And the answer came to her as she looked into his raw-rimmed blue-grey eyes. He was Martin Caldwell. In the end, there was no one else he could be. ‘I am the woman you were supposed to meet in London,’ she said quietly.
‘No you’re not. She never left Tokyo.’
‘If you mean Mimori Takenaga, then, yes, you are correct. My boss sent me to see you posing as her because her family would not let her leave the country. My name is Wada.’
‘And your boss’s name?’
‘Kodaka.’
‘Who met with a fatal accident last week.’
‘That is also correct.’
‘Why didn’t you give up then, with Kodaka dead and his client, as I understand it, confined to a psychiatric hospital?’
‘Why did you not meet me as planned in the British Museum?’
‘I got held up here.’
‘Will you lower the gun, Mr Caldwell? You are making me nervous.’
‘You don’t look nervous.’
‘But I am.’
‘How did you know I was here?’
‘I did not know you were here.’
‘Then why did you come?’
‘Please lower the gun, Mr Caldwell.’
‘First tell me what brought you here.’
‘The Emergence files in Quartizon’s offices. Kristjan and I found out what was in them.’
‘And what is?’
‘Grid references for parcels of land all over Iceland, apparently owned by Quartizon. Including this parcel of land. But Stóri-Asgarbær seems to be different from the others. It’s not part of whatever’s planned for Wednesday.’
‘Where’s Kristjan now?’
‘Under arrest.’
‘How did you get away?’
‘I was lucky.’
‘Well, maybe your good luck is my bad luck.’
‘I am not a threat to you, Mr Caldwell. I am not your enemy. Please lower the gun.’
Something softened in his expression. He turned the gun away. ‘I’d never have fired, Miss Wada. I’m not a killer.’
‘I never thought you were.’
‘Follow me.’
He led her a little further along the passage and turned into a large, low-ceilinged kitchen. It looked out to the rear of the house, across climbing, snow-covered ground. The sink, the range, the dresser and the table and stools belonged to a bygone age, maybe a century past. There was nothing modern or labour-saving to be seen. The light was thin, falling on well-worn flagstones and dust-laden surfaces.
Caldwell propped the shotgun in the corner. ‘Does anyone know you’re here?’ he asked. It seemed to her she could read fear in his eyes as he posed the question.
‘I came with a friend.’
‘Where’s this friend now?’
Wada took a deep breath. Should she tell him what had happened? There was no way of predicting how he might react. But if she didn’t tell him … ‘He’s dead. Shot.’
‘What?’
‘We were followed.’
Caldwell stiffened apprehensively. ‘Who by?’
‘I do not know his name. But he is Japanese, I think.’
‘Where’s he now?’
‘I reversed the car into him.’
‘You killed him?’
‘I think so. I hope so.’
‘But maybe not?’
‘I do not know for certain. I could not take the risk of stopping to check.’
‘Do you know anything about him?’
‘He was at your flat in Exeter last week. I suspect he works for Hiroji Nishizaki.’
Caldwell closed his eyes for an instant. ‘You’ve led the Irishman straight to me,’ he said dolefully.
‘He is not Irish, Mr Caldwell.’
‘It’s what they call him.’
‘And if he is dead—’
‘But what if he isn’t?’ Caldwell’s eyes were open again. He was glaring accusingly at her. ‘I was supposed to be safe here.’
‘Do you have a phone that works?’
‘No.’
‘It was heavy contact. At speed. Even if he is not dead, he will be seriously injured, I think.’
‘You think?’
‘And therefore unable to—’
They both heard it at the same time: a car, engine roaring, approaching fast. They looked at each other in horror. It could only be the Irishman. Not dead. And not giving up.
‘Mr Caldwell, I—’
‘We’re as good as dead. You understand that, don’t you?’ Caldwell glared at her. ‘If only you hadn’t interfered.’
There was a final roar of the engine, then silence. Caldwell made no move towards the gun. He slumped back against the rail of the range. It was as if he’d lost all hope.
