Who Thinks Evil: A Professor Moriarty Novel (Professor Moriarty Novels)

by Kurland, Michael

  “Without a fuss,” added the earl. “How will we manage?”

  “The caterers,” said Moriarty. “Leave it to me.”

  [CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX]

  DO I HEAR A WALTZ?

  ¿Qué es la vida? Un frenesí. ¿Qué es la vida? Un ilusión,

  una sombra, una ficción, y el mayor bien es pequeño;

  que toda la vida es sueño, y los sueños, sueños son.

  [What is life? A madhouse. What is life? An illusion,

  a shadow, a fable, and the greatest good is slight,

  as life is but a dream, and dreams are dreams.]

  —PEDRO CALDERÓN DE LA BARCA

  THE RENTED CHINA AND SILVER PLATE arrived Friday evening in three carriages: twelve large wooden chests, which were lugged in through the service entrance and stacked in the downstairs pantry and adjoining hallway. The caterers arrived Saturday noon: in the service entrance, down the hall past the downstairs pantry and the cold pantry, through the bucket room, through the bottle room, up the stairs into the upper kitchen and butler’s pantry, and then to work unpacking and distributing the kitchenware and cutlery which they had brought with them, and commencing the cutting, peeling, boiling, baking, pounding, ripping, and swearing that the jars of duck confit must be somewhere amongst the comestible supplies that had been sent ahead earlier, packed carefully in ice chests. It was not to be a formal dinner but a floating buffet, which was certain to strain their resources and their patience. Maisgot, the seneschal, had used that dreaded phrase “His Lordship leaves the decisions to your good judgment.” Which in practice meant His Lordship reserved the right to carp about the food choices until the very last moment, when it would be impossible to alter any of the major decisions.

  The extra staff, supplied by Cogswell’s Superior Servant Exchange, began arriving shortly after and set to unpacking and sorting the china and plate and polishing and buffing the odd piece that wasn’t up to Cogswell standards, and trying to find out from Maisgot where to put it all. He referred them to the caterers, which resulted in several muttered comments that he affected not to hear.

  The orchestra arrived at four, except for the flautist, who was half an hour late and showed up in a state of nervous excitement over a contretemps with his landlady, and had to be calmed with a cup of hot tea and lemon and a biscuit before he could join in the rehearsal. In the tradesmen’s entrance they went, up to the ballroom, pausing for an admonition from Maisgot that food and beverages would be supplied as requested, but they were not to mingle with the guests, and then up to the players’ balcony, which overlooked both the entrance hall and the ballroom, with high railings and bars like a seraglio to prevent the cellist from leaping down and mingling with said guests.

  On the far side of the ballroom was a second balcony, similar to the first but smaller, opening only onto the ballroom, with heavy red velvet drapes covering the three walls. Two ornate red-velvet-covered chairs, on which over the past two hundred years various monarchs and other royals were said to have stationed themselves when they merely wished to make an appearance but didn’t wish to mingle with the mere nobility or commoners, faced the room down below.

  At five the man who no longer thought of himself as Albreth Decanare, except in the wee hours of the morning when he awakened from a troubled sleep and, for a few frightening moments, couldn’t remember where he was or why, looked around the ballroom from the privileged balcony. “It seems so large,” he said.

  “There will be,” Macbeth told him, “over two hundred guests as of the latest tally. The room will not seem large. You have hired twenty-two extra staff, not counting the caterers.”

  “I have?”

  “And all will be utilized. You’ll see.”

  “I shall be recognized!” exulted the prospective Earl of Mersy.

  “After tonight, if all goes according to plan, your name will be on the lips of everyone in the English-speaking world.”

  “Plan?”

  Macbeth made a sweeping gesture with his arm, encompassing the ballroom and all it would contain, the past and the future, Albreth’s hopes and his fears. Macbeth was good at these sweeping gestures. “You must be regal,” he said, “and yet humble. Be firm, and yet flexible. This is the beginning!”

  “Gracious!” Albreth said. “The Princess Andrea, she is still coming, is she not? I am anxious to meet her.”

