Alarm Call ob-8

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘No,’ I told her. ‘It’s only twenty to three. We stay out of sight until then.’ I looked around and spotted a bookshop, another crime specialist. . Americans are very big on mysteries. . more or less directly opposite Damon and Pythias. ‘Let’s go in there.’ I didn’t give her the chance to object; I took her hand and marched towards it.

  The store was wonderfully cool; its air-conditioning was helped by Venetian blinds, but they were angled so that we could see out and across the street.

  There was a man behind the counter, but nobody else in the place. ‘Hi there,’ he greeted us. ‘Welcome to the Mystery Bookstore. My name’s Shelley; can I help you?’

  He wasn’t a tall guy, and he’d eaten a few lunches in his time, but the thing that would have made him stand out in any crowd was his remarkable taste in shirts. The one he had on would have made Duffy Waldorf, American golf’s sartorial legend, look like an Amish elder: its sleeves were ablaze with delicate colours, and its centrepiece seemed to be a map of all of the islands that make up Japan. (For geographic simpletons like me, it had ‘Japan’ emblazoned across it.) The rest of the available space on his ample chest was filled by images that I took to denote the country’s varied culture, including a depiction of Mount Fuji and, for some reason, two baseball players. I thought about asking him where the sumo wrestlers were, but decided against it, in case he thought I was getting personal.

  ‘Just browsing,’ I told him, and turned to a stand of books, although in truth I could have browsed Shelley’s shirt for the rest of the afternoon. I picked up a few volumes and looked through them, glancing across the street every so often to observe the cafe action. There wasn’t much. It was gone lunchtime so the place was reasonably quiet, although a few Saturday-afternoon shoppers. . or browsers. . had stopped off there. A couple of kids vacated a table, a couple of ladies took another, and a slim, bearded guy in shades and a light jacket came out of the indoor area, but that was all. Prim saw nothing: she had been trapped in conversation with Shelley, who was trying to sell her a collectable publisher’s proof of The Day of the Jackal.

  He failed with that pitch, but I bought a signed copy of the new Michael Connelly, to thank him for the use of his premises. He blinked at the name on my credit card, then placed me. I asked him if he had any of the Skinner books in stock, but he told me they usually sold out fast.

  At two minutes to three we crossed Broxton Avenue and took a table in Damon and Pythias. Our backsides were hardly on the chairs before a girl came to ask what we’d like to drink and to explain that we were in a vegetarian restaurant. She looked like a cheerleader; the place was cheap and cheerful so I guessed that its staff. . and maybe most of its customers. . were students. I told her we’d like a chilled bottle of Pinot Grigio, some still water, and that we’d already eaten.

  Having been distracted by the bookstore, Prim was back on edge, big-time. Her eyes were all over the avenue; as she picked up her wine-glass I saw that her hand was trembling slightly. I covered it with mine, to still it, and as I did so I was aware of a young man standing behind me.

  He was wearing a waiter’s apron and he was shifting from one foot to the other. ‘Sir,’ he ventured, ‘would you be Mr Oz Blackstone?’

  I nodded. The kid wanted an autograph, he could have an autograph, and then get the hell out of the way; I waited for him to hand me a book and pen.

  Instead, from behind his back, he produced a brown envelope, and handed it to me. ‘I was told to give you this, sir.’ He reached into a pocket and took out a Nokia cell-phone. ‘I was also asked if I could let you use this.’ He gave it to me. ‘It’s mine,’ he explained quickly, in case I thought it was a gift. He was okay on that score: I know the mobile phone industry is pushy but it doesn’t yet hire students to give them away free on the streets. . or does it?

  As I stared at it, the thing began to sing; I think it might have been Beyonce Knowles, but all those divas sound the same to me. Prim had been watching the whole performance, incredulous, but the musical ring-tone sparked her into life. ‘Answer it!’ she snapped at me, as if there was a chance I wouldn’t.

  I pressed a green button and put it to my ear. ‘Hello, you thieving, kidnapping bastard,’ I said.

  ‘Nice to speak to you at last, Oz.’ The accent was smooth, bland, professional and American. ‘You told my mom we’d met before, but I’m afraid I can’t remember it.’

