The Dali Diaries (The Ballashiels Mysteries Book 2)

by Stewart Ferris

  ‘Police? This has nothing whatsoever to do with the police. I’ll probably be fired when I get back. Absent without you know what, and all that. It doesn’t matter. This is far more important.’

  ‘So the connection between us is not the usual state contract of police service protecting the citizens?’ Ratty asked.

  Stuart shook his head.

  ‘A hidden connection is stronger than an obvious one,’ stated the Patient.

  ‘Clearly,’ said Ratty. ‘So you are with us in a private capacity?’

  Stuart leaned forward and gestured with his finger for the others to lean in close to him.

  ‘I am not alone in this. Perhaps you would like to follow me to the car. There’s something I’d like to show you. It may make things a little clearer for you both.’

  The three men put down their glasses and walked along a cloister lined with the graves of medieval monks, soon reaching the parking area within the walled grounds of the hotel. The Ford Focus was parked in one corner, its rear bumper now absent entirely. Stuart opened the boot and rummaged amongst his bags. In one holdall was an arsenal of weaponry, and Ratty and the Patient caught a glimpse of it as the policeman fumbled for the item he was looking for. They instinctively stood back from the car, their trust in this man suddenly gone.

  ‘Actually, it doesn’t matter,’ said Ratty. ‘Ought to be going now.’

  Stuart looked at them over his shoulder and realised what had happened.

  ‘The guns? Don’t be alarmed. They are for your benefit. Without them we wouldn’t be here. Ah, this is the thing I was looking for.’

  He produced a scrapbook and flicked through its pages. It was full of news cuttings, mostly from minor regional papers, concerning court cases. Each one had resulted in lengthy custodial sentences. Ratty looked at the yellowing photos in the dimly illuminated car boot. Things started to click. That was the family cook from his childhood, a Frenchman named Clement. There was the butler, Grant. And the gamekeeper, Huxtable. All had ended up serving time soon after leaving his family’s employment. Their crimes seemed utterly unrelated to his memories of those individuals and their personalities. Almost as if they couldn’t really have been guilty. Almost as if it were a stitch-up.

  ‘All the servants went to prison?’

  ‘All of them.’

  ‘But they weren’t a bad bunch of eggs. I couldn’t imagine any of them suddenly turning rotten.’

  ‘Men acquire a particular quality by constantly acting in a particular way. You become just by performing just actions: temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave actions,’ said the Patient.

  ‘Is he always like that?’ asked Stuart.

  Ratty nodded.

  ‘What I mean is, their characters were formed long before they left your service,’ explained the Patient. ‘If they were wrongdoers after they left Stiperstones, they were wrongdoers before.’

  ‘So all the Ballashiels staff are doing porridge?’

  ‘Were, Justin. Were.’

  ‘Fascinating, but what exactly has it to do with our rather odd current predicament?’

  ‘One of them died in jail. Your old chef. Dropped dead from food poisoning. Quite funny, really, when you think about it, I suppose. Probably couldn’t handle thirty years of English prison food. Can you imagine what that does to a French chef with taste buds tuned to perfection? But then something went wrong. The others got out. Released on the same day. Last week. Should never have happened. We tried to fix things so they would never come out. Big cock-up through and through.’

  ‘Grant and Huxtable are free?’ asked Ratty, trying not to sound as pleased as he genuinely was for them.

  ‘Not just free,’ warned Stuart. ‘They are on a mission of vengeance. They are coming for you.’

  ‘Coming for me? What do the servants have against me? I was just a whippersnapper when they were around.’

  ‘Something big is happening, Justin. Events are unfolding fast. I’m not at liberty to reveal why, but I will do my level best to protect you.’

  Saturday 4th May 2013

  Tired hinges groaned. A door clicked. Ratty opened his eyes, instantly alert to the possibility of an intruder. He fumbled in the unfamiliar darkness for the switch on the bedside lamp. He guessed it was between the side table and the mattress. He began to twist his body to a position that would allow his arm to locate the switch, but stretched too far off the edge of the bed and found himself in a coil of duvet and electric cable on the floor.

