‘Ready when you are,’ the aëronaut said.
He helped Charlotte into the gondola. It was about the same size as the one she was used to in the theatre, Charlotte noted. But the one in the theatre didn’t have a gas burner in the centre of it. And the one in the theatre never rose more than twelve or fourteen feet off the ground.
‘Off we go,’ the aëronaut said, turning up the power of the burner.
Charlotte looked out of the basket, first at her expectant public, then at the spot on the edge of the basket where Pittstock had clung, during so many performances.
‘With this knife, I will have my revenge for the evil you have visited on me,’ she said, swinging an imaginary knife at the imaginary man.
Her public cheered her — and the balloon began to rise.
* * *
Hidden in a clump of trees, some distance from Parliament Hill, Sebastian George watched the balloon rise. He was quite alone on this part of the Heath, and that was no accident. He had anticipated, when planning all this, that any people out walking would automatically gravitate towards the balloon and the famous actress — and he had been proved right.
It was ironic, he thought, that Lord Bixendale — of all people — had been the man who’d made what was about to happen possible. But it was undoubtedly true that he had. If Bixendale hadn’t invited him up to the estate in Scotland…
The only reason you were ever asked to join the shooting party is because I requested it,’ Charlotte had said. Well, she would pay for that.
… hadn’t invited him up to the estate in Scotland, he would never have learned just what a ‘natural’ he was with a rifle — and how much he enjoyed being in on the kill!
The balloon was now clear of the ground — well above the height from which the evil Pittstock fell nightly — and was already beginning to respond to the prevailing air currents. Though Sebastian George had no personal experience of ballooning, he did not think it would take long for the craft to drift into a position which would suit him perfectly.
He hoisted the rifle carefully to his shoulder and squinted down the telescopic sight.
The difference between balloons and stags, he thought, was that balloons moved slower — and were much bigger.
* * *
Charlotte Devaraux looked down at the ground — so very far below the balloon — and began to feel sick.
‘How high up are we now?’ she asked.
‘No more than seventy or seventy-five feet,’ the aëronaut told her.
Charlotte found that hard to believe. Already, the people below were looking like matchstick men. Already, she was wishing that she had not allowed Sebastian George to talk her into going up in this bloody balloon.
It was then that she noticed the two police vans — or Black Marias, as they had become popularly known — arriving on the Heath. The two vans came to a halt, and at least a dozen men in blue uniforms were disgorged from them.
‘What’s going on down there?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know, and I don’t care,’ the aëronaut said, indifferently. ‘When I’m up here with the birds, I have no interest in what’s going on down there with the worms.’
‘At what point will the mooring ropes stop us from going any higher?’ Charlotte asked.
‘Mooring ropes?’
‘The ones that are holding us down?’
‘Oh, the restraining ropes. They were cast off while you were making your pretty little speech to the crowd. Can’t inhibit the movement of the balloon once it’s airborne. That would be very dangerous.’
‘But you said… you told me… ’
‘I told you a little white lie. Mr George said I’d have to do that, in order to get you up here in the first place.’
‘I want you to land this thing immediately,’ Charlotte said, verging on hysteria.
‘Can’t do that, I’m afraid,’ the aëronaut said. ‘Mr George is paying me more than double my normal daily rate for this balloon, but only if we stay in the air for at least an hour.’
Charlotte looked down again — and immediately wished that she hadn’t. The matchstick men walking about below had now become little more than ants, she saw with horror, and the balloon in which she had become a prisoner had already drifted some distance away from Parliament Hill.
Sebastian George felt his stomach lurch as he saw the uniformed policemen advancing across the Heath in the distance.
It was the way they were moving which disturbed him most — each policeman separated from the next policeman by several yards, but moving at exactly the same speed. It was as though they were all individual points on a fisherman’s net, which was being dragged slowly through the water, he thought — and that was exactly what they were.
