I WALKED UP THE front steps of the five-storey building I had exited from the roof at the beginning of this adventure. A surprised escort formed around me and helped me get to my destination: a room much different than the one I had been interrogated in. It seemed to be the central hub of the building on the main floor and was behind two locked doors guarded by armed men dressed all in black. The large room was encircled by a few men at desks, corkboards with papers pinned all over them, blackboards of names, and a television set showing the front door of 10 Downing Street. That gave me pause. I’d never seen this level of live surveillance before using the camera and television technology. Imagine its usefulness in law enforcement. And in law evasion. My mind spun at the possibilities.
“What is it?” said Kell, not even looking up from his chair, facing away from the door. “I left express instructions not to be disturbed until you found the detective.”
“Then I think we’ve satisfied your requirements,” I said, my eyes on Lancaster, who was sporting one Hell of a black eye and sat in a wooden chair facing me. He tried to smile, but winced, the pain in his mouth stopping him. I couldn’t help the glare directed at Kell when he finally turned at the sound of my voice.
“Miss Adams,” Kell said, turning to face me. “This is a pleasant surprise. Here to confess?”
“I am,” I replied. “But it would be best if I made the confession to you alone.”
“Portia …,” Lancaster started to say, speaking slowly out of his wounded mouth.
“I agree,” Kell said, straightening his shoulders. “All the better to compare your stories at the end of this affair.”
He emphasized the word affair and I fought against rolling my eyes at his childish attempt to embarrass us. He bullied his men and Lancaster out of the room.
“K, are you sure?” one of his men dared to ask.
“Are you seriously worried about the likes of her?” Kell answered. “Get out. And take Lancaster with you.”
“It would be best if my associate was not harmed further,” I said in a low voice. “Lest I be forced to retaliate.”
“Are you threatening us with violence, Miss Adams?” Kell sputtered, looking me up and down, and doing that thing he did with his weapon, pulling aside his coat jacket to demonstrate its existence.
“My retaliation will be much worse,” I promised, meeting the gaze of every man in the room. “Do not doubt me.”
A full minute passed in shocked silence until one of the men reached out and closed the door behind them, eyes wide, leaving Kell and me alone in the large room.
“You have Holmes’ arrogance,” Kell said, folding his arms across his chest, his voice bouncing off the high ceiling. “That belief that superior intelligence trumps everything else. Loyalty. Country. Truth.”
“An interesting list of what your priorities are,” I said, taking a seat where Lancaster had been sitting. “Does your loyalty extend beyond your own limited view of who deserves it? Put another way, where was your loyalty to Lancaster?”
“Don’t try and school me on Ian Lancaster,” he spat. “That man has fouled every file he’s been handed. The loss of Major Collins was just the …”
“The murder of Major Collins was arranged by this office,” I interrupted. “And I can prove it.”
Kell turned three shades of red, but said nothing.
“The person who killed Major Collins and the informant became your most useful mole in the Irish movement,” I said. “Their code name was Trident, not Major Collins. Lancaster admitted to me that their efforts had resulted in no useful information and suddenly, Collins dies and you’re able to make headway for the first time in nearly a decade. They’re still your most trusted agent — you sent them to meet with the prince when you suspected the O’Duffys were involved in the bombings.”
Kell ground his teeth, but continued to silently stare at me, as if daring me to continue.
“Did you disavow Lancaster out of spite or because it aided your fictitious storyline of removing all agents from the area?” I asked, curious, but expecting no answer and receiving none. “It’s Heddy that is the biggest question to me. Was she an agent or just a valuable pawn? It seems coincidental that she’s in Ireland, and then she’s with Major Collins, and then she’s at Downing Street. When did she come on board with your group?”
“Heddy Collins is a patriot,” Kell finally bit out. “Don’t waste my time by repeating the rot you’ve been telling Lancaster about her being involved with the bombings. She would never.”
“I agree. It sounds like that kind of attention would be her worst nightmare,” I said. “Good thing we’re talking to her in such a private location.”
Kell followed my eye line to see Heddy Collins and Annie following Inspector Michaels through the previously closed door.
“Who the Hell do you think you are?” Kell managed to get out, his hand now massaging the butt of his gun. I was starting to think it was a bit of a safety blanket for the man rather than an actual threat of violence.
“Portia, I’m so glad to see you,” Annie said, running to me as soon as she saw me. “Brian told me what happened. By the time I got to the fabric store, you were all gone.”
“You were late, which I hope means that you found what I needed,” I answered, returning her hug.
She grinned from ear to ear, handing me a bundle of paperwork. “Not just me.”
“I contributed to that pile as well, Adams, so be sure to include me in your case file, won’t you?” Michaels said, puffing around his usual cigar.
“Michaels, I might have known you were aiding and abetting these two,” Kell said, jerking a chin at Lancaster, who had entered the room as well, pressing a bag of ice to his wounded chin.
“I have no idea who that is,” Michaels said, escorting Heddy Collins into our midst and finding her a chair.
“Mrs. Collins, I will have you returned home as soon as I can locate my men,” Kell said, speaking to the woman seated in our midst.
“That might take a few minutes,” Michaels said. “Turns out your men have been dispatched to The Gore Hotel to round up the last of the missing bombs.”
