A Coffin For Two (Oz Blackstone Mystery)

by Quintin Jardine

  Prim laughed at my defence of our profession. ‘Don’t be so precious. How was your day anyway? This business of ours seems to be a success, so far, at least. I saw Jan’s fax when I came in, and the four enquiries. Did she phone as well?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Fine, as far as I could tell. She sent her best. Said she’d see us at Dad’s wedding.’

  Primavera looked at me archly. ‘Oh, so I am invited, then.’

  ‘Of course. Stop being silly.’

  ‘I’m not, it’s just that whenever you’ve mentioned it so far it’s always been in “I” terms. You and Jan, best man and bridesmaid. I was beginning to wonder whether I figured or not.’

  Inside I was squirming. ‘Look, don’t be daft. Okay?’

  She pouted. ‘Who stole your scone?You’re always like this when you have a sleep in the afternoon.’

  ‘Och, I’m sorry,’ I said, seizing my chance to change the subject. ‘I had a couple of beers at lunchtime, with Miguel ... and with his wife’s nephew, the policewoman’s husband.’ Spinning it out as long as I could, I told her how the bones of poor Ronnie Starr had been run out of yet another town.

  ‘My God,’ she whispered, when I was done. She didn’t see anything funny about it. Nor did I now that the beer had worn off. ‘If you believe in restless spirits, his must be pretty frantic by now. What are we going to do?’

  I spread my hands. ‘What we did the week before last. Go and look for him. I know roughly where he was dropped.’

  ‘But we can hardly go wandering around the fields there,’ she protested. ‘It’s a working village, not the sort of place where young couples go for an innocent stroll.’

  She had a point. I thought about it, and a solution presented itself. ‘Tell you what. Remember that restaurant we went to in Ventallo?’

  ‘The farmhouse?’

  ‘Yes. Let’s go there again. Tomorrow night.’

  She shook her head. ‘Can’t be tomorrow. Shirley’s having a whist night. I said we’d go.’

  ‘A whist night! With the over fifties!’

  ‘You’ll enjoy it. Adrian will be there too. I had a chat with him this afternoon, when I took Davidoff back. He’s a nice chap.’

  I laughed. ‘Okay, I get it. I can talk to Adrian, while you’re wooed by Davidoff.’

  She smiled, but a touch defensively. ‘Well! Indulge me, okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘We’ll go to Ventallo on Wednesday ... after we have another look for Trevor Eames. His voyage can’t be going on for ever.’

  38

  It was probably a blessing that Blackstone Spanish Investigations seemed to be welcomed by the market, and to be generating substantial momentum. Both Prim and I spent the best part of the next day, without taking a siesta and with barely a break for lunch, preparing responses to the enquiries which Jan had faxed through.

  Prim was excited, because the investigation business was still new to her, and allowed her to use her considerable brain in an entirely different way from what she was used to in her nursing career.

  I got a buzz from it too; partly because enquiries like these, and my interview in Tarragona, straightforward factual work as they were, made me feel somehow that I was back in my real world after an extended lie-in, and partly because it allowed me to concentrate on something other than our pursuit of the two Ronald Starrs, skeleton and impostor, or on my disturbing conversation with Jan of the day before.

  ‘Partner,’ said Prim as I sorted through all of the paper which our day had generated, ‘we are on to a good thing here. If this is what it’s like after our second speculative ad, imagine what it’s going to be like when we really get our marketing act together.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘You heard. Look, all we’ve done so far is stick a toe in the water, for no other reason than to keep ourselves occupied. In a very short time we’ve found out that the water’s pretty deep.’ She leaned across the terrace table. ‘If we put together a sensible marketing strategy, with more focused advertising in the right journals, and with carefully targeted mailshots, we could build up a pretty respectable business in no time.’

  I stared at her. ‘Come on, love, how many hours are in the day?’

  She stared right back at me. ‘Eight times the number of people you hire.’

  I couldn’t think of a quick comeback to that one.

  ‘We needn’t just be hiring them here, either,’ she said. ‘Why shouldn’t BSI work in both directions, like the guy in the Consulate suggested, handling investigations in Britain for Spanish clients? Come to that why should it restrict itself to Britain? With a little planning we could have a business dedicated to answering questions all over Europe, and providing information to order from a database, and ...’

