The Brothers of Baker Street (26 page)

“Sherlock Holmes?”

“That’s not important,” said Reggie. “What’s important is that I speak with Dr. Dillane.”

“He is no longer here,” said the woman. “Sherlock Holmes, did you say?”

“Can you tell me where he has gone?” said Reggie.

“He was employed here until just recently; that’s all I can say.”

That meant, of course, that there was much more to it.

“Did he quit, then?” said Reggie. “Or was it a termination?”

“I simply can’t say. But let me be sure I understand. You say Dr. Dillane wrote a letter to Sherlock Holmes?”

“Either he or someone in his therapy group did. That’s why I need to talk to him.”

“I see. And you are here in response to that letter?”

“Yes.”

“I see,” she said again, quite carefully. “Well, I’m sorry, Mr.… Holmes, is it, then?”

“No, my name is Heath, as I said. Reggie Heath.”

“Oh. My mistake. Well, I am indeed sorry that Dr. Dillane is no longer available. However, I’m sure we can find someone else to help with what seems to be bothering you.” As she said this, she glanced back over her shoulder at a tweed-coated professional just now exiting at the other end of the office, and she looked as if she were about to run and fetch him.

“I don’t think I’ve explained myself clearly,” said Reggie quickly. “Nothing is bothering me.”

“No need to feel embarrassed. All of us have something that is bothering us.”

“I just need to talk to Dr. Dillane about someone who may have been his patient. Do you have a number where I can reach the doctor?”

“I’m sorry, he never listed his personal number.”

“Of course,” said Reggie. “A forwarding address, then?”

“I’m sorry,” said the woman. “I simply can’t.”

But as she said it, Reggie saw her glance fall just briefly to the shipping box that she had been packing. It was difficult to be certain from this angle—the shipping label on the box was facing the woman, not Reggie—but he was almost certain that the addressee’s name was Dillane.

“Are these Dr. Dillane’s items?” said Reggie. “That you’re packing up for him now?”

The receptionist immediately pulled the box back from within Reggie’s reach. Then she sat down behind the desk, planted her elbows there firmly, and clasped her hands together.

“Now please, Mr. Heath,” she said, in her most officious manner, “you just tell me what is bothering you, and I promise, we’ll find someone who can help.”

“Very well,” said Reggie. “What is bothering me is that the woman I love is about to marry another man, my legal career hangs by a thread, I spent most of the past twenty-four hours in jail, and I run a distinct risk of going back there again for a very long time. All of which—or at least most of which—I think I can begin to remedy, if I can just talk with Dr. Dillane.”

Reggie paused. The receptionist was unmoved. Desperate measures were called for.

“Or,” Reggie added, “some equally qualified psychiatric professional.”

The woman smiled and stood. “Now we’re getting somewhere. You just wait right here,” she said kindly, “and I’ll find someone for you who’s every bit as good as Dr. Dillane.” She turned and moved off, in the direction of the tweed-coated man.

Reggie reached across the reception desk and turned the shipping box just enough so that he could read the label. Yes, it was in fact for Dr. Dillane.

Reggie made a note of the address.

And then he turned and exited the building as quickly as he could without actually running.

23

Laura arrived at the
Daily Sun
publishing compound by cab. The security staff at the gate recognized her immediately and waved her on through.

As she took the private lift to Buxton’s penthouse, she remembered that she had yet to give him an answer. He was being quite patient about it, actually, which was good.

But best to try to avoid that topic for the moment. Better to keep separate issues separate. She was making every effort to do that in her own mind, and until she made it up, she would have to do that in their conversation as well.

She found Buxton in his private office. He jumped up from the desk—he was quite nimble for a man of his size, and liked to prove it—and came toward her as soon as she opened the door.

He looked like a child on Christmas morning. She would have to be careful. He kissed her, and she returned it, but only as much as was necessary.

“This is not a social call,” she said. She said it with a smile, as if half joking. She could ease into it that way.

“It isn’t?” he was returning the half smile. That was good.

“No,” she said. “I am here as a loyal
Daily Sun
reader with a complaint.”

“We have a department for that.”

“I don’t deal with departments. I came straight to the top.”

“Right, then,” said Buxton. He went around behind his desk and sat down with his hands clasped together, in a pretense of receiving a very ordinary business appointment.

“What’s the issue?”

Sometimes she liked him. That felt like a problem at the moment.

“It’s these,” she said. She plunked down half a dozen different editions of the
Daily Sun
on his desk. “There’s a pattern in them, and it disturbs me.”

“Now, I don’t write the stories, Laura, you know that,” said Buxton, shuffling through them to see what she was concerned about.

“You publish them.”

“Five dailies on three continents. I can’t read them all. What pattern is it that worries you?”

She rearranged the papers to show him where to start.

“This one was the the killing in Chelsea a few days ago. The two American tourists. Page one, and you managed to scoop all the other tabs.”

“We do try,” said Buxton.

“Yes,” said Laura. “And the week before you had this one—a robbery in the financial district, not so glamorous as a murder, but newsworthy, I suppose, in that it was a driver of a Black Cab said to have done it.”

“Yes,” said Buxton. “Quite right.”

“So much so that you threw in two pics where all the other papers had just one, and you devoted twice as much space to it.”

“It was a good story, Laura.”

“And here are three more, going back even further. In each of them, you’ve given them much higher play than any of the other press.”

“Laura, I don’t understand. Why are you being so hypersensitive about a few stories on the Black Cabs?”

