The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes and Impossible Mysteries Part 51

Volpe smiled softly.

"In such an investigation as this, Eminence, it is always best to confirm things at first hand. A word here, a gesture there, may tell one far more . . . And, with your permission, I would like to see them alone, in their own quarters."

He questioned the manservant Iain, a lad whose great-grandfather had come from Scotland to serve the House of Stuart, but whose connection with that country was solely his name. He was a young, excitable man with a Roman accent and a fast way of speaking, uttering half a dozen words in one breath, pausing and uttering half a dozen more. To Volpe, he seemed rather naive. At first, Volpe thought he might be somewhat simple but then realized it was due to the youth's unworldly att.i.tude. He confirmed everything that the Cardinal and Glenbuchat had said. During the morning he had not stirred outside the apartments, as his task was to clean and maintain them for the Cardinal's entire household. He was in and out of the main chamber, where the Marquess of Glenbuchat was working on some papers, within sight of the locked bedchamber door, until the return of Cardinal York and Colonel O'Sullivan.

Count Volpe then went to see Colonel O'Sullivan.

O'Sullivan was a tall man with a mane of golden-red hair, flushed fair features and a ready smile. Unlike the others of the Cardinal's household who were descended from exiles, O'Sullivan was an Irishman born but had spent ten years in Dillon's Regiment of the Irish Brigade in French service until the French Revolution had caused the Brigade to be disbanded in 1792. Too many Irish families, in service with the Irish Brigade of France, had risen to be enn.o.bled in the French aristocracy. The new National a.s.sembly of the French Republic did not trust the loyalty of the Irish regiments as many of their commanders had declared themselves as royalists.

Colonel O'Sullivan had made for Rome and offered his service to the Stuart household. He was too bombastic for Volpe's liking. A man quick to temper and equally quick to humour. He was of too ephemeral a nature.

Volpe interviewed him in the colonel's small, rudely furnished bedchamber in which there was room for scarcely anything other than a camp bed, a canvas campaign chair and a travelling chest. Volpe perched himself on the chest and motioned the big man to be seated. O'Sullivan dropped to the bed with a grin.

"Well, it seems as if this is the last throw of the dice for the Stuarts. After this I scarce imagine His so-called Majesty will be able to employ the likes of me."

Volpe's brows drew together. There seemed a certain amount of disrespect in O'Sullivan's tone for one whom, so Volpe presumed, he regarded as his rightful king.

Catching sight of his expression, O'Sullivan slapped his hand on his knee and let out a laugh.

"Lord bless you, but I am a pragmatist. Sure, the Stuarts have provided me with an income after the French disbanded my regiment. But I am not the fool to forget that they never did my poor benighted country any good. Wasn't it the Stuart king who sent the English and Scottish colonists pouring into Ireland and driving the likes of me to their deaths by the thousands? Thousands more of us had to escape to France, Spain or Austria. I serve the money, not the man."

Volpe's eyes widened.

"You are either an honest fellow or a fool," he observed. "You have just provided me with a reason why I should suspect you of this theft."

O'Sullivan grinned.

"You are at liberty to search my room. What you see is all I have. But as for stealing these jewels . . . why, I might have done had I known of their whereabouts. I didn't know until this morning of the cunning hiding hole in the wall. Then that plumped-up jackanapes, Glenbuchat, started his ranting and raving. The old man was a closed mouth. As for Iain, G.o.d help him, he knows his station and will not depart from it. If he had found the Crown Jewels in a dark alley he would have come obediently to his master and handed them over without thought of recompense."

"Are you saying that you did not know of their existence?"

"Sure, my Italian is not fluent but I think I made myself clear," chided the other. "I knew of their existence. I knew the Cardinal had them but I did not know where he had hid them until this morning when I was told they had gone."

"So you were told after you returned with His . . . His Eminence from ma.s.s this morning?"

"Lord, but you are a sharp one," chuckled the big man.

"And during the preceding night you and Iain, the servant, took turns to stay outside the door of the Cardinal's bedchamber."

"That we did. The Cardinal returned to bed early, so Iain took the early part of the evening. I took my turn on watch when it lacked an hour until midnight. I did a four hour watch and then Iain relieved me and, of course, his watch was relatively short being but two hours before he had to rouse the old . . . the Cardinal to get him up for the Angelus and Ma.s.s."

"And you were not disturbed during this time?"

