One Fell Swoop

by David Linzee

  This tall skinny bloke knocked on the back door and we let him in. He was very soft-spoken and deferential, asked how he could help. I was starting to tell him when he reached out, plucked the knife from the holder, and slashed Hannah’s throat. A jet of her blood shot across the kitchen and splashed on the refrigerator door.

  A brave man would have fought him and died. Any half-decent man would have just stood there frozen with shock and died.

  I lived.

  We’re beginning our descent into Heathrow so I’ll have to give Hannah short shrift, which is my usual form. When I went to her flat that night it was sheer desperation. I didn’t expect her to let me in, after the way I’d simply dropped her. But she did. In fact she was happy to see me. I realized it meant she loved me, and was most annoyed, because I was only planning to use her to make my escape and never see her again. But she wanted the whole story. She believed me and didn’t blame me. And a little while later, when I got her killed, I was out the door by the time her body hit the floor.

  We’ve landed. I wish I had time to rewrite these pages. Even more, I wish I could burn them. But you have to know.

  If you don’t hear from me by dawn tomorrow it means I’m dead. Take this statement to the police. It’ll be enough to set off a great media storm and international scandal about Mavalankar. But he’s been able to survive that sort of thing before. So it’s only my Plan B.

  My Plan A it wouldn’t be wise to tell you too much about, even if I had time. Basically, it’s this. I’ve got to know someone on Mavalankar’s office staff. Not that I trust her, but I think I know her price. And I can pay it, since somebody slipped up and forgot to close off my access to certain Cayman Islands bank accounts. What I’ll buy is the name and address and anything else I can get on the man who killed Hannah. Then I’ll go to the police. I’m an eyewitness to what he did, and the coppers should be able to lay hands on him and force him to grass on Mavalankar. I want that fucker charged with murder.

  Then I’ll go to prison. I know there’s no avoiding it.

  I think I can pull this off. But I’ll admit it doesn’t come as naturally to me as fleeing while Hannah was bleeding her life away. If we don’t meet again, I’m sorry for the trouble I caused.

  Donald Radleigh

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Don’s statement was in the inside pocket of her jacket. Her heart seemed to thump against it as they walked north, out of Hyde Park.

  “Look at those people,” Peter said. “What are they doing?”

  They paused and Renata looked. Half a dozen people were standing at the edge of a wood, perfectly still, with their heads back and hands raised, palm up. “They’re feeding the parrots who live in the woods.”

  “Parrots? I don’t see them.”

  “Listen and you’ll hear the squawks. They’re in there, but rather shy. You have to remain still for quite a long time.”

  “Seems like it would be a lot easier to feed the water birds, down on the Serpentine.”

  “That’s for tourists. These are English people.”

  “You’re a patient folk.”

  “I’m certainly going to have to be.” She turned and walked on. Peter limped beside her. “I don’t know how I’m going to endure until dawn tomorrow.”

  “We may hear from Don before that. He’s been here for a whole day.”

  “You mean if his plan works, we’ll hear from him.”

  “Well, yes.”

  “Do you think it will work? Honestly, Peter.”

  “I don’t know. You may be in a better position to judge.”

  “How so?”

  “I’m guessing Don was being pointlessly discreet when he wouldn’t give the name of the woman he was hoping would help him.”

  “You mean it’s his friend Jhumpa again?”

  “Yes. You’ve met her. What do you think?”

  “When I was a prisoner in that van, she did try to persuade Mavalankar to spare me. But within a few hours, I was running for my life from his goondahs.”

  “Doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence in her.”

  “No. D’you mind riding the Underground home? It’ll take longer, and we’ve hours to kill.”

  “Fine.”

