by Greg Keen
‘Anything that could cast light on whether George was set up or not.’
‘And whether Peter was murdered?’ I shrugged. ‘Who are you working for now?’
‘My brother, Malcolm.’
‘What’s his interest in all this?’
‘He was a good friend of Peter’s and he’s suspicious that both he and George reported seeing Alexander Porteus before they died. Do you have any information?’
‘I might. Although I’m not sure what it’s worth.’
‘Only one way to find out . . .’
I extinguished my fag and sat upright, intending to convey the sense of a man focused and ready to get down to business. There was a scratching sound at the door.
‘Hold on a moment, Kenny.’
Simon crossed the room. As soon as he opened the door, a large black Labrador leapt up at him. Simon’s demeanour changed immediately. ‘Hello, Sappho,’ he said. ‘How are you? She’s had a touch of distemper,’ he explained to me, and returned his attention to the dog. ‘But you’re feeling a lot better now, aren’t you, sweetheart? D’you want to go walkies?’
Judging by the thumping tail, the answer was affirmative.
‘You can stay here if you like,’ Simon said to me.
‘I’ll come with you,’ I replied, and Sappho barked impatiently.
‘Okay, but you’ll need something a little bit warmer than just a jacket. I’ll see if I can dig out a sweater. We’re about the same size.’
Sappho snuffled around me, decided I wasn’t that interesting and scampered down the passage after her master. In their absence, I checked out the library shelves. There were leather-bound sets of Walter Scott and Dickens and single volumes from Somerset Maugham and authors who had largely fallen out of fashion.
Other shelves held books on birdwatching and the flora and fauna of East Anglia, and there was an entire collection of bound Punch magazines stretching from 1880 to 1948. The last shelves I looked at held books solely on religion.
There were five bibles – the oldest dating to 1657 – and three books of common prayer. At least ten volumes were bound in stiff vellum and printed in Latin or German. More contemporary was a work by Émile Durkheim and a complete twelve-volume edition of The Golden Bough by James Frazer. I was leafing through volume three when Simon and Sappho returned.
‘Found something decent?’ he asked.
‘Taboo and the Perils of the Soul,’ I quoted from the book’s spine. ‘Not exactly an airport novel.’
‘I bought the esoteric stuff years ago. It really doesn’t interest me any more. Here, this should just about fit you. Not the height of fashion but warm enough.’
Simon passed me a thick woollen jumper with a roll-neck collar. ‘Thanks,’ I said and replaced the volume. In doing so, I noticed that all the religious books were pristine, whereas the others, including the Dickens, had a fine layer of dust on them.
‘Are you ready?’ he asked.
‘Absolutely,’ I said.
TWENTY-NINE
Simon’s sweater came down almost to my knees but I was glad of its warmth. We retraced our steps to the back of the house and then down a track running parallel to the sea. A path from the house to the beach had been swept away. Now the quickest way down was via a ravine.
Sappho would bound ahead and then turn with an expression that conveyed impatience at our desultory progress. Simon explained that, when Zetland House had been built in 1880, it had been a mile inland. Interesting but not as interesting as the information he’d been about to supply about George. At least, I hoped it wasn’t.
You had to watch your step in the ravine; the way was thick with bushes, rocks and marram grass. Conversation abated until we arrived on the shore. Sappho gambolled joyfully into the sea while Simon and I resumed our chat.
‘First let me give you some background,’ he said as we trudged over the pebbles. ‘After the business in the cemetery, I had a breakdown. My parents took me to several psychiatrists but none of them did any good. By my mid-twenties my behaviour had become so erratic that our relationship disintegrated entirely.’
‘They disowned you?’
He nodded. ‘I was violent and abusive. Eventually I spent a few months in prison for shoplifting. On my release, my father gave me five thousand pounds and said that he and my mother, and my sister, never wanted to see me again. If George hadn’t intervened, I don’t know what would have become of me.’
‘Intervened in what way?’
‘He tracked me down, paid my rent and opened an account at a local store.’
