The Spaniard paused again, waiting for this terrible news to sink in. No one spoke, they sat in silence, mesmerised by the story, waiting for him to continue.
“Nicole had ensured that the paper work for the previous day’s prep and service of the aircraft were in order and had filed the flight plan showing that her husband and Little were flying together that day. The various emergency services were deployed to look for the plane but as we know, it was never found and nor were any survivors. The ‘accident’ had been perfectly planned and executed and Tony Forrester and three other innocent people had disappeared.
“So Nicole organised these deaths just to go off with this man, Robin Little?” Jenny interrupted. “I don’t understand. Why go to all that trouble to get rid of Tony? All she had to do was to divorce him and marry Little.”
“That leads us to the motive, Jenny. You know my theory about motives and crime and that’s why I asked for the file from Perth. As is so often the case, it was simply money. Tony Forrester was well aware of the risks of flying small jet planes, so when he set up N-Jet, he took out a life insurance policy in favour of his wife for one point five million dollars, with a double indemnity clause for accidental death. Six months after Tony died in the air crash, Nicole collected three million dollars.”
Emma shuddered and took a deep breath. “I can’t believe it. How could anyone be so callous? To execute the premeditated murder of four innocent people in cold blood, just for money.”
“Unfortunately it’s true. Both Jenny and I have previously come across similar crimes. You can’t imagine what people will do in such circumstances.”
“So that’s insurance fraud to be added to their list of crimes as well.”
“It’s becoming a very long list.”
“And now Little is living with Nicole under the name of Harry Slater? How does that work” Leo was intrigued by the cast of characters.
Espinoza took out his jigsaw puzzle and list of questions and laid them on the table. He ticked off the second last item. “We have almost come to the last remaining square on my puzzle. That was a question I wondered about a lot – where and how does Constance fit into the plan and why was he fired from several jobs if he was so competent?
“The first answer is that Constance and Nicole knew each other before they went to Rwanda. They had both worked for SOS Médicale in Paris and he arranged for her to come down to replace Emma and that’s when she met Tony Forrester.”
Emma put her hand to her mouth. “I thought he’d been having an affair with her in Paris. I’ve misjudged him all these years.”
“Whatever the case, he jilted you and married her, so I don’t think you misjudged him too badly. Anyway, Constance had kept in touch with Nicole while she was in Australia and she knew he had changed jobs several times and was now working at the St Christopher Clinic. And she knew why. He was an excellent plastic surgeon, but also an inveterate gambler. He gambled more than he earned and found a way to supplement his income to finance his losses.
“That brings us to the second and key reason. When Constance left Rwanda he went to work in Toulouse and played in one of the casinos there. He met a local fraudster who was involved in people trafficking; immigrants, young girls, etc. The man was a forger, creating false documents to permit the movement of people across borders. They went into partnership together, Constance would change people’s looks and his partner would provide them with a new identity. They carried on this business for several years, but he was very indiscreet under the influence of alcohol and he was found out and fired from several hospitals. He was never prosecuted because they didn’t want any scandal and they had no concrete proof. But that was how Nicole learned about his part time occupation.”
“And that’s how Robin Little was transformed into Harry Slater.”
“Exactly. After Forrester’s death, Little stayed in hiding in Perth while Nicole came over to France and acquired a fake passport for him through Constance. He then installed himself in Nice, as Slater, waiting for Nicole to cash in the insurance and join him. It took six months, but in the end the plan worked perfectly. Until they made a terrible mistake.”
“They got involved with Esther Rousseau.”
“Yes, Jenny. Nicole became bored and got a job in the casino. She became friends with Esther and they swapped stories. When Esther and Dudley came up with the idea of the abduction, knowing Nicole had come into a fortune, she seduced Slater and he became her lover. She was already preparing the ground to finance the plan if Dudley would agree to go ahead. When he did, she and Slater convinced Nicole to provide the funding. Constance was already in Johannesburg with a new passport so everything was in place to carry out the abduction.”
“How did you get the story in such detail?”
“Slater broke down and started talking. Marcel told me they couldn’t shut him up. Nicole is a very tough nut but she finally cracked when she knew he’d told them everything.”
“So the police know about the abduction plan. What about me and Leo? Will there be any repercussions for us?
“Not in France. It may seem cruel and heartless, but Marcel Colombey isn’t concerned with Leo’s abduction. He doesn’t know why it was planned and since Leo is safely back home, it’s of no importance to him. He has helped to solve a multiple murder case in Australia and isn’t interested in anything else, especially a boy and his mother in the UK.”
Emma breathed a sigh of relief. “And what happens to Slater and Nicole now?”
“They’ll be held in France until Mac gets the paperwork ready to take them back to Sydney for trial. It’s in his jurisdiction now, so he’ll get a lot of brownie points. He’s a very happy Aussie. Marcel gets a lot of credit too. The French helping the Australians; that’s quite a coup.”
