Young Sherlock Holmes_ Red Leech - Andrew Lane [85]
‘I’ll tell you,’ Matty said urgently.
‘No,’ Balthassar said gently. ‘I want Master Sherlock to tell me. He, I perceive, is the leader of this little group. He is the one who needs to learn to fear me. He is the one who needs to be trained’ He paused for a moment. ‘You see, there are various ways to die. A bullet to the head is quick and painless, I believe. Bleeding to death is slow, and painful. You do not have the choice as to whether you will die or not: I have taken that choice away from you. You do, however, have a choice as to how you die: quickly or slowly, in agony or in peace.’
‘Very well,’ Sherlock said, heart pounding in his chest. ‘Call the cougar off and I’ll answer your question.’
‘No,’ Balthassar said. ‘Answer the question and I will call off the cougar.’
The tension in the air was almost visible. Sherlock knew that he and Balthassar were testing their willpower against one another. The trouble was, Balthassar had all the advantages.
‘The authorities know about John Wilkes Booth,’ he said. ‘They know he’s not dead, that he was bought to England from Japan, and that he’s here in America now. The British Government know that, and so does the Pinkerton Agency. I presume they will tell the American Government. They don’t know what you intend doing with him.’
‘Good,’ Balthassar said. ‘More.’
‘There is no more!’ Sherlock shouted.
‘There is always more. Do the authorities know about me, for instance?’
‘No.’
‘So you ended up on that train by accident? I don’t think so.’
‘We were following them!’ Sherlock said, gesturing towards Berle and Rubinek. ‘We were trying to get Matty back.’
‘And were you with anybody else on the train?’ Balthas-sar’s voice was calm but remorseless.
‘No. We were by ourselves.’
‘How remarkably resourceful of you.’ Balthassar paused, and Sherlock got the impression that he was debating whether to tell Sherman to rip Virginia’s hand off anyway.
Sherlock didn’t bother praying. No outside entity was going to help them now. They were on their own, depending on the whims of a madman.
The thought gave him an idea. Maybe he could turn that against the man in the porcelain mask.
Balthassar gave a curt order, and the cougar reluctantly pulled its head back so that its teeth were no longer pressing into Virginia’s flesh. Her whole body seemed to wilt. It gazed at her for a moment, then padded back to Balthassar’s side.
‘I have a question,’ Sherlock said.
Balthassar gazed at him, eyes red and black behind the holes in the mask. ‘Did you not understand the rules? I ask questions and you answer them, and that guarantees you a quick and painless death. That was our bargain.’
‘But we only have your word for that,’ Sherlock pointed out. ‘I think you’re going to get all the answers you can out of us and then torture us anyway, just because you would enjoy it. On that basis, we don’t gain anything by cooperating apart from a short delay before the torture starts.’
Balthassar mused for a while. ‘A logical analysis,’ he conceded. ‘You do only have my word, and you don’t know how good my word is. What is your counterproposal?’
‘We will take you at your word,’ Sherlock said, ‘ifyou answer our questions as well.’
‘Interesting,’ Balthassar mused. ‘I don’t stand to lose anything on the deal, and I gain more information. On the other hand you don’t lose anything, as I still get to choose the manner of your deaths, but you do gain information, and that apparently matters to you. So yes, I agree. Ask your questions.’
‘What do you need John Wilkes Booth for?’ Sherlock asked. ‘Why is the fact that he’s alive and here in America important enough that people need to die to keep it a secret?’
‘Oh,’ Balthassar said calmly, ‘people need to die for all kinds of reasons, few of them important. But I like you, Sherlock Scott Holmes. You have spirit. So I’m going to tell you.’ He glanced at Berle and Rubinek. After all, they won’t understand. They just want their money.’
‘Hey—’ Berle started, then subsided when Balthassar stared at him.
‘I realize you are British, but even you must have heard