The Angel Court Affair (Thomas Pitt 30) (3 page)

‘I hope not.’ He met Pitt’s eyes. ‘But it is not impossible.’

‘Who are they? Names. Whatever history you’ve heard, or guessed. Do we know any of them?’

‘They’re all with her full time. They don’t do anything else. They’ve given their lives to this. The most important, certainly in his own estimation, is Melville Smith,’ Brundage began. ‘He is the only one who’s English. In his fifties, ambitious, while denying it. Seems loyal, but I think to the ideas rather than to her. Ramon Aguilar, on the other hand, is about fifteen years younger, and he’s loyal to her. He’s Spanish, very softly spoken, gentle.’ Brundage smiled. ‘Sings to himself while he’s walking around. The three women who came with her are all quiet and harder to read. Cleo Robles is small and pretty, about twenty-five; English mother and Spanish father. I’m guessing there is some tragedy in her background . . .’ He left the words as if unfinished, but he was uncertain what to add.

Pitt formed the instant opinion that Brundage had liked her.

‘Elfrida Fonsecca is quiet, watchful,’ Brundage continued. ‘Heavier, but in a comfortable sort of way. Womanly, if you know what I mean? And she has a lovely skin, not a mark on it.’

Pitt nodded. ‘Do you know anything about her?’

‘She seems devout, withdrawn,’ Brundage answered with a small shake of his head. ‘I can’t get any history from her. But she bites her nails. Something bothers her.’

‘Go on,’ Pitt told him.

‘Henrietta Navarro is older. I think she was in some kind of religious order before she joined Sofia. She refuses to speak of it and I can’t press her without causing real anger. I tried, and Sofia herself told me in no uncertain words to leave the subject alone.’

Pitt heard a new note in Brundage’s voice, something of instinct and possibly awe that he had not heard before in the year and a half he had known the man.

‘And Sofia herself?’ Pitt asked.

Brundage hesitated.

Pitt waited. Honesty was more important than speed. It was at least half an hour before any audience would begin to arrive. She was the one person they most needed to know. The whole issue revolved around her, her beliefs, her personality.

‘I don’t know,’ Brundage said eventually. ‘I can tell you about the others. They’re not all that different from other people I’ve known.’ He regarded Pitt earnestly. ‘But she is. I can’t even tell you if I think the threats are real. I can’t tell you if she does, or if she thinks some kind of holy angel is going to protect her, so they don’t matter.’

Pitt stared at him. ‘Is there anything useful you can tell me?’ he said with an effort at courtesy. Brundage probably did not want this task any more than he did himself. There were other, genuine and important cases to work on, specifically the industrial sabotage one, which was growing more serious with time.

Brundage shifted his weight.

‘Ramon Aguilar is loyal. If there’s going to be an attack from inside it’ll be Melville Smith, and probably one of the women, but I don’t know which one.’

They could hear the sound of movement back and forth along the passage, footsteps, quiet voices.

‘Relationships among the followers?’ Pitt asked.

Brundage pursed his lips. ‘Pretty strong dislike between the two men. They think it’s concealed, but it isn’t. The two older women are distant with each other, but polite. Henrietta Navarro seems to be closer to Smith in attitude. And there’s another woman who sweeps and cleans in the yard at Angel Court where they are staying. But she’s new, apparently, only just joined them, and doesn’t talk to anyone.’ There was puzzlement in his face. Like Pitt, he thought the whole thing was no more than a squabble among Sofia’s followers for position, or a few nasty letters from her rivals, and he was not willing to pretend it was anything more.

‘Then I’ll see if Sofia Delacruz will speak with me,’ Pitt replied. ‘I suppose she’s preparing to give her sermon, or whatever it is. For her safety, I have to make the effort.’

Brundage looked relieved. He straightened up and went out of the door without any further comment.

It was less than five minutes later that the door opened again. Pitt swung around expecting to see Brundage, to say that Delacruz was too busy to see him, because she was praying or studying, or whatever she did to prepare herself. Instead he saw a slender woman of more than average height. Her dark hair was drawn back from the most remarkable face he could recall ever seeing. His first thought was that she was not beautiful. She was too fierce, her slate-blue eyes too deeply set. Then he realised as she walked towards him that indeed she was beautiful in a way that was both savage and tender. There was a burning intelligence in her and something that could have been amusement.

