Artful Deception (The Clearwater Mysteries Book 6)

by Jackson Marsh

  Thomas gawped, and as the smile grew on James’ face, so one was mirrored on Thomas’ fuller lips.

  ‘Care to explain?’

  ‘Baedeker’s Continental,’ James winked. ‘I’ve a copy in the study, Archer has the same book with him. It’s a simple book cypher where the first number refers to the page, the second, the line, and the third, the word. Very basic, but the joy of it is, unless you know which book to use for the translation, well…’ He swung his arm to the walls. ‘There are hundreds in this house alone. If Quill intercepts, and I wouldn’t put it past him, he’ll have a clue, but not a clue if you get me.’

  Thomas’ smile became a laugh. ‘You are unbelievable, Mr Wright. I assume those numbers will lead to The Rook sixty-six?’

  ‘To the words, yes.’

  ‘And Paris?’

  ‘Just happens to be the title of the section beginning on page sixty-six of the travel guide. When coding numbers, it is less confusing if you can find such a reference. Numbers mean words, words mean numbers.’ James glanced at the book Thomas had been reading. ‘I’m going to think in the study,’ he said. ‘There’s something else Archer mentioned the other day which I am sure is relevant, but I’m buggered if I can remember what it was. I’ll see you later, but before I go…’ He tapped the book. ‘One hundred, six, two to five.’

  It didn’t take Thomas long to work it out, and when he did, he said, ‘You’re as soppy as a maiden in spring,’ and pointed to line six on the page he had been reading and the title of the painting it described. ‘”Love Never Dies.”’

  ‘And so, it won’t,’ James whispered. ‘In the meantime, we have the rook reference to go on and nothing else.’

  ‘Ah, but before that…’

  Thomas kissed him, and they were still clutching each other when Silas gave a loud cough from the doorway.

  ‘You’re getting bold there, boys,’ he said as Thomas pulled away. ‘Is there any news?’

  ‘Not yet,’ James said, annoyed at himself for being caught. ‘We should hear soon. I’ll be next door, Tom.’

  Silas followed James through the drawing room to the study, where he took a seat at the table and flicked idly through the pages of an atlas.

  ‘Where do you think Archer is now?’

  ‘With his brother, I imagine,’ James replied, sitting and turning his attention to his notes. ‘It’s about all I know. I can only guess he took Danylo to Dordrecht to help him bring Crispin back. I assume that was because of the note he received from Quill, but there’s no proof of that, and Thomas won’t let us work on assumption.’

  ‘Probably a good idea. Until we hear from Archer… Are you with me there, Jimmy?’

  James’ mind was only half in the room, the other half was suddenly back at Kingsclere.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ Silas asked, when James failed to reply.

  ‘Sorry, mate. I was trying to remember what Archer said at Kingsclere. It was to do with his epiphany.’

  ‘Which is what?’

  ‘In this case, “A sudden and great realisation.”’ James read from a dictionary open beside him. ‘But what he realised and why are what I can’t remember. Did you speak to Tom?’

  The question caught Silas by surprise, and he swept his floppy fringe back from his face, before shaking his head and causing it to fall back into place.

  ‘He’s not really jealous of you, you know.’ James closed his notebook and leant on his elbows.

  ‘I never thought he was.’ Silas stood at the window, hooking back the voile curtain to let in more air. ‘I always assumed he didn’t like me much, because of how I treated him when we first met.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Ach, don’t worry about it, Jimmy.’

  ‘No, go on, mate. Tell me.’

  Silas sighed as he rested on the edge of the table, watching the street as he remembered. ‘Archer sent Tommy and Tripp to the East End to find someone like me. They wandered into the Ten Bells, looking as out of place as a Proddie in a confessional, and Tommy approached me. Said he was on someone else’s business, but when you get a handsome bloke chatting you up, you can bet they’re only after your arse. Least, that’s what I thought at the time, so I played him a bit.’

  Thomas appeared in the drawing room doorway, approaching the study as Silas spoke, and when he heard his name mentioned, paused to listen, holding up his hand for James to remain silent.

