by Jill McGown
‘He’s a good detective, and he’s getting early retirement. He’d be putting his lump sum in – don’t you see? It would make all the difference. We might even get enough work to start employing other people to do the dirty work, as you call it.’
Andy wheeled himself over to her and roared at her, his face an inch from hers. ‘When I get a job, this nonsense will stop, so don’t start making bloody expansion plans. Do you hear me?’
Everyone in the neighbourhood could hear him, probably. But Andy wasn’t going to get a job; he knew that, and so did she. He applied for jobs, even went for the odd interview. But he wasn’t going to get one, because he didn’t want one, not the kind that people in his position got. No qualifications, no education past the age of sixteen, no computer skills, and disabled. She had thought that if she could get him to agree to the partnership with Joe, then he would find that he was doing something useful at last, and she truly believed that he would become again the man she had married, and not the bitter, defeated man he was now. But she wasn’t winning the argument.
‘And you can forget your ex-bloody-boyfriend! You must think I’m simple! Am I supposed to sit here and watch you carrying on with him? Is that it?’
Despite what he was saying, he knew she would never do that. He was partially right about Joe’s motives, of course, but Joe knew the score. If he came in with them, there would be none of that; Joe knew that, and accepted it. ‘We’d be working together, not carrying on,’ she said.
‘I know what that bastard’s after, and you’d not say no, would you?’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Or has he already had what he’s after?’ he asked, his voice rising even more. ‘Is that it? Eh? Is that it? Are you and him at it behind my back?’
No, thought Kathy. They weren’t. But they would be. Starting with a weekend in Devon.
SCENE VI – CORNWALL.
Tuesday, July 22nd, 4.15 p.m.
Henderson’s Office.
Arthur Henderson shook his client’s hand as he bade her au revoir at the door of his immaculately renovated fisherman’s cottage, and smiled as she walked away down Penhallin High Street.
Nice woman, Mrs Esterbrook.
Act III
THE PLOTS
Let’s further think of this;
Weigh what convenience both of time and means
May fit us to our shape; if this should fail,
And that our drift look through our bad performance,
’Twere better not assay’d: therefore this project
Should have a back or second, that might hold,
If this should blast in proof.
Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 7
SCENE I – CORNWALL.
Four weeks later, Saturday, August 23rd, 12.45 p.m.
Aboard Lazy Sunday.
Josh waved when he saw Sandie on the harbour. She always arrived first; Paul would drop her off in Plymouth and send her the rest of the way by taxi, because that way, he reasoned, it looked as though she was coming to be with Josh, not him. Josh and Sandie had been working hard to establish a relationship that Paul wouldn’t question; Sandie was much better at it than he was, striking exactly the right note of friendly disinterest. She had totally convinced Paul, which was just as well, because over the last five weeks this hour or so before Paul arrived was the only time they had had alone together, and their being allowed that time was proof that he had no idea at all what was happening.
‘It’s today,’ Josh said.
Sandie’s eyes widened a little, and Josh saw the flush of excitement with which he had grown familiar. ‘Is it really going to work?’ she asked.
‘Of course it’ll work.’ He motioned to the side. ‘Take a look.’
She went to the rail and peered over, then looked back. ‘We’re not going to sink, are we?’
Josh shook his head. ‘It would be below the water-line with a full complement of divers, but they won’t be getting on, so we should be all right.’
‘When did you do it?’
‘After this morning’s session. I took her somewhere quiet and secluded and abused her. I hope she forgives me.’
‘Does this mean you still haven’t brought the proper targets?’
‘No,’ said Josh, smiling. ‘It doesn’t. They’re in the cabin.’
They went down, and he showed her the paper targets with numbered rings that they could pin up on their mattress-stuffed box, so that Sandie could find out how good she really was with the revolver. Then they made love where they were, preferring the clutter of a store-room to what they thought of as Paul’s cabin.
Paul arrived as they were decorously eating lunch on deck.