  “She will definitely be here,” said Macbeth. “We are sending a carriage for her.”

  “We are?”

  “We want to assure her presence, do we not?” asked Macbeth.

  “We do? I mean, of course we do. I just assumed she had her own carriage.”

  “Her mother, the grand duchess, didn’t want her to come,” said Macbeth. “I arranged for un petit pot for the mother and a carriage for the daughter.”

  The almost earl turned to look at his mentor. “You paid her to come?” he asked, a querulous whine in his voice. “You actually paid her?”

  “I gave a small consideration to the grand duchess, and then Her Grace graciously permitted her daughter to come,” said Macbeth. “Not quite the same thing. I have reasons for wanting the princess here.”

  “Yes, yes,” Albreth agreed. “To see if she is suitable.”

  Macbeth, who was thinking of something else, looked surprised for a second. “Suitable?”

  “As my bride,” Albreth explained.

  “Oh, yes. That. Of course.”

  “What else?”

  Macbeth took a deep breath, put his arm around Albreth’s shoulder, and said, “We have much to do, milord. We can discuss this later.”

  Milord. It had a certain pleasant ring, Albreth thought. Milord. He nodded and then gasped. “The silver!”

  “The what?”

  “The silver, the plate, the china—has it arrived? I don’t see it.”

  “It is here. Maisgot assures me that everything is in order. The silver service is in the kitchen awaiting food. The plates will be brought out as soon as the plate warmers are placed and lighted. Most of the service will be done in the dining room.” Macbeth pointed toward the two pair of double doors leading to the dining room. “Small tables, each seating four, will be scattered about for people to sit and eat. At nine or nine thirty the tables and chairs will be cleared away, and the dancing may commence. That is the schedule.”

  “Ah!” said Milord.

  It was just after five when a black brougham swung through Totting Square, rounded the corner, and pulled up by the carriage house in Totting Mews. A tall man who looked a lot like the Prince of Wales emerged, giggling at something only he could see, and was escorted by his short, stocky companion through a concealed side door to Westerleigh House. About ten minutes later a second carriage arrived at the carriage house, and a tall, slender man enveloped in a dark cloak was helped out by two companions. He appeared to be drunk, or drugged, or otherwise incapable of walking on his own, and his companions carefully guided him through the side door, and the carriage pulled away.

  [CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN]

  THE PRINCE AND THE GIGGLER

  Come, thick night,

  And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

  That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

  Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,

  To cry, “Hold, hold!”

  —WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

  THE SMUG, THE EPT, THE UNCURIOUS, the socially insecure thought it best to avoid the fete at Westerleigh House. The adventurous, the bored, the curious, the hungry, the uncertain thought it might be quite interesting to attend and meet the parvenu earl. Some unfortunates were hobbled by husbands or wives who felt that they couldn’t—they simply couldn’t—be seen at such an event, but the lure of good food, entertainment, dancing, mingling with the nobility, and meeting the most talked-about man in London that week was an intriguing idea. So they came.

  The guests began to arrive a few hairs before seven. They shed their outer garments in the cloakroom and were
announced as they entered the ballroom by a grandiloquently attired majordomo with a great gold-tipped ebony staff that he thumped on the hardwood floor before and after each name.

  Thump. “The Honorable and Mrs. Jacob ValVoort.” Thump.

  Thump. “Baron and Baroness Strubell.” Thump.

  Thump. “The Honorable Professor James Moriarty.” Thump.

  Invitations are easy to forge, if you know someone who makes his living drawing pound notes freehand.

  The star of the show, the possible Earl of Mersy, was not in evidence as the guests arrived. He had wanted to be—had pictured himself—standing just inside the ballroom door, smiling and nodding and graciously accepting all the bows and curtseys of his guests as they came through, but Macbeth had convinced him that it would not be wise. There were those, Macbeth suggested, who would choose not to bow or curtsey to a man who, after all, was still a commoner, no matter how close he was to gaining the privilege of being hanged by a silken cord, if convicted of a capital crime.

