But Calum was pushing his lean frame back from the bench and uncoiling, his ears tuned elsewhere.
‘I wonder if, like me,’ he said, ‘you’ve been listening to the purr of a distant vehicle which faded as it hit the valley floor but has suddenly become much louder.’
‘If it’s Creeny,’ I said as we made for the door, ‘the battle will be like something from a Stephen King novel up there in the backwoods of Maine. Three middle-aged men facing each other across a sunlit yard, armed with tin snips, a file and a cut-throat razor.’
Despite the sun, the air was chill. The breeze ruffled my hair. Calum moved away towards the oak tree. Determined to protect his Mercedes? A cunning outflanking manoeuvre? I grinned absently, walked along the stone front of the workshop and so nearer to the house. As I did so I realized I’d left my file on the bench. Unarmed, I faced the approaching hordes driving up the slope from the stone bridge in their war wagon: a red Nissan Micra.
For one horrible moment I recalled the transport Prudence Wise had driven from Gibraltar into Spain and thought she’d come back from the dead. Then the Micra pulled to a halt. Alongside Calum’s Mercedes it appeared to diminish in size. Calum was watching from the other side of his car, arms folded on the roof. Like me he’d seen the Micra’s occupants, and relaxed.
The little car’s doors swung open. A man and a woman slid out awkwardly, straightened with difficulty, looked across at me with faces lined with recent tragedy.
In the circumstances, it didn’t need a detective of any kind to work out who had finally come calling.
It was as if they had stepped down from their yacht in the Mediterranean – soon afterwards riddled with bullets – and landed in my slate-floored, black-beamed living room without time passing or distance being crossed. They were suntanned, dressed for hotter climes, and I’d swear I could smell warm salt air and a whiff of Ambre Solaire sun oil. Pru had mentioned togs by Gucci, Versace and Jimmy Choo, and while I’m no fashion expert I could recognize style, and imagine the cost. Summer togs. Mediterranean, any-time togs. Unsuitable for a North Wales autumn.
The introductions had been done as we clustered in the yard. We’d shaken hands, remarked on their journey and the weather. Then the visitors, turning blue, had made a break for the house.
They were both well into their sixties. Charlie was about five nine, overweight and balding, and had a rust and red patterned snood tucked into his open-necked shirt, a gold ring in his left ear. Adele was tall and still willow-slim, with long fair hair bleached a streaky blonde by her years in the sun. A simple flowered sun dress exposed tanned shoulders. She’d slipped on a wrap that must have cost the earth, but Bryn Aur’s new central heating was doing nothing to ease her shivering.
She was standing with her back to the inglenook, hugging herself for warmth, and she turned as Calum came through with a wooden tray laden with drinks and a couple of bottles and placed it on the coffee table. Charlie had dropped onto the Chesterfield and looked exhausted, but wasn’t too far gone to grab a glass of whisky and knock it back in one go.
‘Needed that,’ he said.
‘But it’s not your usual tipple, darling.’
‘Close.’ He grinned wanly at me.
‘He’s most particular,’ Adele said. ‘Always drinks Laphroaig Quarter Cask single malt Islay Scotch whisky—’
‘Or whatever local brew’s on special offer. Do me a favour, darling, cut the crap. We’re broke; our daughter’s dead.’
Calum threw himself into a chair and stretched out, ankles crossed. I had been standing by the window with the bright sun at my back. Now I crossed to a free armchair, picking up a drink on the way.
‘I am so sorry for your loss,’ I said.
Charlie shrugged, clearly wanting his grief to remain at the back of his mind where it had been dumped. Adele looked down into her drink and registered sorrow with a sniff.
‘We flew in today, from Spain,’ Charlie said. Came straight here instead of to the cops because we’re mystified. Can’t see where you fit in, why you were the chosen ones.’
‘Before getting to that, how did you find us?’ I shook my head. ‘No, what I mean is how did you connect my name to Prudence?’
He looked at me as if I was thick. ‘Brit newspapers. We get ’em in Spain.’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Yeah, yeah, it’s been more than a week. So we get them, but not every day.’
‘And they’re days old anyway,’ Adele said. ‘I read them now and then, and he only reads the sport.’
‘You do know police from Gibraltar and Spain are looking for you?’
