‘“Here be gold”,’ said Quine.
‘Hah. Actually it just said, “TIP MARKS THE SPOT”. Handwritten in red capitals. Someone out there must have become aware of my interest and saw me as a go-between.’
‘They could have posted it direct to the police.’
‘Perhaps they reckoned I’d make sure it got to the right person quickly. I rang the new head of CID. She doesn’t hang about and asked me to come straight in. She ordered a search to start at daybreak. We should arrive just in time.’
‘For what…’
‘Has to be a pattern, doesn’t there?’
Yes, Quine said to himself, there does. He began to assess the implications.
A single motorcycle policeman was stationed at the gated entrance. Boyes gave his name, referenced the head of CID, waited for a phone call to be made, and was waved through. The arrow on the map pointed to a corner of the outer perimeter wall by the former shipwright’s quarters, the one remaining building from the old dockyard. An excavation area had been drawn, taking initially the first ten yards of the corner walls.
Boyes drove as near as he could along a dirt track and was greeted by a fast-approaching Jim Letts.
‘Nothing yet. They’ve advanced a yard on each line.’
‘Meaning they’ve covered a fifth of the area,’ said Boyes, pleased with his speedy calculation.
‘Edith’s in charge,’ said Letts, pointing to a strong-looking woman in overalls, who was alternating between two lines of four diggers.
A woman’s shriek came from one of them. Edith was by her side in an instant and down on her knees, scraping away in the trench. She stood and marked the perimeter of a small area, around two by two yards.
‘What’s going on, Edith?’ asked Letts.
‘Not sure.’
‘Can we get closer?’ asked Quine.
‘Leave them be for the moment,’ replied Letts.
The three men waited and listened to the murmurs of quiet scraping and chipping as stones and earth were peeled away in narrow swathes. An hour passed. Thermoses of tea and coffee were produced. Then a second. At last Edith rose and walked over, addressing herself to Letts. ‘I need to get a SOCO,’ she said quietly.
‘Can we?’ asked Letts.
‘I guess so, as you reported it. Just a quick peep.’ They followed her to what they could now see had become a four-foot-deep hole in the ground. ‘The initial finder hit what looked like a toe. Since then we’ve been able to expose the feet, and make our way up the body.’
Quine looked down. His eyes stopped at the waist and arm remains on each side.
Edith watched him. ‘Yes. No right hand.’
Quine nodded. The skeleton was lying on what looked like a large section of a shower curtain. He frowned. ‘What’s… what’s this?’ His voice shook.
‘Exactly,’ said Edith. She paused. ‘No head. No skull.’
‘My God,’ said Boyes, the triumphalism of the morning now subdued.
‘I can give you some basics. A young woman. Small. Five two, maybe five three.’
‘Any idea how long it’s been here?’ asked Quine.
‘We’ll need to work on that. Like the hand, I’d say within the last twenty to forty years. But, as with the hand, the section of shower curtain, assuming it’s the same, will give us better idea. So twenty-five to thirty-five.’
‘Is it possible that the skeleton is of that age, but has been buried here much more recently?’
‘Why would anyone do that?’ asked Edith. ‘But since you ask… I’ve supervised this dig. I’d have noticed it a mile off.’
‘And the original hand?’
‘Maybe. I wasn’t there. Mind you, the way those bones had been packed was a bit unusual. Didn’t change what they were though.’ She raised her eyes from the earth grave and skeleton that occupied it. ‘Time’s up.’
‘What about the head?’ asked Letts.
Edith shrugged. ‘Let’s assume – we still have to confirm it – the hand belongs. That came from half a mile over there,’ she said, pointing across the empty ground. ‘Let’s further assume the skull is somewhere here. What would you have us do, Jim? Dig the whole place up? Probably quicker to wait till your friend with the map gives us another clue.’
‘When it was just the hand with the ring, it may have been macabre,’ said Boyes in his cluttered sitting room, ‘but it somehow intrigued as well as repelled. Now…’
‘Quite,’ said Letts grimly, sipping his cup of tea. ‘Somebody killed a young woman, dismembered her body, cut off her head and got rid of it.’
