The Kisses of an Enemy: (Parish & Richards 17)

by Tim Ellis

  ‘Mmmm!’ Parish said.

  Richards scrutinised his face. ‘You’re thinking he was murdered, aren’t you?’

  ‘Aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then we’re of like mind.’

  ‘More than that,’ Jill Butler said. ‘It sounds like a conspiracy to murder, to de-fraud Caledonian Energy and the insurance companies and . . .’

  They all turned to look at Rains.

  ‘Why are you looking at me? If there was a conspiracy three years ago, I wasn’t one of the conspirators.’

  ‘If he was, he probably wouldn’t still be working here,’ Parish said.

  Jill Butler nodded. ‘True.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that Cabot and the other two men are still alive?’ Rains asked.

  Parish stared at him. ‘Yes.’

  ‘But why? How?’

  ‘That’s what we need to find out. Let’s go back to the cafeteria, I think we’ve seen enough here.’

  Rains led them back the way they’d come.

  Two men were sitting together whispering and drinking coffee when they entered the cafeteria.

  That’s Tom Paynter and Sean Thompson waiting to be interviewed,’ Rains said.

  ‘Thanks for your time, Mr Rains. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention what we’ve been talking about to anyone else.’

  ‘I won’t say a thing. No one would believe me anyway. I mean, even if they had survived the explosion – where the hell did they go? We’re in the middle of the North Sea, over a hundred miles from anywhere, where could they possibly escape to from here?’

  ‘An inflatable?’

  ‘You’re crazy. The Echo74 platform is roughly equidistant between Aberdeen, the Shetland Islands, Norway and Denmark. It took you three hours to travel the hundred and twenty-four miles by chopper. It would take probably around double that time in an inflatable with an outboard motor, but they’d have been seen and heard by the men on shift.’

  ‘You’re telling me that it’s impossible to get off the rig unseen and then make it to one of those four places?’

  Rains’ face wrinkled up. ‘No, I’m not telling you it’s impossible. What I am saying is that anybody who did it would probably be committing suicide.’

  ‘Maybe that’s exactly what they did do.’

  ‘What about one of those underwater vehicles like they used in the James Bond film?’ Richards suggested.

  ‘Thunderball?’ Butler offered.

  ‘No, I don’t think they were called that.’

  ‘That was the name of the film.’

  ‘Oh! Yeah, that’s right. Well, they wouldn’t have been heard or seen if they’d been underwater.’

  ‘Diver underwater propulsion vehicles – DVPs for short?’ Rains said. ‘We have a couple of those here that the divers use sometimes.’

  ‘Could they have used those?’

  ‘It’s possible, but DVPs don’t have a range of a hundred and twenty-four miles.’

  ‘Maybe they didn’t have to go that far,’ Richards said. ‘Maybe they only had to rendezvous with an accomplice in a boat.’

  Rains didn’t have an answer for that.

  ‘So, we know possibly the how,’ Parish said. ‘All we have to do now is find out the why. What were their names?’

  ‘There was the electrician Vic Noakes, Jimmy Landy the driller, and the crane operator Kevin Parnov.’

  ‘Do you still have their personnel files?’

  ‘No – long gone. No reason to keep them. You’d have to ask Caledonian Energy, they might still have them, or maybe the Coroners’ Court.’

  ‘Okay. Thanks, Colm.’

  Shaking his head as if it was about to explode, Rains wandered off.

  To save time, Parish spoke to Tony Paynter and Richards questioned Sean Thompson. Neither of the men provided them with any additional information.

  After the evening meal they decided to turn in.

  ‘Remember – lock your door,’ he said to Richards.

  ‘I’m in two minds.’

  ‘A strategy that could attract men and women.’

  ‘Women?’

  ‘The arm-wrestler might not be a lesbian, but the other women on the rig might be.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘I’m not saying they are, but if they are . . . you’re already in the spider’s web.’

  ‘I’ll lock the door.’