‘Why did he do that?’
‘Partly because it was in his nature. But I think on some level it was George’s way of making up for what happened to Ray. He always felt terrible about that.’
‘Helping you was a way of expiating the guilt?’
‘To an extent,’ Simon said. ‘I owe him a hell of a lot.’
‘What did the shrinks think?’
‘About my mental health issues?’
I nodded. ‘They came on pretty quickly?’
‘Not really,’ Simon said. ‘I’d been prone to fixations for years; it was one of the reasons I became so obsessed with Alexander Porteus.’
‘What did they diagnose, specifically?’ I asked.
‘The consensus was bipolar disorder. George arranged for me to see someone in Harley Street who prescribed the appropriate medication.’
‘So this would have happened even if you’d never seen Porteus?’
‘If you believe the professionals.’
‘What do you believe, Simon?’
A flock of seagulls took off as Sappho chased them. They shrieked irritation at being disturbed, while she woofed disappointment at not making a kill. Simon picked up a rock and threw it into the water. ‘It was Porteus,’ he said. ‘He took great delight in corrupting young men by convincing them that they could achieve incredible things if they became his disciples.’
‘Did any of them succeed?’
‘Most ended up in jail. A couple became bankrupt and committed suicide. Somebody once said the devil doesn’t come dressed in a red cape and pointy horns. He comes as everything you’ve ever wished for.’
‘Don’t think I’ve come across that one.’
‘Sometimes it’s referred to as the law of attraction. What they don’t say in the self-help books is that what you wish for may not come from the anticipated source.’
I still wasn’t sure how this related to Alexander Porteus, although, from the way Simon picked up his step, it appeared this was his final word on the matter. We had covered a hundred yards more beach before conversation resumed.
‘How did you come to live at Zetland House?’ I asked.
‘It was my Uncle Gerald’s. My sister and I visited in the holidays. When he died, the place was left to me along with a decent chunk of cash. It was quite a surprise. I hadn’t seen him in twenty years.’
‘You didn’t think of selling the place?’
‘I wouldn’t have got much of a price; the erosion was pretty bad even back then. If it had been saleable, I’d still have lived there. It might seem a solitary life to you, Kenny, but I’ve got Sappho for company and she’s all I need.’
I was wondering whether a Labrador might ease my metropolitan ennui when Simon stopped in his tracks. At the foot of the cliff was a pile of rubble. Among the bricks and concrete lay a bulky figure. Simon beat me to the spot by thirty seconds. Sappho was busy running in circles and barking furiously.
‘It’s the chip shop man,’ Simon said. ‘He must have gone over last night.’
The figure was a man-sized plastic fisherman complete with beard, cape and sou’wester. He was holding the upper portion of an enormous yellow cod. Its tail had fractured and was lying a few feet away, as was the bowl of the fisherman’s pipe.
‘There used to be a holiday camp,’ Simon explained. ‘They demolished the buildings a few years ago.’ He bent down and retrieved the fragment of pipe. ‘Looks lik
e they forgot about him.’ He slipped the bowl into his pocket and stared at the clifftop. ‘Nothing lasts,’ he muttered, to me and the world at large.
‘No,’ I replied. ‘At least, not if it’s any good.’
A flurry of dirt and pebbles rolled down the cliff.
‘Should we be standing here?’ I asked.
‘Probably not,’ Simon decided. ‘Come on, Sappho,’ he said, and the three of us retreated to the safety of the compacted sand.
‘Did you see George again after you moved into Zetland House?’ I asked.
‘He was a regular visitor until six months ago.’
‘George didn’t mention he saw you to Peter.’
‘Nor did he mention that he saw Peter to me. George was naturally secretive, even at school. He’d spend most of his time on the headland painting when he was here.’
‘What did the two of you talk about?’
‘Nothing profound. I think he found it an easy place to relax from work. Particularly when his career took off.’
