Will Thomas - Fatal Enquiry

A substantial bank draft.

Name amount and bearer in order

to collect lost item.

Whitehall 042

Looking back on it now, I should have added a line such as “one call per person.” The telephone set began to jangle at seven-thirty and didn’t stop for hours. Half of the calls were people trying to guess the amount and the bearer. Some thought a pound substantial, while others went as high as ten thousand. The bearers that were proposed included the Prince of Wales, music hall comedian Little Tich, and the Archbishop of Canterbury. The rest of the calls were from reporters wondering what we were about and whether the offer was legitimate or a stunt in order to garner publicity. The agency’s name, which Jenkins announced each time he lifted the receiver, was enough to cause every reporter to request an interview. Those intelligent enough to connect the number and the agency beforehand, with the aid of the telephone directory, were thwarted by a locked door. The Barker Enquiry Agency was not open for business.

Finally, about ten that morning, Jenkins called my name and held out the telephone set to me. I’d like to have thought that Sebastian Nightwine was reading The Times and saw the advertisement, and then ran about the room searching for his cheque in a blind panic before calling. Some things we will never know.

“Mr. Llewelyn,” the voice said. One loses a good deal of nuance when speaking through the device, but I could sense the anger and even danger in it. “I believe you have something that belongs to me.”

“Who may I ask is calling?” I said. Were Barker there, I’m certain he would have reminded me not to be jocose with men that have no sense of humor.

“You waste my time at your peril, sir,” he warned.

“Very well, Mr. Nightwine,” I said. “You have my full attention.”

“I want that cheque returned, Mr. Llewelyn. I could have called a stop upon its payment, but it would not look professional asking the Foreign Office for a replacement. Presumably, you have a demand in return. What is it?”

“I’d like you to blanket London today with notices rescinding the five-hundred-pound reward on Barker’s head. Oh, and keep the Elephant and Castle Boys busy all day visiting every public house in London to tell them the news. Do that, and you can have your precious note back.”

“Done. Where shall we meet?”

“In front of the Albemarle. Bring your daughter, please. I want to be certain she can’t sneak up behind me with her lethal parasol.”

“Shall we say seven o’clock?”

“Seven it is, then,” I said, and hung up the receiver.

To me, being in charge always means getting that feeling in the pit of one’s stomach after every decision is made. Some take to it immediately. I never would. Oh, I’d roll the dice on my own life readily enough, I suppose, but with others it is different. One balances the dangers against the consequences, and then realizes one is considering the fate of a human being one actually knows.

There was a point to this. I was responsible for him, and Mac had expressed an interest in accompanying me to the appointment with Nightwine. He had suddenly become fearless. I would give him full credit for finding the cheque, while I could do little more than to take the blame for getting myself captured and escaping again.

Late in the afternoon, Poole entered with a yellow sheet of paper in his hand, its corner ragged from having been ripped from a telegraph pole. He set it down on Barker’s desk without a word. Getting up from my own desk, I bent over and scrutinized it. The letters were large and filled the entire sheet:

The £500 reward for Mr. Cyrus Barker has been rescinded.

“What’s this about?” he asked, in his hangdog way, as if he were going to regret the news, but was obliged to ask for it anyway.

I stepped around to Barker’s desk, and retrieving the bank draft, set it beside the sheet he had brought in. He immediately grinned.

“I take it Mr. Nightwine has lost this somehow?”

“Just happened to find it in the street,” I answered. “Could have happened to anyone.”

Poole nodded and the smile sloughed from his face again. He didn’t have much to smile about.

“What are you going to do with it?” he asked.

“Give it to him. We have an agreement. He removes the bounty on the Guv’s head, and I give him the banknote. He could always stop payment and request another.”

“Are you giving this to him in person?”

“Seven o’clock at the Albemarle Hotel.”

“I swear Nature must protect her idiots. Shall I accompany you?”

“Best not. You may not represent Scotland Yard’s finest in Warren’s eyes, but Nightwine won’t know that.”

“Do you mind if I hang about nearby, then?”

“You may if you like, but I requested Miss Ilyanova’s presence.”

“Nightwine’s daughter?” he asked, as if her identity were common knowledge now.

“Yes. I want her in sight when I hand her father this cheque.”

He rested his backside on the edge of Barker’s desk, a liberty he never would have taken had the man himself been there, and crossed his arms.

“It won’t do you any good, I’m afraid,” he said. “I came across some news this morning. Ever heard of a bloke named Psmith, with a P ?”

“Unfortunately, yes. O’Muircheartaigh’s shootist, isn’t he?”

“Not anymore. He’s employed by Nightwine now. The girl’s been out of sight. If I know Nightwine, he’d like to have your head mounted on his wall right now, and Psmith is just the hunter to give it to him.”

“He can’t have it,” I told him. “I’m still very much using it.”

“You’re sure you don’t need my help?”

“If you happened to be in a tall building nearby and saw Psmith setting up a rifle, I wouldn’t mind if you stopped him from whatever he was about to do.”

“I thought you might. It could get me reinstated, capturing a sharpshooter in the act, so to speak. Warren would appreciate anything that makes the CID look vigilant. So, you’re just going to walk up to Nightwine alone and hope for the best, eh?”

“Not alone, precisely. Mac is coming with me.”

“Mac?” Poole asked. “You mean your Jewish butler? The fellow that looks like Lord Byron?”

“It was he that found the bank draft, you see. I told him he could come.”

His mouth flattened out as he reconsidered. “That’s not a bad idea, actually. The more friends you have present, the less chance you’ll be carried away in a hand litter.”

“Is there a public house in that area you recommend? As a place to meet with friends beforehand, I mean?”

“Try the Dickens, across from Paddington Station.”

“Thanks.”

He thought about that a while and then stood up again. “I think I suddenly have a desire to walk around Paddington. Cheerio.”

After he was gone I considered what people I knew who were tall enough to stand safely behind. The last thing I wanted was to be shot in the head waiting to return a cheque to a criminal who didn’t deserve one. I was minded to start a fire in the grate and watch his gift from the Foreign Office burn.

“I’m going with you, Mr. L, if you don’t mind.”

Our clerk Jenkins had the most intent expression I’d seen on his face in months.

“You’re sure, Jeremy?” I asked. “You’ll be missed at the Rising Sun.”

“The Sun’s loss will have to be the Dickens’s gain. If Mac’s goin’, I can, too. He cares for the house and me the office. We have what you call a working relationship. When the bullets fly, I don’t want anyone thinkin’ to hisself, ‘Where’s Jeremy Jenkins, then?’”