How did they know? he wondered. Who had told them? It could only be Blackstone!
He considered abandoning his plan altogether. If he dropped the rifle now and simply walked away, he would be in the clear. Of course, Blackstone would know what he had been trying to do — Blackstone knew already — but he would never be able to prove it!
But if he did abandon his plan, where would that leave him?
Poor and discredited!
A figure of ridicule and pity!
He was not sure he could stand that. And, unless he was caught in the act, the inspector would be no more able to prove the rifle belonged to him after he had fired the shot than he would have been before.
He looked up into the sky. The balloon was clearly heading in his direction. All he had to do was stay concealed for a couple more minutes, and he could finish the job and then escape.
He had read somewhere that searchers rarely look above eye-level for their quarry. Well, he was about to put that to the test. It had been a long time since he had climbed a tree, but he would climb one now.
* * *
Blackstone looked up at the balloon, making its way serenely across the Heath. His first fear had been a bomb — and there might still be one, ticking away in that basket. If that were the case, there was nothing he could do about it.
But if George had decided to bring the balloon down, instead of blowing it up, then there might still just be time to stop him.
He glanced at the balloon, calculated its likely flight path, and then tried to work out exactly where he would have positioned himself if he had been in George’s shoes.
* * *
Lady Wilton wouldn’t behave like this, Charlotte Devaraux told herself. Lady Wilton would remain calm throughout. Lady Wilton’s a bloody character in a bloody play! a voice at the back of her mind screamed. She’s made-up! Her balloon’s never going to go hurtling to the ground, because she doesn’t bloody exist!
‘I think I’m going to be sick,’ she said, holding tightly on to the side of the gondola.
‘Everybody thinks that, at some point or another,’ the aëronaut replied cheerfully.
‘Maybe they do. But not like this. I know I’m going to be sick!’
‘Well, in that case, you’d better do it over the side of the basket. And not into the wind — or it’ll fly straight back in your face.’
‘Take me down,’ Charlotte pleaded.
‘Stick it out for another hour or so, and you’ll be wishing you could stay up here forever,’ the aëronaut told her.
* * *
The police sweep had passed through the immediate area — a couple of the officers had even entered the copse, though they hadn’t looked up — and was now receding into the distance.
The constables would probably still hear the shot, Sebastian George thought, but they might not recognize it as gunfire. And even if they did identify it for what it was, they would have only a vague idea of where it had emanated from.
Besides, once the balloon crashed down on to the Heath, the resulting pandemonium would command all their attention.
He was going to get away with it, he told himself.
Blackstone would suspect the truth, but what did that matter? He would have no proof — and
he was not a personal friend of Sir Roderick Todd.
The balloon was easily in range now, and one shot was all it would take. He raised the rifle to his shoulder, and placed his eye against the telescopic sight. Satisfied that everything was as it should be, he began to gently squeeze the trigger.
The pain in his leg was as sudden as it was instantly unbearable. It felt as if he were on fire — from the tips of his toes right up to his hip.
The sound of the rifle exploded in his ear, but he knew that his shot had gone wild of the mark. Knew, too, this was the second explosion he had heard, and that the first was the source of all the agony he was now experiencing.
He lost his grip on the rifle, then his hold on the tree, and then he was falling… falling.
He hit the ground with as heavy a thud as a fat man should expect. The impact knocked the wind right out of him, but the pain which followed was strangely reassuring, since, as long as he was hurting so much all over, he couldn’t possibly be dead.
He was lying on his back, and when he turned his head to the side, all he could see was the base of a couple of trees and a pair of boots.
‘Rather unfortunately for you, I’ve had dealings with a few snipers in the past,’ said a voice that he recognized as belonging to Blackstone. ‘It was when I was serving in India. They hid in all sorts of places, those buggers, but trees were always one of their favourites.’
