Atherton did an enormous stir-fry for quickness’ sake, and the four of them sat around the table companionably, as if they had known each other for years, with the cats teetering on the backs of armchairs, trying to see over peoples’ shoulders, and purring like food mixers. Joanna hoped so much that Atherton and Emily could survive the end of the case and the realisations that were bound to come over her then, because they seemed so right together – as right as Joanna felt with Bill.
It was inevitable they should talk about the case, and a lot of it was rehashing the supposed Waverley B plot, guessing how much money the whole thing was worth, and wondering despairingly how people could be so fixated on money.
‘Because they’ve got nothing else in their lives,’ Slider said.
‘That’s all very well, but Tyler, at least, did have other things in his life, before he destroyed them by his own hand,’ said Atherton.
‘We’ve got to find documentary evidence,’ Slider said. ‘I can’t believe Bates got hold of the only copies. Where would your father keep something that important?’ he asked Emily.
‘In his computer,’ she said with a shrug.
‘He wouldn’t give a copy to anyone? He didn’t send you anything, like a data disc or a memory stick?’
‘I’d have said so if he did,’ she said patiently.
‘What about a friend? Candida Scott-Chatton for instance?’
‘No. He wouldn’t implicate her when it was something as dangerous as this. And she’d have told you, surely, if he gave her something and told her to guard it with her life.’
Atherton looked at her sharply. She was holding the locket, warming it in her hand as she so often did. ‘He did send you something.’
She met his eyes. ‘My birthday present?’
‘Why did he send it to you if he knew you were coming over? He could have given it to you in person.’
‘He wanted me to have it on the day,’ she said.
‘Which was a week ago. And Masseter was killed two weeks ago. Allowing for the post—’
‘You think he sent Emily the locket when he heard Masseter was dead?’ Joanna said. ‘But why? You couldn’t get a data disc in that.’
‘I’d have noticed,’ Emily agreed, with quiet humour.
‘But he did tell you it was very valuable and warned you not to let it out of your sight,’ Atherton persisted.
‘No, he warned me not to lose it. I was the one who decided to wear it all the time. I like it. And it reminds me of him.’ Her eyes filled abruptly with tears. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. Slider passed her across his handkerchief, and she accepted it and blotted her eyes, biting her lips to regain control.
Atherton said, ‘I can’t help thinking that he may have sent you a clue of some sort with it. Did it come in a box?’
‘Yes, a jeweller’s box, in a Jiffy bag. But there was nothing else in it.’
‘I don’t suppose you have the box with you?’
‘Yes, it’s in my case. But honestly, there’s nothing else in it except the card that came with it, and unless you’re suggesting there’s a microdot . . . ?’
‘Well, you never know,’ Atherton said.
‘I do. Where would he get access to the technology to compress all his files into a microdot?’
‘But I’d like to have a look at it, if you don’t mind,’ Atherton said, and she shrugged and went upstairs, returning with an ordinary jeweller’s box about four inches square, in red leatherette. Inside was the usual black velvet bracer, with slits where the chain would have been secured to hold the locket in place, and a square, stiff card with some handwriting on it.
‘You’re right, your dad’s handwriting is terrible,’ Atherton said. ‘What does it say?’
Emily took it back. ‘It says “Happy birthday, darling. I hope you like it. It’s valuable so be sure not to lose it. It will be something to remember me by, even if you’re glad to see the back of me.”’
‘That’s an odd thing to say, isn’t it?’ Atherton said, frowning. ‘Why would you be glad to see the back of him?’
‘Oh, it’s a sort of old joke,’ she said. ‘He didn’t like it when I went to live in the States, because he was going to miss me, and he said it must be because I didn’t like having him hanging around me, spoiling my pitch. A joke about me being a better journalist than him – which wasn’t true. He was the best there was.’
Atherton held out his hand. ‘Would you let me look at it?’
‘There’s nothing in it except a picture of him,’ she said, but she undid the clasp anyway, and handed it across.
