Marion Lane and the Midnight Murder

by T. A. Willberg

  22

  THE DEVIL’S BLOOD

  “Good, she’s awake. Now let’s get on with it.”

  Marion’s eyes flickered open as her consciousness returned. She’d been moved from the basement to another room and seated against a wall. Her wrists were bound together in front of her, coarse rope cutting into her flesh. When her senses fully returned and her mind cleared, she realized she was sitting in the corner of what appeared to be a boardroom. It smelled of smoke and urine and was furnished only with a large oval table and several chairs.

  Seated around the table were Swindlehurst, his brutish helper and Nancy Brickett.

  Marion’s intake of breath was audible.

  Nancy looked at her from across the room, though not a single muscle in her face betrayed her emotions. She nodded subtly, as if conveying something Marion alone was supposed to understand. She didn’t, though. What was Nancy doing here? Where was Kenny? Why was Marion tied up and Swindlehurst free?

  Nancy turned her attention to Swindlehurst. “Well, Edgar?”

  Swindlehurst’s posture stiffened and lengthened, as if he were rising to some unspoken challenge. He pulled a large briefcase from the floor, opening it on the table. From inside he removed a pair of heavy-duty gloves. He put on the gloves, then used them to extract a small black vial. He held it aloft, a trophy. “The Devil’s Blood,” he said proudly. “As I’m sure you know, Nancy, the Devil’s Blood is a mixture of gunpowder and an extremely powerful alchemical erosive. When exposed to flame, the substance will produce an explosion fifteen times more powerful than dynamite and one hundred times more devastating.” He paused for effect, then returned the vial to the briefcase and removed his gloves.

  Swindlehurst looked as if he might continue, but Nancy cut him off before he could. “What are we doing here, Edgar?”

  Swindlehurst smirked. “Isn’t that obvious? I’m blackmailing you.”

  Marion tried to concentrate on what she was hearing, to make some sense of what was going on, but her head thumped relentlessly. Her thoughts were dulled and useless.

  “Perhaps I should provide you with a little context first, just to make it clear that my intention is simply to claim, how should I put it? Compensation.” Swindlehurst’s tone was calm and controlled. It was the most terrifying thing Marion had ever witnessed. “Don’t worry, I’m in as much of a rush as you,” he added as Nancy breathed impatiently. “I’ll make this as brief as I can. First, I’d like to take you back to an incident that happened eight years ago. Tell me, Nancy, do you remember the apprentice Ned Asbrey?”

  “Of course I remember him.”

  Swindlehurst nodded. “Yes, yes, I thought you might.”

  Marion sensed a stifling tension accumulate in the atmosphere. In a way she suspected her presence was mostly inconsequential, something to be ignored. Whatever was going on, it was between Nancy and Swindlehurst alone.

  “One evening in winter,” Swindlehurst continued, “Asbrey and I were doing what we did nearly every evening—having a drink at the library bar. But as it always was for Asbrey, one drink turned into many and by the early hours I’d had enough. I left Asbrey and went home. It was only much later the following day when I realized he hadn’t turned up for any of his shifts. No one had seen him since the previous night and most assumed he’d simply taken leave. But I knew something was off.

  “You see, a few months before, Asbrey told me he’d found something in Professor Gillroth’s office, something that suggested Miss Brickett’s was harboring a secret down in the restricted tunnels beyond the Border. I never asked him to explain further. In fact, I still don’t know what it was he found—”

  Marion shifted uncomfortably.

  “To be honest I hardly ever paid attention to Asbrey’s ramblings, of which there were many. But that night in the library bar, the night he disappeared, he spoke of this secret again. He said he was going to investigate, to look for it. And asked if I’d go with him. I brushed him off. As usual I wasn’t interested in his wild conspiracy theories. But the following day, as soon as I realized he’d disappeared, I knew it could mean only one thing. And I’m sure you can guess what happened next, Nancy. Asbrey found the thing you’d been hiding from all of us.” He paused, as if to allow the words to settle. “But then he realized the trouble he was in. He was afraid, uncertain of whom to trust. If he suddenly reappeared, he’d have to provide an account of where he’d been. Of course he could lie and say he’d been on leave, say nothing about what he’d discovered. But Asbrey was a righteous fool. He saw it as his responsibility to speak up.

