by Joe McNally
Treading water, oddly fascinated by this man and his speech rhythms, she nodded. ‘Help me get out,’ she said.
‘No.’ He went back to his chair.
She climbed the steps and stood dripping, a hank of hair gleaming on her shoulder like seaweed.
‘Get changed. You have five minutes. Be thoughtful.’
She went inside. Was there any point trying to leave by the French doors? No, he’d have men at the foot of the stairs. Could she call anyone? Her phone was outside, in her bag. Time was better spent trying to figure out how to handle this guy. She stripped and dried her body, and changed into sawn-off jeans and a short white blouse.
Still towelling her hair, she walked back out into the sun. Ivory was looking at his watch. ‘Good. Three minutes thirty-seven. Come and sit down.’
She moved across and sat facing him, still towelling her hair.
‘Enough. Put the towel down.’
She stopped, looked at him, then obeyed.
‘In forty-five minutes my driver will take me to the airport. Four of my people are downstairs, two men, and two women. They will stay here when I go. The terms of your imprisonment will depend greatly on how truthful you are with me. Understand?’
She nodded.
‘Then I’ll begin.’
In the airport lounge, Jordan Ivory phoned a man he called his project manager. ‘Dalton. I want you to find a woman called Maven Judge, also known as Jolene Cassidy. She might be travelling, possibly in a motorhome, probably in the UK, maybe in Europe. She’s close to a jockey called Eddie Malloy and a man called Sonny Beltrami. I have details on Beltrami which I’ll send on. I have little on Malloy and will leave that to you. Do not pick her up. Do not lose her once you’ve found her. Give me daily updates on this number only.’
70
On his third daily phone update since briefing Dalton, Jordan Ivory, told him to hold. Ivory left his desk and went to close his office door. ‘Go ahead, Dalton.’
‘Been working on Maven Judge’s phone records. Stretching back, they’re mostly from her home in North Wales. A few over Christmas and New Year were made from Malloy’s place. One last week was from a mast in Newmarket. She was either passing through, or she stopped using the phone after that call. No calls have been made on that number since. Bit of a shot in the dark, but I’ll probably send someone to Newmarket to dig around. We have Malloy’s place wired, along with the three caravans belonging to Beltrami. Should have some better news for you tomorrow.’
‘Thank you, Dalton. Malloy has form as a bit of a daredevil, all amateur stuff, but worth bearing in mind.’
‘Thanks, Mister Ivory.’
That afternoon, Mac drove to Taunton racecourse. He’d considered sending someone into the changing room to find Eddie, but he was too nervous about the implications, mostly because he didn’t know the scale of those implications. Events seemed to be overrunning him. He felt he’d never got up to the required pace since joining JCR, and his confidence was suffering.
Although he could have walked into the changing room himself, Mac didn’t think that would be smart. But he had to speak to Eddie.
He scribbled on a page of his diary, and ripped it out. Standing near the paddock entrance as the jockeys filed past for the next, Mac handed the note to Eddie. ‘Keep moving,’ Mac said.
After the race, Eddie did what Mac had requested and hurried to the stables, away from the crowd. He wore a jacket over the pink colours he was due to wear in the next. Mac had been pacing while waiting for Eddie, and as he saw him approach, he found he couldn’t stop walking, couldn’t stay still.
Eddie dropped in alongside him. ‘What’s up?’
‘Broc Lisle came to see me. Somebody’s going to a lot of trouble trying to find a woman called Maven Judge. Broc assured me that you would very much like to know about it, urgently.’
‘Who’s looking for her?’
‘Jordan Ivory’s people.’
‘How did Lisle find out?’
‘My guess is that he has contacts in GCHQ. He worked there for three years.’
‘The government place? The spy place?’
‘Well, intelligence and security, in their lingo.’
‘Why didn’t he come straight to me?’
‘He assumed I knew about Miss Judge.’
‘Mave is the friend I’ve mentioned, the IT genius.’
‘You said it was a man.’