  ‘You know,’ Silas continued, following the passage of a carriage as it passed. ‘Tom wanted me to go with him. I wasn’t in the business of doing house calls, but I told him if he was serious, he’d let me feel his cock to prove it.’

  Thomas blushed, and James threw a wide-eyed look his way in playful reproach. He had heard this story from Tom, and unaffected by it, prompted Silas to continue.

  ‘And did you?’

  ‘Oh, aye. He was the finest bloke I’d seen in months. Be honest with you, Jimmy, your man’s a bit of a dinger. I’ve always thought so, and carrot tops always have massive cocks. I wouldn’t have got into mollying if I hadn’t always fancied blokes like Tommy. Anyway, I gave him a grope, half for a laugh, half ‘cos I wanted to know what he had, and… Well, you’ve been there, you get it. Anyhow…’

  Silas sighed and pushed himself from the table, making Thomas withdraw a pace. Silas, however, remained staring from the window.

  ‘I was mean to him when we got back here, playing with his arse while we waited for the viscount. Wrong of me, really, and I suppose I should have said sorry, but soon as I saw Archie… Well, even Tommy got forgotten.’

  ‘Thanks for telling me,’ James said, staring at Thomas whose blush had left him, and who was now biting his bottom lip in thought.

  ‘Aye, you’re a fortunate man, Jimmy.’ Silas rested his head against the pane. ‘Tommy’s a fine man, and I mean that. He’s as loyal as any bloke could ask for, he cares about everyone, even me, he looks after us and only does what’s right for other people. He’s in love with you, and he loves Archer. Probably doesn’t like me, ‘cos I’m still a little shit, but you know me. I won’t admit that to his face.’

  ‘So, you’re not jealous of each other?’

  Thomas’ eyes opened wide, and he shrugged questioningly.

  ‘To be honest, Jimmy, I’m jealous of Tom’s looks, his physique, his intelligence and his dick, but not because he loves Archie. I get that’s different from what I have with me man, and I respect him for that. So, no, I ain’t jealous. I’m just not very good at telling him stuff like this.’

  ‘You’ve told me.’

  ‘Aye. You and Fecks, you’re no trouble ‘cos you’re me best mates, but Tommy’s on a different level, you know? I just wish I had it in me to say sorry.’ He hissed through his teeth, annoyed with his failings. ‘Maybe one day.’

  Silas fell silent again, and in the doorway, Thomas took a breath deep enough to swell his tailcoat. James raised a finger, telling him to wait, and Thomas took several steps backwards, preparing to approach as if he hadn’t heard.

  ‘Are you okay, mate?’

  ‘Aye, Jimmy,’ Silas sighed. ‘I am. Just got Archie on my mind. Why the feck would he go to Dordrecht unless he’s going to bring Crispin home? And why would he want to do that?’

  ‘Who knows? Meanwhile, we’ve got to find Quill’s location and leave Archer’s note, and we’re no further forward.’

  Silas glanced over his shoulder. ‘Where is it?’

  ‘He said he put it in the safe.’

  ‘So why don’t we look at it, find out where he’s going to be and get there? It’s like he’s pushing us out.’

  A penny dropped, and James realised Silas’ reflective mood was more to do with Archer than it was Thomas.

  The viscount had told them their involvement ended once they had planted the note
for Quill. He had also said that he had put things in place in case anything happened to him, and Silas, fearing that Archer was in grave danger, felt he had been shunted to the sidelines. No doubt Archer had done that to protect him, but James shared Silas’ frustration.

  Once again, Archer was ignoring his men, or at least, that was how it seemed.

  ‘He’s not pushing us out,’ he said. ‘He’s taking care of us, and we must respect that. We shall do as instructed and take the envelope to the destination when we know where it is. Which brings me back to our hunt. Have you…?’

  ‘Stall the ball!’ Silas stood back from the window. ‘Lad in a uniform on his way. Aye. Messenger at the door, Jimmy. Shall I go?’