‘Did you ever discuss what happened in the cemetery?’ Simon shook his head. ‘Not even when he visited for the last time?’ Another headshake. ‘And George didn’t email or speak to you on the phone before he died?’
‘About what?’
‘Maybe the court case?’
‘No, although I did attempt to contact him a couple of times. In the end I assumed that he was either too busy or too ashamed to talk about it.’
‘You think the abuse images belonged to him?’
‘Why wouldn’t they?’
‘He told Peter and his PA they’d been planted.’
‘And the drugs?’
‘He said they were his.’
‘I’ve no idea about the images,’ Simon said after a moment’s reflection. ‘George was a fantastic friend to me, but when it comes to that kind of thing . . .’
He didn’t need to finish the sentence. You only had to open the paper to read that the most unlikely people turn out to be paedophiles. There was one more question I needed to ask, and I wasn’t looking forward to asking it.
‘George and Peter saw Alexander Porteus before they died.’
‘So you said.’
‘Well, I was wondering whether . . .’
‘What?’ Simon asked.
‘. . . you’d seen him too.’
I might as well have asked if Sappho had been spayed, for all the reaction I got.
‘No,’ Simon replied. ‘Although I’m not surprised he appeared to George and Peter.’
‘Why’s that?’ I asked.
‘We brought him back across the great divide and now he’s returning the favour. Except that it’s the other way round, of course.’ He darted a look at me. ‘Many religions believe that those who have passed reappear to fetch us to the other side. Sometimes it’s people who loved us . . . and sometimes it isn’t.’
We walked on in silence for another twenty yards. The sky had become ominously grey and Sappho appeared to be losing her enthusiasm for the walk.
‘Might be an idea to head home,’ Simon suggested.
‘Suits me,’ I said. The wind off the sea was biting. ‘Is that it about George?’ I asked, disappointment creeping over me in addition to hypothermia.
‘Not quite,’ Simon replied. ‘About three months ago, he called out of the blue. Said he’d been feeling down and would I mind him visiting for a week.’
‘Down about what?’
‘He told me that he’d agreed to something politically unethical and that he deeply regretted it. Naturally I asked what it was and George said it was better I didn’t know as it might place me in a dangerous situation.’
‘Dangerous was the word he used?’
Simon nodded. ‘Virtually all he did was sit in the library and smoke, or go on to the beach and stare at the sea. I asked if he could put things right. George said possibly but that it would mean disgrace and the end of his career.’
‘And you’ve no idea what it was?’
‘None whatsoever. Although he left saying that he’d decided to take some action. When I heard that he’d committed suicide, I wondered if that was what he meant and whether the child pornography was what he’d been referring to.’
‘How would telling you about those put you in danger?’
‘I don’t know.’
Presumably Simon wasn’t aware that Will had blackmailed George over the drugs photographs either. That would have meant the end of George’s political career, although it didn’t sound particularly ‘unethical’. Not unless it wasn’t Fair Trade cocaine.
‘Is that why you agreed to see me?’ I asked.
‘You said that you were investigating whether George committed suicide or was murdered,’ Simon replied. ‘And I suppose there’s always been that question at the back of my mind too. Even if I did keep telling myself it was rubbish.’
‘Why not go to the police?’
‘With what? It wasn’t as though George gave me names or details. When I heard that you were looking into the case, though, it seemed like a way to talk to someone who wouldn’t look at me as though I was crazy.’
Sappho was by our side, tongue lolling and exuberance entirely departed. She looked up at Simon and whined. ‘Nearly home, girl,’ he said, and patted her head. ‘Have you found out anything that might point in that direction?’
I thought about telling him about Will and the photographs, but decided against it. ‘Not really,’ I said. ‘What you’ve told me is interesting, but I don’t think it brings me any closer to finding out if anything suspicious happened to George.’
‘Then you’ll close your case?’ Simon asked as we approached the ravine.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I think that’s probably that.’
