Thinking back, Suzanne realised she hadn’t eaten since the supper on the plane. No wonder her stomach was feeling hollow.
‘Yes, I’m starving.’
‘Well, I didn’t think you’d fancy cooking this evening, so I’ve brought you some stuff to be going on with and I thought we could go down to the Indian by the park later on, if you’re not too tired.’ Suzanne watched with amusement as her sister pulled from the bag a couple of packets of bacon, a tin of beans, a large melon, an unsliced brown loaf—and a pack of watercress. ‘They didn’t have any fresh at the greengrocer’s, but I managed to get a bag of the packed stuff in the supermarket.’
Touched that her sister remembered her favourite first meal after a trip—watercress and brown bread sandwiches—Suzanne filled the kettle and pulled the teabags from the cupboard while Charlie grabbed the bread knife.
‘And the bacon?’ she asked.
‘Well, I didn’t have anything in for breakfast...’
It was as they were finishing their sandwiches, sitting at the table in the bright little kitchen, that Suzanne remembered something her sister had said earlier that morning.
‘You said you ran out of money in Greece. You shouldn’t be buying food.’ and reaching for her purse, ‘How much do I owe you?’ Charlie coloured to the roots of her jet black hair.
‘Er, it’s okay, I took the money from your purse while you were asleep.’ Suzanne looked at the vase of lilies sitting on the draining board and Charlie shook her head. ‘No, they really are a present. I just borrowed the money to pay for them. I’ll pay you back as soon as my giro arrives.’ Suzanne was just gearing up to have a go about taking other people’s money and spending it freely, when the doorbell rang.
‘That’ll be the man from the airport;’ said Charlie, ‘do you want me to go?’
‘What man from the airport?’
‘I left you a note. Didn’t you see it? He rang this morning to say he had your suitcase.’ Charlie pushed an old envelope across the table.
‘No, I didn’t see it.’ The doorbell rang again—a longer, more impatient peal this time. ‘Well, you’ll have to go. I can’t answer it dressed like this.’ And grabbing her mug of tea, she dashed into the bedroom as Charlie ambled towards the hall. Pulling the bedroom door to after her, she put her ear to the crack and listened.
‘Good afternoon,’ the voice was deep and Eastern European. ‘Are you Suzanne Jones?’ Say yes, Charlie, she thought, just say yes!
‘No, I’m her sister. We spoke on the phone. You are Mr...?’
‘Mladov, Nico Mladov. I bring your sister’s case. She is in?’ Say no, Charlie, just say no. But once again, her sister failed to read her mind.
‘Well, she’s in, but not available right now. I can take it for her.’
‘No, I need the signature of the owner. It’s airport procedure.’
‘Oh, right; well, you’d better come in then. She won’t be long.’
Suzanne sighed as she heard Charlie take the man into the lounge. She pulled on jeans and a fresh T-shirt.
When she entered the lounge, Mladov was perched on the edge of the sofa, with the suitcase in front of him, holding on to the handle as though he thought Charlie might steal it away from him. He was a huge man, broad-shouldered, wearing black leather and Ray-Bans. The lounge suddenly seemed much smaller. Charlie smiled as her sister walked in.
‘Suzanne, Mr Mladov has brought your case—but he needs a signature for the airport.’ Suzanne held out her hand.
‘Mr Mladov, it’s good of you to come all this way.’ His hand felt icy to her touch and he pulled away after the briefest of handshakes.
‘Miss Jones, on behalf of Heathrow airport, I apologise for the delay in returning your case and any inconvenience caused.’ Romanian, Suzanne guessed, or maybe Polish? But his English was very good. He’d obviously been here for some time.
‘Well, it wasn’t your fault,’ she said, ‘someone took the wrong case, didn’t they?’ He looked surprised.
‘No, I believe your case slipped off the conveyor behind the baggage hall and was only found after you’d left the airport.
‘Oh, but I thought when I saw the other bag...’ He was looking at her blankly. ‘Oh well, I guess it doesn’t matter. Has Charlie offered you a cup of tea, Mr Mladov?’ Her sister nodded.
