PINNACLE BOOKS NEW YORK (38 page)

"Mr.
Orloff is waiting outside with one now, Mr.
'Olmes."

"I
might have known," chuckled the sleuth as he
waved
me toward the door.

Chapter
20

Denouement

THE
COUNCIL ROOM of the B & N Railroad was much as I remembered it;
but then, despite all that
had happened,
our previous visit had been but
eight
days ago. The board of directors were not in evidence and that caught
me up short. I figured Alvidon Chasseur for an exhibitionist and
thought
he might relish an audience when
he received the
Inter-Ocean payment and
had the opportunity to
laugh at Sherlock
Holmes. Claymore Frisbee had set up our meeting for the ostensible
purpose of
paying the insurance claim.
With the rail tycoon
was a sallow-faced
man that I earmarked with the title secretary. Also present was the
grizzled old board member Chasseur had been conferring with on our
first visit. This time the magnate rose to indicate our seats
alongside the great oak table. As before, he ignored me completely
but did direct a
quizzical glance at
Orloff.

"An
associate," said Holmes, which seemed to
satisfy
Chasseur. Orloff did not sit at the conference
table
with us, but seemed much interested in a
chest
against the wall opposite the fireplace, obvi
ously
decorative, for it served no purpose. It was a
fine
old piece, of lowlands origin I thought, and
surely
with its original lock and key. I made note to
check
it for the name of the cabinetmaker, since
they
signed things in those days.

Chasseur
decided to ignore Orloff as well, cen
tering
his large eyes on Holmes. There was a
malicious
twist to his thin lips.

"Our
second meeting is under different circum
stances
indeed, Mr. Holmes. I will be frank. It is not
quite
the tidy wind-up one associates with he who
is
reputed to be the greatest man-hunter of them
all.
By his own admission, I might add."

"We
all make mistakes," replied Holmes, and I
never
expected to hear him say that. But then he
was
letting the pompous railroad man take in more
wind
before he punctured his balloon. "During my last visit, I
labeled Colonel Moran as the finest shot
our
eastern empire had produced. At that time I
had
not seen your man Ledger in action."

"I
would talk to you about that," said Chasseur excitedly. "Ledger
has disappeared, and my rail
road
detectives are searching for him. Scotland
Yard
as well, for he has to be involved in the
robbery."

"Before
it was over he was, perhaps not in the
manner
you think."

Chasseur
gave Holmes a strange look but decided
not
to pursue this. "Now to business, for my
schedule
is tight. The matter of the payment from
Inter-Ocean."

"I
don't have it," replied Holmes blandly.

"But
Frisbee promised to
. . ."

"He
promised to honor your claim at this time if
the
gold was not found."

"That
goes without saying."

"But
I've found it, you see."

Chasseur
leaned back in his chair and exhaled, and I'm blessed if it didn't
sound like air escaping
from a balloon.
There was consternation on his
face. I
couldn't figure if he was amazed at recover
ing
the shipment or disappointed at not being able
to
rub Holmes' nose in the ground.

"This
cannot be one of those practical jokes I'm
told
you indulge in," he finally stammered.

"Hardly.
It is a reasonably simple story. Most cases are, once solved. The
participants may be
familiar to you.
Ezariah Trelawney, Burton Hananish
,
and Ramsey Michael were involved in a
scheme
to pirate four hundred thousand pounds'
worth
of gold from the west coast banks. There was
another
hundred thousand to be picked up from the
Inter-Ocean
insurance as well."

"But
where is the gold, Mr. Holmes?"

"In
the Bank of England."

"Wait,
now! I did know Trelawney and Hananish,
and
the latter's deposit in the Bank of England is
old
news. But it was made prior to the B & N shipment."

"Your
shipment was of crates of baser metal with
little
value indeed."

Now
Chasseur's shrewdness became evident, for
he
grasped the situation immediately. "Amazing.
This
Michael you mentioned. He was murdered, for
I
read it in the papers. Trelawney was killed as
well,
a while back. Was there a disagreement between the conspirators?"

Chasseur
thought on this for a moment, then
pounded
the table in front of him. "Divine interven
tion,
that's all you can call it with Hananish dead
as
well."

"How
did you know that?" asked Sherlock
Holmes.

"Why,
the news came to me at midmorning, I
believe
. . ."

"A
cable, Mr. Chasseur," said the shallow-faced
secretary.

