Alarm Call

by Jardine, Quintin

  That seemed sound to me, so we asked our waiter for two large steaks, medium, broccoli with mine and fries with his, plus a bottle of claret, told him to bring them in fifteen minutes then headed for the lift.

  Up on the roof we weren’t quite eyeball to eyeball with Nelson, but the view was pretty impressive nonetheless.

  There were plenty of people up there too, but we were able to find a quiet corner. Someone in the crowd spotted me and headed towards us, possibly with autograph in mind, but I’ve developed a warning-off look that works every time . . . unless I’m in Los Angeles: autograph-hunting is one of its biggest industries.

  ‘What’s brought you down here?’ Mark asked straight away. ‘You never said you were coming.’

  I told him, then filled him in on what we had found in Prim’s flat. ‘Interesting,’ he said, when I was finished.

  ‘What do you make of it?’

  ‘I can’t say, as yet. Does she know if Wallinger had any friends in London?’

  ‘As it turns out she doesn’t know anything about him, nothing that’s turned out to be the truth, apart from his real name, and the fact that he has a normal sperm count.’

  ‘Has any mail come for him since he left? Or has anyone been asking after him?’

  ‘The first, I couldn’t tell you, but she did mention a couple of phone calls, from a bloke looking for him.’

  ‘Recently?’

  ‘Within the last fortnight. She told him that Wallinger had gone.’

  ‘Then I’d guess he must have watched the place, and when Prim left, sent people in.’

  ‘Could this be the reason why he disappeared so suddenly?’

  ‘Possibly, or at least it could have made him go earlier than planned.’

  ‘With the baby?’

  ‘That’s the puzzler.’

  ‘Can you find out who these guys are, or who’s behind them? I don’t really fancy the boys from Sun Hill to get a result.’

  ‘I can try. Want to hear what I’ve come up with so far?’

  I nodded. ‘If you’re ready to tell me.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve got something for you. First of all, our assumption was right: Paul Wallinger is his real name. He’s thirty-eight years old, and he was born in St Paul . . . maybe that’s where the Christian name came from . . . Minnesota, to John and Martha Wallinger, the oldest of their three children. Pop was a line manager with a firm of mechanical engineers in the city, till he snuffed it five years ago. They seem to have been a respectable middle-class family. Originally, Mr Wallinger was career military. He fought with the Rangers in Vietnam, was decorated several times, and was eventually invalided out with a chest wound that ultimately contributed to his death. Mom worked for a firm of asset managers in Minneapolis, across the river, and had done for over twenty years. While John was in Vietnam, she was a campaign worker for Vice President Hubert Humphrey, when he ran for President for the Democrats against Nixon in 1968. I believe she’s still alive, but she’ll be sixty-three now, and may be retired.’

  ‘How do you know so much about them?’

  ‘I read John’s obituary in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. I did a search for Mom’s name in the death listings, but I couldn’t find it. There are half a dozen Wallingers listed in the twin cities’ telephone directories. Three of them have the first initial M; of those two are in St Paul and one’s in Minneapolis. I looked for J also, in case she didn’t change the listing after her husband died. There’s one, but it’s in Minneapolis, not St Paul.’

  He handed me a sheet of paper; I glanced at it and saw all six Wallingers, with phone numbers and addresses. There was also a business listing, a firm called HHH Asset, in Marquette Avenue. ‘That’s the company Mother worked for; maybe she still does.’

  ‘Easily checked,’ I said. ‘What did the obituary say about Paul?’

  ‘Not much, but there were other references to him on the website; he graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1988 with a BA . . .’

  ‘Same year as I did from Edinburgh,’ I remarked. ‘What was his degree?’

  ‘Theatre Arts, with distinction in vocal production and design and technical. He did an elective in play-writing.’

  ‘Bloody hell, he’s a qualified actor.’

