I could easily believe that. “Did he say what happened to him?”
“That’s the most interesting part,” Beckham replied. “He vanished. Phfffffft! Gone without a trace.”
There was very little other information that Beckham could provide, courtesy of Old Todgers, and by the end of the call I had to admit that I was probably following a fool’s path. Most likely, Stinson had retired and then moved away. This was not the stuff of a great mystery.
I ordered another pint, hoping to drown my disappointment, and a plate of bangers to go with it, which I ate without much tasting. I was at a dead end. Tomorrow I would ring up Wicking and tell him to go ahead with the introduction he already had.
* * * *
Upon arriving back home I planned to try and get in at least a few pages of work done on my current book, so the day would not be totally wasted. But I was distracted by the flashing light on my phone answering machine. I pressed the playback button, and as I listened, all thoughts of my book vanished.
Mr Dobie, the whispered voice on the machine said, if you know what’s good for you, stop the search for Stinson. Take this as a warning.
I played it back a second time, then a third, by which time I convinced myself that it had to be some kind of joke. It was probably Jim Redgrave or one of his equally sardonic friends down at the Standard, put on to the gag by him. Even so, the voice, so hushed it obliterated any traces of identification, was eerie enough to bring the proverbial hairs on the back of my neck to attention.
I went to my portable bar, poured myself a Scotch and sat down to ponder it. If it was not Jim, then who? Only Wicking, Henry Beckham, his friend at Temple Derek somebody, and Old Todgers knew I was seeking information on Stinson, though I could hardly believe that Wicking, or even Beckham, would launch such a juvenile prank. Todgers? I didn’t even know the man. Nor did I know Derek somebody. What’s more, I really had no idea what Henry told him about my request.
I drained my glass and deliberated over a refill when a thought struck me: Henry had said he “asked around” regarding Stinson. Perhaps one of the others he queried made the call, but for what reason?
My desire for another Scotch on top of all the pints I’d had at the pub won over the slight motion of the room around me. After I had downed it, I went back to the phone and dialed Wicking, only this time I received his machine.
“Graham, it’s Len,” I said, having slightly more trouble with the words than I anticipated. “Someone left me a damned strange message, a rather thetren…threatening message about Stinson. I know there’s a story here somehow. (I had intended to say somewhere, but well, sod it.) This is getting cursor…curiouser and curry…oh, forget it, I’ll ring back tomorrow.”
* * * *
The next thing I can remember is the ringing of a town crier. He rang once, twice, thrice, and then began speaking his news. I immediately recognized the voice as that of Graham Wicking. But why had he become a town crier? And why was he so distant?
It was then that I cracked my eyes open and found myself sprawled across my couch, still partially dressed.
“Ohhhhh, my lord…how much did I consume?” I asked the room, and the answer began to come back to me. Then the fleeting dream memory of the town crier flashed through my aching brain.
“Wicking,” I uttered, “where…?”
It was my phone machine, of course, the only thing in the house that could combine a ringing tone with a voice. Now, vaguely, I recalled phoning Wicking.
It was a little past ten and my head felt like it was about to give birth. Rubbing my temples, I lurched over to my desk and noticed the red light blinking on and off, looking like the window of the world’s smallest brothel. Fumbling with the controls, I managed to play back Wicking’s message.
“Been celebrating a tad too much, have we?” he began. “I didn’t get all you were saying. What is that about a threat? Len, have some coffee—the stronger the better—and ring me back.”
The message then ended. I took his advice and made a pot of strong black coffee. Then I went back to the machine and tried to cue up the cryptic threat of the night before with the intent of playing it back for Graham and letting him be the judge. It was a good plan; it made sense, but after I rewound the tape, the only message that came back was Wicking’s from that morning. I played it over and over again, but it was clear that the threatening message was no longer there.
“Damnation!” I cried, realizing at last what I had done. While drunk last evening, I had absent-mindedly erased the message. It was gone forever, nothing more than a memory.
Where could I go from here?
