Poor Henry Stihl did not fare quite so well. The unaccustomed motion of the flight drove him to lean over the side of the gondola more than once, emptying the contents of his stomach with audible groans.
“This is lunacy,” he moaned. “The wildest of goose chases! How can we possibly hope to find them?”
“Courage, Mr. Stihl!” I said, passing him the flask of aguardiente to bolster his nerve. He took it and swallowed deeply, gasping and spluttering as he passed it back. For a moment I thought he would succumb to his fright, but he rallied, and I believed then that his father would be proud of him. The odds that we would spy them in the dark serenity of that March night were incalculable, but I have always enjoyed uncommonly good fortune at the most unlikely of times. Through some means—divine providence? Luck? Stoker’s earnest efforts?—we at last spotted the train below us, speeding through the countryside, the engine exhaling great puffs of steam. I thought of Patrick Fairbrother and Sir Leicester Tiverton and the confrontation to come. Would either of them welcome us? Would we bring deliverance? Or destruction?
“There!” Henry cried, pointing to a bend in a narrow river. “My God, I cannot believe it, but just there, where the river turns back on itself. That is Tiverton Hall. Where the moonlight is showing a broad, flat bit of ground is a lawn in the front, and you can land there.”
Stoker did as Henry directed, maneuvering the balloon to the boundary of the trees that marched to the edge of the manicured lawns. He intended for us to skim gently down, as easily as a butterfly alights on a branch, but our luck did not hold. The balloon had other ideas.
The gondola came down with a precipitous drop, the treetops rushing up at us at dizzying speed.
“Up, Stoker!” I urged.
“For God’s sake, I’m trying,” he said through gritted teeth, tinkering with the brazier to send more heat into the envelope. But it was too late.
There followed a series of sickening shudders as the gondola cracked its way through the canopy, breaking branches on its way down. Broken limbs clawed the sides of the basket, reaching, grasping, as we hurtled down, down, down, faster and faster. I braced myself for the inevitable crash, and with a sickening thud, we jolted to a stop. The balloon had been snagged upon the trees and we dangled there in the gondola, like so much ripe fruit, some forty feet above the ground.
Henry peeped over the edge of the basket and gave a low moan of anguish. Stoker immediately tossed one of the guy ropes out and grunted with satisfaction when it fell just short of the ground.
“We shall have to climb for it,” he announced.
Henry made a sound of protest, but just then the basket slid a little as the wind rocked the trees. I patted his shoulder. “Never mind. It’s best if you don’t look down. And if you break a leg, Stoker can always put you down. He’s got the revolver, after all.”
Henry gave me a look of purest loathing, and I shrugged at Stoker. But the goad worked. Without further ado, Henry put his leg over the side of the basket, grasping the rope in what must have been nerveless fingers. I did not watch. But the sudden snapping of a branch and a thud followed by a groan of pain were eloquent.
I peered down into the darkness. “Mr. Stihl! I say, Mr. Stihl, are you quite all right?”
“I believe I have broken my arm,” he called, in a voice very unlike his usual.
“Well, that is unfortunate,” I observed.
“Your turn,” Stoker said.
“I think not,” I replied in indignation. “I am lighter. I should remain behind since the gondola is unstable and might topple at any moment. I stand a better chance of surviving a fall than you do.”
His expression was inscrutable. “I am, for all intents and purposes, captain of this endeavor. If anyone is going down with the ship, it is I. Now, get down that rope before I toss you out.”
He advanced upon me as if to make good on his threat, and I vaulted over the edge of the gondola, gripping the rope with my hands and tightening my legs around it. I lowered myself in a steady rhythm, ignoring the creaks and groans of protest from the branches above. They were holding the balloon, but barely.
My boot tips hovered above the ground and I dropped from the rope to find Henry staring at me in frank admiration even as he clutched his arm to his chest. “Where did you learn to climb like that?” he demanded.
“On vines in Costa Rica. The best butterfly habitats are notoriously inaccessible. Do you require medical assistance, Mr. Stihl?” I asked.
