by Susan Lewis
On returning to the apartment he kept on the Upper West Side, Elliot immediately stripped off his clothes and went to stand under a cooling shower. New York was one of his favourite cities, but not in August, when humidity curdled the air like soup. After standing under the refreshing jets for at least five minutes, he wrapped a towel round his waist, padded out to the kitchenette, and took a cold beer from the fridge. Whilst drinking it he dialled the first number Maykin had given him for Wheeler Nash. No reply. He tried the next and left a message on the voice mail, asking for a call back. Lastly he tried the main Jarret-Loring number.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Nash isn’t in the office today,’ the voice at the other end informed him. ‘Can I put you on to his assistant?’
Elliot picked up his watch. ‘No, I’ll call again,’ he said and cut the line. It was nine at night in London, he’d try Laurie next. But he got only halfway through dialling when his mobile rang.
‘Elliot Russell,’ he said into it, but whoever it was didn’t make a good enough connection, and after listening to several seconds of hissing and static, he rang off. They’d call again.
Going back to the land line he redialled Laurie’s number at Andrew and Stephen’s. While listening to the ringing tone he carried his beer to the window and stared down at the small Victorian park behind his apartment block, where the locals walked their dogs, and joggers cut out of the mainstream to run through paths of colourful flowers and well-tended trees. They’d been shooting some kind of TV drama or movie down there the day he arrived, but there was no sign of the unit now.
After leaving a message on the answerphone, he tried Laurie’s mobile and waited again for a connection: another recorded message telling him the phone was either turned off or out of range. Surprised at that, he decided to give her office a go.
‘Haven’t seen her today,’ Gino told him, ‘but I’ve only just got back from Wales. Have you tried her home? She’s at Andrew and –’
‘I left a message,’ Elliot cut in. ‘Is Wilbur there?’
‘Left about five minutes ago.’
‘Has anyone seen her today?’
‘Hang on, I’ll ask.’
As he waited Elliot tried not to let his unease take hold. OK, she’d said she was going to the office today, and if Gino hadn’t been there …
‘No, no one’s seen her,’ Gino said, coming back on the line. ‘Oh, wait, here’s Wilbur. I thought he’d gone. I’ll pass you over.’
‘You’re looking for Laurie,’ Wilbur’s voice snapped down the line.
‘She said she was coming in today. Didn’t she make it?’
‘No. So what’s going on? Should I be worried?’
‘I don’t know,’ Elliot responded truthfully. ‘I’ll get back to you if you do. Meantime, if she does get in touch, tell her to call me. If you need me I’m on my mobile.’
After ringing off he called Stan. To his annoyance, and mounting concern, Stan’s mobile asked him to leave a message too, which he did, angrily, telling him to call back the instant he heard Elliot’s voice with an update on Laurie Forbes’s whereabouts. Next he tried his own office.
Gail answered.
‘Have you seen Laurie today?’ Elliot demanded.
‘No,’ Gail answered. ‘But Liam spoke to her earlier. She’s coming here in the morning for a meeting.’
‘What time did he speak to her?’
Gail relayed the question.
‘About ten thirty this morning,’ Liam’s voice called from the distance.
‘Has anyone spoken to her since?’
Again Gail relayed the question.
‘No,’ came the answer.
‘Then try to get hold of her. Or Stan,’ Elliot barked, ‘and don’t stop until you do.’
Putting down the phone, he returned to the bedroom, tugged on a fresh polo shirt and faded jeans, pocketed his mobile and went back down to the street. He was in a cab crossing Fifty-fourth on Sixth, when his phone rang again. Hoping it was Laurie he snatched it up, but it was another bad connection, until whoever it was gave up and ended the call.
At last, after dragging through dense afternoon traffic, the cab pulled up outside the address Maykin had given him for Wheeler Nash. It was a smart neighbourhood, just off Washington Square. Telling the driver to wait, he ran up the few steps, checked the nameplates next to the bells and rang Wheeler Nash’s. After three more tries he had to accept the man wasn’t in.
