Harold smiled sardonically. ‘No, if you’re so smart, you tell us,’ he said.
‘All right, I will,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘I can’t tell you exactly when he was killed, but it must have been some time between when Knox shot him and the evidence against Knox went missing.’
‘You didn’t expect any trouble from the powerful Holt family over the fact that the evidence had disappeared?’ Blackstone asks Captain O’Shaugnessy.
‘Hell, no! They knew the way things work in this city. If they wanted the case to go to court, all they had to do was pay the sergeant a bigger bribe than Knox had, and the evidence would turn up again.’
‘But the Holts never did pay a bribe?’
‘That’s right. And that was a real surprise to me, because Big Bill was known to be one of the most vengeful men in New York City.’
‘Your father couldn’t pay the bribe because he was already dead,’ Blackstone said. ‘And you didn’t want to pay it, because if the case ever went to court, Big Bill would have to appear as a witness — and, of course, he couldn’t.’
‘Why should we have killed him that night?’ George demanded.
‘Fool!’ Harold spat angrily.
‘What your brother means is that you’ve just given the game away, because I never said he was killed on that night,’ Blackstone told George. ‘But if you want me to give a reason why it happened then, I will.’ He paused for a moment. ‘According to the police report, filed by our old friend Inspector Flynn, your father wasn’t alone when Knox tried to kill him. He had a woman with him.’
‘He always had women with him,’ George said with disgust.
‘Knox thought that the woman was a common whore — but I’m guessing she wasn’t. Your father — monster that he was — was known for seducing any woman he could, including the wives of close associates. And I think this time he got even closer than that — I think that this time the woman was Virginia.’
‘That’s a disgusting suggestion,’ George said.
‘Seducing your son’s wife,’ Blackstone mused. ‘That’s the supreme act of bullying, isn’t it? But it was also a big mistake. When George came to his father’s aid that night, and saw the two of them together, he must have been so shocked he hardly knew what he was doing. Certainly, his first act was to protect your father by disabling Knox — but that was no more than a reflex action. But later, when the shock had worn off, he found that he was in a blinding anger, because this really was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I would guess — and again, I am guessing, though you have pretty much confirmed it — that you confronted your father that very same night, George, after the police had had taken Knox away, and then, in a towering rage, you killed him.’
‘Of course, you’ll never be able to prove any of this,’ George said.
‘Oh, George, why are you such a fool?’ Harold asked, exasperatedly.
‘Your brother’s right,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘If you think we can’t prove it, you are a fool. Even as we speak, your father’s body is being disinterred from the grave that bears Rudge’s headstone.’
‘It’s only bones,’ George said.
‘Indeed it is,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘And one of those bones, the scapula, will have a chip out of it which will be a perfect match with the wound your father received when Knox shot him.’
‘You’ve no idea what it was like to have a father like ours — to go through the miserable childhood we went through,’ Harold said, with unexpected vehemence. ‘We’d earned a better life when we grew up. We were entitled to it. And if we had to kill our father to get it, who can blame us?’
‘You may have a point,’ Blackstone conceded. ‘But how do you justify killing the two Pinkerton men?’
‘If we were to have what we deserved, they were necessary sacrifices,’ Harold said, with an indifference which was even more shocking than his sudden anger.
‘There’s a lot of your father in you,’ Blackstone said thoughtfully. ‘Probably much more of him than there is in George.’
‘Do you think I don’t know that?’ Harold demanded. ‘Do you think I don’t have that brought home to me every single day, when I see just how weak my big strong brother really is?’
‘Please, Harold, don’t. .’ George begged, as tears began to run down his cheeks.
‘I love you, George,’ Harold said, and he began crying, too. ‘You’re the most important thing in the world to me. But you have to see that none of this would have happened if only you’d been a different man.’
THIRTY
‘Now haven’t you just gone and made me look like some kind of prize idjit?’ Inspector Flynn asked, gazing up from his hospital bed at his visitor.
‘You made a valuable contribution to the investigation,’ Blackstone told him.
‘Sure, and what could be more valuable than chasing after a man who’s already been under the sod for seven years?’ Flynn countered, with just a flicker of a smile appearing at the corners of his mouth.
