Lord Darcy Investigates Read online

  “In that pose, I’d have recognized her with a sack over her head.” Lord Darcy began to chuckle.

  “What is so funny?” Prince Richard asked in a tone that held more than a touch of irritation.

  “Your Highness,” Lord Darcy said, “that woman is no more a Spanish noblewoman than the Coronel’s horse is. That happens to be Olga Vasilovna Polovski, Number 055 of Serka, the Polish Secret Service. She’s the most beautiful and the most dangerous woman in Europe.”

  “Good God!” The Prince looked shocked. “Did Vauxhall know?”

  “I hope so,” said Lord Darcy. “I sincerely hope so.”

  “Oh, he knew, all right,” said Lord Peter. “He was making special reports to Naval Intelligence at the time. That’s what made the whole affair so delicious.”

  “I can well imagine,” said Lord Darcy.

  They walked on.

  Lord Darcy cast a practiced eye over the long gallery. If someone had wanted to hide it, the eleven-by-fifteen, two-inch-thick diplomatic case could be concealed—with difficulty—in the theater drapes that hung in graceful curves above the windows. Or there might be some secret niche behind one of the paintings. But for now he would assume that it was in plain sight—or pretty much so.

  Torquin the Locksman had gone on ahead to unlock doors. The three noblemen followed in his wake. The next door led into a small but comfortable bedroom. The wallpaper here had a pattern similar to that in the receiving room, but here it was pastel blue and gold. The upholstery on the two chairs and the spread on the double bed matched it. No fancy marble on the corner fireplace, however; it was of plain fieldstone, with an unfinished ruggedness that contrasted nicely with the patterned smoothness of the rest of the room.

  “Wonder how old this house is?” the Lord High Admiral asked idly as they searched the room.

  “Not very, in comparison to the manor house,” Lord Darcy said. “That’s late Robertian—1700 or thereabout.”

  “It’s practically brand new,” Prince Richard said. “Vauxhall built it himself in 1927 or ‘28. It’s been redecorated a couple of times since, I understand, but no drastic changes. It’s rather nice, I think. And the picture gallery is much more inspiring than the one up the hill. All those ghastly old ancestors staring at you.”

  “Your Highness ought to know,” murmured Lord Darcy.

  “Oh, God, yes! Have you seen that portrait of my thrice-great grandfather, Gwiliam IV? The big one that hangs in Westminster? It was painted in 1810, just two years before he died. Really grim-looking old boy at eighty. Well, that picture used to scare the devil out of me when I was a boy. I wouldn’t go anywhere near it. The eyes aren’t quite looking at you, you know, but you get the feeling that if the old man just shifted them a little, he’d see you straight on. At least I thought so. And I had the feeling that if he ever looked straight at me he would see what a wicked little boy I was, and would leap down from his frame and devour me upon the spot. Well, there’s nothing in this clothespress.”

  “And nothing in the bathroom,” said Lord Darcy.

  “It’s dark under this bed,” the Lord High Admiral said. “Lend me your pipe lighter, Lord Darcy. Thanks. Mmmm. No. Nothing under there.” He stood up and brushed off the knees of his trousers.

  Lord Darcy was looking up at the skylight. “That doesn’t look as though it opens.”

  The other two looked up. “No,” said the Lord High Admiral. “Except for that narrow transom on the leeward side.”

  “Yes,” the Duke said, pointing. “It’s operated by that cord that hangs down the wall. It goes up through that pulley, there, you see.”

  “I suppose all of the inner rooms have skylights, Your Highness?” Lord Darcy said.

  “Oh, yes, my lord. Even the library has one, as you’ll see. It has no windows, since the walls are covered with bookshelves. The only other light in there would be from the glass double doors that lead into the garden.” The Duke looked all around. “Well, the next stop is the service pantry.”

  They went out into the north wing of the L-shaped gallery, turned right, and went to the door of the service pantry. It swung open at a touch; Torquin had been there before them.

  The room was, in effect, a very small kitchen. Vauxhall did not throw big dining parties here; when he wanted food served, the servants brought it down from the main house.

  “Not very big,” the Lord High Admiral said, “but lots of places to look.” He opened the warming oven, saw nothing, closed it, and went on to the cabinets.

