Treachery at Lancaster Gate

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Pitt stood in the middle of the street looking at the smoldering ruins of the house. The fire brigade had thoroughly hosed the small bursts of flame here and there, and the water had puddled on the floor and settled into the craters left by the bomb that had detonated approximately forty-five minutes ago. It was midday but the sky was still clouded with smoke and the stench of it was everywhere.

Pitt moved out of the way as two ambulance men lifted a wounded man onto a makeshift litter and carried him out to the waiting ambulance. The horses were shifting their weight impatiently. They knew the smell of burning in the early winter air and each crash of collapsing timber startled them, though they waited obediently.

“That’s it, sir,” the white-faced constable said to Pitt, blinking rapidly. Perhaps it was the smoke that stung the man’s eyes, but more probably it was emotion. All of the men who had been caught in the explosion were police: five of them altogether. “That’s the last of them out.”

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