False Nine

by Philip Kerr

  I was about to help myself from a bottle of Elijah Craig when I glanced out of the window and, in the garden lights, caught a glimpse of Charlotte leaving the house with a laden tray in her hands. Given her size she would have been hard to miss. It was like watching a Swiss ball float through the garden. I quickly followed the housekeeper in time to see her place the tray on the lawn and unlock a door near the bottom of the garden before picking the tray up again and going through the door. She closed it carefully behind her and running after her I was just in time to hear the sound of the key turning.

  Was the tray for her, I wondered, or for someone else? Maybe she was a live-in housekeeper and these were her quarters. Perhaps she locked the door to ensure some privacy for herself. You could hardly blame her for that. Then again, I remembered her saying goodnight to everyone during dinner last night, and having gone out by the front door. Besides, there was a bottle of beer on the tray and I seemed to recollect Jérôme Dumas saying something about her not touching alcohol. So the beer could not have been for her but for someone else.

  As I pondered these circumstances the thought now occurred to me that, perhaps, I had misjudged the situation. It wouldn’t be the first time. Was it possible that Jérôme 1 was being held prisoner, just like the man in the iron mask? Far from being in cahoots with Jérôme 1 perhaps Jérôme 2 was intending to take the place of his twin brother whom he’d incarcerated in order that he might enjoy a taste of the Lamborghini lifestyle himself. Having seen Guadeloupe you could hardly blame him for that. And who would ever know? Even if he wasn’t as talented a player as his twin, Jérôme 2 might even manage to play a couple of games for Barcelona before they concluded he simply wasn’t up to scratch and returned him to PSG. Meanwhile, Jérôme would still be on a hundred grand a week – six or seven times as much as an islander’s average yearly salary. Only a few months earning this kind of loot would probably be enough for any young man living out his days in Pointe-à-Pitre. It might easily leave him set up for life. That’s a lot of temptation for anyone to resist, even a brother. Perhaps especially a brother.

  I took a few steps back and surveyed the low, flat-roofed building into which Charlotte had disappeared. It seemed to be a large garage or perhaps a small house that was the twin of the larger one, and, thinking I might gain access to this building more easily from the beach, I walked to the very bottom of the lushly planted garden and used the door through which Grace and I had first entered the house, the previous day.

  The beach was clear of French tourists now; a cheap foam mattress lay abandoned; further up the strand I could hear a guitar being strummed and some laughter, and there was a strong smell of dope in the air. I wouldn’t have minded a toke myself. My heart was throbbing in my chest like a squid in a net. Squadrons of pelicans were still hitting the waves in the moonlight like feathered harpoons in search of unwary fish. You had to admire their skill; they seldom came up short. The turbid sea crashed onto the shore and drew back again in a grating, melancholy roar of sand and shingle while the blackening night sky was regularly pierced by a ruby red beam from the island lighthouse that was more than enough to illuminate my new purpose. I walked a few yards along the beach and turned a corner onto some large wet rocks that seemed to cover a long sewage pipe that led into the sea. There I found a steel gate padlocked several times, yet which could easily be mounted provided there was something to cover the no mans’ land of barbed wire that festooned the top.

  I went back and fetched the abandoned mattress – but not without getting thoroughly wet from a particularly vigorous wave – and bent it over the coils of barbed wire. With this simple precaution I easily climbed over the gate and dropped onto a concrete path that led up to a series of steps. Near the top of these was a low rectangular building from which emanated a flickering blue light. A few seconds later I was standing beside a sliding glass door. I peered around the edge to see Jérôme 1 watching a movie on television – Goodfellas – and eating a meal off the tray brought to him by Charlotte who now seemed to have gone. He wasn’t wearing an iron mask but a large set of Beats headphones which adorned his unwitting skull as if he’d hoped to prevent the sound of the TV from reaching my inquisitive ears.

