Blackstone and the Endgame (14 page)

‘Certainly,' the solicitor agreed. ‘If the sergeant is, in fact, guilty of the crime of which he's been accused—'

‘He doesn't know whether he's guilty or not,' Ellie Carr interrupted. ‘I've been reading up on what the head-shrinkers in Vienna have got to say on the subject, and I think he's probably suffering from something called repressed memory syndrome.'

‘You will concede, however, that even if he is innocent, the weight of evidence against him is so strong that he's likely to be convicted anyway?' Hartington asked.

‘We shouldn't start out with the assumption that Archie …' Ellie began.

‘Yes, I'll be convicted anyway,' Archie Patterson said gloomily. ‘There's no doubt at all about that.'

‘In which case, I suggest that we change the plea from innocent to guilty, and ask for the mitigating circumstances to be taken into account when the sentence is passed.'

‘And just what mitigating circumstances might they be?' Archie Patterson wondered.

‘That though you broke the law, you only did it to prevent a greater injustice being done.'

‘I did it to save an innocent man – Sam Blackstone – from false imprisonment?' Patterson guessed.

‘Precisely.'

‘That would only work if everybody thought Sam was innocent,' Ellie said. ‘But they don't. And there's almost as strong a case against him as there is against Archie.'

‘Then the case against Inspector Blackstone will have to be weakened to the point at which it collapses completely,' Hartington said.

‘And how would we go about doing that?' Patterson wondered.

‘We – by which I mean specifically you, Sergeant – will have to track Max down and get him to confess.'

‘Hang on,' Ellie said, ‘there's been nothing in the papers about Max, so how do you even know his name?'

‘I know a great many things that the general public are kept in ignorance of,' Hartington said.

‘I might have a slight chance of finding Max if he was still in London – but he won't be,' Patterson said. ‘He'll be long gone. He was probably gone even before Sam was arrested.'

‘Leaving London would indeed have been the logical course of action for him to have followed,' Hartington agreed. ‘Nevertheless, my sources are adamant that he is still here.'

‘And do your sources know
exactly
where he is?' Ellie asked.

‘Unfortunately, they do not,' Hartington admitted. ‘That is where the “tracking down” part comes into it.'

‘And how would we go about that, exactly, Mr Hartington?' Ellie Carr wondered.

‘Sergeant Patterson is the professional in these matters, and I wouldn't presume to advise him.' Hartington paused. ‘Or maybe there is
one
small piece of advice I might give him,' he continued. ‘When I am representing a company that is suing another company over some kind of financial malfeasance, I usually begin by looking through the ledgers for the paper trail, and once I have found it, I follow it doggedly, wherever it takes me.'

‘And I'm sure that works out just beautifully for you when you're dealing with gentlemanly crimes such as fraud and embezzlement,' Ellie Carr said sarcastically. ‘But you see, Mr Hartington, Max doesn't have a silk top hat and doesn't belong to some exclusive West End club. He's a common robber and a con man – and he won't have
left
a paper trail.'

‘Actually, he might have,' Patterson said. ‘But even if there is a trail for me to follow, and even if – against all the odds – I manage to find him, there's no guarantee he'll confess.'

‘No, there are no guarantees in anything of what I said,' Hartington agreed. ‘But what I am offering you, Sergeant Patterson, is the chance to clear your friend's good name and improve your chances of a plea for mercy. Are you willing to grasp that chance?'

‘Yes, I am,' Patterson said.

‘There is … er … one slight complication,' Hartington said, and – to Patterson's and Ellie's amazement – he looked a little embarrassed.

‘What kind of “slight complication”?' Ellie asked.

‘The magistrate can't go back on the amount of bail required – I boxed him into a corner over that – but he can tinker with the other terms, and the spiteful hound has done just that.'

‘Whatever you've got to say, just spit it out,' Ellie told him.

‘Sergeant Patterson must surrender himself on the thirty-first and make a fresh application for bail.'