Charlie nodded. ‘Not working too hard at it, though, not making it a priority. No crime’s been committed. Just a couple of ancient Brits have gone missing. And I’ll guarantee Rickman’s already recovered his boat.’
‘That’s true, but you must surely understand,’ I said, ‘that this happened to Prudence because of … of what you did?’
Charlie stared. ‘But that’s a load of bollocks. You saying Rickman killed her because I got tired of carrying drugs and illegals across the Med?’
‘On the night you sailed,’ I said, ‘he sent two men after you. With guns.’
‘We did hear some shooting from afar, didn’t make any connection,’ Adele said, both hands wrapped around her empty glass. ‘By that time our friends had got us very close to Tarifa.’
‘That’s where you went ashore?’
‘Oh yes. All planned in advance. Even the villa we were renting—’
‘Ignore that,’ Charlie said. ‘I’m not ashamed to say I’m skint. For villa, read tatty one-bed terrace in a town still in the Middle Ages.’
‘As you are, darling,’ Adele said sweetly. ‘Just.’
‘Anyway,’ Charlie went on, ‘what I’m saying is Rickman wouldn’t commit murder just because I called his bluff.’
‘Cross purposes is a phrase that springs to mind,’ Calum said, stirring from his repose just enough to place his glass on the tray. ‘Something like that, anyway, but we’re certainly reading from different pages. So tell us, Charlie, what’s with the bluff and how did you call it?’
‘By goin’.’ He looked at Calum, back at me. ‘Rickman warned me, but I took no notice. I was workin’ for him, and now I’m not. If he doesn’t like that, well, tough titty.’
‘Is that what you think this is about?’
‘Yeah, well … what else?’
‘Stolen diamonds,’ I suggested.
‘What fuckin’ diamonds?’
I looked at Adele. ‘You told me you read the papers; you must have seen the story.’
‘Now and then, I said – and no, I didn’t.’
‘Charlie,’ I said, ‘who dreamed up that photo shoot aboard Sea Wind?’
‘Rickman. He’s the ultimate poser. He was wettin’ himself at the idea.’
‘And you didn’t know Karl Creeny was going to be there?’
‘Couldn’t, could I. I’ve never heard of him.’
‘Well, I find that hard to believe, and from the look on her face so does Adele.’
‘Just get to the point, if there is one,’ said Charlie, irritably.
‘The diamonds I’m talking about are the ones recently stolen by Karl Creeny from a Liverpool diamond merchant. The ones that were carried to Gibraltar by one of Creeny’s men. Now very dead. As you know. Because that’s how you got your hands on them, and that’s why you planned that elaborate disappearance.’
Charlie’s mouth fell open. He went pale beneath his tan. Adele wobbled. Her empty glass hit the rug in front of the dog grate, and rolled. She dropped to the Chesterfield alongside Charlie, and grabbed his hand.
‘Where in God’s name,’ Charlie croaked, ‘did you get that idea?’
‘From Bernie Rickman. He took us aboard Sea Wind and threatened us in your absence. He’s convinced you stole Creeny’s jewels. That’s why he sent armed men after you. And that’s why it didn’t end there, as you thought it might. We’re
pretty sure Prudence was murdered by people working for Rickman. One’s an Australian going by the name of Clontarf.’
I looked questioningly at Charlie. He shook his head.
‘Okay, well, the others were a Liverpool crook, and Françoise Rickman.’
Charlie swore softly. ‘Christ, I might’ve known that cow’d be involved,’ he said.
‘We believe your daughter was killed to draw you out of hiding,’ I said quietly. ‘If we’re right, it’s worked a treat.’
‘Bloody has, hasn’t it?’ Charlie said.
‘And there’d be no point doing it unless a careful watch is then kept to see if the suckers walk into the trap.’
‘Right. So they must be out there now, somewhere in those fuckin’ hills, blokes with guns just waiting for us to turn up.’
There was horror in his voice, and Adele winced as, in his despair, Charlie’s grip on her hand tightened like a vice.
Thirteen
‘I didn’t steal the diamonds,’ Charlie said.
‘We didn’t even know there’d been a robbery,’ Adele said huskily, ‘let alone that someone was bringing the diamonds to Gib.’
She was still clinging to Charlie’s hand. When she’d dropped down beside him it was as if her legs had given way. It was Adele’s collapse more than Charlie’s desperate denial that was planting doubt in my mind. They looked genuinely shocked, and that shock was making them look their age. Middle-aged jewel thieves? I couldn’t see it.