  ‘Good idea.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘I’ll be locking my door, all right.’

  ‘Yes, you don’t want to become somebody’s bitch, do you?’

  ‘Have you been watching those American television channels again?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It’s a good job you don’t lie for food.’

  He tried phoning Anne Pollard to give her the good news, but the weather had made it inhospitable for satellite signals, so he locked the door and went to bed.

  ***

  ‘Who are you?’

  They turned to see a giant of a man with a harpoon in his hands, which was probably thick enough and long enough to kill the Loch Ness monster. Behind him were three other unshaven mean looking men carrying wrenches and iron pipes.

  A couple of West’s men slid the safety catches off their Heckler and Koch carbines and inched them upwards to point at the man.

  Kowalski signalled for them to lower their weapons. They were here to save Jerry and the others – not to kill sailors.

  They’d been looking over the side of the container ship to see if the pilot – Justin Long – might have escaped from his helicopter, but there was no sign of him.

  ‘Keep looking,’ Kowalski said to one of the CO19 officers who was shining a torch into the dark water searching for any trace that the pilot might still be alive.

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  A couple more officers with torches joined him.

  Standing up, he produced his Warrant Card. It was an empty gesture, which meant nothing beyond the territorial limit. ‘Detective Chief Inspector Kowalski of the British Police.’ He swept his hand around. ‘And these are . . .’

  ‘We are in international waters,’ the giant said. He wore dark blue jeans, a dirty white knitted jumper and a matching grey beard. ‘I am Captain Nils Juul. You cannot board my ship. You are pirates.’

  He moved a step closer to the man. ‘We’re not pirates. Are you married?’

  ‘Ja, I have a wife – Borghild is the kjaerlighet of my life.’ His eyes narrowed, he gripped the harpoon until his knuckles were as white as crescent moons and leaned towards Kowalski. ‘Why are you asking about my Borghild?’

  ‘My wife is called Jerry. The mother of my four children and the love of my life also. She is trapped in a container aboard your ship – and she may already be dead.’

  ‘SIR!’

  Kowalski turned.

  It was one of the officers looking over the side of the ship.

  ‘I see movement, Sir.’

  ‘The pilot of the helicopter,’ he said to the Captain, hurrying to look over the side.

  ‘A BOUY, ROPE, LIGHT,’ Nils Juul shouted at his men.

  They dropped the weapons they were carrying and began shouting themselves.

  Soon, the ship was grinding to a stop, a MARGUERITE buoy was thrown overboard, a massive spotlight on top of the bridge housing picked out Justin Long in the water, and a rope was thrown overboard.

  Together, a handful of police officers and ship’s crew hauled the pilot up the side of the ship and onto the deck.

  ‘I thought I was a dead man for a long time there,’ Long said through chattering teeth. ‘Never again. I’m only going to fly over land in future.’

  A member of the crew threw a hairy blanket over him, led him away to get warm, and provide him with dry clothes and hot liquid maybe laced with a drop of something to raise his spirits.

  Kowalski offered his hand to Nils. ‘Thanks for your help.’

  Nils took it and broke into a wide grin.

&
nbsp; They shook.

  ‘Come,’ Nils said, putting his arm around Kowalski’s shoulders like a clamp. ‘We will go to the bridge and talk about our wives.’

  Kowalski went with him, glad that Long had been rescued. Losing a chopper was something he could live with, but losing a man was another conversation entirely. He didn’t really want to talk about Nils’ wife Borghild, he wanted to find Jerry.

  ‘We have to turn round and go back to Tilbury,’ Kowalski said.

  Nils bellowed with laughter. ‘Ja!’

  They reached the bridge and sat down at a table. Nils produced two glasses and a bottle of whisky from a cupboard, and poured generous measures for both of them. ‘Drink.’