‘I am Sofia Delacruz,’ she said quietly. ‘I understand you are Commander Pitt of Special Branch.’

Pitt inclined his head. ‘Yes, ma’am. I hope we can avoid any unpleasantness occurring for you.’

To his surprise she laughed, a rich, spontaneous sound. ‘I profoundly doubt it. It will mean I am so bland that no one can find anything to object to. Then I need not have come.’

Pitt was confused. This was not how he had pictured a woman who was dedicated to religion, and even regarded by some as a saint. He realised that he had expected a calmness, a purity apart from the world, in fact apart from reality.

‘You came with the intention of disturbing people?’ he asked, trying to keep surprise from his voice, and a thread of exasperation. Perhaps she was as much of a troublemaker as people had suggested. Maybe she thrived on attention, shock, even a degree of fear.

He saw nothing holy in that, in fact the opposite. It was contemptible.

She walked across the floor in front of him. She held her head high, proud. The light overhead accentuated the bones of her cheeks and the fine lines about her eyes and mouth. Then she was in the shadows again. She moved with extraordinary grace.

‘What did you expect me to say?’ she asked him. ‘There is nothing to do, nothing to worry about? You are all perfect, just continue as you are? God loves you and will give you everything you want, there is no need for you to do anything at all?’ She gave a shrug so slight it was barely there. ‘The complacent do not need me to tell them that. The sinless, and those who know in their hearts that this is not the glory possible for them, would both go away empty, and wonder why I had bothered to come. That is what you expected of me? Why would anyone threaten me, Commander? I would be guilty of lying, and of perpetuating boredom, but no one kills for such things, as long as the lies are comfortable enough.’

Pitt drew a deep breath. He reminded himself that whatever it cost him in patience or tact, Sir Walter had made it very clear that any attack on this woman while she was in England would be more than embarrassing; it could be the spark that would ignite an international incident that could escalate into a war.

‘So what do you propose to tell them?’ he asked as mildly as he could. ‘What is it that makes any of them wish to kill you? Or did I misunderstand the threat?’

‘Not at all,’ she replied smoothly. ‘I have had several threats to kill me that I know of. I believe that there have been others from which Ramon has protected me.’

‘Not Melville Smith?’ he asked immediately.

The smile was back in her eyes, amusement, not warmth. ‘No. The ones I received were handed to me by Melville. His protection is not of me, but of the faith we share.’ There was no other expression in her face or her voice. She was leaving him to draw his own conclusions as to her feelings.

‘Do you trust him?’ he enquired.

This time she was startled. It showed in her eyes for an instant, and then was gone. ‘You are very direct,’ she responded.

This time the amusement was his. ‘That troubles you? I’m afraid I have neither time nor inclination to be more tactful. Do you trust Mr Smith?’

‘I trust him to do what he believes to be in the interest of the faith.’ She looked directly at him as she spoke. ‘I do not take for granted that that will always be what I believe. But before you ask me, no, I do not think Melville will harm me.’

‘Does he wish you to stir up controversy?’ he pursued. ‘Is that good for the faith, or bad?’

Now there was appreciation in her face. Her feelings were as swift and as visible as light and shadow on water. ‘An excellent question, Commander. I am not certain that I have an easy answer for you.’

‘Do you listen to his advice?’

‘Of course. But I do not always take it.’

He could imagine their confrontations. Melville Smith would be arrogant, insistent, perhaps afraid for her, certainly exasperated. She would be fierce, certain of herself, quite plainly listening to him only as a matter of courtesy. She would still do exactly what she wished.

‘What are you going to tell people that will anger them to the point where they will turn to violence?’ He asked because it was necessary he have some warning in order to forestall an attack, although he still thought the chance of it was negligible. He was also increasingly curious to know what this unusual woman believed in that she cared so intensely to tell strangers of it, even if it might cost her her life. Was she hysterical, touched by delusions? She would certainly not be the first. History was full of women who saw visions and profoundly believed them to be from God. Joan of Arc was burned alive because she would not deny her ‘angels’.

But this woman in front of him, in a simple, dark blue dress, did not seem in the least emotionally overwrought. In fact she appeared to be cooler than he was.

