plane touched down at London Heathrow airport, Agent James Foster, back in Rampart’s DC office, had texted her a list of male passengers from Dempsey’s flight manifest. Dempsey had taken a seat in coach next to a window. Beside him had been a five-year-old girl; the aisle seat had been occupied by the girl’s mother. No help there. Foster and Agent Darren Cooper had narrowed the list of other passengers to eighty-five men, forty of them within ten years of Dempsey’s age, and twenty-three of that subset from the UK. Out of those twenty-three, only one had a criminal record. Spenser Burke from Camden Town had done time in London’s Belmarsh Prison for embezzling from a warehousing and shipping company of which he’d been the controller. He’d also been convicted of a few petty crimes in his youth—fighting, disorderly conduct, shoplifting. Surely, Spenser Burke was a place to start.
Exiting the airport into the cool London air, Kori noticed a man holding a sign that read: Ms. Estella Havisham.
“Hello, I’m Miss Havisham,” Kori smiled, approaching the man.
“Pleased to meet you, Miss Havisham, I’m sure,” said the man, tall, broad-shouldered with black, wavy hair and smoky, gray eyes. “I’m Samuel Pickwick. I have a car waiting if you’ll kindly follow me.”
Inside the car, the MI5 agent revealed his real name. “Victor Graham, at your service, Agent Briggs. I’m heading the investigative task force.”
“Pleased to meet you, Victor. I had no idea you guys at MI5 were so well-read.”
Graham chuckled. “Just our little joke, Agent Briggs.”
“Kori, please.”
“Kori. Glad you picked up on it.”
“Of course. Estella Havisham from Great Expectations and Samuel Pickwick from The Pickwick Papers. Dickens characters. How wonderfully appropriate.”
“Well, we could all use a little levity these days,” Graham said as he drove east out of Heathrow toward London. The flight had been six hours and the time difference was five hours. It was now early evening in England and already dark. “So you’re with the CIA, I presume.”
“I’m with an American intelligence agency,” Kori replied. “And that’s about all I can say, I’m afraid.”
“Oh, I see. A secret agency, eh? You know, I’ve heard rumors of a super-secret American intelligence agency.”
“Really? Well, I wouldn’t trust those rumors, Victor. You know how rumors can be. So, where are we headed?”
“I thought I’d take you to your hotel. The Savoy, right? That’s what they told me. I must say, whatever agency you’re with, your expense accounts are pretty generous.”
“We prefer to travel in style.”
“Yes, quite. At any rate, I thought we’d talk along the way. It’s about an hour’s drive. So, what can you tell me about your man Dempsey? We’re quite keen on learning what you know.”
“Well, of course, I’m happy to fill you in, Victor, and I appreciate the lift to the hotel, but I’ve already lost most of the day. Time change and long flight and all that. I’d like to go straight to the scene of the crime if I could.”
“The scene of the crime? You mean the prince’s manor house?”
“Of course. That’s where I’d like to start. I can check into the hotel later.”
“I see,” Graham said, his brow furrowing. “Well, with all due respect, Kori, we’ve gleaned all we could from there, I’m afraid. Your help there isn’t really what we need. As far as the investigation goes, we’re quite capable of handling things on our end. We’re MI5, you know, and we’ve been at this intelligence and security game quite a while. I have to tell you that we’ve quite completed our investigation of the crime scene.”
The conversation was heading in a direction Kori didn’t expect. “But then I’m a bit confused, Victor. Why did you enlist our help?”
“Truthfully, we just need to know what you’ve got on Dempsey, really.”
“That’s all? What we have on Dempsey?”
“Yes, frankly.”
“We could have done that with a phone call.”
“Yes, I said as much to our chief. But for some reason, he insisted on your presence. I believe he has orders directly from the prime minister. I think it’s an overreaction. To be perfectly honest with you, the PM is in a bit of a panic over this kidnapping business. It doesn’t look good, as I’m sure you can imagine. The press is having a field day with it. And so he’s enlisted the help of you Yanks. Frankly, it’s quite unnecessary, if you ask me. Oh, no offense, of course, Kori.”
“None taken,” Kori said, her jaw tightening. So that’s how it was going to be. She had orders—from the president, no less—to help with an investigation where no help was being asked for. She had information on the kidnapper and that was all MI5 needed her for. But Kori didn’t answer to MI5. She answered to Rampart director Richard Eaglethorpe who had promised the president that Rampart would take an active role in solving the case and rescuing the prince. Not only that, she’d made a personal pledge to the president: to present the queen with Newton Dempsey all wrapped up with a red, white, and blue bow.
