Stone's Fall

by Iain Pears

  “Do you know what about?”

  “No. But she wanted money off him.”

  “Did she get it?”

  “Not the time I was there. He was angry about something, that I heard. ‘Unless you tell me there’ll be nothing for you.’”

  “And you don’t know what he meant?”

  She shook her head.

  Not very helpful. “This Madame Boninska. What do you know about her?”

  “Not much. I mean, she didn’t exactly tell me anything, did she? She treated me like dirt. She either looked down on everyone or tried to pull them down. You should have heard the things she said about the people who came to see her. So nice and sympathetic she was to them until she’d got her claws into them. Then they learned more about her.”

  “Go on.”

  “Don’t know really. She wasn’t Russian. Not a foreigner at all. But she’d been abroad for a long time. That she told me. At the Russian court, high places in Germany, so she said. They all loved Madame Boninska.”

  “So why did she come back to England?”

  “I reckon everyone else had tumbled to her and she hadn’t anywhere else to go. But she reckoned she’d hit a gold mine here. She was going to make her fortune. She was going to get her due, that’s what she said. Then she did, of course. Someone killed her. And if that wasn’t her due, I don’t know what was.”

  “You have no idea…?”

  “I’ve told you—she told me nothing. I was a servant. That’s all. I think I preferred the street. But I hung on just in case she was telling the truth. Just in case she was going to get hold of some money.”

  “There was no money in the flat when the police found the body.”

  She shrugged. I couldn’t blame her.

  “How much did you steal?” I asked quietly.

  “Nothing.”

  She was clearly lying, so I smiled at her. “Back wages?”

  “If you like.”

  “This gold mine. Was it anything to do with this man, do you think?”

  Another shrug. I did wish she’d stop it. She managed to give the impression she couldn’t care about anything in the world. Which might be true, of course. “I think so. She was excited enough after he went.”

  “This money you didn’t steal. Was there anything else in the drawer?”

  “Some papers, didn’t look. Nothing important.”

  “Did you take those?”

  “No.”

  They’d gone as well. I had been beaten at every turn. Every time I did something, thought of something, someone had been there before me. All I had established for my money was that Ravenscliff wasn’t interested in the spirit world, but I had guessed that anyway. That this woman had known something, but I had no idea what it was. Maybe she had learned something in Russia, or in Germany. What could she possibly know that was important to a man like Ravenscliff?

  “How well did they know each other? Were they friendly? Distant? Like strangers?”

  “Him, you could almost see him holding his nose when he talked to her. Wouldn’t shake her hand or anything like that. No; he wanted something, and then he’d never want to see her again.”

  “Did he get it?”

  “Don’t know. All I heard was her muttering to herself. ‘Why? Why? Why that?’ Over and over again.”

  “It’s too much to hope that you know what she was talking about?”

  She shook her head. I sighed. “Tell me,” I said, very dispirited, “do you recognise any of these people?”

  I showed her a picture of Lady Ravenscliff. She shook her head. Then I offered the group photograph of the Beswick board, and she looked and shrugged again.

  CHAPTER 25

  It turned into an eventful evening in Paradise Walk, perhaps the oddest the little house had ever known. I had just managed to persuade Mrs. Morrison that the reputation of her house really wasn’t under any serious threat when the doorbell rang, a fact unprecedented and unimaginable. Respectable people do not ring the doorbell, unannounced, at eight o’clock. Respectable people do not have unexpected visitors at eight o’clock. The very sound caused consternation and excitement.

  Even more the visitor. It was Wilf Cornford, who had a look of beatific pleasure on his face, except when he looked at me. Then he frowned in disapproval.

  “I do believe you have not been keeping to your side of the bargain, young man,” he said sternly. “I assumed that you would tell me things of importance. And I find, or at least I suspect, that you have not been.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because I have been talking to a sales manager from Churchill’s, the machine-tool people. And he told me that Gleeson’s had ordered, near eighteen months ago, three new lathes, the sort used to bore gun barrels.”

