A Blind Goddess bbwwim-8

by James R Benn

  We both looked around for Sophia, but she was gone.

  Bone swam closer, knife at the ready. I was breathing hard, the weight of my clothes dragging my limbs down. Holding my head above water took all my energy. Bone was dressed in lighter clothes, and his insane energy fueled each stroke. He slashed at me, not close enough to hit, but to drive me back, to tire me out in the middle of the canal.

  I spotted a ripple of bubbles close to the shore. Sophia, alive, I hoped.

  Another slash, this one catching on my arm, slicing through my jacket. I felt nothing, but I could tell the blade was sharp by the way it went through the fabric, and probably flesh. I kicked, trying to swim backward, to keep Bone away from Sophia and to escape his blows. I went down once and took a gulp of canal water, choking as I came up.

  “Tired, Captain?” Bone shouted. “Let’s put an end to this then.” He was next to me in a second, treading water with one arm and raising the other to strike.

  Sophia broke the surface several feet behind him. Her hands were in front of her, still bound, but holding a rock. She flung it at his head and it caught him in the back of the neck. Bone was stunned and turned to face this new threat, forgetting about me for a split second. I surged forward, reaching for the knife hand again. I got it this time, pulling him down, beneath the surface, the weight of my boots and clothes working with me now. I held his wrist with one hand and went for his throat with the other while he punched at my face, the blows cushioned underwater. He’d made a fatal mistake. I could take those hits for as long as he dished them out, but my grip on his neck was solid. His arm trembled as he tried to work free of me, but I had the advantage now.

  I kicked upward, desperate for air, dragging Bone after me in a terrible imitation of how he had dragged Sophia. I got my head above water and drank in the air as Bone’s face rose up with me, halting inches below the surface. I felt my hand tighten around his throat, crushing his windpipe as his eyes widened, staring at me in mute horror as I breathed in the precious oxygen he craved. He bared his teeth as his arms and legs kicked and thrashed, his neck muscles straining to get his head above the waterline. My arms ached as I kept him under, feeling his brute strength rising up, but not far enough. I watched him, and waited. Finally his mouth gaped open as his lungs gave out, a torrent of bubbles rising from his lips. His arm went limp and the knife slipped away. I pushed him down with both hands, a trail of small bubbles finally giving way to nothingness. I held him down until I felt my own strength give way, and then kicked my feet against his chest as he went further under and I made for land, hoping it wasn’t as far away as it looked.

  CHAPTER THIRTY — FIVE

  I don’t know how I got ashore. Sophia was beside me, trying to break the cloth strips that bound her hands by rubbing them against the hard edge of the dock. She was crying. Who wouldn’t be?

  “Here,” I croaked, rolling over and digging my pocketknife out. She shrieked and skittered away from me. I opened the knife and beckoned her closer, too exhausted for words. She came closer, offered her bound hands to me as if they were a gift, and I cut the wet fabric.

  “Is he gone?” Sophia asked, her teeth chattering from the cold, the terror fading from her face.

  “For good,” I said. “For all time.” I wanted to say you don’t have to worry about him, but she might spend a lifetime doing just that. Remembering and wondering what she’d done to deserve that treatment.

  “I’m cold,” Sophia said. I got up and took off my sodden uniform jacket, then realized it would do her no good. Her schoolgirl cotton dress was soaked and torn, but there were no marks I could see.

  “Let’s see if there are blankets inside. Then we’ll get you home.” I held out my hand.

  “That’s his place. I can’t go in there. I won’t.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Wait here.” I retrieved the key and opened the door. Inside was damp and musty. Dust coated the few pieces of furniture in the sitting room. A shotgun rested against the wall by the doorway. I found a blanket in the kitchen, draped over a rocking chair by the stove. I was feeling dizzy, and made my way outside, unsteady on my feet.

  Sophia was standing on the bank, looking out over the canal. Downstream, something dark floated in the water. It could have been Bone, or a tree branch.

  “He’s really dead?” she asked.

  “Yes.” I put the blanket over her shoulders and turned her away from the canal. “Are you injured?”