  I paused to observe his demeanour. It was almost astonishing how alike the two brothers were. But for the absent earrings and watch I would have sworn that this was the same man I had just seen asleep in the master bedroom. He was wearing a Barcelona football shirt and a pair of white jeans. He didn’t look like a prisoner, however. He was laughing; Joe Pesci was in the middle of his ‘I’m funny how?’ scene. Jérôme was too relaxed, too much at home in his comfortable surroundings to look like he was in any kind of trouble. I pushed gently on the polished steel handle of the sliding glass door, just to see if it was open. It was, which proved simultaneously that this man was certainly no prisoner.

  ‘Fucking bastard,’ I muttered.

  The headphones Jérôme 1 was wearing now served my purpose, and a minute or so later I had crept into the room and seated myself silently in an Eames chair immediately behind the sofa on which, deeply absorbed in his movie, he was still ensconced. I could even hear the dialogue in the Beats. I smiled bitterly to myself. I was going to enjoy this moment; no one likes to be hoodwinked. I now had the irrefutable evidence of the existence of Jérôme 2’s twin brother. Evidence I was now determined to make the most of, like Hercule Poirot in the big reveal scene at the end of some crappy movie.

  Finally, he took off his headphones, dropped them onto the sofa and just sat there, quite still, as if he suspected he was no longer alone; my aftershave, probably. Creed. It is, as James Bond observes to Mr Wint in Diamonds are Forever, ‘rather potent’. A few seconds more passed like this and then he turned slowly around and met my eyes. For a moment I thought he was going to shit himself.

  ‘It’s not how it looks,’ he said, quietly.

  ‘I suppose I should have suspected something like this, given that your name is Dumas,’ I said. ‘What, is your dad related, perhaps? To the famous French author of The Count of Monte Cristo, The Three Musketeers and yes, The Man in the Iron Mask? Is that where you got this idea, do you think? By the way, Alexandre Dumas was a proper author. Not like that irritating velvet-rope revolutionary you seem to admire so much. Now that we’re all out in the open I can tell you what I really think about Russell Brand. I can’t stand him. All the same, I wonder what he would make of this situation. Are dishonest bankers any worse than dishonest footballers?’ I sighed. ‘Anyway, Dumas would certainly have loved this story. It’s got everything.’

  Jérôme 1 said nothing.

  ‘Incidentally, he was black too. Dumas. His father was from Haiti. A little-known fact that people often tend to forget. Or perhaps they’re just not aware of it. The black count, the French used to call him. At least I think that’s what they called him. Lucky that he wasn’t playing for Queens Park Rangers against Chelsea, eh? John Terry might have called him something else. What do you think? I mean, you’d be the man to ask.’ I smiled thinly. ‘Forgive my manners but I’m just a bit pissed off to discover that you and your twin brother have been playing me for a cunt. And after all your earlier protestations of honesty. That hurts. I mean, I really did come here to help you and now I find that you’ve been taking advantage of me.’

  ‘It’s not how it looks at all,’ he repeated.

  ‘Isn’t it?’ I grinned. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, you mean there’s actually a plausible explanation that makes this all right? At the risk of being played for a cunt again, why don’t you tell me what that is? Fess up, son. Or is telling the truth just something that’s just way beyond your abilities? Only I feel I should warn you. My patience is almost gone. If what you tell me sounds or smells like bullshit I shall walk out of here, get on that plane and go home by myself. And you can stay here and rot on this grubby little island. Like fucking Napoleon.’

  ‘It’s like this,’ said Jérôme. ‘You see—’

  ‘No, wait a moment. I�
��d like Tweedledum to be there when Tweedledee starts to talk. I mean, I’ve no way of knowing which of you is the real deal. Come on. Let’s go and wake him up. I want to make sure I get more than fifty per cent of the story. Maybe he’ll contradict you. Who knows? I somehow got the impression earlier that Jérôme Dumas is not such a great guy. That he’s a selfish prick.’

  We left the beach house and walked up the lawn to the main building.

  ‘By the way, what’s your brother’s name? Is he Jérôme Dumas, or is that you?’