Back at the house, I refused Simon’s offer of coffee and used his phone to call a taxi. During the twenty minutes it took to arrive, he told me that the council had served a compulsory purchase order and that he had to be out in a year. Dealers would strip the place of its more desirable fixtures and fittings, after which it would be demolished. He and Sappho intended to buy a bungalow a couple of miles up the coast with the compensation money.
Bob Yallop had been dispatched instead of Ricky to pick me up. His Jetta was in far better shape than Ricky’s Civic, although the same couldn’t be said for Bob himself. Shoulder-length hair was thinning to the extent that his scalp shone through, and his gut hung over his belt as though it had territorial designs on his thighs.
One thing Bob did have going for him was that his driving was a sight less bowel-curdling than Ricky’s. I was relaxed enough to try to make sense of the info Simon had given me. George Dent had operated in too murky a world for a humble skip-tracer to penetrate. Tomorrow I intended to call Malcolm and admit that I’d drawn a blank. At least I could concentrate on bringing Billy Dylan to book.
Unlike his colleague, Bob wasn’t much of a talker. Only when we were on the dual carriageway did he strike up a proper conversation. ‘You been up to Zetland House, then?’ was his opener.
‘That’s right.’
‘What’s happenin’ to that old place?’
‘It’s being torn down in a few months.’
‘Bloke what lives there movin’ out, is he?’
‘No, they’re demolishing it with him still inside, Bob’ is what I wanted to say. ‘I think that’s the general idea’ is what I did say.
My driver nodded as though, on balance, this was probably the wisest course of action. I hoped it would be the end of our chat. I was disappointed.
‘Don’t see him down the pub much.’
‘Is that right?’
Bob changed down into third and overtook a bus. ‘The major liked a drink,’ he said, and returned to the slow lane. ‘You’d see him in the Crown most nights.’
‘Each to his own,’ I said, hoping that platitudes might do the trick.
‘Course, he was a sociable man,’ Bob continued. ‘Not like the bloke who lives there now. What’s his
name again?’
‘Simon,’ I said. ‘Simon Paxton.’
‘That’s right. I remember that woman asked if I knew him.’
‘Erm, what woman was that, Bob?’
‘Took her up there ’bout a month ago,’ he said. ‘Usually don’t remember fares, but I remember her all right. She looked like that cook on telly what’s always swinging her jubblies around and lickin’ her fingers.’
‘Nigella Lawson?’
‘Yeah, that’s the one,’ Bob said as he took the turn into Station Road. ‘Course, I’m not saying it was Nigella Whatsit, just that it looked like her. She had the same kind of hair and you should have seen the rack on her. Mind you, this bird was taller . . .’
‘What kind of accent did she have?’
‘Posh. Same as Nigella.’
‘How old?’
‘Late thirties. Early forties, maybe.’ Bob turned on to the station concourse and parked. ‘Why you so interested in her?’ he asked.
‘Oh, just that it sounds like someone Simon and I used to work with, although he didn’t mention that Olivia had been to visit. How long did she spend at the house?’
‘Don’t know. I only took her up in the mornin’. Thought Ricky might have pulled the return job but he said he didn’t. Maybe your pal drove her back.’
Bob consulted his meter. ‘That’s eight fifty, mate,’ he said.
I got my wallet out and instructed Bob to make out a receipt for a tenner. He took the note, scrawled something across a small pad and tore off a sheet.
‘There you go,’ he said. ‘Say hello to your lady friend and tell her Bob Yallop’s always happy to give her a ride, if you know what I mean.’
‘Yeah, I’ll be sure to do that, Bob,’ I said, and opened the door.
‘You know, there was one other thing . . .’
‘What’s that?’
‘She had this fancy ring on. Red stone with some sort of carving in it. That the sort of thing your friend used to wear?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Exactly that sort of thing.’
For a good twenty minutes on the train, I pondered why on earth Olivia hadn’t mentioned her visit to Simon Paxton. I hadn’t mentioned him by name when I’d told her about the Highgate Cemetery incident, but it still seemed extraordinary. Presumably there was a perfectly rational explanation that I’d hear when she returned from Scotland.