  ‘I suppose you could call him that, but when he left university he joined a local theatre as a stage manager rather than a performer. He did become a US Equity and a Screen Actors’ Guild member, though, under the professional name of Paul Patrick Walls. Run a trace on that and you’ll find him moving around the US through the nineties from theatre company to theatre company as a performer and occasionally as writer-director. He has some film credits too, some bit parts, some as a member of the screen-writing team but none of them in any movies that made serious money, apart from one, a Miles Grayson production called Kidnapped.’

  ‘Son-of-a-bitch! Dawn was in that movie. It’s where she and Miles met up.’

  ‘I know; I did logistics and security for him on that job.’

  ‘And after that?’

  ‘After that, little or nothing. You might remember that when Miles and Dawn got involved he took some liberties with the storyline and had the script altered to make her role bigger. That led to some changes elsewhere. Wallinger’s part was a minor one, and in the shake-up, most of his scenes wound up on the cutting-room floor. Miles never cast him again. He was never unemployed, though; according to the CV I found, he carried on doing theatre work, and had a few television parts. It looks as if his career was going steadily downhill, though, until about three years ago, when it seems to have come to a full stop.’

  ‘The time-frame fits. Come on,’ I said. ‘Let’s get back downstairs; those steaks must be on the way by now.’ I headed for the lift.

  ‘What else do you want me to do?’ Mark asked.

  ‘See if you can find out who’s behind Prim’s visitors; apart from that, nothing. You’ve done a great job as it is. Send me a bill as soon as you’ve worked out your time and expenses.’

  ‘I could find you someone in the States to follow up for you.’

  ‘No. I don’t want to scare the guy. Who knows how he might behave if he was panicked?’

  ‘So he gets away with it?’

  ‘Shit, no. I’ve got plans.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Well, for a start, I’m going to pay a call on Granny Wallinger.’

  Chapter 13

  As I had guessed, the forensics people didn’t find a thing. When I got back to the flat they printed me with an electronic reader, but only to confirm that the second prints on the cabinet and the door handles were mine.

  They took the two wine glasses, muttering something about DNA comparisons, but I knew that was just a bit of flash nonsense to impress the punters.

  In my absence, a senior CID officer had turned up, a woman called DCI Grace. Lacy seemed to have been sent back to his kennel, for she and Garrett took formal statements from us, and promised to get in touch with Prim, should their investigation lead anywhere . . . not that she held out any hope that it would. She was so sympathetic that for a second I thought that maybe we should make the fraud complaint to her, until I remembered what Harvey had said about the Met’s scale of priorities, and held my tongue.

  I hadn’t planned to tell Primavera at that point about my meeting with Kravitz, and what it had turned up, but I should have known better. She let me sit in silence all the way back to Heathrow, through a coffee in the Executive Lounge, and through the buffet service on the plane . . . I gave her my rubber sandwich, since she’d gone without lunch . . . before she began the interrogation.

  ‘So?’ she said, as the last crumb was cleared.

  It’s not what you say, it’s the way that you say it. I caved in at once and told her Mark’s story, from start to finish. When I’d finished, she looked out of the window, down on the mountains of the Lake District, their craggy peaks standing tall on the cloudless day. ‘So it really was all an act,’ she murmured.

  �
��Looks like it, only I don’t imagine that Tom was in the script. Otherwise, he played the part to perfection. I wish I’d gone to the University of Minnesota if it prepares you that well for a stage career.’

  ‘What happens next?’

  ‘I’m going to find him. I promised you I’d get your kid back.’

  She took my arm and leaned against me. ‘Oz, love, I’m really grateful for everything you’ve done already. I can’t interfere with your life any more.’

  ‘You try and stop me. I care about you, Prim; this guy’s worked you over in the worst possible way. He thinks he’s laughing, but he doesn’t know the tears that are on the way. He’s going to have to answer to me.’

  ‘But how will you trace him?’

  ‘He’s left a trail. I’ll start with his mother.’

  ‘How are you going to find the time?’

  I grinned at her. ‘Circumstances make it easy. I’ve agreed to do Everett Davis’s movie in Las Vegas. I’ve got eight days before I have to be there, maybe more if I can negotiate the shooting schedule with the director.’