  ‘I’m Jérôme. His name is Philippe. Philippe is older than me by about five minutes. And wiser, too, probably.’

  ‘That makes us practically related.’

  Jérôme was about to go upstairs and fetch his twin brother when I caught sight of the Mont Blanc on the table where I’d left it last night.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ I said. ‘Let me see the palm of your right hand.’

  He hesitated.

  ‘It’s all right,’ I said, picking up the pen. ‘Much as I’d like to, I’m not going to stab you with this. I just want to make sure who I’m talking to.’

  He held out his hand; there was still some ink on his forefinger. But I still wrote a large letter ‘J’ onto the back of his hand blew on it to help dry it off, and then inspected my handiwork.

  ‘There. That should keep things straight for a while. I wouldn’t like you two bastards to work a switch on me again. Now go and get your doppel-fucking-ganger and let’s see what’s what. And don’t take long about it. I’m in no mood to be patient here. Come on, move it. If I had a football boot in my hand I’d throw it at you, kid. I really would.’

  29

  Oddly, I hadn’t met many twins since leaving school, but I’d never met twins who looked as alike as these two did. Two peas in a pod just about covers it, provided you could find two peas that were also perfect specimens of pea. There’s something weird about some twins – but not these twins, who were both perfect physical specimens. My earlier, conceited confidence ebbed away more than just a little as the two men came downstairs and faced me silently, as if intent on convincing me that I might be seeing double.

  In spite of all this it didn’t go unnoticed by me that Philippe Dumas was holding a large hunting knife in his hand. There was a line of sweat beads on his forehead and the muscles in his neck and arms looked about as tense as steel hawsers. And there was a meanness in his brown eyes I hadn’t seen before.

  Suddenly I began to perceive the obvious difficulty in my situation. Apart from Grace Doughty, no one knew where I was. Barcelona had sent a jet to meet me at the airport, in Pointe-à-Pitre, but other than that they really hadn’t a clue as to my exact whereabouts. My email to Jacint had informed him only of the circumstances surrounding Jérôme’s disappearance – which bore no relation to the present facts. I hadn’t thought to give them an exact address for the simple reason I didn’t know what it was. For all they and PSG knew I could have been anywhere on the islands, which have a land area of more than sixteen hundred square kilometres, much of it jungle-covered hills.

  It was only now that I remembered why the father of these twins was in jail. He was accused of murder. Maybe murder was not something brother Philippe was unfamiliar with. And I began to feel afraid, like I was back in the nick and facing down some racist bastard with a home-made shiv. As close to the sea as this there would be no problem getting rid of my body; they probably knew a boat they could borrow to take my corpse out beyond the island and dump me over the side. The local fish would eat me and I’d probably never be seen again.

  But if there is one thing I’ve learned in football it’s never to show your fear, because it’s a mistake to think of it as just a game; football is about mental toughness, about saying and doing whatever you need to help your team win. I guessed that I was going to need a lot of that now.

  ‘What, are you going to kill me? Is that it? I should be easy enough to kill. Two of you, one of me. That’s one way of making this problem go away, I suppose. How about it, Jérôme? Are you ready to add a stabbing to your list of crimes and misdemeanours?’

  ‘You don’t speak to my brother like that,’ said Philippe, grabbing hold of my shirt collar with his empty hand. I took hold of his thick wrist and tried to twist my collar from his grasp but he was much stronger than I had supposed. ‘You don’t know him. You only think you do. He’s not a criminal. He’s a good man.’

  ‘I don’t doubt it, since you’re the man with the knife in his hand. But his career is over if you kill me. That much is certain.’

  Jérôme looked at his brother carefully. ‘No one’s going to kill anyone,’ he said, which seemed to be as much for Philippe’s hearing as for mine. ‘All right? We’re cool here. So, put the knife down, Philippe.’

