Death Trick

by Roderic Jeffries

  She moved to one side and he entered. If he were right, he thought sadly, and life had not sufficiently toughened her, she was going to be badly hurt.

  The sitting-room was large, but gloomily dark because of the mimosa tree outside the window. On the heavy marble mantelpiece was a large photograph in an elaborate silver frame which showed her laughing gaily at Oakley, who was clowning with a woman’s hat.

  ‘For God’s sake, tell me what’s happened.’

  He would have liked to put the facts so that she was left with some hope because then he would not be forced to witness her full misery, but because he knew that although there was no final proof, there was now no room for hope, he spoke bluntly. ‘Mademoiselle, last Thursday night, Señor Oakley sailed out of Llueso Bay in a yacht. On Friday, when well out to sea, the yacht was boarded by members of the Spanish Navy and they found no one aboard.’

  She stared at him, her face working. ‘No! No,’ she shouted. ‘You’re lying!’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘He never sailed on it.’

  ‘We know that he did and that he was aboard not long before the yacht was sighted. We can only presume that while he was eating something happened to take him up on deck—it may have been a boat-hook breaking loose and rolling about—and tragically he did not bother to wear the safety harness. He fell overboard.’

  ‘If that had happened, he’d have swum back. He’s a wonderful swimmer.’

  ‘The self-steering gear was rigged so the yacht held its course.’

  ‘But he can swim really fast.’

  ‘I fear, not fast enough.’

  She shivered; her face puckered; she began to whimper and then ran over to the enormous, clumsy settee and threw herself face downwards on to it and began to pound it with her feet.

  At times like this, he hated his job; ten times fortunate the man who had to suffer only his own tragedies.

  After a while, she became motionless; finally she twisted round and sat up.

  ‘I am very sorry, but I have to ask you questions. When did you last hear from him?’

  ‘He . . . he phoned.’

  ‘What day was this?’

  ‘Wednesday, Thursday; I don’t know.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘That he’d be back here in two days at the most. And ever since Saturday evening I’ve been waiting and getting more and more desperate . . . Please, isn’t there a chance another boat could have picked him up?’

  The harbour master had said that the odds were all against this having happened by a rescue craft having neither a radio to report the event nor making for the nearest port to land the survivor. Sadly, he shook his head.

  She whimpered again, as if she had been hit.

  She had been expecting Oakley at the latest on Saturday evening—this placed the phone call as having been made on the Thursday, which was when he had first heard that a detective had arrived from England.

  ‘I’ve only known him for about a year,’ she said, as if the unfairness of so brief a happiness might reverse the subsequent, tragic events. She went on, speaking in a distant voice, reliving the past: ‘I was working in a patisserie and he came to buy bread. He was back the next day and the day after that and always he waited for me to serve him and the other girls began to joke about it. Adele said he was too old for me, but she was just jealous. He asked me out on my day off and we went to a bistro that specialized in Languedoc food and had a cassoulet. We laughed because the waiter refused to understand his French and I had to translate it . . .’ She became silent.

  ‘Did you know he was married?’

  ‘He explained that his wife and he didn’t get on well together and so they lived apart. He didn’t try to hide it from me, if that’s what you’re thinking,’ she said with sudden anger.

  ‘Mademoiselle, I am truly very sorry, but I must . . .’

  She brushed aside his apologies. ‘He’d always wanted to live in the South, so he suggested we look for a house. I left my job.’

  ‘When did you come to Nice?’

  ‘Last year, in November. It was cold and wet when we started, but when we arrived here it was warm and sunny. We rented this house while we looked for one to buy. It was all so wonderful . . .

  ‘We looked at lots of houses, but none of them was what he wanted. And then, just before he went away the last time, we found an old farmhouse near I prey which was empty and for sale and he said that that was exactly right. There are hills and a view down the valley; and lots of vines. He spoke to a local architect about all the alterations he’d want doing. We walked round the land, planning the garden . . . But now . . . But now we’re never going to live there, are we? And it was to be so lovely.’

  She had lost a dream. But had it yet occurred to her that she might have lost something more important in reality— her security? ‘Mademoiselle, do you have any money?’

  ‘Of course I have.’

  ‘Enough to keep yourself?’

  ‘But Gerry gives me . . .’

  Watching her face, he could judge how she suddenly realized that Oakley’s death was going to affect her far more than just emotionally. Unless he had named her in his will, she was now penniless. And would he have done such a thing when she was no more than the last in a long line of women and he would have expected that line to lengthen?

  ‘Don’t you think you should make arrangements to return home as soon as possible?’

  ‘I can’t. When I left to come down here with Gerry, they said . . .’

  ‘Whatever they said, it was only because they were hurt.’

  ‘They were ashamed, but not on my account, on their own. They were afraid of what the neighbours would say. Oh God, in this day and age to worry about that!’

  ‘Do you have enough money for the fare? If not, I’ll give it to you.’

  Her expression changed abruptly. ‘Oh God, I wish there were more people like you in the world.’

  The vehemence with which she’d spoken surprised him. Had she divined what kind of a man Oakley really was, but had been fighting to ignore that knowledge?

