THE REVELATION STUNNED MOLLY, and she knew it set Michael back, as well. He didn’t have any questions. He just sat there and stared at Nanny Myrie in fascination.
“Playing the devil’s advocate, Mrs. Myrie, and meaning no disrespect, but can you prove that?” Paddington tapped his pen against his notebook irritably. He was obviously unaware of the action.
“I can.” Nanny reached down beside her chair and pulled up her purse. She rummaged in it for a moment, then produced a much-folded envelope and an ancient journal. She opened the envelope and spread photographs and old newspaper articles across the table.
“May I?” Michael pointed to the pictures.
Nanny nodded. “Please. Help yourselves. These are only copies. I have the originals Rohan sent me at home.”
Algernon dug into the photographs, as well, plucking out a couple and surveying them. He studied them for a long moment.
Molly took the newspaper article Nanny offered her. It featured a picture of a pair of primitive male figures with elongated heads standing side by side on a shelf behind a glass pane. “The article says these artifacts were being exhibited at the Blackpool Maritime Museum, on loan from the Crowe estate.”
“Yes, though they’ve since been removed. I can only assume Rohan went to Crowe’s Nest to find them. Those figures are very important to my culture.”
“Why?”
“They are ibeji. Twins.”
“Here’s another interesting fact about the Yoruba people.” Algernon glanced over the tops of the pages he held. “Twins run in high numbers in their culture. Not monozygotic twins, mind you, but dizygotic twins.”
“God help me.” Paddington looked beaten. “In English, if you please, Professor.”
Algernon shrugged. “Sorry. Monozygotic twins are identical, from the same egg. Dizygotic twins are fraternal, from different eggs.”
“You could have simply said that.”
Ignoring the inspector, Algernon watched Nanny. “While the number of identical twins are about the same throughout the world, usually around four births in a thousand, the number of fraternal twins is about forty-five births in a thousand in the Yoruba culture. In fact, there is one city—I cannot for the life of me remember the name—that clocks in with twin births at about one hundred and fifty per thousand.”
“Why are their numbers so different?” Irwin looked puzzled.
Algernon shrugged. “No one knows.”
“Twins are a part of my family’s heritage, as well.” Nanny looked at the photographs on the table. “I was a twin, though my sister died early in our lives. And Rohan was born a twin, though his brother passed away before the new day dawned.” She shook her head. “My grandson felt the pressure of having to live two lives, to have to be twice as successful so that he might honor his brother’s memory. He always said that his brother lingered in the spirit world and helped to guide him. And perhaps that’s true. Rohan is finding the strength somehow to stay alive.”
Paddington looked apoplectic and Molly couldn’t help feeling sorry for the man. The interview was going everywhere but where he had thought it would.
“Please.” Paddington raised his hands. “For the sake of brevity, let’s assume those statues of twins are in Crowe’s Nest.”
“My grandson risked everything because he was sure they are.”
“But how can you prove they have anything to do with your family history?”
Nanny opened the journal to a place marked with a ribbon. “This book belonged to my great-grandfather. He started it after he reached the New World. He was taken as a boy from his homeland and didn’t know how to write in his native tongue. That was one of the things immediately lost to him. He learned, illegally, to write in English while living in Jamaica. This was during a time when a slave learning such a thing was punishable by death.”
Placing the journal on the table, Nanny revealed the relevant pages. On the left was a drawing of the ibeji. “My ancestor writes here of the loss of the statues. The names of all the family leaders, from the first to the last, were written on them. They were something his family had saved from the slavers. But the statues were found in Île de Gorée.”
Paddington sighed in resignation. “I’m going to regret asking, but what is Île de Gorée?”
“It is an island, Inspector, and part of the outlying area of Dakar, Senegal, at present.” Nanny’s voice sounded hoarse and Molly knew that she was tired from her long flight and the emotional stress she was under. “More slaves were sold at other ports. From Saint-Louis or Gambia. But my ancestors were sold in Île de Gorée. I could walk that island—though I have never seen it—because I have learned much about it, and I shared that knowledge with Rohan. I filled that boy’s head with all these stories from the day he was born. So, you see, if anyone put him in that house that night, it was me.”
