“You are nothing but a blood-sucking leech,” he said with relish.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Look at you! You come to my house and you drink my wine and eat my food as if it were your own.”
“You invite me, mon ami,” the Duc reminded him.
“And you are not just a leech, but a lecher to boot,” the Count said. “There is no point in attempting to deny it. I have seen, with my own eyes, the way you behave towards the ladies. Good Lord, man, I’ve seen the way you’ve behaved towards my own wife.”
The Duc shrugged. “I was only being polite,” he explained. “In truth, I would never dream of taking your wife to my bed.”
“So now you’re saying she’s not good enough for you, are you?” the Count asked, giving his pent-up fury full rein. “You’re saying you’d bed all the other women you’ve flirted with, but not the lady of the house.”
“You misunderstand me,” the Duc protested.
“I want you out of my house now!” the Count said. “I don’t even want you to wait until my servants have packed your bags for you. Leave immediately, and I’ll see to it that all your pathetic belongings are forwarded on to you.”
“You are only speaking in zis way because you are distraught, anon vieux,” the Duc said.
He attempted to put his hand on the Count’s shoulder, but the other man brushed it angrily away.
“You will need some support in your time of trouble,” the Duc continued. “Permit me at least to stay with you until zat English detective, ‘oo annoys you so much, ‘as finally gone.”
“Have you no pride at all?” the Count asked incredulously. “Is there no level of self-degradation that you will not stoop to, as long as it provides you with free board and lodgings?”
“I excuse you for your rudeness, because I understand zat you are—” the Duc began.
“Get out!” the Count screamed. “Get out before I call my servants in and tell them to give you a damn good thrashing.”
The Duc squared his shoulders. “Even a tolerant man such as myself ‘as ‘is limits, and you have exceeded zem,” he said, with some dignity. “I will leave within ze hour. And ze next time we encounter each other, Monsieur le Conte, I ‘ope you will have ze grace not to acknowledge me —because I will certainly not acknowledge you.”
“Acknowledge you! I’ll burn in hell before I’ll ever speak to you again,” the Count said.
“Good. Zen we are agreed,” the Duc replied.
He would have liked to approach the potentially dangerous situation with more caution, but that was an option no longer open to him, the Duc de Saint-Cast thought as he entered the East Wing.
It had been a mistake to suggest to the Count that he should stay, and an even bigger one to keep insisting long after it was plain that the fool would never give way. And the result of making that mistake was that it would be no time at all before it was widely known in the house that he was persona non grata. Worse, it might even become common knowledge the Count had threatened to have him whipped, and then even the lowest of the indoor servants would not think twice before demanding to know what he was still doing in a house where he was no longer welcome.
Thus, the unseemly haste. Thus, the almost reckless way he headed for the smaller of the house’s two libraries. By the time he passed through the library door, the Duc had all but persuaded himself that his argument with the Count had been no mistake at all, but was, in fact, a master stroke on his part. For if the Count sees me as no more than vermin, he told himself, then so will everyone else on his estate. And you do not question vermin. Nor do you search vermin. When you see a rat, your dearest wish is that it will leave your vicinity as soon as possible. It never even occurs to you that instead of the plague, the rat in question may be carrying with him something that will keep him in luxury for the rest of his life.
He glanced around the library. When people heard the word ‘document’, they pictured huge elaborate scrolls, he thought. But a document did not have to be like that at all. It could just be — as this one was — a few sheets of paper. For it was not how a document looked which mattered, but what it said. And whose signature was affixed to the bottom of it!
He marvelled at his own cunning in choosing this as a hiding place. Who would think of looking for a few sheets of paper in a library which already contained so many? Even if they did look, it could he days before they found what they wanted — and if they were just a little careless, they might not even find it at all!
How tragi-comical it would be if he had forgotten where he’d hidden the precious document which would finally give him everything he’d ever yearned for in life. But, of course, he hadn’t forgotten. It was stamped on his brain. Stamped on his heart!
He stood on tip-toe, grasped the heavy, leather-bound volume, and took it carefully down from the shelf. The searcher might even have the book in his hand and still not find what he was looking for, he told himself. He reached delicately down into the space between the spine of the book and its leather covering. For one terrible moment he thought that he might be too late — that, for all his self-congratulation, Blackstone might have been there before him. Then he felt the tips of his fingers brush against the edge of the paper.
He extracted it carefully — oh, so carefully. He was tempted to read it — to take in, once again, those beautiful words which would make him rich. But such temptation was to be avoided, and he slipped the document carefully into the inside pocket of his jacket.
“I didn’t know for certain that you were the thief,” said a voice behind him. “Except for your unusual willingness to assist me in the investigation of the crime, I had no real reason to suspect you more than any of the others. But if I’d been a betting man, you’re the one I would have put my money on.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The Duc de Saint-Cast slowly turned around to face the tall man in the borrowed suit who was standing in the doorway and pointing a pistol at him.
“What is your problem, my good man?” the Duc asked. “Does a gentleman not ‘ave ze right to retrieve ‘is own private correspondence before ‘e leaves zis ‘ouse?”
