Stone's Fall

by Iain Pears

“He lends people money to buy his own goods?”

  “What you see with Ravenscliff ’s operations is the material side. The factories, the goods. But there was also another side, the banks and the finance. Money flowed into the banks, was turned into goods, which were sold, and turned back into money again. No one truly understood it but him. No one can, I think. That is the main purpose. In the last two decades, Ravenscliff devised a financial structure so complex it is all but impossible to penetrate.”

  “But I have read the accounts…”

  “No. I do not know what you have seen, but you have seen only partial accounts. The profits or losses of one company mean nothing. Because they are part of a much greater whole which spreads throughout the world. Did you know that Ravenscliff controlled some six banks, in America and Europe? They were set up solely to organise financing for various deals. There are other accounts in other banks, dozens and dozens, under the control of the chief salesman, Xanthos, which exist solely to bribe foreign officials, buy presents, purchase favours.”

  “I’ve met him,” I said.

  “And no doubt found him a charming little fellow.”

  “Ah, yes, I did. Are you going to tell me something different?”

  “He is a crook. He pays bribes to whoever needs them. A pimp, who supplies prostitutes to willing civil servants when required. A thief, who steals the details of other companies’ bids for contracts. A fraud, who falsifies details of his products’ capabilities. Whatever is necessary to win an order, Mr. Xanthos will do it. He’s a trader from the bazaar, with an oriental regard for the truth. That was his value to Ravenscliff, who looked the other way, so he did not know how these orders came about. Ravenscliff took care of the big bribes. I could read it all, you know, they had a sort of signature, and I came to know the style of each of them by the end. Xanthos used several banks, mainly the Bank of Bruges in Belgium, but also one in Milan and others in Bucharest, Manchester, Lyon and Dusseldorf.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He did not answer. “We started to unravel all this, thread by thread, but couldn’t see the point of it. That was what was so puzzling. What was it all for? Why had he made everything so complicated? No one could discover it. Wilf Cornford wondered whether it was all the doing of Caspar Neuberger, the director of finance, who loves complexity for its own sake. But I wasn’t satisfied, so I looked further.”

  “I hope you are not going to stop telling me now.”

  “I will tell you, if you truly wish.”

  “I do.”

  “You know what a submarine is?”

  “Of course.”

  “Beswick Shipyard developed one of the earliest that was in any way a practical weapon. The Americans were the first, but Beswick came soon after. For the most part, they were more of a danger to their own crew than to anyone else. But Beswick got a contract from the Government to develop a new, radical design which could carry torpedoes—Beswick, as you may know, also owns the Gosport Torpedo Company and it was looking for new markets.

  “The Royal Navy decided to buy some, and fund the development. The contract with the Government was that this should be entirely secret. And, above all, that there should be no sales, none at all, to foreign governments.”

  “Not like the torpedo, then.”

  “Precisely. They had learned their lesson. The navy realised, even at that early stage, that this new vessel might become a formidable weapon. Ravenscliff gave his word. Six months later he was building a dockyard for the Russians, who were then our most bitter enemies, to build submarines, torpedoes and anything else they wanted. That was the moment his finances became opaque. And the reason: to conceal any sign of treason.”

  I looked carefully at him. “Are you serious? You don’t mean to tell me that no one noticed? When was this?”

  “At the start of the 1890s. Ravenscliff built up the Russian navy to the point that it could challenge the Royal Navy in the Black Sea. All this long before Britain and Russia became allies and when it was one of our most dangerous enemies. Did anyone notice? No. Nothing could be traced back to Ravenscliff at all. The money was raised through bond issues in Paris; the companies were registered in several different countries, with the shares owned by companies set up for the purpose, their owners in turn being hidden. There was not a single thing to suggest that Ravenscliff had anything to do with these factories.”

  “So how did you discover it?”

