‘What?’ she murmured.
‘Nothing.’ I rolled her gently on to her back and sat up.
‘I wish you loved me,’ she said. ‘But after you find my son, I’ll never ask anything of you again, never: that’s a promise.’
‘Aye, sure,’ I said, with a laugh. ‘I’m going to call McLaren.’
‘What will I do?’ she asked, with some of her old mischief. ‘I want to do something for you, and since a blow-job seems out of the question. . Tell me what I can do to help you.’
I thought about it, but nothing came immediately to mind. ‘I dunno,’ I admitted.
She frowned for a few seconds, then her face lit up.
‘How about this?’ she said. ‘There’s bound to be a hairdresser in this place. What if I find it, and get my hair cut shorter, the practical, nurse’s cap way it used to be? To be honest, I’ve never really liked it this way.’
I looked at her, lying there, and thought of how she’d been in the past, in the good times. ‘You’re right,’ I told her. ‘You do that. If you really want to know, I think you look a hell of a lot younger with it shorter.’
‘Say no more,’ she said. ‘You’ve convinced me.’ She jumped up and looked in the mirror, smoothing her hair down, then ruffling it again.
As she launched into the rituals involved in getting ready to go to the hairdresser, I picked up the hands-free hotel phone and went through to our sitting area. I retrieved DI McLaren’s number from my pocket PC. . yes, I’m just like Harvey January in that respect; it goes everywhere with me. . and called him.
‘Mr Blackstone.’ There was a bit of echo on the line, but otherwise it was clear. ‘I’ve got some news for you.’
‘Good news?’
‘Up to a point.’
‘You’ve traced it?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s a bloody good start, then. It’s not in Minneapolis, is it?’
‘No, it’s nowhere near there. I did make enquiries of the firm whose number you gave me, but I was able to eliminate it right away. HHH doesn’t handle funds from outside the USA; in fact, it hardly handles funds from outside Minnesota. It’s a specialist local house with an impeccable reputation and, believe me, in these days of money-laundering, American fund managers are very closely scrutinised.’
‘So where is it?’
‘It’s in a sterling account in a private bank called Fairmile and Company in Vancouver, British Columbia.’
‘Under what name?’
‘Primavera Phillips.’
‘It’s still in her name? Wasn’t that a surprise to you?’
‘Not really; I expected that it would be. Wallinger was acting as Ms Phillips’s agent, remember, and that’s all he was. When he sold up her investments, in the absence of a signed instruction from her to her bank, he’d have had no choice but to transfer the funds into her nominated account, the one into which dividend and interest payments were normally made. And when he went to move the money out, it would have had to go to another account in her name. Unless she told the bank herself, they wouldn’t have transferred the money into any other account than one that’s in her name.’
‘What if he tried to do that?’ I asked.
‘The transmitting bank would have insisted on a signed authorisation, or on meeting her in person, quite possibly the latter.’
‘Did he transfer it straight from the UK to Canada?’
‘It wasn’t in the UK, it was in the Isle of Man, but the answer is no: he moved it into a Jersey account first, then to Vancouver. He probably thought he was being clever. In other circumstances he might have been, using another offshore bank as a launching platform, but I have excellent relationships with both of them, and they were prepared to talk to me.’
‘How’s he going to get the money out?’
‘He’ll have to go to Vancouver, show them Ms Phillips’s letter of instruction and probably evidence of her ownership of the funds. On the basis of that he might be able to arrange some sort of staged transfer to another bank, one that’s less scrupulous about setting up accounts.’
‘But the money’s still there?’
‘So far, yes. I’d have expected him to have tried to move it by now, but he hasn’t.’
‘You’ve spoken to Fairmile and Company?’
‘The local police have. However, there is very little big-scale fraud there; the Vancouver Police Department resources are mainly deployed elsewhere. They’ve done as much as they can in verifying that the account exists and that Ms Phillips is the owner of record. They can go no further without evidence of a crime.’