‘But you must have heard about the robbery. It was on television.’
‘Come on, Jack, the first you heard of it was from Reg,’ Calum pointed out. ‘Not everybody watches the box.’
‘Dead right,’ Charlie said. ‘And we were busy, weren’t we, planning the great escape. That took time, ingenuity and a lot of courage.’ He looked proudly at Adele. ‘Just like all those years ago, eh? It took guts to get from the daily grind producing poxy bathroom tissues to living the life of Riley on the Med, so we knew we had it in us.’
Adele seemed to soften at the memories. She’d released Charlie’s hand, and her eyes were distant.
‘One day we were slaves to industry,’ she said, ‘the next we’d retired. We toasted our freedom with foaming glasses of Krug Grande Cuvée champagne, spent the rest of that same night loading up our black BMW X5 SUV.’
‘God, yes,’ Charlie said. ‘Pru was at uni, so there was nothing holding us. Made do with a couple of snatched hours of sleep, then headed south with thumping heads and bleary eyes. And it was two fingers to Spain’s sprawling, crowded holiday Costas, I tell you. Went like an arrow for the Rock of Gibraltar. British, a tax haven, which is always handy, and as a bonus it’s basking in the Mediterranean sun. Crossed the airport’s sun-baked runway, booked in at the Rock Hotel and settled down to plan the next move.’
‘You hadn’t thought further ahead than that?’ I said quietly, fascinated by the story and what it said about the man telling it.
‘Well, sort of,’ Charlie said. ‘It was a no-brainer, really, because from the moment we crossed the channel we’d been chasing a very special dream.’ He chuckled. ‘The way I saw it, an overpriced apartment in one of the white blocks soaring from all that reclaimed land in Gib would have been like going from rat-race to mouse-hole. So we bought a boat, a small one but big enough to live on, and then… .’
He trailed off. Adele’s posture had once again become stiff with tension for, like Charlie’s, her thoughts had raced ahead from memories of their own small boat to the big one that had come at a hell of a price. A price which had eventually become too much to handle.
‘Going all that way overland,’ I said, ‘was a strange decision.’
Charlie shook his head. ‘Absolutely not. It’s like all those motor homes you see nowadays. People love ‘em because of the freedom. And it’s not just the fact that you really can go where you like, stop when you like, it’s that indescribable feeling you get… .’ He shrugged, at a loss for words. ‘I’d do that trip again,’ he said finally. ‘Do it tomorrow.’
‘Aye, well,’ Calum said, ‘the courage it took could come in handy just now, because unless my ears are deceiving me there is a car getting closer by the second.’ He didn’t move when he looked at me, but there was a new tenseness in his lean frame.
‘Oh, Jesus Christ,’ Charlie said. Pressing her face to his shoulder, Adele whimpered like an animal in pain.
I crossed to the window, listened to the purr of the approaching vehicle.
‘It’s all right, it’s the Shogun.’
I heard Calum explaining what that meant as I watched Sian’s big 4 x 4 rock up into the yard and pull to a stop by the Micra. She got out, stared at yet another strange car, then glanced with a frown towards the house. I gave her a wave. She nodded, and I turned away.
‘Even if you didn’t steal the jewels,’ I said, ‘you’re still in deep trouble.’
‘Like, trapped, you mean?’ Charlie said, surprisingly astute.
‘Let’s just say that coming in was easy; going out could be more difficult.’
Even Charlie smiled at that. Colour was returning to his face. Adele bent to recover her glass, then splashed whisky into it from the bottle on the tray. Footsteps sounded on the hallway’s tiled floor. The door clicked open and Sian swept in. She was flushed from her work with weights. Her tied-back damp hair suggested fifty or so lengths of the pool. She wore her red fleece draped like a shawl over a pale yellow T-shirt. Quick as a flash her blue eyes took in the newcomers. They switched to Calum – who nodded at her unspoken question – then she padded across the Indian rug to Charlie.
‘Sian Laidlaw,’ she said, holding out her hand. ‘I’m here to save you.’
Charlie and Adele shook hands, consternation mingling with bewilderment, putting blank looks on their faces.
‘I’ve spotted the men watching the house,’ Sian explained. ‘They’re up on the hillside, about half a mile from here. You know the spot, Jack. They’re using binoculars, but being very careless with them in this bright sun. The lenses are flashing like a bloody heliograph.’