  ‘Anyone there?’ he whispered to the silent hotel room. ‘Well, if you are there, would you mind awfully helping me up?’ Somewhere in the back of his mind he was toying with the option of using the lamp in hand-to-hand combat the moment the intruder initiated physical contact. He reached back over his shoulder and grabbed the stem in readiness. Another door creaked open and banged shut. Voices erupted and ebbed in the corridor. Ratty finally turned on the lamp and was embarrassed to discover himself alone in his room.

  But he had slept well that night, fortified by the concept of a well-armed personal bodyguard in the adjacent room. This morning, despite his contretemps with the duvet, he was invigorated, powered by the kind of joie de vivre that he hadn’t felt in many years. If they set off early enough, it was possible that he and the Patient would, with the protection of their bodyguard, reach Spain today. The quest for his mother would continue.

  The Patient had already finished his continental breakfast when Ratty sauntered into the foyer to check out.

  ‘I’ll skip petit déjeuner this morning, Patient chappy. Want to get on the old rue as soon as the constable is ready.’

  ‘I fear we will not benefit from his company today, Ratty.’

  ‘Pourquoi not?’

  ‘I observed that a maid has already begun to clean his room and that his key has been handed in.’

  ‘So he’s checked out ahead of us. Keen fellow. Marvellous. Perhaps he’s waiting in his car?’

  ‘His car is no longer here.’

  ‘I’m sure he’ll catch up with us en route later on. Let’s bash off anyway.’

  The receptionist called Ratty back to the desk.

  ‘Monsieur, I nearly forgot. Someone left a letter for you.’

  Ratty took the envelope. It was sealed. He held out his hand in anticipation of being handed a letter-opening knife, but his expectations remained unfulfilled, forcing him to enter the unfamiliar and faintly distasteful territory of having to rip the envelope open with his fingers. The note inside was handwritten, and appeared to have been scribbled in haste. It took him a few seconds before he was confident that he understood its message. He thanked the receptionist and ushered the Patient to the Land Rover, saying nothing until they were inside and the doors were shut.

  ‘Change of plan,’ he told his friend. ‘This has thrown something of a Spaniard in the works.’

  ‘What does it say?’

  ‘It tells us to abandon our journey to Spain in the hunt for my mother. Only by returning immediately to Blighty will Constable Stuart’s life be spared.’

  ***

  Having slept on the events of the previous day, Ruby felt calmer. She didn’t share Rocco’s conspiracy fears. The vandalism of cars and caves could have been random incidents, unconnected and without motive or agenda. The idea that museum officials would destroy the very thing that their institution existed to preserve was preposterous. The museum was the appropriate body to inform of the discovery in the cave, she was convinced of that. Rocco’s motives for attempting to befriend the museum staff were highly questionable, but the result would be the same: the painting would be painstakingly restored, protected and studied and would add to Dalí’s body of work.

  She found Rocco waiting for her outside the museum, studying the seemingly endless line of tourists queuing for entry. In the morning shade of the city square the air was cool, causing the more optimistically dressed visitors to huddle and rub their bare arms.

  ‘I’m not
happy about doing this,’ announced Rocco directly into Ruby’s ear so that no passing strangers would hear, ‘but we’re in too deep already.’

  ‘Stop saying stuff like that, Rocco. Not everything in the world is a conspiracy, you know. Most people are honest and hardworking, and very few people can keep anything secret. Human nature is to share information. It’s why conspiracy theories spread like wildfire when there’s no substance.’

  He looked at her as if she was crazy and said, ‘Follow me.’

  Rocco knocked on an unmarked door at the side of the building. A few seconds later it opened and they were invited in by a brawny museum official who led them to a windowless office in the basement. Rocco and Ruby were left alone in the plain room for several minutes. They said nothing. Ruby relaxed while her companion tensed.

  Finally, the door clunked open and an old man with pale skin and a straight nose entered. He was dressed in a white suit that looked expensively tailored, and there was not a speck of dust on his glistening Barker shoes. Upon seeing Rocco’s face he seemed to do a double take, an expression of horror spreading from his mouth like an earthquake. Rocco gulped hard, stood up and offered his hand.