* * *
It was a hospital bed in a hospital ward, but there were thick bars on the windows and his right wrist was manacled to the bedpost. So it didn’t take a brilliant intellect to work out that this particular bed and ward were in a prison, Sebastian George thought sourly.
He became aware that someone was standing next to the bed, and turned to find it was Blackstone.
‘Come to gloat, Inspector?’ he asked, with some bitterness. ‘No, I haven’t, as a matter of fact,’ Blackstone said. ‘Then why are you here?’
‘To charge with you with the attempted murders of Miss Charlotte Devaraux and Mr Charles Whitney.’
‘Charles Whitney? Who the hell’s he?’
‘He was the pilot of the hot air balloon you hired. If you’d succeeded in shooting it down, he’d have died too, you know.’
‘My leg hurts,’ George complained.
‘I’d be surprised if it didn’t,’ Blackstone said indifferently. ‘But, for all the pain it’s causing, it’s still not much more than a flesh wound, and you’ll survive it well enough.’ He paused for a moment. ‘I take it Charlotte Devaraux is heavily insured, is she?’
It’s a foolish theatre manager who doesn’t take out heavy insurance on his leading actress,’ George said.
‘So her death would have achieved two objectives, as far as you were concerned. It would have prevented her from persuading Lord Bixendale to get your father released from the lunatic asylum, and it would have made you rich enough not to need Bixendale’s money anymore.’
Sebastian George grinned ironically. ‘I did whatever I did in the cause of my art,’ he said.
‘Balls! You did it because you liked the life you were leading, and you wanted to keep on leading it,’ Blackstone contradicted him. ‘You’ve done all kinds of things to ensure that — including giving Tamara Simmons roles in your plays that she had neither the experience nor the talent to handle.’
‘She’d earned those roles,’ George said.
‘Indeed she had,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘If she hadn’t pretended to be Martin Swinburne’s mistress, the company would have been in deep trouble long before now.’
‘Are the attempted murders the only thing you’re charging me with?’ George asked.
Blackstone thought about it. ‘I suppose I could throw in “disturbing the peace”, if I was of a mind to, but given the heavy sentence you’ll be facing anyway, there really doesn’t seem to be much point in that.’
I’m surprised you’re not also charging me with the Swinburne and Kirkpatrick murders,’ Sebastian George said. ‘That’s what I would do, if I were in your position.’
‘I’m sure you would — but don’t judge everybody else by your own miserable standards,’ Blackstone said mildly. ‘Besides, we don’t know if Martin Swinburne was murdered. We’ll probably never know now, since the only person who could have cleared that up, one way or the other, is also dead. And as for William Kirkpatrick’s murder, well, frankly, Mr George, I really don’t think you’re clever enough to have planned it.’
‘I resent that!’ Sebastian George said angrily.
‘Do you?’ Blackstone asked. ‘You’ve no grounds for resentment, you know. Kirkpatrick’s murder was so much more subtle than yours. It had a finesse about it which your crude effort was totally lacking in.’
‘Perhaps if I’d had more time to think about how to kill Charlotte’ Sebastian George began.
‘You’re not nearly as bright as you think you are, Mr George,’ Blackstone interrupted him. ‘If you had have been, you’d have made your own way in the world, instead of climbing to where you are — or rather, where you were — on the backs of better men than you are.’
‘You know who killed William Kirkpatrick, don’t you, Blackstone?’ Sebastian George asked.
‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.’
‘Then who was it?’
Blackstone smiled. ‘You’re looking very tired, Mr George,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to weigh you down with any more details.’
‘Tell me who it was, you bastard!’ George screamed, as Blackstone walked towards the door.
‘When you’re feeling better, you can read all about it in the papers,’ Blackstone promised. Then a look of mock-regret came to his face. ‘Oh, I forgot,’ he said, ‘they don’t allow you newspapers in prison, do they?’