  But Philippe’s grip merely tightened on my shirt collar and on the handle of his knife, which was one of those with a black blade and a serrated edge – the kind you expect Rambo to pick his teeth with. I expect there was a useful compass in the handle, just in case you got lost at the local supermarket. I started to look for the exits, wondering if I could make it to the bottom of the garden before the twin with the knife caught up with me and cut me a new smile.

  ‘I don’t think Grace will be too happy if she finds out that she’s become an accessory to a murder,’ I said. ‘How’s that going to affect her chances of running for political office? Not well, I’d have thought.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Philippe. ‘Leave her out of this. You’ve done enough talking, Englishman.’

  ‘Oh, I agree,’ I said. ‘But consider this before I shut my mouth. Or before you do it for me. Barcelona and PSG know where I am. I sent them an email from Jumby Bay telling them I was at the house of Gui-Jean-Baptiste Target. Not to mention the limo driver who’ll be back here at five a.m. wondering where I’ve got to. I bet that even the Guadeloupe police could solve that crime. If I disappear, this address is the first place they’ll look. And it won’t just be your father who goes to jail, it will be the two of you. If you’re lucky they’ll give you twin beds in the same stinking cell. And in twelve months’ time the only balls you’ll be kicking are each other’s for being dumb enough to kill me.’

  ‘He’s right,’ Jérôme told his brother. ‘It’s not worth it. So put the knife down, eh?’

  Philippe glanced at his brother and then pushed me away. There were tears in his eyes. ‘He shouldn’t speak to you like that, Jay. He has no idea what you’ve been through. Better for us both that we get rid of him. He’s going to spoil everything. For you, me, Dad, everyone.’

  ‘No, no. It’s okay. It’s okay. You’ll see, Philippe. Everything is going to be fine. We’ll sort this out, I promise. I’ll make him understand. All right?’

  ‘Better listen to your brother, Philippe. For once he’s talking complete sense. You’d be making a very big mistake to kill me and think you could get away with it. But there’s still a chance to salvage something from this mess if you both level with me now.’ I nodded. ‘That’s right. Tell the truth. The whole truth. And maybe we can fix this mess.’

  Jérôme put his hand on Philippe’s arm, and then on the hand that was holding the knife. Finally he managed to take the blade away from his brother. He laid the long, black knife on the table next to the Mont Blanc. From where I was standing the pen didn’t look like it was mightier than the sword but there was no doubt that my prospects had improved, a little. I let out an unsteady breath as fear gave way to nervousness.

  ‘Shit, I need that drink,’ I said, and returned to the tray where this time I poured myself a large glass of twenty-one-year-old Elijah Craig bourbon with a shaking hand, and drained it in one noisy gulp.

  I knew I wasn’t completely out of the woods yet. And I figured my best chance of preserving my safety was to get hold of the knife before they changed their minds about cutting my throat. I poured another drink and walked to the table where the knife was now within my grasp. I sipped the bourbon, put the glass down, picked the
knife up and examined it objectively, almost as if it had already been used to commit a crime and there was an evidence tag attached to it.

  ‘This would certainly get the job done, I suppose,’ I remarked coolly. ‘Saw a man stabbed in prison once. With a shank made from a toothbrush and piece of glass. I don’t think the guy who stabbed him expected him to die because the victim was stabbed in the thigh. But the femoral artery was cut right through and he bled to death before anyone could do anything about it. That’s the one thing they never get right in the movies. The blood. There’s a lot of blood when someone bleeds out. A whole gallon of the stuff makes a hell of a puddle.’

  I looked at the twins, neither of whom seemed bothered that I was the one now holding the knife. I put it down, collected my drink and sat on the sofa.

  ‘I’m all ears, gentlemen.’

  Which was hardly true; there was my chest to consider; my chest felt like I’d just played on the losing side in a cup final.

  The twins looked at each other for a moment as if exchanging some telepathic remark – they did a lot of that, I was to observe – and then sat down opposite me. For a moment neither man said a thing but then Jérôme held his hand up in front of my face as if to indicate his true identity and started to speak, albeit with some difficulty.