Bedford Square (29 page)

Treadwell shook his head. “Yer never bin army, ’ave yer?” There was pity in his tone, and a certain kind of protective-ness, as of the world’s innocents. “Yer don’ show up one o’ yer own, even if ’e looks for it. Loyalty. The Major’d never a’ done that. One o’ the old sort, ’e were. Take wot comes ter ’im an’ never complain. I seen ’im so wore out ’e were near
droppin’ ter the ground, but ’e jus’ kep’ goin’. Wouldn’t let the men down, yer see? That’s wot bein’ an officer is abaht, them wot’s any good. Yer always gotta be that bit better’n others, or ’ow could they foller yer?”

There was a bellow of laughter from the open door of the public tearoom.

Tellman frowned. “Did you like him?” he asked.

To Treadwell it was an incomprehensible question.

“Wot d’yer mean … ‘like ’im’? ’e were the Major. Yer don’ ‘like’ officers. Yer either love ’em or ’ate ’em. Yer like’ friends, fellers wot yer marches beside, not them as yer follers.”

Tellman knew the answer before he asked; still, he needed to hear it in words.

“Did you love or hate the Major?”

Treadwell shook his head. “If I din’t see yer face, I’d reckon you was simple! In’t I just bin tellin’ yer, ’e were one o’the best?”

Tellman was confused. He could not disbelieve Treadwell; the light in his eyes was too clear, and the amusement at an outsider’s failure to grasp what was so plain to him.

Tellman thanked him and took his leave. What had happened to Balantyne in the intervening years which had made him the stiff and solitary man he was now? Why was Treadwell’s view of him so … unrecognizable?

The next soldier he found was one William Sturton, another ordinary man, who had risen through long service to the rank of sergeant and was immensely proud of it. He was stiff with rheumatism now, and his white hair and whiskers shone in the dappled shade as he sat on the park bench, eager to talk, remembering the glories of the past with this young man who knew nothing and was so happy to listen.

“ ’Course I remember Colonel Balantyne,” he said with a lift of his chin, after Tellman had introduced himself. “It were ’im as led us w’en we rode inter Lucknow after the Mutiny. Never seen anyfink like it.” His face was set hard as he strove to control the anguish of memory that tore him even now. Tellman could not imagine what lay in his inward vision. He
knew poverty, crime and disease; he knew the ravages of cholera in the slums, and freezing corpses of the beggars and the old and the children who lived in the streets. He knew all the agony inflicted by helplessness and indifference. But he had never seen war. Individual murders were one thing; the carnage of mass destruction was beyond his knowledge. He could only guess, and watch the sergeant’s face.

“You went in …” he prompted.

“Yeah.” Sturton was looking beyond him, his eyes misted over. “It was seein’ the women and children that got me. I’m used ter seein’ men cut ter pieces.”

“Colonel Balantyne,” Tellman said, forcing him back to the issue. He did not want to hear the other details. He had read about it, been told in school, enough to know he dreaded it.

A thread of breeze stirred the leaves, making a sound like waves on a shore. Away in the distance a woman laughed.

“Never forget the Colonel’s face.” Sturton was lost in the past. He was in India, not the milder heat of an English summer afternoon. “Looked like death ’isself, ’e did. Thought ’e were gonna fall orff ’is horse. Stumbled w’en ’e got orff. Knees fair wobbled w’en ’e walked over ter the first pile o’ corpses. ’E’d seen plenty o’ death on the battlefield, but this were different.”

In spite of himself, Tellman tried to imagine it, and felt sick. He wondered what Balantyne’s emotions had been, how deep? He looked like such a stiff, cold man now.

“What did he do?” he asked.

Sturton did not look at him. His mind was still in Lucknow thirty-four years before.