  “No,” she said in a small voice. She shook her head, a silent acknowledgment of the injuries that didn’t show. “But you are.” She pointed to my arm. Bone’s blade had cut me across the bicep, on the same arm I’d cut breaking into his shop. I hadn’t felt a thing before, probably from the cold water and a good dose of shock.

  “Maybe I should get us both to the doctor,” I said. “Just for a quick look. Okay?”

  “Okay.” She let me lead her to the car, but I could tell she didn’t want to get in.

  “It’s all right,” I said. “You’ll be up front with me.” I opened the door and she got in, after turning it over in her mind. Like she’d probably do for the rest of her life. I got in and watched her fidget with the cloth still tied around her wrists.

  “Is it really over?” Sophia asked.

  “Yes.” Her small voice reminded me of another woman who’d gone through an ordeal with a madman. If I could find Diana, bring her back from her SOE exile, perhaps she’d be able to talk to Sophia. It might help both of them.

  “What’s your name? He called you captain, didn’t he?”

  “Billy Boyle. Yeah, I’m a captain in the army. But you can call me Billy if you want. I like it better anyway.”

  “Billy,” she said, trying it out. “Were you looking for me?”

  “Yes. A lot of people were.”

  “I wish you’d come sooner,” she said, her face cast down to the floor. “But thank you.”

  I couldn’t say you’re welcome. I pressed the starter and drove to Hungerford, careful to avoid High Street and the sweet shop. My arm hurt like the devil, but that didn’t matter. What mattered was Sophia, and the days and nights she’d been a prisoner. I’d been sure there was a connection between Stuart Neville and the kidnappings, but I hadn’t been able to work it out in time. Neville saw something in the building plans or in the shop itself that raised his suspicions. It must have been churning in the back of his mind, which is probably what caused him to warn Eva Miller. Maybe he would have gone to the police the next morning. Bone had sensed it, his criminal smarts telling him Neville was onto him, or soon would be.

  As an MI5 agent, Neville had been trained to observe and assess data all around him. That’s what got him killed. Bone had been intelligent, that much I was sure of. I was curious as to what the police would find in the cottage. Money, identity papers? Maybe another corpse, but I doubted it. The cottage and the boat were his ticket out of here. He’d have been careful not to compromise them.

  I took the turn into Hungerford, having detoured around High Street and the maneuver area. I hadn’t seen a constable or a roadblock yet. Sophia was shivering under her blanket.

  “You looked like a good swimmer,” I said, making conversation.

  “We swim all summer,” she said. “At least we used to, my parents and I, back on Guernsey. When do you think the war will be over? So I can go home.”

  “I don’t know, Sophia. Seems like it’s been going on for a long time, doesn’t it?”

  “It does.” We were silent for a while.

  “How did you get that rock?” I asked.

  “Oh, it was easy to slip my feet through my tied hands, especially underwater. Then I dove to the bottom. The hardest part was finding a rock big enough, but not too large.”

  “You can open your eyes underwater?” I asked, remembering what a big challenge that was when I was a kid. It took me a while to be able to do it.

  “Yes, I can,” Sophia said proudly.

  “And you can throw pretty well too.
”

  “Yes. And I’m glad I did. Are you all right, Billy?”

  I’d swerved a bit as I rubbed my eyes to stay awake. I’d lost a fair bit of blood and was glad to see Doc Brisbane’s office ahead, with the police station opposite. “Sure,” I said, working up a smile for her sake. I pulled to the side of the road, and thought how sad it was that a young girl like Sophia had to be glad she’d helped save my life. And ended Bone’s.

  Life just isn’t fair, I thought as I set the brake and promptly passed out.

  I awoke to a jab of pain in my arm, and my first thought was of Bone stabbing me. But it was only the doctor, pouring antiseptic over my wounds. The room seemed crowded, and it took me a few seconds to focus on who was who.

  “Billy, did you get him?” That was Tree. “The guy who got Binghamton killed?”

  “Yeah, I got him. We got him. Where’s Sophia?”

  “You settle down, Captain Boyle,” Doc Brisbane said. “I need to finish bandaging that arm. You have a nasty cut. Sophia is in the back room with Miss Ross. She brought some clothes over for her.”

