The Falcon's Malteser

IN THE BATH

Snape and Boyle drove me back to the apartment. I was cold. I was wet. And I was fed up. My pants, sneakers, and socks were ruined and my legs weren’t feeling much better. My throat was sore and my nose was blocked. They’d gotten my feet out of the cement, but I could still feel the cement in my blood and there was nothing they could do about that. And I’d lost the Maltesers. It had been a bad day. I was glad it was over. If I’d known it was going to be a day like that, I’d have stayed in bed.

They came in with me and I made them some coffee. While the kettle was boiling I tried to call Lauren. I thought she might be worried about me. But there was no answer. I flicked on the hot-water tank for a bath and went back downstairs. Snape and Boyle had made themselves comfortable in the office. I fixed us three cups of coffee and took them in. I didn’t like them and they didn’t like me. But like it or not, they’d saved my life. The least I could do was give them a cup of coffee.

“All right,” I said. “How did you find me?”

“We were watching the flat,” Snape told me. “We saw you go in and we saw you taken out. Lucky for you. We followed you to the Thames. When we saw what was going on, Boyle here called for backup on the radio.”

“Why were you watching the flat?” I asked.

Snape let out a sniff of laughter. “Why do you think? In the last few days we’ve been receiving some of the craziest reports I’ve heard in thirty years. A young boy blows up a hotel in the Portobello Road. A young boy pushes a grand piano out of a fifth-floor window. A young boy goes berserk in Selfridges and leaves forty hysterical children and a dead Santa Claus behind him. You’d think London was crawling with lethal young boys. Except they all fit the same description. Yours.”

“I can explain,” I said.

“I’m delighted to hear it. You’ve been making life very difficult for me. You’ve upset Boyle—”

“I’m upset,” Boyle agreed.

“—and you’ve done more damage than the Germans managed in two world wars. And I thought your brother was a menace!”

“Where is Herbert?” I asked.

Snape’s eyes narrowed at that. “We released him at lunchtime. We couldn’t hold him. To be honest, we didn’t want to.”

“Well, I haven’t seen him.”

I wasn’t particularly bothered just then. It was strange that Herbert should have just disappeared, but I could understand it. He’d probably gone to Auntie Maureen in Slough. He’d hide out there until the heat was off. I shivered. Herbert hadn’t paid the gas bill for the flat. The heat had been off for two weeks.

“Did he tell you everything?” I asked.

“Well, let’s just say that Herbert and canaries have a lot in common.”

Snape held out a hand. “I want the Maltesers,” he said.

“I don’t have them,” I said. “The Fat Man took them.” Snape’s eyes narrowed a little more. “If you don’t believe me, you can search my bag.”

“I already have,” Boyle muttered.

“The Fat Man took them,” I repeated. “When you arrest him you can get them from him.”

“Arrest him?” Snape twisted his neck until the bone clicked. “That may not be so easy.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a question of evidence, lad. We haven’t got anything on him. Nothing concrete—”

“What about the stuff he was burying me in?”

“You don’t understand!” Snape was distressed. “He’ll deny he was ever there. He’ll say it was a case of mistaken identity . . . in the fog. He’ll have an alibi.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “So that’s it, then,” I said. “If the Fat Man goes free, he’ll find the diamonds and that’ll be the end of it.”

“You should have given us the Maltesers in the first place,” Boyle said.

“Sure.” I nodded. “And if the Fat Man had come strolling in and claimed them as lost property, I suppose you’d have handed them over.”

That made Boyle scowl again. But Snape stood up. “You’ve got a lot of questions to answer,” he said.

“Are you arresting me?”

“No. You’ve had enough for one day. We’ll talk to you next week. Like you say, the Fat Man has the Maltesers and that’s the end of it. We’ll be in touch.”

I showed them to the door. Snape stopped in the doorway and turned around. “Merry Christmas,” he said.

I’d forgotten until then. It was Christmas Eve. “Yeah . . . Merry Christmas, Chief Inspector,” I said. “And to you, Boyle.”

Boyle grunted. He probably didn’t even know what Christmas was.