  Lord Darcy climbed up on a little three-legged stool and began going through shelves. “Your Highness,” he said, “would I be out of order if I asked just what these ‘important papers’ are?”

  “They’re the only copies, in three languages, of our new naval treaty with Roumeleia.”

  “Oh, ho. I see.”

  “As ambassador to the Basileus at Constantinople, Lord Vauxhall was instrumental in persuading Kyril to agree to all the terms. The Greeks, of course, control the Bosphoros and the Dardanelles, which means they have the Black Sea bottled off from the Mediterranean.

  “Casimir of Poland is still trying to get around our naval blockade of the North Sea and the Baltic. By the treaty we forced on him after the ‘39 war, no Polish armed vessel is to pass the Fourteenth Meridian, and no Imperial armed vessel is to pass the Tenth Meridian going the other way.”

  “Nobody here but us Scandinavians,” growled the High Admiral.

  “Right,” said Prince Richard. “And the treaty also permits Scandinavian or Imperial naval vessels to stop and search any Polish vessel between the Eight and Fourteenth Meridians for contraband—arms and ammunition—and to seize any that’s found.

  “But the situation’s different in the Mediterranean. The Greeks didn’t like what Poland pulled during the ‘39 War, and took advantage of our winning it to say that no armed vessel of any nation—except Roumeleia, of course—would be allowed in the Sea of Marmara. But they didn’t quite have guts enough to put a stop-search-and-seizure clause in that fiat.

  “Emperor Kyril is ready to do that now, provided we’ll back him up in the Mediterranean. The Roumeleian Navy isn’t strong enough by a long sight to patrol the Black, the Marmara, and the Mediterranean, and they’re still worried about the Osmanlis, to say nothing of North Africa. This treaty arranges for all that.”

  “I see,” Lord Darcy said. He was silent for a moment, then: “May I ask, Your Highness, why all this sudden need for a search of King Casimir’s merchant ships?”

  The Lord High Admiral’s chuckle was unpleasant. “May I tell him, Your Highness?”

  “Certainly. The King my brother has trusted Lord Darcy with state secrets far more crucial than this one.”

  That was not what the Lord High Admiral had meant, but he let it pass. He said: “His Slavonic Majesty, Casimir IX, has concocted a scheme to get himself a fleet in the Atlantic. It’s a lovely scheme— and it could work. In fact—it may already have worked. We may have caught on just a little too late for comfort.”

  “Three ships is hardly a fleet,” the Duke objected.

  “Three ships that we know of, Your Highness. At any rate, what has happened is this: A few years ago, Poland started expanding her merchant fleet with a new type of vessel—a little faster, a little more sturdily built. They started making them first up in the Pomeranian Bay area. Six months later, they began tooling up for them in the Black Sea—at Odessa.

  “More time goes by. At some time—which we haven’t nailed down yet—the game of Shells-and-Pea begins.”

  “The papers don’t seem to be in here,” the Duke interrupted. “Shall we go into the green room?”

  “Yes,” said Lord Darcy. “Let’s see if naval treaties grow on bushes.”

  There were no bushes. The room, like the gallery, had two outside walls that were practically all glass. Greenery and flowers grew in pots and tubs all over the place. Nothing spectacular, but it was colorful and pleasant.

  The search cont
inued.

  “Thank goodness the roses are the thornless variety,” said the Lord High Admiral as he pushed leaves and blooms aside. “Where was I?”

  “You were playing the Shells-and-Pea Game with Polish merchant vessels,” said Lord Darcy.

  “Oh, yes. Now, you must understand that these ships are all alike. We call ‘em the Mielic class; the Mielic was the first one off the ways, and they’re all named after small cities. And you can’t tell one from the next, except for the name painted on ‘em.

  “Here’s what happens. Let’s say the Zamość sails from—oh, Danzig. She stops at the Helsingør-Hälsingborg Naval Check Point for inspection, which she passes with flying colors.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that,” murmured Lord Darcy as he peered under a long wooden bench.

  “From there,” Lord Peter continued remorselessly, “she continues to Antwerp. This time, we check her. She’s clean.”