  “I must be honest, when he met me in the common room the next day, well... I thought I’d seen an apparition. At first he was unable to speak, from shock and delirium, I suppose. But at last I managed to calm him down, gave him some water and food. And then he began to explain, to tell me everything all at once. He took me down to the laboratory, even. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Nancy, our founder and head, hiding a chemical weaponry experiment beneath our very feet, around the corner from where we were training to solve crimes for the greater good? I was so shocked, in fact, that I didn’t want anything to do with it. I just wanted to become an Inquirer. I didn’t want anything to get in my way. I told Asbrey that whatever he planned to do next, he’d have to do it alone.

  Swindlehurst’s features suddenly looked a shade less controlled and ordered. He swallowed nervously and continued. “But Asbrey was insistent. He told me he was going to approach the High Council the following day and ask for an explanation about what he’d found. I was terrified. For him, for myself. I knew it would get us fired, or worse. If the agency was keeping a secret like that, there was bound to be a good reason for it. I tried to talk him out of saying anything, tried to get him to forget what he’d seen. But it was no use.” He wrung his hands together; his entire body appeared rigid.

  There was a sharp intake of breath from Nancy as something dawned on her. “You killed him?”

  “No, no!” Color rose up Swindlehurst’s neck, blood flushing to his face. “It was an accident. We were arguing about what to do. I got angrier and angrier...” As if reliving the fury, Swindlehurst slammed his hands against the table. “I pushed him against the wall. I was just trying to shake some sense into him but—” He spoke more rapidly now, and began to stammer. “The wall was—there was a sharp rock—I didn’t—I didn’t know. He was so much weaker than me—he hit his head.” He stopped. There was a long spate of silence, during which he seemed to regain some of his composure. But it was Nancy who spoke next.

  “It was you, then, who started the rumor. You placed Ned’s bag outside White’s office to make it look like he’d crossed the Border and disappeared?”

  “And aren’t you grateful I did? I saved the agency, didn’t I? I stopped Asbrey from exposing your little secret and made all your problems go away.”

  Nancy raised an eyebrow. “If that were so, we wouldn’t be sitting here, Edgar.”

  Swindlehurst seethed. “No, you’re wrong. I never had any intention of doing anything more. I hid Asbrey’s body in the tunnels, closed the door to the laboratory and that was it. If anyone found the body it would look like an accident, like he’d got lost down there and tripped, perhaps.

  “But then I saw how you dealt with Ned’s family, the bribery and lies. It was the first time I’d properly considered the hold you had over all of us. All those documents you’d made us sign in the beginning, tethering us to the agency for the rest of our lives. I wasn’t worried about Asbrey’s death being linked to me. How could it? And I wasn’t worried about you ever bribing or coercing my family, since I had none. But I knew I needed my own little insurance policy, just in case. So I went back down to the cellar and into the tunnel beyond. Everything was still there—vials, formulas, diagrams. I took some papers, documents that proved the experiment had taken place in ’43. But then I thought, is this enough to use as leverag
e? Does it really prove the agency had anything to do with the experiment? No, I decided I needed something more viable, more tangible, something that would make it look like the agency was producing chemical weapons illegally. So I went back to the laboratory a third time. But this time I went to learn. To understand.

  “After much research I discovered there was a timing problem with the initial design. You see, the explosive had been concocted almost perfectly by 1944, albeit with a few mishaps here and there. They’d miscalculated the amount of time the alchemical explosive needed to mature before it was ready. It was a disaster for the operation, of course. The bomb was supposed to be ready within months but actually it would take more than a decade to complete. By which time, of course, the war would surely be over.

