‘Eh? What are you on about?’ Lily murmured.
‘Suspicious behaviour? Describe it, Fanshawe.’ Sandilands was peremptory.
Fanshawe enjoyed the incredulity for a moment. ‘I watched as the food was being put out. I watched as Wentworth followed the prince to a table. There she snatched his plate from him and replaced it with her own. Oh, it was neatly done. But the movement was not in the briefing. It exceeded instructions. It was surreptitious and possibly suspect. We were at the ball to prevent a young woman — a young woman with certain social graces — “Mayfair”, I believe, was the Assistant Commissioner’s judgement — from getting close enough to the prince to kill him. And here was one such sitting by his side and forcing the food of her choice on the prince with all the skill of a music-hall card sharp. She could easily have anointed the oysters with something nasty held in her hand. If I’d made a fuss and had both plates taken away at that moment, the poison would have been discovered there and then. And Prince Gustavus would still be alive. You have my unqualified apology, sir.’
Rupert drooped then raised his head in defiance. He swept his floppy blond quiff off his forehead, the better to stun them with his blue eyes ablaze with an emotion which clearly anticipated a coming martyrdom. ‘I’m ready to accept whatever proportion of blame you care to assign to me, sir.’ And he added coldly into the shocked silence: ‘After you’ve chucked the book at Wentworth.’
Lily shivered, devastated by the implications. The two plates had been exactly alike. If Fanshawe had proceeded with the scheme he’d just outlined there was every chance the plates would have been confused on their way to the laboratory. Intentionally or accidentally. Who would ever know? She wouldn’t have been able to distinguish them herself. Both carried her fingerprints and those of the prince. Accusations would have been made. From what they’d stitched together of her background she knew they could make a spectacularly convincing case against her. ‘Left-wing, anti-royalist, worms her way into the Royal Presence …’ Poison was known to be a woman’s choice of weapon.
A pit of horror opened up before her. If they were seeking an easy suspect to cover for their incompetence, she would find herself occupying a cell in Vine Street within the hour. She looked instinctively to the commander for support.
Her appeal went unacknowledged. He was watching Fanshawe, head on one side, quizzical, encouraging him to go further. It occurred to her — and the realization hit her like a thump in the stomach — that for these men, all of whom had a position to lose, the career, the life even, of a lowly woman policeman on the point of leaving the service anyway would count for little. She was expendable. They were officers. Ex-military. It was men of their kind who’d sent out Tommies to die in their thousands on the Somme. She too was no more than cannon fodder.
She’d been sitting here playing eeny meeny miney mo, choosing the unlucky victim, never thinking to enter her own name in the draw. If these five men were to behave in concert she was ruined. And there was every sign that, with Sandilands acting as ringmaster, they were coming to an understanding.
Coming to? These were men trained to think and plan weeks and years ahead. The chilling thought came to her that the understanding might have been arrived at some time ago, an undeclared Plan B. If all else fails, look to a scapegoat. Once again she felt the presence of the sacrificial altar and the raised knife.
Lily locked stares with Fanshawe, grasping for words to attempt a defence. Finding none.