‘Shit!’ he muttered, standing back to look up at the building. Where the hell was everyone today?
Returning to the cab, he told the driver to take him to the Twenty-One Club where he was due to meet another contact. Then, intending to try Laurie again, he’d just flicked open his mobile when it rang.
‘Elliot Russell,’ he barked.
‘Tom Maykin,’ the voice at the other end told him. ‘Where are you?’
‘Trying to track down your guy Nash.’
‘I thought so. You can stop wasting your time. I just got a call from the West Coast. Wheeler Nash was at the party, but apparently his car went off the freeway last night on the way back to LA airport. He didn’t make it.’
Elliot was so unprepared for that that it was a moment before he could take it in. ‘Was it an accident?’ he finally asked.
‘It certainly looked like one.’
‘What did your guy on the West Coast think?’
‘That it was an accident. Of course, if he’d been at the party, he might have another opinion. Who can tell?’
‘Is Nash the first to go like this?’ Elliot asked after a pause.
‘I can give you the names of two others, but there’s nothing to tie them together. Or to this one.’
‘Who were they?’
‘The first was a freelancer. The second worked at the Pentagon.’
Elliot thought of the Nuclear Missile Defence programme – Son of Star Wars. ‘When?’ he asked.
‘Six, seven weeks ago. Five days apart.’
‘The government defence guy was a source?’
‘So I’m told.’
‘We need to meet again,’ Elliot said.
‘Sure. In London. I’ll be there in a couple of weeks. I’ll keep at it here and deliver then.’
Elliot rang off and tried Laurie’s numbers again. Still no answer.
‘Stan!’ he cried, when finally he reached the detective. ‘Where the hell are you?’
‘Driving round in circles in the back of beyond,’ Stan answered. ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of you, but this is a hell of a place –’
‘Where’s Laurie?’ Elliot interrupted.
‘I don’t know. I –’
‘What the hell do you mean, you don’t know?’
Stan quickly explained what had happened that morning.
‘And you’re only telling me now?’ Elliot stormed. ‘Have you got any leads?’
‘No trace on the car. All she could tell me was she’d gone sort of north-east out of London. I contacted the police, but she got into the car willingly, so there’s nothing they can do. I’ve been trying to call her since eleven o’clock. Nothing doing.’
‘Where are you?’
‘Suffolk. Near Long Melford. But I’ve got to tell you, she could be anywhere by now.’
Elliot was thinking fast. North-east of London … the Gatlings’ country estate … a code that couldn’t be broken. ‘Get hold of Murray,’ he said. ‘Tell him you need the Gatlings’ address in Suffolk, but don’t attempt to go in. It’ll be heavily guarded and they’re likely to shoot before they ask. Just try to get a look, see if you can spot the car.’
‘Right, I’ll call Murray now.’
Elliot’s expression was thunderous as he looked at his watch. He wasn’t sure who he was angriest at – himself, Stan or Laurie, or probably the Gatlings for being out of the damned country while the dirty work was being done. Well, if anything happened to her, if those bastards tried to force that code out of her just to save the corrupt no-good necks of a few billio
naires, then there was going to be more merry fucking hell to pay than any syndicate could ever afford. ‘If there’s a Concorde flight available I’ll be back before midnight,’ he barked at Stan. ‘If not I’ll catch the red-eye and be with you by nine in the morning, ten at the latest.’
Chapter 18
THE ROOM WAS hot, airless and smelt faintly, mustily, of the centuries it had passed through. The floor was gnarled, polished wood, the furnishings exquisitely restored antiques, the gloomy collection of art, presumably real. It was an old-fashioned salon, part of a large country house that had a grey Jacobean frontage and a patchily light interior, blending early European baroque with a vaguely frivolous Georgian dressing. When they’d pulled up outside and allowed her to remove the blindfold Laurie had seen only that they were within the elaborate grounds of what appeared to be a large walled estate. It had occurred to her then that it might be where Sophie Long’s parents had been brought immediately after Sophie’s murder.