“I’m not being hypersensitive at all,” she responded, a bit defensively. “I just think it’s odd. And—”

“This is about Heath, isn’t it?”

“It’s got nothing to do with Reggie.”

“It’s this one, isn’t it?” said Buxton, holding up one of the front-page stories that blasted Reggie for getting the driver released. “I’ll have a word with the editor about the ‘Balmy Barrister’ stuff, if you like. I don’t kick a man when he is down. I mean, not repeatedly. At least not for personal reasons.”

Laura considered that, then said, “I thought the ‘Balmy Barrister’ headline was rather clever, actually, possibly not even far from the truth. But Reggie can take care of himself, and it’s certainly up to you whether you want to risk another shrubbery. What concerns me is the sensational coverage—even for a tabloid—you’ve given all the Black Cab crimes. And in some of these, you not only gave them more play, but you seem to have scooped the competition, either on the timing, or on the lurid details, or both.”

“Well, my journalists are very thorough, if they want to keep their jobs. Some evidence clerks can be bribed. That’s Scotland Yard’s lookout, if they can’t keep their own staff on the straight and narrow.”

“It’s one thing to dig deep and be hard-hitting. It’s another thing to go on a vendetta.”

“Laura, what are you saying? That I have something personal against Black Cabs?”

“I’m saying that you are being used.”

Buxton laughed. “That would be a first,” he said.

“Someone is providing your reporter with inside information on each of the crimes, and the
Daily Sun
is in return giving the stories extraspectacular coverage.”

Buxton wasn’t laughing now. “Why would anyone do that?” he said.

“I don’t know. To make everyone afraid to take a Black Cab? That seems to be what’s happening.”

“And what possible motivation would anyone have for doing that?’

“I don’t know. But if that is the intent, aren’t you concerned that with the way you’re playing the stories, you are assisting them?”

Buxton sat back a bit on that remark. But then he recovered, leaned over, and patted Laura on the knee.

“I’ve been in this business many years, my dear. I know how it works, and I know what boundaries I can push. Your concern is noted, but I think you can safely leave the management of my newspapers to me. Now—while you were on your way up, I had a word with the chef at Club Gascon, and he’s sending over an early dinner.”

There are knee pats, and then there are knee pats. Laura was familiar with pats, squeezes, and caresses of all varieties. And this variety of pat, with the remarks that accompanied it, was the wrong one at the wrong time.

“Actually, I was thinking not so much dinner as a bit of shopping. I think Harrods is still open.”

Buxton’s look in response said that he knew full well how much Laura enjoyed the evening meal and how little regard she had for shopping as a pastime. He knew the tone of trouble when he heard it.

“Of course,” he said. “I’m sure the filet mignon is reheatable.”

Laura almost sighed at that, because she knew it was not. But she held the sigh in and said nothing.

Instead, Buxton sighed.

“You can take my limo, if you like,” he said. “But I’ll call a Black Cab if you prefer.”

“I’ll take a cab,” said Laura.

She turned and started for the door, but then she paused and looked back at him.

“Robert … when Reggie first came back from Los Angeles a few weeks ago, who was it that had the idea to do a story that told the world about his financial difficulties and those embarrassing Sherlock Holmes letters.… Was it Emma Swoop all on her own? Or was it you who put her up to it?”

Buxton looked at Laura and then away for a moment, and then, after gathering all the courage he could, back at Laura again.

He said, “I can’t recall.”

Laura gave that response the look it deserved, and then she went out the door.

Moments later, riding in the back of a Black Cab that had appeared quite promptly at the Buxton Enterprises gate, Laura concentrated on the workings of her mobile phone and tried to ignore the center rearview mirror, which kept showing the driver’s eyes shifting over to get a better look at her. These days it was getting difficult to tell sexual ogling from celebrity ogling—at least on first glance—and she was getting tired of it, regardless of whether it was one or the other, or a hybrid.

“Aren’t all you Knowledge Boys supposed to be professional enough to keep your eyes on the road?” she said.

“Sorry, ma’am. Miss. Ms. Sorry.”

She laughed at that, and finally got the phone to connect and ring Reggie’s mobile. But there was no answer.

She closed the phone, and the cab driver, who had in fact not stopped watching her in the mirror, said, “Just surprised, is all. Would have thought you’d be taking a limo. Glad to have you though.”

Laura smiled and nodded politely. Then she pressed the lever to turn off the driver-passenger intercom, and for the remainder of the trip she tried to ignore that the driver continued glimpsing her in the rearview mirror.

Twenty minutes later, she got out of the cab on Baker Street and took the lift up to Reggie’s chambers.

“I just want to check something, it will only take a moment,” she said to Lois, and then she went directly into Reggie’s office. She closed the door behind her and took a moment to look about.

There were three combination locks in Reggie’s office. There was a lock for the bottom right drawer of the desk. There was another lock for the center top drawer. And yet another one for the separate file cabinet. All of them, she knew, were among the office furniture that Reggie had owned when he first met her.

She went first to the lower right drawer of the desk, the one she and Nigel had been unable to open with her birth date earlier. But this time, instead of entering her birth date, as she and Nigel had done before, she entered the first six digits of her phone number—not her mobile, but the landline number she had given Reggie when they first met.

The drawer opened, sliding easily, with the silence of a well-made piece of furniture being treated properly.

She pushed it back closed again.

She went to the file cabinet and entered her digits again. It opened. She pushed it back closed.

And then she did the process on the center top drawer as well. The drawer slid open as if it had just been waiting for the opportunity.