“Well, here’s the thing, Victor,” Kori said, “I’ve been tasked with finding Dempsey. My orders come from the president of the United States. Now, my interest is not in stepping on anyone’s toes or interfering in any way. I’m sure your investigation thus far has been top-shelf. MI5’s reputation is sterling. And when this whole thing is over, I’d be thrilled to have you guys take all the glory. We don’t need it. Our agency’s practice is to avoid it, in fact. But whether you feel as though you need us or not, we’re going to investigate this crime. That’s what I’ve been sent here for, and that’s what I’m going to do. We’ll start with the manor house and then go from there.”
“I see, Agent Briggs.”
Hmm…What happened to “Kori”? Suddenly, it seemed as if the playful Dickens thing was a very long time ago. Damn shame. Those smoky, gray eyes hadn’t left her mind.
“And what makes you think we will cooperate to the degree you’re asking?” Graham continued. “As I said, the grounds of the prince’s manor have been thoroughly investigated. There simply is no reason for me to take you there.”
“Well, I can think of one reason, Agent Graham.”
“Which is?”
“You’ll take me there if you wish to learn what I know about Newton Dempsey.”
“I see,” said Graham. Then he was quiet, apparently mulling things over in his head. “Well, you seem determined, Agent Briggs,” he said at last.
“Indeed I am, Agent Graham.”
Graham sighed. “Then I suppose we will pop over to the prince’s house.”
“Thank you, Agent Graham.”
“You’re quite welcome, I’m sure, Agent Briggs.”
On the way, Kori shared with Graham the name “Spenser Burke” from Camden Town, telling him how she’d uncovered the fact that Dempsey was not working alone. “We don’t know anything for sure,” she told him, “but it’s a lead certainly worth following up on.” Graham managed a nod of appreciation and called the name into MI5 headquarters. The hunt for Burke was on.
At Prince Grayson’s manor house in St. John’s Wood, Graham and Kori brushed past a few members of the paparazzi who’d been hanging out in front of the house. “Any news on the prince?” one of them yelled out as the pair accessed the steps leading to the entry. One of a few bobbies on duty nodded to Graham at the front door and unlocked it for him. Graham and Kori entered the house and the bobby quickly closed the door behind them.
“You see?” said Graham. “Every time we come back here, we’re met with those media vultures out front.”
“What have you been telling them?”
“Only that the prince is missing. But our continued presence here suggests foul play and that stokes the rumor mill. You can’t believe the bollocks that some of these rags publish. Come along, Agent Briggs.” Graham led the way through the foyer and up the main staircase. “The master suite is on the third floor.”
The suite had been left untouched since the kidnapping. Kori noticed the unmade bed and the trail of blood that led from it to the window, about twenty feet away.
“Of course, we identified the blood,” Graham said. “As expected, it’s the prince’s. The more or less straight line of the blood to the window, without a lot of extraneous spatters, means he was most likely accosted in his bed and then dragged directly to the window, probably unconscious. We assume he was hit with a blunt instrument on the forehead that produced a gash that ran down his face. That would be consistent with the photograph, too, as I’m sure you’ve seen. His nose was probably broken as well; the photo shows a bandage across his nose and two black eyes. We believe the prince might have fought back from his bed before being knocked out, thus the broken nose.”
“He was awakened by the intruder’s entrance.”
“So it would seem.”
“He didn’t scream out?”
“If he did, nobody in the household heard him. Maybe the intruder put a hand over his mouth. So, after a short struggle in the bed, the prince was knocked out, and then carried to the window. Now, you’ll notice the blood pooled at the base of the window.”
“He was held there for a short time,” Kori surmised.
“It appears so. We suspect that Dempsey was trying to figure out just how to get him out of the window and down to the ground.”
“It wasn’t Dempsey who held him,” Kori said.
Graham nodded. “Yes, we came to the same conclusion. The prince is not a particularly big man, but, nonetheless, it would take some doing to physically manhandle him through the bedroom, out of the window, and, presumably, down a ladder to the ground. Dempsey’s in his fifties and not exactly in tip-top shape. Perhaps this Burke fellow did the dirty work. Or perhaps it was both.”
“Seems strange that Dempsey and/or Burke would come here without a solid plan as to how to remove the prince. Dempsey’s a master planner.”
“Yes, but then from what we understand, this is the man’s first kidnapping, isn’t it?”
“What about security cameras?”