  “And her colors are still flying,” said Lord Darcy.

  “Exactly. So she works her way south. Bordeaux, San Sebastián, La Coruña, Lisbon, and finally through the Strait of Gibraltar. She does business around the Mediterranean for a while. Finally, she heads east, through the Dardanelles and the Bosphoros, into the Black Sea, and straight for Odessa. A week later—Ouch! That rose does have thorns! A week later, she’s coming back again. The Zamość goes back through the Bosphoros, the Dardanelles, the Mediterranean, the Straits of Gibraltar, and heads south again, for the coast of Africa. A few months later, here comes the Zamość again, back to Bordeaux with a hold full of zebra hides or something. Then, on north and turn east again and back to Danzig, passing every inspection with utter innocence.”

  “Only the name has been changed to protect the guilty,” Lord Darcy remarked.

  “You are so right. I won’t ask how you knew.”

  “It was obvious. Tell me: Were the crew allowed liberty at port?”

  The Lord High Admiral grinned through his beard. “Not likely, eh? No, they weren’t. And would it surprise you to know that the hull of a Mielic-class vessel looks astonishingly like that of a light cruiser? I thought not.”

  Lord Darcy said: “I see what you mean by the Shells-and-Pea Game. It means that three different ships are involved. Number One—the Zamość—is a genuine merchantman. But when it gets to Odessa, there’s a heavily-armored light cruiser hull that looks exactly like her, with the name Zamość lettered neatly on her bow and stern. Her cargo is heavy naval guns, ready to be mounted in some shipyard in Africa. Where?”

  “Abidjan, we think.”

  “The Ashanti, eh? Well, well. Anyhow, the second Zamość, with the same officers, but a different crew, gets by the Greeks easily because they can’t board and search. Off she goes to Abidjan, where the third Zamość, another genuine merchantman, is waiting. Same officers; third crew. And back to Danzig as pure as the snows of Pamir. Clever. And what happens to the original Zamość?”

  “Why, pretty soon the Berdichev comes sliding down the ways. Brand new ship. Says so in her papers.”

  “And this has happened three times?”

  “Three times that we know of,” said the Lord High Admiral. “We still haven’t been able to check out every one of those ships and follow their official courses, much less try to deduce their unofficial shenanigans. The point is that we have to put a stop to it immediately.”

  “There is evidence,” Prince Richard said, “that two more will be sailing out of the Black Sea within the week. They’re stepping up operations, my lord. That’s why all the worry about that damned missing diplomatic case. It has already been signed by Kyril, but he won’t act on it until he sees the Imperial Seal and my signature on it. There’s an official letter with it from His Majesty, signed, sealed, and everything, authorizing my own signature as proxy, and all that. It was done that way because the King my brother cannot come to Normandy at this time, and it would take just enough extra time to get the thing over there and back that we would be skating too close to the edge. Two—or even one more of King Casimir’s ships out of the blockade could mean more trouble than we can handle right now.

  “The Napoli Express leaves Calais in—” He pushed back the lace at his cuff and looked at his wristwatch. “—five hours and twenty-one minutes. That train only runs twice a week. If we can put that treaty on it in Paris, it will be in Brindisi in less than thirty-six hours. From there to Athens by ship is another twenty-four hours. The Basileus will be there, waiting for it, and the Greek Navy will be enforcing it in another twenty-four.

  “If we don’t have it on that train, we’re lost.”

  “I don’t think it’s as bad as all that, Your Highness,” the Lord High Admiral said. “We can get it to—”

  But the Duke cut him off sharply. “Don’t be an optimistic fool, my lord! If we haven’t found that thing by then, it will mean that somehow—I don’t know how—it has come into the hands of the Serka.

  “Kyril trusted and liked Vauxhall. With him dead, we’d find it hard going to re-negotiate the treaty. Kyril would think us fools to lose the first copy, and he’d be right. He’d likely balk at signing another. Besides, Casimir would know all about it and be taking steps to do something else.”

  It was not until that point that Lord Darcy realized how much on edge the Prince was. Outbursts of that kind were not like him.