  Salas said sarcastically: ‘Then is that proof enough, even for you?’

  ‘Yes, señor,’ replied Alvarez.

  ‘You’re not going to tell me in two days’ time that he isn’t dead, he’s alive and well and living in Outer Mongolia?’

  ‘Unfortunately, it is now quite certain that he drowned.’

  ‘Unfortunately? It saves us a great deal of trouble.’

  ‘I was thinking of all the emotional distress that his death has caused.’

  ‘Our job is concerned with facts, not emotions. Inform England, then make out your report and see it’s on my desk by tomorrow morning.’

  ‘But, señor, that’s impossible in so complicated a matter as this.’

  ‘And whose damned fault is it that it’s been so complicated?’

  CHAPTER 23

  The heat, considering it was now the middle of September, was exceptional. Tourists sweated on the beaches, which were littered with empty bottles of sun-tan lotion, and doctors treated so many cases of sunburn that their minds became filled with thoughts of the extra winter holidays they could now afford . . .

  Braddon, waiting in a corridor in the justice building, was called into court.

  The room was small, rectangular, and except for the two doorways and single small window, lined with filing cabinets and cupboards. The court official, a man in his late twenties, sat at a desk and typed the statements as they were made; both his desk and a second one nearer the window were piled so high with papers and files that to someone not versed in the mysteries of the law they appeared to be in inextricable confusion. The two doorways were directly opposite each other and between them passed a stream of people, some of whom murmured brief apologies for the disturbances they caused. The four lawyers — representing the three defendants and Braddon—stood in a rough semi-circle around the desk at which the official typed.

  T
he official looked up and spoke to Braddon. ‘Please be seated, señor.’

  Braddon, who understood just enough Spanish to realize what had been said, sat. Butterflies were stamping about in his stomach and making him feel sick. He remembered trials whose whole course had been altered by the brilliance of counsel—Birkett, cross-examining with quiet but devastating effect—or the stupidity of the accused—Wilde, too concerned with being clever. Letitia had said: ‘Just tell the truth.’ But jesting Pilate had asked what was truth and had not stayed for the answer, knowing that there could not be one that would always be true.

  The official, speaking rapidly, addressed Braddon. This time, Braddon understood nothing. His lawyer leaned forward. ‘Say yes.’

  He said yes.

  The lawyer for the architect raised a sheet of paper, read, looked at Braddon over the top of it and spoke.

  ‘Say no,’ said Braddon’s lawyer.

  He said no.

  There were three more questions, to each of which he was advised to say no.

  The lawyer for the aparejador consulted his file, looked up, asked a question of much greater length.

  ‘Say yes,’ said Braddon’s lawyer.

  He said yes.

  There were three more yeses and two more noes.

  The lawyer for the builder spoke at inordinate length.

  ‘Say you don’t know,’ said Braddon’s lawyer.

  He said he didn’t know, four times.

  The official pulled out a sheet of paper from the typewriter and put it down on several others. He spoke to Braddon.

  ‘Sign,’ said Braddon’s lawyer.

  He signed.

  The lawyers and Braddon filed out of the courtroom into the corridor, the lawyers for the architect and the aparejador laughing over something highly amusing.

  ‘You want to eat some coffee?’ asked Braddon’s lawyer, a pleasant man whose English was not quite as fluent as he believed.

  They left the building and went down the street to a bar where they ordered two coffees. If it had been slightly later, Braddon would have asked for a brandy. He had tensed himself for a trial and a whiplash duel with eagle-eyed counsel, but instead there had merely been some further form of preliminary hearing, the nature of which entirely escaped him.

  His lawyer drank quickly. ‘Now, I leave; much work to make. Thank you for coffee. Goodbye, sweet dreams.’

  ‘Here, hang on a minute.’

  ‘Yes, you want to ask?’

  ‘When’s something going to happen?’ The familiar, angry sense of frustration gripped his mind. ‘Why can’t you get them to understand that it’s urgent? The bloody cracks are getting worse all the time and if something isn’t done soon, the whole house will fall down.’

  ‘I do not comprehend.’

  ‘I’m saying that I want to know when the trial’s going to be.’

  His lawyer looked curiously at him. ‘That was trial. Now, I come.’ He started to walk away.

  ‘But . . . but there wasn’t any judge.’

  He came to a stop. ‘No judge in such court.’

  ‘That . . . that’s impossible.’

  ‘Very possible; is always.’

  A trial without a judge? Braddon wondered if that morning he’d inadvertently walked through a looking-glass. ‘How can you have a verdict without a judge?’

  ^o verdict.’

  A sense of panic caused him to shout: ‘I’ll contact the British Ambassador.’

  ‘No verdict until judge reads papers and decides. We win.’

  He slowly calmed down as he realized that the procedure was not as anarchic as he had first believed. ‘Then when will he read the papers and decide and give his verdict? This afternoon?’

  His lawyer thought that so funny that he laughed until be began to choke.

  Alvarez had spent much of the day in a village not far from Andratx and on his return journey he chose to take the old road rather than the autoroute. Just past a restaurant, advertised by a mule carriage which stood on a concrete plinth, he saw a large billboard proclaiming that the country’s finest development, La Portaña, lay a kilometre to the right. On impulse, he decided to turn off and visit the urbanization.

