Who Killed Sherlock Holmes? (36 page)

She saw Tock looking at her, that empty sadness in his eyes. ‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘enjoy.’

Everything she wanted to say to him would make him feel worse. She turned instead to Flamstead, who was laughing along with her, and kissed him. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I want to be
with you forever. I’m definitely committed to this relationship.’

‘What?’ She took a step back. She couldn’t quite believe he meant the opposite.

He took her head in his hands and kissed the top of her skull. It was a brother’s kiss. ‘It’s not me. It’s you.’

She knew him breaking up with her right now was the best possible time anyone could have done it, but she would have so appreciated the chance to have a relationship now she could once again
enjoy the emotional pleasure of it. She would also have appreciated him doing this in private. ‘You got together with me just to get me to this point, is that it?’

He smiled, which she took to be the only agreement he could make. ‘To exactly this point,’ he said, ‘and no . . . further.’

So there was something else he felt she should do? Solve the case, presumably, but surely she was nowhere near doing that tonight?

‘The gods make long-term plans,’ said Tock. ‘There’ll be some advantage to him involved.’

‘Can’t advantage sometimes be mutual?’ asked Flamstead.

Costain stepped forwards to meet his gaze. ‘You didn’t have to hurt her. You could have been a lot more direct about all this.’

‘Yes,’ Flamstead agreed gleefully, ‘I could.’

Ross couldn’t help but feel saddened, maybe a bit used, but it still felt to her like Flamstead had been thinking of what she needed. Also, the whole experience, looking back, had been
inside the anaesthetic of her lack of happiness. And come on, it had been a few good shags and some walks. Any sadness right now was of a beautifully limited nature, and there were roomfuls of
happiness beside it, and she couldn’t help but laugh again. She’d never known him properly. She’d shagged a god, and it hadn’t been all that. On impulse, she kissed him
properly, and he let her. He didn’t mean it, though. Then with a wink at her about old times and a little ruffle of air, he was gone.

She looked to Costain and he met her gaze. Now she could see clearly the suffering that was going on behind that face. It looked like he was holding her responsible.

Sefton was too knackered to drive back home, so he texted Joe and lay down on Quill’s sofa. Across the room from him, Moriarty was glaring at him, his fingers formed into
a steeple, his back hunched forwards, plotting, or pretending to plot. When they’d all retired, Sefton had wondered if this creation would follow Quill up to bed, but scheming somewhere
nearby seemed to be the iconic look Moriarty was going for, rather than glaring down at a married couple. Sefton was sure Sarah was glad about that. He wondered if the two of them would get any
sleep, or if Quill would feel he had to keep muttering his new mantra. At least Jimmy was home now.

He found that Moriarty sitting there gave him an idea. He got out his phone. If the immense, misguided belief of one brain could generate a Moriarty, then couldn’t something similar, with
more people involved, do something to help their cause? He found the email addresses for the three production companies involved in the Holmes series and began to write. ‘Time,’ he said
to them, ‘to make your fanbase very worried.’

In the early hours of Sunday morning, Ross lay on the bed of her hotel room. Her sheer relief at being able to feel happy was keeping her awake.

She heard a sound from outside her door and went to the spyhole to see what it was. There was Costain, pacing outside her room. He was going back and forth, a focused, utterly obsessed look on
his face. If they hadn’t been shown his credentials, security would surely have come for him by now. This was so extraordinarily unlike him. Her first impulse was to open the door and tell
him to go away, or at least to talk to her, but she was too scared of that look on his face, of what he might be capable of. She was amazed they’d now got to a place where she could think of
him like that. What did this jealous, possessive man, desperately trying to hold himself together, have to do with the person who’d hurt her terribly by making tough, decisive choices? This
person was seeing her as an object he wanted to possess. That person had been focused on the needs of others, and had hurt her, whom he’d truly loved, as a result.

The comparison had said it to her, and her newfound happiness agreed: the old Costain really had loved her.

She sat down, her mind going back to what Flamstead had said. He’d wanted her to get her happiness back. He also wanted her to do something more. But he felt he’d already done
everything necessary to . . .

