The Last Queen of England (22 page)

“Who are you?” the man asked.
 
“What do you want?”

“You
are
Robert Cornell?”

“Yes, I’m Cornell.”

Tayte extended a hand and when the man ignored it he withdrew it again.
 
“My name’s Jefferson Tayte,” he said.
 
“I’m a genealogist.”

“A genie-what?”

“Family history.
 
I’m assisting the police with a murder investigation and I believe you’re in danger.
 
Can we go inside?”

Cornell looked up at Tayte and then he looked out into the street.
 
“Where are the police?”

“They’re on their way,” Tayte said, hoping it was true.

“And you say I’m in danger?”

“I think so, yes.”

“From what?
 
What kind of danger?”

“The worst kind, believe me,” Tayte said.
 
“Look, we might not have much time.”

“There’s enough time for you to tell me what this is about.”

“
Quo Veritas
,” Tayte said.
 
“You know about
Quo Veritas
.”
 
It wasn’t a question.

Cornell said nothing.

“You have something that someone else wants - a family heirloom of some kind.”

Cornell seemed to measure Tayte then.
 
“How do I know you’re not the one I’m in danger from?”

“If I was,” Tayte said, “it would be too late already.
 
Now can we get off the street?”

The man paused again, studying Tayte closely.
 
Then he stepped back and invited him in.

The hallway was tight: two doors to the left and a staircase straight ahead.
 
Tayte followed Cornell through the first door into a lounge that was stuck in the seventies, with peeling box-patterned wallpaper and abstract brown carpet.
 
The furniture was older still but cheap looking rather than antique.

Tayte sat down.
 
He was too tired to wait for an invitation.
 
“I’m glad I caught you home,” he said.
 
“I thought you might be at work.”

“I just finished,” Cornell said.
 
“Another half-hour and I’d have been in bed.”

“Night-worker?” Tayte said.
 
“I can relate to that.”

“You work nights, too?”

“I did last night.”

“Well, don’t get too comfortable,” Cornell said.
 
He was across the room by the window, looking out through the faded net curtains.
 
He turned and picked up his jacket.
 
“If someone wants to kill me this is the first place they’ll look.
 
You found me easily enough.”

Tayte thought it had been anything but easy.
 
“I could use a coffee,” he said, standing up.
 
“I saw a place out on the main road.”

“No, I’ll drive us to the police station,” Cornell said.
 
“My car’s outside.”

As Cornell passed Tayte he wondered again whether the research had led him to the right man - if the hunch had been correct.
 
“Was anything passed on to you from your father?” he asked.
 
“Something that’s been in the family a long time?”
 
He thought about Fable’s interview recording and about the Royal Society.
 
“Was it a scientific instrument?”

Cornell paused at the door and turned back.
 
“I don’t want to talk about it here.
 
Not until we’re at the police station and I’ve confirmed you are who you say you are.”

They went back out into the hall and Cornell put his jacket on as he walked.
 
It was a close-fitting jacket, short and boxy.

“You’re a security guard?” Tayte said.

“So what?”

“Nothing.
 
The jacket’s a giveaway, that’s all.
 
I was wondering what kind of job you had.”

Cornell picked up a mobile phone and a set of keys off the shelf.
 
“Well now you know.”

“Looks like you cut yourself shaving there,” Tayte said, indicating his shirt.
 
“You’ve got blood on your collar.”

Cornell gave a small laugh.
 
“I’m always doing that.”

He rattled his keys and seeing the mobile phone again made Tayte think of Jean.

“I just remembered,” he said.
 
“I’m expecting someone to meet me here.
 
If we’re going to the police station she won’t know where to find me.”
 
He indicated the mobile.
 
“You mind if I give her a quick call?”

“Not on this,” Cornell said. “Work gets funny about it.”
 
He slipped the phone inside his jacket.
 
“You can call her from the lounge.
 
But don’t be too long.”

Tayte went back into the lounge and Cornell followed him.

“You know what,” Cornell said.
 
“I could use a coffee myself.
 
Tell her to meet you at the Star Café.
 
It’s just around the corner on Lower Clapton Road.
 
It’s the place you probably saw on your way here.
 
We’ll go on to the police station from there.”

“Great,” Tayte said.
 
He dialled Jean’s number and as expected he got her voicemail.
 
He left a message.
 
“She’s on the road,” he said.
 
“Motorbike.”
 
He ended the call and followed Cornell outside.

Cornell was about to close the front door behind him when he stopped.
 
“Damn,” he said.
 
“I’d put the grill on just before you arrived.
 
I won’t be a minute.”

When he came out again he showed Tayte to a red VW that was parked a few spaces along the street.
 
Tayte got in and the car pulled away.

It only took a few minutes to get to the Star Café: a greasy spoon with red vinyl seats over black and white linoleum.
 
The place was busy with lunchtime trade and the air was thick with the smell of all-day breakfasts and old cooking fat.
 
Tayte sat next to his briefcase with Cornell opposite, Tayte looking into the café, Cornell looking out.
 
