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“I haven’t laid out all the pieces.” Daniel gave a wry, tight smile. “The Thorwoods have come to England to settle Miss Trelawny’s will and lay claim to the house. Someone has been trying very hard to buy it…Oh, you didn’t know that?”
Armitage shifted his position slightly, altering his balance on the balls of his feet.
“Yes,” Daniel went on quietly. “I went to the island over the weekend. Just got back yesterday evening. Brought Dr. Mullane with me. Excellent man. Very fond of Miss Trelawny. It was he who told me about her murder. Very dreadful. Very violent. It happened when you were over here from Washington. Not here in London, perhaps elsewhere in Britain. Like the Channel Islands, for example.”
Armitage stood rigid now.
“Never mind if you’ve forgotten,” Daniel continued. “I can ask Dr. Mullane. He is already present and has a very good memory. As has the postmistress in St. Anne. That is on Alderney, but of course you know that…” He glanced at Sidney, who was now sitting bolt upright in his seat at the dock, his face filled with anger. He seemed taller than before, bigger altogether.
“I remember what it is that I know!” Sidney said loudly.
“Mr. Pitt, control your client or I will have him taken outside,” the judge warned.
“I think we should put him in the witness stand, Your Honor,” Daniel replied as politely as he could. He was directing the judge, but he did not wish to sound like it. He could not afford an enemy on the bench now.
“First we will let Mr. Hillyer question Sir John, if you are finished,” the judge answered grimly. “And you make a claim that Dr. Mullane can identify Sir John. Do you wish to call him to that effect?”
Daniel looked at Armitage, then at the jurors. “Thank you, Your Honor, but I think that may prove unnecessary. But if not, then yes, certainly I will.”
Hillyer shook his head. “Thank you, Your Honor, but I would prefer to question Mr. Sidney on what it is that he suddenly claims to recall at this late and desperate hour.”
The judge excused Armitage, and he stepped down from the witness stand.
“I saw him in Washington,” Sidney said quite clearly from the dock. “I went to take a message to him, and I knocked on the door. I thought I heard permission to go in. But I must have mistaken it, because he was furious. He was speaking to a cultural attaché from the German Embassy, and they had a map of the English Channel out on the table. Alderney was marked, and a lot of sea lanes. I ignored it at the time, then forgot about it, because I was more amazed to see a scarf of Mrs. Thorwood’s, or one exactly like one she has, on the back of one of the chairs. I remember it, because I was with Rebecca when she chose it for her mother’s birthday. It was very expensive, and Rebecca told me she had it made especially for her mother, so it couldn’t have belonged to anyone else. But I know now that it was the map that mattered.”
Armitage was walking toward Bernadette Thorwood. Next to Jemima, Patrick stood up.
The judge’s face was pink. “Order!” he said sharply. “I will have order in court. Sir John! You have not been given permission to leave!”
At that moment, Armitage was galvanized into action. He whipped his hand out of his pocket holding what looked like an open penknife, small-bladed but very sharp. He grasped Bernadette by one arm and held her immediately in front of him. “Come after me and I’ll cut her throat!” he said quite clearly.
Everyone stopped motionless.
Sidney jerked his hands as if to follow, but he was manacled to the chair and could not take even a step.
Armitage dragged Bernadette out of the room, the doors opened for them by a white-faced usher. Patrick was the first to charge after them, leaving Tobias Thorwood holding a frantic Rebecca.
Daniel left his table and dashed through the door and past the still-paralyzed usher. He could see Armitage, still dragging Bernadette with him into the street. Patrick was only yards behind them.
Daniel reached the top of the steps in time to see Patrick sprinting along the pavement. Ahead of him Armitage stopped dragging Bernadette. It was bound to happen. He could not run holding her.
Then the impossible happened. Armitage took Bernadette by the han
d and she ran with him, as fast as he did. Suddenly a whole lot of pictures in the kaleidoscope shifted and made a totally different pattern, one that explained many small details: how Armitage knew so much about May Trelawny and the deep-water cove, why Bernadette had lied about recognizing Sidney in the bedroom corridor, why Armitage had suggested so quickly that Sidney claim diplomatic immunity and flee, leaving himself without a defense.
Patrick was racing along the pavement, gaining on them. Armitage came to an open-topped car parked by the curb. He swung the door open and leaped in, Bernadette immediately behind him. He started the engine just as Patrick came level with him. He threw himself at Armitage, who came back at him hard, sending Patrick reeling backward and to the ground, blood streaming from a knife slash on his face. The knife clattered to the road and Patrick grabbed it, lashing out. It was a moment before he struggled to his feet.
Daniel skidded to a stop, ignoring the car as it jerked forward and sped away. “Are you all right?” he asked. “Here!” He held out a clean handkerchief. The blood was oozing through Patrick’s fingers and running over his hand.
“Get them!” Patrick said urgently. “They won’t get far…I put a gash in his tire! That’ll slow him up. We’ll catch them, if you get on with it.” He sounded urgent, desperate, but he was ashen pale.
“We’ve got to get you to a doctor…” Daniel began.
Patrick held the folded handkerchief hard against his face. “Go after them.”
The car disappeared round a bend in the road, and a second later there was a tremendous explosion, and plumes of dark gray smoke rose in a huge billow, followed immediately by a gout of scarlet flame.
“God! I hope they didn’t hit anybody else!” Patrick gasped. “I thought it would just go flat!”
