Young Sherlock Holmes_ Fire Storm - Andrew Lane [81]
‘Why did he change tactics?’ Sherlock asked. ‘It started out with you chasing him, but it ended up with him chasing you. What happened?’
Crowe stared levelly at Sherlock. ‘There ain’t much gets past you, is there, son? You’re right. Something did happen. Ah said ah lost some men in firefights an’ traps an’ the like. Scobell lost somethin’ too. He lost . . .’ He paused, and looked up at Virginia. ‘Ah’ve never told you this, Ginnie. Ah reckon you’ll think the less of me for what ah’m about to say, but that can’t be helped. It’s the truth, so help me God.’
He took a breath, obviously having to force himself to continue. Sherlock found that he was holding his breath, waiting for what came next.
‘Bryce Scobell had a wife an’ child. Ah don’t believe he ever loved either of them. Ah don’t believe he’s capable of love. But ah think he came closer to real emotion with them than with anyone else. Maybe it was more like possessiveness – ah don’t know for sure. But the thing that happened was, we cornered Scobell an’ his bodyguards at a farmhouse in Phoenix. They started firin’ when they saw us, an’ we fired back. In the crossfire, two of mah people were killed, and so were Scobell’s wife an’ son. We’d had no idea they were there. Scobell escaped, like he always did, but he took an oath that day that he would make me pay for what ah’d done.’ He grimaced. ‘A month later a message arrived for me. It was from Scobell. He told me that he’d kill mah wife an’ mah child an’ he’d make me watch. He told me exactly what he’d do. It weren’t . . . the kind of thing that would occur to any normal, God-fearin’ person, but ah knew Scobell – ah knew that once he set his mind to a thing, then that thing would happen. With the permission of President Johnson ah took a leave of absence from mah duties an’ came here.’
‘And now he’s followed you,’ Sherlock said in the silence that followed Crowe’s admission.
‘As ah said, once he sets his mind to somethin’, that thing happens.’
‘You could have asked for help,’ Rufus Stone pointed out. ‘Mycroft Holmes would have provided guards for your cottage, I’m sure. If not, we could have recruited some people locally to help.’
‘For how long?’ Crowe asked. ‘Even if Mr Holmes provided us with round-the-clock bodyguards, he couldn’t keep them there forever. At some stage they would have been taken away an’ placed on more important duties.’ He shook his head. ‘Bryce Scobell is a patient man. Patient, and very, very clever. He would have waited until everyone had gotten bored an’ tired, an’ then he would have struck.’
‘But you’ve faced dangerous men before,’ Sherlock pointed out. He was confused. He didn’t understand why Amyus Crowe hadn’t stayed to fight. Crowe had always seemed to Sherlock to be a man who confronted difficulty rather than running away from it. Secretly he felt a bit disappointed. ‘I was there in the tunnels beneath Waterloo Station when you took on that man who wanted to kill me. You nearly broke his neck, and you didn’t seem the slightest bit frightened. What’s so different about Scobell?’
‘Ah have faced dangerous men before,’ Crowe agreed. ‘Ah’ve gone up against some of the toughest, hardest men in the world in mah time, but Bryce Scobell is a different bucket of catfish entirely.’ He sighed. ‘It’s difficult to describe, but there’s something . . . not human about him. Most people are wary of bein’ hurt, of bein’ damaged, an’ that gives you an advantage in a fight, but he ain’t. He just don’t care. Ah’m not sayin’ he don’t feel pain, cos he does, but he just shrugs it off. It don’t interest him. An’ he don’t remember the pain neither. If you punch a normal man in the face enough times he’ll stay back, not wantin’ to get hit again, but Scobell – hit him the first time an’ he’ll remember the fact that he was hit, but he don’t seem to learn from the pain. He don’t seek to avoid it next time. Knock him down an’ he just gets up again, an’ again, an’ again. He keeps comin’ back at you, like some kind of mechanical creation.’ He shook his head. ‘Ah’m not