Nemesis

by Rory Clements

  ‘Yes, they found it a few hours ago, somewhere east of here towards Newmarket.’

  ‘And what was in it? There must have been things in the bloody van.’

  ‘The thing had been stripped. Panels removed, tyres slashed open, seats torn and gutted. Whoever took it was looking for something. Which brings us back to you, Wilde. I want to hear what you know – not what the police have discovered.’

  Wilde gave Eaton a hard look. The MI6 man was turning things around and, as usual, was not being completely open. He had implied that he had heard of Rosa Cortez, but so far he had revealed nothing. Instead he was fishing for information. ‘I know what you’re doing, Eaton, because I know the way you work. But at least tell me this: what did you know about her before all this?’

  Eaton hesitated.

  ‘Eaton? Come on, I’ve been open with you.’

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘You know I have.’ But he hadn’t, had he. Not about everything. He hadn’t mentioned the fact that Marfield had a wife, and with good reason. Why should the poor, blameless woman be involved in all this unsavoury business? ‘Damn it Eaton, I’ve had enough. Anyone would think we were on opposing sides. I’m going home – I need my bed.’

  CHAPTER 25

  It was almost two o’clock in the morning when Wilde crept beneath the sheets beside Lydia. She feigned sleep but he knew she was awake, waiting for him. He curled himself around her and placed his hands on her warm, gently rounded belly. Soon, surely, it would be swelling. She covered his hands with hers and pulled him closer, and they both drifted off to sleep.

  Lydia woke him at eight thirty. ‘Rupert’s on the phone. He’s just going out but he wants to talk to you first.’

  Wilde struggled to untangle his brain. ‘All right, I’ll be down in a few moments.’

  ‘Coffee’s on.’

  In the hall, he picked up the phone. ‘Hello, Rupert?’

  ‘Tom, glad you got out of the nick safe and sound. Sorry I couldn’t help you there.’

  ‘My own fault. I misled a constable.’

  ‘Anyway, I wanted to catch you before I go out and bring you up to date on a couple of things. What occurred to me was the nature of the fatal wound suffered by Miss Rosa Cortez. I’m not an expert in the ways of assassins, but I would venture that this was a professional killer’s strike. Not that I’ve ever encountered one before, but there was something very clean and decisive about it. One might almost use the word efficient.’

  ‘Did you discover anything else about her?’

  ‘She wasn’t wearing any rings to say she was married or engaged and we don’t think she’d ever been pregnant. I’d guess her age at about twenty to twenty-three. None of that really helps, does it?’

  ‘No, I suppose not.’

  ‘There was something else, probably unrelated, but of interest to you and me. I had another chat with the coroner down in Ipswich. He knew a bit about Ronald Marfield beyond the suicide note. I must say I was rather surprised by what he said. When I think of retired colonels in Suffolk, I tend to think of blimpish moustachioed reactionary Tories. Anyway, in this case I was completely wrong. Turns out Colonel Marfield was a bit of a leftie. Good friend of Mr Attlee, apparently, having served in Gallipoli with him, and of much the same brand of politics. He even stood as a Labour candidate in the 1935 general election, and suffered a sound thrashing. There’s not much taste for that sort of thing in rural Suffolk, as you might imagine.’

  ‘Well, well, that is interesting,’ said Wilde. ‘I would never have picked up on that from talking to the widow.’

  ‘I thought you’d be interested. What are you doing with your Sunday? Relaxing and spending some time with your gorgeous girl, I hope. I’d invite you around for lunch but I’m a bit frantic today. Edie would love to see you both.’

  ‘Soon then.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  *

  Wilde dressed quickly, threw the coffee down his throat, kissed Lydia and went next door to collect the Rudge. He was just about to leave when the telephone rang.

  ‘Is that Professor Wilde?’

  ‘Yes it is. Who’s this?’

  ‘Percheron, Professor. Gus Percheron. I’ve just got back from the west country and there was a message asking me to call you. The porter gave me your number, sir.’

  ‘Ah yes, Percheron, good of you to call. Look, I hope I’m not out of order here, but I wanted to talk to you about a rather delicate matter. It’s about Marcus Marfield.’