“I’d better get back to Malaga now and leave you and your family to absorb all this news. I’m afraid it has upset Emma a lot. She feels guilty for bringing all this upon her family and is very upset about what happened to Forrester.” Espinoza and Jenny had left Emma and Leo together and were talking in the hall.
“There’s something I realised during your explanation,” she said. “Our research into Mutesi’s experience with Galaganza was actually irrelevant. They seem to have known very little about it, only that Mutesi had a child, probably by a genocidist and Emma took him illegally to England.”
“You’re partly right. Because of Dr Constance and Nicole Forrester’s involvement we assumed that it was an important event, and in reality it was just a red herring. Against my own experience and convictions I have to admit that the timing of Galaganza’s death and the organisation of the abduction was purely a coincidence. He may not even have been Leo’s father; we just don’t know. But your overall analysis was correct and it helped us in many other ways to work out what was going on in South Africa. In the end though, the whole abduction scheme and the deaths of many people were caused by nothing more than a fortuitous conversation in a casino and a combination of greed, sex and revenge. What a sad indictment of our civilisation.”
“All the more reason to never mention anything about Galaganza to Leo. He and Emma need to put this behind them and get their lives back on track. You’ve solved this case brilliantly, Pedro. Emma and I can never thank you enough. Leo is safely back and doesn’t seem to have come to any harm; in fact I think he enjoyed the experience in a perverse way. We now know why it happened and some of the people responsible.
“But there’s one thing we haven’t discussed. You remember our agreement, ‘get Leo safely back and then bring the culprits to justice’. We know the participants who have been arrested or killed were not the brains behind this plan. Esther Rousseau was definitely one of them, but she must have had help to carry it out. What are the chances of finding and punishing her and the other culprits?”
Espinoza took her hand and in a conspiratorial whisper, he said, “Wait until this evening and we’ll see what happens. Hasta luego, Jenny.”
SEVENTY
Nice, Côte d’Azur, France
Robin Little, alias Harry Slater’s laptop was in the data retrieval room at the National Police Commissariat in Nice. An IT technician was interrogating the machine for any information relating to the murder of Tony Forrester and the subsequent cover-up and counterfeiting of passports and other documents.
An incoming email flashed across the screen and he opened it up. It was from someone called Esther and came from an ISP in Thailand. There were several attachments, including a recorded conversation. The material didn’t seem relevant to his search criteria but the technician transferred everything onto a memory stick and sent it up to the fifth floor, addressed to Inspector General Marcel Colombey.
London, England
Lord Arthur Dudley was watching the midday news when a message arrived on his laptop, it was from Esther. He grunted with surprise when he saw she had used an ISP in Thailand.
He read the short message and opened up the various attachments with an increasing sense of anger. That unfaithful hussy. She led me to believe she had feelings for me and now she’s resorting to blackmail! Once again his perverted sense of justice distorted his reaction. Blackmail against a common foe, such as Emma Stewart, or Jenny Bishop, was acceptable, they were the opposition and fair game to be targeted. But he and Esther were partners; they had worked together in a united cause and he had developed feelings for her which he thought were reciprocated. It was simply unacceptable for her to act so spitefully.
He considered the situation. If she disclosed this information to the authorities he might be compromised, although he had never failed to escape from such situations before. His London lawyers, De Franco & Berlinger, were the most expensive and sought after criminal defence firm in the UK. She couldn’t risk confronting him in person, since she would be equally compromised. In addition, he was wealthy and she wasn’t. He would wait and see what transpired. Probably nothing, he decided. It’s a last futile attempt to get money from me. He deleted the message and its attachments twice from the machine. Thanks to the scrambling software there would be no incriminating messages to be discovered, if ever it came to that.
There was another nagging worry in the back of Dudley’s mind. He’d received a call the previous evening from his contact in Harare. The two agents sent down by them seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth. There was no trace, neither of them nor their car. One of them was an old and experienced agent, personally known to the President and he was likely to ask questions. The man did not want to incur his wrath, he needed to find them, or risk suffering serious consequences.
“Did they have family in Harare?” Dudley had asked.
“Those guys never have close friends or family, that’s why they get chosen. Plato’s a widower, lost his family during the war. He’s a bitter man. The kid, Greg, is an orphan. His folks were purged years ago. I don’t know the details, it was before my time, but he’s what you’d call a career gangster, no allegiances.”
Dudley suggested that the usual reason that people disappeared was because they wanted to. There had been no confirmation that they had arrived in Delmas and that was probably because they had never gone there in the first place. Otherwise Nwosu would not have been allowed to continue on to Diepkloof, he would have been eliminated by them in Delmas. If they had nothing to stay for, everything pointed to them deciding to take the opportunity to escape from Zimbabwe.
He didn’t insinuate any reason for such a decision but the man in Harare seemed to consider the suggestion possible, or even probable. He would continue to investigate but if they didn’t turn up he would try to bury the news, like many other matters he’d buried in the past.