An hour later I was lying in hot water with soap bubbles up to my neck and Herbert’s plastic duck floating around my feet. My body wasn’t a pretty sight just then. What with the ropes, the cement, and the general manhandling, I had more bruises than I cared to count. But it felt good in the bath. I needed to relax. It was time for some serious thinking.

What did the Maltesers unlock?

I knew the answer. I knew I knew the answer.

It had to be something near Herbert’s apartment. Johnny Naples had left Notting Hill Gate with the Maltesers and a pair of scissors. By then he’d found the answer. He knew where he was going and he went to Fulham. But he’d been followed—and rather than lead anyone to his destination, he’d come to us. So it had to be something near. But what was there near the apartment connected with the Falcon?

Four days later we’d found Naples dying. He’d managed to say two things: “The Falcon” and “the sun.” I assumed it was sun—with a u. Henry von Falkenberg didn’t have a son . . . at least, not one that we’d heard about. But what did the sun have to do with the Falcon? Nothing . . . unless he’d been talking about another falcon. Maybe not a man. A bird. Or a statue of a bird.

And then I thought about the Maltesers themselves and about a phrase that Clifford Taylor had used. The journalist had described the laser as “the shining light.” The sun was a shining light, too. But the phrase bothered me. I’d seen those words somewhere before. The Maltesers.

When the Fat Man had taken them, he’d looked on the bottom. I’d already tricked the Professor once. He’d told the Fat Man to find something, to check that they were the real ones. Henry von Falkenberg would have had to mark them in some way. And there was an easy way.

You’ll see that there’s a number with thirteen digits underneath.

That was what the journalist had said. And I knew that number. I’d read it so many times that I’d learned it by heart: 3521 201 000000. That number was the final clue.

I pulled the bath plug out with my toes and wrapped a towel around my body. Then, still dripping water, I went downstairs. It took me an hour before I found what I was looking for, but there it was—a piece of paper with another number on it. I’d written that number myself on the day of the Falcon’s funeral.

There were thirteen digits on the Maltesers box—but the last six of them were all zeroes. Cross those out and you’d be left with seven digits.

A telephone number. And I knew which telephone it rang.

That was when our own telephone rang. The noise of the bell was so sudden, so loud, that I almost dropped the towel. I went into the office and picked it up.

“Nick Diamond?”

The voice was ugly with hatred. I didn’t believe a voice could hate that much.

“Gott,” I said.

“We have your brother.”

That took me by surprise. Herbert? But that was the way Gott worked. He’d snatched Lauren, then me. Why shouldn’t he add Herbert to his list?

“If you don’t give us what we want,” Gott snarled, “he dies.”

I didn’t have what they wanted, but I wasn’t going to say that. Because suddenly I knew everything. It all made sense. I should have seen it a long, long time before.

“Come to the cemetery,” I said. I was talking even before I knew what I was saying. “I’ll meet you at the Falcon’s grave. Tomorrow at twelve o’clock.” I hung up.

I didn’t want to get into any arguments.

Then I opened the drawer of Herbert’s desk. On the day we had first met the Fat Man, he had given us a card with his telephone number. I called it now, hoping there would be someone in.

“Yes?” It was a flat, neutral voice.

“I want to talk to the Fat Man,” I said.

“He’s not here.”

“It’s important I get a message to him.”

“Who is this?”

“Nick Diamond.”

There was a pause. Then the voice said, “What is the message?”

“I know what the key opens,” I said. “And I’m willing to do a deal. Tell the Fat Man to be at Brompton Cemetery tomorrow. At the Falcon’s grave at five to twelve exactly. Alone. Have you got that?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” I hung up on him, too.

After that I made one last call. That was the hardest to make. It cost me five million dollars. But the way I looked at it was like this. The Fat Man had the Maltesers. Gott (and maybe Himmell) had Herbert. And I had the answer. If I’d planned things right, it would all sort itself out the next day at noon.

If I didn’t . . . well, we were meeting in a cemetery. At least they wouldn’t have to carry me far.

I just hoped it would be a sunny day.