  It was as if his voice was a trip-wire inside my head and I’d stumbled over it. I felt myself explode. ‘The next time we speak, you’ll remember it, Wallinger. Thanks to you I’ve been taken away from my family, compromised, embarrassed and nearly fucking killed. When I catch up with you, you will be picking teeth out of your arsehole.’

  ‘That’s exactly why I don’t intend to go face to face with you. After your escapade in San Francisco, I’m seeing you in a different light. I had you taped as just another effete actor like me, but it seems that you might really be as dangerous a son-of-a-bitch as Primavera said you were. So I’ve changed the plan. In that envelope my young waiter friend just gave you. . kids will do just about anything for a hundred bucks, you know. . you’ll find a document. I’ve had it drawn up by a lawyer. It sets out the terms under which I will be prepared to yield custody of Tom to his mother.’

  ‘Give me that phone!’ Prim demanded, beside me.

  ‘Don’t do that, Oz,’ said Wallinger. ‘She’d only yell at me, and I don’t need that. Just listen to me carefully. This is not a negotiating thing; what you have there is how it has to be. I’ve signed the agreement, and I expect Primavera to sign it also. Since you’ve come this far, you can be her witness. I think you’ll find it’s legal and that it can’t be construed as extortion. You can take it to the Nevada State Attorney if you don’t believe me.’

  ‘Nevada? Why Nevada?’ I asked. Prim stared at me.

  ‘That’s your next stop, isn’t it, Oz? That’s where you have to be? So, you take Primavera along for the trip. You’ll be contacted there. The signed document will be handed over and arrangements for the trade will be made.’

  ‘The trade?’ I shot back at him. ‘This is a child you’re talking about.’

  ‘This is two and one half million British pounds I’m talking about. . or however many US dollars that buys.’

  I stood, looking up and down Broxton Avenue, but I couldn’t see anyone talking into a phone. ‘Where are you, you bastard?’ I growled.

  ‘I’m near, but far enough away.’

  I took a shot. ‘You’re not in Roscoe’s office, are you?’

  ‘Hey,’ he whistled, ‘you really are a detective, but no, that’s not where I am.’

  ‘Is Tom with you?’

  ‘Tom is safe; Primavera needn’t worry about that.’

  ‘God, he better be.’

  ‘Oz,’ said Wallinger, patiently, ‘ask yourself this. Suppose you and the third Mrs Blackstone came to this, and you were forced to take your kids to negotiate a fair share of your joint property, would they be in the remotest danger from you?’

  ‘Is that how you really see this? As a palimony thing? You’re fucking crazy, man.’

  ‘If that’s so, in a few days from now I’ll be rich and crazy. Go to Vegas. I’ll find you there.’

  There was a click and the line went dead; I was on the point of chucking the Nokia as far as I could down the street, when I remembered that it was the kid’s. Instead I scrolled through the menu till I found the number from which the call had been made. It was LA local, and I had no doubt that it was a public telephone. Wherever it was, he’d had us in sight when he’d called, because he’d known exactly when to ring. I looked along Broxton and saw any number of shops and restaurants, each with its own payphone, I was sure.

  I handed the phone back to the waiter. ‘Describe the guy.’

  ‘He was around your height,’ he replied, ‘but not as solid. I can’t tell you much about him. He wore Ray-Bans, and he had a beard. He had on a tan-coloured jacket and a light blue hat, like yo
u see golfers wear sometimes.’

  I had seen him from the Mystery Bookstore; I had actually seen Paul Wallinger, and I had let him get away from me.

  ‘What happened?’ I asked the waiter, tersely.

  ‘He came into the restaurant about a quarter before three. I offered to seat him, but he didn’t want to eat. He said that you’d be coming in here to meet with him but he couldn’t wait. He said he’d give me a hundred dollars to deliver that envelope. That’s more than I’m going to make this afternoon, so I said okay. Then he asked me for our payphone number; he said he wanted to call you to make sure it was okay. I told him it was bust, but I said that he could call you on my cell, if it was that important. He took the number, gave me the envelope and a hundred bucks, and that was it.’