  ‘Ah.’ There was a deep intake of breath at the other end of the line.

  ‘I believe you were at school together before you both came up to Cambridge?’

  ‘Well, yes, sir, we were in the same year.’

  ‘Have you heard that he’s back in England? Here in Cambridge, in fact.’

  ‘Good Lord, no I hadn’t heard that. When did that happen?’

  ‘About a week ago. I was in France and heard that he was languishing in an internment camp with a lot of other International Brigaders. I managed to get him out and brought him home.’

  The line wasn’t good and there was some crackling, then a pause. ‘I’m sorry, Professor, but why are you telling me this?’

  ‘Because I want to know what sort of young man Marcus Marfield really is. War can affect people in different ways, and before he is accepted back into college, we have to be sure that all is well. I couldn’t see any problem at first, but now little doubts are creeping in. Then Mr Laker told me you had brought a complaint to him about Marfield.’

  ‘But I spoke to Laker in confidence!’

  ‘Of course you did – and he hasn’t betrayed it.’

  ‘Well, sir, it sounds very much as though he has.’

  Wilde was becoming exasperated. ‘Can we deal with that later? The thing is, Percheron, you were at school with Marcus Marfield so you’ve known him longer than anyone else in college – and I want your honest opinion of him.’

  ‘Well that’s easy, Professor. He is a vicious bastard.’

  ‘That’s quite a damning verdict.’

  ‘Well, you asked my opinion. He can sue me for defamation if he likes.’

  Wilde liked Gus Percheron. Though he had never taught him, their paths had crossed in the college. Being small and unathletic, he must have been the sort of lad picked on by school bullies. Wilde suggested as much to him now.

  ‘Yes, I was bullied by Marfield. He bullied everyone at school – everyone less strong than him, that is. The teachers thought he was wonderful, the gilded youth with the voice of an angel, but we all knew what he was like.’

  ‘Why did you come to the same college then? You must have known he was coming here.’

  ‘My father’s alma mater. Soon, I’ll be joining up – and it’ll be the old man’s regiment, too. I’m not going to go into all the foul things Marfield did at school, because they’ll all sound pathetically trivial to you, but when you’re a rather timid boy like me, life can be made utterly miserable by someone like him.’

  Wilde waited for more. There was a sigh at the other end of the phone.

  ‘Well, if you must know, he tried to force himself on me. I suppose I was his type. In a woman, you’d call it rape.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Something I’ll have to live with, Professor.’

  ‘And he tried it on again here at college?’

  ‘This time I had a knife. Like all bullies, he doesn’t like people standing up to him.’

  The line was getting worse now. But Wilde just managed to hear Percheron’s final words before he was cut off.

  ‘When I was told he had gone off to fight in Spain, and save the world from the fascists, I laughed out loud.’

  *

  The streets were empty save for the hasty steps of churchgoers hurrying to morning service. At first Wilde heard nothing but the growl of the Rudge’s 500cc motor. But when he stopped outside the Samovar, he noticed the silence. There were no church bells. They were not being rung on a Sunday
for the first time in his memory. How, he wondered, had Hitler been granted the power to silence Britain’s bells?

  The door to the Samovar was locked and a closed sign was in the window. This didn’t surprise him. Nothing opened in this town on a Sunday except the churches.

  At the side of the tea shop, there was a narrow alleyway that led beneath an arch to the rear of the buildings, perhaps the entrance to a stableyard in former times. The Samovar side was just a blank brick wall, no windows. At the back, a path ran in both directions outside a line of small fenced yards.

  Wilde stood outside the gate that gave onto the back of the tea shop’s living quarters. If Elina’s parents were in America, then the only one likely to be here was Elina herself. The gate was waist high and had no lock, merely a latch that opened with a flick of the fingers. Wilde walked across the stone-flagged yard to the back door. Above him there was a second storey and above that a blacked-out attic window.

  He knocked firmly on the door. There was no answer, so he called out to the upstairs windows. ‘Hello? Anyone home?’