  “So?”

  “And then I dropped into a pub in Moorgate, and talked to a broker who deals in such things, who told me quite categorically that Gleeson’s had not sold off its old lathes. In fact, that the lathes it already possessed were exactly the same as the new ones.”

  “Is this interesting?”

  “Why would Gleeson’s need eight lathes? For boring guns for battleships, when it has no orders for battleships?”

  “I am truly not dissimulating when I say I haven’t got a clue.”

  “I want a little bit more information from you, if you please. What else have you found out that you haven’t told me?”

  I thought for a while, then decided to take the plunge. “I have discovered that a couple of million has been sucked out of Ravenscliff ’s companies in the past eighteen months, and that the shipyard is awash with spare parts.” I described the scene as best I could. “Also that every politician in the land has shares in Rialto. And, if you want minor details, that Ravenscliff had discovered some hole in his management structure that he couldn’t understand, and that the estate is tied up because of a bequest to a child who is probably dead.”

  Wilf leaned back and sighed with contentment. “Ah, yes,” he said. “A great man, even in his fall.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Had you told me all of this when you started, I could have put all the pieces together very much faster, you know.”

  “I didn’t want the pieces put together at all,” I said crossly. “My job was to find this child, not investigate his companies. I couldn’t give a hoot about Beswick or Rialto. Anyway, what pieces have you put together?”

  “Ravenscliff was a gambler. He took the biggest gamble of his life and was losing. I wonder how much longer he could have kept it going.”

  “Could you just tell me what you are talking about?”

  “Don’t you realise? He was building himself a battle fleet.”

  “What?”

  “Obviously. He had no new orders, profits dwindling, shipbuilders everywhere are in despair. And yet he was ordering new lathes, new armour plate, the factories are bursting with parts. What do you think these are all for? How many spare guns do you think anyone needs? Three maybe. No, my friend, he was building ships. He committed five, six million pounds, and didn’t stand a chance of getting it back. It was simply a question of how long he would manage to keep going before everything came crashing down. What is remarkable is that the likes of Barings are still pretending there’s nothing wrong.”

  “You are sure that he’d lost his bet?”

  “Did you not read the last Budget?”

  “No.”

  “The Government has spent so much money on old-age pensions that there is nothing left at all. The only thing that could possibly change the situation is if a war broke out, and that doesn’t seem likely at the moment.”

  “But Ravenscliff was a clever man.”

  “The cleverest.”

  “And he wasn’t worried. If you were him, and you were in that situation, what would you do?”

  “Nothing. Nothing I could do. Except jump out of a window maybe.”

  “Or keep going and hope for a war.”

  He stared at me. �
�That’s absurd,” he said. “There must be another explanation. Besides, how does it explain the shareholders’ meeting?”

  “I was merely repeating what you said, not advancing my own opinion, you know. What about the shareholders’ meeting?”

  “I have discovered who was behind the attempted coup d’état.”

  “I do very much hope you are going to tell me.”

  “Theodore Xanthos.” He looked dreadfully smug as he said it.

  “But he’s just a salesman,” I said scornfully.

  Wilf was now the one to adopt a look of superior condescension. “Just a salesman? Xanthos is responsible for about half of Rialto’s sales. Eleven million a year. For the last twelve years.”

  “So?”

  “He gets a commission of one and three-quarter per cent. Figure it out.”

  I shut my eyes and tried to use my newly learned financial skills. “That’s about… Heavens! That more than two million pounds!”

  “So, not just a salesman, eh? Admittedly, he has to pay all his own bribes out of that…”

  “Really?”

  “Of course. You wouldn’t want them traced back to the company, would you?”

  “I suppose not.” The comment, however, made me think.

  “No. But even if he’s been spending at the rate of £50,000 a year…”

  “In bribes?” I said incredulously.

  “Oh, yes. At least that,” Wilf said airily. “It’s quite normal.”