I began to realise why he had said that the news was good, up to a point. ‘And there isn’t any, is there?’
‘No, there isn’t, not yet; the funds haven’t been moved out of Ms Phillips’s control, so technically no theft has taken place. Presumption of intent is way short of evidence. That means I can’t take this any further, short of taking leave, getting on a plane and going to Canada myself.’ He hesitated; for a moment I thought he was going to volunteer to do that, but his loyalty to Mike Dylan didn’t stretch that far. ‘Where are you, right now?’ he asked.
‘We’re in Minneapolis; we’ve just seen Wallinger’s mother. She says he’s her prodigal son and she hasn’t a clue where he is. We’re not quite so sure, though. We saw some evidence that a fatted calf might have been killed recently.’ I told him about Tom’s duck.
‘Then you’ve got a choice to make, Oz. Either you stay on the trail of Wallinger, or you go to Vancouver so that Ms Phillips can visit Fairmile and Company in person, identify herself and resume personal control of her funds, cutting Wallinger out of the picture. Or maybe not; maybe you could do both, with you keeping trying to find him and her going straight to Vancouver; but either way she needs to do that right away.’
‘We could always go there and sit tight for a while,’ I said. ‘She could instruct the bank, then we could just wait for him to turn up, as he’s bound to do.’ Then I remembered that I had to be in Las Vegas at the weekend.
I was thinking about this when I heard Prim behind me. ‘ ’Bye,’ she called out. ‘I’m off to be shorn.’
I could have told her to wait, but I just waved airily in her direction and let her go.
‘Okay,’ I said to McLaren. ‘It’s for us to sort out. I really appreciate what you’ve done so far. At the moment I’ve got no leads here, so I think we’ll both go west. If we get there and find that he’s been there since you spoke to VPD, I’ll report it to them, and let you know what’s happened, if anything has.’
‘Yes, do that. The moment he moves money out of that account to his own use he’s committed a crime, and I can get a warrant for his arrest.’
I have this habit of coming up with annoying and complicating thoughts just when I don’t need them. ‘What if he transfers money to Tom?’
‘Without her instruction it would still be a crime.’
‘Good. Thanks again, Inspector.’
I thought about our discussion for a while longer, and then I returned Mark Kravitz’s call.
‘What have you got?’ I asked him, without preamble.
‘Nothing you could hang your hat on, I’m afraid. I haven’t traced Prim’s breakin merchants, and neither have the police. However, I’ve been asking around and I’ve found out that your Mr Wallinger is a bit of a gambler. I wondered whether something like that might be behind it. Turns out that he has an account with a London bookmaker; it’s operated through the Internet, but they have a record of his home address. His debts are settled on a direct debit through an American bank, and the arrangement’s worked in the past. A couple of months ago, just after Wallinger did his runner, the bookie sent in a debit for ten grand’s worth of losers and it rubbered on him.’
‘So you’re guessing that he sent people to collect.’
‘I can’t go and ask him, Oz, but it looks like it.’
‘So they nicked the diamonds to cover Wallinger’s gambling debt?’
>
Mark grunted. ‘That’s the way it looks. The insured value of the gems will be way more than the debt, but they’ll have to break them up to move them, so overall what they’ll get will be pretty close. Meantime, I assume they’re insured: yes?’
‘I suppose so; she’s not daft.’
‘Then at least Prim isn’t going to lose out of it.’
‘There is that to it.’
‘Any further instructions?’
‘Yes. Do some general asking around. Speak to neighbours, postmen and such; ask if they’ve seen anyone hanging around, and see if you can find out when Wallinger was seen last. I suppose it’s possible that he might have gone back there.’
‘What good will that do?’
‘Probably none; I want to get a handle on his movements, that’s all. It’ll keep Prim happy.’
‘Will do, boss. What’s up where you are? My phone tells me you’re in the US.’
When I updated him on McLaren’s discovery, he laughed. ‘The guy’s not as clever as he thought, is he? It leaves you two a bit stretched, though. Do you want Conrad out there as back-up?’
