Dirty Business (The First Acer Sansom Novel)

by Oliver Tidy

  In the basement car park, she removed the cover from her friend’s car, stuffed it in the boot and, activating the electronic shutter of the underground garage, drove off into the Istanbul dusk.

  *

  Sansom awoke, fully clothed on the sagging bed, damp with sweat. Although having fallen back to sleep after speaking with Eda, he still felt tired. Despite the one window being wide open there was not a hint of a breeze. The heat and humidity of the Bodrum climate were oppressive. As he lay staring at the far wall gathering his thoughts, a small lizard scuttled across it. He watched it as it dodged from side to side and then disappeared behind the oversized and ancient wardrobe in the corner.

  Night’s darkness was still some way off. In an effort to reinvigorate himself, he showered under the meagre trickle of lukewarm water.

  Dripping wet, he sat on the bed and called Eda. ‘Have you left yet?’

  ‘Yes, I’m driving though. I didn’t want to risk air travel or public transport,’ she said.

  ‘I know the feeling.’ He sensed something in her voice. ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘Yes, fine. I’m tired and I’ve got a long way to come, that’s all.’

  ‘I’m grateful for all your help,’ he said. There was a short silence. ‘Where will you go when you arrive here?’

  ‘I told you that we have summer houses in Bodrum. I shall go to one of those. I’ll call you when I get there. I hope to arrive by lunchtime tomorrow.’

  ‘Take care,’ he said.

  *

  Sansom dressed in preparation for a walk around the town. As well as being hungry, he would investigate the large marina he had seen on his way into Bodrum. Possibly that was Botha’s destination. He wondered what Eda had meant by ‘summer house’. Probably some kind of holiday apartment like those he had seen that dotted the hillsides on his approach.

  Leaving his room, he fixed a barely-visible thread between the door and the jamb. It was a little Bondesque, but if it was good enough for James, it was good enough for him. He took the rear staircase, which opened out on to a cluttered, dingy, narrow passageway, at the end of which he could see throngs of tourists out for a good time – an unbroken stream of humanity flowing towards the sea. As he strode to join them, he prepared himself mentally to become one of them.

  *

  Tallis sat back in his booth trying to remember the last time he had eaten such wonderful food and been waited on so attentively. He was finishing his coffee and it was almost nine o’clock. He signalled for the bill, and was pleasantly surprised when it arrived. In preparation for his imminent meeting with Murat – the waiter had introduced himself shortly after the policeman had ordered his meal – he left a decent tip for the lad. Judging from the look on his face, he was not disappointed.

  Ten minutes later, the pair sat outside the rear of the hotel on a couple of plastic patio chairs. This was obviously where the kitchen and waiting staff took their breaks. Murat had removed his tie and was hurriedly demolishing a sandwich. With a mixture of sign-language and his pidgin English, he communicated to the DI that they had fifteen minutes.

  The newspaper lay on the plastic table in front of them. Tallis indicated the article under the life-like artist’s impression of Sansom, sat back and waited while the youth chewed and studied the text with equal concentration.

  ‘Why you interest this man?’ said the waiter, after a minute. Tallis smiled patiently. From his wallet he withdrew a fifty-lira note and placed it on the table between them. Tallis tapped his watch, indicating the passing of valuable time. Further explanation was unnecessary; the waiter refocused his mind to the task.

  After another minute, he said, ‘Him bad man, sir. It say, he kill man, here, Istanbul.’

  ‘Is he in prison?’ asked Tallis, trying to keep the surprise out of his voice. Murat frowned his lack of understanding. Tallis pointed to the picture and then puts his hands out to receive handcuffs. ‘Police?’ said Tallis.

  The boy shook his head vigorously. ‘No, no. They want her,’ he said.

  ‘Him,’ clarified Tallis, pointing once again at the drawing of Sansom.

  ‘Him,’ said Murat smiling. ‘Sorrys, we have not gender in my language. It difficulty.’ He bent to the article again. Tallis’s mind was still racing when Murat spoke again. ‘He not here now,’ he said.