Atherton took it, warm from her hand, smooth and pleasant to the touch. It didn’t look old, that was his judgement. There’s a look to old, second-hand gold. This looked quite new. And it didn’t look valuable to him, either – not enough to warrant a warning. It was worth maybe a couple of hundred pounds, not more. He prised it open with a thumbnail, and inside was a photograph of Stonax, smiling and looking rather windblown with that shock of dark hair. The photograph was held in place by a thin oval bezel. He thumbnailed that off, as well, and lifted out the photograph, which he saw had been cut with scissors to fit the oval shape. There was nothing behind it but the back of the locket.
He turned the photograph over. On the back was some very small, neat writing.
BZ793A58
He handed it to Slider. ‘Eight randomly assorted numbers and letters,’ he said.
When Slider came back to the table from the telephone, he said, ‘Jimmy Pak says there’s an absolute mass of information there – notes, scanned documents, letters, cuttings from newspapers, you name it. It looks like the goods all right.’
Joanna reached over and kissed Atherton on the cheek. ‘Genius!’ she said. ‘Old planet-brain, the boy wonder.’
‘Fluke,’ said Atherton. ‘It was Ed Stonax who was the clever one, thinking of hiding it that way.’
‘I don’t know why I didn’t think of it,’ Emily said. ‘I’m embarrassed.’
‘Don’t be. How were you to know?’
‘But he said he had something important to tell me. I suppose when I got here he was going to tell me everything, show me the documents.’
‘I’m not quite there,’ Joanna said. ‘He copied everything into the computer and encrypted the files?’
‘The Arbuthnots heard him tapping away day and night,’ Slider said.
‘Then why did he keep the original stuff – assuming that was what was in the file that was stolen?’
‘Insurance,’ Atherton said, ‘in case of a break-in. The way I see it, he wouldn’t leave everything in the file, but enough to look convincing, so that if they broke in they’d think they’d got the lot and (a) not tear the place apart and (b) feel confident they’d covered themselves. He knew they were ruthless – he must at least have suspected Danny’s “accident” was helped along. But probably he didn’t realise just how ruthless they were. He can’t have thought that they’d actually kill him – only cut him off at the pass like they did the first time.’
‘If he’d known,’ Emily said quietly, ‘it wouldn’t have stopped him.’
‘But he might have gone about it a different way,’ Slider said.
‘So if he had all Danny’s stuff,’ Joanna said, ‘what was he waiting for? Why didn’t he go public right away?’
‘Hard to say, until we see what there actually is in the encrypted files,’ Slider said. ‘It might be that there was something else he still needed. Or he might have been working it up into a final report. Or he may have had someone else involved and was waiting for them to act.’
‘But no-one else has come forward to say they were working with him.’
‘True. Well, I don’t know the answer to that.’
‘Of course, there wasn’t any particular hurry,’ Atherton said. ‘It wasn’t as if the leisure park was going to be built in one day, starting tomorrow. He may just have been considering what course his action should take. He had plenty of time.’
‘I don’t know until I look at the stuff. Jimmy Pak’s making copies, and we’ll have to go through it all tomorrow and see what we’ve got. And then get Porson in on it and start making up a case. But if your father took this trouble to get the information to you, I’m betting it will be significant.’
‘But you still don’t know where Bates is,’ Joanna said. ‘Not to rain on the party, but we can’t go home until you get him.’ She anticipated Atherton’s next words and said, ‘We can’t stay here with you for ever, Jim. Even if you were willing to keep us, what about Derek?’
‘Derek?’
‘The baby.’
‘Why on earth—?’
‘Don’t ask,’ said Slider. ‘Is that your phone?’
Atherton went out into the kitchen, where they heard him say, ‘Oh, hi . . . Yes, he is. Did you want to . . . What? Good for you! Yeah, yeah, I’m writing it down. Brilliant. OK, I’ll tell him. Love to Tony . . . No, I mean it. Bye.’
He came back in, grinning. ‘That was Norma. She was waiting for a call back from an estate agent friend – or in her case, probably a former lover.’
‘Pots and kettles,’ Joanna muttered.