  It was obvious that the tempo of work had picked up sharply from when he’d last been there. The two apartment blocks were once more under active construction, there was activity on several new plots, the grass in the square had just been cut and two men were working in the flowerbeds, sprinklers were on, and a lorry with a lifting hoist was lowering a mature palm into a hole. Vidal had correctly foretold the course of events, he thought. The banks had taken possession, had resold to the waiting predator, and this other property company was now all set to make a large profit. Curious to know whether Vich had been made redundant, as feared, he parked outside the wooden hut that was the office and went in. He recognized the typist, but not the young man who came up to the counter and spoke to him. He asked if Vich was still working there.

  Vich shook hands with considerable energy, then led the way into his small, inner office.

  ‘I was passing by,’ said Alvarez, ‘so came to see how things were. More than once, I’ve wondered whether you survived the new ownership.’

  ‘No new owner and I’m still here. And, what’s more, Andreu y Soler are looking at another possible development so things are very much more cheerful.’

  ‘Don’t say the banks relented at the last moment—that sounds very untypical.’

  ‘They extended the time limit because a German company showed a great deal of interest in injecting the necessary capital into Andreu y Soler.’

  ‘Good for them! Who found them?’

  ‘I don’t know for sure, because I’m not in that side of finance, but the word is that it was Señor Oakley, just before his unfortunate death. That man must have had a tongue of gold.’

  ‘And presumably the German company finally did invest?’

  ‘They certainly did. And that was the end of our money problems.’

  ‘Have things changed much?’

  ‘Not really. There was a lot of talk that the only way of making certain the development really prospered was to reduce prices and aim for a more popular, and therefore wider, market, but instead the reverse happened; prices were upped and the German market was targeted. And it worked! Land went up to twelve thousand a square metre and the houses had to cost a minimum of sixty million. Explain that to an Englishman or a Frenchman and he either has a fit or laughs. But the Germans, with their currency up in the stratosphere, become more and more interested. The ratio of contracts to inquiries is rising all the time.’

  ‘What was the date when the banks gave their extension?’

  ‘The middle of July.’

  ‘And when did the German company make its decision?’

  ‘I heard about it at the end of the month, when I’d given up all hope of keeping the job and was wondering what was the kindest way of cutting my throat.’

  ‘So presumably they hadn’t finally made up their minds until about then?’

  ‘Knowing the situation vis-a-vis the banks, they can’t have done.’

  Then how, wondered Alvarez, had the company been persuaded to invest in Andreu y Soler when Oakley, the man who’d introduced them to the proposition, had just died in circumstances that suggested he was far from the honest businessman they must have believed, and would have demanded, they were dealing with? . . . And suddenly he identified the likeness he had seen weeks previously in Jacqueline Tabriz’s face.

  Alvarez’s mind was so perturbed that when he returned to Llueso he did not drive straight home and pour himself the first of several strong drinks, but instead parked close to the guardia post, went up to his office, and slumped down in the chair behind the desk and stared at the opened, but shuttered, window.

  After a time, he roused himself and used the phone to find out the telephone number of the Nice police. He dialled that and spoke to a woman who referred him to a sergeant, who had the call tr
ansferred to an inspector. The inspector, rather grumpily, agreed to do as asked.

  Nice called back at seven-fifteen.

  ‘We’ve spoken to the estate agents. The house was let on the fourteenth of July. The tenant was a young widow, whose husband had just died, by the name of Madame Brinaud. She took it for six months and paid the rent in full in advance.’

  ‘Did she have to present papers to be granted a lease?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘Is she still living there?’

  ‘One of our chaps went with someone from the estate agents along to La Maison Rouge. It was empty and there are none of her belongings around. It certainly looks as if she’s left.’

  ‘Without any word to the agents?’

  ‘None; but as they say, since the rent’s paid for several months to come, there was no call for her to contact them. Perhaps she intends to return soon.’

  ‘I rather doubt it.’

  CHAPTER 24

  On Wednesday morning, Alvarez sat at his desk and stared through the opened and unshuttered window at the sun-blasted wall of the house on the opposite side of the street. He heard a woman begin to sing; a car hooted; young boys shouted obscenities with all the pleasure of new discoveries. Did he speak to Salas now? Not yet, he immediately decided. Not while there was still room for his being wrong. After all, there might be a reasonable explanation of why Madame Brinaud had also called herself Mademoiselle Tabriz; why she had told him she had moved into the house the previous November, when in fact it had been this July . . .

  He telephoned the site office at La Portafia and spoke to Vich. He asked for the name and address of the German company which had invested money in Andreu y Soler. After trying, and failing, to learn why the request was being made, Vich gave this to him.

  He dialled the Munich number. A woman answered the call and failed to understand his Spanish, English, French, or even the few words he thought he knew in German. Then a man came on the line who spoke almost faultless English.

  ‘You are the Spanish police and want to speak about something in connection with an investment we’ve made in the Spanish firm of Andreu y Soler? What is the matter?’ There was a note of concern in his voice.