Wakefield had no upper-class connections. He had climbed from an ordinary clerk's family to become the Suppression Bureau's head of daily affairs through his own efforts. That made him a man of considerable worldly experience, with keen instincts.
The moment he learned that Viscount Fresswater and the others had been killed, he instinctively suspected that he had something to do with it.
He had not forgotten that the viscount was killed shortly after he contacted him through the secret telephone. Several members of the House of Lords had died alongside him. They held nominal posts as Suppression Bureau advisers, but in fact, like the viscount, they were authorized to use that telephone and could also be counted among the bureau's leaders.
The Suppression Bureau was a peculiar department. Neither the British government nor the London Police Department had authority over it. Unless Director Saint Isaac returned from Mansus, where he lived year-round, no one could openly tell them what to do.
In practice, however, the Suppression Bureau's highest authority did not belong to Wakefield, the assistant director who managed its daily affairs. It belonged to that secret telephone.
Whoever was on the other end, once the call connected, he was the "deputy director of the Suppression Bureau."
In other words, not only Viscount Fresswater but also the members of the House of Lords killed alongside him were "deputy directors of the Suppression Bureau."
Or rather, the real "deputy directors of the Suppression Bureau" were everyone in the House of Lords authorized to make that call.
The Suppression Bureau was, in fact, a subordinate department of the House of Lords.
But unless something especially serious happened, that telephone was generally never used.
The connection between the Suppression Bureau and the House of Lords was itself a secret.
Within the entire bureau,