“That’s not true, madam,” Paddington insisted, “so let me lift that burden from you. I’ll get to that in a moment.” He tapped the picture of the ibeji. “You can’t tell me the statues are the same ones your ancestor wrote about.”
Nanny never flinched. “Look at their hands, Inspector Paddington. One of them is missing a right hand.”
Molly examined the photograph she held and saw that was true. She hadn’t noticed it earlier.
Quietly, Nanny pushed the journal out into the center of the table again. “Now look at this.”
Studying the inked drawing on the page, Molly saw that one of those statues was also missing a right hand.
“My great-grandfather drew this image on January 14, 1829.”
Paddington sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “There’s no way you can prove that drawing was made in 1829.”
“I disagree.” Algernon’s voice was gentle, but his rebuke was immediate. “That journal and those pages can definitely be dated. Now we’re in my bailiwick, Inspector.”
Paddington drew a breath. “All right. For the time being, let’s say those statues are the same ones exhibited in the museum. Why did your grandson think he could find them at Crowe’s Nest?”
Nanny clasped her hands calmly. “I’m not sure. All he told me was that he wanted to find out what else Charles Crowe had taken from our family and our people.”
“Other than his reputation as a collector, what proof is there that Charles Crowe had anything to do with this?”
“The article says the museum loaned the artifacts from the Crowe, and Charles Crowe is named in this book.” Nanny turned a few pages. When she opened the journal again and shoved it out for everyone to see, the likeness of one man’s features was sharp and clear despite the yellowing pages. Underneath the head shot, Charles Crowe was written in a fine, neat hand.
Without a word, Michael got out his iPhone, punched in a few entries, then placed the mobile down on the table beside the journal. “That’s Charles Crowe. I took a photo of the man’s portrait that hangs inside the Blackpool Library.”
The resemblance was unmistakable.
MICHAEL STARED AT THE TWO images on the table and felt flummoxed. He hadn’t had a clue what Rohan had been chasing the whole time he’d been in Blackpool. Michael was also somewhat disenchanted with Paddington’s attitude. He felt the inspector should be more excited about everything they were finding out. When he glanced at Molly, he could tell from her slightly irritated expression that she was thinking the same thing.
“You believe your grandson went to Crowe’s Nest that night to do what?” Paddington focused on Nanny Myrie. “If he was so bent on recovering artifacts taken from your family, why didn’t he lodge a complaint?”
“According to my ancestor’s journal, Charles Crowe was an avid collector of tribal art and items with curses. Molly mentioned there was some trouble with Charles Crowe and a gypsy family named Draghici, as well. All of these things are tied into Charles Crowe’s treasure hoard.”
“If that exists.” Paddington didn’t look pleased.
Michael couldn’t blame the inspector. Stefan Draghici and his lot had cast a dark shadow over the community ever since they’d appeared in town.
“And that attitude is why Rohan didn’t want to lodge a complaint without proof that the treasure existed. I can’t speak to the gypsy gold, but these relics do exist,” Nanny said. “And they need to be returned to their rightful owners.” She flipped the pages. “My ancestor mentions several other things that were taken from the prisoners. Rohan hoped to find any pieces that hadn’t been donated to museums in Charles Crowe’s name. Getting donated items back would have proven difficult, maybe impossible. But Rohan believed that if he could find Crowe’s treasure trove, we would stand a better chance of getting our own artifacts back. But it wasn’t just about us. He wanted those things returned to all the rightful owners.”
“Owning the property of slaves would have been awkward for Charles Crowe.” Michael stared down at the image on his mobile. “Given that participating in the slavery business was illegal in England at the time, Charles Crowe would have faced heavy fines and prison time.”
“That’s why he must have ordered Jeremy Chatwhistle killed.” Algernon sipped his beer.