‘Josh has got proper targets,’ Sandie said, when she finished eating. ‘Can we have our contest?’
‘No. I don’t approve of contests,’ said Paul.
Sandie was disappointed, and Josh doubted that she would take no for an answer.
‘Are you frightened I’ll beat you?’
‘Of course you wouldn’t beat me,’ he said. ‘Which is one reason why a contest would be a waste of time.’
‘You can give me a shot a round or something, to even things up. You said we’d do it when I got good enough.’
A motorboat started up, setting up ripples in the calm water as it manoeuvred itself to where it wanted, and Lazy Sunday gently bumped her neighbour.
‘In a weak moment,’ said Paul. ‘I hoped you’d forgotten. Guns aren’t playthings.’
Oh, Sandie hadn’t forgotten, thought Josh. She had been pestering him for the last two weeks to get real targets; she had taken to shooting much more readily than she had taken to diving. It had suited him to wait until now, that was all, because it was obvious even to Paul when Sandie was excited about some prospect; he would put it down to her desire to show off with the revolver, and wouldn’t start getting suspicious. It didn’t really matter whether Sandie talked him into it or not now; the reason for her excitement had been established.
‘I hadn’t forgotten,’ said Sandie. ‘And I haven’t forgotten why you’re teaching me in the first place.’
‘All right,’ Paul said reluctantly. ‘But if we do this, no more lessons. We’re quits. All right? I’ll give you a range advantage. Let’s get on with it.’
Josh took the boat out and anchored at the usual spot, further along the coast than any of the other little craft, except one. The motorboat that had been getting itself under way while Paul and Sandie were talking had left not long after they had, and its occupant had anchored some way out to sea, safely away from the rocks.
‘Who’s that?’ Paul asked, tapping him on the shoulder, and pointing to the little boat. ‘Do you know him? How come he’s always where we are? Have you got binoculars anywhere?’
‘No. He’s just a fisherman, Paul.’
‘I’m sure that bitch has put someone on to me,’ Paul muttered. ‘I’m bringing binoculars next time. Get a good look at the bastard.’
Josh pointed out that even if someone was watching him, they’d see nothing they shouldn’t. Paul made certain of that, but he was still paranoid about it, which suited Josh admirably, because that was what had given him the idea in the first place.
The idea that he and Sandie had honed and polished and perfected over the last few weeks.
SCENE II – BARTONSHIRE.
Saturday, August 23rd, 2.00 p.m.
Paul and Elizabeth’s House.
Elizabeth looked at the clock. Paul would be in Penhallin now, she thought. And her detective would be right behind him. In a hire car, a different one each time, so that Paul wouldn’t spot that he was being followed.
The surveillance hadn’t, of course, produced anything at all, but she hadn’t expected it to. Only an interruption to Paul’s routine would be likely to make him drop his guard, and it would have to be an interruption that he could not have foreseen.
Foster had suggested that it might not be Sandie that Paul was seeing; it seemed that she really was a diver, contrary to what Elizabeth h
ad believed. But she knew it was Sandie, and if Paul didn’t ever drop his guard, she might.
It would take a long time, she supposed. A long time, and a lot of patience. But at least she was doing something.
SCENE III – CORNWALL.
Saturday, August 23rd, 2.10 p.m.
On board a small Motorboat.
The red dot told Ian Foster that he was recording the scene on the distant boat. He zoomed in, and he could have been on the boat with them as they got ready for their shooting lesson. They’d got a proper target this time, he noticed. He panned back to Townsend and Esterbrook, but they were, as usual, doing nothing at all suspicious, just standing and talking with Esterbrook’s brother.
It looked as though they were having some sort of competition. Whatever sort of gun they were always playing with, it was probably illegal, but Foster had no interest in illegal firearms, and he doubted if Mrs Esterbrook had. He switched off the camcorder with a little sigh of resignation.