  “That is what we do. And, as is often the case, the weak spot was the human side of things. The expertise. You don’t just build a factory, put in a bunch of illiterate peasants and start turning out complex weapons. You need people to train the workforce, to oversee things. Not many, the Russians already had many engineers. But they had little managerial expertise, and that was Ravenscliff ’s speciality. I found some of the people who had worked at the yard, and they all came from Beswick. Eventually, one—only one—told me the whole story.”

  “And then you received a visitor.”

  “As you say. And now you know the story as well, so you had better be careful. Ravenscliff was utterly single-minded. He is dead, but his spirit, as they say, lives on in people like Xanthos and Neuberger and Bartoli. He chose them and trained them. The company embodies his methods. It is alive, and can work without him. You might say he transferred his soul into it, so that he will live as long as his companies exist. It is the only form of immortality a man like that could expect, and more than he deserves.”

  “Did you ever meet him?”

  Seyd shook his head. “Never. I got to know him through numbers. It is not a bad way of making an acquaintance. And safer.”

  “What did your numbers tell you? You see, I am having trouble. What was it all for? I’m a simple man, myself. I dream of a house and a garden and a wife. I want enough money never to have to worry. I do not want to end up in the poor house, or a pauper’s grave. Ravenscliff had all that, decades ago. What did he want?”

  Seyd looked thoughtfully at the carpet. “Well,” he said. “Not money. I really think he had no great interest in money. That is often the case with these people. Not fame or position, either. He took the peerage with the greatest of reluctance and never sought any sort of public role. Few people had ever heard of him and he liked it like that.”

  “What does that leave? Power?”

  “No, I don’t think so. I’ve no doubt it pleased his vanity, but not greatly. No, I believe his motivation was pleasure.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  Seyd smiled. “Pleasure, Mr. Braddock. Not something usually associated with heavy industry or armaments, I know. But he seems to have approached what he did rather as an engineer approaches a problem, or an artist a picture. He took pleasure in creating something that was harmonious, integrated and balanced. He could have been an architect, I think. Or maybe he would have liked these new crosswords, where the delight lies solely in solving the puzzle. He liked taking an insuperable problem, and conquering it. I’ve no doubt he liked the admiration that generated, and certainly never refused any profits, but I suspect he would not have done it had he gained no delight from it. You might even call him an aesthete. The pleasure was in the mind. He set out to create the most perfect organisation the world has ever seen, and he succeeded.”

  “Numbers tell you that?”

  “They hint. The rest is guesswork and experience.”

  “I think I am more confused than ever.”

  “Maybe so. But it is the only explanation of Ravenscliff which answers. Now, you know what I know, in an abbreviated version. What are you going to do about it?”

  “Knowing him through numbers, what do mine tell you?” I summarised what the single file had contained. Seyd listened attentively, frowning in concentration as I spoke.

  “So he’s burning up his cash, is he? Well, I would rule out fraud, if I were you.”

  “Why?”

  “He was too elegant a man to be fraudulent in that way. It is too crude for him.”
<
br />   “So?”

  “He was using the money for something.”

  “What?”

  “How should I know? You seem to have taken that task on yourself. Find out, if you want, and if you can.”

  The interview was over. All reporters with a little experience know when there is no more information to be extracted and I knew that I had got as much out of Young Seyd as he was able, or willing, to give. I stood up. The vicar, out of politeness, stood as well. He did not urge me to stay, to sit down again.

  I walked to the door, then turned. “One question then, which you should not mind answering. The man who came to see you at your club. What was he like?”

  Seyd considered, trying to find an objection, but coming up with nothing. “He was in his late forties, fair hair, thinning on top. Medium build. No moustache or beard, a large, unusually large, mouth. Entirely unremarkable. I do not know who he was, and have never seen him again.”

  CHAPTER 17

  I got back to London at eight that evening, and went straight to the Ravenscliff residence. I had nothing particular to do there, no reason not to go home via a chop house or pub for a good night’s sleep. The only reason I went to St. James’s Square rather than Chelsea was because I wanted to see her. I was almost aware of it.