  No reply. He found a few pieces of gravel from a small herb bed at the edge of the yard and tossed them against the windows. Still no response. Wilde hesitated, and then turned the handle of the rear door. It was locked, but the wood was rotten. Turning his left shoulder to the door, he braced for impact then rammed hard against it. There was a sound of splintering and the door moved, but didn’t open. He tried again, and this time it flew inwards.

  He stepped into the house, closing the door behind him. Standing still for a few moments, he heard only his own accelerated breathing. He was in a kitchen storehouse, full of tins of tea and coffee, flour sacks and other foodstuffs. There was even an icebox; very modern. Two butler’s basins sat side by side with racks for plates and cups and teapots.

  Not really certain what he was looking for, he ranged through the ground floor at a steady pace, looking in on an office, which was unlocked, and a food-preparation area, then some sort of laundry with aprons, towels, napkins and tablecloths neatly arranged. When he came into the tea shop itself, he realised that he could be seen by anyone walking past the front window. He moved back deeper into the building, and climbed the staircase to the living quarters above.

  Eaton had talked to him about the connection between Marcus Marfield and Elina Kossoff. ‘But it’s pointless now to ask you to pursue that line any further, Wilde. The death of the Spanish woman takes everything on to a new level.’

  ‘Is it really so pointless?’ Wilde demanded.

  Eaton looked at him suspiciously. ‘You do realise there is a limit to how much I can help if you get caught doing anything illegal?’

  ‘I’d better not get caught then.’

  Eaton laughed. ‘You’re a cocky so-and-so for a history professor, aren’t you? None of the dons at Trinity were remotely like you.’

  Anything illegal. This was breaking and entering. What in God’s name was he thinking? He had played his luck thus far, but he would be in a great deal of trouble if someone walked in; trouble that he would not be able to talk or punch his way out of. But, as ever, once the seed of doubt had been sown, he couldn’t help himself.

  The decoration of the apartments was not to his taste. Imperial Russian, he would call it. Large, gilt-framed portraits of officers in dazzling uniforms, icons, chalices of the orthodox church inlaid with gemstones. The furniture was heavy, dark and did not look comfortable. The Kossoffs really had brought a little bit of Tsarist Russia to England with them. One wall had bookshelves: volumes in Russian, French and English.

  There were three bedrooms, a bathroom and a small upstairs kitchen. Everything was neat and in order. There were no revolutionary pamph-lets, nothing to suggest any political affiliation, nothing to mark out the Kossoffs as people of concern to the British security services. Perhaps they were almost too clean.

  Wilde came to the bedroom that he took to be Elina’s. The bed was freshly made, the surfaces dusted and polished. She had a novel on her bedside table. The Grapes Of Wrath, the new Steinbeck. Wilde had read it himself; Miss Kossoff clearly shared a taste for good American literature.

  There was nothing here. He wasn’t sure what he had hoped or expected to find, but he had clearly risked all this for nothing. At the doorway he lowered himself to his hands and knees for a last look around. He was about to get up again when a dull glint caught his eye on the floor at the far side of the single bed. A small object, wedged right against the skirting board. A brooch perhaps?

  He eased himself under the bed and picked up the object. It was a bullet.

  CHAPTER 26

  As Elina Kossoff pulled up outside the Samovar, she had seen a shadow pass the window of the tea shop. She drove further along the road then stopped, killed the Morgan’s engine, and waited.

  The history professor had emerged ten minutes later. Elina’s instinct was to put a bullet in him then and there, but there were too many people around, straggling towards church. Killing the Spanish woman in the centre of Cambridge had been risky enough. Tom Wilde had been there at her side. Now he was breaking into the Samovar – but why? What was he looking for? She relaxed; there was nothing to find. She didn’t make mistakes . . . did she?

  Marcus was the one who made mistakes. He was the loose cannon. His visit to the Samovar had been reckless.

  At first, Cambridge had seemed a good, quiet place to hide in plain sight, but if MI6 was here and Professor Wilde was sniffing about it was no longer safe.

  *

  Timothy Laker was emerging from the chapel as Wilde strode along the path towards the old court.