  Kowalski took a swallow. He’d never been much of a spirit drinker. In fact, apart from the crazy drinking games after rugby matches, he’d never been much of a drinker at all. And certainly, since he’d stopped playing rugby, he hadn’t been any kind of drinker. The odd pint here and there, but nothing that would have peppered his liver or pickled his brain.

  ‘Ah Borghild! Let me tell you of my beautiful Borghild. She is blonde, of course. Her hair reaches down to here . . .’ He pointed to his crotch. ‘And it is true what they say about blonde women – she is blonde there as well.’ He poured more whisky for both of them . . .

  ‘My wife might be dead,’ he blurted out.

  Nils stared at him. ‘Dead? What are you meaning?’

  He told Nils what had happened and why they had landed on the ship. ‘And I need to find her. Imagine if I could save her now, but while we were drinking and laughing she died.’

  ‘MIKHAIL,’ Nils shouted.

  There were echoes all around the ship as Mikhail was located.

  Eventually, a small thickset man arrived. He was breathing heavily, as if he’d travelled the whole length of the ship to respond to Nils’ request.

  ‘Yes, Captain?’

  ‘We have containers for Durrës in Albania – Ja?’

  ‘Ja – sixty-seven.’

  ‘How many orange containers?’

  Mikhail pulled a face and shrugged.

  ‘You know where all sixty-seven containers are?’

  ‘Ja.’

  ‘Open the orange ones.’

  ‘WHAT!’

  ‘Have you gone deaf suddenly?’

  ‘No, Captain.’

  ‘You want I should ask little Pablo to be the new Load Master?’

  ‘Little Pablo!’ Mikhail spat. ‘No, Captain.’

  ‘Then do as I ask.’

  ‘Am I looking for anything in particular?’

  ‘Dead bodies.’

  ‘Ah!’

  Nils stared at Mikhail. ‘You want I should come and help you?’

  ‘No, Captain.’ Mikhail hurried off to open the orange containers bound for Durrës in Albania.

  ‘We soon find out if your wife is in containers, Raymond.’

  He wished Nils wouldn’t call him that, but he could live with it. What he couldn’t live with was drinking a half bottle of whisky, but he didn’t want to offend his new friend. ‘We have to turn round and go back to Tilbury,’ he said, and his voice sounded like that of a man who was talking through a thin metal pipe with a golf ball in his mouth.

  ‘Ja. Here – more whisky.’

  ‘You can’t take us all the way to Albania. How will we get back to England?’

  ‘I have containers to deliver in Greece, and the Black Sea ports of Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia and Georgia. We are already behind time now, and Nils is never behind time. Nils always delivers containers on time. I drop you off at Albania. You catch next ship back to England. I speak to people. Nils get you passage on a ship.’

  ‘But I might have five dead bodies to transport back to England. Not only that, if you do find bodies in a container, it will form part of a multiple murder investigation. We will need that container back in England, so that forensics can examine it.’

  ‘Ja. Here – more whisky.’

  ‘You have to stop the ship and go back to England.’

  Nils threw back his whisky and poured more them both. ‘And then Nils will have no job. The company Nils works for will lose millions of krone. Nils will not be Captain of the Marguerite anymore. Borghild will be angry with Nils and stop him from his pleasuring. No, Nils will not turn ship around.’

  Kowalski tried to convince Nils that it was the right thing to do, even though he couldn’t feel his tongue, the inside of his mouth or his lips; and the voice and garbled words coming out of his mouth belonged to an alien parasite that had inhabited his body. But Nils wouldn’t be convinced. Instead, he began crying and called out Borghild’s name just before his face crashed onto the table. He didn’t feel too well himself, and thought maybe if he closed his eyes for a short . . .

  Chapter Nineteen

  Thursday, February 4

  ‘What time do you call this, numpty?’

  ‘Quarter to eight?’

  ‘Not half-past seven as agreed?’

  ‘I can explain.’

  ‘I’m all ears?’

  ‘The story started at three o’clock this morning . . .’

  ‘The story! It’s fictional then?’

  ‘Absolutely not. Jen woke me up . . .’

