The Baker Street Jurors (22 page)

“We'll go in pairs, of course,” said Mrs. Peabody. “We ladies do it all the time, you gents will just have to get used to the routine. And we'll take turns sleeping—just two at a time—so that we always have at least two people awake at any one time.”

Bankstone looked from one juror to the next.

“Suits me,” said Nigel.

“All right,” said Bankstone, finally relenting. “I apologize for thinking about going out to the car and perhaps finding a nice roll of duct tape in the boot. But tell me this—who sleeps first and who stays awake, and in what combinations?”

It was a complicated question, and much discussion followed, during which Bankstone, still apologetic, went into the kitchen himself and made them all some more tea. Nigel hoped that somehow the sleeping arrangements would end up with just himself and Lucy awake and together, and everyone else asleep or otherwise not around.

But as important as that outcome was, and even with the second servings of tea, he was finding it hard to stay awake at all. Even though he had gotten a reasonably full sleep the night before and had ordered only one pint at the pub—and despite everything that had been and was still going on—he found himself nodding off.

He raised his head up and looked about. He didn't see Bankstone. Or Mrs. Peabody. There was a noise in the kitchen that might have been them, but Nigel was fading too fast to get up and look.

He did, however, see Lucy.

She was right next to him, sitting on the floor. Perhaps she was a little wobbly herself. Or perhaps not—now she was pushing herself off the ground, about to stand. The pants on her right hip slid down a bit as she did this, and now, finally, Nigel got a full look at the tattoo.

It was a blue crown, with three stylized blue lions beneath it, and for good measure, beneath that were what looked like crossed swords, only they weren't swords—they were cricket bats. It was the logo of the England cricket team. Nigel blinked and wondered if he was just imagining things.

And then he was out like a light.

 

21

Nigel dreamed that he was still back in Los Angeles, and that Mara was not next to him only because she had just gotten up, and all he had to do to find her again was to simply get up himself.

And then his conscious mind began to recover. He opened his eyes. He knew where he was now. Under other circumstances, he would have just gone back to sleep and tried to recover the dream.

But now he was groggily awake, with a dull headache, and he was just aware enough to know that current circumstances were such that he should not go back to sleep. On the floor next to him he saw the paper cup from which he'd been drinking tea. He saw Lucy's paper cup as well—but not Lucy herself.

He got to his feet, felt nauseous, and leaned on one end of the rough oak table.

He saw Mrs. Peabody. She was sitting on the bench, head down on the table, asleep. Snoring slightly. And there was an empty paper teacup next to her as well. And there was something odd about the table. It took a moment, and then he realized—the body of Mr. Armstrong was gone.

Nigel staggered into the kitchen and almost slipped, catching himself just in time on the edge of the stove. He looked down to see why he had slipped—and he saw water beginning to accumulate on the floor. In his still drowsy state, he supposed it might have spilled when Mrs. Peabody made the tea. Something in the back of his mind told him there was too much water on the floor for that, but at the moment he didn't really care. What he wanted to know about was the tea itself.

The sides of the stove were still warm. There was an old iron kettle, in which Mrs. Peabody must have heated the water for the tea. Nigel sniffed at it, but did not detect anything but the residual scent of the Earl Gray.

Then he looked in the lower cabinet. There was an old coffee can that had served as a waste receptacle. In that can was the paper wrapper that had contained the tea bags.

But on the cupboard floor near the can—not in it—were more than half a dozen of the little foil packages that typically contain allergy capsules.

Like Mrs. Peabody's allergy capsules. The kind that double as sleep aids.

Nigel thought for a moment about what that meant.

And then he heard a sound from outside the kitchen door. He opened it and stepped outside. The rain had tapered off, at least for the moment. But the wind hadn't; it was blowing the clouds in a steady stream overhead, with occasional gaps, and right now, through one of those gaps, there was enough moonlight to see the woodpile clearly—and Lucy standing near it, with one of the fire logs in her hand.