Esterbrook’s routine was always the same. He dropped Townsend off in Plymouth, checked into his hotel and had lunch. He just dropped his weekend bag off at the hotel; didn’t even go up to the room. He always ate lunch alone. Then he’d drive to Penhallin, and if the sea was calm enough, they’d take the boat out and have some shooting practice. Esterbrook and Townsend always stayed up on deck, and the brother was always there too.
He was never evidently alone with anyone, never mind Townsend. He waited, crafty devil, until the other divers came on board for the afternoon session, and then at some point he would disappear below. But all the divers went below at various times, Townsend included; they stowed their stuff down there. Esterbrook, however, tended not to come up again until the boat was back in harbour for the night.
When the Saturday afternoon session was over, they would all go off to various inns and hotels, except the ones who lived locally, and the brother, who stayed on the boat. Esterbrook never turned up at Townsend’s hotel, and she never left it once she had gone there. Mrs Esterbrook had let him employ another investigator for one weekend only to spend the night at the Excalibur, and no one else had visited Esterbrook at his hotel either.
As far as Foster had been able to work out, there were two possibilities, assuming the man was up to something. One, that whoever he was seeing was already in his hotel room by the time he went to it, and had nothing to do with the diving sessions, and two, that it was happening on the boat. Mrs Esterbrook had shelled out for someone to watch her husband’s room at the Excalibur for one weekend, and no one at all had turned up at it but Esterbrook himself, so Foster had told Mrs Esterbrook that it must be happening on the boat.
He had added that he didn’t think it was Sandie Townsend he was seeing, but she insisted that it was, so for a couple of weeks he had watched her rather than Esterbrook. He’d followed her taxi from Plymouth, and each time she had gone to the boat, and each time she and Esterbrook’s brother had disappeared below. He’d told Mrs Esterbrook that, but she said it was a bluff, and he mustn’t let them pull the wool over his eyes.
When the shorter Sunday afternoon session was over, Esterbrook would drive Townsend back to Bartonshire. He would drop her in Stansfield at her flat, without so much as a peck on the cheek, then drive on to Barton, to the opulent terraced house in the wealthy part of town where he and his wife lived, and in all the time that Foster had been watching him, if it was Townsend he was playing around with, Esterbrook hadn’t dropped his guard once. Not once.
SCENE IV – CORNWALL.
Saturday, August 23rd, 2.20 p.m.
The Deck of Lazy Sunday.
Josh pinned up a virgin target, and walked back to where she stood. ‘You have to get thirty to beat him,’ he said.
Sandie’s lips were dry. This was very, very important to her. If she could beat Paul at this, it would give her more satisfaction than anything else ever had, except Josh. Paul had used her to humiliate Elizabeth, used her when she had had a loaded gun in her hand. No one would ever do that again, and certainly not Paul Esterbrook.
She took a deep breath, steadied herself, remembered everything she had been told, took aim, and fired. Good. Again. Another close one. Again. Centre ring. She could feel the excitement mounting as she watched the bullets rip into the target to bury themselves in the mattress, a new one that Josh had bought to replace the bullet-riddled one they’d used to start with. One more. Not so good. She closed her eyes, opened them, steadied herself again. One more. She swore under her breath as it went into the outer ring. A boat wasn’t the best place to be doing this; any movement put your aim out. One more, just one more, but it would have to be dead centre. Her last chance. She could do it. She could.
And she did. Josh and Paul both applauded as though they were at a football match, with whoops and hollers and stamps and whistles that rocked the little boat and made her worry about the hole in its side.
‘You are good,’ Paul said, taking the gun from her as Josh started up the boat again. ‘On dry land you’d be a match for anyone.’
She smiled. ‘But it was from the ladies’ tee,’ she said.
‘I think you might have beaten me anyway.’ He lowered his voice. ‘I gave you an advantage so that I had an excuse if I lost,’ he said. ‘But don’t tell Josh I said that.’
She wanted to share her triumph with Josh, not Paul, but she couldn’t, not yet. Paul went into the wheelhouse to clean the gun, and she stayed out on deck, sunning herself, feeling utterly contented. She had beaten Paul Esterbrook, and now she was going to help Josh do the same.
