It seemed the “event” that was rumored was a possible assassination attempt that Soropkin was involved in. But against who?
It wasn’t the first time. A previous inquiry case had exposed a threat against the Prince of Wales. And then, there had been the attempts in the past against the Queen.
That information, Brodie had been able to learn from bits and pieces of information in the past, came from a network of those the Agency— and therefore the Crown, paid to keep them informed about increasing unrest in Europe.
It came by way of coded messages in telegrams as well as bits of information in obscure telephone calls that Alex revealed the Agency was able to listen to through new equipment that had been invented. And then there were messages intercepted, like this last one, often at great cost.
“What about the man, who originally provided the information some time ago?” he had then asked Alex.
“Nothing has been heard from him since that first message, even with the amount of money he was promised. He’s a greedy sort and has always had something to send us. But there’s been nothing more.”
Sir Avery hadn’t shared that with him, something that might mean nothing at all.
On the other hand, it might mean that there was someone who was willing to pay more, that the information first received was just a rumor, or that the man’s communication with London had been exposed, and he was dead.
He had thanked Alex for the additional information then set out to learn what he could about Soropkin, in anything thatmight be overheard on the streets— long hours that often went far into the night. He had said nothing about it to Mikaela.
He worked those sorts of hours and more with the Met, and in private inquiries on behalf of clients. He was accustomed to it. One did the work until the work was done. And this new urgency was like searching for needles in haystacks as someone would have reminded him.
That particular someone would have been the first person to understand, to give her thoughts on the matter and then plunge into the middle of it.
Mikaela— intelligent, stubborn, fearless… with a habit for ending up in the middle of things, dangerous things that made him want to shake some sense into her, then hold onto her to make certain she was safe.
She was safe now, or as safe as she could possibly be all things considered, off on her own inquiry case.
He could well imagine her with her notebook and pen. That direct way she had of obtaining information. The case— a husband, a physician, who had been keeping late hours and being most secretive, the wife certain there must be another woman involved.
Then again, he thought, knowing Mikaela’s past experience with her own father, it might be dangerous for the poor man when she finally learned his whereabouts and the reason for it.
“Contact the priest again,” Sir Avery was telling him now.
The priest was one of his sources.
“Call me if he’s heard anything more, then go home and get some sleep.”
He had placed a call to Father Sebastian and asked to meet with him before he left the Tower.
Now, as he made his way from that ancient fortress he thought of Sir Avery’s parting comment— “go home and get some sleep.”
Home. At present that might be the office on the Strand or Mikaela’s townhouse in Mayfair.
It didn’t matter. He’d spent his life on the streets and slept in places that were best forgotten before joining the London Police. Afterward there had been a small flat, then the office on the Strand best suited his needs.
It didn’t matter, he thought again, as long as she was there, with her notes, and questions, and suggestions. Even when she put herself into situations where she had no business. She would have argued that with him.
He found a driver and gave him the location in Whitechapel.
The German Catholic Mission Church had served the immigrant community that had grown over the past several years, ministering to the poor, providing a haven of faith for those who had little else.
Brodie had met Father Sebastian in the course of a previous investigation some years before, when the priest was asked to provide last rites over a young girl who had been brutally used and then left to die on the streets.
The priest had arrived in the East End over twenty years earlier, with little more than a Bible and his faith. In that time he had established a school for orphan children and helped families as best he could.
“God does not ask whether Catholic, Methodist, or Jew,”Father Sebastian once told him.“He accepts all, and I can do no less.”
After that first encounter, Brodie had made contributions to the church in his mother’s name. She had been baptized in the faith and believed in a merciful and protective God, even with her dying breath.
His own beliefs were more circumspect, influenced by the streets as a boy after her death and then in London. With whathe saw on the streets, he thought that God might very well not exist at all.