“We was all took bad at it,” he said quietly. “The Colonel took charge. ’e was white as death an “is voice were shakin’, but ’e told us all wot ter do, ’ow ter search the buildings ter make sure there weren’t no ambushes. Ter see if there were anyone ’iding, like.” There was fierce pride in his voice, faraway things remembered, and the fact that he had done his duty and survived into these softer times. “Secure the bounds, put a watch in case they returned,” he went on, not looking at Tellman beside him. “ ’e sent the youngest fer
that … keep ’em out o’ the way o’ the dead. Some of us was took pretty ’ard by it. Like I said, it were the women, some of ’em wi’ babes even. ’e went ’round ’isself to see if any of ’em was still alive, like. Gawd knows ’ow ’e did it. I couldn’t a’. But then that’s w’y ’e’s a colonel an’ I in’t.”

“He was a colonel because his father bought his commission,” Tellman said, then instantly and without knowing why, wished he hadn’t.

Sturton looked at him with patient contempt. His face was eloquent that he considered Tellman beneath explaining to.

“You dunno nuffink about duty or loyalty or nuffink else, or yer wouldn’t say such a damn stupid thing,” he retorted. “Colonel Balantyne were the sort o’ man we’d a’ followed any place ’e’d a’ gorn, an’ proud ter do it. ’e ’elped us bury the dead, and stood over the graves and said the prayers for ’em. Even on ’ot nights if I shut me eyes I can still ’ear ’is voice sayin’ them words. Never wept, ’course ’e wouldn’t, but it were all there in his face, all that ’orror.” He sighed deeply and remained silent for several moments.

This time Tellman did not venture to interrupt. He was full of strange and troubling emotions. He tried to imagine the General as a younger man, a man with an inner life of emotions, anger, pain, pity, all masked with a mighty effort because it was his duty, and he must lead the men, never let them doubt him or see weakness, for their sakes. It was not the Balantyne he had believed he knew.

“So wot d’yer want ter know about the Colonel for, then?” Sturton burst across his thoughts. “I in’t gonna tell yer nuffink agin ’im. In’t nothing ter tell. If yer think as ’e done suffink wrong, yer daft … even dafter an’ more iggerant than I took yer for, an that’s saying a lot.”

Tellman took the reproach without argument, because he was too confused to justify himself.

“No …” he said slowly. “No, I don’t think so. I’m looking for someone who is trying to hurt him … an enemy.” He saw the look of anger on Sturton’s face. “Possibly from the Abyssinian Campaign, perhaps not.”

“Yer got any idea wot yer doin’?” Sturton said disgustedly. “Wot kind o’enemy?”

“Someone vicious enough to try to attempt blackmail with a false story,” Tellman answered, then was afraid perhaps he had betrayed too much. He felt as if any step he took he was on uncertain ground. Suddenly everything was shifting beneath his feet.

“Then yer’d better find ’im!” Sturton said furiously. “An’ soon! I’ll ’elp yer!” He stiffened as if to move and begin straightaway.

Tellman hesitated. Why not? He could use any expert help he could obtain. “All right,” he accepted. “I need to know anything you find out about the attack on the supply train at Arogee. That’s the event that’s being lied about.”

“Right!” Sturton agreed. “Bow Street, yer said. I’ll be there.”

Tellman spent the next two days discreetly following Balantyne himself. It was not difficult, since Balantyne went out very little and was so deep in thought as never to look to either side of himself, far less behind. Tellman could have been striding step by step with him and probably not have been noticed.

The first time the General went out in a carriage with his wife, a dark, handsome woman Tellman found intimidating. He was very careful not to catch her eye, even by accident. He wondered what had made Balantyne choose her … and then realized that perhaps he had not. Maybe it was an arranged marriage, family links, or money. She was certainly elegant enough as she walked across the pavement past the General, barely looking at him, and accepted the coachman’s hand up into the open carriage.

She arranged her skirts with a single, expert movement and stared straight ahead. She did not turn as Balantyne got in beside her. He spoke to her. She replied, again without looking at him. She told the coachman to proceed before he moved to do so.

Tellman felt vaguely embarrassed for the General, as if he
had been somehow rebuffed. It was a curious sensation, and one that took him entirely by surprise.

He followed them to an art exhibition where he was not permitted inside. He waited until they emerged a little over an hour later. Lady Augusta looked bright and hard—and impatient. Balantyne was speaking with a white-haired man, and they seemed deep in conversation. They regarded each other with respect which bordered on affection. Tellman remembered that the General painted in watercolors himself.

