Blackstone and the Wolf of Wall Street (6 page)

He's waiting for me to ask what this has to do with my question, Blackstone thought.

‘The English landlord,' he repeated, non-committally.

‘He used to ride around on his fine white horse, with a fat smirk on his face, and watch the peasants, breaking their backs in the fields. And why were they out there breaking their backs, Mr Blackstone?'

‘So that the landlord could live in luxury, while they could earn just enough to not actually starve to death?'

‘Just so. The other man I remember is the parish priest. He was a well-meaning sort of feller, in his own way – maybe even kind. But he watched those poor peasants suffering – and he did nothing about it.'

‘And when you look at Mr George and Mr Harold, you're reminded of the landlord and the parish priest?' Blackstone asked.

‘When I look at
most
men with any kind of authority, I'm reminded of either the landlord or the parish priest,' Flynn replied.

‘So which of the two is which?' Blackstone asked.

The corner of Flynn's mouth twitched slightly. ‘You're the big man from Scotland Yard. You work it out for yourself.'

The carriages came to a halt in front of the house, and the two passengers climbed out. One of them was a solid chunk of a man, with a square, block-like body and a round head balanced on top of it like a watermelon on a gatepost. The other had a thin sensitive face and a frame which looked as if it might well blow away in a strong wind.

‘I'll wager I can pick out the one who reminds you of your landlord,' Blackstone said to Flynn.

‘And if I was inclined to throw my money away, I'd take you up on that wager,' Flynn replied.

The chunky brother stood still and looked around him. The expression on his face seemed to suggest that he was expecting a larger reception committee – and was offended there wasn't one.

The skinny brother, in contrast, made a beeline for Inspector Flynn.

‘Have the kidnappers been in contact with you yet, Inspector?' he asked breathlessly, as if he'd been running.

‘I'm afraid they haven't, Mr Holt,' Flynn said.

‘Mr Harold,' the skinny brother said automatically. ‘Mr
Holt
is my father.'

The other brother – Mr George – had clearly given up waiting to be fêted, and joined them.

‘Have the newspapers been informed of the kidnapping yet, Flynn?' he demanded.

‘Not by me, nor by anybody in my department, sir,' the inspector said. ‘And we'd prefer it if you didn't . . .'

‘The board will have to be briefed – and so will the brokers,' Mr George said, ‘Otherwise, God alone knows what effect the news will have on our stock position when it gets out. And it
will
get out – make no mistake about that.'

‘This is Inspector Blackstone, from Scotland Yard, sir,' Flynn said evenly. ‘He and Sergeant Meade will be in charge of the investigation.'

Mr George nodded vaguely, as if he'd heard the words but had not yet had time to process them.

‘Thank heavens we closed that deal with the Furness Trust this morning,' he said to his brother, ‘because if we'd left it even a little later, they'd certainly have found out that Father had gone missing – and then they'd
never
have signed.'

‘Is there somewhere we could have a private conversation, sir?' Blackstone asked.

‘A private conversation?' George repeated, as though he had no idea what the other man was talking about.

‘That's right,' Blackstone agreed.

‘But why would we —?'

‘Inspector Blackstone needs to ask us some questions about Father,' Harold said quietly.

‘Ah, yes, of course he does,' George agreed. He took his pocket watch out of his waistcoat pocket. ‘No doubt you'd like this meeting right away, Inspector . . . er . . .'

‘Yes, sir, I would.'

‘And so would we – but there are few important business calls we still need to make, so could we postpone it for half an hour, do you think?'

‘I'm sure that would be fine, sir,' Blackstone agreed, because it seemed pointless to say anything else.

George nodded. ‘Good,' Then he turned towards his brother. ‘Well, for God's sake, don't just stand there like a tailor's dummy, Harry. If we've only got thirty minutes to make those calls, it will need both of us.'

The two men headed for the house, George striding ahead, Harold scampering after him like a puppy which was finding it difficult to keep up.

‘There are some people who maintain that money has an almost magical effect – and they're not wrong,' Flynn murmured, almost to himself. ‘Sweet Jesus, how else could you explain the fact that a few bits of paper can turn a man into a walking heap of shit?'

Though the SS
Star
of Liverpool was close enough to port for the travellers to stand on deck and admire the New York skyline, the first class passengers – having partaken of a sumptuous banquet the previous evening and, anyway, regarding sightseeing as slightly
passé
– felt under no obligation to take advantage of the opportunity. As a result, the two women walking up and down the first class deck had it all to themselves.

They were an odd pair.

One of the women was well into middle age and had the kind of thick squat body and sturdy legs which suggested she came from peasant stock stretching back over generations. She was dressed in a skirt made of rough fabric and had a hand-knitted shawl over her broad shoulders.

The second woman was still young enough to regard middle age as nothing but a distant threat. Her face had none of the natural ruddiness of her companion's, but instead displayed the slightly pinched features of those born into urban poverty.
Her
body was wiry and muscular, though there was nothing boyish about it, as the rounded bosom straining against the confinement of her inexpensive blouse more than proved.

They had been promenading up and down the deck for some time, the older woman leaning heavily on her companion, when the younger woman – Ellie Carr – noticed that one of the stewards was approaching them. His very gait told her instantly that he was the sort of man who confused ‘official' and ‘officious' – the sort who considered that having been handed a key made him automatically superior to anyone who hadn't.

Easy, girl, she told herself. Play it straight.

But even as the words passed through her mind, she knew she wasn't going to – knew that, though she guiltily considered it somewhat childish, she still got considerable pleasure from blowing the wind out of the sails of people who
deserved
to have the wind blown out.

The steward came to a sharp halt directly in front of them, rudely blocking their way.

Well, he was asking for it, wasn't he, Ellie thought.