  “Inspector Payne?” I asked. I remembered Bone had run into him with the jeep. It seemed like years ago.

  “Right over there,” Brisbane said, nodding to a bed in the corner. “Just finished setting his cast when that girl came in soaked to the skin and said you were outside, unconscious. Haven’t been this busy since the last time we were bombed.”

  “What happened, Boyle?” Payne said, trying to rise from his bed.

  “You stay put, Inspector,” the doctor growled. “I’ll get crutches for you as soon as I finish here.”

  I saw Kaz come in with a bundle of clothing in his arms, and it was only then that I realized all my clothes had been stripped away. The doc had a sheet over me, but that was all I had, and it felt damned odd in a roomful of people. The feeling didn’t last long, because I passed out again.

  When I woke up the second time, I was in the bed and Inspector Payne was trying out his crutches. He had a cast on one leg, below the knee, and looked pretty banged up, but still alive. Kaz and Tree were leaning against the wall, and Sophia Edwards and Laurianne Ross sat on chairs by the bed.

  “Sophia, how are you?” I asked. She was dressed in a white blouse and sweater with a grey skirt. She was cleaned up and her eyes had some life in them. Miss Ross held her hand.

  “I’m fine, Captain Boyle. I want to thank you for rescuing me. It was very brave of you.” She leaned over and kissed my cheek, blushed, and sat down, folding her hands in her lap. She was a girl brought up with good manners.

  “Sophia refused to leave until you were awake, Captain,” Laurianne said. “I’m so glad you found her in time.” That point was debatable, but I let it pass. Alive was good enough for now.

  “Thanks, Sophia,” I said. “You should get some rest now. I’ll visit you as soon as I can. Is that okay?” She smiled and nodded, and for the first time I saw her as a nice young girl, not simply a victim. I sent up a prayer for her, to Saint Agnes, the patron saint of young girls. Agnes was only thirteen when she was killed for her faith; I was glad Sophia would outlive her.

  “Some food, then rest,” Laurianne said. “Sophia, the baron is driving us back to the school. Will you go outside with him? I’ll be there in a minute.” Sophia smiled shyly at me and left.

  “How is she?” I asked.

  “The doctor says it could be worse,” Laurianne said. “Like the dead girl you found. But he didn’t have her for that long. Still, it’s horrible for her. We’ll do our best to keep her spirits up.”

  “Without being too explicit,” Doc Brisbane said, “while she was abused, it was not with the brute force that was visited upon poor Margaret Hibberd. Perhaps with time, as he tired of her, that would have been the case. Quite bad enough though, I assure you. I’ll come out to the school tonight to check on her. She may need a mild sedative.”

  “Thank you, Doctor. And thank you again, Captain.” After she left, Tree brought over my uniform. Kaz had brought my other clothes to the inn to be washed and cleaned, and brought back this new set of duds.

  “Up to going over a few things, Boyle?” Inspector Payne asked. “PC Cook is searching Bone’s store now and should return soon. He needs to take a statement from both of us.”

  “What about Sophia?”

  “That can wait until she’s rested.”

  “Don’t you need to rest?”

  “I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” Payne said. “When you’re dressed, join me at the nick.” He hobbled out the door, cursing at the crutches with every step.

  I made it across the street with Tree’s help. Kaz and Cook returned and the constable went over what he’d found at the shop. He still had other constables out trying to trace my route to the cottage.

  “We found the room, just as you described,” Cook began. “Here’s your revolver. I cleaned it for you.”

  “Thanks,” I said as he handed me the.38 Special. “You sure you don’t need it for evidence?”

  “You sure Bone is dead?”

  “Absolutely certain.”

  “Then no. We did find a diary, hidden under a floorboard in his bedroom. It would be more than enough to convict him if he were alive. Glad he’s dead, from what I read.”

  “Was there any money?”

  “What? Other than what was left in the till? No.”

  “Bone told me he’d robbed a couple of banks. Sounded like it was a while ago. It was to fund his work, he called it.”

