Twigs glanced enquiringly at the others.
Lockston chewed imperturbably on his cigar. Asagawa surveyed the sick man with a satisfied air. Only the vice-consul was clearly ill at ease.
‘Never mind,’ said the sergeant. ‘You’ll get out in week or so, you can stick yourself then.’
The prince howled and doubled over.
‘This is torture,’ Fandorin said in a low voice. ‘Say what you will, gentlemen, but I do not wish to obtain information by such methods.’
The inspector shrugged.
‘How are we torturing him? He is torturing himself. I don’t know how things are in your countries, but in Japanese jails we don’t give prisoners narcotics. Perhaps the municipal police have different rules? Do you keep morphine to ease the suffering of morphine addicts?’
‘Like hell we do,’ said Lockston, shaking his head in admiration. ‘Well, Go, you old son of a gun. I could learn a thing or two from you.’
On this occasion Goemon Asagawa did not protest about the American’s familiarity, he just smiled at the flattery.
‘This is a genuine discovery!’ the sergeant continued, waxing more and more enthusiastic. ‘Think of the prospects this opens up for police work! What do you do if a criminal clams up and refuses to inform on his accomplices? They used to stretch him on the rack, burn him with red-hot tongs and all the rest of it. But, firstly, that’s uncivilised. And secondly, there are some tough nuts you can’t crack with any torture. But with this – away you go. All very cultured and scientific! Get a stubborn character like that hooked on morphine and then – bang – stop giving him any. He’ll be only too delighted to tell you everything. Listen, Go, I’ll write an article about this for the Police Gazette. Of course, I’ll mention your name. Only the idea is mine, after all. You came across it by chance, but I invented the method. You wouldn’t dispute that, would you, my friend?’ Lockston asked anxiously.
‘I wouldn’t, Walter, I wouldn’t. You don’t even need to mention me at all.’ The inspector walked over to the bars and looked at the sobbing prince. ‘Tell me, Doctor, could you find an ampoule of morphine and a syringe in that bag of yours?’
‘Of course.’
Onokoji straightened up, gazing at Asagawi imploringly.
‘Well, Your Excellency, shall we have a talk?’ the inspector asked him cordially.
The prisoner nodded, licking his purple lips.
Erast Petrovich frowned, but said nothing – the Japanese inspector was in charge now.
‘Thank you, Doctor,’ said Asagawi. ‘Fill the syringe and leave it with me. You can go home to bed.’
Twigs clearly did not wish to leave. He ran a curious eye over the bound man and rummaged slowly in his bag, opened the ampoule without hurrying and took a long time to examine the syringe.
No one was intending to initiate the doctor into their secret game of backstage politics, but it simply happened anyway.
‘Come on, quickly, quickly!’ the prince shouted. ‘For God’s sake! Why are you dawdling like that? One little injection, and I’ll tell you all I know about Suga!’
Twigs pricked up his ears at that.
‘About whom? Suga? The intendant of police? What has he done?’
There was nothing for it – they had to explain. And so the group that had investigated the case of Captain Blagolepov’s strange death was reconstituted. Only now it had a different status. They were not official investigators but, rather, conspirators.
Almost as soon as the prisoner had been untied and injected, he turned pink, started smiling and became jaunty and talkative. He spoke a lot, but told them very little of real substance.
According to Onokoji, the new intendant of police had taken part in the conspiracy against the great reformer because he was nursing a grudge – he felt offended at having been subordinated to a worthless little aristocrat with connections in high places. Being a man of intelligence and cunning, Suga had planned the plot in such a way as to achieve two goals at once: take revenge on the minister, who had failed to appreciate his true worth, and land the responsibility on his immediate superior, in order to take his place. Suga had succeeded wonderfully well. The public, of course, might repeat all sorts of rumours, but once a lion is dead, he ceases to be the king of beasts and becomes plain ordinary carrion, and no one was interested in the late Okubo any more. There were new winds blowing at the highest levels; the dead minister’s favourites were making way for appointees from the opposite party.
‘Is Suga’s involvement in the conspiracy just rumour or authenticated f-fact?’ asked Fandorin, disappointed by this frivolous tittle-tattle.
The prince shrugged.
‘Naturally, there is no proof, but my information is usually reliable. Otherwise I would have starved to death a long time ago. That skinflint Tsurumaki, who owes everything to our family, pays me such a pitiful allowance that it’s barely enough for decent shirts.’
Five thousand yen a month, Fandorin recalled. Twenty vice-consular salaries.
‘And who led the c-conspiracy? From whom did Suga receive the estate of Tarazaka as his reward?’
‘The samurai of Satsuma set up an entire organisation, and all the members swore to kill the traitor Okubo. Those people prepared for a long hunt, they collected a lot of money. It would have been enough for a dozen estates.’
Further questioning produced nothing. Onokoji repeated the same things over and over again, occasionally veering into high-society gossip, and finally wore his interrogators down.
Eventually, having realised that they wouldn’t discover anything else useful, they moved away and tried to work out a plan of further action.
‘Apart from the certainty that Suga is guilty and a few other details unconfirmed by any proof, we have nothing,’ Erast Petrovich said acidly, no longer doubting that it had been a waste of time to stir up this whole mess. The cunning and morally dubious operation had produced very little.
Asagawa was gloomy too, but he remained determined.
‘But even so, we cannot pull back now. Suga must pay for his villainy.’
‘How about this?’ Lockston suggested. ‘The intendant receives an anonymous letter that says: “You think you’re a sly dog and you’ve sold everyone a pup, but you’ve slipped up, hombre. I’ve got something on you. I don’t give a cuss for Okubo, he got what was coming to him, but I’m in desperate need of money. Come to such-and-such a place at such-and-such a time: I’ll give you the evidence, and you give me – let’s say, ten thousand”. And to make it convincing, slip in a few details about his dirty dealings: the stolen reports, the gag and the estate. At the very least Suga will get alarmed, he’ll want to take a look at this blackmailer and see what he’s got. If he doesn’t send a detachment of police to the rendezvous and comes himself, that alone will give him away, hook, line and sinker. How’s that for a plan?’ the sergeant asked, giving his comrades a boastful look. ‘Not bad, eh?’
The titular counsellor disappointed him.
‘Terrible. No good at all. Of course Suga won’t come. He’s no fool.’
Lockston wouldn’t surrender.
‘So he’ll send some police? I don’t think so. He won’t want to take the risk. What if the blackmailer really does have some evidence?’
‘And there won’t be any p-police. More Satsumans will just turn up and slice us to ribbons.’
‘Mm, yes, that is very likely,’ the doctor admitted.
The inspector didn’t say anything, merely frowned even more darkly.
The disputants fell silent.
‘Hey! What are you whispering about over there?’ Onokoji shouted, walking up to the bars. ‘If you don’t know how to get Suga’s back to the wall, I’ll tell you! And in exchange you’ll let me out of here. All right?’
The four of them all turned towards the prisoner together and spontaneously moved towards the cell.