  ‘... and hold on just a minute! Have you any idea what it would take to set up a business like that?’

  Her stare had turned into a frown. ‘We’ve got quite a bit at our disposal.’

  ‘I don’t only mean cash. I mean the time it would swallow, and the implications it would have for our lives. Have you any idea what’s involved in running a business?’

  ‘Yes. Hard work, self-discipline, dedication, reliability, quality standards: that sort of stuff.’

  ‘Sure, and accountants, bankers, lawyers, health and safety inspectors, VAT men, office overheads, employee overheads, employees’ statutory rights, customers you never get to know, customers you can’t stand but can’t tell to piss off in case they rubbish you in the market place, customers who don’t pay their bills, overdrafts, ulcers: that sort of stuff.’

  I shook my head. ‘I could have done all that in Edinburgh, love, but I chose to be self-employed. I like being self-employed. I feel comfortable being self-employed. I don’t want to run a business that has a hundred mouths to feed. I don’t want to feel responsible for so many people’s lives. I don’t want to be able to go round the world on the air-miles I’ve racked up on business flights during the year.’

  That frown of hers had deepened. ‘Don’t you have any ambitions?’

  I laughed out loud. I couldn’t help it, but she didn’t like that; not one bit. I stood up and walked across to the edge of the terrace. ‘Take a look out there. That’s the Mediterranean. Those are the Pyrenees. This is a very comfortable home in a beautiful place in the sunshine. We have cash in the bank, and earning capacity. We can live here, or in Scotland, as we choose. All these advantages, all the parts of our lifestyle are wildest dream stuff for most of the guys I know. I’m thirty, and they’re all reality. I reckon I’d be greedy if I had any more. Now you’re saying they’re not enough.’

  She stood up and stamped her foot in frustration. ‘Come on! You must always have a goal. Otherwise ...’

  ‘Otherwise what? Isn’t being happy enough?’ I paused, and smiled, trying to put out the flames. ‘If you want me to have a goal, how about extending the Blackstone line? To tell you the god’s honest, that’s the only ambition I’ve got left.’

  Someone must have filled my fire extinguisher with petrol when I wasn’t looking. ‘That’s all the growing you want to do for the rest of your life, is it?’ she exploded. ‘Your bloody dynasty?You can have kids and be a business success too, you know.’

  ‘But I’m a business success already, as far as I’m concerned. You and I, we are a business success.’

  She shook her head. ‘Oz, what will you be like when you’re old?’

  I looked at her, puzzled. ‘Knackered, probably. I’ll be like my dad, I hope, although he’s still a few years away from old himself. What do you want me to be like?’

  She stepped up and seized me by the shirt front. ‘I want you to be fighting against being old. I want the flame of ambition always to be burning inside you.’

  It dawned on me. ‘You want me to be like Davidoff, don’t you.’

  For an instant, she looked defensive, then she tugged my shirt again, yanking out a few chest hairs in the process. ‘And why not?
Most men his age ... whatever that might be ... have given up the ghost, but not him. He looks after himself. He’s fit, he’s charming, he’s funny and he’s full of life.’

  ‘Not all of him, according to Shirley.’

  She flashed her eyes at me. ‘Whatever the truth of that, he isn’t a boring old fart. You could be one of those by the time you’re forty.’

  This was getting near the bone. ‘Only if I’m bored myself, dear,’ I retorted. The flames in her eyes went out instantly, and were replaced by hurt. I grabbed her and hugged, and she pressed her face against my chest, as if to smother any more anger. ‘Sorry, Prim my love,’ I said. ‘This is a daft argument anyway. It shouldn’t be about what I want, or what you want, but about what we agree together that we want.

  ‘Tell you what. This weekend, we’ll draw up a business plan, and maybe when we go back for Dad’s wedding, we’ll see about taking someone on in Edinburgh, to market the business for us. Long-term decisions can wait till then.’

  She was mollified, but there was still tension between us when we arrived at Shirley’s three hours later. We found that we knew all of the other guests. Ma and Pa Miller were among them, no longer in the shadow of Steve, now that he had gone back to England.

