“Yes, of course,” he said, turning to Milo, “but how do they fit into this particular situation?”
Milo made a hand motion, and the twelve screens switched over to a security feed. A number of different security feeds, and none of them black-and-white, as they were in the movies, but full, deep color. A beachfront cabana, complete with billowing curtains that framed a view of the ocean. A bedroom with a four-poster bed. Other scenes, other rooms—and the four monitors on the bottom, which all showed a different approach to the Holmeses’ Sussex house. With a start, I recognized the woodpile where I’d last seen Leander.
Milo ticked them off on his fingers. “Your brother Lucien’s latest hideout over here. And here, your brother Hadrian’s pied-à-terre in Kreuzberg—really, August, do get yourself born into a better family next time—and his front entryway, and the view of his back windows, and one of his toilet, though for propriety’s sake I’ve chosen not to show you that one. There’s a rather large window in there, though, so I deemed it necessary.” He flicked his wrist again, and the screens changed. “I have every angle of every room in our family home, including a camera on the septic tank, and two specialists who do nothing but watch these screens and synthesize their deductions.”
“That doesn’t answer my question,” August said. Beside him, Holmes leaned forward to see the screens better, drumming her hands against her knees.
“If Lucien sneezes, I know about it. If he orders a different cocktail than what he usually has delivered to his sad little beachfront hideaway, it’ll be one of my men bringing it to him. If he even thinks about getting into a car, it’ll be missing three gaskets and the back right tire, and if anyone remotely connected with him takes a flight to Britain, it makes an emergency stop in Berlin, during which they are forcibly removed from the plane.” Milo’s voice was electric with hate. I shrank a little as he spoke. “I’ve stripped him of his resources and his connections. The last phone call he made was three weeks ago, to his sister Phillipa, and I had it terminated after one point three seconds.
“So to answer your question, if Lucien has something to do with Leander’s disappearance, he is better than me at my own game, and I am the best. I told my sister she shouldn’t worry, and so she won’t. We’ll sort this through.”
Holmes looked up at her brother questioningly. He stared back down at her, his face still tight with anger, until she lifted the enameled coffee pot to refill his mug. Marginally, he relaxed.
She turned to look back at the screens. When Milo spoke, he was his usual dour self again. “As for Hadrian Moriarty, he’s employing me.”
I coughed. August lowered his face into his hands.
“Explain,” Holmes said. She didn’t sound surprised.
“Why, Lottie. I thought you’d be able to figure it out.”
She took a breath. Thought about it. Then began ticking it off on her fingers. “The sort of services you’d provide to a man like that would be in the personal protection business. I can’t imagine that he’d employ your mercenaries for anything else, unless it was the transportation of legally dubious artwork from one country to another, and as most self-respecting governments loathe you and your ‘independent contractors’ as it is, I doubt you’d get your hands that dirty for the sake of a Moriarty. Sorry, August.”
From behind his hands, he groaned.
“So you’re providing agents to serve as his . . . bodyguards. It would have to be bodyguards. But how did it come to pass? Hadrian would never approach you, not unless he’d gleaned that August was working for Greystone, and I imagine that if that were the case, we’d have seen some fallout already. Unless Leander’s disappearance is the fallout—but no, he’d have gone for me directly. From what I’ve heard of Hadrian Moriarty and his six-thousand-dollar watch, he’s not particularly subtle. No. You approached him.”
Milo sipped his coffee.
“But why on earth would he agree? Even if he doesn’t personally want me flayed and hanging on his wall, his older brother does, and I can’t imagine Hadrian wanting to rock the boat without a good reason. What could you have offered him? You don’t appeal to a Moriarty’s better angels. Sorry, August”—August groaned again—“but you don’t get traction that way, not really, and so you had to make him afraid.” She read some invisible cue in her brother’s face. “No. You didn’t. You appealed to something he was already afraid of.”
“Leander,” I said, putting the pieces together. “He’s afraid that Leander will expose his forgery ring.”
“But he wasn’t investigating Hadrian directly—oh. Leander was deep undercover. He might have kicked up some stray information that led back to Hadrian. And if no one in the government is paying any attention to art swindlers—”
“And then a Holmes comes along with a boatload of information, and takes it to the press—”
“—even if the government never goes after him, his international reputation is ruined,” Holmes finished neatly. “No more lining his piggy bank with cash from plundered treasure.”
August looked up. His eyes were miserable. “So you’re feeding my brother information about Leander’s investigation, you do his private security. And your men report back to you about what Hadrian is doing.”
“Peterson,” Milo called. “Please get these three some gold stars.”
Maybe I was getting better at this. Maybe I was just the only one who was properly afraid. “Are you so morally bankrupt that you’re willing to gamble with your uncle’s life?” I demanded.
“The information runs both ways,” Milo said. “I told Leander how to keep safely out of Hadrian’s way. I told Leander how to avoid Hadrian. It was the only way to keep abreast of the situation. It’s a lesson of my father’s—it’s always worth sacrificing safety for omnipotence.”
“It isn’t your safety you were sacrificing,” I told him, and he set his jaw.
“So it can’t be Hadrian who has Leander,” August was saying, with palpable relief. “Or Phillipa, the two of them are inseparable. You’re saying they’re not involved?”
“Insofar as I can tell,” Milo said, “no.”
Holmes looked down at her hands. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t upset. For a brief moment, she looked . . . crestfallen. As though she’d known, absolutely known the solution to Leander’s disappearance, and had that surety taken away. I’d wondered why she hadn’t been more outwardly worried about her uncle. Here was my answer. She thought that finding him would be as easy as tracking down August’s brother.
She wasn’t used to being wrong.
Scowling, she leaned forward to study Milo’s security feeds again, as if the answer were there. Maybe it was.
I turned back to Milo. “Hadrian knows the details of Leander’s investigation. And you don’t think he’s responsible for his disappearance.”
Milo sniffed. “Leander wasn’t anywhere near Hadrian’s operation, not until very recently, when he ended up working a source—a dealer who also represented Moriarty interests. Hadrian heard about it, so I heard about it. And as soon as I did, I phoned my uncle up and told him to leave the country. To go stay with my father, who had connections that could shed new light on the investigation from a distance. It was enough time for the dealer to go to ground before Leander returned. Everyone happy. Everyone unharmed.”
“Hadrian could have had agents in England,” I said.
“He wouldn’t dare. I have every inch of our house surveilled.”
“And Phillipa—”
“Lottie has her own plans there. I imagine.” He frowned. “Either way, it’s not as though you’re in any danger. I’ll send along a sniper or two.”
“A sniper or two,” August muttered. “You’re all the same.”
Beside him, Holmes moved her hands up and down in front of the screen. Nothing happened.
“Excuse me?” Milo said. “I’m juggling a number of flaming clubs here, one of which is you. I’m more than happy to find you a position in Siberia, August.”