‘You assumed it was a man, Mac. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. Did Lisle say they’d caught Nina Raine?’
‘He didn’t. I got the impression he had to be very selective. Or chose to be. Do you want me to ask him?’
‘No. There’s no point. You got your phone?’
Mac took it from his pocket. Eddie asked him to dial Marie’s landline number, then to cover him. It was ringing. Mac passed him the phone and stood in front of him, blocking Eddie from the view of anyone in the stand.
‘Marie, it’s Eddie. All well there?’
‘Fine, Eddie. What’s wrong?’
‘Is Mave around?’
‘She’s upstairs. You sound like you’ve got bad news for somebody.’
‘Not really. Kind of good news, in a way, depending on how you look at it, I suppose. Listen, before I speak to Mave, if you and Kim had to leave there temporarily, but very quickly, could you do it? Could you place the horses somewhere?’
‘How quickly?’
‘Today. Soon.’
‘What’s wrong?’
Eddie told her. She said, ‘My God! I’ll call Mave.’
‘What about you, Marie? And Kim?’
‘Well, I know you’re worried, Eddie, but isn’t it Mave they’re trying to find.’
‘It is. But even if Mave’s not there, if and when they come there, I want you two safe as well.’
‘Why? What do you mean safe? We’re not involved. From what you say, you’re not even involved, not really.’
‘If they know Mave has been there, they’ll think you know where she’s gone.’ She didn’t reply. ‘I’m sorry, Marie.’
‘This isn’t our fight, Eddie, mine and Kim’s. We’re only just getting our bloody life together!’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I’ll get Mave.’
Eddie stepped sideways and peered past Mac, nervy. He checked his watch. ‘Fuck!’ he said.
‘Pardon?’
‘Sorry, Mave. Listen…’ Eddie told her.
‘All right,’ she said, ‘I’ll fix something.’
‘You got access to the money, as much as you’ll need?’
‘Yes.’
‘Don’t tell me where you plan to go. Don’t ever tell me where you are until we get Ivory. Okay?’
‘Okay.’
‘Don’t tell anyone. Don’t talk on the phone. Call me once a day at nine p.m. from the throwaway, just to say you’re all right. Get half a dozen more phones. Cycle them for the calls to me. Speak to nobody else.’
‘What if you need to get in touch with me?’
‘I don’t know. I need to think about that. You’ve got to get out of there as soon as possible. Try and talk Marie and Kim into coming with you.’
‘They’ll be safer well away from me, Eddie.’
‘I don’t think they will, Mave. If they won’t go with you then I’m going to leave my place and move in with them until this is done.’
She was about to speak, then reeled it all back and just said, ‘Okay.’
‘Call me tonight. Nine o’clock.’
‘I will.’
‘Good. I have to go.’
‘Eddie. I need to tell you something…’
‘I’m listening.’
‘I love you.’
He stood still, staring straight ahead, unblinking. Mave said, ‘Goodbye, Eddie.’
Marie had been standing at the open door of the kitchen, biting her lip, watching Mave talk, until that last part. Marie had lowered her head, and backed away, sorry to have witnessed what seemed a sad intimacy, a last go
odbye.
When Kim got home from school, Mave was waiting. She’d packed one case. After an argument with Mave, Marie had agreed that he had the right to know what was happening. He was old enough. He’d been a victim himself of Eddie’s enemies. Mostly, Mave wanted him to know that she would never have considered leaving, but for this.
He listened, blinking steadily, as though storing each part of what she said away in his brain for safekeeping. When she was finished, Kim turned to look at Marie, then back at Mave. ‘You can’t go on your own! Marie, tell her, tell Mave! She can’t go on her own!’
Mave reached to touch his arm. ‘I’ll be fine, Kim, honestly.’
‘You won’t be fine. Even if you are fine, it’s not right! We’re not throwing you out like this!’ He turned again to Marie, and the anger in him shocked her. Marie said, ‘Kim! Kim! Mave’s leaving of her own accord. We’re not throwing her out!’