  ‘Laker, a word if I may. Have you seen anything of Marcus Marfield in the last couple of days? He seems to have disappeared from view.’

  The Director of Music smiled broadly. ‘He was in the chapel only about two and a half hours ago. Already there when I turned up ahead of Matins, waiting for me. Wanted to sing Ave Maria again. He seems obsessed with it.’

  ‘Did he give you any indication of what he’s up to?’

  Laker ran his fingers through his thinning fair hair. ‘What do you mean? What’s going on, Wilde?’

  ‘I wish I knew. Do you have any idea where he might be now?’

  ‘His rooms?’

  It was worth a look. ‘If you see him, try to make contact with me without scaring him away. I think he’s trying to avoid me.’

  *

  Lydia had been having a rest on the sofa when the telephone rang. She picked it up.

  ‘Hello?’

  After a short pause a strange metallic voice came through. ‘Is that you, Lydia? Is Tom there?’

  ‘Jim? I’m afraid Tom’s out.’

  ‘Oh, well, I said I’d call when I had news. It’s not looking good. I spoke to the captain of the City of Flint by radio-telephone, and Juliet and William are not aboard, and nor is there anyone answering their description. Coastguard cutters have taken off the worst of the injured, and they’re not among them. The Flint was our last hope.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s worse. I’ve spoken to the Donaldson line again and they tell me that all lifeboats are now accounted for.’

  ‘Oh Jesus, Jim . . .’

  ‘This line is breaking up. Will you tell Tom I’m returning to London with Henry, please? Jack Kennedy’s already returned – he has an important family celebration to go to – and I’ll be following him down south today, assuming the trains are running.’

  *

  Wilde looked for Marfield in his rooms, but there was no sign of him. Back in his own set, he took the bullet, unfired and still encased in its cartridge, from his pocket and placed it, pointing upwards, on the desk. He guessed it was a .45. He was sure that the revolver found beside Eric Charlecote’s body up on the Gogs had been that calibre. Rupert Weir would know. Grabbing the bullet, he shoved it deep into his trouser pocket and strode from his rooms and out of the college, taking Trumpington Street southwards at a farmer’s pace.r />
  Weir was just emerging from the mortuary when Wilde found him.

  ‘Anything of interest?’

  ‘No one you know. An old fellow put his head in the gas oven. Sad little tragedy, Tom. But why are you here?’

  ‘I want you to look at this and tell me if it could have been fired from the Smith and Wesson found up on Little Trees Hill.’ He removed the bullet from his pocket, held it between thumb and forefinger, and then dropped it into Weir’s palm.

  Weir turned it this way and that. ‘It’s a .45, no doubt about it. I’ve seen the gun and the bullet my colleague pulled from Eric’s head, and it could well be a match. I’ll have to see them side by side to give you a firmer opinion, though. Where did you get it?’

  ‘I can’t say at the moment – you’ll have to trust me. Look, we need to talk with Philip Eaton. He’s at the Bull. Until now this has all been speculation and surmise. This is solid evidence.’ Unfortunately he had to acknowledge that it was evidence that was unlikely to find its way into a court of law.

  *

  Ten minutes later, Wilde was in Eaton’s hotel room, revealing his discovery of the bullet. Eaton remained silent for a full minute, and then winced as he eased himself back into the room’s solitary armchair.

  ‘You’re in pain?’ Wilde asked.

  ‘Always, old boy. Where’s Dr Weir?’

  ‘Looking for the Charlecote bullet. The hospital has entrusted it to the police, so he’s gone around to get it.’

  ‘But he’s pretty sure it’s a match?’

  Wilde nodded.

  ‘And you found this under Elina Kossoff’s bed? What on earth did you think you were up to, going in there like that?’

  ‘I thought you wanted me to investigate the Samovar.’

  ‘I don’t remember suggesting you break in.’ Eaton attempted to smile, but it looked more like a grimace of pain.

  As he spoke, the door opened, Weir’s large tweedy figure filling the frame. He was holding up a brown manila envelope. ‘Good day to you, Mr Eaton.’

  ‘Glad to see you, Dr Weir. Do you have it?’