‘Do you know that this is the first class deck?' the steward demanded.

‘Yeah, as a matter o' fact, I do,' Ellie replied. ‘There's lots of fings to suggest that's what it is, but it was the big sign sayin' “First Class Deck” wot really tipped me off.'

‘And that means it is reserved for first class passengers,' the steward said stonily.

‘Well, that's all right, darlin', 'cos that's what I am,' Ellie replied.

‘You! A first class passenger?' the steward repeated, disbelievingly.

‘Me! A first class passenger,' Ellie confirmed.

‘And
I'm
one of the first class stewards,' the man said. ‘So why is this the first time I've seen you on the entire voyage?'

‘Ah, well, that's easily explained,' Ellie replied. ‘See, I've been spendin' a lot of me time in steerage.'

It was no mean feat to produce an expression which conveyed both a contempt for steerage and a look of arrogant self-congratulation at having his suspicions confirmed, but the steward managed it.

‘In steerage!' he repeated.

‘That's right. See, there's bin a bit of a stomach bug goin' round, an' since the ship's official doctor has bin spendin' most of 'is time wiv the first class passengers – it bein' a well-known fact that the rich suffer much more from their illnesses than the poor do – I fort I might as well 'elp out wiv some of the patients in cattle class.'

The steward sneered. ‘So you're a doctor, now, are you?'

‘As a matter of fact, I am,' the woman said. ‘The name's Dr Ellie Carr.'

There had been a Dr E. Carr on the passenger manifest, the steward remembered, but he had automatically assumed – who wouldn't? – that the ‘E' stood for something like Edward or Eustace.

There
were
women doctors, of course – the steward was not so far behind the times as not to know that – but he was still far from convinced that this woman was one of them.

‘So why are you travelling to New York,
Doctor
?' he asked, cunningly. ‘I'd have thought that there were probably more than enough physicians already in the new world.'

‘There probably are, in general terms,' Ellie agreed. ‘But the very fact that I'm making this journey would suggest there's a distinct lack of forensic pathologists, don't you think?'

‘For . . . forensic pathologists?' the steward said, struggling with the words. ‘I'm not sure I know exactly what that means.'

‘And I'm sure you have absolutely
no idea
what it means,' Ellie countered, ‘but the City Hospital and the New York Police Department obviously do, or they'd never have clubbed together to buy me my ticket, now would they?'

Her accent, which had started out as broad cockney, was growing more refined by the minute, the steward thought. And there was a real authority in her voice now – the sort of authority which he would expect in someone who actually was what she claimed. So maybe – and as incredible as it might seem – she really
was
the genuine article.

In which case, he thought, he was in big trouble, and his mind was filled with the nightmare image of him being pulled up in front of the captain for treating an eminent physician as if she were no more than a common washerwoman.

He cleared his throat. ‘Well, since we're almost in New York, there's not much more I can do for you on this trip, ma'am,' he said.

‘Not much more?' Ellie repeated quizzically. ‘Have you done
anything at all
for me?'

‘Well, no, ma'am,' the steward admitted. ‘What with you attending to the sick and all, I haven't really had the opportunity. But if there's anything I
can
do before we land . . .'

‘As a matter of the fact, there is,' Ellie interrupted. ‘This lady next to me is Mrs Gruber. Would you like to say “hello” to her?'

The steward looked down at the woman. Her face was weather-beaten, and as he leaned closer to her his nostrils filled with the smell of boiled cabbage.

‘Hello, Mrs Gruber,' he said, forcing himself to smile.

‘Hello,' the woman replied, in a thick foreign accent.

‘Mrs Gruber's been rather under the weather,' Ellie Carr said, ‘which is why I've brought her up here from steerage for a breath of fresh air.'

‘I see,' the steward said.

‘The fing is,' Ellie continued, lapsing mockingly back into cockney, ‘it's a bit of a strain for a bag o' bones like me to keep 'olding her up, so I was wonderin' if you wouldn't mind walkin' 'er around for a bit yerself.'

The steward swallowed. ‘I'd be delighted to,' he said.

Ellie smiled. ‘Do you know,' she replied, ‘I was almost certain you'd say that.'

With a poor attempt at graciousness, the steward offered the peasant woman his arm, and the two of them began to walk away along the deck.

Left alone, Ellie turned her gaze towards the skyscrapers, which were becoming commonplace in New York, but were still strangers to the London landscape.

‘Well, 'ooever would have thought it, Mum?' she said softly to the woman who had been dead for ever ten years. ‘'Ooever would 'ave imagined that your little Ellie would end up travellin' first class to America?'

She needed no ghost to respond, because she already knew the answer.

Nobody
would have thought it.
Nobody
would ever have imagined that a snotty-nosed kid from the slums would end up not only being a doctor, but a doctor who the Yanks were eager to consult.

It was largely a matter of luck, she told herself. She was lucky she had been born with a good brain. She had been lucky that her own interest in forensic pathology had developed just before the science really started to get off the ground, and thus made her a pioneer almost by default.

‘But you're right, Mum,' she said into the wind. ‘It wasn't
just
luck – I've worked damned hard for it as well.'

And paid the price, she thought – in all sorts of ways.

She was flattered the Americans had invited her to visit them. She was as excited as only a true evangelist – eager to impart her knowledge to the world – can be.

But she was nervous, too.

Not about defending her views and discoveries – she was on solid ground there.

Not about meeting new people and finding herself in new situations – you didn't claw your way out of the East End unless you had the ability to take that kind of thing in your stride.

She was nervous because she knew that in New York was a man who she was desperate to see, and yet both afraid and embarrassed to meet; a man who sometimes seemed like
the
man her destiny had always intended for her, and at others seemed more like the instrument that fate had specifically designed to destroy the life she had worked so hard to build up.