Stone's Fall

He gave me the morning paper, then summoned a nurse to help me sit up enough to be able to read it. This took a very long time, but at least it gave me an opportunity to get back to my senses. The pain helped as well – it wasn't that bad, but it reminded me I was still alive. I was given some water, and tucked into bed properly and fussed over quite charmingly. All of that took about half an hour, during which time Cort sat quite impassively, doing nothing and managing not to look bored. Then, when I was feeling tolerably human again, he once more handed me the newspaper.

'Feminist outrage at Cowes,' I read. I looked at him.

'Terrible, these women, eh?' he said.

I frowned, and read some more.

Cowes – An outrage was offered to our Royal Visitors today by a suffragist in what is regarded here as a childish and unseemly exhibition. An attempt to embarrass the people of this country by the parading of supposed grievances in front of visitors is considered another blow which women suffragists have dealt to their own cause. Miss Muriel Williamson let off firecrackers close to the Royal Party as they were leaving Osborne House, having paid their respects in the death Chamber of our late Queen, in a manner deliberately designed to alarm. The fact that it could well have been a much more serious matter gives considerable cause for concern. Miss Williamson, who we understand has only lately been released from an asylum . . .

'He should be ashamed of himself,' I said weakly.

'Oh, he is,' Cort said. 'He really is. He took some persuading to write that.'

'And why did he?'

'Because I was able to convince him that a near assassination of the Tsar on English soil would not be good for our standing in the world.

And, of course, the prospect of a foreign posting, on the strong recommendation of the Foreign Office . . .'

'Why did Elizabeth shoot me?'

'Another interesting question,' Cort said thoughtfully. 'She says you got in the way. You hurled yourself heroically on the assassin, but not quickly enough to prevent him from bringing his gun to bear on his target. She decided it was too risky to be squeamish, so shot you both, just to be on the safe side. She killed Jan the builder, so you may consider yourself fortunate. The question I have not yet managed to settle in my mind, though, is who is responsible for all this.'

'Don't you know?' I was lying down again, staring at the ceiling, so heard his words without being able to see his face. It was curious; it was more like a conversation with myself. And as long as I talked to myself, as quietly as I liked, I found it easy enough to speak. Cort picked up his chair and moved closer to the bed.

'I was working on the assumption,' he said, 'that Ravenscliff had organised it in order to make the need for his battleships a little more pressing. But if so, why did his wife stop it – and in such a dramatic fashion? And so we come to you.'

'Me? It has nothing to do with me at all.'

'Of course not! No. I was merely hoping you might be able to shed a little light on matters.'

'Why don't you ask Lady Ravenscliff?'

'Well, as she has recently shot two people, I'm not sure her word is so very reliable. Even more difficult, of course, is the fact that she claims she has been acting under the belief that I was responsible for it all.'

'Why?'

'She has a long memory,' he said cryptically. 'It is of no importance. But there you are, you see. She thinks I was responsible, I think she was. You, on the other hand – the victim, the innocent bystander, so to speak – may be considered objective. So am I right that John Stone really was behind it all and wanted the blame to fall on the Germans?'

'Why do you think that?'

Cort shrugged. 'John Stone felt betrayed. He had been persuaded to launch a private venture building battleships and was facing severe difficulties because the Government would not place the orders he had been promised. He therefore decided to organise an international crisis which would generate the orders he needed.'

'Who persuaded him to build the ships?'

'A group of concerned citizens. Influential ones, I might say, who felt that the Government's naval policy was disastrously misguided.'