What, I wondered, would DCI Sim Tanner do? Putting it through Tanner’s eyes, there seemed only one logical place to start: I needed to talk to Old Todgers.
It was not difficult to get the man’s telephone number, and once I had achieved something close to complete sobriety, I called and made an appointment to see him at his office that very afternoon.
Upon arriving, I saw that Edward Todgers, Jr., would not have been out of place in a Hammer horror film. He was so gaunt, ghostly and pale that by comparison, he made Peter Cushing look like Jude Law. He appeared around 80 or so, and his eyes were so deep-set they almost disappeared. Why he was still on the job was anybody’s guess. As I was ushered into his office by his assistant, Old Todgers made a half-hearted effort to rise up from behind an ancient oaken desk before sinking back down and motioning for me to take a seat, which I did.
“What may I do for you, Mr Dobie,” he inquired.
“Actually, Mr Todgers, I am here on a social call.”
At the first indication that he was not about to collect a fee, the man’s face turned even paler. “Social call?” he repeated, incredulously.
“Yes, I am endeavouring to learn more about a man named William Radford Stinson, whom I am told you knew.”
“Ahhhh, you must be the chap about whose inquiries I was told.”
“That’s right. What can you tell me about Mr Stinson?”
“You realize, my dear sir, that I foreswore pro bono work since before the war.”
I did not ask which war, though from his looks it might have been the action against the Boers during Victoria’s final years. But clearly, the message was that I was expected to pay for the information.
“Perhaps,” I ventured, “we could discuss it over drinks.”
“Over dinner might be better,” the man rejoined.
The mercenary bastard! “Of course,” I said, forcing a smile. “Whenever you like.”
“I believe I am free this evening. Shall we say, nine o’clock in the restaurant at the Ritz?”
The Ritz? Why not Buckingham sodding Palace? I nearly cried out. But I held my composure and my smile, and said instead: “Fine. I will meet you there in the bar.” There seemed nothing more to be said so I took my leave, stopping off at my bank on the way home to prepare for the evening.
* * * *
It was about 8:30 when I arrived at the Ritz and headed straight for the bar, consoling myself with an £11 martini. By the time I had finished my second one it was 9:10. He was late, but not egregiously so. At 9:25, however, I began to wonder whether the old corpse was going to show up. Fifteen minutes (and a fresh martini) later my cell phone rang. “Mr Dobie?” a strange voice asked.
“Yes, who is this?”
“My name is Maitland, sir, I’m an associate of Mr Todgers. I am afraid something has come up and he will not be able to keep his appointment with you.”
“Oh, bollocks!” I uttered, in spite of myself.
“Allow me to convey his sincere apologies, and ask when it may be convenient for him to reschedule.”
“Sooner is better than later,” I said. “Tomorrow, if that suits him.”
“I will relay that to Mr Todgers first thing tomorrow morning and either he or I will contact you.”
“Fine, fine, thank you,” I mumbled, and rang off. But as I sat there, looking at my phone, I suddenly won
dered something: how had Todgers gotten my cell phone number? I had not given it to him in his office. Or had I?
Glancing at the now nearly empty glass in front of me, I really could not remember. Perhaps I had. Perhaps I had not.
Perhaps I needed another £11 martini.
It was a little past eleven before I staggered out of the bar and made my way through the lobby. Straighten up, straighten up, I told myself, for once hoping that no one would recognize me. Despite the old adage to the contrary, I firmly believed that there was such a thing as bad publicity.
There was a line of taxis across the street and I started for them, but as I stepped off the curb, I heard a voice call: “Taxi, mister?” The voice belonged to a young, bearded man of either Indian or Pakistani descent, who was leaning out from behind the wheel of a battered American sedan.
“I am going for one now, thank you,” I called back.