  “Well, he’s been at it for some time. This was the third town he’d set up shop in. There was a clothing store, a stationery shop, and a greengrocer’s. If we can match the diary to missing girls and shop owners, we may close a few open cases.”

  “The money is likely hidden at the cottage,” Payne said, his leg propped up on a chair. “We’ll find it.”

  “Anything else unusual at the shop?”

  “No, other than he’d recently installed acoustic tiles in the basement,” Cook said, consulting his notes. “The kind of thing they use in music studios and radio stations, to dampen sound.”

  “I wonder if that’s what Neville saw,” I said. “Maybe a crate of those, and Bone saw him taking note of it.”

  “That’s precious little to kill a man over,” Cook said.

  “It was a threat, and one Bone thought he could eliminate easily. From his perspective, why take a chance? Neville knew about building construction, and he’d come to the conclusion sooner or later that a sweet shop would have no need for soundproofing.”

  “Makes sense,” Cook admitted. “Now let’s go through this from the beginning.” We spent the next hour going over my statement, detailing what Bone said and did while I was with him. Payne went over Blackie Crane’s identification and his chase. Tree confirmed what he had seen of Lieutenant Binghamton and the crash of the armored car. As we finished, the telephone rang.

  “It’s for Captain Boyle,” Cook said, handing the receiver to me.

  “We’ve been waiting for a call from MI5,” I explained, my hand over the receiver. They’d probably been calling all day with the answer from the owners of the manor house at Chilton Foliat, about Angus Crowley. I listened to what they had to say and hung up, not quite grasping what I’d been told.

  “Well?” Kaz said.

  “There are no owners of the Chilton Foliat manor,” I said. “No private owners, that is. The last family member died and willed it to the government back in nineteen thirty-nine.”

  “Anyone in the village could have told you that,” Cook said. “I even mentioned it to you, that the government took it over. What’s this all about?”

  “I thought you meant in the recent past, when the Hundred-and-First moved in,” I said. “Angus Crowley told them he was sent by the owners, to look after the stables. But MI5 confirmed there are no private owners.”

  “Doesn’t Crowley work for the army?” Cook asked. “I know I saw him eating in their mess hall on two occasions when we inve
stigated the Eastman murder.”

  “No,” I said. “They let him eat there since he doesn’t have a kitchen, but he claimed he was sent by the owners to live and work in the stable.”

  “Why would this fellow represent himself as employed by the owners?” Payne asked. “Not for three meals a day, certainly.”

  “Perhaps this will answer the question,” Kaz said, tossing the scrapbook onto Cook’s desk. It was open to the article about the trial of Alan Wycks. “You all know this man did work for the actual owner, prior to nineteen thirty-nine.”

  “Of course we do,” Cook said with some irritation. “I told you that story myself.”

  “Wycks?” Payne said, his brow furrowed as he dredged up the memory from almost ten years ago. “Stonemason, wasn’t he? A minor theft, if I recall, but a clear case of insanity. But what’s that got to do with the Neville case?”

  “Nothing. But when I was in Angus Crowley’s room,” I said, “he had a picture of that man on his wall. A younger face, but I’m sure it’s Alan Wycks, and Crowley is his son. He killed Tom Eastman and threw his body on Sam Eastman’s grave. Revenge for Sam arresting his father.”

  “After all this time?” Cook asked. “It makes no sense. That picture could have been left by Wycks himself years ago.”

  “No, it was hung in a prominent position, and there were no other personal items in the room. It clearly wasn’t someone’s forgotten junk. Besides, Wycks worked there, but he lived at home with his wife and child.”

  “It’s a thin thread, Billy,” Tree said. “You sure?”

  “I wasn’t sure of anything, but the call from MI5 clinched it. Crowley deliberately misrepresented himself to the army personnel at Chilton Foliat. He may have known about the horses in the stable and decided that was his ticket. No one paid him much mind or checked his story, so he moved right in. A US Army installation is the perfect place to hide out in plain sight. Plus, it gave him easy access to the graveyard where Sam Eastman was buried. He watched and bided his time. What I can’t figure out is what the horses were doing there in the first place.”