LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

Trafalgar House was a small hotel with an oenophilic owner and an indifferent cook. Harris contented himself with bread and cheese to accompany his glass of wine, while it took Small the rest of the bottle to wash down his portion of boiled beef.

      “Could anyone else have killed him?” said Harris as soon as they were alone. “Possibly not by accident.”

      “Whoa, what kind of question is that?” Small took a steadying drink.

      “Well—had he received any threats? Did anyone come to the office—I don’t know—brandishing a revolver?”

      “There were times I came close to brandishing one myself,” Small replied. “And he certainly made enemies, but apart from the Orangemen—which is to say, apart from the police, the fire department, the carters, the innkeepers and the politicians—any enemies he made he made into friends again right after. My money stays on the medico. But what’s your interest, Isaac? Why so keen?”

      Harris shrugged stiffly.

      “That’s what I thought,” said Small, wiping his mouth on a corner of his napkin. “Then what’s this about threats against her father?”

      The two seldom spoke of Theresa, whom Small had courted for eight weeks and Harris for considerably longer—so much longer as to not seem a fit subject for raillery.

      After two false starts, Harris explained his belief that Sheridan’s death and Theresa’s disappearance must be linked. He spoke also of his own researches to date and of his unsatisfactory interviews with Crane and Vandervoort.

      Small leaned forward. “You won’t take advice on this subject, I know.”

      “Likely not.” Jasper’s most recent advice—only half facetious—had been that to circulate the blood and reset his compass what Harris needed was to visit a whorehouse, a good one. Jasper knew just the place. On the whole, Harris found he dreaded Small’s advice.

      “Let me just say, Isaac, that involving yourself in the search for Theresa can do you no good.”

      “That’s not the—”

      “No, listen—”

      “She has been missing four days,” Harris in turn broke in. “All I want is to know she’s safe.”

      “We all want that,” said Small with murderous mildness, “and then again, suppose you desert your bank and kill your horse galloping it all over the continent. I won’t speak of the worst outcome—but take the best case. Even if you find her safe and whole, you’ll be bringing her home to Henry. Can you swallow that?”

      “If she wishes it.”

      Small studied his friend’s face. “Given the state of your feelings for her, you can’t be serious.”

      “Yes, certainly, of course—but Crane is not above suspicion in all this. Why isn’t he looking for her himself?”

      “Business preoccupations, I would guess.”

      Harris took this as a further instance of Small’s contempt for sentiment. “You be serious, Jasper. Any normally affectionate husband would leave his immense wealth to look after itself for a week.”

      “Not so immense as all that. Have you not heard?”

      Harris had not. He had got in the habit of paying no more attention to Crane’s activities than he could help. Crane took his business to the Commercial Bank, and their ways seldom crossed. References to Crane in the press were generally laudatory.

      Railways he had built in the southwestern part of the province had, to be sure, suffered mishaps. Bridges had collapsed. Iron rails had split in the severe Canadian winter. Stoves had set fire to passenger coaches with fatal results. Deaths had resulted from the lack of gates at level crossings. By then, however, the customer had always paid and taken delivery of the line. Crane had fulfilled his contract and never seemed to come out the loser, not even in terms of reputation.

      But Small knew more than was in the papers.

      “He has overreached himself,” the lawyer announced authoritatively. “He has committed too much of his personal capital to risky or long-term ventures.”

      The Kingston to Cape Vincent railway car ferry was a case in point, said Small—who had sat at the same piquet table as the treasurer’s daughter. Loading trains on boats was to cost less than bridging the St. Lawrence. Wolfe Island did stand in the path of navigation, but Crane had allegedly taken up shares with both hands on the mistaken assumption that a canal across the obstructing land mass would soon be completed. Such miscues weren’t like him. Nevertheless . . . Untypically, also, he had undertaken railway contracts east of Toronto for shares instead of bonds or cash. That meant higher construction standards and worries about rising costs.

      “His shrewdness has deserted him,” Small declared, “and—whether cause or effect—he’s desperate for funds. There are even rumours that he has touched friends for loans.”

      “Next you’ll be telling me he has lost money at the race track,” said Harris. “How long is he supposed to have been feeling the pinch?”

      “A year,” said Small, “fourteen months. And he never bets on horses—or drinks, or smokes, or swears. So much for the wages of virtue!”

      Harris thought back to Tuesday. The exquisite carriage in which Crane had taken them to the graveside was so new that the ship that had brought it from England might still be in the harbour. A bold purchase. And yet the most distinguished mourners had seemed to avoid Crane as they would not have done if he still smelled of success.

      “Whatever his difficulties,” said Harris, “he should still be more concerned about his wife.”

      Small smiled like a Buddha. Plainly, he thought Harris biased.

      Harris was, of course. “Are they happy together?” he asked.

      “Like any couple. I rarely see them together.”

      “When did you last see Theresa?”

      “Friday at her father’s. She had more or less moved down there from Queen Street East while he was ill. I was sitting in the old boy’s room, waiting for him to wake up from a nap, when she came in and shooed me out. She said I could tell the housekeeper to serve tea to her and myself in the parlour. She let me back upstairs later on, but only on condition I not bother her Papa with business. So the papers never did get signed.”

      “Anything important?” said Harris.

      “Everything I do is important, Isaac. My God, I wish we had time for another bottle of this.”

      Small was mooning over the wine label, ostensibly dreaming of the château where it had been pasted on.

      “A new will perhaps?” said Harris.

      “Nothing I intend to blab about. Not a will, though. His will is no secret. His daughter gets the villa and its contents. Most everything else, no great hoard, goes to charity. Oh, and I inherit his share of the practice, which at present seems a very mixed blessing.”

      “But would the estate be large enough to restore Crane’s fortunes,” asked Harris, “assuming he could get his hands on it?”

      “Not nearly.” Small pushed back his chair, which the innkeeper’s daughter took as a signal to bring the two hats.

      Harris ignored his and remained seated. “How did Theresa seem?”

      “In the sickroom, quite under control. She knew just how far open she wanted the windows and what covers should be on the bed. When her Papa woke up, she took his temperature with a thermometer, which is more than I’ve ever heard of Christopher Hillyard’s doing.”

      “And downstairs at tea?”

      “Agitated,” said Small, evidently choosing a word softer than the one he felt appropriate. “She complained of the stifling

Скачать книгу