  I returned the boy’s phone and gave him another hundred for the aggravation. He’d given us the envelope, unopened. Another kid might have slit it to see if there was money in it, or even drugs; this one was honest, trusting and stupid. I hoped he wasn’t studying medicine, or law, or anything maybe a little less life-threatening, like nuclear physics.

  Prim almost snatched it from my hand as I sat down. ‘What is it?’ she asked, as she tore it open.

  I topped up my Pinot Grigio. ‘It’s what we’ve been expecting. It’s the sharp end of the business.’

  She read through the document, once, then again for luck, and looked up at me, pale beneath the tan. ‘He wants all of it, Oz, everything that he moved to Vancouver. The shit,’ she hissed. ‘He’ll give me my son, but take his inheritance. Well, he’s not getting it; I’m going to find him and I’m going to take Tom from him, dead or alive.’

  ‘Do you mean him or Tom?’

  ‘Don’t be stupid.’

  ‘I’m not. When people start thinking like that, there can be cross-fire, and the innocent can get caught up. You’ve still got your interdict from Scotland, remember. Once we find out for sure where Tom is, I mean in which legal jurisdiction, we can take action to enforce it. I can afford better lawyers than Wallinger, I promise you.’

  She looked down, and gnawed at her lip, as I’d seen her do a few dozen times before when she was preoccupied. ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Speaking of lawyers, we should run that past one, just to check that it’s as binding as Wallinger said it is.’

  ‘Where are we going to find one on a Saturday afternoon?’

  ‘Good question. If necessary it can wait till we get to Vegas…’ Her gasp stopped me.

  ‘I’m going to Las Vegas?’

  ‘That’s what he wants. Before we get there, though, let me try this.’

  My phone had been switched off, in case Wallinger had shown up, to prevent interruptions. When I switched it on, I noticed that I had a voice message, but I didn’t have time to deal with that. I located Miles’s cell and called it, not caring what time it was in Australia. As it turned out he was having breakfast.

  ‘I need a lawyer,’ I told him.

  He chuckled. ‘Hey, I saw that stuff on the news. Don’t tell me the guy’s suing you for beating him up.’

  ‘If he does I’ll counter-sue.’ I filled him in on where we were with Wallinger, and on the document.

  ‘Okay, I can fix that,’ he said at once. ‘I have a lawyer on twenty-four-hour call, against something going south on one of my projects anywhere in the world. Call this guy, mention my name, and suppose he’s three up with four to play at the country club, he’ll concede the game and see you. His name’s Victor Knight.’ He read me a phone number; I patched it in and stored it as he spoke.

  ‘Thanks, mate,’ I told him. ‘That’s another one Prim owes you.’

  Mr Knight wasn’t on the fifteenth fairway, as it turned out. He was in his Jacuzzi at his home in Beverly Hills. At the drop of Miles’s name, he gave us the address and said that he would see us as soon as we could get to him. We left half of the Pinot Grigio in the bottle, walked back to the hotel and went straight down to the garage to pick up the Jaguar.

  The navigation system took us right up his driveway in twenty minutes. His home was in a small estate with private armed security; we had to be cleared at a gatehouse before we could even drive into the street where he lived. Mr Knight’s wasn’t a movie star’s mansion, but it was a movie stars’ lawyer’s mansion and that was impressive enough. It wasn’t anywhere near as big as the Loch Lomond place, but it might well have been in the same price bracket.

  He was ready to do business when we arrived, a dapper bloke, silver-haired but fresh-faced, dressed in grey slacks, a blazer, and a blue and white striped shirt. We made some contrast as we were still in shorts, but he didn’t bat an eyelid: he was used to actors.

  He took us through the house and out on to a huge patio at the back, where he offered us plush seats around a low table. It reminded me of our leisure wing, but being in LA this one was outdoors. ‘Run through your situation for me,’ he began.

  I’d done enough talking for the day, so I left it to Prim. It took her longer to run through the story than it had taken us to drive there from Wilshire Boulevard. When she was done, she handed him the document.

  Knight studied it, line by line. When he was finished he laid it on the table and nodded. ‘If you sign and implement that,’ he announced, ‘you will be handing over ownership of your fortune voluntarily, with full legal effect, and no prospect of recovery.’