“None.”
“Alarm system?”
“Not functioning at the time.”
“Seriously? Good God, this is the home of a prince.”
“Yes, quite. From what we have ascertained, security was extraordinarily lax here. The prince often comes in late at night. He had a history of accidentally tripping the alarm and it appears as though it was deactivated on the night in question, presumably to avoid his tripping it when he returned. And apparently, the prince never liked the idea of cameras. Too intrusive, he said.”
“I’ll bet he’s regretting that now.”
“No doubt.”
“What about the forensics report? Can I get a copy?”
“I suppose that can be arranged. There is scant DNA evidence and zero fingerprints. Certainly, the culprits wore gloves. The instrument that was used to hit the prince was apparently taken with them. From what we can gather, nothing of the kidnappers was left behind.”
“You’ve had rain lately. I presume the ground is soft. Did you find evidence of a ladder?”
“Um, yes, indeed we did. Quite right. There were imprints in the ground below the window, as one would naturally expect.”
“No wonder they knocked him unconscious.”
“Indeed. Who wants to try climbing down a ladder while clutching a struggling kidnap victim? It’s hard enough with dead weight.”
“Not necessarily,” said Kori. “I have a cousin who’s a firefighter. You lay the unconscious person across your arms while you hold tight to the ladder and you carefully lower yourself one rung at a time. Meanwhile, you have a second person behind you, supporting you with his hand on your back end.”
“Yes, evidently, that’s the way it unfolded.”
“And they took the ladder with them? Along with the prince?”
“Evidently.”
Kori was thoughtful for a moment. “I don’t know. This whole operation of Dempsey’s seems half-assed, if you’ll pardon my Americanism. I mean, why didn’t they just take the prince out of here at gunpoint?”
“Well, first of all, Ms. Briggs, guns aren’t quite as easy to come by over here as they are in America. Handguns are illegal. Now, I suppose Dempsey’s accomplice might have been able to access one. He could have had a sporting rifle or shotgun, which are legal with a license, or he could have bought whatever he needed on the black market. But the fact is, for whatever reason, their preferred strategy seemed to be to just bop our prince on the head and take him away in an unconscious state.”
“And lug him down a ladder from a third floor.”
“So it would seem.”
Kori noticed an open doorway on the far side of the bedroom and followed it into a spacious dressing room. Along the wall stood shelves of shoes and racks of clothes. Pricey stuff, too, Kori observed. Desmond Merrion suits and Salvatore Ferragamo shoes and Versace shirts and pants. She spied a Brunello Cucinelli sweatsuit and a Landon lambskin bomber jacket.
“The prince has expensive taste in clothes,” she said.
“Yes, I must say he’s quite the dresser,” Graham said. “Everything custom tailored, no doubt. Now, is there anything else, Agent Briggs, that you need to see here in the bedroom? I do believe I have held up our end of the bargain, wouldn’t you agree?”
Kori didn’t need to see anything else. It had never been her belief that she would somehow magically uncover some piece of evidence that MI5 had missed. But she’d needed to see the scene. It was important on an instinctual level to get a feel for not only what happened, but where and how it had happened. She’d needed a picture in her mind. Now she had it.
“No, Agent Graham, I don’t need to see anything else. You’ve been very patient. I would like to talk with the valet, however. He’s the one who discovered the prince was missing, correct? The next morning?”
“Yes, Kingsley Moore. He’s staying with relatives. We’ve had everyone clear out of the house until the prince is found. We consider the entire manor a crime scene. But, again, Agent Briggs, I don’t see the point. We’ve interviewed Mr. Moore quite extensively, I assure you. Also the butler, the maid, and Prince Grayson’s private secretary. Those were the people in the house that morning. Unfortunately, none were able to shed any light on what went on here during the night. Now, if you’d like, I can get you transcripts of those interviews. Will that suffice, Agent Briggs?”
It would not suffice, but Kori made a determination then and there that collaborating with Agent Victor Graham and MI5, notwithstanding Agent Graham’s smoky, gray eyes, was going to be a dead end. Clearly, she was going to have to drag whatever information she needed out of MI5; none would be given easily. Just as well. Kori preferred investigating on her own anyway. Investigation by committee—indeed anything by committee—always tested Kori’s patience.
“Yes, that will suffice,” she replied.
“Very well. We’ll swing by HQ and I’ll give you copies of those transcripts. While we’re there, you can tell us what you know about Dempsey. I believe that was the deal we struck, yes, Agent Briggs?”