‘Conrad’s first job is to protect my family. I can manage without him.’
‘If you’re sure. I’ll ask those questions, and contact you again when I’ve got answers.’ I wasn’t sure he’d find any, and if he did whether they’d mean anything was just as uncertain.
I thought about Vancouver and made an executive decision, without consulting Prim. Her deductive processes were muddled by the loss of her son, but I reasoned that if she went to Vancouver and secured her money, that could only strengthen her hand when it came to negotiating. I don’t play cards very often, but when I do, I don’t like the other guy to hold all the aces.
I called Susie again, although it was damn near midnight at home, told her what was happening, and asked her to have Audrey book us on to a flight to Vancouver next day, find us a hotel there for another couple of nights and to call me back, whatever the time, with the details.
With that behind me, I tried to put in some time with the script, but my concentration was shot. I decided that I needed some hard physical time to clear my mind, so I called Reception to book myself into the hotel’s fitness centre and set off down there to punish myself. (For getting so wrapped up in this business? Probably.)
The gym was well equipped, and at that time of day, very quiet; there were a couple of ladies. . force me to guess and I’d have said they were cabin crew. . running on treadmills, but that was it. I did some loosening exercises and then set to work on the heavy apparatus, building up until I was pressing some pretty serious weights with both my arms and my legs. I did a bit of circuit training when I was a kid, but it was the guys at the Global Wrestling Association who got me into it seriously. My buddy Liam Matthews showed me how to increase my strength and endurance without bulking up too much, but over the years I have put on quite a bit of muscle, so now I have to keep working at it to make sure that my body shape stays the same throughout the period of filming a project. If you look closely at some celebrated movies you’ll see the lead player going from fat to slim then back again.
I had been at it for around three-quarters of an hour when I became aware of a uniformed bellboy standing in the doorway, looking at me, hesitantly. I was in the middle of fifty bench presses, so I finished them and then turned towards him. ‘You want me?’
‘If you’re available, Mr Blackstone: there’s a police officer in the foyer, asking if he can see you.’
A cop? What the hell had I done to annoy the local bizzies? I asked myself. ‘Tell him to wait in the lounge,’ I told the boy. ‘I’m just about finished here, but I’ll have to warm down properly, then shower. Offer him a drink and put it on my tab.’
I didn’t hang about, but it took twenty minutes before I was ready to go down. My hair was still wet, but I slicked it back.
The lounge waiter pointed out my visitor as soon as I appeared. He was sitting with his back to me, facing the door and fidgeting like a nervous gun-fighter. There was a beer on the table in front of him, but it was barely touched. He sprang to his feet when I appeared in front of him, and I knew at once who he was. I’d seen his photograph that very afternoon, on Martha Wallinger’s sideboard.
‘You’ll be John the Second,’ I said to him, offering him a handshake. He had a crusher of a grip; he tried it on me, but when I want to, so have I. He was a big guy, though, around six four, and he wasn’t smiling.
‘Lieutenant John Wallinger, MPD,’ he replied, as we sat. ‘Narcotics Unit.’
‘I don’t use them.’
‘Glad to hear it: too many public figures do.’
‘This one has a wife and a couple of kids. What can I do for you, Lieutenant?’ Actually I was wondering what he could do for me, but I thought I’d work up to that.
He went straight to the point, though. ‘I’m concerned about your visit to my mother, Mr Blackstone. It’s alarmed her, and I don’t like that.’
‘I’m sorry if that’s the case, but presumably she told you why I called.’
‘She did, and if it’s true that you and Mr Grayson have some significant work for Paul, that’ll be excellent for him but, to be honest, that strikes me as a smokescreen.’
‘Why should that be?’
‘Because I’ve checked you out since my mother called me, sir, and there’s a couple of things that don’t sit square.’
‘Such as?’
‘The lady you had with you today, she wasn’t your wife, was she?’
‘I never said that she was.’