He shook his head manfully. “No. I can manage.” He struggled to sit, then to stand. His broken arm was folded like a bird’s wing against his chest.
I removed my shawl and knotted it tightly about his neck, forming a snug cradle for his injured limb. “There you are,” I pronounced. “And mind you see that shawl gets back to me. It is my favorite.”
He nodded, smiling weakly as I lifted my face to call, “Come on, then, Stoker. We haven’t all night.”
Stoker appeared over the edge of the basket and wound one leg about the rope, gripping it with the expert technique of a man who has spent years aboard Her Majesty’s ships as a naval officer. His weight, greater than mine or Henry’s—and possibly both together—caused the gondola to tip perilously. The branches holding the balloon cracked, and the ominous sound of ripping silk shredded the night.
“Faster,” I urged under my breath. He moved fluidly, unhurried. He was still more than thirty feet from the ground, and a drop from there could kill him. But he would do far better without distraction from below, so I restricted my comments to muttering under my breath.
There was a long, slow sound, like a seamstress ripping calico, then a breathless pause. Stoker looked up, and before I could shout a warning, the last of the branches broke with a crack so loud it sounded like a cannon shot. Stoker, the rope, the basket, the balloon, all came tumbling to the ground in a rush of wicker and silk, landing with an audible thud that shook the earth.
“Stoker!”
I could not see him, for the balloon had landed in a riot of destruction. It took a moment for the silk to settle, and the silence was ominous. Suddenly, the pile gave a great heave, and Stoker emerged, crawling free of the debris. He coughed heavily, clutching his side.
“You’ve no doubt broken a rib,” I scolded. “You ought to have descended before the balloon had a chance to tear.”
He looked up at me, wheezing heavily, and I realized he was laughing. “It is no more than cracked, you virago. Good God, a man could die and you would scold him for making a mess on the carpet. Never change, Veronica.”
“I shouldn’t dream of it,” I promised him. “Although what I am to do with a pair of wounded combatants, I cannot begin to think. Perhaps you should give me the revolver after all,” I suggested brightly.
“Not bloody likely,” Stoker muttered. I helped him to his feet and saw the grimace of pain he tried to suppress. I did not fuss. We had a mission, and he would not thank me to distract him from it with talk of broken bones and bandages.
“They have just entered the house!” Henry called in a hoarse whisper.
Following Henry’s lead, we crept near to Tiverton Hall. It might, at one time, have been a pretty Tudor manor, but the gardens had been left untended and the building itself showed signs of neglect. Sir Leicester had obviously poured every spare penny into his Egyptological expeditions, and we had cause to be grateful: a lack of proper security meant no watchman and no dog to stop us.
As we moved near to the house, we saw a progression of lights as Sir Leicester and his captive moved through. At first a distant glow, the golden nimbus of a lamp grew brighter as they came to the back. We could hear Sir Leicester’s voice raised as he berated Fairbrother, giving vent to his temper.
We paused only a moment in the shadow of a shrubbery to get our bearings. The bushes led us up to the edge of a French window, undraped. Through the glass we cou
ld see Fairbrother, sitting in a chair, his expression wary as he kept his eye upon Sir Leicester and the lethal black revolver in his hand.
To my astonishment, Stoker rose slowly from the shadow of the shrubbery, openly approaching the window.
“What are you doing?” Henry asked in a high voice.
“If we surprise him, he may shoot,” Stoker explained. “Better to give him a moment to accustom himself to the idea that he has visitors.”
He did not bother to lower his voice, and Fairbrother’s instant glance in the direction of the window drew Sir Leicester’s attention. He started from the chair and Sir Leicester waved him back, menacing him with the revolver as Stoker slowly opened the door, followed hard by me, Henry Stihl bringing up the rear reluctantly.
“What the devil are you lot doing here?” Sir Leicester demanded, all traces of good humor vanished.