  ‘Doctor Rocco Strauss,’ he said, in what he hoped was a confident tone. ‘Pleased to meet you.’ The old man said nothing, allowing his facial muscles to return to a position of neutrality. ‘And this is Doctor Ruby Towers. Archaeologist,’ Rocco continued.

  Ruby offered her hand to shake, but the old man remained aloof from her, still standing, as if preparing to spring from the room at a moment’s notice.

  ‘I cannot decide,’ began the old man after an uncomfortable pause, ‘if you are depressingly stupid or incredibly brave.’

  His lack of civility unnerved Ruby. Museums the world over had always welcomed her. The possibility that there might be some substance to Rocco’s paranoia began to enter her head.

  ‘Hear me out,’ said Rocco. ‘I know you guys have a problem with my interest in Keo, but that’s cool. All in the past. I want to start again. I want to join you. We both do, right?’

  Ruby nodded, already regretting it.

  ‘Out of the question,’ stated the old man, flatly.

  ‘Why?’ asked Rocco.

  ‘You don’t know what you are dealing with. Your request is entirely unrealistic. And your arrival here presents me with a problem.’

  ‘What kind of problem?’ Rocco’s assertive façade was crumbling.

  The old man leaned against the door and sighed, his spirit suffering the same rate of decline as Rocco’s confidence.

  ‘Why do you have to meddle so much?’ asked the old man. ‘You complicate my life. I do not need this when there is so little time.’

  ‘You had time to destroy Dalí’s cave painting,’ said Rocco.

  ‘Rocco, you can’t just accuse people of that with no evidence,’ admonished Ruby. ‘I apologise for his directness, but we did find what appeared to be the remains of a painting in a cave at Cap Creus. There are signs that might link this painting to Dalí, so I think it would be a good idea if you sent someone to take a look at the remains and subjected it to a more rigorous inspection than I –’

  ‘You really think I do not already know about Dalí’s cave painting?’ interrupted the old man.

  ‘Of course he knows, Ruby,’ said Rocco. ‘He’s the one who ordered its destruction.’

  Ruby looked to the old man for a denial of the accusation, but his face remained blank.

  ‘Your interest in cave paintings does not bother me,’ said the old man. ‘It is your preoccupation with Keo that I find disturbing. It has made you too much of a threat to everything we are working towards. You will wait here while I decide what will be done with you.’

  ‘Screw this,’ said Ruby, standing up and making for the door. The old man stood aside and let her rattle the handle in frustration. ‘I’m not playing games!’ she shouted. ‘Let me out!’

  The old man knocked twice on the door and it opened for him. The bulky security guard forced Ruby to remain in the room with Rocco while the old man exited. The door shut. She could hear the key turning again.

  ‘That went well,’ Rocco whispered, winking at her. ‘He reacted exactly as I wanted him to. He doesn’t know that he has walked right into my trap by refusing to let us join their organisation.’

  Ruby was about to contradict Rocco’s unlikely statements when he held a finger to his mouth and pushed a note to her. ‘Bugged room,’ it said. ‘Play along.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ruby, sighing. ‘They’ve walked right into your clever trap. You’re clearly too smart for them.’

  If their English was good enough to detect her heavy irony she would have blown his plan aside, but even Rocco appeared to think she was sincere.

  ***

  ‘Logic doesn’t solve our conundrum,’ complained Ratty, still sitting in the driving seat of the motionless Land Rover. ‘There is no way to make our decision logically. It has to come from the heart.’

  ‘Decisions of the heart are invariably inferior to decisions of the head,’ said the Patient.

  ‘Right now my head is throbbing. It isn’t fit to choose our course of action.’

  ‘If we do not return to Stiperstones, Constable Stuart will be killed. The logic is simple and unavoidable.’

  ‘There are too many ifs, buts and wotnots, old fellow. These ne’er-do-wells could be bluffing. The constable

  might be in danger anyway, and if we continue to Spain, we may again cross paths with these ruffians and have a chance to help him. What if they have no means of knowing where we are? What if we drove home then jumped on the next flight to Girona? Would that count?’