“It’s certainly private correspondence,” Blackstone agreed, “but it’s not your private correspondence.”
“I am surprised zat your government would trust such a low-level official as yourself — a man ‘oo has scarcely risen beyond the rank of servant — with knowledge of the document,” the Count said sneeringly.
“It didn’t,” Blackstone replied. “But I have friends in the Russian secret police.”
“I also,” the Duc said.
“I know you do. Two of them tried to kill me on the journey down from St Petersburg. Do you know about that?”
“How could I, when I ‘ave been isolated in zis Russian Mite ever since ze robbery?” the Frenchman asked logically.
“But you would have approved their action if you had known about it, wouldn’t you?”
“Since you must already know zat I arranged for ze throat of ze peasant guarding the Prince of Wales’s door to be slit, it would be pointless for me to try and pretend I would ‘ave shed any tears if my associates in St Petersburg ‘ad dealt with you in a similar manner,” the Duc said. He paused for a moment. “May I ask you a question, purely for my own satisfaction?”
“Why not?”
“How could you have been so sure zat, of ze thousands of places I could ‘ave chosen to hide ze document on zis estate, I would select ze library?”
“I wasn’t sure. Though, now I come to think about it, it was the logical choice — and you French have always prided yourself on your logic, haven’t you? But I was fairly certain that wherever you’d stashed it, it would probably be somewhere in the East Wing.”
“Indeed?”
“Indeed. The reason the fire was started was to panic you into retrieving the document. But you didn’t panic, did you? There was no need to, because the fire was in the West Wing, and unless it got totally out o
f hand and spread through the rest of the house, the document was perfectly safe.”
“So ze only reason zat you are ‘ere now is because I am ere”
“That’s right. All the other guests seemed to have nothing else on their minds but making their arrangements to leave. But you appeared to have some other objective. All I had to do was follow you.”
The Duc sighed. “Alas, where ze fire failed, the ‘discover’ of ze golden egg ‘as succeeded. I should ‘ave been careful. I should ‘ave watched my back. But I ‘ave always been cursed with an impetuous nature.”
“You’re taking all this very calmly,” Blackstone said.
“Why should I not take it calmly? You know as well as I do ‘ow valuable zis document is, do you not?”
“Yes,” Blackstone lied.
“Zen you must also know zat zere is more zan enough money to be made from it to keep us all ‘appy. Zat being the case, I suggest zat you name your price, Inspector. But please, try not to be too greedy.”
“Reach into your pocket, take out the document slowly, and place it on the table,” Blackstone said.
“What! You want it all for yourself? My friend, you truly do surprise me. I am an avaricious man myself, but zat is a level of greed to which even I would not aspire.”
“I’m going to return it to its owner,” Blackstone said.
“And ‘oo might that be?’ the Frenchman countered. “Ze Prince of Wales? Or ze Tsar?”
The Tsar? Blackstone repeated silently. What the bloody hell does the Tsar have to do with it? And then he remembered the coach with the blacked-out crest which had fled early on the morning after the robbery.
The Duc de Saint-Cast laughed. “For all your protestations to the contrary, you really do not know what ze document contains, do you, Inspector?” he asked. “And zat, in turn, means zat you cannot even begin to gauge just how truly rich it could make you.”
“Put the document on the table,” Blackstone said firmly. Something had been nagging away at the back of his mind ever since the Duc had first spoken, and now —suddenly — he knew what it was.
The Duc hadn’t said that he’d slit the throat of the peasant who’d been guarding the Prince of Wales’s room. No, his actual words were that he’d arranged for it to be slit.
And that could only mean one thing. The Duc wasn’t in this alone. The bastard had back-up! Even as the idea set alarm bells ringing in his head, Blackstone heard two distinct sounds behind him — one the swish of some heavy material, the other the lightest of foot-falls.
He swung round to face the new — and totally unexpected — threat. If he’d made his move a second earlier, the knife would probably have missed him completely. If he’d left it a second later, the blade would have been plunged deep into his back. As it was, the weapon did no more than slice across the surface of his upper arm.
The shock came first, but the pain followed hard on its heels. As a thousand tiny burning needles seemed to embed themselves in his arm, Blackstone felt his fingers open and his pistol slip away.
Fight back! his instincts commanded. Fight back while you still have the chance!
The knife had embedded itself in the door frame, and its wielder was attempting to pull it free. Despite his pain, Blackstone forced his mind to assess his opponent.
His attacker was wearing a long dress and a wig which had come askew, and was now covering one eye. But this was no woman he was fighting. It was a slight — but strong and determined — man.
Mademoiselle Durant — now revealed to be Monsieur Durant — succeeded in pulling the knife free and lifted back his arm to take another swing at Blackstone. But he was not dressed for hand-to-hand fighting. His whalebone corset — and the padding inside it — slowed him down just enough for Blackstone to take a counter-action of his own.
The Inspector brought his uninjured arm up, and, with the heel of his hand, struck Durant — hard — across the throat. The Frenchman started to crumple immediately.
Blackstone did not wait to see him fall — he had been in enough fights in his time to know that with a crushed windpipe Durant was finished, and there were other dangers still to deal with.