  I shook my head. It wasn’t my idea of normal. “The point is, Xanthos often operates through a bank in Manchester, which was where the payments to Anderson’s to buy the Rialto shares came from. A few favours called in, and they confirmed it. Which means that Xanthos was trying to take control of Rialto.”

  “How does this fit in with anything?”

  Wilf was standing now and reaching for his hat. “My dear boy, I have no idea. I was hoping you could tell me that.”

  CHAPTER 26

  I arrived to see Elizabeth the next morning. There was nobody around, so I let myself in and went up to the little sitting room to wait for her. And got a shock when I walked in. Sitting on the settee was Theodore Xanthos.

  “Mr. Braddock,” he said amiably as I entered. “What a pleasant surprise.”

  “I’m surprised to see you, as well,” I replied. “Have you come to visit Lady Ravenscliff?”

  “Ah, yes, but I fear we will both be disappointed. I have just been told she has gone.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, quite gone. To Cowes, so I am told. For the week. She and John went every year. It was one of Lord Ravenscliff ’s great pastimes. He loved the sea. Which I always found curious.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, he was not one of nature’s sportsmen, you know. Nor a great romantic. The lure of the elements did not burn brightly in him. We once crossed the Alps together in a train and I do not think he looked up once. All that scenery, that magnificence and grandeur, and he never once took his nose out of his book. The sea, on the other hand, had a very strange effect on him.”

  “In what way?”

  “It hypnotised him, almost. Something about it. You English and your sea. Very peculiar. Now we Greeks are quite immune, you know, even though we were a seafaring nation while your ancestors were still grubbing around in forests.”

  “When did she leave?”

  “Early this morning, I believe. I imagine all her bags went yesterday.”

  “And she comes back…?”

  “I don’t know. Last year they spent a week there, then travelled to France for a month.”

  “A month?”

  “Then he came back here and she went to take the waters in Germany.”

  “Baden-Baden.”

  “Yes, I believe so.” He paused and looked puckish. “Aha! You are wondering how you will do without her for such a long time. I told you, you know. I tried to warn you. But she is quite irresistible.”

  “I wished to consult her on a matter of importance…”

  “And so did I! So did I! But here we are, abandoned and forlorn. Ah, well. We must make the best of it. Have some of this excellent coffee. I didn’t want it, but Lady Ravenscliff has her servants so well trained that the wishes of visitors are quite irrelevant.”

  He gestured to the tray on the table, then poured, delicately and without spilling a drop.

  “How are your researches? I gather you have been to Newcastle. Were you impressed?”

  I looked at him. “How did you know that?”

  “Good heavens, Mr. Braddock! How can you even ask such a thing? Lady Ravenscliff begins to act in a very unusual fashion, hires someone who is quite unsuited for the task she gives him, and you expect someone like me not to be curious? Of course I have tried to find out everything I can about you. It’s not as if you are very good at hiding your tracks.”

  “I didn’t realise I was supposed to.”

  “Of course you didn’t!”

  “I found Newcastle very interesting.”

  “And Mr. Steptoe? Was he interesting as well? Poor man.”

  The shock of the question quite threw me. Naturally it did; I was perfectly unprepared for it, and in any case was hardly trained in dissimulation. It was not really necessary as a journalist. I was clever enough to know that Xanthos was trying to frighten me, clever enough to acknowledge to myself that he was succeeding, and above all, quick enough to realise that my best response was not to play on his terms. I looked enquiringly.

  “Terrible accident, so I hear. Run down in the street by a horse and cart. Went right over him, broke his back. Dead, poor fellow.”

  He smiled sadly. I stared, horrified.

  “I do wish Elizabeth was a little more generous with the cake,” he said, waving at an empty platter. “I’ve eaten it all. I hope you don’t mind. A curious way of writing a biography, when you haven’t even written a letter to his family in Shropshire.”

  I concentrated on my coffee, trying to stop my hands from trembling. “My editor advised me that, when researching someone’s life, it is best to start at the end and go back to the beginning. I always take his advice.”

  “Have you ever travelled, Mr. Braddock?”

