The Sugared Game - K.J. Charles Page 0,64
sentence,” Kim said enragingly. “But it’s hushed. Believe me, it’s hushed. The body’s gone, the club is closed, and Mrs. Skyrme took the boat from Dover with a bagful of chocolates and hasn’t been seen since.”
“She’s gone? Why didn’t you have the ports watched?”
“Because I made a deal. She opened the safe for me, and I let her clear off with the loot. Admittedly she left before we’d entirely finished our conversation, but she did her part. Not one of the true-believer idiots, Mrs. Skyrme, she got when the going was good. When the getting was good? When the going had got good, by God.”
“You’re drunk,” Will said, noticing.
“I’m not fucking drunk. I’m drinking. So would you be.”
There was an empty bottle by the chair which had been half full of cheap Scotch this morning. If Kim had put that away voluntarily, they were probably in big trouble.
“Why did you let her go?” Will demanded. “What was the deal?”
Kim shrugged. “Didn’t want her. I wanted Capricorn. A big pile of lovely incriminating undeniable evidence all about Capricorn. That’s what I asked for.”
“And did you get it?”
“I got lots of stuff. Lots and lots. Codenames, references. Financial johnny piecing it together as we speak, page after page. Sodding marvellous.”
“You never gave a damn for Skyrme,” Will said. “You never meant to arrest her for what she did. You meant to get at Capricorn all along, and you leant on Mrs. Appleby so you could lean on Skyrme.” He looked at Kim’s face, the empty bottle. “And you haven’t got him. Have you?”
Kim met his eyes, murder in his dark gaze. They stared at each other for a couple of seconds that made Will’s knife hand itch, and then Kim looked away. “He isn’t in the stuff from the High-Low. She told me he wouldn’t be. ‘You won’t find him here,’ she said, and we haven’t and won’t. And she’s fucked off and Fuller’s dead, and there’s still no bloody evidence, which means I still can’t pass the cup and say, This is Capricorn. Deal with him, so it’s still down to me. I don’t know why I ever thought it wouldn’t be.”
It took a second for Will to grasp the implication. He stared at Kim, the words slotting into place. “You know. You do, don’t you? Jesus Christ. You know who Capricorn is!”
“Of course I do,” Kim said. “If I’m honest, I’ve known for a while. ‘If I’m honest’.” He gave a little giggle. “That’s rich.”
Will had so many things to say to that, he could barely speak. He went for the least of them. “Then why don’t you bloody arrest him?”
“On what grounds? I’ve got a lot of nothing. Straws in the wind, and fears, and the words of the dead. The case needs to be iron-clad, and mine is wet tissue paper. I need objective proof. Not objective. What does Othello say? Ocular proof. Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore, be sure of it. Give me the ocular proof.”
“Steady on.”
“Othello’s wrong anyway. Lear would be better.”
“I’m sure.” There was no point venting his feelings with Kim in this state—Will wanted him to remember what he said—and he might even be drunk enough to tell the truth, if pumped. That was doubtless a shabby, deceitful way to go on, but Will had learned from a master. “If you know who he is, we can get him. Tell me about it. We’ll make a plan.”
“If I could get him, I’d have sodding got him.” Kim’s control of his speech was slipping now, the words slurring. Will wondered just how fast he’d put away the Scotch. “You think I’ve been sitting around doing nothing?”
“Of course not.”
“You should. I might as well have been. This is a fucking nightmare and it doesn’t stop. It’s never going to stop. I thought I knew best in 1914 and I’m going to pay for it the rest of my life. And I wouldn’t mind that, not really, it’s only fair. This isn’t fair.”
“What isn’t?”
“Any of it. Shit. I’m drunk.”
“I know.”
“You should throw me out.”
“I don’t need telling. How much have you had?”
“About...I don’t know. I finished the brandy. That’s a civilised drink, not like this muck.” He picked up the bottle on the second try and contemplated it as if wondering where the whisky had gone.
“Sorry my booze isn’t up to your standards.” Will wondered if it would help to march him downstairs and find a water-butt to stick his head in. It