“We came at Lady Tiverton’s insistence,” Stoker replied calmly. “She is rather afraid you might do something foolish.” He deliberately circled to the left while I moved to the right, dividing Sir Leicester’s focus.
The baronet was not to be so easily deceived. He jerked the revolver from one of us to the other. “No. Stand together,” he ordered.
“Surely you do not mean to shoot us,” I said plainly. “It is far too late for that. The game is up. Much better for you to take the consequences like a man.”
His ruddy complexion was florid. “Consequences? Of what? Letting myself be duped by this, this blackguard?” he demanded, turning the gun once more upon Fairbrother.
“That’s a bit rough, don’t you think?” Fairbrother asked in a casual tone of voice. “We did agree to this scheme together, after all. You were perfectly happy to undertake it when we began.”
“Happy? How could I be happy when you were always there, goading me to do more, to risk more? I wanted only to make a little money, but you have taken a harmless little business dealing and made it something grotesque. It is your fault that I have risked my honor,” he lamented.
Any sympathy I might have had for the man was fast evaporating. He seemed far more concerned for his own name than for John de Morgan’s life. But I could well imagine Patrick Fairbrother nudging him to the precipice of these crimes, then tipping him gently over the edge. I was thoroughly annoyed at myself for ever thinking him charming—and not a little chagrined that I had failed to consider him earlier in the role of the mastermind of this pernicious plot. I did not like to think that a sturdy pair of shoulders and a handsome smile might have compromised my judgment, so I dismissed the thought at once and turned my attention to provoking a confession.
“You arranged John de Morgan’s death at the hotel in Dover, did you not?” I asked Fairbrother softly. “It was to be the culmination of the mummy’s curse, proof along with the appearance of Anubis that the expedition had discovered something unique in all of Egyptology. Tell me how you managed it. I presume you had some connection to the hotel’s proprietress.”
“His sister,” Sir Leicester supplied, leveling the revolver at Fairbrother’s chest.
Fairbrother’s eyes cut sharply to me, but he was careful to keep his voice casual, perhaps sensing that we were all that stood between him and the angry baronet. “Yes. Rebecca Giddons is my sister.”
“Rebecca F. Giddons,” I mouthed at Stoker as Fairbrother went on.
“Her hotel was failing, so when I took the position with Sir Leicester, I arranged for the expedition to stay with her. I thought she would benefit from it.”
“She did,” Stoker remarked. “So much that she felt obliged to help you when you conspired to remove John de Morgan. He gave you the perfect opportunity to kill two birds, if you will pardon the expression, with one stone. He found the diadem while you were digging, and when you pretended to discover it in the tomb, he realized what you were doing. He became a threat to your scheme and he had to be eliminated.”
I looked at Fairbrother. “Redecorating the room was a particularly cruel touch. I suppose it bothered you not at all to think that you might drive Mrs. de Morgan mad with such a trick.”
“She had to be discredited,” Fairbrother said slowly. “If her story was plausible, the authorities would ask too many questions. But if she told a thoroughly unbelievable story, then she would be written off as a madwoman.”
“And with John de Morgan ostensibly at large, no one could prove that he was not responsible if the fakery ever came to light. You eliminated a witness and established a scapegoat at a single stroke,” Stoker said. “All to hide what you were doing—creating a fake Egyptological find where none existed.”
“How do you know that?” Sir Leicester demanded, his color rising hotly.
“Something Horus Stihl said,” I told him. “That he could sell a clay flowerpot so long as he could persuade someone it belonged to Amenhotep. That is precisely what you were doing, wasn’t it? You pretended to find an incomplete grave complete with a mummy. That gave the find a certain cachet, and the notion of a curse prevented people from asking too many questions or becoming too suspicious when the body count began to grow. In the meantime, you would exhibit your treasures and then sell them privately for astronomical sums. Cheap reproductions, netting you a fortune.”