As they’d escorted her across the threshold, one of the men, the one with horn-rimmed glasses and a silver-grey crew cut, had removed his jacket exposing a small firearm in a sling over his shirt. If it had been meant to intimidate it had worked, though Laurie was already more afraid than she’d ever been in her life.
Now she’d been here for five, six, maybe even ten hours, with fear merging into every moment, sometimes worsening, sometimes lessening, but always there, pumping her system with adrenalin, firing her to the point of panic, then subsiding slowly, leaving her shaken and depleted, until the next rush began with a renewed round of questions. Her whole body ached with the tension, and from sitting so long in the same chair. She felt grubby and hot, her mouth was stale and her mettle had long since started yielding to the exhaustion that was creeping slowly, inexorably all the way through her.
It was some time now since anyone had spoken, except to ask if she was hungry. She was, but knew she’d be unable to eat, so she’d merely shaken her head. There was a glass of water on the tripod table beside her, which the woman had just replenished, and each time she needed to go to the bathroom the woman escorted her, and waited outside. Mainly, though, they’d maintained their positions throughout the day, Laurie in a wing-backed chair next to the hearth, which had been turned slightly to face the two men who occupied a sofa each. With their loosened ties and casual poses they appeared as relaxed as if they were enjoying a lazy evening at home. The woman was in a chair opposite, watching, listening and occasionally leaving the room to go Laurie didn’t know where, though she suspected from the mumbled communication that passed between them on her return, that she was either speaking to someone elsewhere in the house, or making phone calls.
The interrogation had been endless, and though no one had attempted any kind of physical persuasion, the mental anguish, as well as the almost deadening fatigue she was enduring now, could be a torture in itself. So was the confusing repetition of questions. What did Ashby tell her at the prison? Why did she want to see Sandra Chettle? What did she know about Sophie Long? Why didn’t she believe Ashby had done it? How much did she know about Ashby’s private life? What had Beth Ashby told her when they’d been alone, during those minutes after Ashby’s arrest? Had she spoken to Beth Ashby since then? What did she know about Beth Ashby’s book? How well did she know Heather Dance? What stories was she working on now? How long had she known Elliot Russell? What was Russell working on now? Was she involved in what he was working on now? They were going round and round in circles, so many questions, so many different answers that she could barely remember now which ones she’d given.
Picking up the water beside her, she drank half of it, then put the glass down again. It tasted sweet, yet citrussy, and the ice had almost melted.
‘I don’t imagine you want to stay here all night,’ the man with the crew cut and glasses eventually said.
Laurie looked at him. The light outside had faded completely into darkness. The lamps in the room might, at any other time, make it homely, a haven from the night. Her thoughts were becoming strange, tinted with delirium, or maybe it was fatigue. Sometimes it seemed as though there were small pockets in time that she was falling into, leaving her uncertain of how many seconds or minutes had passed since the last person spoke. She might even have missed whole chunks of what her captors had said.
‘Your parents live in Windsor, don’t they?’ the man with the crew cut said.
A small, warning chill stole into her blood. Had they mentioned her parents before? Why were they mentioning them now?
‘Didn’t you have a sister who committed suicide?’ he continued.
Her heart contracted. Was this an oblique way of reminding her that her parents wouldn’t want to lose another child? Oh God, if only she weren’t so tired. She could barely think straight now, and this about her family was disorienting her even more.
‘Why is Elliot Russell in New York?’ the other man asked.
Her voice sounded cracked and dry as she said, ‘I don’t know.’ How many times had she thought of him today, wondering how he would handle this, what he would or wouldn’t tell them, how he would make them give up.
‘You said earlier he was meeting someone. So who is he meeting?’ the man barked.
Had she said that? She didn’t remember saying that. ‘I don’t know,’ she responded.