His eyes hardened, letting me see what Minneapolis drug-dealers were up against. ‘Don’t play games with me, sir. I checked you up on several websites; your wife’s name is Susan, formerly Susan Gantry. Her photograph appears on some of them, and she does not fit the description of the woman you took to meet my mother. So who was that?’
‘The websites you saw must have been authorised; they don’t discuss my previous marriages. My first wife was killed in a domestic accident; my second wife, Primavera, and I divorced. That’s who I took to meet your mother; Mrs Blackstone all right, just not the current model, that’s all. They’ve got a photocopy of her passport at Reception; I’m surprised you didn’t check it out.’
He let slip a flash of a smile. ‘I did. I wanted you to tell me about it, that’s all.’
‘Right, so now I have. Where do we go from here?’
‘I want you to explain to me just what the hell you really are doing here. The thing that you said to my mother that really upset her was about my brother. You said he told you that he’d got an English girl pregnant.’
‘If we’re being strictly accurate I said British, not English.’
‘What’s the difference?’
‘Imagine me calling you a Texan. British, but not English; in fact she was Scottish, the same as me, the same as Primavera. In fact, it was Primavera.’
His back straightened in his chair as he stared at me. ‘He told you that?’
It was time for a small confession. ‘No. The fact is I’ve never met your brother; it was Prim who told me all about it.’
The big man gasped. ‘That’s unbelievable. . Paul?’
I decided to give him the whole story. ‘They’ve been living in London for a couple of years. Prim had a son, called Tom; she thought your brother was a stockbroker. She had so much confidence in him that she gave him control over her investments. A little under three months ago, they vanished. So did Paul. So did Tom. We’ve come here to find him.’
I could see that he was stunned. ‘That’s amazing,’ he murmured. He looked up at me. ‘All the same, Mr Blackstone, you’ve come to the wrong place. My brother hasn’t been here. Didn’t my mother tell you that?’
‘Yes, she did. But what if I was to tell you that we have evidence that he has?’
The hard look he’d shot me before was a baby beside the one that came into his eyes. ‘Then you’d be calling my mom a liar, mister, and
that would be a very serious mistake on your part. In fact, it would be liable to make me forget about the badge I carry, and take you for a walk out back.’
In such circumstances, I’ve always found that the best course of action is to smile; so I did. ‘Are you threatening me, Lieutenant?’ I asked him.
‘Call it a promise,’ he growled.
‘Well, John,’ I said, ‘I’ve had promises like that made to me before in my life; not many, but some. And yet I don’t remember one ever being kept. We can go for a walk out back if you like, but big and all as you are, I promise you, I’ll walk back in first.’
His eyes didn’t alter, and I kept my smile fixed on him; we had a bit of a stand-off going, and I really didn’t fancy getting into a brawl with a cop, even if he did look far too straight a guy to stand a chance against some of the tricks I’ve been taught by my GWA pals. So I decided to offer him a way out.
‘I wouldn’t dream of calling your mother a liar,’ I told him. ‘However, I think you should consider the possibility that your brother might have been back here without her knowledge, or yours. How does that hang with you?’
He took a deep breath. ‘I’ll consider it.’
‘Can I ask you something?’ I continued, quickly. He nodded. ‘Why were you so certain he wouldn’t show up here? And why were you so surprised when I told you what he’d been up to?’
‘Mr Blackstone,’ he replied, ‘I’m a police officer, so I’m used to asking questions not answering them. All I’ll say is that the Wallinger family does not wash its dirty linen even in private, far less in public. We’re Christian people with Christian values, and Paul simply did not live up to them. You misread my reactions: your accusations of deceit and dishonesty don’t shock me at all.’
I still didn’t believe his mother, but him, I did. ‘Where should I look for him, John, if not here?’
‘I don’t know. I’d guess California; if he’s still pursuing his dream he’ll probably go back there, now that he’s got the sort of money that would support a lifestyle there.’
‘He doesn’t; not yet at any rate. I think he might be setting up a trade: the money for Tom.’
‘But …’
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