"Not I. No, I had a candle and good reading to occupy me. A countryman had sent me Mister Tone's Argument on Behalf of the Catholics of Ireland . . . a fascinating little book the like of which I wish I had come across sooner. It put me in mind of returning home and offering my sword arm to these United Irishmen to strike for the liberty of my own country. I'd be better occupied than with a lost cause like . . ."

He nodded towards the door.

"Nevertheless, you are paid to be a bodyguard to His Eminence," pointed out Volpe.

"And, by the saints, I earn my pay," replied O'Sullivan quickly. "I guard the old man and no one can claim that I have allowed a single a.s.sa.s.sin to get near him."

"You believe there are such a.s.sa.s.sins abroad?"

Again, O'Sullivan laughed sharply.

"The enemies that the Stuarts have in London are not beyond paying a fellow a few golden sovereigns to rid them of an irritant if they cannot buy them off. The old man has been growing fearful in recent years. It is not to be wondered at. Why, I'll tell you an irony, an English agent in Madrid in Spain a.s.sa.s.sinated my own kinsman, The O'Sullivan, chieftain of Beare. The irony being that a.s.sa.s.sin was sent by a Stuart king who feared poor wee Felim O'Sullivan. The current King of England, Farmer George as he is called, has more to fear from the last of the Stuarts than ever the Stuarts had to fear from my forebear."

Volpe frowned, not really understanding.

"So," he said, trying to make sense of things, "you believe there is justification to fear a.s.sa.s.sination?"

O'Sullivan leaned forward with a wink and tapped Volpe's arm in a conspiratorial manner.

"Justification, indeed. Didn't I see that wee man, Father Vane, sneaking near these chambers these last two days?"

"Father Vane?" Volpe mentally tried to remember the delegates and their attendants.

"Aye, a weasel of a man. One of the delegates from England. A Catholic? What Englishman is truly a Catholic these days? I'd sooner believe that he has an a.s.sa.s.sin's dagger in his ca.s.sock than a rosary."

Volpe smiled thinly.

"You are prejudiced, my friend."

"If an Irishman can't be prejudiced about the English, then I have no understanding of this world."

"Are you saying that this Father Kane has been seen lurking near these apartments?"

O'Sullivan didn't understand the word nascondersi and Volpe had to use a simile to express the action of someone hiding themselves near the apartments.

"Not exactly hiding themselves," confirmed O'Sullivan, "but keeping to the shadows. In fact, before I took over my watch from Iain last night I was sure I saw the little ferret below in the courtyard."

Now it was Volpe's turn to be lost.

"You saw a furetto in the courtyard?" he exclaimed.

"Vane, the wee fella," explained the Irishman.

"Ah. How did you observe him?"

O'Sullivan rose and went to the tall windows, the porta-finestra, in his room and opened one of them. Outside was a small balcony. O'Sullivan beckoned Volpe to join him.

"Was I not having me a pipe out here when I saw him. The old man does not like the smell of tobacco and, seeing that tobacco is one of the few pleasures I can indulge in, I have my smoke outside."

Volpe saw that the balcony overlooked the courtyard below.

"It must have been dark at the time," he said. "How could you recognize anyone down there as Father Vane?"

"Bless ye, and ye are no fool," chuckled O'Sullivan. "However, at dusk along comes one of your own men and helpfully lights those torches you see on the walls there."

"And you can swear that you saw this Father Vane standing down there . . . show me exactly where."

O'Sullivan pointed to an area further along. It was a spot immediately below the small window of Cardinal York's bedchamber some ten metres above.

"You say that you suspect Father Vane of evil intentions towards His Eminence and yet you had no fear when you saw him there? You raised no alarm?"

"Love you for a cautious man, but what harm? Have you seen the piddling little window in the old man's bedroom? Even had he been able to climb the wall, he wouldn't have gained entrance by that means. No, if Vane is your thief, he came in through the door. If he came in through the door, he must have had a key. If he had a key, then he must have taken it from somewhere. If not from the hand of the old man, then there must be two keys. And even if there was another key, he must have had the other key to the safe and knew of the secret panel. And if he had all that, then he also had the miraculous ability to have made himself invisible to pa.s.s either Iain or myself last night."

"Then there are two possibilities," observed Volpe in a dry tone.

The big Irishman stared at him for a moment.

"Which are?"

"Either Iain or yourself allowed the thief to enter or one or other of you are the thief."

There was a silence. Then O'Sullivan roared with laughter.

"There is no denying that you are a sharp one, Count Volpe. There's yet another explanation. If the jewels were not removed through the door then the only possible method was through the small window, and who can get through it but the wee fairy folk. Have you thought that the sidhe might be at work here . . . the wee folk of the hills?"