‘Anyway, she’s found – or rather he had found – Richard Tyler. He’s bought a house in Holland Park Avenue. And given what property costs along there, he must have done very well out of Brussels and whatever else he’s been up to since he went away. He moved in at the end of August.’
‘Just about the time Bates escaped,’ said Joanna.
‘Holland Park Avenue’s right on our doorstep,’ Slider said. ‘Not much more than half a mile from the station.’
‘Also just round the corner from Aubrey Walk,’ Atherton added, ‘where Bates’s house is.’
‘And a hundred yards or so from where they found the black Focus,’ Slider added grimly. Joanna glanced at him, and knew that expression. She felt a cold chill, though she wasn’t sure what she feared. ‘I said that Bates hadn’t a friend in the world but Tyler – if you can call him a friend. But friend or not, he’s the one person Bates can be sure won’t shop him. What would be more natural than that he should hole up with Tyler? On his old stamping ground, which criminals always like, being creatures of habit. And handy for his old house if he needs a bit of equipment. I’m sure Tyler could arrange that. Tyler came back to England at the end of July, and Bates was sprung at the end of August.’
‘And all the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t find him,’ Atherton said. ‘Well, of course they couldn’t if he was under the wing of a former minister and EU commissioner.’
Joanna was still looking at Slider and reading his mind. ‘Bill, no. You’re not to.’
‘Just a look,’ he said. ‘I promise I’m not going to do anything, but I just want to have a look.’
Atherton looked at him too. ‘What, now?’
‘Why not?’
‘I’m coming with you, then.’
Slider said to Joanna. ‘Just a look. And I’ll feel better about leaving you because you won’t be alone, with Emily.’
‘Better let them get it out of their system,’ Emily said to her. ‘You know what boys are like.’
She was easy about letting Atherton go, Joanna thought, because their love was so new, and she couldn’t yet imagine anything bad happening to him. Perhaps it was another thing to lay at pregnancy’s door. But she had never tried to stop him doing what he felt he had to. It was just that the longer she knew him and the more she loved him, the harder it was to let him go.
Nineteen
Down and Out
They drove to the station in Atherton’s car and left it there, to take an unmarked car out of the pool instead. It was possible, Slider thought, that they knew the number of Atherton’s car as well as his, and he didn’t want them to look out of the window and see it, and know they were being watched. Atherton thought he was being unnecessarily cautious.
‘But since you are, hadn’t we better tell someone upstairs where we’re going?’
They went up to the department, where Mackay was on night duty. He was at his desk having a bunny with Fathom, who was sitting on the other side of it, evidently waylaid on his way home, since he was wearing his street clothes, a bomber jacket and a pair of lamentable cut-away leather driving gloves.
‘Hello, guv. Something up?’ Mackay said.
Slider explained, and Mackay whistled. ‘Very nice. Very cosy, and handy for everything. No wonder Bates could follow you around so easy, guv. What’re you going to do?’
‘Just go and have a gander at the house,’ Slider said. ‘Tyler’s not going anywhere, we know that, but I’d like to see if there’s any sign that Bates is there. Tomorrow we can get Mr Porson to stump up a search warrant and we can go in and take the place apart.’
‘Guv, let me come,’ Fathom said. He looked excited. ‘Please. Just in case. You might need another hand. I was just going home. I’ve got nothing else to do.’
It would have been like kicking a puppy. He looked at Atherton, who shrugged minutely. ‘It’s not going to be exciting,’ he warned. ‘Just sitting in a car looking at a house.’
‘But I need the experience,’ Fathom said cunningly. ‘I have to learn.’
‘All right, you can come. But you do exactly as you’re told at all times, and keep your mouth shut,’ Slider said.
‘Deal,’ said Fathom.
There was just an outside chance, Slider thought, that something might happen. And Fathom was a big lad. In a pinch, one might overlook the dorky gloves.
The Holland Park house was large, beautiful, elegant – white stucco, with a portico and steps up to the door. The tall windows of the drawing-room were lit behind drawn curtains; the upper floors were in darkness. There were also lights on in the semi-basement, which had blinds on the windows. In the original arrangement of these houses, that was where the servants had hung out. Nowadays the semi-basement was often a separate flat. Slider wondered if Thomas Mark was down there. From what he knew of both Tyler and Bates, they would have been too grand to let the minions bunk in with them.