‘It’s the same, Marie! It’s the same thing. We’re her friends! We’re almost her family! She’s not going alone. End of!’
Mave reached for him again, ‘Kim-’
‘You are not going out to God knows where from this house. No! I’m going with you.’ He stood straight and tall and looked at Marie. ‘So are you. Come on. Get ready. Let’s get moving.’
Marie folded her arms. ‘Kim! Listen-’
‘No, Marie. No more listening. No more excuses. No more desertions. No more abandonments of people we love. This family changes, and it changes now! Now!’
One of Dalton’s men checked in with him. ‘The names you gave me, Malloy and Beltrami, along with the phone records…there’s a Malloy in Newmarket on the voter’s roll, it looks like she’s Eddie Malloy’s sister.’
‘Says who? Are you in Newmarket?’
‘Not yet. Online search brings up a news story from a while back with both of them mentioned, and a picture of the family. Parents both dead. Small stud in Newmarket left jointly to Eddie and Marie Malloy. Stud feeds off that phone mast where the single call was logged.’
‘Get down there.’
71
Eddie had talked Mac into coming back to his place straight from Taunton. He had been struck by Mac’s bewilderment. While talking to Mave he’d been watching Mac who had seemed to Eddie almost like a lost child. In all the years he’d known the big man, he’d never seen him look so nakedly vulnerable. Eddie wondered if some sort of delayed grief over Jean’s death had suddenly caught up with his friend.
‘So strange to see your house dark and fireless’, Mac said, as he followed Eddie inside.
‘Ahh, well they don’t do takeaway fires at the drive-through, Mac. Believe it or not. I actually build those fires with my bare hands. Anathema to you, I know…’ He stopped and watched the big man.
‘Anathema, I said, Mister McCarthy. AN-ATH-EMA.’
Mac nodded, half smiling, ‘Indeed. You’re correct. Manual work has never appealed.’
‘What about my mental work? Learning that word? Just for you?’
‘What word?’
‘Anbloodyathema! I downloaded a dictionary app and I’m learning a word a day. Starting at A. Just for you.’
‘Commendable. Admirable. Good idea.’
‘I give up! Whiskey? While you watch me build this fire?’
‘Splendid!’
‘And spagbol?’
‘Perhaps later.’
At nine, Mave rang. ‘All well?’ Eddie asked.
‘Perfect.’
‘You sound pleased.’
‘Kim and Marie are with me.’
‘Thank God for that! She changed her mind, then?’
Mave told him what had happened. ‘Your teenage nephew is now officially in charge and ruling with a rod of iron.’
‘He is a hell of a kid.’
‘You’d best not call him kid, Eddie.’
‘I’ll be calling him boss by the sound of things. He’s a walking wonder, that boy. You’ve done brilliantly to tie everything up and get away. Who took the horses?’
‘We did.’
‘You’re kidding?’
‘Nope. Kim wouldn’t leave them behind.’
‘You’re travelling in a horse-box?’
‘We are. And you’ll be glad to hear I am not driving.’
‘I am…I am.’
‘What’s up?’ Mave asked.
Eddie sighed, ‘There are questions I want to ask that I can’t. For your sake. For all your sakes.’
‘I know. It’s okay.’
‘Mave, if we get away with this one, I promise. Never again. Never.’
‘Pointless promising, Eddie. Trouble finds you. Or us. If I’d never written the programme we wouldn’t be here.’
‘If I’d noticed Jonty Saroyan when I should have, we wouldn’t be here either.’
‘Spilt milk, as Sonny once told us. How is he?’
‘Lying low. Licking his emotional wounds. Don’t tell him where you are, Mave.’
‘I won’t. I won’t, but give him my love.’
‘You can do that yourself when this is all done. Mac’s here. We’re going to figure out a way to get these people, to get the police involved.’
‘I thought Mac’s hands were tied because of this Major Aubrey whatever?’