  “Not really.”

  “You must. It broadens the mind. And it is good for the health.”

  “And staying here isn’t?”

  “Violent place, London. Street crime. Innocent people attacked and murdered, just for their wallets, not even for that. It happens all the time.”

  “Not so very often,” I said. “You forget, I was a crime reporter.”

  “So you were. I mention it only because I need a contract taken to Buenos Aires for signature. A trustworthy person to take it would be well paid.”

  “Really?”

  “Seven hundred pounds. The boat leaves from Southampton in a few days’ time.”

  “Otherwise I will meet the same fate as Mr. Steptoe?”

  “A strange thing to say, but I suppose it is a risk we all face. Good heavens, is that the time? I must run.” He stood up, brushed nonexistent crumbs from his jacket, straightened his tie and looked at himself in the mirror.

  “Where is the bowl?”

  “What bowl?”

  He gestured at the mantelpiece.

  “Oh, that. It got broken.”

  He stared at me.

  “It was just a pot.”

  He paused, then recovered. “Of course.” He took an envelope out of his pocket and placed it on the table, then left. It was addressed to me. It contained a cheque for £700, drawn on the Bank of Bruges in London, and a ticket for the Manitoba, sailing from Southampton in two days’ time.

  CHAPTER 27

  It goes without saying, I imagine, that I was agitated, disturbed and very frightened. This was all so far outside my experience that I had not the slightest idea what to do. Xanthos had given me money and said that if I did not take it, he would kill me. Or have me killed. Not in so many words, but even I could gr
asp his meaning. Poor Mr. Steptoe was already dead. So was someone else at the works. So was Ravenscliff. And with such people dying who was I to think I was safe?

  I needed time and I needed somewhere I could put aside the nagging feeling I had that I was being watched and followed. This wasn’t madness on my part; I used all of George Short’s skills in reverse and discovered it was true. Two people, in fact; for the first time I wondered how long they had been behind me without my even noticing. They tailed after me all the way down Piccadilly, but I led the way into my territory, not theirs, into a land where I knew every little alleyway and many of the people on the streets. Every step made me feel safer, less alone. They weren’t that good, and this made me feel stronger and less helpless. I went down the Strand, carelessly, as if I had not noticed them, then into Fleet Street and into the Duck—always nearly empty at that time of day, so I could be sure I would not be surprised. I bought a drink, which I needed badly, and settled into a quiet corner. Peace. I needed that as much as a whisky.

  Both in combination slowly had their effect. I calmed down, then became positively angry. How dare he? Not a sensible response, as it was obvious that he dared only too readily, but it brought me back to myself, and put to a temporary rest the quivering, frightened and somewhat shameful creature which had taken over my mind. Xanthos had threatened me, damn him. Why then? He could have said the same at any stage over the past month or so. Was it because his scheme at the shareholders’ meeting had gone awry and he was planning another way of getting what he wanted? And where was Elizabeth? Had she really gone to Cowes, or was she…? The thought struck horror into my mind. He was trying to take control of Ravenscliff ’s companies, and she was Ravenscliff ’s heir…

  Curiously, it was the thought of the little Greek sitting so calmly on her settee which made my mind up. I would like to say it was courage, or patriotism or chivalry or some other manly virtue which aroused me, but it was not. It was the feeling of being supplanted, of having the image in my mind spoiled, which fired my determination. I would be damned if I was going to Southampton, at least to get on a boat to South America. I was all alone; so be it. I could not go home, so I wrote a letter to McEwen in the pub, and left it with the barman to give to him when he came in. It set out, as fully as I could, everything I knew, and left it to him to decide what to do about it. Then I sent a message for the runners. For five shillings each, they agreed to follow the followers, and also make sure they were distracted while I left the pub by the back entrance. One, I believe, was hit in the face by a large stone, sending him to hospital. The other had his wallet stolen, the lad involved dancing down the street, waving it above his head and tossing the contents on the ground until the pursuit got too close and he was obliged to show how fast he could run.