The Duc de Saint-Cast was coming across the room at him, armed with a knife of his own.
“You ‘ave killed him!” the Duc screamed. “You ‘ave killed my love — mon petit am !”
The pistol was on the floor, but it was covered by the body of the dying Durant, and would take too long to retrieve. Blackstone looked around him for some other weapon he might use, but there was nothing!
Burning with rage, the Duc lunged forward. Blackstone reached out, and grabbed the wrist of the hand holding the knife.
Mistake! he told himself, as fresh waves of agonizing pain coursed through his body.
Big mistake!
He should have thought before he acted. If he had, he would never have used his injured arm to block the Duc’s attack. But it was too late to change tactics now, because the good hand was needed to grasp the Duc’s free hand, which was on course to gouge out his eyes.
For a moment then two men stood locked together, then they swayed and tumbled to the floor. They rolled three, or perhaps four, times — Blackstone could not be sure — before they smashed against one of the library tables. They were both winded from the experience, but the Duc had no throbbing wound to contend with, and so it was he who recovered first. He pulled himself free from his opponent and — now on his knees — raised the knife in preparation for striking the lethal blow.
Looking helplessly up at him, Blackstone could see that whilst there was undoubtedly madness in the Duc’s eyes, it was not the kind of raging madness which causes a man to make a mistake. No, it was rather a cold, determined madness — a madness which would drive him on until he succeeded in his aim.
Then, suddenly, the Duc’s eyes were no longer mad — because they were no longer there. The top of his head exploded, covering Blackstone with blood, brains and splinters of bone.
The Inspector dragged himself clear of the carnage, and saw Agnes standing in the doorway. She must have pulled his pistol from under Durant, he thought hazily — pulled it out, taken aim, and fired.
Agnes looked down at the gun in her hand as if she were almost surprised to find it there.
“My father taught me how to shoot mad dogs in India,” she said calmly. “I never thought I’d have to do the same in Russia.”
Chapter Thirty
Blackstone was sitting on the teacher’s chair in the schoolroom. Agnes had bandaged his wound, and though it still throbbed, the pain was becoming easier to bear. His head was starting to clear, too. And he would need a clear head, because though he had dealt with one enemy, there was another he still had to face.
The Count was, if anything, even more ruthless than the Duc de Saint-Cast, he thought. The Duc had only tried to kill him when it was plain he couldn’t be bribed. The Count, on the other hand, had a vested interest in seeing him dead, however much he was willing to co-operate. So if he was ever to leave the chateau alive, he would have to bargain for his life — and bargain for Agnes’s life, too!
The door of the schoolroom burst open, and the Count stormed in.
“I have been out riding, to calm myself down a little after my guests have treated me so shabbily,” he roared. “And when I return, what do I find? That my home has been turned into a slaughterhouse!”
It was mostly play-acting, Blackstone thought. The Count was not so much burning with rage as with anticipation. He wanted what Blackstone had taken from the dead Duc as much as he had ever wanted anything in his life.
The Russian’s next words confirmed it. “You have the document, do you not?” he asked.
“Yes, I do.”
“Then give it to me immediately!”
Blackstone shook his head as much as his aching body would allow. “I’m afraid that I can’t do that, sir,” he said.
The Count laughed heartily, as if he really did find the situation genuin
ely amusing.
“You are in no position to refuse it to me,” he said. “You are in no position to refuse me anything. Don’t you understand that I have only to click my fingers in order to have half a dozen men come into the room and take the document off you by force? And let me assure you, they will not be gentle. Why should they be gentle — with a proven criminal?”
“A proven criminal?” Blackstone repeated. “Me?”
“Of course, you! What else would you call the man who has just murdered two of my guests?”
“I can’t see why their deaths should bother you particularly,” Blackstone said, praying that he sounded as much at ease as he was intending to. “One of the men — Durant — was here under false pretences. And as for the other — Saint-Cast — you’d ordered him to leave anyway, though perhaps not quite in the manner he did. Besides, I was only defending myself. They did both try to kill me, you know.”
“The document,” the Count said, holding out his hand impatiently. “Give me the document!”
“Ah, I see. You want to return it to the Tsar,” Blackstone said. “You feel that in some way that will mitigate the disgrace that’s befallen you for allowing it to be stolen from under your roof.”
“I am not prepared to discuss such matters with the likes of you,” the Count said haughtily.
“As soon as I’d handed it over to you, I’d be a dead man,” Blackstone pointed out.
“Why should I want to kill you?” the Count asked, as if Blackstone’s words really had puzzled him.
“Why?” Blackstone repeated. “Which reason would you like me to give you? The one you’ll tell yourself is the truth — or the one which actually is?”
“This is nonsense!” the Count said.
“No, it isn’t,” Blackstone contradicted him. “You’ll tell yourself that the reason you had to kill me was to keep the document’s very existence a secret. But your real motive will be that, with me out of the way, you’ll be able to claim all the credit for its recovery yourself. But before you do anything you might regret, let me ask you one question. Given all you’d done to keep it quiet, how do you think I knew what to look for?”
Blackstone and the House of Secrets (The Blackstone Detective series Book 3) Page 20