“Take you anywhere in the city for ten pounds,” he rejoined. Suddenly he had my attention. As a rule, it is not advisable to patronize the many “gypsy” cabs that proliferate throughout London. Aside from taking work away from a standard city trade, you can never be certain if a gypsy driver possesses the legal licensing. But having consumed nearly fifty pounds’ worth of non-tax-deductible martinis, I was open for a bargain.
“Ten pounds, anywhere in the city, you say?” I called back, and the man smiled eagerly and nodded. “Very well.” Climbing into the back of the car (which smelled of some exotic spice), I handed the man a tenner and gave him an address. Not my address, since I was still somewhat cautious about the arrangement, but the address of a pub close enough to my house that I could either walk or crawl home.
Despite my somewhat hazy condition, it did not take long for me to realize we were headed in the wrong direction. I pointed this out to the driver, and he merely smiled back. At first I thought he simply did not understand, so I tried again, but this time I was rewarded with an all-too-knowing smile. The driver knew exactly what he was doing.
I was being kidnapped!
I tried for the door handle, but it was locked. “Where are you taking me?” I demanded, trying vainly to keep the fear out of my voice.
“To the end of your search,” the man answered, as if that was supposed to mean anything.
I decided to remain silent and wait it out, knowing that the car eventually had to stop and the door be opened, at which time I could make a run for it. After all, being kidnapped by a party of one was not exactly overpowering. On the other hand, my capacity to fight back had been considerably diminished by my capacity for alcohol.
Before long we came to street I knew only too well, and pulled up at the curb in front of a building I had been in many times. “Why have you brought me here?” I asked, staring through the window at the offices of Graham Wicking.
I heard the car doors unlock, and quickly opened mine and rolled out. I made my way for the front door of the building, which was being held open by Wicking himself.
“Graham, is this some bloody joke?” I demanded.
“I wish it were a joke, Len,” he said, ushering me into the dark building.
“What’s going on?”
“It’s not safe for you, that’s all I can say.”
“What?”
“Come this way, Len, please.”
He led through the darkened lobby to the elevator. My head was spinning.
“Are you going to tell me what this is all about?” I asked.
As we waited for the lift door to open, he said: “At first I thought you were crazy, or maybe just drunk. But this thing with Stinson…” A bell announced the lift. “Get in.”
We took the lift to the basement, and when it opened again, Wicking led me down another hallway to a door that, save for a tracing of light around it, might have looked like the entrance to a bunker. “What is this?” I asked.
“Please, Len, just go in,” he said, nervously.
I did as I was told and entered the room, and he closed the door behind me. It was a storeroom, filled with boxes of books. There were probably a few crates of mine somewhere in here. In the midst of the crates, seated on folding chairs, were about a dozen elderly men and women, each of whom sported a tweed fore-and-aft hunting cap and carried a peacock feather.
My utter confusion must have been telegraphed on my face, for the one of the group, a very old man, rose and uttered: “We are the Peacock Street Peculiars.”
I looked around at the assortment in astonishment. “Good God,” was all I could think to say.
“You are Leonard Dobie?”
I nodded.
“The same Leonard Dobie, I presume, who fostered lies about Lord Stinson?”
“What?” I said, stupidly. “You mean my introduction? My good man, I did not lie. Perhaps I did not have all the facts, but it was not a conscious attempt at prevarication. You said ‘Lord Stinson.’ I did not know he had been made a peer. I’d be happy to put that in.”
The old man’s face darkened. “That is a blasphemous jest,” he scolded.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You have taken the name of the Lord Stinson in vain!”
“The Lord Stinson?” I muttered. As I looked from face to face, I noticed that they all could have been wearing the same mask. It was not their features that were similar, it was their identical expressions of wide-eyed adoration, the kinds of glassy stares that one encounters amongst the desperately religious. To my horror, I realized then that they did not represent simply a gathering of fans, but a cult!
“Good lord, you mean to tell me that you people have based a religion on William Radford Stinson?”
“We honour our God,” one of the women said.
“But of all people, why him?” I cried. “He was nothing but a crap writer!”