  Now Macbeth had unaccountably disappeared, leaving Albreth standing by the door to his bedroom and trying to decide on his own just when the proper moment would be for his descent down the great staircase.

  “How many?” he asked, intercepting a maid who was scurrying down the hall and clutching her arm as though he thought she would run off if he let go.

  “’Scuse me, Your Lordship?” (He would be called “Your Lordship” in his own house.)

  “How many guests have arrived? How many people are downstairs?”

  She considered for a second and then curtseyed. “I don’t rightly know, Your Lordship. I’ll go down and find out for you.”

  “Yes, yes,” he said. “Do that.”

  “If you’d let go of my arm…”

  “Oh. Sorry.” He released her, and she scurried off.

  Two minutes later she scurried back and stopped a respectful distance from His Lordship. “Mr. Maisgot says as how an hundred and twenty-seven persons have passed in through the front door so far,” she volunteered. “Not counting a few servants and the like.”

  “Ah!” said Albreth. “Go back and tell him to inform me when the number reaches two hundred. At that time will I reveal myself.”

  “Yessir, Your Lordship,” said the girl, and she scurried off again.

  * * *

  “He’s here!” Sir Anthony whispered, looking casually about as though he just happened to be standing next to Moriarty.

  “No need to whisper, Sir Anthony,” said the professor. “No reason why we shouldn’t be talking to each other, and if anyone sees you talking out of the side of your mouth like that they may wonder about it.”

  “Ah,” said Sir Anthony, turning to face Moriarty. “You’re quite right, of course.”

  “Who’s here?” Moriarty asked.

  “The Belleville Slicer, and quite probably the prince. Sherlock Holmes is watching in the mews, and he got word to that woman—Red Sally—who’s lurking by the statue, and she sent that very short person, Mummer, who told me as I was coming in. He saw a carriage pull up and a chap who looked to be the Slasher come through into the house. A few minutes later a second vehicle disgorged a cloaked man who seemed to be incapacitated and was helped inside. That would be the prince, or I’m an octopus. Holmes would have stopped them then and there, but there were three burly chaps, and he feared for the safety of the prince.”

  “Ah!” said Moriarty. “The wisest course, but it must have been difficult for him to restrain himself, given his impetuous nature.”

  “He didn’t say,” said Sir Anthony.

  “Now it’s up to us,” Moriarty said, tapping his thumb thoughtfully on the beak of the silver owl head that was the handle of his walking stick.

  “What should we do?”

  “Who have we inside the house?”

  “In addition to you and me? There’s the earl and Mrs. Barnett, who has come in as his niece, and Miss Dilwaddy, her maid. And the duke and duchess, who is pleased that her husband is doing what she wanted to do for once. I don’t think he has told her the reason for his change of mind about attending. And some of the waitstaff, I believe?”

  “Two of the servers are my people,” Moriarty confirmed. “Following my instructions, they should leave their putative jobs as soon as they can manage and begin searching the house. Of course, it’s a big house.”

  “Won’t they be stopped?”

  “Quite possibly. However, the regular staff are all new and probably don’t know each other very well yet, and my lads have glib tongues, so they have a good chance of talking their way out of any situation that may arise.”

  There came a riff from the orchestra that might have been a prelude to something, and then a few bars of “Boot and Saddle” from the trumpet, and then expectant silence. The assemblage looked up to the orchestra balcony. The orchestra leader pointed across the room. Their gaze shifted.

  The possible Earl of Mersy was standing on the second balcony and leaning forward at a precarious angle toward the crowd.

  “My friends.”

  Slowly the sounds from those in the ballroom ceased as all looked up and waited.

  “It was good of you to come. I am your host. My name is Albreth Decanare. My great-great-great”—he stopped and counted on his fingers, then nodded to himself and went on—“great-grandfather was the Earl of Mersy, and his title has fallen into disuse. My family has been away from England too long. I wish to come back, as my great-great-, ah, ancestor would have wished, and assume my rightful place in the affairs of this country, my country, which I have always loved.”

  A smattering of applause broke out from the crowd, but it quickly petered out.