  “So there wasn’t much left for me to do. A few simple calculations to see how much longer the explosive needed to mature—seven years as it turned out—and that was it. Of course, technically it meant that I’d have to wait at least seven years before I could use the vial as leverage, but I decided that was fine. As I said, it was a long-term insurance policy, not something I was ever hoping to use, anyway.”

  Nancy stared at him, her glare unrelenting, and for a while the two appeared engaged in some silent battle of wills.

  Marion, on the other hand, was growing more anxious by the minute. Her head throbbed, her back ached, the rope ensnaring her wrists stung as it dug into her flesh. She closed her eyes and breathed. One, two, three. She reminded herself of the reason she was entangled in this standoff in the first place. Frank. She saw his face, his soft eyes. She felt his hand on her shoulder, that gentle assurance that was always there when she needed it.

  Subtly, she lifted her bound hands to her chest. She stretched her fingers under her bra, feeling for the cold metal against her skin. It was still there, still in place.

  She looked at Swindlehurst; he and Nancy were talking again, arguing about something she didn’t follow. She’d have to interrupt. “Why did you kill Michelle?”

  Swindlehurst paused midsentence.

  “It’s obvious you did,” she added, her voice stilted, fractured. She spoke with caution, saying only what was necessary, because while she knew exactly how Swindlehurst had bypassed the camera above the lock room gate, she hadn’t yet decided whether this was a revelation she should admit in front of Nancy. After all, Marion’s journey to the discovery of Operation Gray Eagle had led her to break a multitude of agency regulations.

  Swindlehurst frowned as he turned to face her. He didn’t look afraid, or even annoyed. His expression was impassive, unconcerned. “She was a spanner in the works, so to speak. Much like you, Miss Lane.”

  Breathe. One, two, three.

  “You stabbed her with her own Herald Stethoscope. Why?” Marion pursued, her voice rising.

  “What else could I have done!” he spat. “I didn’t intend to hurt anyone. I didn’t even have a weapon!”

  Marion was thinking quickly, going out on a limb. Previously, she’d been too consumed with finding out who’d killed Michelle to pay much attention to the way she was killed. But now that she came to think of it, she was pretty certain Swindlehurst’s use of the Herald Stethoscope—the Snitch—had been a ruse. “You recognized an opportunity, though, didn’t you? A chance to complicate the crime, distract the council?” She paused for a moment, watching Swindlehurst’s reaction. He shifted in his seat, anxious, unnerved, furious. She was right, then. “Yes, you didn’t have a weapon and you had to act fast. Michelle had seen you. She wasn’t going to let you get away with it. And of course you knew she was carrying her stethoscope with her, she always did. If you had to kill her, what better way than silenced forever by the gadget she’d used to expose so many of her colleagues? You knew the way you’d killed her would widen the pool of suspects so much that you’d be lost among them.”

  Swindlehurst placed his hands on the table, wringing them together madly. When he spoke, his words were strained, hollow. He was beginning to unravel. “I had no choice. No choice!” He breathed, closed his eyes. Silence ensued. “I told you. I wasn’t going to use it, the vial. I never wanted to.” He was addressing Nancy now. “I completed my apprenticeship and was promoted to head of Intelligence. Things were going well and I thought I might leave the vial in the safe forever. Forget about it. Move on. That’s what I wanted.” He gripped the edge of the table. “But then it began, a slow and subtle demotion. You started to ignore me, disregard my opinions, disrespect my position. And the final blow last year...” He inhaled; it sounded like a hiss. “You put Rakes in my position as head of the department and you made me work under her, a goddamn immigrant with half my experience? Jesus Christ, Nancy! Did you think I’d just accept that?” Again, he paused to calm himself before continuing. “But I’m not here to rehash the past. I simply want to move on with my life, start again. Of course, I’ll need your help with that, won’t I?” Nancy said nothing, so Swindlehurst turned to Marion. “You’ll understand one day, Miss Lane. You’ll come to realize what it’s really like to be under Nancy’s employ, her rule. You’ll wake up one day and think, I want a change. I want to live a life free of secrets. I want to come home from work and share the details of my day with family, friends. And eventually the urge to leave those damned sunless corridors will become so overwhelming you can’t ignore it any longer.”