They each ordered a black coffee and against his better judgement after seeing just how greasy the place really was Tayte ordered a ham and cheese sandwich to go with it.
 
Cornell didn’t say much.
 
It wasn’t like they could talk about what was going on in such a public place.
 
He stared out the window for several minutes before breaking what had become an uncomfortable silence.

“How long do you think she’ll be?”

Tayte checked his watch.
 
“Not long now.”
 
He sipped his coffee.
 
“So, you’re not married.”

“Was that a question?”

Tayte realised it wasn’t.
 
It was just another weak attempt at small talk to fill the time.
 
He knew from his research that Robert Cornell was a single man and now another snippet of information caught up with him.
 
It was something that applied to both the abducted Peter Harper and Robert Cornell and it suddenly struck him as odd.
 
He figured he must have been too tired to see the significance before.

“This heirloom that’s been passed down through your family -”

“I told you I didn’t want to talk about it until we got to the police station.”

“I know,” Tayte said.
 
“But I was just thinking.
 
You’re in your forties, unmarried with no children.
 
So it ends with you, doesn’t it?”

“You seem to know a lot about me,” Cornell said.

“Enough to know that you’re bucking the trend.
 
Every one of your ancestors seemed to make a point of marrying early and starting a young family.
 
I figured it was because they felt it was their duty - that they each had to ensure that whatever had been passed down to them survived to the next generation.
 
I was just wondering why that’s not the case with you.”

“It’s like you said.
 
It ends with me.”

“What does?
 
Why now?”

“You’ll get your answers soon enough,” Cornell said.
 
He scanned the room.
 
“But not here.”

“Okay.
 
I’m sorry.”

Tayte knew he’d done well to get Cornell to trust him this far, so as much as he wanted to push the matter he thought better of it.
 
Cornell was right.
 
This wasn’t the place.
 
He finished his coffee in silence, supposing that as whatever was set in motion by the hanged Fellows of the Royal Society had remained a secret for three centuries, it could wait a little longer.

A lanky waitress in a pink T-shirt and blue jeans arrived carrying four plates of food in her arms.
 
“Ham and cheese?” she said with an Eastern European accent.

Tayte put his hand up and with an awkward delivery the waitress set his sandwich down in front of him, rebalancing the remaining plates.

“Can I get another coffee to go with that?” Tayte asked.

“Of course.”
 
The waitress turned to Cornell.
 
“Anything else for you?”

“No thanks.”

The waitress turned again and at that moment she lost one of the plates.
 
It flipped off her arm towards Cornell and he recoiled, scraping his chair back as the contents of what looked like another full English breakfast splashed down on the table and onto the floor in front of him.

“I’m so sorry!” the girl said and she rushed away.

Cornell didn’t say anything.
 
He didn’t look too happy though as he dabbed at his trousers with a napkin.
 
The waitress quickly returned with a cloth and an ill-advised smile, clearly trying to make light of the incident.

“Did I get you?” she said.

“It’s nothing.
 
Don’t worry about it.”

She cleaned up and left, taking Tayte’s lunch with her.
 
“I’ll get you another one,” she said.
 
“No charge.”

Tayte didn’t see the girl or the food go.
 
All his attention was on Cornell.
 
As he’d recoiled on his chair, Tayte saw the nickel-plated grip of a handgun and the leather sheen of a shoulder holster beneath his jacket.
 
It had appeared like a splice of subliminal advertising: a momentary flash that left him wondering if he’d seen it at all.
 
He realised then that he was still staring at Cornell’s jacket.
 
He looked up and their eyes met.

“I didn’t think British security guards were allowed to carry firearms,” Tayte said.

“We’re not.
 
I picked this up for personal protection.
 
I read the papers.
 
You came here yourself to tell me my life’s in danger.”

“I see,” Tayte said, not sure that he really did.
 
“Is that what you went back inside the house for?”

Cornell nodded.

“Better not let the police see it when we go to the station,” he said.
 
“I don’t think they’d understand.”

“No,” Cornell said.

Their eyes remained locked and Tayte suddenly felt like they were the only people in the café.
 
The noise around them, of people talking and eating and clanking their cutlery, had all but faded to a low static hiss.

Cornell smiled coldly.
 
“You’re not going to buy that, are you?”

“No, I don’t think so,” Tayte said.
 
He’d already made it obvious enough.
 
To deny it now would be futile.
 
“We were never going to the police station, were we?”

“No.”

Tayte wondered then how he could have overlooked the possibility that the killer might have been one of their own number.
 
But he was tired and he’d been caught up in the chase all night, thinking only that he had to identify the remaining descendants.
 
To protect them.

Cornell touched his smooth scalp, drawing Tayte’s eye.
 
“All that’s missing now is the wig and the mask,” he said, and before he’d finished speaking, his other hand had the gun trained on Tayte beneath the table.
 
“If you try to run, I’ll kill you.
 
If you try to warn anyone, I’ll shoot you dead before a single word leaves your mouth.
 
Are we clear?”

Tayte nodded.
 
Having seen how confident this man was he didn’t doubt him for a second.
 
His mouth felt so dry that he didn’t think he could speak even if he wanted to.