‘Yes, of course. The kettle’s just boiling. Tea, black, two sugars, wasn’t it?’ The man inclined his head and Charlie disappeared towards the kitchen.
‘Did you enjoy your trip to Africa?’ Mladov said. Suzanne gave a start.
‘How did you know...?’ He pointed to the baggage tags.
‘You took the overnight flight from Lusaka. Was it business or pleasure?’ He grimaced. ‘Although, I’m not sure many people go to that part of the world on holiday.’
She ignored the disdain in his voice.
‘Yes, business.’
‘And was it successful?’
‘Very, thank you.’ She was beginning to find his questions and the sharp stare he gave her unsettling, and looked up in relief as her sister came back into the room with three mugs of tea precariously balanced on a tiny tray.
As Mladov drank his tea, the sisters attempted to talk to him about how long he’d been in England and how he liked working for the airport, but he seemed distracted and answered their questions briefly, his eyes continually roving around the room. Then draining his mug, he jumped up.
‘Well, ladies, I must go,’ he said, heading for the hall.
‘I thought you needed my sister’s signature,’ Charlie said quietly. He gave a start and then laughed.
‘Of course! Thanks for reminding me.’ He pulled a typed sheet out of his pocket, together with a cheap biro which he handed to Suzanne.
‘I do hope you won’t get stuck in traffic going back to Hounslow at this time’’ she said as she handed the signed paper back to him.
‘Oh, I’m sure it will be fine,’ he said. ‘There was no problem on the way here—and the way back looked clear as well.’
‘What a strange man,’ said Suzanne as she closed the door. Charlie gave a theatrical shiver.
‘Creepy, I’d say. I’m glad I wasn’t here on my own when he came.’
‘‘That’s funny,’ Suzanne said, as she opened her case, ready to throw the dirty clothes in the washing basket.
‘Hmm?’ Charlie was sitting cross-legged on the floor in the corner, scrolling through the menus on her laptop.
‘Well, I’m sure I put this dress at the bottom of the case. But now it’s on the top.’
‘How on earth can you remember what order you did your packing in?’
‘I put all the dirty stuff on the bottom, tuck my caftan around it, and then put any unworn clothes on the top.’
‘Well maybe you didn’t wear that dress after all?’
‘Oh I did, definitely, because WB was teasing me about it glowing in the dark when we went out to dinner on the last evening. And then someone knocked over a glass of wine and it went all down my skirt.’ She pulled a few more things out of the case. ‘And my toiletries don’t look right—the toothpaste’s out of the box.’
‘Only you would keep your toothpaste tube in a box, sis. You’ve really got to lighten up a bit.’ Charlie grinned up at Suzanne, taking the sting out of her words, before returning to studying the screen.
‘But the lock’s not been tampered with,’ Suzanne continued, checking the padlock. ‘How very strange. I reckon someone’s been through this case. Good job I never keep anything of value in there, isn’t it?’
‘Well, anyone who’s going to trawl through your dirty underwear must be dedicated to their job,’ was the muttered response. As Suzanne looked around for something soft to throw at her sister, Charlie suddenly sat up straight and looked sharply at her.
‘Didn’t Mladov say the journey from Heathrow was a smooth one?’ she asked.
‘Yes, you know he did; only took him forty minutes, he reckoned. Why?’
‘Well, h
e must have come by helicopter, then,’ said Charlie, ‘or teleported. There’s been a serious accident on the Great West Road. It says here the M4’s been closed since early this morning and all the other roads are gridlocked.’
‘Which means—’
‘Wherever your Mr Mladov came from this afternoon, it certainly wasn’t Heathrow!’
5: ENGLAND; OCT 2004
When Suzanne arrived at the office on Monday morning, she was still concerned about the incident with the suitcase and the mysterious Mr Mladov. But the pile of papers, phone messages and faxes on her desk soon pushed the events of the weekend to the back of her mind. She was halfway through drafting a reply to a query about import regulation requirements between two countries in the Horn of Africa when Sir Frederick Michaels knocked on the doorjamb and peered into the room. Suzanne always thought Fred’s habit of knocking was ironic—after all, who was going to refuse entry to the IHF Director General when he wanted to talk to them—but she appreciated the gesture. She pushed her chair back from her desk with a smile of welcome.