“Did you even bother to put the goods into the grave?” Stoker asked. “No, wait. We already know the answer to that, don’t we, Veronica?” He directed the baronet’s attention to me just long enough to move himself forwards an inch. “You didn’t. That’s why you needed workers from upriver—strangers who wouldn’t talk in the Valley villages, giving away your secret. You paid off the Egyptian authorities with a few real artifacts from earlier expeditions. It meant sacrificing your own collection, but that would be a small price to pay for the fortune you stood to make from the sale of the Exhibition. You could charge astronomical prices and no one would blink at paying them.”
I continued the narrative, turning an accusing eye upon Sir Leicester. “The only item you needed to produce, with theatrical flourish, was the sarcophagus—a mummy case you had already purchased, one you damaged by fire when the bitumen went up in flames. Easy enough to add a few inscriptions, particularly with a pet philologist to hand,” I said, nodding at Fairbrother.
Sir Leicester started to protest, but Fairbrother let out a gusty sigh. “Oh, for God’s sake, Sir Leicester, we’ve had it. They have put all the pieces together and they know enough to hang us both.”
“Hang us!” The revolver in Sir Leicester’s hand jumped wildly. “I shall not hang! I am no murderer!”
Fairbrother’s mouth twisted into a grotesque smile. “Do you think that matters? Do you think your title is going to save you when the story gets out? If you aren’t hanged, you’re disgraced, ruined forever. Unless I swear that you murdered Jonas Fowler,” he said, a cunning expression creeping over his face.
“But I did no such thing!” Sir Leicester protested.
Fairbrother shrugged. “Can you prove it? There was no post-mortem,” he pointed out. “Jonas died of heart failure after gastric trouble—a common thing when a man has been poisoned with arsenic. And there is a tidy packet of arsenic powder currently in your lady’s possession. She cannot prove she took it from my room, can she? I shall say she took it from yours. If you lay the blame for de Morgan’s murder on me, I shall lay blame for Fowler’s on you.”
“But you cannot,” the baronet said, his voice thick with rage. His complexion was empurpled, and I wondered if he was about to have a second apoplexy.
“I can,” Fairbrother told him slowly. “And I will unless you agree here and now to take the blame for the planning of this endeavor. If neither of us admit to involvement in de Morgan’s death, they cannot hang either one. We will spend our lives in prison, but we will live.”
Sir Leicester looked frantically from Fairbrother to the rest of us. Stoker inched closer again, but Sir Leicester brandished the gun. “B
ack. You must stay back. I need to think,” he said, jabbing the weapon in Stoker’s direction.
“It is all right, Sir Leicester,” I said soothingly. “You do not need to decide anything now. Give us the gun, and let us take Fairbrother in to the authorities. They will know best what to do.”
Sir Leicester looked confused. Beads of perspiration sprang out, beading the edge of his hairline. He panted a little, as if struggling to get his breath.
“Sir Leicester,” Henry said gently. “You do not look well. Perhaps we ought to summon a doctor.”
The word galvanized Sir Leicester. “No,” he said, holding up the gun with renewed vigor. “No. He is trying to manipulate me, but I will not have it. I know the truth, and the truth is that I would never have embarked upon this road were it not for him and he intended to cheat me of my share. He means to flee to the Argentine, leaving me to clear up the mess. He has a ticket on a ship leaving tomorrow. Did you know that?” he demanded. “After all the sins we have committed, he means to add treachery to the list. But now he has been caught in his own web. He will lie and twist and connive and he will go free. They will believe him because he is clever and I am not. Every evil that I have done has been at his instigation. And now I will atone for it,” he said.
He lifted his chin with a quiet, desperate resolution.
“No!” I cried. But of course it was too late.
Before any of us could act, he lifted the gun and fired once.
Patrick Fairbrother made no sound. He merely widened his eyes in astonishment, looked down to the crimson stain blossoming across his chest like a terrible flower. He fell to the floor in silence. A second shot followed hard upon the first as Sir Leicester Tiverton pressed the revolver to the soft flesh just under his chin and pulled the trigger.
CHAPTER
20
A Treacherous Curse Page 29