She looked a bit muddy. The wind was blowing her hair, and her cheeks were red—either from the wind, or from sudden adrenaline, or both.

“Now we know which of us is the heavier sleeper,” said Lucy. “And also which of us snores.”

“I wasn't awake when you were asleep,” said Nigel. “So we haven't had a real test of that. Yet.”

“I'm so sorry I voted you guilty,” said Lucy. “But I was suspicious of Mr. Bankstone, and I thought it was the only way I could figure out what he was all about. Of course I wouldn't have let anything happen to you. And then when I dozed off, and I woke up and he was gone—well, I thought it best to just leave you and Mrs. Peabody as you were for a bit. For myself, I guess I'm lucky that I never really liked Earl Gray tea; I only took a few sips.”

“Bankstone was gone when you woke up?”

“Yes. And so was Mr. Armstrong's body, as I'm sure you noticed. But there's something here I want to show you.”

“I was hoping we'd get to that,” said Nigel.

“Well, you have to come closer.”

Nigel walked up next to her, very close, and he looked, and waited.

“What are you looking at?” she said.

“What you're going to show me,” he said, fully expecting that she was going to show him the cricket team tattoo that he had glimpsed before losing consciousness—and that then she was going to confess to something. He just didn't know exactly what that would be.

“Well, it's down there,” she said. She was pointing at her feet. “You'll have to get down on your hands and knees to see it, I think. Like I just did.”

Nigel got down on the ground to look. He hoped she wasn't going to hit him over the head with the fire log, but he was still too groggy to worry about it very much.

He looked at the wet ground. At the completely flat surface that seemed out of place. He pushed the water and mud out of the way.

“See it?” she said.

“It's a door,” said Nigel. “A trapdoor.”

“Yes,” she said.

Nigel cleared more of the mud away, and in the process realized that he wasn't the only person to do this recently—the mud was heavy and thick at the edges, but thin, fresh, and watery on the wooden surface of the door.

It wasn't old wood. It was recent; simple plywood used in modern construction.

“We're not the first ones to discover this,” said Lucy.

“No, we're not.”

“Can you lift it?”

Nigel felt around the edges. There was no handle—whoever had put this in place had not intended it for frequent use—but there were hinges. And opposite those, Nigel found a crease.

He lifted the door.

Water and thin mud immediately ran into the opening.

And out of the opening came a scent of tobacco smoke. Pipe tobacco.

“Oh, I'm so glad,” said Lucy. “This means Mr. Siger is alive, don't you think? That he's gone below into a tunnel?”

“I hope that's what it means,” said Nigel. “That is, I hope it's a tunnel and not just a grave, and that he's in it somewhere. But without any light, it's bloody difficult to tell.”

“I know, but I think it's a tunnel—and you'll think so, too, when I show you what I found in the fireplace.”

This was an awful lot of good news in quick succession—Siger might be alive, the lovely woman with the cricket tattoo was not a juror murderer who wanted to hit him over the head, and she didn't want to go down into the pitch black tunnel without a light, either.

But the rain had started up again, and it was getting heavier by the second. Nigel stood, put the trap door back in place, and brushed the mud and water off his knees.

“Show me,” he said.

Nigel followed Lucy back into the lodge. They sloshed through more than an inch of water on the kitchen floor, and now Nigel could see the source of it—or two of many probable sources, actually. A steady stream was pouring down from the ceiling at one of the wall joints, and an ambitious drip had begun right in the center. Which had to mean that on the second floor above them, water had already pooled heavily.

Nigel vaguely hoped that someone had homeowner's insurance, but at the moment there were other concerns. He followed Lucy into the main room.

Mrs. Peabody, still at the table, raised her head slightly as they entered, and muttered, “Don't track mud in, children.”

Then her head was down and she was asleep again.

Nigel followed Lucy to the fireplace. She got down on her hands and knees in front of it. She reached into the cold, wet ashes and pulled out a clump of burned paper.

There were only fragments left—someone's attempt to burn the sheets had been almost completely successful—but she detached one of the fragments, about two inches square, and showed it to Nigel.