She suddenly had an entirely new idea in her head, a horrifying one, an enormous one, formed out of connections she’d already seen, but hadn’t put in context before. She saw it
whole, at once, every part of the hypothesis. It made her slowly lower her hands to the bedclothes and grasp them in horror and exultation. She finally knew who she’d been playing against. It
was what she had been missing, what they had all been missing, and it had been in front of her all the time.

Monday morning. Sefton parked up beside the Portakabin and was surprised, even pleasantly so, to see all three familiar cars already there. He walked cautiously up the steps,
but before he could open the door, it had burst open, and Ross ran into his arms, hugging him . . . and laughing!

He stared at her, amazed, not letting himself believe it, had to step back from her. ‘Hey! What happened?!’

‘I’ll tell you all about it,’ she whispered. ‘But I came out here mostly to say big stuff is going down this morning and I’ll need you to back me up, OK? No
questions. Don’t say anything.’

‘OK,’ he said, now worried as well as bemused. She led him inside, and there was Quill, still shaking, a cup of tea beside him, and with him Moriarty. Costain seemed to have accepted
the presence of the sketchy, dark shape completely, pacing, tense, but not giving the creation a moment’s attention.

‘So . . . yesterday morning, you told me that you’d started doing something . . . that might progress the investigation,’ said Quill to Sefton, not his old self by any means,
but trying to lead. From the looks on Ross and Costain’s faces, they’d already tried to have a joyful reunion with him and quickly found themselves feeling like Sefton, that Quill
shouldn’t have come back so soon. The atmosphere in the room was well weird, not matching the slight hope he felt at them all being together again.

‘Yeah,’ Sefton said, ‘and with the support of the three Holmes productions’ social media departments, it’s really taken off. It should get even bigger today, now
we’re past the weekend. They’ve each let it slip to their fans that one, or all, of their Watsons might be killed off.’

‘And of course,’ said Ross, ‘that’s generated a lot more media interest than the deaths of all these real people.’

‘Of course. So there’s now a lot of London memory space being devoted to Watson. That interest, getting London to remember him, could act as a hook when we next try to summon
him.’

‘I’ve tried to talk to Lofthouse.’ Quill sounded as if he hadn’t listened to what Sefton had just said. ‘She’s not back at work. Her office says she fell ill
at a conference and is staying with a friend. What else have we got?’

Sefton listened with interest to Ross and Costain’s report about the occult London conference. Interest and annoyance. Something from his speciality and they’d gone off on their own?
He made himself keep a poker face, which turned into a genuine smile as Ross got to the bit about how she’d got her happiness back. She’d asked him, a few moments ago, not to ask
awkward questions, so he didn’t. Also pleasing was the idea of a culture who’d provided them with a few indications of interest in offering leads, who’d expressed the start of a
grudging interest in being policed by consent. ‘We also,’ said Ross, ‘heard about another site where Ballard left artefacts that might—’

‘We did?’ said Costain.

‘I meant . . .’ Ross looked suddenly awkward. ‘I forgot to tell you. It was one of . . . you know . . . one of those things Gilbert . . .’

‘It’s OK,’ Costain said quickly, as if protecting her virtue.

Ross took a piece of paper from her pocket and handed it to Sefton. On it was written, ‘Don’t let anyone else see this. Pretend it’s an address. Say you’ll go over
later.’ He kept his expression steady and pocketed the paper. ‘Right. I’ll go over there later.’

‘There’s meant to be a few things we might be able to use, including some sort of hat that lets the wearer see through all pretences. But not that item Ballard talked about that can
find people. I think Gilbert really wanted us to go get this stuff.’

‘How’s the “Resident Patient” scenario going?’ asked Quill. He’d been muttering his couple of sentences about himself under his breath at intervals. Sefton
could see him holding on, and it was about just holding on.

‘Uniforms haven’t reported anything unusual around Brook Street this weekend,’ said Ross. ‘Jimmy, how would you feel if I laid out suggestions for what our aims should be
today?’ She started making a list on the board. Costain was to go down to Brook Street and liaise with the uniforms; Sefton was to leave Ross and Quill instructions for what needed to be
assembled for the summoning of Watson, then go to the address she’d given him.

‘On it,’ said Costain, and headed out.