‘He has to surrender himself on
New Year's Eve
!' Ellie exclaimed. ‘And will there even be any magistrates on duty on New Year's Eve?'

‘Oh yes, there will be
one
,' Hartington said. ‘But he'll have a great many cases to deal with – and I'm sure Lambert Charnley will have asked the clerk to put Sergeant Patterson at the bottom of his list.'

‘So once he's inside again, he'll stay inside,' Ellie said.

‘I suspect so,' Hartington agreed.

‘In other words, Archie not only has to find a needle in haystack, but he's got just seven days to do it?' Ellie asked.

Hartington smiled encouragingly. ‘I have the greatest confidence in Sergeant Patterson's detecting skills,' he said.

It was ten fifteen when the doorbell rang, and Blackstone heard Yuri's heavy footfalls as he made his way up the hall.

‘Now, I wonder who could possibly be visiting us at this time of night?' Vladimir said.

Did
he wonder? Or did he know
exactly
who it was? That was the problem with Vladimir, Blackstone thought – it was almost impossible to distinguish between when he was lying and when he was telling the truth.

There was the sound of the door bolts being drawn, followed by an urgent clattering of heels in the corridor, then the study door suddenly flew open, and a girl entered the room.

She was quite tall and quite slim. But it was her hair that immediately drew Blackstone's attention. It was almost jet black and was not cut short – as was the fashion – but instead spilled over her shoulders and covered half her face.

She was carrying a poster in her hand, and she marched straight over to Vladimir's desk, slammed it down hard in front of him and spoke very rapidly in Russian.

‘In case you haven't noticed, we have a guest, Tanya, and I think it would only be courteous for us to speak in a language he can understand,' Vladimir said in English.

‘Have you seen this, Vladimir?' Tanya asked, switching languages with ease.

‘And I also think it would be polite of you to say hello to our guest,' Vladimir said.

Tanya turned her head towards Blackstone very slowly, as if she had a stiff neck.

‘Good evening, Mr Blackstone,' she said, in a flat, dull tone. Then she turned back to Vladimir, again with slowness and care.

‘You have to do something about it,' she said.

‘Come and look at this, Sam,' Vladimir suggested. ‘You might find it interesting.'

Blackstone walked over to the desk and looked down at the poster that Tanya had brought.

It was much cruder than the one he had seen that morning – in every sense of the word. There were only two figures in it – the tsarina and Rasputin – and both were naked. The tsarina was lying on her back, with her legs spread. Rasputin was on top of her, his spotty backside the focal point of the whole drawing.

‘It's an insult to the monarchy, and that makes it an insult to Russia,' Tanya said. ‘You
have
to do something about it.'

Vladimir shrugged. ‘What
can
I do?' he wondered. ‘I could track down the artist …'

‘Artist!' Tanya snorted. ‘You call the man who produced this abomination an
artist
?'

‘Yes, I do,' Vladimir said mildly. ‘Art, as I understand it, is anything that engenders an emotional response in the viewer – and this has certainly done that with you.'

‘It's nothing but filth!' Tanya protested.

‘Yes, that's just what it is,' Vladimir agreed. ‘But it's
effective
filth.'

Blackstone listened to the whole exchange with growing amazement. He was sure there was not another person in the whole of Russia – except, of course, for the royal family – who would have dared to talk to Vladimir as the girl was doing now, and yet Vladimir seemed quite happy to let her get away with it.

‘As I was saying, I could track down the artist and have him imprisoned – or even send him on the long walk from which there is no return – but some other cartoonist would only spring up to take his place,' Vladimir said.

‘When I said you had to do something about, I was not referring to the vile creature who drew this – and you know that,' Tanya said furiously. ‘I meant that you must do something about Rasputin.'

‘I have tried, through my agents, to bribe him to return to his family's village in Siberia,' Vladimir said, his tone still mild. ‘I have been most generous – in fact, I have offered him considerably more than my poor department can really afford – but he simply refuses to go.'

