Chapter Seventeen #4
“We have. But madeleines are most welcome. Will you share some with me?”
Most native English speakers would not be able to immediately name the shell-shaped, fluted little cakes.
But Stephen Marbleton had a soupcon of an accent—which hinted not so much at foreign origins as significant portions of life spent abroad.
“I serve madeleines for me—you’ll need to be quick and ruthless to have a chance at any. ”
He smiled. She did not return the smile. He was young—younger than she. Left-handed, obviously. Had lived in hot climes not long ago. Enjoyed fiction. Was a little vain about his clothes, but not so much that it interfered with practicality.
“Were you the one who alerted the police about the body in Hounslow?”
The bobbies had gone running to the place because they had received a telegram concerning iniquitous goings-on in the house.
He shook his head a little, but not in denial. “Of course Sherlock Holmes would know that.”
The clock gonged the half hour, then carried on with its tick-tocking.
“Thank you most kindly for letting us stay,” he said.
“Tell me why you impersonated Mr. Finch,” she said at the same time.
He sighed, sat down across from her, and reached for a madeleine. “Mr. Finch has something we want.”
“Who are we?”
“My family—my parents, my sister, and myself.”
“Your mother is Mrs. Marbleton?”
“Yes.”
“Your father?”
“Mr. Marbleton, of course.”
“And who is Mr. Marbleton, in relation to Mr. Moriarty?”
“They are not the same man, if that is what you are asking.”
Charlotte nibbled on a madeleine. “I take it then that you weren’t responsible for the death of the man currently known as Richard Hayward. But you didn’t learn of it by accident.”
“We were watching the house. The house wasn’t particularly important—and hadn’t been for some time.
The man who lived there performed unsavory services for a fee.
He’d been working for Moriarty for a while but was the kind of underling happy not to know anything about why he was asked to do what he was asked to do.
Nevertheless, he was one of our few leads. ”
“Your mother doesn’t know more about Moriarty’s organization?”
“She left him decades ago.”
“And she does not cooperate with him in a mutually beneficial manner?”
“Not that I know of.”
She eyed him. “Not a terribly reassuring answer.”
“I know a great deal of my mother’s life. Moriarty has been hunting us for almost fifteen years and we can’t afford secrets. Any ignorance—any mistaken assumption allowed a foothold—can lead to disaster for the entire family. That I do not know of something should be a reassuring enough answer.”
A strong retort. She would not consider her mind completely put at rest, but the reason he gave was certainly specific enough. She took the kettle from the spirit lamp and poured hot water into the teapot.
“How did Mr. Finch come into anything of value to you? Was he working for Moriarty?”
“He was.”
She had hoped, when it turned out that Mr. Finch might be alive after all, that he would also turn out to have no connections to Moriarty. Of course she’d always known that it was a vain hope, but still.
“Since when? And how did he find Moriarty—or vice versa?”
“I don’t know when he started working for Moriarty.
I do know that Moriarty has a preference for those who are tainted by illegitimacy—they tend to be hungry for success, and ruthless because the world has been ruthless to them.
No one misses them very much when they disappear and there’s always a ready supply of young, eager men born on the wrong side of the blanket. ”
“So when you said he has something you want, you mean he has something of Moriarty’s.”
“That is correct.”
“What is it?”
“We don’t know precisely. What we know is that a dossier exists concerning plans to be put into motion next year.
The plans vanished at the same time as Mr. Finch and Mr. Jenkins, otherwise known as Richard Hayward.
Moriarty is extremely displeased about the disappearance of the plans and the betrayal of his subordinates. ”
“How do you know all that?”
His smile was bitter for one so young. “The less you know about it, the better.”
“All right. This Mr. Jenkins, was he also illegitimate?”
“Quite so. I understand he and Mr. Finch attended the same school—and were in the same residence house.”
So she was right, in a way, about Mr. Jenkins having been an orphan.
What must it have been like, for young men such as her brother and Mr. Jenkins, to feel themselves not so much children of those distant, well-born fathers but bags of refuse that had been carelessly left behind?
And was it any wonder that a man like Moriarty had easily garnered their trust and loyalty, at least in the beginning?
“Why did Messrs. Finch and Jenkins abscond with those plans?” she asked.
“On that I do not have reliable intelligence, only speculation.”
“And what is your speculation?”
“There might be something in those plans that could be used for blackmail—Moriarty pays well but not so well that a man wouldn’t still dream of a fortune.”
“Surely, such dreams must be tempered with fear of crossing Moriarty.”
“Which is why I’m not entirely sure of my own conjecture. Another possibility is that they wanted to leave Moriarty’s service—and believed that having the plans in their possession might ensure their safety.”
“Why have you involved yourself in all this? Shouldn’t it be your goal to stay away from Moriarty as much as possible?”