‘Why?’ asked Quine. ‘Decapitation, for God’s sake.’
In the hour that had passed since the discovery, he had felt the screw turning on the history the Prime Minister had asked him to explore. He urgently needed to tell Sandford, if only to prepare him for the headline splash that Geoff and Jim, despite their qualms, must be contemplating. How would – or could – Sandford react? Perhaps he would see this as evidence of something so impossible for him to be involved in that it could be encouraging. Against that, no word uttered by Jed Fowkes had yet been disproved. If anything, his allegation had gained weight.
‘It removes dental evidence, doesn’t it?’ Letts sighed, as if nothing could be more obvious.
Boyes turned to Quine. ‘What now, Joe?’
‘You’re first to a hell of a story. A participant in it, too, with the map. If you want that known.’
‘Back to the Mail, I guess?’
‘If it all helps to set up the newsletter, why not?’
Quine calculated. The police would soon issue a statement. It would hit the Sunday papers, come what may. There was no point in trying to prevent it. ‘They should pay you properly this time,’ he said. ‘I know the Mail on Sunday editor.’
‘How much, do you reckon?’ asked Boyes.
‘Five figures for sure,’ replied Quine without a beat.
Eyebrows raised, Boyes and Letts looked at each other and exchanged a silent nod. ‘Let’s get writing,’ said the old newspaperman, a veteran of print remounting his charger.
‘I’ll ring him now.’ Quine made the call and fixed the price. The next move must follow fast. Sandford had to know before the Sundays began their print run.
28
Stretching out in the back of the Prime Minister’s custom-built, armoured Jaguar, escorts in front and behind, Robin Sandford felt, for the first time since Jed Fowkes had stopped him at the party conference, that he might at last be ahead of the game.
Jed had acted impetuously towards Morland-Cross. His motives remained mysterious – for a moment Sandford wondered whether he had been diagnosed with advanced cancer or some other fatal prognosis and his story was a lever to exert power before he died. Perhaps he should ask him if he was all right.
Nothing made sense but, however scary these past days, he was still Prime Minister. There was an unexpected bonus. Even if Morland-Cross hung on as Chancellor, the grassroots would never make him leader now. He would not have the tricky job of reneging on their ‘deal’.
The comforting stream of thoughts was interrupted by the beep of a text message. He hesitated; it was not the usual sounds of his mobile. Then he remembered – it was the ‘burner’. He shuddered. The head of the protection officer sitting next to the driver in front whipped round. Sandford smiled sweetly back – the head reverted.
He took the phone from an inside jacket pocket.
Need to meet without any delay. It can’t wait. Will travel anywhere. Am coming from London. Jonathan.
Quine had been clear the phone was for one-off emergency use only. What had come up? For sure, it wouldn’t be good. If life had been easy, he could have just phoned back and asked. Sometimes he felt more like a prisoner than a Prime Minister.
It was an informal Chequers weekend – mainly friends of Carol, hospitality all paid for by her. She and the girls had driven down ahead and, if the usual pattern prevailed, her guests would be soon arriving for lunc
h. The idea of meeting Quine at the Prime Minister’s official country house seemed inappropriate, not to mention the rushed preparations for Special Branch to clear him. There appeared to be no choice. He looked at his watch – just before noon – and texted back.
Has to be Chequers. We have guests arriving for informal weekend. Am on my way there now. Tell me when. Paul.
A few minutes passed, then another ping of a phone, this time his personal mobile. The screen showed a message from Joe Quine.
Just to remind, am looking forward to discussion re biography we arranged for early afternoon at Chequers. Arriving by taxi from Wendover station. Should be around 2.30. No more than hour needed. If security needs to know, plan taxi to wait and take me on to Reading station. Best, Joe.
In addition to the confirmation, Sandford understood the implication. Don’t use the burner phone again.