It was an omen.
SCENE V – CORNWALL.
Saturday, August 23rd, 2.45 p.m.
On board Lazy Sunday, and in Penhallin Harbour.
Oh, well, Paul thought, as he cleaned the gun, at least if she did go on the rampage, she would hit what she was aiming at.
The boat was nosing its way into harbour, and he grew impatient, as always. Waiting for the diving to begin was always the worst part, and Sandie’s excitement was infectious. It was the August Bank Holiday; he had a whole extra day this weekend, and he was going to make the most of it.
Josh looked at him, and grinned. ‘Do you ever think of anything else?’ he said.
Josh knew him too well. He baited him, as he always had, about anything and everything, but particularly about this, especially since he had started using the boat for his assignations. He was still grinning at him as they neared the harbour wall, and Paul could see that the boat’s attitude was all wrong. ‘Look out!’ he shouted, but it was too late. His words had been drowned by the grind of wood on stone, and a sickening crunch.
Josh stopped the engine, ran to the side and looked over. ‘Jesus,’ he said.
Paul, still in the wheelhouse, couldn’t believe what was happening. Didn’t want to believe it. Slowly, reluctantly, he walked to where Josh stood, saw the gaping hole, and his temper snapped. ‘You can negotiate rocks that have wrecked dozens of ships, and you bang into a fucking harbour wall?’ he shouted. ‘Why weren’t you looking where you were fucking going, you stupid bastard?’
Sandie had come running over to see what was happening. She looked over the side, and up at Josh. ‘What was that you once said about women drivers?’ she asked.
Josh held his arms wide in a confession. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I should have been looking where I was going.’ He turned to the people on the harbour, who had run over to see what was happening. ‘I don’t know how I did that,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. She’ll have to go in for repair. The weekend’s cancelled, I’m afraid.’
None of the dismayed people who lined the wall could have been as keenly disappointed as Paul. He helped Josh get their stuff from the cabins, unable to speak. He wanted to hit the stupid bugger, but a brawl would be a little unseemly in Penhallin harbour.
‘Sorry,’ Josh said again.
Paul picked up dive bags and went up the steps, throwing them down, going back for more. He wouldn’t put it past his unpredictable brother
to have done that on purpose just to frustrate him. He handed the last of the bags up to Josh, and joined him on deck.
‘I’ll refund you for the whole weekend,’ Josh was saying to each of the paying customers, as he handed them their stuff.
He turned to Paul. ‘I’m honestly sorry,’ he said, his voice quiet, and reached down for the last two bags. ‘But I’ve had a thought.’
Paul didn’t want to know. His weekend was ruined.
‘Angela’s in London this weekend.’
Oh, no. He wasn’t using Little Elmley. Elizabeth thought that was what he’d done last time the boat didn’t go out, and he wasn’t about to risk really doing it.
‘Shopping, dinner, and a show with the girls,’ said Josh.
Paul failed to see the relevance. He was supposed to be gleaning something from all of this. If Josh didn’t speak in bloody riddles it would help.
‘Going to the Notting Hill Carnival on Monday.’
It was the first Paul had heard of it, but then he didn’t enquire after his mother’s doings. He had known that she was doing something different from usual this weekend, that was all. He frowned. ‘I thought she and Elizabeth were working on her book on Sunday,’ he said. ‘Something about sorting out the photographs.’
Josh shook his head. ‘She’s away all weekend.’
‘So?’
Josh handed one of the bags to a retired bank manager with what was now sounding like an incantation as he promised to refund the fee, adding that he hoped he would still enjoy the weekend, then turned back to Paul.
‘So as far as your wife is concerned, you’re still on a diving weekend. And the cottage is free.’
‘The cottage?’ Paul frowned.
‘Yes. There’s no reason why you can’t do what you were going to do. Just use the cottage rather than the boat.’