  ‘We must do that which causes the most good and the least harm,’ said the Patient.

  ‘One does one’s best.’

  ‘Do you agree that attempting to save the constable is a good thing?’

  ‘Of course,’ agreed Ratty.

  ‘And that by rescuing him we would reduce the risk of harm coming to his person?’

  ‘Indeedy.’

  ‘And yet by attempting to do good we increase the risk of harm by not following the instructions of his kidnappers. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes,’ Ratty sighed.

  They had been sitting in the hotel car park at Chartres for over an hour. While the Patient’s ability to argue about probability, ethics, law, and morality seemed boundless, Ratty was growing weary of their inaction.

  ‘So can we say,’ continued the Patient, ‘that an attempt to find and save the constable is neither a good nor a bad thing, because its nature depends upon its outcome?’

  ‘I suppose it is morally neutral, yes.’

  ‘And what are our chances of a successful rescue? Do we feel confident about our abilities or are we concerned about our lack of fighting skills, our lack of weapons and our inexperience in this field?’

  ‘Er, when you put it that way, we’re up against it somewhat, yes.’

  ‘Therefore we know, when beginning such a rescue attempt, that the chances of failure run at more than fifty per cent. Would you agree?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘Therefore,’ droned the Patient, ‘by attempting to be heroic we are tilting the balance in favour of harm to the constable, and probably to ourselves, and therefore –’

  Ratty put his hand over the Patient’s mouth.

  ‘Follow me,’ Ratty whispered. The two men climbed out and walked to the other end of the car park. ‘I have a solution, but I couldn’t tell you in there. Remember Stuart said he had bugged our jalopy? If the kidnappers have his car, they could be listening on the same bug. And they might have put another tracker in there somewhere. How else would they know if we were heading back home? But I know what we should do.’

  ‘And your solution is what?’

  Ratty returned to the Land Rover and opened the rear door, selected the wrench from the canvas tool bag, then walked round to the front and opened the bonnet. The engine was dirty. Its c
oolant pipes were beginning to perish. The wires were blackened with oil.

  ‘This is my solution,’ said Ratty. He looked over his shoulder, then began to hit the various engine components with the wrench. ‘Rather jolly good fun, actually. Care to try?’

  The Patient shook his head. Ratty checked that the car would no longer start, then closed the bonnet and took out his mobile phone. He called the breakdown insurance company and demanded that his car be returned to England for repair and that they provide him with a rental car so that he could continue his journey. When the call was finished, he smiled at the Patient, who expressed a look that suggested Ratty’s actions had been entirely logical.

  ***

  The absence of natural light in the museum basement served only to fuel Ruby’s contempt at her incarceration. Two hours without daylight, without food and water, and without a reprieve from Rocco’s incessant paranoiac babbling was driving her to the edge of sanity. He seemed to have forgotten his earlier concern about the room being bugged, and had been jabbering about every conspiracy theory he had ever encountered.

  ‘How is your plan coming along?’ she asked him in a tone that was loaded with sarcasm.

  ‘I’ve calculated that they won’t shoot us in here,’ replied Rocco. ‘Too much risk of a bullet ricocheting from those walls.’

  ‘Reassuring.’

  ‘But something’s not right,’ he continued.

  ‘I know. I just assumed you were born that way.’

  ‘I mean, why hasn’t the old man come back yet?’

  ‘Maybe he hasn’t decided which conspiracy he’s part of, and he’s trying to make up his mind?’

  Rocco glared at Ruby for mocking him at a time of crisis.

  ‘No. It’s something else. Something deeper. I think this is a test, Ruby. He is testing us.’

  ‘A test?’ she asked, trying not to roll her eyes in irritation.

  ‘He is testing our loyalty. We said we wanted to join them. I have a hunch that this door is not actually locked.’

  ‘But we heard them locking it two hours ago,’ protested Ruby.

  ‘And have we tried the handle since then?’