  ‘Oz, are you sure?’

  ‘Certain.’

  ‘In that case I’m coming with you.’

  I wasn’t so sure I liked the sound of that. ‘Hey, wait a minute! I’m a big boy, I don’t need minding.’

  ‘I’m not thinking about that. I want to be there when you find Tom. You’re a stranger; if you turn up out of the blue and confront his daddy, the poor wee thing will be scared out of his wits. Plus, on your own, what could you do? Paul could probably have you arrested for attempted kidnap. But if I’m there ...’

  She had a point. ‘Okay,’ I conceded, ‘but only if Susie’s happy with the idea. Otherwise I’ll go armed with Harvey’s interim interdict and present it to the local district attorney.’

  ‘And by the time he does anything, Paul will have moved on.’

  ‘Let’s talk to Susie. Once you explain why you need to go, she probably won’t object.’

  For once, Prim looked doubtful. ‘I’m not as sure as you,’ she said. ‘In her shoes, I don’t know if I’d be generous enough to let you go off alone to the US with your ex.’

  ‘Yes, but you’re not in her shoes, so you don’t know about her generosity. Whether or not she trusts you isn’t relevant. The question is whether or not she trusts me.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  In spite of myself, I smiled at her. ‘The past is just that, Prim. As you said, I’m a different guy now.’

  She let it drop.

  Glasgow was well in sight when a thought that had been festering all afternoon popped out of the back of my brain. ‘You know what’s been puzzling me?’ I said. ‘Since Wallinger’s stolen every penny of yours that he could get his hands on, why the hell did he leave you with the diamonds?’

  ‘Pure luck,’ she replied. ‘The insurance company advised me to change the combination of the safe at least once a month, as an added security precaution. I did it the day before Paul left, and I never told him the number. Not that I needed to; there was nothing of his in there anyway.’

  I called Susie from the airport, to let her know that we were wheels down and that we’d be home in half an hour. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘In plenty of time for dinner. Oh, by the way, Greg rang to say that the birth certificate’s arrived, and Ricky Ross called too. He said that DI McLaren would be here at nine thirty tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Fine; anything else?’

  ‘Yes, you cunning bastard, Roscoe called.’ I was glad that I could hear a laugh in her voice. ‘He told me to tell you that the deal with Everett is done on the basis of no fee but five points of the gross. You’d decided to do it all along, hadn’t you?’

  ‘I owe Daze, Susie.’

  ‘I know that, and I think you’ve done the right thing. Roscoe says that you’re booked into the Bellagio from next weekend, into a two-bedroom suite so that the kids, Ethel and I can come with you. That’s a lovely thought, but I really did mean it. It’s too hot there at this time of year. On top of that, I might have some Gantry Group business to take care of in the next couple of weeks. The flotation date’s getting closer and Phil Culshaw wants me to go to London with him to make some presentations that our PR company’s setting up for us. It’s all for the good of the share price, darling.’

  ‘Even so, you might change your mind when you hear what I’ve got to ask you.’

  Chapter 14

  She didn’t, though. When I explained to her where we were in the search for Tom, and where we had to go next, she agreed with me one hundred per cent.

  When Prim suggested that she hire a detective instead, she almost went ballistic. ‘You what?’ she exclaimed. ‘You think we’d let you go to a place you’ve never been, with some bloody gumshoe you don’t know from Adam, to find a man who’s not exactly going to welcome you with open arms? No chance in hell. Oz is going with you, and that’s that. I’ll have Audrey book your flights first thing in the morning.’

  There was one thing that Prim hadn’t done the day before and that was to call her sister and tell her the whole story. I made her fill that gap after dinner, leaving her to do it on her own. She was sombre when she came back into the sitting room, where Susie and I were watching the US Open on television.

  ‘Did Dawn give you a hard time?’

  She shook her head. ‘Far from it; she couldn’t have been better. I spoke to Miles too. He was great. He said that any help I needed, to let him know, and that if he wasn’t in Australia he’d be on the case himself. When I told him that you were, he was happy.’