  There were many more stairs in Marble Arch Station than she remembered. Peter limped down them stoically. The train was crowded, but a pink-cheeked girl in a dark blue school uniform offered him her seat. He was flustered by this old-world courtesy, but accepted. At Ladbroke Grove Station, it was a long climb to the street. Fortunately, the walk to her bank was short. She left him in a comfortable chair in the lobby while she asked the staff to let her use a photocopier. After making a copy of Don’s statement, she descended to her safe deposit box, where she left the original with her will and the rope of pearls she had inherited from a great aunt. At the post office next door, she mailed the copy to Peter’s address in St. Louis. Then they set off on the uphill walk to her flat.

  “Sure you don’t want a cab?” she asked him.

  “As you say, we’re in no hurry. Say, what are these spots on the sidewalk? I’ve seen them everywhere.”

  “Gum splats.”

  “I didn’t know there were this many gum chewers in the whole world. And all of them thoughtless. You know, I owe you an apology. And Don, I guess. It was just as you said all along. He didn’t know what he was getting into until it was too late.”

  Renata sighed heavily. “Let’s talk about something else. Please.”

  “Sorry. The sign across the street says ‘Off Licence.’ What’s that?”

  “A liquor store.”

  “Maybe we should stop in.”

  “Peter, you know I can’t drink. Not on top of my anti-depressants. It’ll put me to sleep.”

  “That’s just what I had in mind.”

  “Perhaps later.”

  Reaching her building, they went through the low gate into the area, which was peppered with litter as usual. She patted her jacket for her key. How had it gotten into her left-side pocket? Her bandaged hand probed clumsily for it.

  Peter’s hand closed on her arm. She looked over her shoulder at him questioningly. He said nothing, just pulled her backwards until she was looking through the window, down into her kitchen. What she saw was baffling. She could only fall back on childhood, a dim memory of her mother defrosting the fridge. Its door stood wide open, and its contents—milk bottles, beer cans, juice cartons, jam jars—stood on the table.

  “Your place has been searched,” Peter whispered in her ear. “Maybe they’re still in there. Let’s move.”

  They retreated to the gate. He closed it carefully, silently behind them. “Keep walking,” he said. “Which way is busier?”

  “Back the way we came.”

  They strode down the hill, as quickly as Peter could manage. It was mid-afternoon and there were plenty of people on the sidewalk, plenty of traffic on the street. It was reassuring.

  “The searchers are Mavalankar’s men,” she said. “The goondahs.”

  “Yes.”

  “But what are they looking for?”

  “Don’s statement.”

  “How would they know it even exists?”

  “Because they’ve got him. I’m sorry, Renata. I can’t think of any other explanation.”

  She stopped walking. There was an iron fence on her right, and she grasped one of its posts with her unbandaged hand and leaned on it to keep herself upright as weariness and hopelessness flooded over her.

  A van pulled over and stopped. Its back door slid open and a woman leaned out. Jhumpa. She was wearing a different but equally beautiful foulard headscarf. “Get in,” she said. “Both of you.”

  “No,” said Renata. “I will not get in a van with you again.”

  The woman jumped down from the van, leaving the door open, and approached her. “Your brother is alive,” she said. “We will take you to him.”

  “Don’t come any closer,” Renata said. “I haven’t got the statement on me.
It’s somewhere safe.”

  Jhumpa hesitated, a pace away from her.

  “Lady,” Peter said, “tell your friends to stay in the van, or we’ll scream blue murder.”

  She turned. The front door was open and the driver had one foot on the curb. The woman spoke curtly to him in Hindi. He held still.

  “Tell Mavalankar to ring me,” Renata said to Jhumpa. “Mavalankar himself. I’m sure he has my number.”

  Jhumpa shook her head. “You cannot speak with Mr. Mavalankar.”

  “If he wants Don’s statement, he’ll have to talk to me.”

  The woman returned to the van. Its door slid shut and it accelerated away.

  Peter was looking around. He said, “There’s a safer place to wait. Come on.”

  Twenty paces farther on was a Barclay’s Bank with a cash point and a queue of customers waiting to use it. Peter positioned them so they were covered by the CCTV camera. He said, “I think we can believe what she said. Don’s alive.”