  I did not, of course, have a key, but I had been given free run of the house and could go in and out as I pleased. I noticed a slight hesitation when the door was opened, as though the servant thought it unbecoming for a young man to turn up to a house of mourning so late in the evening. She was probably right. I asked about her mistress and was told she had already retired for the evening, which made my heart fall. I then realised there was nothing I wished to do there; but I could hardly turn on my heel and leave, so I walked up the stairs to Ravenscliff ’s office to make a pretence of studying his papers.

  I did nothing; instead I sat in the armchair by the empty fireplace, and thought about its owner. An aesthete and an ascetic, from Seyd’s description, building his complex, incomprehensible organisation in such a way that almost no one in the world could appreciate it. Perhaps that would have spoiled it. Maybe the secrecy of what he was doing was the source of the pleasure. Or not. I didn’t know. I was a long way out of my depth. In a matter of days, my orderly life had been reduced to a complete mess. Not so long ago all I had to do was get up, write about crime—generally committed by simple, straightforward people—and go back to bed again.

  And what was the dominant thought in my mind? The eyes of a widow nearly twice my age. Her faint smell of perfume. The way she moved. The glimpse of skin above her expensive, handmade dress. The softness of her voice. What she had said to me, what it implied. What it might lead to. What I hoped.

  Awful, awful, awful. I groaned to myself as I thought about it. Truly, my £350 a year would be hard-earned if it went on like this. Ordinarily, I would have done as I had done so often before: made a list. Decided what the most important things were to get done, and then proceed single mindedly to do them. I tried to dismiss the thoughts of Elizabeth from my mind and think once more of Lady Ravenscliff. To work out some practical means of getting this job done quickly, so I could be free to go back to the Chronicle, or some other paper which might have me.

  But, once I did that, then the result was even more depressing. For the fact was that I had made no real progress at all. I looked blankly at the shelves of notes and files; I was sure there was something in there somewhere, but the idea of actually looking for it filled me with revulsion. I think I must have stayed there for about an hour; it was quiet and peaceful, and after a while it almost became comforting. There was a photograph of Ravenscliff on the mantelpiece; I took it out of its frame and looked at it for a long while, trying to fathom the character behind the face, before folding it and putting it in my pocket.

  And eventually I was able to lever myself out of the chair and prepare to rejoin the world; to go home to sleep, and then to start afresh the next morning. It wasn’t so bad. The worst that could happen would be failure. I’d still have my £350.

  I was almost content as I went back down the grand staircase, walking slowly, looking at the pictures on the walls as I passed. I knew nothing of such things; they seemed perfectly pleasant decorations to me. But as I was passing the door to the sitting room, I heard a noise. Nothing exceptional, just a bump and a scrape. I knew it must be her and I hesitated; all my anxiety and irresolution flooded back.

  A sensible person would have carried on down the stairs. Discipline and self-denial should have been called upon. A commonsensical realisation that the only way of returning to my mood of calm was to avoid the woman disturbing it as much as possible, keep her at arm’s length, be polite and professional.

  I didn’t want to be or to do any of those things. I knocked, quietly and tentatively on the door, and then pressed my ear against it. Nothing. So what do you do now? I asked myself. Tiptoe away like some nervous schoolboy? That would be humiliating even if no one else knew about it. Is that how bold would-be lovers behave? Or open the door and walk in. I had a right. She had looked at me.

  My heart was pounding, and I was almost breathless as I gripped the doorknob, turned and pushed. The room was dark, the curtains drawn, only a fire almost extinguished in the grate, and a candle. The expensive modern electrical lighting was not switched on. I thought I must have been mistaken, until I heard a voice, so quiet I could hardly make out the words.

  “Who is it?”

  It was her, but the voice sounded entirely different. Dull and without the musicality that normally made it so appealing. Slightly slurred, as though I had woken her up from a deep sleep.