  ‘You sleep together?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘How disgusting. Okay – carry on.’

  ‘So, she woke me up at three o’clock . . .’

  ‘You’ve said that already.’

  ‘She heard a noise downstairs . . .’

  Xena took a swallow of the coffee that she’d had to make herself. ‘Why are you staring at me?’

  ‘I thought you might like to make a comment.’

  ‘Well, you thought wrong – tell the story and make it quick. Because of you we’ve already lost fifteen minutes, and I have the feeling that the time you take to recount this pathetic story will form a black hole in the continuum of my life.’

  ‘Shall I miss out the boring bits?’

  ‘I thought you’d never ask.’

  ‘I caught a burglar.’

  ‘In your house?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You mean Jen caught the burglar?’

  ‘Jen played her part.’

  ‘And you played a bit part?’

  ‘It was a joint effort.’

  ‘That still doesn’t explain . . .’

  ‘So then we had to wait for the police to arrive . . . Do you know what they said?’

  ‘Go on?’

  ‘Our burglary was important to them, and we were number seven in the queue.’

  ‘Mmmm!’

  ‘So, we had to wait in the kitchen with him.’

  ‘You should have locked him in the cellar and gone back to bed.’

  ‘We haven’t got a cellar. Not only that, it would have been a breach of his human rights apparently.’

  ‘Since when do burglars have human rights?’

  ‘I don’t know when it came about, but that’s what the woman on despatch told me – that I had to make sure he was comfortable, provide him with a warm drink and a chocolate biscuit . . .’

  ‘A chocolate biscuit! Did she specify it had to be a chocolate biscuit?’

  ‘Well no, but . . .’

  ‘You’re winding me up.’

  ‘I am not.’

  ‘Have you seen the Chief this morning?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What about last night?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you know where the Chief is?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you have any information about the Chief’s current whereabouts or situation?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you know where Parish and Richards are?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Or what they’re up to?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you complete the tasks I set you yesterday afternoon?’

  ‘Last night, you mean?’

  ‘Stop quibbling. Well?’

  �
�Yes.’

  ‘Right, let’s go into the incident room so that you can bring me up to date.’

  ‘Do you want a coffee?’

  ‘I’ve made my own, no thanks to you.’

  ‘I’ll just . . .’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘You should have thought about that before you decided to arrive fifteen minutes late and then have the audacity to feed me some cock-and-bull story about what made you late instead of coming right out and admitting: “I have no excuse, Ma’am. It’s entirely my fault, Ma’am. I take full responsibility for my own actions, Ma’am.”’

  ‘No coffee?’

  ‘No coffee.’

  She led the way into the incident room and sat down. ‘Begin when you’re ready?’

  ‘The first thing I did was try to get hold of Slinky. I didn’t know, but celebrities aren’t like you and me . . .’

  ‘You.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘They’re not like you.’

  ‘Or you.’

  ‘How do you know that? You know nothing about my life.’

  ‘I know you live in an apartment on your own, that you . . .’

  ‘Focus on Slinky and keep your spotty proboscis out of my life, Stickynuts.’

  ‘Sorry. So, I couldn’t contact her directly.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I had to go through her agent – a Salie Turner who lives in London . . .’

  ‘I’m assuming this is leading somewhere?’

  ‘Yes. Salie . . .’

  ‘Do you mean Sally?’

  ‘No – Salie. It’s Moroccan, so I discovered. The Phoenicians established a settlement called Sala . . .’

  ‘Forget I asked.’

  ‘It’s a very interesting . . .’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘Well anyway, Salie Turner said that Slinky was taking a break between tours and staying with her family in the Channel Islands.’

  ‘You explained why you were ringing?’

  ‘Of course. She said that she’d speak to Slinky and get back to me.’ A grin cracked Stick’s face wide open.

  ‘Why are you grinning like a demented three-humped camel?’

  ‘She called me.’

  ‘She said she would.’