‘Without the work you put in, there’d have been no investigation at all,’ Blackstone pointed out.
‘And I’m not sure that would have been such a bad thing,’ Flynn said, growing more serious. ‘If I’d have kept my nose out of it, Harold and George would have got away with doing the world a favour — and the two Pinkerton men would still be alive.’ He paused. ‘It could be argued that those two men’s deaths are on my head.’
‘You can’t think about it like that,’ Blackstone told him. ‘You just have to do what you believe is right, and hope that people don’t get hurt in the process.’
Flynn’s amused grin returned for a moment. ‘You’re wasted in Scotland Yard, Mr Blackstone,’ he said. ‘You’d have made a damn fine priest.’
‘Which, given your opinion of priests, is not necessarily a compliment,’ Blackstone said.
‘That’s right enough,’ Flynn agreed.
‘So what are your plans when you’re discharged from hospital?’ Blackstone wondered. ‘Will you stay on Coney Island? Or now that your reason for being there has gone, will you ask for a transfer back to Manhattan?’
‘Maybe neither,’ Flynn said reflectively. ‘Maybe, now I’ve got my own personal monkey off my back, I’ll go back to the old country and help my compatriots get the monkey off theirs.’ He paused again. ‘It’s you English I’m talking about,’ he amplified.
‘I know it is,’ Blackstone said. He flicked open his pocket watch. ‘I have to go.’
‘And what might you be rushing off to?’ Flynn asked. ‘Is Wall Street so grateful that you’ve proved Bill Holt is finally dead that it’s throwing you a victory parade?’
‘Nothing like that,’ Blackstone answered. ‘I have to say goodbye to a friend.’
‘Goodbye? Or au revoir?’ Flynn asked, detecting something in the other man’s tone.
‘I don’t know,’ Blackstone admitted. ‘Only time will tell.’ He walked over to the door, then turned on the threshold. ‘You know what you said about returning to Ireland?’
‘Yes?’
‘I wouldn’t, if I were you.’
‘And why might that be?’
‘There’s been a lot of blood spilled there in the past — and there’ll be more spilled in the future. And I wouldn’t like to think that some of it might end up sticking to your hands.’
‘You can’t think about it like that,’ Flynn said, mockingly throwing Blackstone’s own words back at him. ‘You just have to do what you believe is right, and hope that people don’t get hurt in the process.’
The train was almost ready to leave the station, but Ellie Carr still seemed reluctant to board it.
‘Don’t worry, you’ll charm Chicago just like you’ve charmed New York,’ Blackstone said.
‘Yeah, I’m a real little charmer, ain’t I?’ Ellie said. ‘A bleedin’ world champion!’ She paused. ‘It don’t seem to ’ave much effect on you, though, does it, Sam?’
‘You do charm me,’ Blackstone said awkwardly.
‘No, not enough for that. I can’t just follow you around for the rest of my life. I have to work, Ellie. I have to do the job I was born to do — because if I don’t, I’m nothing.’
A serious — almost sorrowful — expression came to Ellie’s face, as if she were about to say something of great significance. Then, slowly, the expression drained away, and was replaced by a cheeky grin.
‘Course yer can’t come wiv me,’ she said. ‘Yer an ’ero, ain’t yer? An’ ’eroes ’ave got to stay around to be admired.’
Blackstone smiled. ‘I might be a hero today, but it won’t last,’ he said.
‘Bloody right, it won’t,’ Ellie agreed. ‘Before this train even reaches Chicago, you’ll have managed to get up right up the nose of somebody important.’
The guard blew his whistle, and as they kissed Blackstone told himself — not for the first time — that he was probably certifiably insane. Then Ellie climbed aboard, and the train pulled away.
Blackstone walked across the station, to where Meade was waiting for him.
‘You should have gone with her,’ Meade said.
‘I know,’ Blackstone agreed.
‘But since you didn’t, you might consider taking an excursion to Sing Sing Prison,’ Meade suggested.
‘Now why would I do that?’ Blackstone wondered aloud.
‘Because Harold Holt wants to talk to you,’ Meade told him.
