The Game - Laurie R. King [2]
“Yes, the Americans are becoming increasingly nervous about the Reds. They seem to envision a Socialist state that stretches from London to Peking, and don’t know whether to be more worried about the Bolsheviks succeeding, or about the chaos that will follow if they fail.”
When we had exhausted the various topics, we sat down to a meal only marginally less sumptuous than one of Mycroft’s usual, accompanied by what passed for small talk and polite conversation in the Holmes household, in this case an interesting development in forensic science from America and a nice murder that was baffling the authorities. Dessert was a small decorated cake, which none of us ate.
The pouring of coffee, offer of brandy, and fingering of cigars indicated that the meal was finished, business could be resumed. The talk circled back through the Labour victory and the huge problems facing a minority government, before Mycroft took a last, ritual mouthful from his cup, put it onto the table, and asked, “Have you been following the news from Russia?”
My head snapped up as if he’d hauled back on my reins—which in a way, he had: I knew him far too well to think his question innocent. “No!” I said sharply, before things could edge one syllable further down that slippery slope. “I absolutely refuse to go to Moscow in January.”
He made a show of shifting feebly in his chair, letting out a quiet sigh of infirmity before he looked up. “I said nothing about Moscow.”
“Siberia, then. Some place either deadly or freezing, or both.”
He abandoned the attempt at innocence. “I would go myself,” he tried, but at my disbelieving snort and Holmes’ raised eyebrow, he dropped that as well. All the world knew that Mycroft Holmes went nowhere outside his tightly worked circle if he could possibly avoid it: Dr Watson had once referred to Mycroft’s unexpected appearance in their Baker Street flat as akin to finding a tram-car running down a country lane.
It did, however, answer a question that had been in the back of my mind ever since the general election, namely, how would the radical change in government affect Mycroft? Mycroft’s rôle in the outgoing Tory government was as undefined as it was enormous; it seemed he intended to simply ignore the shuffling of office-holders all around him.
“What has happened, Mycroft?” Holmes asked, drawing my attention back to the until-now overlooked fact that, if Mycroft, in his condition, had been consulted on a matter by whichever government, it had to have struck someone as serious indeed.
By way of answer, the big man reached inside the folds of his voluminous silken dressing-gown and pulled out a flat, oilskin-wrapped packet about three inches square. He put it onto the linen cloth and pushed it across the table in our direction. “This came into my hands ten hours ago.”
Holmes retrieved the grimy object, turned it over, and began to pick apart the careful tucks. The oilskin had clearly been folded in on itself for some time, but parted easily, revealing a smaller object, a leather packet long permeated by sweat, age, and what appeared to be blood. This seemed to have been sewn shut at least two or three times in its life. The most recent black threads had been cut fairly recently, to judge by their looseness; no doubt that explained the easy parting of the oilskin cover. Holmes continued unfolding the leather.
Inside lay three much-folded documents, so old the edges were worn soft, their outside segments stained dark by long contact with the leather. I screwed up my face in anticipation of catastrophe as Holmes began to unfold the first one, but the seams did not actually part, not completely at any rate. He eased the