As to whether Bates was in there at all, Slider quietly drew his companions’ attention to a new-looking and very powerful radio mast on the roof.
‘Now what would Richard Tyler want with a mast that powerful?’ he said.
‘It’s the only way to get Jazz FM?’ said Atherton.
‘There’s a satellite dish, too,’ Fathom noted. ‘A big one.’
‘Maybe he likes Sky Sports.’
‘Not the right sort of dish.’
There was a car parked on the gravelled forecourt, a black Lexus; and a motorcycle, a powerful-looking Triumph.
‘And there’s the bike,’ Slider said.
‘There’s more than one Triumph in the world,’ Atherton said, though it sounded a bit messianic.
‘Can you see Richard Tyler on a bike? No, I feel it in my bones, Bates is in there.’
Fathom leaned forward from the back seat. ‘Shall we go in and get him?’ he asked eagerly. He was already reaching for the door handle in his excitement.
‘Steady, lad, or I’ll have to put the child lock on. We can’t go prancing in there on a whim. We’ve got no authority to search the place, and all that would happen is that Tyler would refuse us entry and be put on his guard. By the time we got back with the right papers, Bates would be dust on the horizon and any evidence we might hope to pick up would be destroyed.’
‘So you really did only want to look,’ Fathom said, disappointed.
‘What did you think? I’m not going to shout “Go, go, go!” just so you can get to kick the door in with your size twelves.’
‘On the other hand,’ Atherton said, ‘we’ll have to watch the place now we know there’s a chance Bates is in there. Hadn’t we better call it in and make it official?’
&nbs
p; ‘It’ll have to be twenty-four-hour surveillance. I’d better get Mr Porson out of bed. Can you radio the station and see who they can get here by way of temporary back-up – out of uniform, of course.’
Porson seemed rather glad than otherwise to be called out. Slider wondered if he had trouble sleeping. He said he would come straight in and sort out the paperwork for a surveillance request. At the station, they said they’d get someone over for surveillance as soon as they’d got them into their civvies – about half an hour, if they could hang on. Atherton said they could, and they settled down, with Fathom’s tangible disappointment like a fourth person in the back seat, to watch the quiet house and wait for support to arrive.
But only minutes later there was a movement across the road.
‘Someone’s coming out,’ Fathom said. A dark figure was coming up the steps from the semi-basement. ‘Is it Mark?’
It was a man in all-over motorcycle leathers and a dark-visored helmet. Little runt of a man. ‘Not big enough for Mark,’ Slider said, hearing his own voice cool and far away, while his blood tingled with adrenaline. ‘I’d say it was probably Bates.’
‘Where the hell’s he going?’ Atherton complained.
‘Escaping. It’s my fault,’ Slider said. ‘I told you to radio in. Pound to a penny he’s been monitoring the station radio. Why the hell wouldn’t he? I just didn’t think of it.’
‘What do we do, guv?’ Fathom asked. He was sweating with excitement now. ‘Do we grab him? Let’s go get him! Run across the road and collar him!’
But the figure was already astride the bike. Even if they ran, by the time they got across there he’d be moving, and then they’d be on foot and he’d be motorised. He’d be away and gone while they were scrambling back to the car.
‘Follow him,’ Slider said tersely. Atherton gunned the engine. ‘There he goes.’
‘I’m on it,’ Atherton said.
The bike swerved out of the opening and on to the road, executed a flashy U-turn round an on-coming taxi, and hammered off down the road towards Shepherd’s Bush Green. Atherton was after him, while Slider radioed the information to the dispatcher. ‘I bet he goes up the motorway,’ Fathom said. He was leaning forward as if he could make the car go faster that way, gripping the back of Slider’s seat, his breath whistling hot past Slider’s ear. ‘He’s gonna go up the motorway. That’s what I’d do. Bet he does. Bet he does.’
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