A gasp went up in the room, and some people fell to their knees while others clasped their hands in prayer. No doubt about it, it was time to leave. “Well, I am glad to have had the honour of meeting you all,” I said quickly, “and I am truly sorry if I have broken a commandment, or…whatever. I shall try to be more careful in the future. Now I must go.” I rushed to the door, only to find that it was locked. Where in hell was Wicking?
“You must answer for your heresy,” the old man, clearly the leader of the group, proclaimed. “Let the charges be read.”
Charges? Bloody hell!
Another member rose and read aloud my introduction, the one in which I savaged the man, the one Wicking claimed never to have received! Good god, don’t tell me Jim Redgrave had leaked it out to these lunatics! When he was finished, the rest of the group began to moan in a low, eerie way.
Then the leader asked: “What does the accused have to say?”
“What do you mean ‘the accused’?” I cried indignantly, instantly realizing that was the wrong approach. These people were clearly unbalanced, and I had to treat them with more gentleness. Forcing myself to calm down and think, I had a sudden flash of inspiration.
“You are forgetting the other introduction I wrote, the real introduction. I realized I had made a grievous mistake. I had been too harsh, too cruel. Perhaps the devil forced me to write it, I don’t know, but I wrote another one to make amends for it. Read that one before you judge me.”
The same man who had aired my “charges” now pulled out another piece of paper and, much to my relief, read the favourable review. When he was done, the old man asked: “And you say that is your true belief?”
“I swear,” I declared.
“Mr Wicking?” the old man suddenly shouted, and I heard the door unlock and saw Graham walk in. “Mr Wicking, the accused claims to have realized the error of his sacrilegious beliefs and writings and argues that he rectified them with this.” He took the second introduction from the hands of the reader and passed it to Wicking, who looked at it. “Is this true?” the old man asked.
Wicking looked up at me, and then back to the paper.
“Tell them,” I prompted. “Graham, tel
l them I got drunk and wrote the first one as a bad joke, and then sent it to you by accident, and then realized my mistake and wrote this one. Tell them.”
“The truth, Mr Wicking,” the old man said. “We will accept only the truth.”
Looking down at the floor, Wicking said: “He sent them both to me. He said I could use either one. His words were, ‘the favourable one or the honest one.’”
“Dammit, Graham!” I cried.
He faced me, looking somewhat sick. “I’m sorry, Len, but it is what you said.”
“Enough,” the leader intoned. “Leonard Dobie, you have been revealed as a blasphemer and a liar. We, the keepers of the flame, we who protect the truth against the falseness, must now pass judgment.”
“Truth?” I shouted, suddenly enraged. “You want the truth? All right, I will tell you the bloody truth about William Radford Stinson. He was the worst sodding writer who ever drew breath! He probably faked his own death so he would no longer have to be recognized as the purveyor of the most dogshit prose on whole of the bloody damned planet!”
I felt a hand on my harm and Wicking quickly stepped between me and the leader. “Allow me to talk to the defendant,” he said, then dragging me into a corner, he hissed in a whisper: “For god’s sake, Len, shut up! You don’t know what you’re up against!”
It was a whisper I recognized. “You,” I said, stunned. “Graham, you were the voice on my phone machine!”
“I tried to warn you, tried to get you to stop, but you wouldn’t.”
“Graham, I want the truth. What do you have to do with all this?”
He looked at me with pained eyes. “The Peacock Street Peculiars came to me with the request that Stinson be brought back into print, that’s all. Since the stuff had been allowed to fall into the public domain it was cheap enough, and vintage fiction is selling again, so I said fine. I thought it was a marketable idea. But then I made the mistake of asking you to write an intro.
“First you wrote that vindictive one, which I pretended not to receive in order to protect you. But I still had to show it to them. Then you became more interested in the man than his writings. You started investigating him, trying to discover what happened to him. You went to see that old barrister today and made dinner plans with him.”
The Sherlock Holmes Megapack: 25 Modern Tales by Masters: 25 Modern Tales by Masters Page 51