Wada didn’t wait for him to rediscover any. She grabbed the gun. As she did so, a car door slammed outside.
The weapon was surprisingly heavy and she couldn’t really imagine using it. But she was going to have to start imagining. And soon. She looked at Caldwell, but he was simply staring into space. Whatever she was going to do, she was going to have to do it alone. She hurried out into the passage.
She moved towards the front door, but as she passed the open door of one of the bedrooms she saw the Irishman through the window, heading in the opposite direction. He was following the footsteps she’d left in the snow, leading to the back door. He was limping, but still he was moving fast.
She turned round and headed back past the kitchen, glimpsing Caldwell, still leaning against the range. As she approached the back door and the broken window beside it, a shadow fell across the smashed pane. She couldn’t see the Irishman, but she felt sure he was there. Then she saw the door handle turn and the woodwork strain against the lock.
She raised the shotgun, wondering if she should fire now, hoping to hit her target on the other side of the door. But she had no spare cartridges. There’d be no chance to reload if she missed. She had to wait until she had a clear shot.
Suddenly, there were several deafening cracks. The Irishman was firing into the door. The wood splintered around the lock. Then the whole lock mechanism was blasted off, crashing to the floor as the door sagged open.
Wada heaved the gun up against her shoulder, aware the barrel was shaking as she held it. Her fingers trembled around the triggers. She heard the Irishman kick the door. It flew wide open. She saw his face, twisted with fury. And she saw the gun in his hand, the gun he’d used to kill George Guptill.
She fired, both barrels.
But all she hit was wood. The door had struck the wall behind it so violently it had bounced back across her line of fire.
Then he was in and on her. The shotgun was wrenched from her grasp and flung aside. He shoved her against the wall and clapped the barrel of his gun to her temple. ‘Where is Caldwell?’ he demanded in Japanese.
She couldn’t speak at first. All she could register was the brutality in his eyes and the cold, heavy pressure of the gun barrel against her skin.
‘Where is Caldwell?’
She mustered her thoughts and forced out an answer, in English, so that Caldwell would understand. ‘Caldwell is not here.’
‘You are lying. You came here because you knew this was where he was hiding.’
‘There is no one else in the house.’ It was strange to confront her own stubbornness. It was the only weapon she had at her disposal.
‘Tell me where he is.’
‘I do not know where he is.’
Keeping the gun to her head, he grabbed her by the hair with his other hand and began dragging her along the passage, looking into each room as they went. She had to go with him, or be pulled off her feet. His right leg was stiff, she saw, with a length of wood strapped to the side of his knee as some kind of splint. He was probably in a lot of pain. And she was responsible for it. But he wasn’t ready to kill her quite yet.
They reached the kitchen. Caldwell wasn’t there. When he’d left and where he’d gone Wada couldn’t guess. He might ne
ver have heard their exchanges for all she knew.
The door of the next room was closed. The Irishman kicked it open with his uninjured leg. It was a bathroom, fitted with a cupboard, hand-basin, loo and claw-footed bath that all looked about as old as the kitchen furnishings. The Irishman let go of Wada’s hair for a second, pulled a set of handcuffs out of the pocket of his parka and closed one cuff round her right wrist. Then he forced her to the floor, bent over her and snapped the other cuff round the downpipe under the basin.
‘When I have found Caldwell and killed him,’ he rasped into her ear, ‘I will come back to question you, Wada. And you will answer my questions, I promise you. You will answer every one of them.’
As he stood upright, he winced and steadied himself against the rim of the basin. Seeing her chance, Wada drew back her legs and aimed a kick at his splinted knee, using all the force she could summon. Something cracked under the impact. The Irishman cried out and fell. The gun went off as he toppled. There was an explosion of plaster from the ceiling above the basin.
Then there was another crack, as the Irishman’s head struck the curved rim of the bath. He thumped to the floor, his head taking a second heavy blow. The gun was jolted from his hand. It slid across the tiles and came to rest against the wall beneath the window.