  Thomas signalled no and turned to the hall.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ James said. ‘Tom or Mrs Norwood will get it. Sit down and try not to worry about Archer.’

  With another sigh, Silas did as James suggested, turning a chair to face the room where he sat leaning his arms on his thighs, picking at his fingers with his head hanging.

  ‘If it helps, mate,’ James said. ‘Like you, Tom’s not very good at talking about certain things. He’s not jealous, and you’ve no reason to be either.’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘He cares about you.’

  ‘Whatever you say, Jimmy.’

  Thomas returned to the drawing room, collecting a salver and placing an envelope on it as he approached. His raised eyebrows asked if it was safe to enter, and a wink from James told him it was.

  ‘Here’s Tom now,’ he said. ‘Who’s that for?’

  ‘A message for James Wright Esq.’ Thomas replied as he entered with a wry smile. ‘Good morning, Mr Hawkins.’

  ‘Alright, Tommy?’

  ‘I am, thank you.’ Thomas offered James the salver. ‘I shan’t bow,’ he added with a grin.

  ‘Thank you, Payne.’ James put on a dignified voice, playing a role.

  ‘Will that be all, Sir?’

  ‘No, actually, Payne,’ James continued the act. ‘Stay. There may be a reply.’

  ‘Certainly, My Lord.’

  ‘Ach, get on with it, you spanners,’ Silas chuckled.

  It was reassuring to see his mood lifting, and opening the envelope, James hoped it would contain news to lighten it further.

  There was nothing but a string of numbers, as he expected, and he took the telegram to the writing-table.

  ‘Your Baedeker’s Continental, Sir.’ Thomas passed the book.

  ‘I’ll read, you find. Silas?’

  ‘I’ll write it down.’

  James threw him his notebook, and Silas readied a pencil.

  ‘First page to look at is page six,’ James said. ‘Line twelve, word number five.’

  Thomas checked the reference and said, ‘The.’

  ‘Well, that’s a good start,’ Silas muttered.

  James read the next set of numbers, Thomas found the page, line and word, and they continued in this fashion until the message was complete.

  ‘And we have?’ James asked when the telegram had been decoded.

  ‘The astronomer poet of Persia,’ Silas read with a grimace. ‘Whoever that is. And then it says, Study, Book, Verse and a name, Edward Fitzgerald. Mean anything, Tommy? Books are your thing.’

  ‘I assume there’s a book in here called “The Astronomer Poet of Persia,”’ Thomas reasoned. ‘Written by someone called Fitzgerald. And in it, a verse.’

  A search of the bookcases revealed no such title, and they returned to the desk more bewildered than before.

  ‘Perhaps he moved it,’ James suggested. ‘Library?’

  ‘We could spend hours,’ Thomas said. ‘It would be quicker to crawl to the British Museum reading room and speak with a librarian.’

  ‘Or,’ James said, ‘we could ask Mrs Norwood. She’s a teacher and her husband works for a firm that publishes poetry.’

  ‘I’ll go,’ Silas volunteered, and having taken another look at what he had written, hurried from the room.

  James and Thomas locked eyes across the reading table.

  ‘And now you know why there is an awkwardness between us,’ Thomas said. ‘Yes, he was very forward. He even kissed me in the carriage when we brought him here, but he was merely being… annoying. All of what happened came from Silas, not me.’

  ‘It’s okay, Tom,’ James said, laying his hand over Thomas’ and finding it cold. ‘It was before I met you, makes no difference to me, and yes, now I understand why you and Silas have never really got on. Just try and be nicer to him, yeah?’

  ‘Do you think he meant what he said about respect?’

  ‘I do, and he knows how much respect means to you. He was brought up differently to you, that’s all.’

  ‘I was brought up among the treddles and dags of a dairy farm,’ Thomas countered. ‘Sounds romantic but it was little more than a hovel on a remote marsh where you were lucky to survive the ague.’

  ‘Yeah, but at eight, you were living here and at Larkspur while he was still in his hovel and just as likely to die of cholera. While you were learning how to polish silver, he was teaching himself to prostitute just so he could eat. You have different perceptions of respect, and completely different ways of showing it.’

