The Dead Can Wait (35 page)

‘Never better . . . Well, that’s not true, but a dose of clean air seemed to clear my brain in no time.’

Cardew ran a hand through his hair. ‘Thank goodness for that. What are you writing?’

‘I’m lucky it’s not my will. If it wasn’t for you and Mrs Gregson . . . what on earth was she doing in there, anyway?’

Cardew laughed. ‘I think she used her female wiles on the commander. You’ve not seen her?’

‘She is avoiding me. I think she is concerned that I’ll bite her head off.’

‘And will you?’

Watson laughed. ‘I suspect even a circus lion might come off second-best in the head-biting stakes with Mrs Gregson.’

‘And are you avoiding this?’ From behind his back Cardew brought out a bottle of brandy. He fished in the pocket of his jacket. ‘And two glasses.’

Watson nodded. ‘As a doctor, I shall not hesitate to prescribe myself a little medicinal tot.’

‘You’ve eaten?’

‘Some soup from the housekeeper.’

Cardew set about pouring two glasses on the side dresser. From over his shoulder he asked: ‘What do you think happened out there, Major? To make you go—’

Watson cut him short. ‘Insane? It’s interesting, isn’t it, that the other tanks we ran today had no such mishap?’

The ‘controls’ had run for a full hour, hatches fully battened, and although the crews were grateful to get out, and showed some signs of mild asphyxiation from the fumes, none of them had suffered a mental collapse.

‘Curious, I suppose,’ said Cardew.

‘I’m just writing my report. Do you have any theories?’

‘Me? I’m just an engineer. But between you and me, before the test I did see Thwaites—’

Watson cut him off. Thwaites was not the culprit in this. ‘Oh, more than a mere engineer, I think. You are a policymaker.’

‘How do you mean?’ Cardew asked warily.

Watson put his pen down and turned to face the man. ‘When you decided to delay the introduction of the tanks, why didn’t you go for mechanical sabotage? Instead of targeting an innocent crew?’

Cardew stared at him as if he was still in the grip of the madness. ‘Major Watson! Really!’

‘I am not sure you intended to kill the men in
Genevieve,
did you?’

Cardew sipped his brandy but remained quiet.

‘You did everything as one should. But for one thing. It was what was missing from
Genevieve
that was important.’

‘Which was?’ Cardew asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.

‘Dirt.’

‘Dirt?’

‘And grease and soot. When I first inspected
Genevieve,
I found one of the exhaust pipes spotless. The others were as I described – filthy. But this one had been wiped clean. By a rag, I suspected, from the smears. Who do we know who always carries a rag?’

‘When you first . . .?’ Cardew asked, puzzled.

‘I slipped out for a little inspection before the official one. At sunrise, with Mrs Gregson. Often better that way, to have the scene to oneself. But later, when I inspected the interior with you, all were polished clean. So that they matched, I suppose. How is the hand, by the way?’

Cardew looked down at Mrs Gregson’s dressing.

‘Genevieve’s
exhaust was damned hot just now, wasn’t it? But after I had my little turn, you had to wipe it again to check that the drug wasn’t still active, affecting me and then, who knows? Perhaps you.’

‘This is nonsense, Major. Something has scrambled your brain.’

Watson shook his head. ‘No, it can only be you, Cardew. You don’t want your machine wasted in dribs and drabs. You want to wait until there are thousands. Didn’t you say that?’

‘Yes, but . . . so you weren’t affected in the tank? You didn’t take leave of your senses?’

‘I am afraid that little incident was a charade.’ Watson couldn’t keep the pride from his voice. ‘The first bit of real acting I’ve done since my days at Blackheath Football Club.’

I thought that was a Christmas pantomime, Watson.

‘Not counting a few impersonations for Holmes. It did the trick, anyway. I even fooled Mrs Gregson, and that is no simple matter. Although I think my rapid recovery aroused her suspicions. But I wasn’t after plaudits for my performance. What I really wanted was to see what you – or someone – would do if there still seemed to be a residue of the poison. What you did was rewipe the hot exhaust pipe at the first opportunity. And burn yourself into the bargain.’

Cardew shook his head as he imagined an innocent man might. Yet, Watson noticed, something was glistening on his forehead. His eyes flicked to Watson’s brandy. Watson had no intention of drinking it, for he suspected it was intended to hasten the return of his mysterious symptoms. Watson would become another of
Genevieve’s
victims.