  “I think you need not worry yourself unduly on that score, Your Highness,” he said quietly. “I believe I can guarantee that the treaty will be on the Napoli Express in the morning.” He knew he was sticking his neck out, and he knew that the axe blade was sharp. But he had that feeling…

  The Prince took a deep breath, held it for a second, then eased it out. “I am relieved to hear that, my lord. I have never known you to be wrong on something of that kind. Thank you.”

  Lord Darcy felt a ghostly prickle at the back of his neck. The axe had grown a bit more solid.

  “Well, wherever it is,” said the Lord High Admiral, “it is not here with the vegetation. I guess the library’s next.”

  They slid aside the double doors and went in.

  And stopped.

  The room was wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling with bookshelves. And they were full of books.

  “Help us, Blessed Mary,” Prince Richard said earnestly. “We’ll have to look behind every one of them.”

  “Just a moment, Your Highness; let me check something,” said Lord Darcy. He went over to the doors that led back into the front room and slid them open. Master Sean was over by the fireplace, talking in low tones with Journeyman Torquin. Coronel Danvers was sipping a drink and staring moodily out the front window. There was no sign of either Dr. Pateley or the body. Three heads turned as Lord Darcy opened the doors.

  “I see the clay has been removed,” Lord Darcy said.

  “Aye, me lord,” Master Sean said. “The hearse came. The doctor went along to make arrangements for the autopsy. I made all the tests possible for now.”

  “Excellent. Tell me, my good Sean, how long would it take you—possibly with the assistance of your colleague—to remove all the privacy spells around here so that an ordinary clairvoyant could find what we’re looking for?”

  Master Sean blinked, then looked at Goodman Torquin. “Are any of these yours?”

  Torquin shook his head. “Not much good at that sort of thing, Master. Locks are my specialty. I don’t know who he got to renew his privacy spells.”

  Master Sean looked around and seemed to feel the air. “They’ve been here a long while, me lord. Fifty years or so—give or take ten percent. Strong; well reinforced. Complex, too. Fine, competent workmanship. Master grade, I’d say—or a specialist. Ummm.” He reached down, opened his symbol-decorated carpetbag, and took out a thin silver wand with a flat, five-pointed star on the end, looking rather like a long nail with a five-pointed head. He closed his eyes and twirled it slowly between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. “Some of the basics are even older. This house is new, but the gro
unds have been private property for centuries. There was a castle up on the hill where the manor house is now, but it was torn down in the Fifteenth Century. But they had good, solid privacy spells, even then. And the more modern ones are built on an old, very solid foundation.”

  He opened his eyes and returned the wand to his bag. “Nine hours, me lord—if I’m lucky.”

  Lord Darcy sighed. “Forget it. Thank you very much, Master Sean.” He slid the doors shut again.

  “It was a nice idea while it lasted,” said the Lord High Admiral. “Let’s get on with it.”

  “I suggest,” Lord Darcy said, “that we give it a quick look and then go on to the dining room and the other bedroom. We can come back here if we don’t find it there, but we’d feel silly if we pulled out all these books and then found it in the bath of the front bedroom.”

  A quick search revealed nothing.

  “Dining room, then,” Lord Darcy said, opening the sliding doors. “Well! What have we here?”

  There was a large, bare table of polished walnut, big enough to seat ten, set lengthwise in the room. At the southern end, near the door to the front room, was an open bottle of wine and an empty glass. Lord Darcy went over and looked at them carefully. “Schwartzschlosskellar ‘69. A very good Rhenish. One drink gone, and the bottle’s abominably warm. Bottom of the glass still has a sticky drop or two in it.”

  “His last drink,” said Prince Richard.

  “I think so, yes. Leave them alone; we’ll have Master Sean look them over later, if it becomes necessary.”

  They found nothing in the dining room.

  The front bedroom was very like the rear one, except that the wallpaper pattern was green and silver.

  “Notice the way the bedrooms are separated,” Lord Peter remarked. “Only a partition between them, but you have to go through at least two other rooms to go from one to the other. Vauxhall had a fine and very subtle sense of psychology.”

  “That’s why he became a diplomat,” said the Duke.

  There was no diplomatic case in the bedroom, either.

  “Back to the library,” muttered the Lord High Admiral.