  When the phone rang a couple of minutes later, I knew who it would be. I picked the hands-free unit from its cradle and was walking out of the room as I pressed the receive button. ‘I just spoke to Primavera,’ said Miles. The fact that he was using her Sunday name was a sure sign that however ‘great’ he had sounded, she wasn’t his favourite person right then.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Do you know what you’re doing, getting involved in this?’

  ‘I don’t see any other option, nor does Susie. Anyway, if I hadn’t cut her off, she wouldn’t have been drifting around like a lost soul.’

  ‘She’d have worked out a game plan, don’t worry.’

  ‘Do you remember this guy, Wallinger?’

  ‘Should I?’

  ‘Ah, Prim didn’t tell you his professional name: Paul Patrick Walls.’

  ‘Walls? Walls? Hey, wait a minute, he’s a bit player, isn’t he? And didn’t I use him once?’

  ‘Not much, from the story I heard. You cut all his best scenes out of Kidnapped to make way for Dawn.’

  Miles fell silent for a few seconds . . . an unusual condition for him. ‘Are you trying to tell me that when this guy ripped off Prim he was actually getting even with me?’

  ‘At this stage of the game, pal, I haven’t a fucking clue what I’m trying to tell you. But when I have my hands around the bastard’s throat, that’ll be one of the questions I ask him.’

  ‘If the answer’s “yes”, then tell him that if mistakes are on a scale from one to ten, that one’s a Bo Derek.’

  ‘I’ll tell him many things, once he’s handed over Prim’s kid and her money.’

  I wished him a good morning in Sydney, and went back to the golf.

  Detective Inspector Ian McLaren arrived spot on time next morning, just five minutes after Greg McPhillips called to say that Harvey had found a sheriff to hear his application for a child-protection interdict at midday, and that there was no way it wouldn’t be granted.

  The specialist fraud investigator was a tall man in his early forties, with a pencil moustache and wearing a brown suit that looked way too heavy for the weather: I hoped he wouldn’t start to sweat. I showed him through to our huge and, happily, air-conditioned office, where Prim was waiting. Susie and Audrey were working together. They looked up when I introduced him to everybody, then carried on with what they were doing.

  He listened, gravely, as Prim told he
r story. He examined the documents she gave him, with a suitably earnest frown as he went from page to page, deepening as he reached the statements at the end.

  ‘Did you give Mr Wallinger any specific instructions at any time regarding the sale of your investments?’ he asked her, when he had read his way through the lot.

  ‘No, I didn’t. I never gave him any instructions at all, other than to make damn sure he took good care of my money.’

  ‘And you don’t recall ever telling him to transfer funds elsewhere?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘How often did you discuss your financial affairs with him?’

  ‘Every few months, I suppose. We were very comfortable financially, and at that time I assumed that he was earning too. I was so focused on my child that I just let him get on with everything. I never asked him for regular reports, like I had from my old fund managers.’

  ‘So you were never told of any crisis, or of any movement of capital?’

  ‘No.’

  McLaren arranged the papers in a neat pile on my desk. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘What do you want the police to do?’

  Prim stared at him. ‘I want you to find him, I want you to arrest him, and I want you to get me my money back.’

  ‘We can only do the first two of those things, Ms Phillips. The third will be up to the court. A judge in a criminal trial could order him to make full restitution, but there’s no certainty of that. You’d be well advised to raise an action in the civil courts to recover your assets.’

  ‘That’s under way already,’ I told him.

  ‘I’m glad to hear it,’ he replied. ‘However . . .’ There followed a portentous pause.

  ‘What?’ Prim demanded.

  ‘. . . in the circumstances,’ he continued, ‘since you willingly gave Mr Wallinger access to your funds, there’s something that will have to happen before anyone gets arrested. We’ll have to establish that your money has been deliberately placed beyond your reach.’

  ‘But I don’t know where it is!’

  ‘Maybe not, but legally he’s your agent, and he does. He’s only committed a crime if he’s diverted your property to his own use. How long did you say he’d been gone?’