‘But even before that, I had my suspicions. Square-toed boots are very distinctive around a military base. The ground outside the ice house was rather churned and soaked by the water, but a close inspection of the soil nearby showed several impressions of square toes. It was you who locked us in the ice house.’

Excellent, Watson, excellent.

Cardew’s only response was another shake of his head.

‘What was the concoction you used?’ asked Watson. ‘In the tank?’

‘Major, I fear your brain is definitely scrambled.’

‘I thought at first it might be the devil’s foot powder,’ continued Watson. ‘You, though, are probably too young to recall “The Adventure of the Devil’s Foot”? The so-called devil’s foot root? It is an extract of
Physostigma venenosum
, the calabar bean, although I held that detail back from my account in the
Strand
lest others be tempted to use the terrible drug. But, I reasoned, that is found only in Africa, and not South Africa, but chiefly along the banks of the Ubangi, which forms the border between French and Belgian Congo—’

‘I have never been to Africa!’ Cardew protested.

‘No. Nor has anyone here, as far as I am aware, not the central part of the continent, anyway.’ Thwaites’s experience didn’t count; he hadn’t travelled overland through the continent but by ship to and from Cape Town. ‘And with the Cornish sample destroyed, the only other example in this part of the world is in a laboratory in Buda. So I considered the matter further. Not the devil’s foot, then. Something European, perhaps. How did you hit upon the idea of using ergot? Was it the local rye fields, gone to seed, infested with the stuff ? And to find a way for the vapour to work amid all those competing fumes . . . part of me is impressed. But you are a man of science, a seeker of solutions, aren’t you?’

Cardew said nothing now, just gulped at his brandy.

‘Did you know at the beginning of your scheme that it causes vasoconstriction? Affecting the brain and the limbs, causing gangrene. That was why you had to dispose of the bodies, wasn’t it? The doctor was the last to die, so had the most advanced gangrene symptoms. And poor Hitchcock. At first I thought he was weeping at the piano because of the pain. I now think it was something worse for a musician – he couldn’t feel his fingers. The fingertips were losing their sensitivity. That is why he banged the keys. The gangrene was coming, so I suspect you pushed him along with a little more of your devilish concoction, hoping we wouldn’t examine him too carefully.’

‘Poppycock.’

‘Perhaps. Hitchcock, I can’t be sure of. But I did notice that the paraffin heater in his room had been on – I turned it off when I left him and ordered more blankets. It had also been wiped clean. Was that how you delivered it? No matter. Your quarters and workshop are being searched as we speak, looking for this foul poison you have created.’

‘I didn’t . . .’ Cardew gulped. ‘I wouldn’t. What you suggest is monstrous.’

‘And so is what is at stake. I have put myself in your shoes. We have one chance with this machine and you wanted to make sure it was the right one. What are eight deaths versus the millions out there? Eight men die every minute somewhere in this war. And I am sure you had other plans to stall the progress. But I ask you again, did you mean to kill the men in the tank? And what other schemes have you put in place?’

Cardew sucked in his cheeks and began to chew at one of them.

The door swung open and framed Swinton, and behind him two military policemen. ‘Well?’ Watson asked.

Swinton, who had taken the precaution of wearing gloves, held up a glass bottle, the size of a jam jar, half-filled with a black, oily liquid. ‘In a panel behind the bed in his quarters. Along with what appears to be a coded recipe for making it.’ He looked at Watson. ‘What is it?’

‘I suspect a suspension that uses ergot of rye
. Claviceps purpurea,
possibly, or another species. It infects various cereals and, if digested, causes ergotism –
ignis sacer
or St Anthony’s Fire. The symptoms are intense burning of the limbs, hallucinations, gangrene and death.’

‘Cardew—’ Swinton began, his voice trembling with rage.

‘Just a moment, Colonel.’ Watson turned his attention back to the young engineer. ‘I think we are about to hear all the details.’

‘Not from me,’ snarled the young man.

‘It is your best hope,’ said Watson.

‘You’ll never know the truth.’

‘Oh, I think we will,’ said Swinton, stepping aside to allow the military policemen into the room.

‘Not from these lips.’