The writing was in a woman's hand—flowing, elegant, and imaginative. There were only a few words still visible, but they were enough: Until then, my love. Marlie.

“Do you see?” said Lucy.

“I think so,” said Nigel.

“These are the love letters that Mrs. McSweeney wrote. They do exist. Liam McSweeney did see them. It must have happened on their holiday here before she was killed. Perhaps she intentionally showed the letters to him, to make him understand that she could have a life of her own. Or perhaps she brought them here to destroy them, because she was ending the affair, and he found the ashes, just as we did. Or perhaps he discovered the letters and burned them himself in a rage. Those are all possibilities. But these are the letters, and the tunnel outside is how he got between here and the mainland more quickly than anyone could imagine, without being seen crossing the water.”

“The monks' tunnel,” said Nigel.

“Yes.” Lucy lifted up her feet as she said that. Her shoes were soaked. “Oh.”

They both stopped paying attention to the fireplace. They looked about them. There was water everywhere.

Mrs. Peabody, still slumped at the table, lifted her head now and looked at the floor and said, “I asked you not to track mud in, children.” And then she raised her head, fully awake.

“Oh, dear,” she said.

“There's this thing called situational awareness,” said Nigel. “I think we all need to get better at it.”

The water was inches deep across the floor. They could hear a major cascade in the kitchen, but they didn't need to go look—it was coming down in streams right in front of them, and there was a sound of groaning timbers from the floor above.

“Time to go,” said Nigel.

They all three ran outside. The rain and wind were as strong as ever, but staying in the lodge, with all the water pouring onto the ceiling, and saturating the foundation and soggy earth all around—was not an option.

The sedan was still there in front, with water and mud swirling on the tires.

“Do you still have the keys?” said Nigel.

“Looking,” said Lucy.

“Bankstone got out somehow,” said Nigel. “But how? He wouldn't have tried to walk out in this, and the Fiat is still here. So how did he leave?”

“The tunnel?” said Lucy.

“For his sake, I hope not,” said Nigel. “That's the last place I would want to be in a flood.”

Nigel looked at the ground immediately in front of the lodge, in a small area protected by the eaves. He knelt down for a closer look.

“I've found the keys,” said Lucy.

“Then let's go, shall we?” said Mrs. Peabody.

Nigel stared at the mud directly under the eave. “This is a tire track,” he said. “Not ours. Someone else's. And it's a huge tire. I've never seen anything like it.”

“So someone came and picked Mr. Bankstone up—and took Mr. Armstrong's body—and left all of us behind?” said Mrs. Peabody.

“It would seem so,” said Nigel. “It reminds me a lot of my partying days at university.”

“Sometimes it is good to be separated from the herd, and sometimes not,” said Lucy. “But if it were an official rescue team, they would not have left anyone alone here. We'd all be sitting on each other's laps if necessary. And what is their possible destination? The bridge is out, and they know it—so they cannot be taking the road in that direction.”

“They can't be heading to the hotel by land,” said Nigel. “So they're either trying to get to McSweeney's estate—or they're heading toward the sea.”

“I'm not sure I would like that sort of deliverance,” said Mrs. Peabody.

Nigel nodded. “A trained amphibious team could get through that surf line in a craft made for that purpose. But untrained city dwellers in a small boat? Not a chance. Not until the surf calms down.”

“Then let's catch up with them,” said Lucy. “Whichever way they went.”

 

22

The starter motor in the sedan whirred—but no ignition.

Lucy turned the key again. Same result.

“How do you feel about doing a push start?” she said to Nigel.

“Crank it again,” said Nigel. “Longer. If it doesn't work this time, we'll end up just floating down the hill. That would not be good.”

She tried again. And this time the engine turned. It belched out gray smoke, and it kept running. Lucy put the car in gear, and they started down what remained of the driveway.

They reached the main road. To the right was the washed-out bridge. They turned left, with the water runoff getting worse—but there was nowhere else to go.