a done it fer some reason, an’ we’ll go on until we find out wot it is.”
He smiled. “Gracie, you don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said softly, but the light in his eyes denied his words.
“Yeah, I do,” she argued, and she leaned forward and kissed him very lightly, then drew back quickly and picked up the knife to cut the cake for him, looking away. She did not see the color rush up his face or his hand tremble so hard he had to leave his cup on the table in case he spilled it.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Pitt continued to work at the silk weaver’s and to run as many errands as possible, watching and listening. At night now and then he took a watch at the sugar factory, standing under the shadow of the huge building and hearing the steady hiss of steam from the boilers, kept going around the clock, and the occasional clatter of footsteps across the cobbles. The smell of the waste washed off the syrup filled the darkness like an oversweet rot.
Occasionally he patrolled inside, carrying a lantern along the low passages, hunting the shadows, listening to the myriad small movements. He exchanged a little gossip, but he was an outsider. He would have to be here years before he would be accepted, trusted without question.
Increasingly he heard the ugliness of anger under the surface of what appeared casual conversation. It was everywhere: in the factory, in the streets, in the shops and public houses. A few years ago it would have been a good-natured complaining; now there was an undertone of violence in it, a rage close under the surface.
But the thing that frightened him the most was the hope that flashed every now and again among men sitting and brooding over a pint of ale, the whispers that things would soon change. They were not victims of fate but protagonists who governed their own lives.
He was also aware how many different kinds of people there were in Spitalfields, refugees from all over Europe fleeing one kind of persecution or another, financial, racial, religious or political. He heard a dozen languages spoken, saw faces of every cast and color.
On the fifteenth of June, the day after a series of poisonings in Lambeth occupied all the headlines, he arrived back late and tired at Heneagle Street to find Isaac waiting for him. His face was strained with anxiety and his eyes were shadowed as if he had slept little in many nights.
Pitt had developed a considerable affection for him, apart from the fact that Narraway had trusted him with Pitt’s safety. He was an intelligent man, well-read, and he liked to talk. Perhaps because Pitt did not belong to Spitalfields, he enjoyed their time after dinner when Leah was in the kitchen or had gone to bed. They argued over all manner of philosophy and belief. Pitt learned much from him of the history of his people in Russia and Poland. Sometimes Isaac told the tale with a wry, self-mocking humor. Often it was unimaginably tragic.
Tonight he obviously wished to talk, but not in the general way of conversation.
“Leah is out,” he said with a shrug, his dark eyes watching Pitt’s face. “Sarah Levin is sick and she has gone to be with her. She has left dinner for us, but it’s cold.”
Pitt smiled at him, following him into the small room where the table was set ready. The polished wood and the unique aromas were already familiar to him, Leah’s embroidery on the linen, the picture of Isaac as a young man, the matchstick model of a Polish synagogue just a trifle crooked with age.
They had barely sat down to it when Isaac began talking.
“I’m glad you went to work for Saul,” he remarked, cutting a slice of bread for Pitt and one for himself. “But you shouldn’t be at that sugar factory at nights. It’s not a good place.”
Pitt knew him well enough now to be aware that this was only an opening gambit. There was far more to follow.
“Saul is a good man.” Pitt took the bread. “Thank you. And I like going around the neighborhood. But I see a different side of things at the factory.”