“Certainly. I took the case while everyone else was downstairs. When I had the treaty, I put it into the special lining of my coat and substituted a map of Europe so that the case would not be empty.” He smiled at me. “I thought it wiser not to tell you.”
“No doubt,” I responded, stung.
His face lost its cherubic aspect. “You were so green, Guthrie, that I could not be sure you would be able to do all we had to do.” He stared into the fire. “And I am very sorry you have paid so high a price.”
“Others paid higher,” I said, taking some of his somberness. “Guilem. Francoise.”
“True enough,” he said. “But I think it has been worth it. The treaty will ensure that for the next two decades no nation in the Balkans is able to draw all Europe into war. In time, I suspect, the Balkans will be the fuse on the powder keg primed by the newly united Germany. For the time being, Russia has every reason to enforce peace in that region through diplomacy, not trial of arms. There is nothing like the Royal Navy and British gold to serve as incentives to the Tsar. All in all, a difficult but worthy month’s effort.” He regarded me in that sleepy way that has no trace of inattention about it. “Would you agree, dear boy?”
I nodded and sipped my tea. “I wonder if McMillian thinks so.”
“When he is given his knighthood, he will,” said Holmes with world-weary certainty. “He will boast of his part in it, and very possibly take credit for things you and I, and Miss Gatspy, did.”
That seemed all too likely to me. I stretched out my legs and sighed, glancing at the red spot on my wrist where Mycroft Holmes had used his chemicals to dissolve the tattoo he had put there. “It will not be easy to listen to that.”
“You will learn how to do so with grace, if you stay in my employ.” There was a speculative light in his eyes as he said this.
“Why should I not?” I asked with some alarm. I had thought I had done well enough for a novice, but did not know how to protest on my own behalf.
“Well, this work may not be to your taste. Not everyone has a talent for it, and of those who do, not all will do what the ... employment demands,” he told me in a steady way. “As you have discovered, my secretary does not always have the usual sorts of duties one would expect in a secretary’s venue. It is unpredictable, the work I require. And it has already been the cause of your broken engagement. To say nothing of three attempts on your life.” Again he looked at me, waiting.
“As to Miss Roedale, I am sorry she could not accommodate herself to the work you give me to do, and I am no doubt a cad for bringing disappointment to her. My mother will be severely displeased and I cannot blame her; my union with the Roedales was her dearest wish. But it is far better to know of this ... unhappiness before we were married, for as great an injury as I have done her and her family, I am afraid it would have been magnified many times had we actually been married.” I did not like to confess that I had, over the last two days, come to regard the termination of our engagement as a deliverance—no gentleman likes to think so poorly of his judgment or his word. “As to the attempts on my life, they will be made, either on me or on another who undertakes this necessary work. It cannot all be left to Miss Gatspy and her associates. How can I permit another to fall in my place?” I met Holmes’ eyes and smiled. “And I suspect that a return to the humdrum work of records and letters and translations would pall on me now. Besides, there are enemies of Britain out there who cannot and must not be allowed to act with impunity.”
“Good fellow, Guthrie,” said Mycroft Holmes, and went himself to fetch the brandy.
FROM THE PERSONAL JOURNAL OF PHILIP TYERS:
A sleety Boxing Day, and G. is off to Amsterdam, with instructions to send a telegram when he arrives there. Mister Watkins will be waiting for him. We will have the packet in our hands by the New Year.
Word came from Inspector Cornell that Vickers appears to have gone to ground, much to his distress. The case of the young woman’s murder will remain unsolved as Long as Vickers is at large, a situation which satisfies neither the Inspector nor M.H.
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