The Irishman’s eyes stared sightlessly at Wada. He didn’t move. A pool of blood appeared beneath his head, slowly widening. Wada scrambled to her feet, sliding the handcuff up the pipe. But she was unable to stand fully upright because it snagged against the underside of the basin. And from that position the gun was out of her reach.
‘Mr Caldwell,’ she called out. ‘Come here. To the bathroom. It is safe. I need your help.’
The house was enveloped in silence, magnified and muffled by the snow outside. Nothing moved. There was no answer from Caldwell.
‘Mr Caldwell!’
Still nothing. Wada knelt and stretched out her free hand to where the Irishman lay, his face flattened against the floor, his eyes gaping like those of a giant tuna on the slab at Tsukiji Fish Market. He had to have the key to the handcuffs somewhere about him, but, even lying down, she couldn’t reach beyond the left sleeve of his parka.
He didn’t seem to be breathing. It came to her then that he might be dead. She wasn’t certain. He might just be unconscious. And how long he’d remain unconscious she didn’t know. But while he was, they had to act.
‘Mr Caldwell!’
No response. He was hiding somewhere. He had to be. Perhaps he feared she was trying to lure him into a trap at the Irishman’s bidding.
‘I tripped him up and he has knocked himself out,’ she called. ‘We have to take this chance. But I am handcuffed to the basin. I cannot reach him. Or the gun. Please come. Now.’
At last, there was a sound, faint and ambiguous. But it was something. And soon it became a succession of sounds that were surely footsteps in the passage, drawing slowly closer.
‘Mr Caldwell?’
And then there he was, in the doorway, looking in at her and the Irishman. He was trembling. His breathing was fast but shallow.
She rattled the chain of the handcuffs. ‘You see?’
‘What … what happened?’ he asked in a voice hoarsened by stress.
‘I told you. Please search his pockets, Mr Caldwell. We need to find the key for these handcuffs.’
‘Is he dead?’
‘I think he may be.’
Caldwell moved cautiously into the room and stooped over the body on the floor. He pressed his fingers to the side of the Irishman’s neck. ‘I can’t feel a pulse,’ he said. ‘Hold on.’
There was a round metal-framed mirror hanging on the wall above the basin. He took it off its hook and, kneeling carefully clear of the pool of blood, held the glass close to the Irishman’s mouth and nose. Several slow moments passed. Then he glanced at the mirror and turned it round for Wada to see. The glass was clear. The Irishman wasn’t breathing.
‘It seems you’ve killed him, Miss Wada. What do you think we should do with him now?’
‘Just find the key.’
Caldwell nodded and began working his way through the Irishman’s pockets. He pulled out a passport and a wallet from one. Opening the passport, he grimaced, then laughed oddly.
‘What is wrong?’
‘His name. Ohara. That’s why they call him the Irishman. I suppose they think it’s funny.’
Wada wanted to ask who they were, but decided that could wait. ‘The key, Mr Caldwell.’
He nodded again and went on searching. He pulled a phone from a zipped side-pocket of the parka and a car key from Ohara’s jeans. But not the key to the handcuffs. He stopped and shrugged his shoulders. ‘It doesn’t seem to be here.’
‘It must be.’
‘Maybe he left it in his car. I’ll go and take a look. But before I do …’ He stood up and hurried out of the room, returning a few moments later wearing rubber gloves. He stepped over to the window and picked up the gun, holding it carefully by the handle and barrel. ‘I’ll put this somewhere safe. And I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
By Wada’s watch twelve long minutes of silence elapsed, during which she could only wonder what Caldwell was doing. Then she heard several thumps and grunts from the direction of the back door, as if he was carrying something heavy and unwieldy into the house.
A moment later, he was back in the doorway of the bathroom. ‘I couldn’t find the key,’ he announced. ‘Sorry.’
‘It has to be somewhere.’
He smiled oddly. ‘True enough.’
‘What was that noise I heard just now?’