  Fortunately, the whist turned out to be optional; good news for me since I hate card games of any form, and good news for Prim, since it meant that she could allow herself to be whisked into the garden by Davidoff with a clear conscience. I watched him nosing his Cava and nodding his approval as they headed for the door. When he was with Prim he always seemed a wee bit taller, his back a wee bit straighter, his shoulders a wee bit wider.

  I heard his voice drift back to me. ‘Ah, these unspeakable people. Had it not been for you, I think I would have gone today.’

  ‘Where would you have gone to, Davidoff?’ I heard her ask. ‘Where do you live?’

  I strained to hear the answer, but it was lost as Adrian Ford caught my elbow, with a cheery, ‘Hello!’

  I turned towards him, leaving Prim to her fate with a smile. ‘Glad you could come,’ he said at once. ‘My sister didn’t give me a choice about tonight. She said I was co-host and that was it.’ He paused. ‘Are you a cards man, Oz ... or would you prefer a game of snooker?’

  I grinned at Shirley’s amiable brother. ‘Anything but bloody cards,’ I whispered.

  ‘Excellent. Let’s grab some food from the buffet, and I’ll show you the table. Clive had it shipped over from England.’

  The snooker room was in the basement level of the house, off the vast garage. In the corner there was a small fridge, from which Adrian produced two Sol beers. He uncapped them, handing one to me. ‘No limes to suck with them, I’m afraid, though I always think that’s a bit of a pose.’ I agreed. Beer was beer, whether it was Mexican, Spanish or made in Fountainbridge.

  Adrian’s snooker seemed to be on a par with mine. After half an hour, there were still four reds left on the table, one for each empty Sol bottle on top of the fridge. ‘I never could take this game seriously,’ he confessed at last. ‘Clive used to regard me as cannon fodder, and Shirley used to say that she could wipe the floor with the pair of us.

  ‘Golf’s my game, really,’he added, suddenly slamming the twelfth red into the right middle pocket. The white spun back behind the blue, on its spot. He rolled it away very gently, then edged a red along the cushion into the top left pocket, finishing on the black. It went down, followed by the last two reds, two pinks and all the colours.

  I looked him in the eye as the last black thudded against the back of the pocket. ‘Are you as big a bandit at golf?’

  Adrian smiled, his beard spreading out in a funny kind of way. ‘Not a bandit, Oz. I just don’t like to show all I’ve got. Bit like someone else around here,’ he added, almost absent-mindedly. ‘The thing was,’ he went on quickly, ‘I could hardly have screwed poor old Clive into his own table, could I. It wouldn’t have been courteous. Old man, you’re a better player than he was. When we were down here I used to miss in a way that would set balls up for him to pot. You should always keep a bit back, whatever you do in life. Just a little extra in the tank, for when you really need it.’

  I wondered about the ethics of that approach. ‘Where do you play your golf?’ I asked him.

  ‘When I’m here, at Torremirona, mostly, although I’ve played all of the courses in the province at one time or another. Back home I play at the Belfry, off six.’ Having seen his snooker, I wondered how genuine his golf handicap might be. ‘How about you?’ he went on. ‘Do you play?’

  I’m always modest about my golf, with good reason. ‘I’m from Fife,’ I said, ‘so it’s compulsory. I’m a member of Elie, like my dad, but I haven’t been there very often of late. I’ve never played over here.’

  ‘Mmm,’ Adrian mused. ‘Next time I’m over we’ll have a game. It’ll need to wait till then, I’m afraid, for my dance card’s full for the rest of this week, and I’m going home on Saturday.’

  ‘Too bad.’

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘John, my nephew’s coming out on Monday to see his mum, and to have a board meeting with her. They’re directors of the company. I’m not; just a poor wage slave, I’m afraid, but John and I can’t both be away at the same time. Or so he says.’

  He glanced up at the clock on the flock-papered wall. ‘I suppose we should really put in an appearance upstairs. Fulfilling one’s social obligations and all that.’

  As Adrian re-racked the crystallite balls, I wiped the cues and replaced them in their clips on the wall. ‘Do I get the impression that you and your nephew don’t get on?’