‘OK,’ said Ross, ‘moving forward . . .’ Then she paused, as if waiting for something. Sefton heard the sounds of Costain getting into his car, starting it up, driving
off. He looked to Ross, puzzled. Her expression had suddenly changed. ‘Follow him!’ she yelled. She grabbed a bag from beside her chair and shoved Sefton towards the door.
‘Quickly!’

‘What’s going on?’ Quill called from the back seat. Sefton was driving at high speed, just about keeping Costain’s car in sight. Costain was moving
fast, ignoring the lights, which, thank Christ, turned to green just as Sefton got to them. Moriarty had just flashed into existence beside Quill, Sefton saw in his mirror.

‘If we lose sight of him,’ said Ross, ‘that’s our only chance gone. If that happens, we call the uniforms, get warrants across the board, get them to search every
building near Brook Street, but I think by then we’ll be too late.’

Sefton shifted gears and found himself weaving in and out of traffic to follow the car way ahead.

‘Too late for what? Why are we chasing bloody
Costain
?’ Quill sounded like he was questioning reality again.

‘You think, what, someone’s controlling him?’ asked Sefton.

‘Listen,’ said Ross, ‘this is what I’ve worked out. We’ve been assuming we’re after a team of criminals, but if I’m right, that’s not the case.
Just about everything we thought we knew is wrong.’

As Sefton and Quill listened, at first incredulous, then horrified, Ross told them about her theory.

Costain drove north, crossed the Thames over Vauxhall Bridge, up Park Lane and round Speaker’s Corner. The traffic stopped him from losing them. To Sefton’s relief,
he hadn’t shown any sign of trying to, was hopefully unaware of them following. He did indeed seem to be heading for Brook Street, which made sense, thought Sefton, with what Ross was telling
them. What she said made keeping him in sight terrifyingly urgent. Costain parked not on the street itself, but turned to enter Brook’s Mews nearby. Sefton left his car in a non-existent
space on Davies Street, the front end up on the pavement, police logbook in the window, and they got out and ran to the corner.

‘If he’s going to liaise with the uniforms,’ said Ross, ‘he’ll head this way for the control van.’ She looked round the corner, and Sefton could hear the
tension in her voice. ‘Go on, go on . . .’ Shoppers were walking past them, glancing curiously at them. ‘Oh, you beauty. Come on!’

She led them at speed to a door on the mews, what looked to be a private home with the black door of a garage beside it. Sefton took the stick of walkthrough that Ballard had used in the bank
raid and drew with one long sweep the rough oval of a door. Quill dived at it so hard that if it hadn’t worked, he’d have injured himself. Sefton and Ross were right behind him. They
heard shouts not from the stairwell, not from the kitchen, but from a door that must lead to the garage. Quill, as if desperate to be decisive about something, threw himself forwards.

The three of them rushed into the garage space to witness an extraordinary sight. Costain spun from where he stood beside a chair. There was a noose above, tied to a beam on the roof. He’d
been about to kick the chair away and kill his prisoner, who stood there helplessly, his hands tied.

The prisoner was also Tony Costain.

Ross pulled the knife she always carried and leaped forwards to cut the rope.

Quill rushed at the figure by the chair, but that Costain was too fast, throwing himself against and through a wall that already had a door drawn on it in chalk. Quill attempted to follow, but
bounced off the wall with a shout of pain. ‘He’s got something to switch that off!’ he yelled.

Sefton got to the door, but, looking up and down the street, there was no sign of where the other Costain had gone. By the time he got back down to the garage, Quill and Ross were helping what
Sefton took to be the real Costain down from the chair. He was panting with shock, a look of abject horror on his face. He’d lost a lot of weight; his cheekbones were stark. ‘You found
me,’ he whispered, looking as if they might vanish at any moment.

‘When did they take you?’ asked Ross. Concern and awkwardness were mixed in her expression.

‘The
Lone Star
. Those bastards . . . put me in a crate. I was in there for days. He only opened it up in here. Where are we?’

‘Brook Street. Did he make you recite some lines from Sherlock Holmes?’

‘Yeah. Just the other day. He used one of those electrical stunners to threaten me. I went along with it, didn’t see why not.’