‘Well, the major’s in partnership with Ivory in the bond scam. He’ll have to be outed sooner or later. It’s just a matter of deciding when. Mac and I will work it out.’
‘Okay. At least we’re doing something. You’re looking after everything there and your nephew’s looking after everything here.’
‘Give him my love.’
‘I will.’
‘And Marie.’
‘Of course….’
‘And you.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry about this afternoon, Eddie. It all felt so, well, terminal at the time.’
‘Don’t apologize. I’d always want you to say what’s on your mind.’
‘Always?’
‘Er, I think.’
They laughed.
Sonny lay in the dark in the small bedroom of his caravan. He’d spent the day in bed, rising only to use the toilet, before taking refuge once more beneath the covers.
He thought of racetracks. He pictured a seven furlong race and thought of the verse from Macbeth:
Threescore and ten I can remember well
Within the volume of which time I have seen
Hours dreadful and things strange; but this sore night
Hath trifled former knowings.
This sore night…This sore life…This short race which found him now at the furlong pole, six tenths of it gone. Nina had failed to kill his body but had murdered all they’d had. Slaughtered his hope. He had betrayed Jolene, his best friend’s daughter who had become just as dear a friend as her father had been.
He thought of Jack Cassidy. ‘You were lucky, in a way, Jack,’ he whispered, ‘we were not made for growing old, you and I.’
Sonny had amassed one hundred paracetamol tablets. He had left them in a cupboard, because the memory had come to him of a woman he had known in the music business, a woman who had overdosed on paracetamol, but not enough to kill her.
Sonny had gone to see her in hospital and watched her lie in what looked like a huge incubator. Her skin, at 30, was grey, her pillow wet with drool, and her system so toxic she would never regain consciousness. And he had watched her family disintegrate in arguments over when the life support was to be switched off.
That could not be risked. And ends remained to be tied. Jo’s place must be left as it had been before the misery. The Shack must be cleaned. A note must be left.
He rose, and got dressed. He held his motorcycle leathers in front of him…he thought of them as friends, as protectors, comforters and, gently, he eased them on for the last time.
72
Broc Lisle made his second call of the week to Cynthia. ‘That information proved most helpful to my friend. Thanks.’
‘My pleasure.’
‘I’m going
to ask you another favour, if you don’t mind?’
‘I could never live long enough to repay you for all you did for me.’
‘Not at all. You were born to do good things. It was my duty to help, and I took, and still take great personal satisfaction from it.’
‘I know you do. I know. What can I help with?’
‘Well, this is a bit unusual. Are you free in about an hour?’
‘I can easily arrange to be.’
‘My father is dying. I need to go and discuss the arrangements for his end-of-life care. I’d very much like the comfort of a companion at the meeting, and you were the only one who came to mind.’
‘I’m so sorry to hear that. Of course. I’ll be honoured to be with you.’
The senior nurse welcomed them into her large office. Broc Lisle shook her hand warmly and introduced Cynthia as a family friend. The nurse led them away from her desk to a comfortable corner unit built around an oak coffee table. They politely refused drinks. The nurse sat and opened a folder, taking out some papers.
‘Mister Lisle, I’m sorry to have had to call you so late. The doctor was delayed and he did not see your father until after six o’clock.’
‘That’s perfectly all right.’
‘I gave you the briefest of details on the phone, and again, I apologize for that. But I didn’t want it to be a total shock when you got here.’
Broc nodded. The nurse scanned a page from the folder. ‘You know your father’s had trouble with this stringy mucus, these awful choking fits, for some time now?’
‘I accompanied him to hospital myself that first day,’ Lisle said.
‘Of course. I’m afraid the doctor is convinced that dementia is the cause. The brain has ceased communicating with the swallowing muscles. Your father is unable safely to take in food or water, other than intravenously, and the doctor believes his chances of surviving surgical intervention to set up the intravenous feed are outside the risk-reward boundaries. It’s unlikely your father would survive such surgery.’