Volpe left O'Sullivan enjoying his obscure joke and returned to the main chamber.

Cardinal York had retired to his bedchamber for his private devotionals and the Marchese Glenbuchat was pacing the room in front of the fireplace.

"Well?" he demanded roughly, when Volpe re-entered. "Have you come upon a solution?"

Volpe smiled thinly.

"Let us say that I have a few lines of inquiry that need to be pursued. If I may suggest, Marchese, let us be seated for a moment."

Reluctantly, Glenbuchat sat down and Volpe took a chair and pulled it opposite him.

"As I understand it, you are more concerned with His Eminence's political position rather than his ecclesiastical one? You serve him as rightful claimant to the English throne than as Bishop of Frascati, am I correct?"

Glenbuchat frowned.

"As rightful King of England and Scotland," he corrected. "I am a faithful subject and servant of His Majesty, Henry Ninth, by divine right . . ."

"Just so," intervened Volpe. "How long have you served the Stuart Household?"

"All my life. My grandfather was a young man on the staff of His Grace, the Duke of Berwick. He served both His Majesty James the Second and James the Third while they were in exile at St Germain-en-Laye. He went back to Scotland and fought at Glenshiels in Seventeen-Nineteen. My father was born in St Germain-en-Laye and continued that service. He was in Lord Drummond's Regiment when we defeated that fat German who called himself the Duke of c.u.mberland at Fontenoy and, a few months later, sailed with Prince Charles Edward back home to Scotland. When Charles Edward came back to exile and then became Charles III, my father returned with him. I was born in Rome and continued in that service. When Charles died, I went to serve the next Stuart monarch, King Henry at Frascati."

Glenbuchat recited all this with a great deal of pa.s.sion and pride in his voice.

Volpe nodded thoughtfully.

"So you know much of the politics of the conflict between the Hanoverians and Stuarts?"

"Of course."

"His Eminence is considered the last of the Stuarts?"

"The last of the direct line although there are relatives by consanguinity."

"I am told that His Eminence is poor?"

"This last decade has seen his fortune vanish because of this revolutionary fever among the French. The French have taken all the Stuart possessions that remained to them."

"Except the Crown Jewels."

"Except the Stuart Crown Jewels," confirmed Glenbuchat. "The Stuart cause is bereft of wealth. Why do you wish to know this? Your task is to find the thief who took them last night."

Volpe smiled.

"I know my task, Marchese. And that is precisely my intention. I am pursuing it in my own way. Tell me, do you really think that the people of England or Scotland are interested in the return of the Stuarts to the throne?"

Glenbuchat's mouth tightened.

"Whether they are interested or not, the Stuarts are the rightful kings."

Volpe sighed wistfully.

"Kings are not the currency they once were. They can be easily deposed as the French have just shown. The creed of the republicans has swept Europe like a forest fire."

"The French!" sneered Glenbuchat.

"Wasn't it the English who showed the way? They executed one Stuart king and chased another out of the kingdom. For over a hundred years the Stuarts have been in exile. Now we have a frail old man, a Cardinal no less, as the last of the line. Do you think anyone really cares now whether this old man can suddenly be restored to the throne of his grandfather?"

Glenbuchat had turned almost apoplectic with rage.

"How dare you, sir! You insult my King. I have fought duels for less."

Volpe sat back unperturbed.

"I am prefect commander of the guard protecting all the princes of the church meeting at this monastery to elect a new Holy Father. You, Marchese, are here on sufferance only because you are employed by one of the Cardinal delegates. I should be careful with your threats. Now, I make the point, that monarchy is unfashionable, the Irish seem to have turned to republicanism, even your own Scottish nation with its Friends of the People seem to be declaring for a republic. The Stuart cause is no longer justified."

Glenbuchat was still angered.

"I called you here to investigate a theft and bring a criminal to justice. My family and I have devoted our lives, our estates and our good name to the cause of the Stuarts and we are still prepared to defend that cause."

Count Volpe rose abruptly.

"I can see that, Glenbuchat. I think that you may be what the English call the last of the Jacobites. I believe you to be an honest man in that cause."

Glenbuchat regarded him in bewilderment at his conciliatory tone.

"Well, sir, are you to proceed in solving and resolving this theft and naming the culprit?"

"I think I already see a solution to this affair," Volpe replied complacently. "Before the culprit is named, I would like another word with His Eminence."