“I did think of that.” McDade’s lips thinned fractionally. “I have been aware for some time that the water in the Thames goes up and down with monotonous and predictable regularity. However, what I cannot say is whether he was caught up in the wash of a passing boat that soaked him higher than the actual water level, or even if he slipped and got wetter than he intended.”
“Can you say for certain that he hanged himself?” Pitt asked. Even though it made no sense of anything they knew, he hoped intensely that McDade would tell him it was suicide.
McDade did not hesitate. “No, I can’t,” he said dryly. “He’s been knocked around a bit, bruised under the skin, but it happened either just before death or just after. There’s been no time for the blood to gather, no marks to see. Bit of a gash on his head under the hair, but that’s not necessarily a blow administered by someone else. It could have happened when he dropped, or any of a dozen ways afterwards-water carried him against the arches, struck by a passing boat, or even by driftwood or flotsam.” He shrugged his massive shoulders. “It could be murder, but I can’t tell you anything to prove it one way or the other. Sorry.”
Pitt pulled back the sheet and looked at the rest of the torso. There were other marks on it as if it had buffeted to and fro, and been caught by rough objects which had torn the skin in several places. He replaced the sheet and turned away.
“Will anyone see he gets a burial according to his faith?” he asked.
McDade’s eyebrows rose. “No one to claim the body?”
“Not so far as I know. I think the court will decide by now that he was the one who shot Lieutenant Lovat.”
McDade shook his head, his chins quivering. “You say that as if you are not sure it is true,” he observed.
“I’m sure it’s true,” Pitt replied. “I’m just not sure it is all of the truth. Thank you.” He closed the conversation and turned to go. McDade made him uncomfortable; he was too observant. And Pitt needed to speak once more to the river police about exactly where el Abd was found, the state of his clothes, and the precise hours of the tides last night. A time of death mattered to him; in fact, just at the moment the importance of it overrode everything else in his mind.
Two hours later, at a quarter to nine, he had the answers. He stood on the Embankment in the gusty wind, his coat flapping around his legs and his scarf whipping out sideways, staring at the racing water of the flood tide returning. Out on the river, boats churned the water, steamers, barges, a lone pleasure boat with only half a dozen people on deck.
Tariq el Abd had died between one and five in the morning. They could not be more accurate than that. It was a time when most people were at home in bed. Pitt could have proved he was there, because Charlotte always woke if he got up. A man who lived alone would have no such safety.
He realized how little he knew of Narraway’s private life; he had never even wondered about it. For that matter he knew almost nothing of Narraway’s past, his family or his beliefs either. He was private to the point of being secretive. The only thing Pitt was sure of was that Narraway cared passionately about his work, and the causes it served, and that there was a personal relationship between him and Ryerson which caused him deep pain and which he would not discuss, no matter what the circumstances. And it was that which ate at Pitt now with a hard, angry pain that he could no longer ignore. It must be now; there was just time before the court resumed-if Narraway was at home.
Pitt met him on the doorstep, dressed smartly in his usual perfectly tailored dark gray. Narraway stopped abruptly, his eyes wide, his face pale.
“What is it?” He caught his breath, his voice husky.
Pitt had never defied Narraway before, never even challenged him. He knew his own dependence upon Narraway too well, not only for his job in Special Branch, but for the guidance and the protection while he was feeling his way in learning a new skill. But the emotion inside him now had power to override all such careful considerations.
“Inside!” he said abruptly.
The wind was cold and there was a fine rain behind it. Narraway’s face hardened. “This had better be important, Pitt,” he said, now that his initial shock was controlled and the steel was back in his eyes.
“It is,” Pitt answered between his teeth. Perhaps he would have been wiser to say it all out there on the doorstep. He knew it, even as he followed Narraway in and heard the door close. Narraway led the way across the hall into his study and swung around.
“Well?” he demanded. “You have ten minutes. After that I am leaving whether you are finished or not. The trial resumes at ten. I mean to be there.” In the morning light through the large window, his face was ashen, the fine lines of strain and too little sleep marked harshly in the skin around his eyes and mouth.
“But the special new witness is dead,” Pitt replied. “There’ll be no revelations about Ayesha Zakhari’s motive now. El Abd’s suicide is almost as good as a confession.”
“Almost,” Narraway agreed tersely. “I still need to see the acquittal. What is it you want, Pitt?”
“Why do you suppose el Abd killed himself?” Pitt asked. He wished he were anywhere but here, doing anything but this. “He was on the brink of success.”
“We knew he was guilty,” Narraway said, but there was a fractional hesitation in his voice; perhaps no one but Pitt would have heard it.
Pitt stared at him. “And he was afraid? Suddenly? Afraid of what? That we would arrest him on the way into court and stop him from testifying?”
Narraway breathed in and out very slowly. “What are you saying, Pitt? There is no time for games.”
If he did not say it now then the moment would be past, and he would live with the doubt forever.
“Convenient for us,” he answered. “In fact, it has probably saved Suez.” He held Narraway’s gaze without blinking.
Narraway was very pale. “Probably,” he agreed. Again there was the shadow across his face.
“Why would el Abd do that?” Pitt asked.
“I don’t know. It makes no sense,” Narraway admitted, still standing motionless in the middle of the floor.
“If I had…” Pitt said. “Or you…”
At last Narraway understood. The last vestige of blood drained from his face, leaving his skin like gray paper. “God Almighty! You think I killed el Abd!”
“Did you?”
“No,” Narraway said quickly. “No, I didn’t.” He did not ask if Pitt had; he already knew the answer. He also knew that Pitt’s question was genuine, and that it hurt him to ask. It was the doubt twisting inside him that drove him to speak. “Was he murdered?”
“Are you certain he was murdered?”
“Not beyond doubt. But I believe he was,” Pitt replied. “It was done well, with great skill. Impossible to tell if the injuries were just before death or just after… a deliberate blow or accidental as he fell, or even from a passing ship. We’ll prove nothing.”
The shadow was there in Narraway’s face again. “Who would kill him, and why?”
“Someone who knew of the massacre,” Pitt replied. “And who would do anything, even commit murder and allow Ryerson to hang for it, rather than see the truth exposed, and face what it will cost.”
Narraway was truly astounded. “Is that what you think?” he said, his voice cracking with incredulity. “That I want Ryerson to hang?”
“No, I don’t think you do,” Pitt said honestly. “I think you hate it. I think the guilt tortures you, but you’ll let him hang rather than expose the massacre and lose Egypt.”
Narraway did not reply. The silence hung in the air like a gulf of darkness between them.
“Don’t use my few minutes left for this,” Pitt said, not moving from his position blocking the doorway. He did not intend a physical threat; in fact, he was not even sure if he could provide one. Narraway was lighter and shorter, but he was lean and possibly he was trained in ways that Pitt had not even thought of. He might even be armed.