  “Will Mavalankar call? Oh lord, what will I say to him?”

  “You’re doing fine. Continue to hang tough.”

  She waited, mobile in hand. Only a couple of minutes later, it rang. Nothing came up on its screen.

  “Hello.”

  She recognized the deep, lilting voice at once. “You have already told me what I wanted to know.”

  “Have I?”

  “Your brother said his solicitor had the statement. But someone like Don wouldn’t have a solicitor on retainer. I assumed you had it. Now I know I was right.”

  So Don had tried to protect her. She said, “What have you done to him?”

  “He is unharmed. Apart from minor bruises and possibly a loose tooth. In better shape than he deserves to be, considering what he was playing at. Your brother overestimated his own abilities. And underestimated the loyalty of my staff.”

  “Let him go.”

  “I am willing to turn him over to you. If you bring me the statement.”

  She lowered the phone and said to Peter, “He’s offering a swap.”

  Peter shook his head.

  She said into the phone, “I don’t believe it. That wouldn’t get you anywhere. Don would just make the statement again.”

  “Oh, you’re trying to talk me out of it?” Mavalankar chuckled. “You’re as stupid as you are stubborn. Now listen to me. Get the statement. I give you one half-hour. No more. The van will pick you up at—”

  “I’m not getting in the bloody van.” She looked at Peter. He mouthed, Stall him.

  “We are going to meet. Just you and me. You’ll prove Don is alive. And then we’ll talk.”

  Mavalankar sighed. “I cannot be bothered to meet with you.”

  “That statement is very detailed. It tells all about you and Sheikh Abdullah.”

  After a pause, he said, “At three o’clock, you will be at—”

  “No. I’m choosing the place.” She thought quickly. It would have to be somewhere very public and secure. “The Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand. The lobby. Just beyond the metal detectors. In one hour.”

  “All right,” Mavalankar said, and rang off.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  They arrived early. Leaving Peter outside, she entered and joined the queue for the metal detectors. It moved slowly: they were being reassuringly thorough. She had to hand over her watch before she was cleared.

  London’s civil courthouse had a lobby modeled on the knave of a Gothic cathedral, with rows of pointed arches and a lofty vaulted ceiling. She crossed the richly tiled floor to a bench beside a statue of a robed and wigged judge. The place was as busy and noisy as she remembered from previous visits, which was just what she wanted.

  She kept her eye on the entrance. The queues were not diminishing. People were shedding their coats, emptying their pockets, stepping through the metal detectors, to be frisked by guards or sent back for another try. On the far side was a lane where employees were presenting IDs and walking through. A short broad man in a beautifully tailored dark-gray suit went through this lane, smiling as he presented his pass. He spotted Renata and approached. He had rather long graying black hair, large eyeglasses, and a tan face spotted with moles. Heavy jowls dragged his mouth down at the corners. She remembered the shark-like sickle mouth she’d glimpsed in the driving mirror of the van. This was Mavalankar.

  “Litigation brings me here frequently,” he said, in his deep, musical voice. “I bought a pass.”

  “Fat lot of good the metal detectors did me, then. Score one for you.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m not armed.”

  “But you wanted me to know you could be. You’re smart, I’m dumb. For a rich man, you’re very fond of cheap tricks. Like the ones you played on my brother and Chancellor Reeve.”

  He sat down beside her. She remembered the citrus scent of his aftershave. “I don’t know what you mean. And I’m not really interested.” From his pocket he took the latest model iPhone, which he held up before her eyes.

  “What’s this?”

  “What you asked for. The proof your brother is alive. Note the time code. This was shot less than an hour ago.”

  He pressed a key and a video began to run. It showed Don lying on a concrete floor. His face was to the wall. A shoe came into the frame and prodded his back. He looked over his shoulder, saw the camera and put up his arm to cover his face. She only saw his expression for a split second, but that was enough to reveal fear, exhaustion, and shame.