Half an hour later the Jaguar swished through the gates of Chequers. The mini-paradise of rural isolation in one of England’s most enchanting landscapes held one illusion – constant armed watch was kept for snipers on hilltops and approaching drones. But from the house and garden and the estate beyond, you would never have known. The imposing mass of the grand Elizabethan house should have been a fortress against turbulence, the surrounding parkland and hills a folding embrace of comfort. A weekend here, unless it had to be spent pacifying a trouble-making Cabinet Minister or showing off the Nelson Room to visiting dignitaries, was meant to be a haven. Quine’s text had put paid to all that.
The taxi arrived shortly after 2.30 p.m. and was asked to wait in a car park a short walk from the main entrance. In the few minutes’ gap after Sandford’s initial text reply, Quine had worked out that, by getting a train to Wendover, a taxi to Chequers and then on to Reading station – at the Prime Minister’s expense – he should comfortably make it to Cornwall by late evening. The afternoon was grey, a chill wind coming from the north. He imagined well-fed guests settling by a glowing fire in front of the day’s rugby internationals.
Sandford met him in the lobby. ‘Got a coat?’
‘I left it in the taxi.’
‘You’ll manage. We’re going for a walk.’
There was no small talk. Quine explained the discovery of the headless skeleton and the near certainty that it matched the hand with the ring.
‘Hell,’ said the Prime Minister under his breath. His first question was instant and simple. ‘Does Jed know?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘How did they know where to dig?’
Quine had hoped he would not ask. He was tempted to say that, as with the initial discovery, a workman had come across some bones by chance.
Sandford sensed his reluctance. ‘Just tell me.’
Quine explained the map that had been sent to Boyes, with its message in red ink. ‘Presumably the same hand that sent the newspaper articles to Fowkes.’ Quine described his collaboration with Boyes and Letts. ‘I hadn’t wanted to bother you with all that,’ he concluded.
‘I want to know everything,’ said Sandford.
‘They’ve sold the story to the Mail on Sunday. I expect it to be their splash tomorrow. I thought you had to know.’
Sandford stopped, looking up at the overhead gloom. ‘What next?’
Quine could only shrug.
‘Maybe,’ Sandford continued, ‘it’s helpful. Even Jed won’t blag he’s been chopping off heads.’
Quine felt a curious satisfaction at Sandford having one of the reactions he had forecast. ‘Robbie, what, exactly, did he say about what happened to the girl after he’d called his “friend” to help? Can you remember?’
Sandford was silent for a few seconds. Quine shivered. ‘Not every precise word but the content, yes. He said he had a “friend” from a different world to ours. And this friend, along with someone else he didn’t then know, took the girl away. He suggested they drop her at a hospital. He said the friend later told him that they had “disposed of her”. Those three words are precise. He said his friend never told him what they meant.’
‘Some friend,’ said Quine. ‘Unless “friend” is actually a euphemism for Jed himself.’
‘Jed dismember a body?’
‘You’re the one who knows him.’
Sandford shook his head. ‘If this skeleton is really that girl, Jed must have had a bloody unusual friend.’
‘In which case we need to dig deep into the Jed of thirty years ago,’ said Quine.
‘He never introduced any such friend to me.’ Sandford, too, shivered. ‘I ought to get back.’
‘OK,’ said Quine. ‘It seems to me this is where we are. Right now Jed Fowkes is an undetonated bomb. We don’t know for sure whether it’s a dud or contains real explosive. We won’t know till we have all the facts. So far there’s a dismembered body, the place it was buried and a timescale. Beyond that we have a story told by Jed of how one particular evening played out. You agree how that evening started – you have no memory of how it ended. I’m going to be very honest, Robbie. Jed still holds the cards.’
‘If he’s daft enough to implicate himself in murder—’
‘He’ll have worked that out. His threat can always be that he’ll plea-bargain with the police to give evidence against you in return for leniency towards himself—’
‘He’d still have to be mad—’
‘Yes, but that’s not the point. The point is the threat. The hold he’s trying to build. As I said, the unexploded bomb. Until we unearth the truth, we have to treat him as highly fragile. After the story comes out tomorrow, he’ll want to see you, to frighten you more. Ride with it. Ride with whatever he wants. Do whatever he wants.’