  ‘But I’ll get my son back, and that will be irrevocable too. Yes?’

  ‘Yes, that’s the case. However, Ms Phillips, I have to point out that in the light of this gentleman’s behaviour just about any court in the United States would give you your son back.’

  ‘If we could find him.’

  ‘There is that; it’s easy to hide in this country. There is also the possibility that Mr Wallinger could take the child to Mexico. It’s a lot easier for Americans to gain admission there than the other way around.’

  ‘What should I do?’ she asked.

  ‘As you say Mr Blackstone has told you, if you find the child, you could seek to enforce your Scottish court order. You could also petition for custody under US law, with, as I have indicated, a significant chance of success. Our courts are a lot more flexible with children than with adults. However, I concede that this is all contingent upon locating the infant.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So, to be brutally honest, it’s your call.’

  We thanked Victor Knight, and left him to his weekend. As I slid back into the S-type, I switched my cell-phone back on; it had been off for that meeting too. That message warning popped up again; this time I retrieved it.

  It was short and sweet. It was Susie, sounding strange, tired and drawn; all she said was, ‘Oz, I trusted you, and you lied to me. If it’s her you want, stay with her and may God rot the pair of you. And if by any chance you don’t know what I mean, check your e-mail.’

  ‘What the hell are you on about?’ I said to the phone.

  ‘What’s up?’ Prim asked.

  ‘Susie,’ I told her. ‘From the sound of things Wallinger’s been stirring her up again.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘God knows; I’ll find out when we get back to the hotel.’

  As I piloted the Jag out of Beverly Hills and back into Westwood, that was all I could think about. Well, almost all: my ear was throbbing again and that got my attention. I was tired, and annoyed. I was doing my bloody best here, out of some sort of duty, and I was doing it on a pink ticket from my wife, and now here she was getting outraged about it. Part of me wanted to forget her and her problem, whatever it was; happily it was only a small part. I determined that as soon as we got back to the Century I would get online.

  That was my top priority; it really was. It wasn’t my fault it was knocked on the head. I parked the car in the tight basement space, then we took the incredibly shaky wood-lined lift. I got out at the reception area, leaving Prim to go up one more to the suite, and went straight to the desk. I retrieved my laptop, and was heading for the door. . th
e lift was so slow I decided that I’d be quicker on the stairs. . when the clerk called after me, ‘Excuse me, sir, there’s this too. It was left for you.’

  I turned, to see that she was holding out a package, wrapped in red and white striped paper and tied in a neat bow. ‘Who left it?’ I asked as I took it from her, then I held up a hand to stop her reply. ‘Let me guess: it was a guy about my height, but slimmer, with shades, a beard, a tan-coloured jacket and a funny blue hat.’

  The woman nodded. ‘That’s right, sir. Should I not have accepted it?’

  ‘No, it’s okay. He’s some damn joker who’s been following us around, but you weren’t to know that. If he shows up again and I’m in, try to stall him and call me.’

  ‘Will do, Mr Blackstone.’

  I took my laptop and the package up to our mini-suite and showed it to Prim. ‘A gift from Wallinger,’ I told her.

  She stared at it. ‘What do you think it is?’

  ‘I haven’t a clue; if it’s half a pound of Semtex you can kiss your arse goodbye, for I’m going to open it.’ I was joking about the explosives: Wallinger needed us, or at least he needed Prim, to get the money. Still, I took the package into the bathroom. I undid the bow carefully; it was tied tight and the wrapping was pretty crude, a sure sign that it had been done by a man. (There’s an old Scots saying, ‘Let on you’re daft and you’ll get a hurl for nothing,’ which means, loosely translated and put into context, that if one makes a real bollocks of wrapping a present, one will never have to do it again. It’s a principle I’ve followed all my life, but I’ve never had to feign incompetence.)

  Eventually I just tore the ribbon loose and ripped off the paper, feeling that involuntary pang of regret that is part of my Scots heritage at the knowledge that it couldn’t be reused. It had enclosed a small, square yellow box, around six inches by six by six. I lifted the lid off, cautiously, and saw that it was packed with tissue paper. I removed the top layers, until I came to a red plastic circle with regular upraised dots all the way around: a baby’s teething ring.