  “I invited you all here,” he continued, “to my new London home so we could get to know each other. As the evening continues I hope to meet each of you and thank you personally for coming. So—let us get on with it! Eat! Drink! And shortly we shall dance!” He twirled around once and then disappeared behind one of the heavy drapes that lined the walls of the small balcony.

  “The perfect place!” Moriarty said.

  “How’s that?”

  “That balcony, it’s the perfect place. Visible yet unreachable.”

  “The perfect place for what?”

  “Murder,” said Moriarty. “You stay here. Find Mrs. Barnett and Pamela—Miss Dilwaddy—and stay close to them. If she sees anyone she recognizes, or if anything else of note happens, attract my attention.”

  “How will I do that?” asked Sir Anthony.

  Moriarty considered. “A loud noise,” he suggested. “Drop a tray. If no tray is available, have a seizure. Here.” He unpinned the green carnation from his lapel and fastened it onto Sir Anthony’s jacket. “I told my people that if they have anything to report and they can’t find me, go to the man with the green carnation.”

  “Very good,” said Sir Anthony. “And then I drop a tray?”

  “Do whatever seems appropriate,” Moriarty said. He smiled for an instant and then walked away toward the great double doors leading to the hall.

  * * *

  “It is a pleasure, and an honor, to meet you,” said Albreth, with a minuscule bow.

  “Yes?” said Princess Andrea. “For me, also.” She extended her gloved hand, which Albreth took and seemed loath to let go of.

  They were standing in a private, or at least empty, alcove off the ballroom, where Macbeth had arranged for them to meet. Princess Andrea Marie Sylvia Petrova d’Abore was everything Albreth hoped, and secretly dreamed, she would be. She looked to be somewhere between seventeen and twenty-five—Albreth wasn’t good with women’s ages—and had long light brown hair that was done up in one of those fancy things that women do their hair up in, topped by a tiara that sparkled with hundreds of tiny diamonds centering around one large green stone that had an inner light of its own. She was tall for a girl, and slender, and dressed in a green gown that discreetly hinted of possible delights beneath.

  “Tell me,” Albre
th continued, “how long are you going to be here?”

  “My mamma wants me home by midnight,” said the princess, “like Aschenputtel, you know. But I may stay longer. She’s almost always asleep by midnight anyway.”

  “Aschenputtel?”

  “Yes. You know—the girl with the cruel stepsisters who goes to the ball.”

  “Cinderella?”

  “Oh yes? Cinderella? Cinderella?” She rolled the word around on her tongue. “So, unlike Cinderella I may stay until the new day has begun.”

  “Actually,” Albreth said, “I meant how long are you staying here, in England? Before you return to Courlandt.”

  “Sadly,” Princess Andrea said, shaking her head sadly, “we cannot return to our homeland at this time. We are guests of your queen, and thankful for her hospitality.”

  “Ah!” said Albreth.

  Macbeth appeared from somewhere behind them. “You must mingle,” he told Albreth. “Wander about amongst your people. Go now. I will escort Princess Andrea.”

  “His people?” asked the princess.

  “I will explain,” Macbeth told her, leading her away. Albreth drooped sadly for a moment, but then straightened up, squared his shoulders, and marched back into the ballroom. A to-be-king has his responsibilities.

  [CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT]

  FEET, FEET

  The trumpet shall be heard on high,

  The dead shall live, the living die,

  And Music shall untune the sky.

  —JOHN DRYDEN

  DINNER WAS DONE. The staff rushed politely about taking up the tables and chairs and clearing away the debris. The time for dancing, or standing around the side of the ballroom with a glass of wine and watching others dance, was approaching. Several servitors in classic Polichinelle costumes—long, baggy white jackets over even baggier white pantaloons and black domino masks—wandered among the guests distributing dance cards. The guests were, for the most part, using this time to inspect the other guests. Two dukes were in attendance, perhaps three, some said, along with a smattering of barons and honorables and sirs and ladies and a real-live princess; from a Balkan country nobody had ever heard of, but a princess nonetheless. Such a pretty young thing.