She smiled, and for an instant he saw uncertainty in her eyes, then it was gone again. It was not doubt of herself, but perhaps of him.

‘I am going to tell them that they are the children of God,’ she said levelly, watching his face. ‘As is every human being on earth. There is no other kind of person.’

‘Why should that upset them?’ he asked, wondering as he said it if it were a stupid question, or if it was exactly what she had intended him to say.

‘Because children are required to grow up,’ she replied unwaveringly. ‘If we are the children of God, rather than simply creatures of His hands, then we may eventually become as He is, with the power to create worlds. Not in this life, but now is the time to begin, to make the choice that this will be our path. And growing up can hurt. Lessons must be learned, mistakes put right, some errors paid for. Ask any child if he will find it easy to become like his father, if his father is a great man.’

She smiled slightly, almost in self-mockery. ‘But what follows logically from that, what disturbs many people more, what is in fact the “blasphemy” they cannot abide, is that if we may one day become as God is, then it follows logically that he may in the infinite past have once been as we are now. Which is, of course, why he understands us totally; every fear, every error and every need. And possibly even more terrifying to some, he knows that we can do it – if we are willing to try hard enough, pay the price in effort and patience, humility and courage, never to give up.

‘Most of us want something immeasurably easier than that, far smaller and safer. That is the devil’s plan for us – stunted, eternally less than we could have been.’

‘You are saying that men and God are the same thing?’ Pitt asked incredulously.

‘Only in the sense that a caterpillar and a butterfly are the same,’ she replied. ‘There is no safety, nothing to be bought except by the growth of the heart and the soul. And that is frightening to many. It changes all the rules we thought we knew. There is no hierarchy, except of the ability to love with a whole heart. Obedience is not enough, it is only a beginning. It is a small thing, compared to understanding.’

‘Are you frightened?’ he asked after a long hesitation.

Her voice was very quiet. She understood exactly what he meant.

‘Yes. The only thing worse would be to deny what I know is true. Then I would have nothing left at all.’

‘We will see that nothing happens to you,’ he promised, but as he excused himself and turned away he did not think there was anything to fear. Her ideas might well be offensive, especially if taken seriously, but no more so than any of the activists who wanted economic reform, higher wages, even votes for women. There was too much fear of political anarchy for what might be blasphemy to disturb anyone to active violence.

The meeting was far better attended than Pitt had foreseen. Word had spread that Sofia Delacruz was controversial, and many there were in tense, whispered conversation, their faces sharp with curiosity. The large preponderance of them were women.

Pitt checked with Brundage, and with the regular police, going around the doors, watching the crowd, looking for anyone excitable, furtive or who seemed out of place.

Sergeant Drury was very clearly annoyed at being taken from his regular duties for what he considered a frivolous purpose. He was broad-shouldered, a little corpulent, and he stood at the main entrance with a sombre look. A gaunt woman in black nodded at his presence appraisingly, but did not speak.

‘She’s come to complain, that one,’ he observed to Pitt, who was standing near him. ‘But I can’t see her being dangerous, can you? What the devil do they think is going to happen, sir? Nobody’s going to throw a bomb at her! From what I hear, the anarchists would be on her side!’

Pitt’s reply was prevented by the presence of a large woman passing by. She glanced at Drury and nodded her approval.

‘Ma’am,’ Drury acknowledged her, perhaps with a degree of fellow feeling at being in an unfamiliar situation and wanting something concrete to disapprove of.

Pitt nodded to Drury and moved on. He was looking at other entrances and the increasing crowd when he spotted Charlotte. It was the familiar angle of her head that drew his attention and a unique grace with which she turned to the young woman beside her. He smiled with pleasure, until he realised with a jolt that the ‘young woman’ was his sixteen-year-old daughter, Jemima. Her long chestnut hair was wound high on her head and she wore one of Charlotte’s plainer hats. She was lovely. He had known her all her life, and yet suddenly she was almost a stranger. He stared at her a moment longer, then he was interrupted by one of his own men repeating a slightly unpleasant exchange and he was aware of a cold shiver of warning. The letters had not threatened argument, even ugly or embarrassing scenes, they had threatened death. He must see that it did not happen, not just for Sofia’s sake, but for everyone here.