‘Sir Frederick, good morning. Come on in.’
‘Suzanne, my dear, I didn’t want to intrude; I can see you are swamped. But I just wanted to see how you got on last week.’ Suzanne’s mind flew back to her delayed case, but she doubted if Sir Frederick was really interested in her domestic travel problems.
‘Well, yes, I think it went well,’ she said, waving her boss to a seat, ‘but you can never tell with these things, can you?’
‘Get any push-back from the locals, did you?’
‘Well, everyone agreed the problem of counterfeiting is terrible, but there was no consensus on what should be done about it. The industrialists think the governments should do more. The regulators want the factories to improve so they don’t have to import so many drugs, and the distributors say they’ve seen it all before and campaigns like this never work.’
‘So we still have a way to go, then?’
‘And the Kenyan Health Minister was a bit hostile, which didn’t help.’
‘Yes, well, Walter always was a bit of a stroppy bugger, but I think his heart’s probably in the right place.’ Suzanne looked questioningly at Sir Frederick. ‘Didn’t I tell you the Honourable Walter Mukooyo and I were at Kings at the same time?’ Suzanne shook her head, ‘Yes, we used to go shooting together in the long vacation; crack shot he was too—always bagged more birds than I could.’
Suzanne didn’t have time to adjust her perception of the Kenyan Health Minister, or of her boss for that matter, as her phone started to ring. Sir Frederick jumped up.
‘Look, I’ll leave you to it,’ he said, ‘but we’ve got a briefing session booked for eleven hundred hours tomorrow. Nothing elaborate, just an initial report back for now.’ And with a wave of his hand, he was gone.
Picking up the phone, Suzanne thought ruefully that she was going to have a long day—and night—in front of her if she was going to have her report ready for the next morning. Sir Frederick might be affable on the outside, but inside he was a hard task master.
‘Miss Jones?’ The voice broke into her thoughts. ‘Are you there, Miss Jones?’ She gave a start.
‘Yes, this is Suzanne Jones.’
‘Miss Jones, this is Melanie? From Heathrow Airport? You reported a suitcase missing on Saturday morning?’ Suzanne vaguely remembered a tiny badge on a large bust and a cheery cockney laugh.
‘Oh yes, Melanie, thanks for ringing. I was going to call you later today, to thank you for sorting out the problem so quickly—and finding someone who was willing to come out to Vauxhall on a Saturday too.’
‘But, Miss Jones—’
‘Although I did wonder if the case had gone through customs before it came to me.’
‘Sorry, Miss Jones?’
‘The contents seem to have been disturbed, and I wondered if that happened at your end or before it left Zambia.’
‘But, Miss Jones.’ The voice sounded a little more shrill with each interruption. ‘‘Miss Jones, I was ringing to say we haven’t been able to find your case.’
‘But your Mr Mladov brought it round at the weekend.’
‘Mr Mladov? No, the name doesn’t ring a bell. But this is a big place, Miss Jones, and the left hand often doesn’t know what the right hand’s been nicking, as the saying goes.’ Suzanne was pretty sure that wasn’t how the saying went, but the girl was talking again. ‘It was probably the baggage handlers, doing it off their own bat, as it were. Did he say where they found it?’
‘He said it had slipped off the conveyor...’
Well, there you are, then. Probably thought there was a reward in it.’ The voice sharpened. ‘You didn’t give him a reward, did you?’
‘Only a cup of tea.’
‘Well, I don’t think we’ll begrudge him that, will we?’ There was a burst of laughter. ‘Okay, so I’ll mark this one as resolved then.’
‘But how would he know—’
‘Well, I’m glad it’s all been sorted out. Cheery bye, Miss Jones.’
‘No, wait a minute—’ but the buzz at the end of the phone told Suzanne she was talking to herself. She stared into space, trying to work out how Mladov had got her address, then gave a smile as the penny dropped.
‘You idiot, Suzanne, there’s an address label on the case, isn’t there?’ And with a shake of her head, she turned back to her work.