  “Oh, it’s you,” she said as I stepped into the room and the light from the landing fell on my face enough for her to recognise me. “Come and sit down. Shut the door, the light hurts my eyes.”

  This was not what I had expected. Going into the room, so dark I could see only shades and shadows in the candlelight, was disconcerting, even slightly frightening.

  “Are you all right? You do not sound well.”

  She laughed softly and looked up at me. For the first time, her hair was unpinned, and fell down over her shoulders in a rich dark mass. She wore some sort of thin gown which shimmered slightly as she moved, embroidered in reds and blues. Japanese motifs, very fashionable. She was extravagantly, impossibly beautiful. I caught my breath as I looked at her for her eyes were darker than usual, the pupils wide, almost as though she was terrified of something.

  “What is the matter?”

  She laid her head on the back of the settee, and pushed her hair back over her ear, but said nothing; just smiled.

  “Please. Tell me.”

  “It’s nothing. A little medicine to calm my nerves. It is strong, and I haven’t used it for many, many years.”

  “Perhaps you need a doctor for a different prescription? I could summon one very quickly if you wish.”

  She smiled again and looked at me with what might have been affection, or indulgence, or even sympathy.

  “It is not the sort of medicine which needs a doctor, Matthew.”

  She pulled back the sleeve of her robe, and I could see a broad red mark around her upper arm; below it there was wound, with a trickle of dried blood coming from it. She laughed again at my incomprehension.

  “Oh, my God, I have employed the most innocent man in London,” she said. “You poor dear boy. You really know nothing at all.”

  I must have been looking horrified by this stage, so she became more serious herself. “Morphine, Matthew,” she said soberly. “The great releaser, the comforter of tormented souls.”

  I would have been shocked, had I had the time to arrange my thoughts, but in fact I wasn’t thinking anything at all at that moment. I just sat there, closer to her than I had ever been, my heart pounding.

  “Do I frighten you? Or do you frighten yourself?” she asked, but not in a way which suggested she wanted a reply. “Shall I tell you what you are thinking
?”

  No reply from me. I was so far out of my depth I knew that the faintest wriggle might cause me to sink and drown.

  “You have been thinking of me, night and day. You dream of me, of wanting to take me into your arms and kiss me. That is what you would say, were you able to say anything at all. You are silent now, but in your mind some part of you is trying to turn it to your advantage. Perhaps this is your opportunity, perhaps I would not resist if you leaned forward and took me now. But you don’t want merely to kiss me, of course. You want to make love to me; you dream of me becoming your mistress. You long to see me naked in front of you, wanting only to be possessed by you. Is that not true, dearest Matthew?”

  Her voice was entirely even; there was nothing in its tone or expression to suggest whether she was enticing or mocking, or both. Perhaps she was so drugged—I could hardly imagine her talking like this had she not been—she didn’t even know herself. Either way, her words and actions paralysed me. Of course, everything she said was entirely true. But there was cruelty in her saying it.

  “Are you lost for words, Matthew? Do you think that if you say something, it might be the wrong thing, and ruin a moment full of such wonderful possibilities? Are you so very timid and naïve with women that you do not know what to do next?” Then she put her hand round the back of my neck and pulled my head towards her, and whispered words into my ear such as I had never heard from the mouth of a woman before, even the very lowest. Hissing, almost serpent-like, her voice became, making me feel even more like a prey being immobilised.

  So I took hold of her, and began to kiss her, becoming ever more rough as she not only did not resist, but responded. Only when my hands moved down to touch her body did she stiffen, then push me away and stood up. She walked over to the fireplace and looked into the mirror a few moments.

  “I must ask you to leave,” she said, without even turning round.

  “What?”

  She gave me no answer. What had gone wrong? What had I done? I was sure I had made no terrible error. If I had been unduly forward, it was only on her provocation, and she knew it. So what had happened?