"Exactly.
If the three conspirators have met their
end,
you can understand my immediate thought regarding a higher power. But
come, yours
is
the
practical approach, and there must be a
rational
explanation. Trelawney was
involved in the gold
shipment, as was
Hananish. What alerted you to
this
Michael fellow?"

"Something
relative to his murder," replied
Holmes.

"And
you were able to tie the three together? The
tales
of your amazing professional powers are not
overstated,
sir. How did you do it?"

"They
served in the same regiment in the Crimea. Also, their names were a
clue. Relative to the Bible,
you see."

"The
Bible?" Chasseur appeared befuddled.

"You
may recall that Nebuchadnezzar had
brought
to his court in Babylon certain of the children of Israel."

"Wait,
Mr. Holmes, for I know my Bible well. You
speak
of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Good
heavens,
I see it! In Judah they were Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. That's
what tied them to
gether in your
mind? Brilliant."

Holmes
gestured in a modest manner, a cloak ill-
fitting
to his shoulders.
"It was a
coincidence that would be hard to
overlook.
Like three ladies on a committee named
Faith,
Hope, and Charity. They would become
known
to each other, I'm sure."

Chasseur
was regarding my friend, reluctantly I
thought,
with some awe. "With this thin thread you
tied
them into the plot to swindle the Inter-Ocean,"
he
said.

"Not
exactly. Recall that there was someone else
associated
with the three wise men."

The
tycoon preened himself. "I do, sir. Let me quote to you: 'And
these three men, Shadrach,
Meshach, and
Abednego, fell down bound into the
midst
of the burning fiery furnace.
'"

"'Then
Nebuchadnezzar the king was aston
ished,
and rose up in haste, and spake, and said
unto
his counselors, Did not we cast three men
bound
into the midst of the fire? They answered
and
said unto the king, True, O king.
'
"

"'He
answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose,
walking
in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the
fourth is like the Son of
God.'"

Chasseur
was regarding Holmes rather tauntingly. "Surely, sir, you
are not suggesting that the Son
of God
was in cahoots with three modern-day
bandits?"

"A
scholarly rendition from the book of Daniel,
Mr.
Alvidon Daniel Chasseur. My compliments."

I
slid my hand into my coat pocket, gripping the
Smith-Webley,
for now it was obvious. The impli
cation
was not missed by the rail magnate; and I thought he paled slightly,
though he retained his
hauteur. Holmes
did not wait for a response.

"It
was Daniel, renamed Belteshazzar, who came
to
Babylon with the others; and it is the fourth man
I'm
after. He has to exist, else nothing makes sense.
Ezariah
Trelawney was a miserly soul who never left his native village of
Shaw. Hananish was a cripple, entrenched in Fenley. Michael was very
much of the London scene. Unless they
transacted their considerable business by post, there had to be
a
connective link. Also, the well-planned robbery
depended
on a knowledge of the time and route of
the
treasure train, plus the plan to guard it evolved
by
Ledger."

"Trelawney
was a stockholder in Birmingham and Northern. So was Hananish,"
sputtered Chas
seur; but his
argument sounded weak, even to him.

"Probably
Michael as well," replied Holmes. "Which brings us to the
nub of the matter. There
are too many
stockholders of the B & N. You were
originally
financed by a cadre of speculators in Scotland. The Scotch are of the
opinion that they
hold seventy-five
percent of your rail empire. But how about the financial group in
Cornwall? You
attended a stockholders'
meeting there recently; and I learned they hold around eighty percent
of
the outstanding stock of the B &
N, or think they
do. Your three partners
have large blocks of the
company as
well."

Chasseur's
face was becoming a fiery red. "Mr.
Holmes,
for a presumably clever man you are
indicating
a naiveté about financial matters. Books
are
inspected. What kind of sleight of hand do you
fancy
I indulged in?"

"Your
words are apt," responded the sleuth. "The
B
& N was constantly expanding, engulfing other
rail
concerns. As long as you were altering your
corporate
structure, a clear picture could not be
obtained,
for you obfuscated matters with pre
ferred
issues, convertibles, deferred bonds, and all
the
prestidigitation of which you are an obvious
master.
It had a disadvantage in that the moment
you
ceased to expand, someone would be able to
figure
out that your original stock issue did not incorporate one hundred
percent of the company, but two or three times that amount. That is
why,
right now, you are involved in the
acquisition of the
London, Tilbury and
Southend Railroad."