‘I can’t do that,’ Sandford protested.
‘You have to,’ said Quine. ‘And I – and the MI5 officer attached—’
‘Can you tell me?’
‘Best not. I and she—’
‘She?’
‘Yes. We have to get to the bottom of all this, Fowkes’s motives above all, before he can execute – or force you to execute – whatever plan he’s got in mind.’
‘How much time have we got?’ asked Sandford.
‘Don’t know. I’m sure we’re in a race of some kind or other. There has to be an endplay. But Jed himself may not yet know exactly what it is.’
‘Next steps?’
‘I need to get on with speaking to anyone who knew you then. Starting with Mikey Miller.’
‘I’ll ring him.’
‘Good. And Robbie, ride with Jed. It’s the only way.’
They were back at the front drive. ‘Joe,’ said Sandford softly, ‘what do you think? I mean, really think?’
Quine, puzzled, replied, ‘What do you mean?’
‘I keep having nightmarish images.’ His face sagged, his voice a murmur. ‘I even have a half-memory of a girl lying semi-naked in my bedroom and blokes visiting her one by one. Could I have ever been part of that? Surely to God, that’s not me. I can’t stop asking myself. Did something bad actually happen?’
Quine hesitated. ‘I think something bad did happen. And some kind of fallout is happening now. But you’d never be a bad man, Robbie. Not knowingly.’
Later, standing alone in front of a bathroom mirror, a distorted image of Jed Fowkes, face pinched and finger jabbing, flashed before Sandford. As the image faded, he reminded himself of Quine’s mantra: Ride with Jed. Easy to give advice if you were not the one having to carry it out. You’ll have the greatest political scoop of all time. It seemed clever at the time. Now it left him cold.
He walked into the kitchen, where Carol was inspecting the tea trolley. ‘You were out for a while. Was it my friends?’
He tried to smile. ‘No. I was having a catch-up with Joe Quine.’
She frowned. ‘Couldn’t it have waited?’
‘No. Nothing’s over till it’s over.’
‘Do you still mean M-C?’
‘Joe reckons there may be more to come.’
She turned towards
the fridge, then stopped. ‘Just tell me, my darling. You can’t keep everything locked up inside. It’s too much for one person to bear. That’s why I’m here.’
He closed his eyes and sighed. ‘There’s nothing I want to do more, love. But this time I can’t. I just can’t.’
29
The taxi bringing Quine from Bodmin Parkway arrived at 7, The Waves, just before 10 p.m. No doubt alerted by its headlights, Mrs Trelight stood in the porch, ready to greet him as the prodigal son.
‘You’ve been gone for an age, Mr Q.’
‘Only just over a week, Mrs T.’
‘Any news of your book?’
‘Not yet, I’m afraid.’
‘Well, I hope that person – whoever he was – will make sure it’s a best-seller.’
‘And I’ll send you a signed copy. By the way what did my visitor look like?’
‘Nice-looking, respectable, I’d say. Maybe in his forties? He wore a suit and spoke like a gentleman. It was just the hair. Rather “bouffant” for a man, I thought.’ She sniffed. ‘I even detected a touch of pomade.’
You truly do come out with some gems, thought Quine. ‘Well, it will have to remain a mystery.’ For sure, it was not Riley Trueman. No description could have less suited the shambling, unkempt, overweight, wheezing figure he cut.
On the Sunday morning, Quine rose with the sun and, almost twelve months to the day since he arrived, embarked on his final trek to the point and back. He made a quick calculation for the period of what he now saw as his exile. Three thousand miles plus walked, some seven hundred thousand feet climbed, twenty-five Everests, give or take a foot or two. It was not just an exile, but a reinvention. The book was its physical manifestation. Starting out, he had seen himself as a latter-day Zola; the book his ‘J’Accuse…!’. In the end, it was just another chapter in the long history of human injustice. His labour was not the crushing of rock but the tapping of keys. Now it was over. From here on his story would be in the hands of others. Whether or not it changed the world, he had set the record straight. That was what mattered.
A Time to Lie Page 16