  ‘How do you know?’ said Tallis, struck by this fresh disappointment, like a physical blow. How could he go from feeling so good to so bad so quickly?

  ‘It say, dead man not Turk, working for big, very bad man, name Botha. Security.’

  ‘How do you know’ said Tallis, speaking slowly and pointing to the picture again, ‘he not here now?’

  ‘My brother.’

  Tallis suddenly wondered if this boy in front of him understood anything at all. What the hell could his brother have to do with anything? His look must have transferred a question to the youth.

  ‘My brother, work boat supply, foods, drinks, stores,’ he explained. ‘He say big man, Botha, go on her, sorry, his, big boat yesterday. Go Bodrum. He,’ he continued, also pointing at the picture of Sansom, ‘want make trouble, Botha. He go Bodrum too, yes?’ And suddenly Tallis felt good again.

  ‘Makes good sense,’ said Tallis, nodding and smiling once again. ‘Thank you, Murat,’ he said. From his wallet he took another fifty-lira note and handed it over. The boy’s face was in danger of splitting in two. The detective rose to leave.

  ‘You want him?’ said Murat. The policeman nodded. ‘Why?’

  ‘Family,’ said Tallis.

  The youth’s eyes widened. ‘How you find him in Bodrum? Bodrum big place. Many sea.’ The policeman shrugged. ‘Sit,’ said Murat. ‘I call my brother. He know everything.’

  The policeman listened as Murat gabbled away excitedly on his mobile phone. He took a pen from his shirt pocket and began scribbling on the newspaper. He ended the call with what sounded like a volley of abuse.

  ‘Name of boat, Stella’, said Murat, pointing to where he had mis-spelled it. ‘Brother say he always go Akyarlar. Small place near Bodrum. Has big family house, home for holiday.’

  DI Tallis was speechless at his good fortune through the boy’s efforts. He reached again for his wallet to show his appreciation but Murat put his hand on his arm. ‘No, sir,’ he said, shaking his head, a serious expression settling on his young features, ‘for family, no charge.’

  Tallis didn’t trust himself to speak. A head poked around the kitchen door and barked at the youth. Murat jumped up, sensed something emotional in the older man, patted him on the shoulder and hurried back inside. The policeman sat for a minute longer, regaining his composure, before tearing off the piece of newspaper and heading back to his room.

  As he rode the lift, he allowed himself a smile at the way things turned out sometimes. He’d thought he would maybe find the man he was looking for from a newspaper, but not quite like that.

  *

  As he made his way towards the sea, Sansom was struck by the high number of tourists. Listening to their excited exchanges as they headed out for a night on the town, he detected several European languages, some North American voices and a number of British dialects. Street hawkers and shop workers called out phrases and invitations to the passing trade in accomplished predominantly-British accents, like well-trained parrots.

  Sansom appreciated the clear advantage that such a seasonal population would be to him. Not only would he blend in better as a foreigner but, if the shop and restaurant signs and menus were anything to go by, English was widely understood here.

  He allowed himself to be swept along with the flow of people until he arrived in a pedestrianised area that led out on to the marina. The sight of hundreds of ocean-going vessels lifted his spirits as they had always done. However, the association with the loss of everything that he held dear could never be far away from such a scene and he soon found himself remembering his last wonderful days with his family and then their horrific and needless deaths.

>   He found himself standing outside a bar advertising Steek & Chips but was equally drawn to the sign that offered happy hour drinks, two for the price of one. For the first time since he had returned to civilisation, he felt the need for what his ex-military friends would have called a good drink. With the only people alive that mattered to him far, far away in distance and time – Botha hundreds of miles out at sea and Eda hundreds of miles away on land – he was as alone as he could be, despite the thousands of fun-seekers milling around him. He went in.

  *

  The very friendly and extremely helpful young English-speaking girl at the hotel reception had listened sympathetically to the troubles of the hotel’s guest when he had explained to her his predicament. Despite the lateness of the hour, she had telephoned one of the chain’s sister hotels in Bodrum to make a reservation for him, in fact to transfer his reservation from Istanbul to Bodrum at no charge.