  ‘Bloody hell, you can be ruthless sometimes, Mr Wright.’

  ‘Silas is my friend, Tom.’ James squeezed his hand. ‘How you feel for Archer, is how I feel for Silas. He’s no threat to you, to us, to anyone. I know, professionally, you’ve never approved of a viscount living with a street rat…’

  ‘Now hold on,’ Thomas pulled his hand away.

  James grabbed it and continued, unperturbed.

  ‘It’s just taking you time to get used to,’ he said. ‘Understandable. But, here’s you now, son of poor dairy farmer, best friends with a viscount. Cool yourself. Be Tommy Payne, the farmer’s son, but in a fine livery rather than sackcloth, or whatever you wore.’

  ‘Wool, mainly.’

  They sat in silence with only the subtle tick of the mantle clock between them, holding each other’s gaze until Thomas looked away.

  ‘Thanks, Jimmy,’ he said. ‘I probably needed to hear that.’

  ‘You did, and let’s leave it there.’

  Another squeeze of each other’s hand, a furtive peck on the lips, and James was back at the desk by the time Silas returned.

  Reading from a scrap of paper, he walked directly to the bookshelves and scanned the top row from one case to the other, before repeating the process in reverse on the next shelf down.

  ‘Can we help?’ James offered.

  ‘Yes.’ Silas checked the spine of a book against his note. ‘You can tell me what the feck that says.’

  Bringing the book to the desk, he put it in front of James, and Thomas joined them to study the cover and its gold script. The title was set inside an ornate frame, which James assumed was a Persian design, but apart from two words, made no sense.

  Thomas, on the other hand, understood the florid lettering.

  ‘It says, “The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam”, and if we look inside, we should find… Yes. “A translation by Edward Fitzgerald.”’ Opening the book further, he showed them it contained a poem, written in blocks of numbered stanzas, and turning to verse sixty-six, he gasped.

  ‘What is it, Tom?’ James came to look over his shoulder and read.

  I sent my soul through the invisible,

  Some letter of that afterlife to spell:

  And by and by my soul return’d to me,

  And answer’d, “I myself am Heav’n and Hell.”

  ‘And what, exactly, does that tell us?’ Silas sneered.

  ‘It tells me where Quill intends to kill Archer.’ Thomas sat back, his face grave. ‘An
d as far as I know, it could be in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.’

  Fourteen

  The day had also started early for Dorjan, and like the viscount’s butler, he had passed a night with little sleep. The journey to Calais the previous day had been uneventful. Always careful to stay a safe distance behind, he followed Clearwater from the boat to the Brussels train, where on arrival, he booked into the Hotel Le Dixseptième near the railway station in the company of several other travellers.

  The viscount took dinner in the dining room, sitting alone near the window, while Dorjan watched from the back of a street café opposite. The only thing to note was that, during dinner, Clearwater received a message via a bellboy. The youth waited while a reply was penned, and soon after, left the hotel, crossed to the station, and with Dorjan nonchalantly standing a foot behind in the queue, dispatched two telegrams to London. Unfortunately, he was only able to catch a glimpse of the messages. One was composed of numbers, while all he could read of the other was, ‘Make me fly like Torelli’, a message which could have meant anything.

  Dorjan didn’t see any other activity from Clearwater until the following morning when he left the hotel alone carrying his own suitcase. Again, maintaining his distance, he trailed the man to the Central Station and noted which platform he used, before buying a ticket on the same train, learning its stops from the booking office. He kept a close watch when the train pulled into Antwerp, but the viscount wasn’t among those making a connection, and remained vigilant all the way to Dordrecht. There, he witnessed Clearwater alight from the train, and weave through the throng of early morning passengers to the street, cross the road and enter the Station Hotel.

  This was not the most accessible property to survey, being set back from the pavement and partly hidden by trees, but the fact that the viscount was in the city, proved he was following Quill’s instructions, and would, before long, make his way to the Rotterdam Institute at Buiten six miles distant.