Lady Augusta tapped her foot.

Balantyne was some minutes more before he joined her. All the way home she ignored him, and back in Bedford Square she alighted from the carriage and went to the front door without waiting for him or looking back.

On the second occasion he went out alone, pale-faced and very tired. He walked quickly. He gave a threepenny piece to the urchin who swept the crossing over Great Russell Street, and a shilling to the beggar on the corner of Oxford Street.

He walked to the Jessop Club and disappeared inside, but he came out less than an hour later. Tellman followed him back to Bedford Square.

Then Tellman returned to Bow Street and went to Pitt’s old files to read the case of the murders in the Devil’s Acre and the startling tragedy of Christina Balantyne. It left him with a feeling of horror so intense the helplessness to affect it knotted inside his stomach, the anger at the pain he could not reach, the willful destruction and the loss.

He ate a brief supper without any pleasure in it, his imagination in the dark alleys of the Devil’s Acre, the blood on the cobbles, but every now and then worse scenes intruded into his imagination: frightened little girls, children no older than Pitt’s Jemima, screaming … unheard, except by other little girls, cowering and just as helpless.

He wondered about Christina Balantyne and the General. Perhaps in his place he might have chosen solitary pursuits as well. Please God he would never be in such a place to know!

*   *   *

It was with a very different feeling that he followed Balantyne the next morning, when to Tellman’s amazement he met Charlotte Pitt on the steps of the British Museum.

Tellman felt like an intruder, a voyeur, as he saw the joy in Balantyne’s face when he caught sight of her. There was an acute vulnerability in him, as if he cared intensely and dared not acknowledge it even to himself, far less to her.

And watching her quick concern, the direct way she met his gaze, her complete candor, Tellman was suddenly aware that she had no idea of the nature or the depth of the General’s feelings. She was frightened for him. It was clear in her face. Even had Tellman not known that from Gracie, he could have guessed it watching her now.

They turned to go inside, and without even considering any other possibility, he followed them in. Then, as Charlotte glanced at a woman almost on her heels, he realized with a sudden chill, a feeling of almost nakedness, that if she saw him she would recognize him instantly.

He dropped to one knee and bent his head as if to tie his bootlace, causing the man behind him to trip and only regain his balance with difficulty, and some ill temper. The whole incident drew far more attention to him than if he had simply followed at a more discreet distance. He was furious with himself.

From now on he must remain at the far side of any room and observe them by reflection in any of the glass cases that housed certain of the exhibits. Balantyne disregarded him, he was interested only in Charlotte, but she would recognize Tellman in profile, perhaps even entirely from the back.

For some time he contrived to stay always behind a garrulous woman in black bombazine and watch as Charlotte and Balantyne moved from room to room, speaking together, pretending to look at the exhibits but seeing nothing. She knew of the blackmail, of the murder, and was determined to fight to help him. Tellman had seen her like this before, perhaps never caring quite so passionately, but he knew her capacity to become involved.

Every now and then as they moved to stand in front of an
other case, he was obliged to pretend to be absorbed in whatever was closest to him. In this place a man alone would be conspicuous if he were not seen to be looking at something.

He found himself next to what was listed on the little plate as a carving from a palace in Assyria, seven centuries before Christ. There was an artist’s impression of how the whole building would have appeared. He was amazed at the size of it. It must have been magnificent. He could not pronounce the name of the king who had ruled it. It was surprisingly interesting. One day he would come back here and look at it again, when he had time to read more. He could even bring Gracie.

Now he must follow after Charlotte and Balantyne. He had nearly missed them.

He was beginning to understand why this case mattered to Charlotte. Balantyne was none of the things Tellman had thought of him. Which meant he had been mistaken, full of misjudgments. If he could be so wrong in his assumptions about Balantyne, what about all the other arrogant, overprivileged people he had disliked and dismissed?

What about all his preconceptions?

What kind of an ignorant and prejudiced man did that make him? One Gracie would not want. One who was angry with himself, and confused.

He turned and walked away from the exhibition, out of the museum and down the steps into the sun. He had a great deal of thinking to do, and his mind was in chaos; his emotions even more so.

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