‘There are tools in the barn,’ he said, seeming not to hear her question. ‘Given this is a farm, they probably include a pair of bolt-cutters. I’ll check. Meanwhile …’
He grasped Ohara by the ankles and began dragging him towards the door, leaving a gleaming smear of blood on the tiles. ‘Where are you taking him?’ Wada asked.
‘I’ll explain … when I come back.’
Wada sat down and waited. At least she no longer had to look at Ohara. What Caldwell was planning for him she had no idea. As far as she could tell from the sounds that reached her, he dragged Ohara as far as the kitchen. There were muffled scrapes and bumps and thumps after that that she couldn’t interpret. And several more grunts of effort from Caldwell.
Then he was back, breathing more heavily than ever. And sweating, despite the chill that hung everywhere in the house beyond the range-warmed kitchen. He leant against the doorpost and looked down at her apologetically. ‘I’ve had to … improvise,’ he said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘There’s a chest freezer in the scullery, at the back of the kitchen. I’ve put him in there. Along with your friend, whose body I found under a tarpaulin in the back of Ohara’s car. In the circumstances, it seemed the best thing to do. The only thing, really. They’ll keep there until Thursday.’
‘What happens on Thursday?’
‘I’m going to be collected. We can sort everything out then.’
‘Who is collecting you?’
‘You have to stay until Thursday as well.’ Caldwell rubbed his eyes behind his glasses. ‘Sorry.’
‘That is three days from now. I cannot stay here for three days.’
‘You have to. If you left, you’d go back to Reykjavík and do your best to interfere with Emergence. You know you would. More importantly, I know you would. And that would … upset the arrangements.’
‘What arrangements?’
‘Everything will be sorted out, I promise. On Thursday. You’ll come to no harm. All you have to do is … remain here. With me.’ He shrugged. ‘I’m sorry, but there it is.’
The truth suddenly dawned on Wada. ‘You have the key to the handcuffs, don’t you?’
Caldwell nodded. He took his hand out of his pocket and there it was, nestled in his palm. Wada made a move towards him and he took an apprehensive half-step back, though she could never h
ave reached him.
‘Let me go,’ she said, firmly but calmly. ‘You have no right to hold me prisoner.’
‘I agree.’ He looked genuinely regretful. ‘But I notice you’ve made no attempt to deny that you’d try to obstruct Emergence if I allowed you to leave here before Thursday. Which unfortunately leaves me with no choice in the matter.’
‘You have a choice, Mr Caldwell. It is absurd to try to blame what you are doing on me.’
‘Not from my point of view it isn’t.’
‘Let me go. Now.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You must.’
‘But I’m not going to, Miss Wada. My mind’s made up, I’m afraid. It’s force majeure. You’re going to be spending the next three days here. And there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.’
SEVENTEEN
THE SNOW THAT had fallen the previous evening was thawing slowly by Tuesday morning. Nick made his way to Reykjavík Roasters along slushy pavements under a pale blue sky. The coffee shop was busy but not crammed, the customers comprising a predictable mix of laptop-tapping student types and mothers with tiny children and enormous buggies.
No one paid Nick any attention as he settled in a corner, so he assumed Erla Torfadóttir wasn’t there yet. He was early anyway, so that was no surprise. By the time Erla herself was late, it became more of a cause for concern.
That was when he noticed a tall, slim, blonde-haired young woman loitering on the other side of the street. She was wearing jeans and a yellow anorak and appeared to be studying him with greater interest than young women normally displayed for men of his age. He gave her a cautious smile.
A few minutes later, she was seated at his table, cradling a mug of hot chocolate. ‘I am Erla,’ she announced.
‘Hi. Nick Miller.’
‘Can I see your passport?’
‘My passport?’
‘You have it with you, don’t you?’
‘Er, yes.’ He pulled it out and showed her the page with his name, date of birth and photograph on it. ‘Happy?’
‘No. I’m not happy. I’m worried. As you should be, Mr Miller.’
‘Call me Nick.’
The Fine Art of Invisible Detection Page 18