The God of the Hive - Laurie R. King [112]
“Oh no, that was mine. The brass band was something else entirely.”
“Ha! The small blond man whom you introduced into the bolt-hole near Baker Street.”
“He spent more time there than I did, but yes. Was that disapproval I heard?”
He summoned a look of surprise. “Why should I disapprove? Clearly you had reason to permit a stranger access.”
Before I could respond, he turned to the antique antiquarian perched behind the counter and thanked him for the temporary use of his shop, then took me by the arm again to drag me towards the back. I shook off his grip—shook off, too, the fleeting memory of running hand in hand with Goodman through a dark forest.
“His musical interlude was, I will admit, remarkably effective,” he remarked over his shoulder. “I had not anticipated quite such a number of opponents, lying in wait for us.”
“Nor I. Holmes, where have you been?”
“First Wick, then Amsterdam,” he said succinctly.
“Yes, Billy told me you were there, although he did not know why. Rather a long detour to London, was it not?”
“Damian was more comfortable when we ran before the wind.”
“Is he all right?”
“His shoulder is healing. I left him in the tender hands of a lady doctor.”
“You found a lady doctor in Amsterdam?”
“We abducted one from Wick.”
“Abducted? Oh, Holmes, do you think—”
“Needs must, Russell. Can you climb in that frock?”
I sighed. “Needs must, Holmes.”
The external ladder led to a flat above the bookshop, which by all evidence belonged to the bookseller himself. Holmes moved to the gas ring and put on a kettle, tossing my way a few details of the trip he and Damian had made, along with this doctor lady.
When I had unearthed a chair from a dozen ancient volumes and settled with my cup of tea, I returned to my question.
“When I asked where you were, I meant more recently. I expected to see you at the bolt-hole.”
“Life became rather more complex than I had anticipated.”
“You went down to Southwark,” I suggested.
“Either they are good or I am getting old, because I nearly handed myself to them twice.”
“If they got the better of Billy in his own home ground, they know what they’re doing.”
“And you?” he said. “Any problems on the way down from Scotland?”
“Ah. Goodman didn’t give you the letter?”
“Goodman is your blond friend? No, I received no letter.”
Of course not: Even I had needed a moment to see behind the priest’s disguise. I took another revivifying swallow of tea and began my report on the past eight days. Thirty seconds in, he interrupted.
“Brothers is alive?”
“The book, Holmes. Brothers had his death journal with him, probably in his breast pocket where the bullet hit. I thought it odd that the Orcadian police seemed only marginally interested in the site, but Lestrade confirmed it when I went to his house this morning—news had reached him of a fire and loud noise like a gunshot, but since there was no body, that was all he’d heard.”
“That does rather change things.”
“But I can’t see—” I jolted to a halt: I had not seen Holmes since Mycroft’s death, and his brief description of the week’s activities had skipped over that central event. I put down my cup and laid my hand over his. “I’m so sorry, Holmes. I read of it in The Times, on Wednesday. It was … couldn’t believe it.”
“Nor could I,” he said flatly. “And I’ve now wasted a week.”
“Holmes, I can’t see any relation between Brothers alive and Mycroft …”
“Dead? Brothers had help from within the government, either directly or purchased for him by others. I was operating under the theory that he came here under the auspices of a Shanghai crime cartel, who then lost control over him at the same time he lost control of his reason. If he is alive, it throws another light on our target, but in either case, we are facing a group with considerable resources: men in Holland and in Harwich, an insider in the passport office, twelve men this afternoon. Mycr—”
“A sharpshooter in Thurso,” I added to his list.
He raised an eyebrow, and fell silent. I told him all: Javitz; aeroplane; sniper; crash;