‘You have access to the tsarina, don't you?' Tanya asked.

‘I have limited access – and then only when she's feeling in the mood to see me.'

‘Then you must go and see her, and tell her all about his scandalous behaviour.'

‘She's already been told about it. She refuses to believe anything bad about him.'

‘She would believe
you
.'

‘She would not. And by trying to tell her, I would lose what little influence I have.'

‘In that case, you must have the bastard killed.'

‘I will not go against the tsar's explicit wishes,' Vladimir said.

‘Is that meant to be a joke?' Tanya demanded. ‘You know yourself that you
constantly
go against his wishes!'

‘That isn't quite true,' Vladimir said firmly. ‘I do things that I suspect his majesty would disapprove of if he knew about them – but since he has not specifically instructed me
not
to do them, that is not the same thing at all.'

‘You're splitting hairs,' Tanya said.

‘Yes,' Vladimir agreed heavily. ‘That is what a man in my position is sometimes forced to do.'

‘So you'll stand by and let Rasputin destroy Russia?'

‘The tsar is my absolute master – I have no choice but to obey him,' Vladimir said.

‘There are times when you make me so angry that I almost hate you,' Tanya said, shaking her head furiously from side to side.

And as she shook her head, her hair swirled – and Blackstone saw what it was that she'd been hiding.

The ugly scar ran from the top of her right cheekbone to her jaw and was almost a quarter of an inch wide. It had puckered, angry edges and made the right side of her face look twisted and disproportionate.

A look of horror swept across the girl's face when she realized what had happened. Her anger evaporated, and she reached up and clawed the hair back into place with all the desperation of a drowning man clutching at a straw.

‘Thank you for bringing this poster to me. You may now leave us,' Vladimir said softly.

Tanya nodded – but very carefully.

‘Yes, thank you,' she said in a tiny voice.

And then she turned and left the room.

‘Who is she?' Blackstone asked when she had gone.

‘She's my best agent.'

‘But she can't be more than seventeen or eighteen!'

‘She's older than she looks, but her apparent youthfulness is an advantage I've exploited on many occasions. Besides, her age is unimportant. She comes from good stock, and she was born to do this work.'

‘Do her parents – this good stock she comes from – approve of the work she is doing?' Blackstone asked.

‘She is a young woman, not a child,' Vladimir replied. ‘She does not need their approval.'

‘But
do
they approve?' Blackstone insisted.

‘They do not know,' Vladimir admitted, ‘but speculating on their approval or disapproval is pointless. Tanya is doing work that needs to be done – and that is all that matters.'

‘How did she get that scar?' Blackstone asked. ‘Was it through working for you?'

‘That is as pointless a question as the one you asked previously,' Vladimir said.

‘Did she get that scar working for you?' Blackstone persisted.

‘I think that I will run my trains for a little while before I go to bed,' Vladimir said.

He flicked a number of switches in rapid succession. Several locomotives backed out of the engine sheds, and others began their journey to different parts of the apartment.

Blackstone looked on, fascinated by the intricacy of the layout, and as he watched, he noticed that two locomotives – one that emerged from the parlour and another that had been in his bedroom – were approaching each other on the same piece of track.

Soon, he thought, Vladimir would switch one of the trains on to a spur.

But then both trains passed the last point at which they could possibly be diverted.

Blackstone glanced across at Vladimir. The Russian was staring at the wall, with an intensity strong enough to burn a hole in it.

‘Look out for your trains!' Blackstone said.

But Vladimir paid no attention.

The collision, when it came, could not have been at more than two or three miles an hour, but, on two such small objects, it had a devastating effect. The locomotives buckled and twisted through the air – dragging their carriages behind them – then crashed down on to the floor.

Now, when it was too late, Vladimir came out of his trance and looked down impassively at the wreckage.

‘What happened there?' Blackstone asked.

‘I was distracted for a moment,' Vladimir admitted, ‘and in my line of work, that can be fatal.'