  He smiled. ‘Let’s just say that things run more smoothly when one of us isn’t around. John runs the business now, although Shirl’s the major shareholder. I keep a quiet eye on her interests, but mostly I let him get on with it. As long as he doesn’t make any mistakes, I’m happy to stay in the background. Anyway, he doesn’t pay me enough for me to do any more than I do at present. No bonuses, no profit share, no options. Just salary, pension and company car.

  ‘Come on, let’s rejoin the wrinklies ... only don’t tell my sister that’s how I describe her circle of companions.’ He led the way up the narrow, tiled staircase, back to the party. Shirley was in the kitchen, opening more Cava.

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘About time you two were back. Adrian, put the coffee on, love. Oz, could you do something for me? I owe those bloody card-sharp Millers three thousand pesetas, and I’ve left my purse up in my bedroom. Take a run up and get it for me, will you. It’s the door facing you at the top of the stairs. You’ll find it on the dressing table, I think.’

  ‘Sure.’

  As I crossed the hall, I glanced through the open garden door. It was dark but Prim and Davidoff were still outside, side by side on one of the big loungers. She was smiling and leaning slightly against him. I laughed to myself at his persistence as I trotted up the wide stairway.

  When I found the light switch, I saw that Shirley’s bedroom was on the same grand scale as the rest of the house. It had its own terrace, with patio doors, and a huge bed, covered in pink satin. The dressing table was against the far wall. Her cosmetics were arrayed neatly to one side on a silver tray. On the other side was a photograph, in an ebony frame, of Shirley, a few years younger and a few years lighter and a tall, dark-haired, distinguished-looking man.

  The purse lay in the centre of the table. I crossed the room, picked it up and turned back towards the door. It was only then that I saw the picture.

  It was hung above the bed. Even in the artificial light, its colours exploded out at me. Along the Firth of Forth on the east coast of Scotland, it’s pretty well compulsory for aspiring artists to paint the Bass Rock. In Catalunya, it’s the same with Cadaques, the fishing village with which Picasso, Miro and Dali all had links.

  There must be a million pictures of the place, with its bay, its square-towered white church and its encircling mountains behind. But none like this. It was big, a metre dee
p at least, and maybe one and a half wide. In the foreground the sea shone cobalt blue. The white church tower gleamed almost silver. On the slopes behind the town, the sun glinted on the green foliage.

  I gazed at it, and as I did, the intensity of its colours reminded me of another picture; one which I had seen in Milton Bridge, in Scotland.

  I leaned across Shirley’s bed, looking for a signature. It took me a while to find it, for it was modest, and self-effacing. But eventually I spotted it, near the bottom left corner. It was small, but it was clear. I read the name aloud. ‘Ronald Starr.’

  I was shaking with excitement as I switched off the light and closed the door behind me. I was still trembling slightly when I found Shirley, back in the sitting room, refilling Cava glasses.

  I handed her the purse. ‘That’s some picture you’ve got up there,’ I said, quietly. ‘Had it long?’

  She beamed. ‘Isn’t it just! My lovely son gave it to me. He fancies himself as a bit of a collector. He came in with it one day when he was out here at Easter, and gave it to me, as an early birthday present.’

  ‘Do you know where he found it?’ I asked, all innocence. ‘That’s a gallery I wouldn’t mind visiting.’

  She shook her head. ‘It wasn’t from a gallery. John said that he bought it off Trevor Eames. He never told me how much he paid for it. Bet it was a right few hundred, though.’

  I smiled, involuntarily, and nodded. ‘I’ll bet. Had you ever heard of the artist before?’

  Shirley laughed, heartily. ‘I couldn’t tell you even now who painted it, and it’s been hanging above my bed for six months. A picture’s a picture as far as I’m concerned, love. You can ask John when he gets here on Monday. Or you can ask Trevor ... if you can ever find the bugger!’

  39

  ‘Her son bought it for her?’ Primavera gasped.

  ‘That’s what she told me. And he said that he bought it from Trevor Eames.’

  We were outside in Shirley’s garden, the two of us, with Davidoff. When I appeared, he had seemed put out, for an instant, but it passed and he welcomed me as if I was a brother in arms.