Play his game but do it better . . .
Play his game. But also, something to do with Bradshaw.
Bethany didn’t know Bradshaw. Not really. Poe and Clara, in her Doctor Lang capacity, had discussed her at length obviously, but the two personalities rarely bled into each other. So when Bethany said Bradshaw was somewhere to start, it had nothing to do with her extraordinary intellect. It was something to do with her as a person. No, that was wrong. It was something to do with what she meant to him. Play his game, only better, and use Bradshaw.
Logically, that could only mean one thing. Poe needed to make Ezekiel Puck so angry with him that he became his sole focus. And when that happened, Puck wouldn’t go after him, he’d go after his nearest and dearest. That’s why Bethany had asked who he would run into a burning building for. Because she knew Puck would go after Bradshaw. Just like he had with Alastor Locke. He hadn’t killed the old spymaster; he’d killed his daughter-in-law.
Play his game but do it better . . .
Involve Bradshaw.
Speaking of the next stage in human evolution. . .Bettys was on the corner of Parliament Street. On the opposite corner was some sort of fashion shop. He couldn’t quite see the name, but it began with J. Poe watched a woman dressing a window mannequin. Poe smiled. The mannequin looked like Bradshaw. Another one. He wondered if it was a Yorkshire thing. Or maybe all mannequins looked like that. He’d never really paid them any attention. This case was throwing up mannequins like a size-zero model throws up their breakfast. Every mannequin in North Yorkshire looked like Bradshaw and Ezekiel Puck had used one as a decoy after he’d lured Commander Mathers to that skyscraper roof. Everyone had had their eyes peeled for a lone gunman. Puck’s mannequin had allowed him to hide in plain sight. He had set a trap.
Which made Poe think of his beautiful, eccentric fiancée. Specifically, the wedding favours she and her friend Emma were putting together. No sugared almonds for the guests of Estelle Doyle and Washington Poe. No, they were getting carnivorous plants. Venus flytraps for the ladies, huntsman’s horns for the men.
Traps.
Carnivorous plants like the Venus flytrap didn’t rely on disguise. They didn’t hide in plain sight, didn’t try to look like something else. The inner walls of their leaves were coated with nectar. So, despite looking like a miniature bear trap, the flies and the bugs and the other creepy-crawlies couldn’t resist exploring the inside of the trapping structure. And as soon as they did – SNAP.
Mannequins and carnivorous plants. Ezekiel Puck and Bradshaw.
Play his game but do it better . . .
Bethany had said it was as though he was locked in a game of chess. Poe didn’t play chess. But he understood the basics. She’d also said it was a game of strategy and counterstrategy. Which it was. But it was also a game of sacrifice.
And the bigger the sacrifice, the greater the reward.
Poe knew what Bethany wanted him to do. He had to do the unthinkable.
He had to sacrifice his queen.
He had to sacrifice Bradshaw.
Chapter 93
The Council of Highwood
‘Obviously, we aren’t putting Tilly at risk,’ Poe said when he’d finished explaining what he wanted to do. ‘We’ll use a mannequin instead.’
His assembled audience of Locke, Flynn, Bradshaw, Doyle and even Uncle Bertie stared at him in astonishment.
Flynn was the first to break cover. ‘A fuckingmannequin?’ she snorted. ‘Are you out of your mind?’
Poe shrugged. ‘Why not? It worked for Puck.’ He didn’t add that North Yorkshire mannequins looked like Bradshaw anyway. Flynn already thought he’d lost his marbles. This would tip her over the edge.
‘Because Tilly moves, Poe.’ She paused. Thought through what she’d just said. Corrected herself. ‘Tillyoccasionallymoves. Mannequins don’t.’
‘I have a plan for that,’ Poe said. ‘It worked for Sherlock Holmes in “The Adventure of the Empty House”, and there’s no reason it won’t work for us.’
‘That’s fiction, Poe!’
‘The theory is sound, though,’ Poe countered. ‘And the execution is simple enough. Sherlock Holmes lures Moriarty’s henchman, Colonel Sebastian Moran, into shooting at a wax bust.’
‘Who’s Mrs Hudson in this whack-a-doodle plan? Who’s underneath the chair, making the mannequin move?’
Poe frowned. That was the weakest link in the chain. ‘I haven’t got that far,’ he admitted.
‘And who’s the kamikaze pilot in a wig who drives Tilly’s car to her parents’ house?’ Flynn asked. ‘Because we sure as shit aren’t asking Tilly to do it.’