“Jeremy Chatwhistle, the skeleton we found in the underground tunnels while we were trying to find the murderer of Willie Myners?”
“Oh.” The professor looked embarrassed. “Sorry. We’ve been so busy talking about these things that I forgot to mention that I heard from a marine-archivist friend of mine today. He managed to find several of Chatwhistle’s reports to his superiors and interesting references in the good captain’s journals.”
“What did they say?” Michael waited anxiously.
“Captain Chatwhistle was posted to the West Africa squadron, and was commended several times for his determination and success at catching slave traders. But his commanders at the Royal Navy were unhappy about his pursuit of one particular ship—the Seaclipse—all the way from Africa to English waters. He begged them for more time, saying he was close to interdicting the ship and arresting its captain, and its owner—Charles Crowe.” He paused. “Obviously Charles Crowe or his men found Chatwhistle first. And the Royal Navy dropped the issue.”
For a moment, silence hung around the table.
“All right, then.” Paddington sat forward. “I’ve listened to all of you put forth all kinds of summations. Now it’s time we have mine.” He cleared his throat. “I think that, given what you’ve told me here, your grandson had some altruistic reasons for being at Crowe’s Nest the night he was shot, Mrs. Myrie. But that doesn’t excuse him from breaking the law.”
“I didn’t expect that it would.”
“It doesn’t excuse Mr. Crowe from shooting him that night, either, but that would be something for the courts to decide. If it ever comes to that. It’s my belief that no criminal charges will be filed against Aleister Crowe.”
“Why?”
“Mr. Crowe is well connected and I have been advised that filing charges for shooting an intruder in his own home would not be approved of by my superiors.” Paddington colored a little, but Michael didn’t know if that was from anger or embarrassment. “At any rate, I believe that your grandson could have been coerced into following his altruistic instincts a mite more actively than he might have done on his own.”
“You don’t think Rohan acted alone?”
“Not to take anything away from your grandson, madam, although this does and you should be thankful for it, I’ve found nothing in his background that suggests he would be skilled enough to breach Mr. Crowe’s security measures. You see, that has been a conundrum for me since I first learned of the matter. The man Mr. Graham accosted today has shed more light on the subject.”
Deftly, Paddington opened his manila envelope and extracted a mug shot. Michael recognized the face immediately as the murdered man at the hospital.
“Dunkirk?” Michael studied the harsh features.
“Not anymore. Meet Mr. Timothy Harper. A bloke who knows the inner workings of security systems the way you know video games, Mr. Graham.” Paddington pulled out more photographs and sheets of type-filled paper. “According to his jacket, Mr. Harper has been in and out of correctional institutions since he was knee-high. The detective I talked to in London Metro tells me that Mr. Harper was part of an efficient criminal ring. They specialize in taking down big scores.”
“You think they were after the Crowe family?”
“I don’t think they were after West African artifacts that the rest of the world has more or less forgotten.” Paddington glanced at Nanny. “Meaning no disrespect, madam.”
Nanny waved his words away. “What you’re saying makes sense, Inspector, but you’ll have to forgive me. I don’t see my grandson taking up with people like this.”
“He probably wasn’t aware he was taking up with people.” Michael scowled at Harper’s picture. “He thought he was taking up with Dunkirk.”
Paddington nodded. “I believe Harper got Rohan into Crowe’s Nest that night, and I believe he left him there when he got shot.”
“No honor among thieves.” Algernon’s voice was a low growl.
“Oh, karma is plainly a coldhearted harpy when it comes to that,” Paddington said. “I believe one of Harper’s partners blew him out of his socks today.” Suddenly self-conscious, he glanced at the women. “Pardon my coarseness.”
Michael sipped his brandy. “I don’t suppose any of Harper’s known crew is a sniper?”
“As a matter of fact, there are two men who are noted for their shooting abilities. One of them was an armorer for the army, and the other is an assassin. Either one is capable of making the shot that killed Harper.”
Michael studied the photos of Harper’s suspected gang affiliates. What had Rohan gotten himself into? What had he gotten them all into?