Chapter Twenty-Six
The queue outside the George Theatre stretched right down the street. And it would have been even longer, Blackstone thought as he climbed out of the Hansom cab, if the news had already broken that Sebastian George had been arrested. For while Charlotte Devaraux had been a terrific draw when she was only known as the actress who had killed a man on stage, how many more people would be clamouring to see her when they learned that her own boss had attempted to murder her — in a most spectacular way — on Hampstead Heath?
Yes, on the face of it, the production had a golden future, with the public clamouring to buy tickets and backers falling over each other in their efforts to invest. But such a golden future was no more than an illusion. The final performance had already been given. The play had thrilled for the last time.
* * *
‘I never liked that Sebastian George,’ Spotty Wilberforce said as he let Blackstone in through the stage door. ‘When Miss Devaraux told me he’d been arrested, I wasn’t the least bit surprised.’
‘Weren’t you?’ Blackstone asked.
‘I was not. Well, that’s only natural, isn’t it? I know every-thing that goes on in this theatre. I see everything that goes on is this theatre. And I had him marked down as a wrong ‘un from the start.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me that the first time we talked about him?’ Blackstone asked, barely managing to hide his smile. ‘It would have saved me a great deal of time.’
For a moment, Wilberforce looked lost for an answer. Then he rallied. ‘Ah well, you see, Sam, I thought it would be much better if you found out for yourself,’ he said.
‘And why didn’t you tell me that Martin Swinburne’s death was no accident?’ Blackstone wondered.
‘No accident?’ Wilberforce asked.
‘No accident,’ Blackstone repeated.
‘Well, to tell you the truth, I wasn’t completely sure about that,’ Wilberforce said. ‘And I didn’t want to go spreading suspicions without absolute proof, now did I?’
‘Of course you didn’t,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘You said you’d spoken to Miss Devaraux, didn’t you, Thomas?’
‘That’s right. She never passes my office without stopping to have a word. She relies on me
, you see.’
‘As do we all,’ Blackstone said. ‘Is she still in the theatre?’
‘Yes, she most certainly is. Matter of fact, she’s in her dressing room, making herself beautiful.’
‘Not that she needs any artificial help,’ Blackstone said.
‘She certainly doesn’t,’ Wilberforce agreed. A leer came to his blotched face. ‘I’ve fancied bedding her for years. I expect that you’ve had similar thoughts yourself, Sam — not that either of us would have much of a chance.’
‘I think you’d have more of a chance than I would,’ Blackstone said.
‘Oh, I don’t know about that,’ Wilberforce contradicted him. ‘I think you might well give me a fair run for my money.’
The door to Charlotte Devaraux’s dressing room was slightly ajar, and from the corridor Blackstone could see that she was sitting in front of her mirror, going through the daily ritual of examining her face for signs of the march of time.
She need not have bothered to do that, he thought. Even after the horrendous ordeal she had undergone, she was still one of the most ravishing creatures he had ever seen.
As he stepped through the door, Charlotte saw his reflection in the mirror. She stood up — so quickly that her stool fell over — then she rushed across the room, and flung her arms around him.
‘Thank you, Sam,’ she said, before burying her face in his chest. ‘Thank you for saving my life.’
He gently untangled her. ‘I’d like you to sit down again, please, Charlotte,’ he said.
‘Sit down again? Why should I do that, when all I really want is to hug you so tightly it will almost squeeze the life out of you?’
‘There’s something we need to talk about, and it will be easier if you’re sitting down,’ Blackstone said.
Charlotte smiled. ‘How serious you can sound when you want to,’ she said, looking up into his eyes. ‘Just like a real policeman.’
‘I am a real policeman,’ he reminded her. ‘And it’s a serious matter that we have to discuss.’
She nodded, as if she understood completely.
‘You’re frightened, aren’t you?’ she asked. ‘You’re terrified by the passion we aroused in each other last night, and you’re using your job as a shield to protect you from it happening again.’
Blackstone and the Stage of Death (The Blackstone Detective series Book 5) Page 22