‘Why was Liam Woods in Paris?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t work with them.’
‘You said he was there because of the ex-foreign minister’s trial. What’s Elliot Russell’s interest in that?’
Had she told them that about Liam? When had they talked about Paris? ‘I don’t know why he was in Paris,’ she said.
‘What other names did Ashby give you when you saw him?’
‘Just Sandra Chettle.’
‘Why her?’
‘He said she might help prove his innocence.’
‘How could she do that?’
‘He didn’t tell me.’
‘Where’s the transcript of your meeting with Ashby?’
‘On my computer. The one that was stolen.’
‘Who stole it?’
‘I don’t know.’
The two men looked at each other. Time after time they came back to the transcript, and the computer, but no one had admitted either to taking it, or being unable to decipher the code. Their knowledge of it was there though, hanging almost palpably in the air, and now she couldn’t remember if they’d told her they had it or not.
‘When did you last speak to Beth Ashby?’ the silver-haired man demanded.
‘I told you, I bumped into her a few weeks ago, but she didn’t want to talk to me, and I haven’t seen her since.’
‘You have a friend who works at Buchmanns.’
‘Yes.’ A sudden throb of unease. Buchmanns? Was this the first mention of Rhona?
‘Has she given you a copy of the manuscript?’
Manuscript? Oh yes, that manuscript. ‘No. I’ve never seen it. Nor has she.’
‘But you know what the book’s about?’
‘No.’
‘You know what it’s based on?’
‘No.’
‘You said earlier you knew what it was about.’
‘No. I didn’t say that.’
‘Then what did you say?’
‘I don’t know.’ This was becoming too difficult now. Tiredness was moving over her mind like a blanket, even though she felt panicky and upset. If only they would let her sleep …
The man with the crew cut exchanged glances with the woman, then the other man said, ‘Mrs Ashby made certain remarks recently that suggested you knew what was in the book.’
‘No. Why would she say that? I told you, I’ve never seen the book.’
The friezes around the ceiling seemed to undulate and grow. The cherubs quivered and floated, while the grapes appeared to fall. After a while her head lolled on to the wing of the chair as she started to sink into sleep.
‘Miss Forbes,’ the
silver-haired man suddenly barked.
She was jolted out of sleep, feeling more desperate than ever. She forced her eyes open. They were sore, her vision was blurred; the room seemed hazy and distant.
‘Exactly what is it that intrigues you about the Colin Ashby case?’
Everything was still swimming. Her throat was parched, and as she answered her tongue felt too big for her mouth. ‘The fact that he might not have done it,’ she said.
‘Then who do you think did?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Who does Colin Ashby think it was?’ The voice was an echo at the end of a cave.
Who does Colin Ashby think it was? ‘He says he doesn’t know.’
‘You said he had a theory.’
‘I don’t know what it is,’ she mumbled, hardly able to form the sentence.
Minute after minute ticked by until the clock on the mantelshelf struck midnight, and the woman turned the lamps down low. Laurie’s eyelids were too heavy to hold up any longer, so she let them fall and listened to the drone of their murmurs, fading and lifting, burring and burbling, soothing, almost like a song. Dimly she wondered if she’d been drugged. She didn’t care. She needed more water, and sleep.
‘What did Colin Ashby tell you about Sophie Long?’ someone suddenly demanded.
Startled, she struggled awake and tried to refocus. ‘That he didn’t kill her.’
‘So who did?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Why haven’t you submitted a story?’
‘No one will run it.’
‘Do you understand that withholding evidence of a crime is a crime in itself?’
Her head was spinning. This was all just a dream, drifting in and out of focus and eluding reality. ‘I’m not withholding evidence,’ she said in a voice that belonged to somebody else.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, I’m sure.’
‘That’s not what you said earlier.’
Confused, she tried to recall what he meant. But she couldn’t, so she stayed silent, swirling in a strange, vaporous cloud of grey.