Kingstone paused and gave a considered reply. “In the end, he’ll do what he wants to do. But he’s been known to take advice from those close to him. Men he trusts. He trusts me. He chooses his friends carefully and stays loyal to them. We’re working together on some very special projects … his New Deal? You know about that?”
Joe nodded.
“We’re both concerned to get a scheme running … in the Tennessee Valley. My home county. If it goes well, schemes like it could pick the country up by its bootstraps, reinvigorate the US economy.” He gave Joe a twisted smile. “Interesting, isn’t it—and revealing—the way different countries react to a depression? The US hitches up its britches and puts the unemployed and impoverished into work, building hydroelectric power schemes and farming new land; the Germans invest a billion marks they don’t yet have in autobahns, bridges and steel mills; you British cry, ‘Hey, nonny, nonny,’ and build a luxury liner or two.”
Joe smiled at his jibes but did not reply to them, sensing Kingstone was getting close to making a point he wanted to hear.
“Well, this president’s bottom-up way for economic growth isn’t popular with some. His democratic ideas, which we would see as far-sighted, bold and compassionate, are anathema to many.”
“To many? Whom have you in mind?”
“Republicans, Communists, Fascists, Daughters of the Revolution, Seventh Day Adventists … you name it. Hard to believe, but a fully employed population earning a living wage with provision for good health, equal status for coloured folks and immigrants of all races, and equal rights for women come pretty low on the agenda of the wealthy and privileged. But how to attack it without appearing inhumane? They tar it with the same brush as ‘communism’ and take this as the authority to stamp down hard on it in a self-righteous, patriotic hand-on-heart way. Their number includes some bankers and industrialists he hasn’t yet managed to haul on board and never will. And these same money-men are right here in London. Plotting and planning.”
HE WAITED TO see if Joe had got the point of his speech, which had been delivered with increasing urgency, his breath shortening, his jaw tightening.
“And coercing politicians into taking action against their better judgement?” Joe said. “That’s a crime, I’m sure. I don’t know exactly what we’d call it here but give me what you have and I’ll run them down and charge them with something high-sounding enough to shove them into the Bloody Tower for a spell. Perhaps an appointment with the axe man on Tower Green at dawn? If any Englishmen are involved, they’ll find that treason is still a capital offence.”
Kingstone’s sudden guffaw was alarming in the grim room. Armitage put a hand on his arm to steady him but he shook it off with unnecessary vehemence. Rippon cast a glance full of professional concern at Joe and raised a warning eyebrow.
“ ‘Assault on the gold standard with malice aforethought’? How does that sound? Because that would be hitting the nail on the head. That’s what it comes down to. Money and power. And a British bobby like you wouldn’t get near the men involved. They can spend millions on getting their way and then covering their tracks. They are men of the world, international power brokers. They stand to make grotesque amounts of money if the conference goes the way they’d prefer. If it doesn’t?” He spread his hands and shrugged. “No problem whatsoever. They can still make money. They just need to know for sure before the announcement’s made. Coming off or staying on the gold standard may sound like a political decision to you but when there are fortunes to be made or lost, politics, morality and the law get squashed like that damn beetle.”
He looked down with anguish at the dead girl. “And this poor child? And her dancer’s toe? Why is she caught up in this net? A substitute? A token?… Oh, Lord! I see it! I’m not thinking straight! She’s an understudy, a stand-in, pushed on stage to play a dying role …” The enormity of the realisation seemed to make him reel. “Why? Where did they lay hands on her? They just used … killed and disfigured her in order to scare the hell out of me? Can I believe that? I don’t want to believe that. But it is believable because I’ve known them do worse harm for less gain. Used and thrown away.”
He was muttering to himself. Repeating words and phrases. His normally clipped, allusive style was reduced to fervid ramblings. Seeing Joe’s concern, he swallowed and pulled himself together. “And Natalia? She’s been used too. Tortured. Dead. I’ve accepted that. They don’t waste time. The next body you haul in will be hers. All to coerce a pigheaded, God-fearing, straight-talking Tennessee man who wouldn’t be bought, who was naïve enough to think they’d never go that far. Not in a civilised country. But I’ll tell you what I’ve learned, Joe—you talk of the Tower of London … huh!… these guys have the keys to your Tower in their back pockets! As they always have. Think of your boss. Now think of his boss and then his boss and you’re getting somewhere near the guy they’ve got on the end of a lead. You’re just another insect under their boots, Joe. And, believe me, I’m no giant, but I’m going to die. Sooner rather than later.”
He was breathing fast, his limbs were twitching uncontrollably, his face, in the cold room, shone with perspiration. Joe was uneasy with his task but he knew he had to push Kingstone to the limits of his resilience.
“That’s how you interpret this scholarly bit of venom? I mean—it’s hardly ‘Pay up or you’re a gonner, guv,’ is it?” He held the elegant black writing in front of Kingstone’s face.
The man shuddered and pulled away. “It is. That’s just a bit of theatre. They’re devilish but they’re human. They even like their bit of fun. And they’re clever. They can converse in ancient Greek, can you believe that? Shakespeare? That’s for dumbos like me … they could give you the whole of the Iliad at the drop of a hat. They’ll leave me to squirm a bit, but not for long. They won’t waste any more time on me. I’m expendable. No—worse than that—I’m a walking liability. If she’s dead, I have nothing more to lose. I’m a loose cannon and they’ll have to tip me overboard. It’ll be so subtle you won’t hear the splash. It’ll come suddenly and apparently entirely naturally. A heart attack, a traffic accident. Ask Armiger here—he knows this sort of stuff. He’s up to his ears in clandestine thuggery. That’s why I have him around. But even he can’t stop a London bus if it’s aimed at me. I’m not even going to make it back to the hotel.”
His head went down with the abrupt, sobbing despair of a winning racehorse whose heart had given more than it had in reserve and was about to fall to its knees in the paddock.
They couldn’t reach him, so far had he sunk. Joe had seen many strong men broken by circumstance and he knew that Kingstone had put his finger on it when he’d claimed, crazily, “they’re targeting the inside of my head.” A series of incessant, calculated, malicious blows—possibly more than Kingstone had declared to anyone—had laid the senator low. Joe was tempted for a moment to produce the slim hip flask of scotch he kept inside his jacket for just such crises of confidence but a glance at the puritan features of the pathologist dissuaded him from the simple soldier’s gesture.
Armitage turned a distraught face to Joe with a silent plea. When it came to protecting his boss, Bill could out-gun, out-run and out-wrestle anyone, Joe guessed, but he had no skills to save him from the mental collapse that seemed to be taking place before their eyes. He had no idea what to do next.
It was the doctor who stepped in. “Have a seat, sir.” With brisk authority, he pushed forward a chair and, hand on shoulder, eased Kingstone onto it.
In instant understanding and collusion, Julia pulled up another one for herself and settled down, side by side with the senator. Her pat on his thigh was a nanny’s reassuring gesture and her voice brisk and unruffled: “Cor! I thought no one was ever going to offer anybody a seat! And you call yourselves gentlemen! That’s a long time to keep a lady standing on one leg, if I may say so. You need to take the weight off after a shock like that. Any chance of a glass of water, Mr. Harper?” The attendant, who was just coming back into the room, took in the scene at a glance, turned round and hurried off again.