  Mavalankar put the phone back in his pocket. “My men have told him he will come to no harm. But I’m afraid he doesn’t believe them.”

  “You bastard.”

  “It’s you who is prolonging his ordeal. Give me the statement and he’s yours.”

  “You have no intention of letting him go. You’re just using him as bait. You want to kill us both.”

  “Such words, in such a setting. You’re making yourself ridiculous. Just walk down a corridor with me, and you will see me greeted by several queen’s counselors. I’m a businessman. I don’t kill people.”

  “You hire men to do it. You sent a couple of them after me.”

  “There was never any question of killing you. My men would only have sequestered you.”

  “ ‘Sequestered’?”

  “Jhumpa thought you could be trusted to stay home and make no phone calls. On reconsideration, I did not. You would have been kept in a comfortable place in the country for a few days, until your brother closed the deal.”

  “And then they would have let me go? You expect me to believe that?”

  “Why not? You think I should’ve been afraid you would retaliate, make trouble for me somehow?

  Mavalankar looked at her, raising his heavy eyelids, pretending to shrink back in fear, his chin touching the knot of his saffron silk tie. He chuckled. “Well, now we’ve seen what you can do, when you put all your energies into opposing me. Not much.”

  “You’ve lost your hundred-million-dollar contract.”

  “Chancellor Reeve disappointed me. I thought he would be able to handle the media and his employees. But you are correct that this has been a bad business. I want to put it behind me. Which I can do as soon as I have the statement.” He reached into his jacket pocket and handed her a folded piece of paper. “Here are your instructions for the meeting.”

  “No. We negotiate that.”

  He wagged his head from side to side in the Indian negative. “You have wasted too much of my time already. Follow the instructions. You and your friend Lombardo will be there at nine o’clock this evening.”

  “And if we’re not?”

  “I don’t think I need go into that. You’ll be there. You have no choice.”

  He rose and walked away.

  * * *

  Peter was waiting outside, his back against an iron fence, allowing him to take the weight off his throbbing ankle. The Strand, he thought, had to be the busiest street in the world, lane upon lane of oozing cars and buses, with
bicycles and motorcycles whizzing among them, and sidewalks packed with people from curb to building wall.

  A little while after Renata had left him, he had seen Mavalankar arrive. A long black Bentley eased over to the curb, in front of the courthouse, followed by an SUV. Three men jumped down from the SUV and deployed, their eyes sweeping the crowded pavement. They were all white, British, clad in suits and ties. Military-trained, Peter guessed. No goondahs here. This was the security detail of an executive, not the gunmen of a big criminal. The doors of the Bentley opened and three more men in suits formed up around Mavalankar, so close that the short, broad Indian could only be glimpsed. They walked through the gate in the fence Peter was leaning against and disappeared into the tall pointed archway that formed the entrance to the courthouse.

  The bodyguards returned to their cars, which stayed put. Traffic snarled, drivers honked. A policeman came and knocked on the chauffeur’s window. They talked, and the policeman went away. In his days on the Springfield Journal-Register, Peter had seen the governor of Illinois arrive at various events with the same rigmarole. It hadn’t saved the governor from being convicted on corruption charges and sent to prison. The thought had cheered Peter.

  Now car doors were opening. The bodyguards re-deployed, three of them going into the archway to meet the boss, the others fanning out to watch the pedestrians. The meeting must be over. Mavalankar reappeared and the three guards hurried him across the sidewalk.

  A sudden movement caught Peter’s eye. A street person in a thin jacket, head down, showing cropped hair and pale scalp, was shouldering his way through the crowd, heading for Mavalankar. One of the bodyguards noticed and moved to block him. The street person kept coming. They collided and the man fell. Passersby stopped and looked and a few exclaimed oh! But the street person was all right. He put out an arm and pushed himself up from the pavement. His only arm.