Page 192 of King’s Ransom

Even more than that, the Unperson had made it look like the Grandmaster had double-crossed his employer, Yasmina Ivanova, and tried to kill her, too, by dropping her off the roof in the helicopter.)

‘That was Modern Alchemical Solutions’ overall plan: to lay the blame on the Grandmaster, who they kept—drugged and dazed, with two Russian goons—at the water mill by the cemetery. Then Vasha, disguised as a gardener, would bring them out at the appropriate time. For a while, I thought this was Vasha’s only task, but that wasn’t her whole job, was it? She could also be an independent witness to your heroism.

‘The Grandmaster and Yasmina take the fall, and since both of them are dead, they can’t prove it otherwise.

‘You become a hero.

‘And Modern Alchemical Solutions comes through for all three of its clients.

‘Until Yasmina Ivanova—having survived the day, yet penniless, outcast and abandoned by New York society—asked me to clear her name. And I took her case, for free.

‘It was only when I started poking around, first with the Russians, then at Sleepy Hollow and later with Monty Woods, that the true scheme emerged.’

(It occurred to me that if I hadn’t saved Yasmina’s son in the elevator shaft and then Yasmina herself in the helicopter on the roof, it all would’ve worked. For even if Yasmina had survived, she wouldn’t have known who I was and thus thought to hire me. But by impressing her on those two occasions, she did think of me and that was what had made the difference.)

Merritt Garrett nodded slowly, his gun still aimed at me.

‘I heard you were smart,’ he said.

He looked away, thinking. ‘I saw all that coverage you got after that business in the South. All the TV interviews and magazine profiles.

‘I’ve been a private detective my whole life. An honest one and a good one—I got knifed catching the Funhouse Killer in Atlantic City; shit, I almost died—yet I’ve always scraped by. Never had any fame like you got. And I wanted some of that fame. I’m just as good a detective as you, Speedman, better even, and I wanted the world to know that.’

‘So you went on the darknet . . .’

‘. . . and found this company I’d heard whispers about: Modern Alchemical Solutions.’

I said, ‘You unleashed a monster. That man is ruthless—’

‘That man is my monster! I paid him his fee. He works for me,’ Garrett snapped.

He was getting angry. Good.

Now I just needed him to hit me.

‘So it was all set up to make you look like a hero?’ I said. ‘Like saving Cassandra by abseiling down the side of the building?’

‘Yep.’

‘And Alexei in the elevator shaft. You were supposed to save him, too. When I jumped across the shaft to catch him, I thought I glimpsed someone reaching out for him.’

‘That was me. I was supposed to catch Alexei, but I didn’t get to the edge of the shaft in time,’ Garrett said. ‘Didn’t matter in the end. It actually gave you a moment to shine.’

‘You were also supposed to solve one final riddle at the end of it all, revealing Katya’s location in the garbage chute,’ I said. I recalled the Post-It with ‘Titanic Oscar2’ written on it: Titanic’s Oscar win in 1998 and Oscar the Grouch who lived in a garbage can, i.e. the garbage chute on the 98th floor.

‘I didn’t have to,’ Garrett said. ‘Hooper figured that out. Like with you and the boy, it helped for someone else to have a moment.’

(I didn’t tell Garrett that I had been the one who’d figured that out, not Trey Hooper.)

‘So, the shootout at the cemetery,’ I said. ‘When I dashed off to the bridge to check on Audrey, Vasha brought the three Russians out—armed, but drugged and helpless—for you to shoot and kill. Tell me, did you shoot yourself in the arm as well, to make it look like you’d been winged?’

‘I got her to do it.’ A nod at Vasha. ‘Better angle.’

‘What if I’d stayed?’ I asked pointedly. ‘What if I hadn’t gone to the bridge?’

Garrett answered in a low voice. ‘Vasha and I would’ve killed you. And then we’d have just blamed it on the Russians. Given where we are now, I kinda wish it had happened that way.’

‘What about the drone that attacked my chopper on the way back from King’s drone base in New Jersey?’ I said. ‘Did you send it?’