The prison uniform was at least two sizes too large for him, and hung off Harold’s thin shoulders like the loose skin on a chicken’s neck. And yet, Blackstone thought, he did not look in the least pathetic, because the strength which he had been hiding for so long had finally been allowed to come to the surface.
‘I want you to speak to the District Attorney,’ he said. ‘I want you to persuade him not to ask for the death penalty for my brother.’
‘Nothing I could say would influence him,’ Blackstone told him. ‘But even if I could swing it, why would I?’
‘Because everything was my fault. I was the leader, and George merely followed my lead.’
That wasn’t what he’d said just before he and his brother had been arrested, Blackstone thought.
Back then, he’d turned to his brother with tears in his eyes, and said, ‘You have to see that none of this would have happened if only you’d been a different man.’
‘Maybe a great deal of it was your fault,’ Blackstone said to Harold, ‘but it was George who started it, when he killed your father.’
‘Do you really still think that?’ Harold asked, amazed. ‘Can you still believe that George could have had the nerve to kill the man who so terrified him?’
‘So you’re saying that you killed him?’
‘Of course it was me! I went to see him again that night, after the police had left. I told him that of all the despicable things he’d done in his life, making his own son’s wife get down on her knees to him — like a common whore — was the worst. And he laughed at me. He said he hadn’t made her do anything. He said she’d been more than willing — that she’d appreciated being with a real man for once.’
‘It must have been hard to take,’ Blackstone said, sympathetically.
‘I showed him the knife I’d brought with me — and he laughed again,’ Harold continued. ‘As I advanced towards him, he made no effort to defend himself. Why should he? It was only weak, nervous Harold. But he stopped laughing when I stuck the knife in his guts — stuck it in, and twisted it around. Then, he was screaming in agony. Then, he was begging me — begging me — to stop. But I didn’t stop — not until I was absolutely certain that he’d reached the point where he couldn’t feel pain any longer.’
‘And you have no regrets?’ Blackstone asked.
‘None,’ Harold told him. ‘I felt then — as I still feel now — that that was the happiest moment of my life.’
She was standing in front of the prison, looking up at the long soulless block in which Blackstone had just visited her husband. There was an intensity to her gaze which suggested that she thought she might be doing some good — that, somehow, just by staring at those blank walls, she could bring her husband a little comfort.
She was still a beautiful woman, Blackstone thought, but she had aged at least ten years in the past few days.
He wondered whether or not he should speak to her, but as he drew closer, she showed no signs of resenting his approach.
‘How often do you come here?’ he asked.
‘Every day.’
‘I didn’t realize you were such a devoted wife.’
‘Nor did I. But perhaps that is because, until recently, I never appreciated my husband — never saw the strength that lay within him.’
Perhaps if you had, you’d never have betrayed him with his own father, Blackstone thought.
‘Did you know that it was Harold who killed Big Bill?’ Virginia asked.
‘Not until he told me, less than half an hour ago.’
‘I had always assumed it was big, beefy George who had done it. It was a great shock to learn the truth, but, almost immediately, I began to see Harold in a new light.’
‘Was that because you finally understood that he loved you so much he was willing to kill for you?’
‘He certainly killed for love, but not for the love of me,’ Virginia said, perhaps a little sadly.
‘Then for who?’ Blackstone wondered.
‘For George, his dear brother.’
Who Harold had once blamed for their predicament, but now no longer seemed to, Blackstone thought. But what exactly had he meant when he said, ‘You have to see that none of this would have happened if only you’d been a different man’?
‘I don’t understand how, when Harold killed his father, he was doing it for his brother’s sake,’ Blackstone admitted.
‘George should have taken his own revenge on his father. But George couldn’t — so Harold did it for him.’
‘Revenge for what?’
‘You really don’t know, do you?’ Virginia asked.
‘No’, Blackstone confessed. ‘I really don’t know.’
‘It wasn’t me on my knees before Big Bill when Knox burst into the study,’ Virginia said. ‘It was my sister-in-law, Elizabeth.’
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Blackstone and the Wolf of Wall Street isb-2 Page 24