‘So with them up there, how do we get out?’ Charlie said.
‘The easy answer is, don’t bother,’ Calum said. ‘Stay here until they run out of food and water, make a break for it when they head for the shops.’
Sian shook her head. ‘They’ve been out there waiting for Charlie and Adele to show up, so it can only be a matter of time before they storm the house.’
‘Then we think fast, and outwit them,’ I said.
‘Easy for you to say,’ Charlie said. ‘What brain I’ve got left has gone numb.’
‘Try subterfuge,’ Calum said, uncoiling from his chair, yawning, and stretching his long arms towards the black beams.
‘Eh?’
‘Leave here in disguise. Or rather, don’t leave here, but look as if you are because people who look like you are away like the wind in your wee car.’
‘That’s excellent,’ Sian said. She’d been in the kitchen and was back swigging long draughts from a tall glass of water. ‘Also, it will work a treat because there’s rain coming and those people who are not Charlie and Adele can throw jackets or something over their heads. Their faces will be hidden, without in any way looking suspicious.’
‘Problem is,’ I said, ‘that when those people who are not Charlie and Adele leave they’ll be followed by those armed men up there on the hill who think they are, and will be in the trouble meant for—’
‘Charlie and Adele,’ Calum said. ‘However, trouble for gallant amateur detectives would be all in the day’s work, and taken in their stride.’
‘You three,’ Charlie said, ‘are completely bonkers.’
‘Not at all.’ Calum stroked his beard, poked at his glasses. I thought he looked a bit embarrassed. ‘We tend to laugh and joke a lot out of habit,’ he went on, ‘which can be a wee bit off-putting to strangers. But today I think we’ve all got a special reason. We’re so sorry for your loss, but ra
ther than get maudlin, lightening the mood seems like a much better idea.’
For a moment there was silence. Then Charlie gestured helplessly.
‘Yeah … and thanks for that,’ he said gruffly. Adele made some kind of appreciative sound, but her eyes were damp and she was again looking into her glass.
‘Anyway,’ Calum said, working his shoulders to ease the tension, ‘to keep the light-hearted bit going but append to it a serious note, I think the idea of Jack and Sian rushing out of here wearing your clothes is not only hilarious, but workable.’
‘The biter bit,’ I said. ‘Rickman’s mob used a murder to draw you here; we use cunning to draw them away. And once they’re on our tails, you leap into Calum’s Mercedes and head for … well, where would they go, Sian?’
‘Calum’s flat in Liverpool?’ She looked at the lanky Scot. ‘You’ve got a spare room, Calum, so what d’you say?’
‘It cannot be used.’ Calum shook his head. ‘Hell, didn’t Rickman mention my name when he threatened you? If he knows that, he’ll surely know where I live.’
‘Okay, well, as we’ve decided on Liverpool I’ve got a better idea,’ I said. ‘Eleanor lives in Gib, but she’s kept her flat in Booker Avenue, and I’ve got a set of keys.’
Sian frowned. ‘But won’t Rickman have that address in his notes?’
‘No. He knows Eleanor lives in Gibraltar, and he won’t have looked beyond her bungalow.’
‘Yes, all right, that sounds like an excellent bolt hole,’ Sian said, a twinkle in her eyes, ‘but do you really trust Charlie and Adele?’
‘Calum will take them there, with a week’s supplies,’ I said, deadpan, ‘and lock them in.’
‘But if we don’t move fast it’ll be too damn late,’ Calum said. He grinned at Charlie. ‘That was another example of their weak jokes, as you’ve no doubt guessed, but I think it’s time you all rushed upstairs and changed clothes.’
And so we did. Sian and I had plenty of spare jeans and sweaters that were roughly the right size for our two visitors. I wore Charlie’s shirt – we were both wearing jeans, so didn’t need to swap – and Sian slipped Adele’s dress on over her T-shirt and jeans. The rain Sian forecast had already come sweeping in along the valley and was hissing through the big oak and turning the yard’s stone flags to cold grey mirrors. Visibility from the mountain’s slopes would be severely restricted. Looking through misted binoculars and sheets of fine rain the watchers would spot bits of shirt and quick flashes of the brightly-coloured dress, and draw the wrong conclusions.
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