  Having confirmed availability and secured his accommodation, she then made phone calls to reserve him a seat on one of the red-eye flights that shuttled regularly between Turkey’s cultural capital and its holiday capital. A little expensive for a forty-five minute flight perhaps, but what did he expect at such late notice. And in any case, it was time that was of most value now, not money.

  When Tallis attempted to thank her in the same way that he had thanked Murat she, like Murat, had politely declined. It wasn’t necessary, she said, not where family were involved. She sincerely hoped that he managed to catch up with his son to pay him the surprise visit that he had flown all the way from England for and hadn’t managed in Istanbul.

  Finally, she ordered him a taxi to take him to the airport and had his bags carried out to it. Tallis’s good mood was dampened only slightly by the girl’s parting remark that she hoped that he had packed some lighter clothing, as he could expect temperatures in Bodrum to be well in excess of those of Istanbul. He’d deal with that when he got there.

  ***

  13

  Eda witnessed the sunrise on the road. With the visual intensity of an atomic explosion, it fractured the horizon as she crested a rise, forcing her to raise a hand to shield her tired eyes. Other than to refuel, she hadn’t interrupted her progress towards the tourist hotspot and a man she had come to think about in a way that she hadn’t thought of a man for a long time. The drive had given her the chance to explore these feelings, which she found both ridiculous and exciting.

  It amused her to think that not twenty-four hours before Sansom had also driven this same road. Had he stopped where she had stopped? Seen what she had seen? That broken-down stone building coming up, for example, or the groves of olive trees? What had been on his mind as he drove? Her, at all? She chided herself for her schoolgirl stupidity. Sansom had given no indication of any feelings towards her other than as a confidante and an accomplice.

  Inevitably, her thoughts also strayed between what she had done, and fled from, in Istanbul and what she would find, face, do, win or lose in Bodrum. She couldn’t shake off the bizarre idea that she was being inexorably drawn to her destiny. And she was afraid.

  Before long the vista opened up before her. As she sometimes had in the years that she had driven to Bodrum, she pulled into a loose gravel pocket at the side of the road and got out of the car.

  From her lofty vantage point high up in the hills that embraced the area, she was able to look down at the sprawling panorama of the holiday capital of Turkey. Little enclaves of white boxes, taking advantage of the best geography, were packed so tightly together in places that they might have been one huge solid mass of concrete.

  The steep hills that backed these separate little communities demonstrated both the developers’ greed and the sun-seekers’ need for yet more building as newer communities sprang up, patching the arid landscape white like some poorly-designed chess board.

  At this time of year Bodrum would be heaving not just with the Turks who could afford to escape the suffocating heat and humidity of the bigger cities but also thousands of holidaymakers of all ages and nationalities.

  Any other year, the sight would have filled her with a sense of pleasure and anticipation for the weeks of sea, sun and fun to come. This time, however, despite the warmth of the early morning, all she felt was a dread chill filter through her. She wrapped her arms around herself.

  Once, she thought, the place must have looked like paradise from where she stood – before Man’s concrete assault paradoxically began the ruination of the very environment that made him invest in the area. Would it always be only a matter of time and money before the need to develop areas of outstanding natural beauty outstripped Man’s admiration for them? Thank goodness there were still some idyllic pockets of the area where the authorities had elected to cease development. She felt grateful, if a little hypocritical, that her family owned a villa in one of them.

  Her gaze took in the superb sweep of the Aegean, glistening in the early morning light, stretching out towards Greek territory; the differing hues of green and blue combined to create the most inviting scene. She tried to make out details of the ships anchored across the bay but was too far away. How long before Botha’s was one of them? she wondered. Was he already here?

  The sudden rush of a tourist coach roaring past startled her out of her reverie. She saw the white faces of a fresh batch of visitors pressed up against the windows, staring out eagerly at their home for the next week or two. As the coach disappeared around the bend in a cloud of dust and fumes, she turned back to the view with a sigh and, kicking a stone over the edge, walked back to her car and prepared to follow.