  Marion cringed under Swindlehurst’s glare. But perhaps part of what was making her so uncomfortable was that, even if by just a fraction, she understood.

  “But then you’ll remember. You can’t walk away, not really.” He turned back to Nancy. “How can we get another job when we have no record of work experience? No references? No skills we’re able to account for. And of course no savings, because you pay us such a pittance.”

  “That is nonsense, Edgar. I’d gladly have assisted you in finding a new job, if only you’d asked.”

  Swindlehurst laughed. “Really? Maybe, if I’d been someone else. An apprentice, or a skivvy who cleaned the kitchens or maintained the corridors. But I was head of Intelligence. I’d seen it all—all the times we’d blindsided the police, interfered with their investigations. Do you remember, Nancy, August last year? I came to you, told you I wanted to resign, that I’d found a position I was interested in at a private investigations agency in Glasgow. What happened then?”

  “For heaven’s sake, Edgar. I’ve told you countless times I had nothing to do with that.”

  Swindlehurst looked at Marion. “You might not believe it, Miss Lane, but even after my demotion from head of Intelligence, all I wanted was to resign, to leave peacefully. I felt stifled in my career at Miss Brickett’s and I wanted a change. I explained this to Nancy and she seemed disappointed, though not particularly against the idea. But then I received a letter from my future employers in Glasgow. They’d suddenly realized I was not mentally fit to be a private detective. Some obscure reason relating to my wartime records as an operations manager. I’d shown signs of mental instability with manic tendencies.” He turned back to Nancy. “Now how could they’ve possibly got hold of those private records?”

  Marion watched as the expression on Nancy’s face slowly shifted from collection and control to agitation. She didn’t know what to think. Was Swindlehurst telling the truth? Was it really possible that Nancy had gone to such lengths to prevent him from leaving Miss Brickett’s? Dread settled in her stomach as she considered the implications of the accusation.

  “I knew then I was trapped. I’d never get another job, nothing worth my time at least,” Swindlehurst said. “So I had no choice but to wait a few more months and then take what was mine.” He glanced at the vial. “How about we call this a severance package.”

  Nancy spoke without hesitation or acknowledgment. “How much?”

  “Seven hundred thousand.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I haven’t got anything near that amount at my disposal.”


  “Then you’ll sit there and watch as I post this vial, along with a collection of incriminating documents, to the address of the British Secret Service. I’m sure they’d be quite interested in a covert chemical weapons operation going on right beneath their feet.” His voice raised several octaves.

  “Don’t be a fool, Edgar. If you did that, you’d be just as implicated as the rest of us.”

  Swindlehurst looked unconcerned. “Yes, perhaps I would. Except you’re forgetting something—I’ve got nothing left to lose. I can’t remain at Miss Brickett’s, not after the unfortunate complication of Michelle’s demise. Someone would have figured out the truth soon enough.” He passed a swift glance at Marion. It made her shudder. “I am disappearing, changing my name and starting anew, with or without your help. I’ll be long gone by the time MI5 comes knocking on the bookshop door. But if you pay me the money, I’ll leave the vial with you and be on my way without further trouble. I guarantee you’ll never hear from me again. I’ll carry your secrets to the grave, and you will carry mine.”

  For a moment Nancy did not speak. Marion could hardly breathe or feel her body. She could not think or speak or formulate a plan. Her mind was numb.

  A flash of impatience sparked across Swindlehurst’s face. He checked his watch. “Come come, do we have a deal?”

  “Of course we don’t.” She looked at him more intensely, more demandingly, than Marion had ever seen her do with anyone before. “You’ve obviously learned nothing about me these nine years if you believe you can coerce me so easily.”

  “Oh, I think I know you rather well indeed.” Swindlehurst gestured to his accomplice.