After the call Dudley had speculated further on the events in Delmas. There was still a missing link and that was Coetzee. He had assumed that Nwosu had got rid of the security man in Delmas, which was why he wasn’t with him when the Zimbabwe agent arrived at his apartment, but it might not be the case. I wonder. Could he have somehow turned the tables on the two hit men in Delmas and escaped? But why would he let Nwosu go free if he had the upper hand? He knew he would never get to the bottom of the matter, but it was still lurking in his mind.
His thoughts turned back to Esther. He was still furious at her insolent disrespect but there was nothing he could do to teach her a lesson. He had no idea where she was and any action on his part could backfire on him. He watched the news programme for a long while, not registering anything, fuming inside at her disloyalty and the possible loose ends that he had assumed were tied tightly. Loose ends that could just possibly lead back to him. Finally he made a call, using his US phone with the new AT&T SIM, making a mental note to get rid of it later. Then he made an online transfer of twenty-five thousand dollars from his Lugano account. He began to feel a little better.
Malaga, Spain
Espinoza received a call from Marcel Colombey at two pm Spanish time. While they were speaking, an email forwarded from the Commissariat in Nice arrived on his laptop. He read it with satisfaction. “Très bien. I’ll get back to you when I’ve looked at the attachments. Merci, Marcel.”
London, England
DI Callum Dewar received Colombey’s forwarded email at two thirty pm UK time and called Espinoza as soon as he had read and listened to the content. “It seems Simon Pickford was right to suspect Dudley’s motives. Thank you, Sr Espinoza, this could be the break we’ve been looking for to nail this so-called Lord.”
“I recommend immediate action, Detective Inspector. Dudley has probably received a similar message and he will be destroying everything that could compromise him. I think you have no time to lose.”
“I’m taking charge of this myself. I’ve asked for a warrant and we’ll be knocking on his door in less than half an hour. Wait for my news later this afternoon and thanks again.”
Dublin, Republic of Ireland
Esther Bonnard had received no response to her emails to Dudley and Slater. This didn’t surprise her. Given the content of the messages it would take them some time to react. She knew, though, that if they resisted her blackmail attempt, there was nothing further she could do. The abduction plan was almost irrelevant compared with the murders in South Africa and the emails and recordings she had safeguarded were highly incriminating in that regard. But she couldn’t go public with the information without setting off another manhunt targeted at her, and this time she might not be so lucky. If her threats brought no reward she would have to regroup and devise a new strategy to recover her lost inheritance from Jenny Bishop.
London, England
DI Dewar arrived at Lord Dudley’s apartment just before three pm accompanied by DS Holden. A police Vauxhall Astra, warning lights still flashing and a uniformed driver at the wheel, stood half on the pavement in front of the building, adding to the usual disruption in the London street.
Dewar didn’t beat about the bush. He made his introductions, then immediately announced, “Lord Arthur Selwyn Savage Dudley, I am arresting you in connection with the recent deaths of Barry Lambert, Ernest Blethin and Jonathon Nwosu in South Africa.”
Dudley was dumbfounded. How on earth had this detective, in London of all places, connected him with Leo Stewart’s abduction in South Africa? He summoned up his most unctuous tone. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about, Detective Inspector. I’ve never heard of the persons you mention, but I suppose you have some obscure reason for this unpleasant disturbance. If you don’t mind I’ll call my lawyer, Sir Archibald Berlinger, who I’m sure will assist us in rectifying this misunderstanding.”
“You can ask him to join us at Scotland Yard, Lord Dudley and please provide us with your computers and mobile phone.”
When he tried to bluster his way out of the demand, Dewar showed him the warrant he’d received fifteen minutes earlier. “Since you seem to be unwilling to cooperate with us we’ll look for the items ourselves.”
They collected the laptop from the table in the living room
together with a mobile phone. A quick look around the other rooms revealed nothing, but one door in the apartment was locked. After prevaricating as long as he was able Dudley opened the door with a terrible sense of foreboding. His inner sanctum was about to be violated and he couldn’t bear the thought of it. The other mobile phones and his iPad were in there. The police technicians were bound to be able to break into his private world. Why didn’t I simply destroy and replace everything?
He sat silently in the living room, his confidence ebbing away, leaving a frightened middle aged fraudster who knew the game was up.
* * *
An hour later, Lord Dudley was in an interview room at Scotland Yard, with his lawyer, Sir Archibald Berlinger. Sticking to the lawyer’s advice, he was denying all knowledge of everything that was said to him. His confidence was slowly returning. Thanks to his obsessive paranoia the scrambled delete software meant they could obtain no information from his computers. His choice of ISPs and SIMs might appear peculiar, but they proved nothing at all. They have no actual proof of anything, he realised. It’s all circumstantial evidence based on hearsay. But who have they been listening to? He racked his brains to work out who their source could be. Slater’s in France, Esther has disappeared and Coetzee is somewhere in South Africa. There’s no one else.
Finally, Sergeant Holden said, “Do you know a man called Harry Slater?”
Dudley supressed any reaction. “I don’t believe so. Should I?”
The Rwandan Hostage Page 49