“Quite a brace you have, there,” he commented over his tea. “You look as if you just went ten rounds with the great Mendoza himself in his prime.”
“You wanted to see me, sir?” I asked, helping myself to the contents of the silver coffeepot, which Mac had obviously brought up for me. Dummolard had provided currant scones.
“I thought we might discuss the case,” Barker said. “Let me begin by admitting a mistake. I should have gone after Miss O’Casey myself.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean to shoot her.”
Barker poured another thimbleful of tea into his handleless cup. “Oh, that could not be helped, lad. If you hadn’t shot her, I would have. She wasn’t going to be allowed to get off that bridge with one of our bombs. If your conscience is bothering you, let me state that I have my doubts as to whether you triggered the explosion at all. The actual time of the explosion was very near.”
“I’m sure I shot the bag, sir.”
“How’s your shoulder?”
“It’s fine.” Actually, there was an ugly purple bruise, with a reddish ring about it.
“I’m sorry you went over the railing, Thomas. I tried to get to you, and my hand was no more than a foot away, but you flew past me too quickly. It was good that you were wearing that coat. It saved your life. I shall have another made for you, and buy a new Webley to go with it.”
I sat down and idly began to pick apart one of the scones. Barker was buoyant, and why shouldn’t he be? His case was completed successfully, and in the very face of Inspector Munro. I, on the other hand, felt like a complete failure, and a murderer as well.
“Are you feeling sorry for Miss O’Casey and the faction?” he asked. “Don’t. Remember, they would have killed us without mercy had they discovered who we were. And if you were swayed by Miss O’Casey’s words on the bridge, remember she was still using you, hoping to get you to join their side, but she despised you. When she saw you were of no use to her, she had no qualms about dispatching you. She was a brilliant leader, a strategist, and as ruthless as she needed to be.”
I put my hand to my face, then instantly regretted the gesture. “I’m confused,” I admitted.
“I thought you might be. Now that the case is finished, I shall go over it with you. Let us start at the beginning.”
Had it really been only four weeks ago?
“Very well,” I said. “Why did you offer your services in the first place? As everyone has pointed out, you’re an enquiry agent, not a spy.”
“Scotland Yard is good at what it does-keeping the peace, investigating crimes, and patrolling the city-and I have the greatest respect for the organization, but this operation was beyond their scope. The Special Irish Branch, under Inspector Munro, has made great strides since it was formed last year; but it takes several years to develop the connections I have in this city, and the S.I.B. was not yet ready. As for the Home Office, their members are recruited from the top schools in the country. As good as they are, it was difficult for them to infiltrate the factions. That’s why their spies died in the field, all, that is, save Le Caron, whom, you remember, I trained myself. Now, I couldn’t make a convincing Irishman, and there are very few people I could impersonate, but Johannes van Rhyn was one of them. It just happened that he was the one man they wanted most of all.
“The last I spoke to him, van Rhyn was complaining because Rossa was attempting to recruit him for his faction. I thought that if Dunleavy knew the other factions were after him, he would jump at a chance to make use of van Rhyn.”
“How could you be certain you would discover the faction that blew up the Yard?” I argued.
“The Irish are a loquacious race. We would have had almost no chance of discovering them had they been Chinese, for example. Cathcart deserved his pound a day. As for Soho Vic, I’ve kept him busy running messages between the Harp and our offices. There was a chance I couldn’t discover which faction had blown up Scotland Yard, but I did, so the question is moot.”
“Dunleavy was never able to convince you he was the faction leader, was he?”
Barker lit his pipe, in no hurry to answer, running the lit vesta around the bowl before blowing it out. “No,” he stated. “Alfred Dunleavy was too weak. He is undisciplined, lazy, melancholy, and a drunkard. He had grandiose schemes and a complaint against the world for not making him a great leader. He could not have thought up or enacted the brilliant scheme of employing a team of five men using timed assaults to bring down London.”
“So, whom did you suspect?”
“Everyone, of course. A brilliant leader would be capable of playacting. Now, confess, lad, even when you found O’Muircheartaigh’s letters, I’ll wager you didn’t once suspect Miss O’Casey of being the leader, did you?”
I had to admit it, but I wasn’t going to say it was because she had turned my head. “No, sir, I didn’t.”
“Yes, well. My second list of suspects, if you considered the faction leaders as the first, were: the O’Caseys, Garrity, McKeller, Yeats, the Bannon brothers, and Mr. O’Muircheartaigh. Oh, and Dunleavy, since there was a small chance he was more clever than I thought he was. That was my list of suspects, and I merely had to winnow it down.”
“Yes,” I added, “while concealing who you were, making their bombs, and preparing a plan to capture them when they reached London.”
Barker gave a cough, his answer to a chuckle. “I’ve had a little experience doing this, lad. Where was I?”
“The list of suspects.”
“Correct. I crossed McKeller off early. It’s possible he was more than he claimed, but he seemed so genuine, I believed him. He was a big, violent man, without much of a past or a future. By the way, I must compliment you on defeating him. He was a very dangerous opponent. Did you really intend to put up that weak guard?”
“Yes, sir. I remembered what you said about putting everything into a final effort. It was the only way I could win.”
“You improve, Thomas.”
“Thank you, sir,” I murmured. It was rare praise, indeed.
“The Bannons I dismissed because they were twins. I know it was possible for one of them to be the leader, but they were very self-involved, as twins sometimes are. Also, they seemed to be doing mere yeoman service. They had no internal fire.”
“O’Casey,” I said. “Now, he was the logical choice. Trinity educated and obviously talented. He’s good-looking, intelligent, not to mention a trained fighter. What was it about him that didn’t make you suspect him as the secret leader?”
“He didn’t rise to the bait.”
“Bait?” I asked. “What bait?”
“You, lad,” he said, taking his pipe from his mouth. “I used you as bait. Surely you must have seen that. A young fellow like Thomas Penrith, armed with all the skills of van Rhyn, with decades to develop more. I thought if O’Casey or Dunleavy was the actual leader, they would have been astute enough to latch onto you early. You’ll note that Dunleavy barely spoke a word to you, and young Eamon O’Casey didn’t warm up to you until after the bomb demonstration. He was a little closer to you later, but not enough. I would have thought that someone wishing to attach a man of your skills to this cause would have forged a bond with you. He did not, but Maire O’Casey grew very interested in you.”
“What of that?” I asked. “She was a beautiful woman.”
“I will not say otherwise, but think of it. If she had the world at her feet, if she could have her pick of any man in England or Ireland, why would she choose a little Welsh bomb maker? That is not the decision of a beautiful young woman but the thinking of a leader trying to build a strong faction.”
That was a trifle harsh, I thought. I sat there for a moment, trying to look at it all objectively, but it was difficult.
“So you don’t think she genuinely cared for me.”
Just then, Harm trotted in the room. He came up to me, but when I reached for him, he avoided me, convinced, perhaps, that I was going to blubber in his fur again. He settled into Barker’s lap and fell asleep.