In one clean movement Cardew swept up Watson’s neglected brandy and swallowed it in one. He stood, staring at the Major for a few seconds and then gave a little laugh and a cough. ‘The poison doesn’t . . . doesn’t have to be delivered as fumes, Major. It . . .’ – he took a step back – ‘. . . it can work dissolved in liquid. As you were meant to discover.’

Watson jumped from his chair and ran towards the man, intending to make him sick, but Cardew clamped his left hand over his mouth and scurried backwards. From his pocket he extracted the pistol he had confiscated from Watson in the tank.

‘Get back,’ he threatened through his fingers. ‘Or I kill the major.’

Watson raised his hands to show he was coming no further. ‘Look, Cardew, the tank will be deployed within weeks with you or without you. It’s too late to stop now. Churchill, Haig, the other desk-wallahs – they don’t care if a crew is killed or goes mad. They’ll just get another one. The dead men are an irrelevance. You are a clever lad. Don’t throw it all away.’ He risked a single pace forward. ‘We can plead temporary insanity. All those hours working with the machine, the stress of sleepless nights, the damned fumes . . . make yourself sick, now. The toxin can’t work that quickly. Good God man, you don’t want to die of madness and gangrene.’

Cardew’s features relaxed. He let his left hand drop and spoke clearly. ‘You know, you’re absolutely right.’ He put the gun to his forehead and pulled the trigger.

The report was almost as loud as Watson’s scream.

THIRTY-SIX

Miss Pillbody had no real idea where she was. She had arrived in Liverpool in time for afternoon tea at the surprisingly opulent Adelphi and had sat next to the dolphin, as instructed. A waiter had asked for her room number, she had given the correct response and received a note with her pot of tea instructing her to go to the basement of a shop called Blackler’s. There she had been bundled out by two workmen and loaded into the back of a delivery van for a short but bumpy ride. One of the men sat with her, rifling through her bag until he found the pistol and pocketed it without comment.

She was so tired, she almost didn’t care what happened to her. Only her
Sie Wölfe
training – the long marches on no sleep and little food, and the nights of mock interrogation – kept her going. And that training told her to pick her moments. When resources are low, marshal them carefully and strike when you have a good chance of succeeding, not merely to demonstrate courage or defiance. So when the van stopped and her escort produced a blindfold, she offered no resistance.

She was helped down from the van and shuffled through a door, up a flight of stairs and along a corridor. When the blindfold was removed she was in a rather shabby hotel room. Her bag was placed on the bed, and the two men departed. She heard the key turn in the lock.

The temptation was to lie down on the bed and sleep. It had been a long, fraught journey from Great Yarmouth, by car and then train. Then she caught sight of the colour of the pillows and thought better of putting her head on them. She examined the windows, but they were screwed or nailed shut. The grimy panes looked out onto an airshaft. All she could see were a number of similarly unwashed windows on the opposite wall.

She sighed and sat in the only chair, a rather upright and scuffed object placed next to a mismatched and equally careworn desk. She closed her eyes, trying to empty her mind of the last forty-eight hours. But there was one question that kept returning: had the dentist really been out to dispose of her? Were his instructions to remove any potential loose ends, as she had become? Or had her fevered imagination made her liable to over-react? She would probably never know the truth. What she did know, judging by the documents in the car she had stolen, was that the dentist had been under observation. So, with the British on his tail, he was no great loss.

She must have nodded off, because when she opened her eyes again a man was entering the room. He had on a black frock coat, waistcoat and striped trousers and had a pair of pince-nez dangling round his beck. He had a beaky expression that reminded Miss Pillbody of a vulture. The hair was heavily oiled and he smelled of strong tobacco. He inclined his head towards her. ‘Good evening.’

‘Good evening,’ she replied.

He glanced at the bed and decided to remain standing. ‘I apologize for the manner of your arrival.’ He gave a snort of laughter. ‘Indeed, for the place of your arrival. I’m sure you’re used to somewhat different surroundings, Miss . . .?’

She didn’t answer. She wasn’t sure who she was now. ‘I am here to report.’

‘Really? I think news has travelled ahead of you. Or at least snippets of it. You remind me of one of those hurricanes they have in the Caribbean.’ She could detect a faint accent now. This man wasn’t English. ‘Leaving a trail of destruction in her wake. An agent in Suffolk, a dentist in Great Yarmouth . . .’