‘Wait here for now,’ he told her. ‘I’ll be back in a moment.’
He walked across the yard with a brisk, businesslike stride, but he squinted sideways at Doronin’s window anyway. He saw Vsevolod Vitalievich turn away with a certain deliberate emphasis. What could that mean?
Clearly he must already know about Suga, and he realised that Fandorin had been involved in some way; waiting at the window was a way of reminding the vice-consul about himself and showing how impatient he was to hear a few explanations; his demonstrative indifference made it clear that he did not intend to demand these explanations – the titular counsellor would decide when the time was right.
Very subtle, very noble and most apposite.
Masa was standing outside the cupboard, as motionless as a Chinese stone idol.
‘Well, what has he been like?’ Erast Petrovich asked, gesturing to clarify the meaning of the gesture.
His servant reported with the help of mime and gesture: first he cried, then he sang, then he fell asleep, he had to be given the chamber pot once.
‘Well done,’ the vice-consul said approvingly. ‘Kansisuru. Itte kuru.’
That meant: ‘Guard. I go away.’
He looked into his room for a second and went back quickly to the carriage. He opened the door slightly.
‘You are not dressed and have no shoes,’ he said to the charming passenger, setting down a sack of Mexican silver on the seat beside her. ‘Buy yourself some clothes. And, in general, everything that you think you need. And these are my cards with the address. If you need to have something taken in or whatever, I don’t know, leave one with the shop assistant, they’ll deliver it. When you get back, you can settle in. You are the mistress of the house.’
O-Yumi touched the jingling sack with a smile, but without any great interest, thrust out a little bare foot and stroked Erast Petrovich on the chest with it.
‘Ah, what a dunce I am!’ he exclaimed. ‘You can’t even go into a shop in that state!’
He glanced furtively over his shoulder at the consulate and squeezed her slim ankle.
‘Why would I go inside?’ O-Yumi laughed. ‘They’ll bring everything I need to the carriage.’
The anti-Bullcox coalition, assembled at full strength, held its meeting in the office of the head of the municipal police. Somehow it turned out that the role of chairman had passed to Asagawa, although he had not been appointed by anyone. The Russian vice-consul, previously acknowledged by all as the leader, ceded his primacy quite willingly. First, having abandoned his brothers-in-arms for the sake of a private matter, Erast Petrovich had, as it were, forfeited his moral right to lead them. And secondly, he knew that his mind and heart were preoccupied with a quite different matter just at the moment. And that matter happened to be a most serious one, which could not be dealt with half-heartedly.
In any case, Asagawa conducted the analytical work surpassingly well without any help from Fandorin.
‘So, gentlemen, we have a witness who is prepared to testify. But he is an unreliable individual of dubious character and what he says is of little value without documentary confirmation. We have the Satsuman warriors’ oath, signed in blood, but this evidence incriminates only the late Intendant Suga. We also have the police reports confiscated by Suga, but again, they cannot be used against Bullcox. The only unquestionable piece of evidence is a coded diagram of the conspiracy in which the central figure is the senior foreign counsellor of the British imperial government. But in order for this diagram to become proof, we must first decipher it completely. We cannot hand the document over to the authorities before that – we might be making a fatal mistake for, after all, we do not know which other officials are involved in the conspiracy. Since the intendant of police himself was one…’
‘That’s right,’ said Lockston, who was puffing on his cigar on the windowsill, beside the open window – in order to spare Dr Twigs’ sensitive nose. ‘I basically don’t trust any of the Jappos… Apart from you, of course, my good friend Go. Let the doc try to figure out what the squiggles mean. We’ll identify all the bad guys and then smash them all at once. Right, Rusty?’
Erast Petrovich nodded in reply to the sergeant, but he looked only at the inspector.
‘All this is c-correct, but we don’t have much time. Bullcox is a clever man, and he has powerful allies who will stop at nothing. I have no doubt that Bullcox will pay particular attention to my person [the vice-consul cleared his throat in embarrassment at this point] and to you, since it is known that we were working together on investigating the case of the Satsuma trio.’
At this point Erast Petrovich allowed himself to deviate from the truth somewhat, but only in the details. Even if the Englishman had not had personal reasons to hate him, the members of the conspiracy, frightened by the intendant’s strange death, would certainly have taken an interest in the vice-consul. He and Suga had been actively involved in the investigation of the conspiracy against Okubo – that was one. The blow struck against the intendant was in the interests of the Russian Empire – that was two. And there was also a three: in his recent confrontation with Bullcox, the titular counsellor had been incautious – his actions had intimated his suspicion that the Briton was intending to burn certain compromising documents. In the emotional heat of the moment, the Right Honourable had probably not paid any attention to this, but later, of course, he would call it to mind. And there could certainly be no doubt that at present he was thinking unceasingly of the Russian diplomat, and with quite exceptional intensity.
It was getting stuffy in the office. Asagawa walked over to the window and stood beside the sergeant in order to take a breath of fresh air, but instead he choked on the ferocious tobacco fumes and started coughing. He waved his hand, scattering the cloud of smoke, and turned his back to the window.
‘Perhaps Fandorin-san is right. In any case, extra caution will do no harm. Let’s divide up the evidence, so that it is not all kept in the same place. Twigs-sensei will take the diagram – that is obvious. You are our only hope now, Doctor. For God’s sake, do not leave your house. No visits, no patients. Say that you are unwell.’
Twigs nodded solemnly and stroked his pocket – obviously that was where the crucial clue was.
‘I shall take the police reports, especially since three of them were written by me. That leaves the oaths for you, Sergeant.’
The American took the three sheets of paper covered with brown hieroglyphs and examined them curiously.
‘You can count on me. I’ll keep the papers with me, and I won’t set foot outside the station. I’ll even spend the night here.’
‘Excellent, that’s the best thing to do.’
‘And what will I get?’ asked Erast Petrovich.
‘You have custody of the only witness. That is quite enough.’
That left Fandorin feeling at a loss.
‘Gentlemen… I was about to ask you to take the prince off my hands. My domestic circumstances have changed somewhat, you see. I can’t possibly keep him now… I’ll exchange him for any of the clues. And please, as soon as possible.’
The inspector gave the vice-consul a curious glance, but he didn’t ask any questions.
‘All right, but it can’t be done in daylight – he’ll be seen. I tell you what. I know where we can accommodate the prince, there’s a good place that he won’t escape from. Tonight, just before dawn, bring him to pier number thirty-seven, it’s beside the Fujimi bridge.’
‘Th-thank you. And what if the doctor doesn’t manage to decipher the diagram? What then?’
The Japanese had an answer ready for this eventuality.
‘If the sensei does not decipher the diagram, we shall have to act in an unofficial manner. We shall give everything that we know, together with the material evidence and witnesses’ testimony, to one of the foreign newspapers. Only not a British one, of course. To the editors of L’Echo du Japon, for instance. The French will be absolutely delighted by a sensational story like this. Let Bullcox try to explain everything and demand a retraction. Then all the secrets will come out.’