“Dispatched?” Kell repeated. “Dispatched by whom?”
“By His Royal Highness,” Lancaster answered. “He did offer the full force of the British military, after all, and, upon hearing of this credible threat to the negotiators, pulled all your men out.”
I sat down in front of Heddy Collins, who, remarkably, looked well-used to this level of hostility.
“Mrs. Collins, my name is Portia Adams,” I said. “You’ve already met Annie and the inspector, and of course, you and Lancaster have known each other for years.”
“Hello Heddy,” Lancaster said. “I’m sorry you’ve been brought into this, but Portia would not be dissuaded.”
Michaels and Kell both snorted at this understatement and then glared at each other.
“It’s true. I’m very hard to wiggle off an idea once I’ve had it and I think I may have that in common with your daughter,” I said, watching for a reaction from the woman with the unforgettable eyes.
“I do not have a daughter,” she said finally, pressing her purse against her stomach like it could protect her. “Major Collins and I were only together for a few months.”
She looked to Kell and Lancaster, who both nodded.
“A child from your first marriage,” I corrected, “to Harold Digby.”
This got a reaction. She clutched at her purse so tight her knuckles turned white.
“Val and Harold Digby,” Annie said, opening the file on my lap. “Parents to Ilsa Digby, born 1919.”
“And the marriage certificate of Valerie Zimmermann and Harold Digby, 1917,” Michaels put in.
“Digby thought you left him because of the drink,” I said, leaning forward “But I think you left because of the prejudice against you. I think you got fed up with being treated like an outsider and decided to leave your old miserable life behind. I don’t know if you tried to make a go of it with your daughter and couldn’t or if you planned to leave her at an orphanage from the start, but at some point, you started over. You left your old life and your old name behind and moved north where no one would know you.”
“No, no,” Kell said, stepping forward to look at Annie’s file. “We looked into Heddy Weber when Collins revealed himself to her. She was a refugee from the war.”
“Heddy Weber fled Germany,” I agreed, letting Annie flip pages until she found the one she was looking for. “I suspect in the same caravan that Valerie Zimmerman did.”
“Did she die here or on the journey across the border, Val?” Annie asked.
“She arrived in London, registered here as a refugee,” I answered when the woman seated in front of us would not. “I suspect she died within a year of moving here, though. When you moved away, you took her name with you so that Digby couldn’t find you.
“You’re a survivor,” I said with admiration. “Even when Major Collins was killed, you pivoted, moved back to London with his name and Lancaster’s help, and then when Kell came to you with an offer of employment, you threw Lancaster under the bus.”
I looked up at Lancaster, seeing the hurt in his eyes, and regretted that I would have to tell him what else had been done to him in the service of his country.
“What has this to do with the bombs?” Kell broke in. “Even if what you say is true, and Heddy Collins is actually Valerie Zimmermann, surely you’re not saying that she is behind the bombings. Why would she target her place of work?”
“She wouldn’t,” I said. “But her daughter — who it turns out, was smarter than any of you — found her out and came up with a perfect revenge for being cast aside. First, she found her father and then she ingratiated herself into the Collins family, perhaps through the colonel, or perhaps through Alisha Collins.” I looked to Michaels for this answer.
“Checked with the family and it sounds like Alisha was part of the Irish Feminist movement and brought home some friends, one of whom fits the description of young Ilsa,” Michaels said.
“Right, so she found out about the bombs through her friend Alisha and suddenly she had an even better revenge than just outing the mother who abandoned her,” I continued. “She stole the bombs and tried to use one to kill her father.”
“Killing a good man by mistake,” Michaels growled.
“Yes, and spraining her ankle, but leaving her father somehow alive,” I said. “She was learning as she went. She tried again at Downing Street and at the college where you were taking language classes, Valerie. This must have been about when you suspected you were a target.”
Annie sat down beside me to dig out the King’s College student list and handed it to Kell while I spoke. Lancaster peered over her shoulder, shaking his head in disbelief.
“But what about Buckingham Palace?” Kell said. “Heddy … I mean … whomever this is, surely she wasn’t at the palace.”
Cognizant of the promise I had made I said, “Some of those phone calls were pranks, I’m sure, and some were overly paranoid citizens. No, I don’t think Ilsa was targeting anyone but her parents.”
“She was trying to kill us,” said Valerie, making all of us jump a bit in surprise at the sound of her voice. “I had no choice.”
“I think you did have a choice,” I said, shaking my head. “But you’re a survivor. After the Downing Street incident, you took the chance of seeking out some help from Trident, the spy you had helped elevate. They owed you for that, and trusted you, so you had them set up a meeting at Paddington Station with Ilsa through her Irish Feminist group. And you killed her there with the gun you’d carried over the border from Germany. A gun that I am guessing is in the bag you’re clutching right now.”
Valerie closed her eyes.
“You killed your own daughter?” Annie said. “Surely there was another way to maintain your anonymity.”
“She wouldn’t listen to reason. She wouldn’t take money,” Valerie answered, her eyes still closed, but crying now too. She handed the bag to me and I handed it to Michaels without opening it. “She wanted to see me destroyed. She said it was all that would make things right. It was her or me.”