Five hours, several cups of coffee and a cheese and celery sandwich later, she’d got her notes for the presentation in a reasonable order and was just about to start work on the PowerPoint slides when the phone rang. The display showed a familiar number; her own.
‘Charlie, what do you want? I’m right in the middle of a report and haven’t got time to chat.’ There was a silence at the other end of the line. ‘Charlie? Are you there, Charlie?’ The voice, when it came was a cross between a whisper and a croak.
‘Suzanne, I’m sorry, I only went out for a few minutes.’ There was a pause. ‘I thought I’d left the door open, so I came straight in. He was still here.’
‘Charlie, what are you talking about?’
‘There was a man, here, in the flat. You’ve been burgled.’
‘Good grief, Charlie, are you okay? Is he still there?’
‘No, he ran away when I arrived. I’m so sorry, Susu.’ It was a long time since her big sister had called her that. Now Suzanne was really scared.
‘Charlie, I’m on my way. Stay right there. I’ll be ten minutes.’
The main attraction of the Vauxhall flat for Suzanne was its close proximity to St Thomas’, the sprawling hospital complex on the embankment opposite the Palace of Westminster, where IHF rented offices. In good weather, she walked to work in less than twenty minutes. Today, she grabbed the first taxi she saw on the embankment and made it home in just under ten.
The door of the flat was ajar and the hallway was dim. Suzanne didn’t see her sister until she switched on the light. Charlie was on the floor, slumped against the wall, eyes closed and phone still in her hand. The phone was emitting a high-pitched whine. Suzanne dropped to her knees beside her and put her hand on her sister’s shoulder. Charlie groaned and opened her eyes. A thin trickle of dried blood ran down the side of her face.
‘You should see the other guy,’ she mumbled with a lop-sided grin that turned into a grimace. She touched her fingertips to her head and sucked in air sharply. Then she tried to stand up but Suzanne pushed her gently back against the wall.
‘You stay right there, sweetie. I’m going to get you checked out before you move. Let me have the phone.’ Charlie held the handset out, but her fingers were still tightly wrapped around it.
‘I can’t seem to...’ She started to shiver violently and a whimper escaped from her mouth before she clamped her lips together. Suzanne carefully uncurled her sister’s fingers, one by one. Taking the phone gently and placing it briefly on the cradle to get the dialling tone, she hit the bottom right hand button three times.
‘Hello,
yes, police please—and an ambulance, my sister’s been attacked.’
While the paramedics were checking out Charlie, Suzanne surveyed the damage to her home. The lock had obviously been forced—so Charlie didn’t need to feel guilty about leaving the door open. The drawers and cupboards in the kitchen were all open. In her bedroom, the contents of her dressing table had been tipped onto the bed. She gazed ruefully at the untidy pile of knickers and bras, thick winter tights and summer T-shirts plus colourful chiffon scarves bought for her every year by a maiden aunt who didn’t realise Suzanne didn’t wear a scarf unless it was an angora wool one in winter.
But the worst mess was in the lounge. Every book had been pulled off the shelves and thrown on the floor. They were all lying open and looked like they’d been shaken before being discarded. Papers, which she kept neatly catalogued in pigeon holes in the dresser were scattered on the patterned carpet, together with the contents of her box files which seemed to have been upended haphazardly. Every painting on the wall was askew. Her collection of LPs—she still preferred listening to vinyl, even though most of her friends favoured CDs these days—were scattered across the room.
‘Well someone’s gone to a great deal of trouble searching for something, haven’t they? What do you think they were looking for, Miss Jones?’ The voice took her by surprise in the quiet of the flat and she jumped nervously. A uniformed police officer was standing in the doorway looking at her. ‘Sorry, Miss Jones, I didn’t mean to startle you. Can we go into the kitchen and have a chat?’ And as she followed the man into the hallway, Suzanne was asking herself the same question. What was the burglar looking for? Was this just a random piece of bad luck or something more?
6: ENGLAND; OCT 2004
By the time the policeman had finished talking to Suzanne, the Scenes of Crime Officer had dusted every surface of the flat for prints, and the local locksmith had repaired the door, it was early evening. The paramedics had confirmed Charlie didn’t seem to be suffering from concussion.
Counterfeit! Page 3