  *

  DI Tallis observed the sunrise through the tiny aircraft cabin window from thirty-thousand feet. He shouldn’t have. He should have been tucked up in his hotel bed hours before. However, flight delays, the curse of the airborne traveller, had contrived to keep him and hundreds like him penned up like livestock at market in Istanbul’s second airport for most of the night.

  Unlike the majority of his fellow passengers, his body had not managed to succumb to the tiredness that he felt. His mind was alive with what he viewed now as the probability rather than the possibility that he could finally catch up with Sansom. If Sansom had been a needle in a haystack in Istanbul, surely he would be easier to locate in Bodrum. Now he had to hope that he could reach Sansom before Sansom reached Botha.

  Tallis felt that locating Botha’s area and his yacht would not be a problem if Murat’s information was good, of course. His over-riding concern was time. He had no idea of the South African’s itinerary or what sort of speeds his craft was capable of. For all the policeman knew, Botha may intend to cruise the Aegean or further afield for a fortnight before arriving at his holiday destination. For Tallis, that scenario would open up a whole set of different problems that he preferred not to think about for the moment. For now, he had his goals: get himself to his hotel, find and get himself to Akyarlar, there to begin his searching.

  *

  Acer Sansom saw the sunrise from the shore of the Aegean. He didn’t plan it, it just happened. He’d managed the ‘steek’ and chips and one of his two drinks but was unable to stomach the drunken advances of a tattooed, sun-burnt, overweight Geordie struggling hopelessly against the tide of time and the effects of her obviously-unhealthy lifestyle. Forgoing his free pint, he had slipped away, suddenly and acutely aware of how dangerous a ‘good drink’ could be for him.

  He had found Bodrum at night difficult to deal with. Crowds of vocal revellers had spilled from even noisier bars on to the promenade, fuelled by alcoholic concoctions and inflated egos. For the most part, he found it a depressing spectacle. The hedonistic aspirations of these foreigners, whose idea of a good time was to drink and party all night and spend the whole of the next day either in their beds sleeping it off or unconscious, roasting on a sun-lounger, demonstrated little ambition. Still, he thought, it was their lives. He realised with a half smile that he must be getting old to be fostering such opinions. He remembered
a time when he had been just as bad.

  He had taken a walk around the marina, feeling safe in the belief that Botha would not have arrived yet. And even if he had, Sansom was anonymous in the crowds and the darkness. The hundreds of moored ships impressed upon him how difficult it would be for him to find Botha’s yacht if, indeed, this was where he intended to come.

  Criss-crossing the floating walkways at the farthest end of the marina, a place obviously reserved for the larger craft, he came upon a vessel that stopped him in his tracks. Moored beneath the ancient castle walls that had been built to defend Bodrum against half the nationalities that were currently invading it was a tall-rigged ship that could have been a sister to The Rendezvous. The lines of her bow and stern he would know anywhere. The arrangement of the deck was twin-like. He knew from experience that such ships, exact replicas of each other, existed. It wasn’t unusual. He fought against the idea that this could be The Rendezvous. He searched her hull for a name, finding Ocean Gazer emblazoned under the bow.

  His head swam with the mixture of images and memories that the vessel conjured vividly in his mind, temporarily disorientating him. Staggering away, he missed his step on the swaying walkway and collided with an elderly couple. He murmured his apologies as he quickened his pace away from them. As he went, he heard the woman lament to her companion how sad it was that people came to Bodrum just to get drunk.

  Sansom chose to make his way back to his hotel using the quieter side roads, away from the pavements constantly thronging with people. He stopped at a quiet bar in need of a drink and some anonymous human company. Before he managed to finish his first drink, however, a Turkish folk guitarist had embarked upon his repertoire of melancholy tunes. Another night, he might have borne it. Throwing in the towel on his evening, he had gone back to his room. No one had interfered with his arrangement of cotton on the frame. He showered again and flopped down on to the bed, hoping that sleep and morning would both come soon.