The Vanishing

by John Connor

  ‘So you think she’s in the UK? Or could be?’

  ‘I really have no idea. She’s nearly twenty-one and has considerable means. I’m not particularly worried that she’s sitting in a field somewhere, shivering. She knows what she’s doing. She managed to get off that island and they tell me there were ten people killed there. She should have a medal really. She’ll be all right, I’m sure. But if she had come to me immediately … well, I wasn’t sure that you wouldn’t have a car outside all my properties, waiting for her. I didn’t know which way you would play it at all. To be brutally honest, I wasn’t sure I could trust you, Bill.’

  ‘You can trust me, Freddie. This is nothing we can’t handle. The Belgians have put in a request to alert staff at entry points, in fact. So normally it wouldn’t happen that we would put resources into surveillance, et cetera …’

  ‘You can assure me that won’t happen, I trust?’ Freddie stopped what he was doing and gave the man a glance.

  ‘There is no surveillance on you. None. As far as I know your phones are clean. You have my word on that. There is presently an alert at UK entry points. That’s all …’

  ‘And you have the lawyers working to solve that. Good. The sooner we can get this stupid thing out of the way the sooner we can start to work out who was behind this. The Belgians can be left to look at the burglary, I assume. But the people in the Seychelles will need assistance. I’m putting that in place already.’ He stood and pushed his chair back. Arisha stood with him. ‘Is there anything else, Bill?’ he asked.

  Bill stood quickly. ‘The photo,’ he said. ‘Have you seen the photo the Belgians are using?’ He started to fish inside the pocket of his sports jacket, presumably to produce a copy.

  ‘I’ve seen it,’ Freddie said. ‘I had someone send me a copy.’

  ‘You also have a copy?’ Arisha asked the policeman. ‘Let me see it, please.’ She wanted to make sure it was the same one they had. Very reluctantly he took out an envelope and slid a photo from it. She came round to his side of the table and took it from him. It was the same one.

  ‘Do you know who the man is?’ the policeman asked. Arisha looked up to lie, but he wasn’t asking her. He was trying to pretend she wasn’t there at all. Freddie shrugged. ‘No,’ he said. ‘A friend of Sara’s, I assume. He clearly hasn’t kidnapped my daughter, as the Belgian information states. Do you know who it is?’

  ‘We think it’s an ex-police officer, called Tom Lomax.’ He looked at Freddie, waiting for a reaction, but Freddie just smiled. She had recognised Lomax as soon as she saw the photo, of course, but Freddie didn’t have a clue who it was. She hadn’t told him. He knew vaguely about the letters Liz Wellbeck had written, but didn’t know that Arisha had identified the courier, bought her off, gained some idea of the content of those letters – enough to have had the name Lomax ringing alarm bells in her ears, because John Lomax, she recalled all too well, was the policeman who twenty-two years ago had made the disappearance of Lauren Gower into some kind of personal crusade. She had assumed that Liz must be writing to him, with some kind of insane, death’s-door confession that would sink them all. But Barsukov had made enquiries and found out it was the son Liz had named in the letter. That had puzzled everyone, so Barsukov had done some work on him and made the connections, asked to meet him, in fact, only about a week ago, though that hadn’t worked out. Unfortunately. Because here he was now, Tom Lomax, a fly in the ointment, helping Sara Eaton to escape. Until a few minutes ago, at least.

  ‘Are you looking for him also?’ Arisha asked the policeman. ‘For Tom Lomax?’

  ‘The alert is for both Sara and Lomax …’

  ‘So that will be dealt with too,’ Freddie interrupted. ‘When you get the lawyers going on it. Clearly this man is a friend of my daughter’s. I don’t want you hassling him with some foreign crap either. We have to make a principled stand here. These European arrest warrants are a dangerous affront to British liberty …’

  ‘It’s not an arrest warrant. Just an alert …’

  ‘At the moment. Can I count on you to deal with it, Bill? That’s all I need to know. I want it killed dead. It’s a distraction. Terrible things have happened. The last thing we need right now is the fucking Belgians blundering in. Can I rely on you?’ He stepped forward and took the man by the shoulders, looking into his eyes. Arisha saw the policeman lick his lips. It wasn’t the size of the consultancy fee that Freddie paid him each year – though that was incentive enough, she would have thought – it was simply that it existed, that the mere fact of the payments could ruin him, if made public.

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘I’ll do what I can. You’re absolutely right about it all. We should have queried the APA. No doubt about that.’

  Freddie walked him out of the library, pointing him in the direction of the lawyers. One of the house assistants appeared to guide him away and Freddie stepped back inside the library. He shut the door and stared at her. ‘What a fucking idiot,’ he muttered. ‘I can’t believe we give him what we do.’

  ‘He’s worth the investment. He’ll do it.’ She reached forward and took hold of his hand. Inside she felt a shiver of disgust, but that was normal these days, and easily hidden. She’d had years of practice living this lie. She’d been concealing her hatred of Freddie Eaton since the moment Sasha was born. That was when it had started. It had taken her by surprise, because before then she had found him attractive enough, looked up to him, even. It had never been a question of love, of course, always something more practical. But that was still a long way from the contempt she felt now. He would be fifty-six this year, and still looked fit and comfortable with his body. He was tall, with a beautiful shock of white hair, a classic, aristocratic face. He could be charming and friendly, or manipulative and cruel. But he’d always been that way. Nothing had changed. She’d only started hating him because of Sasha, she thought, because the baby had given her a different perspective on everything. All she saw when she looked at Freddie Eaton now was some kind of moral aberration, and she didn’t want that anywhere near her child. That was the heart of it. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, smiling reassuringly. ‘We’ll find her.’

  ‘Did you check with the wretched tracker people?’

  ‘They’ve got nothing. Not yet.’ She squeezed his hand and saw there were tears in his eyes. He was such a pathetic emotional wreck, in private. Capable of boundless self-pity. It was truly despicable, and getting worse as he aged. ‘Where’s Sasha?’ he asked. ‘Will he sleep through all this?’

  ‘I put him in the Star Room. He loves it.’ The Star Room had a huge window set in the roof. On a clear night you could lie in bed and gaze at the heavens, light pollution permitting. ‘What was the phone call?’ he asked her, his eyes narrowing a little.

  She frowned. ‘Which?’

  ‘You went out to answer your mobile, no?’

  She thought he hadn’t noticed. ‘Nothing important,’ she replied easily. Soon he would be getting his own call from Maxim – a little reality check. He’d had precious few of them in his life. But no need for her to warn him.

  39

  Tom sat in the front passenger seat, leaning against the window, breathing hard. John had found him where he had said he would be, on one of the exit roads from the Surrey village of Shackleford, in the shadow of a hedge. They were almost back in London now, on nearly empty night roads, and not much had been said aside from questions about the injuries. Tom had suffered John to examine him once he was in the car – and John had done his best to properly assess the mess – but there was no question of him going near a hospital or a doctor. He had other things on his mind. He was in pain, clearly, but had made it plain that didn’t matter. John had seen him like this before, a couple of times, when he was a kid.

  As far as John could determine he’d been kicked and punched repeatedly. It was possible he had a broken rib, maybe a broken nose. His face was a swollen mess, his clothing covered in bloodstains, but nothing was still bleeding. There were
head injuries that were harder to see properly, but Tom insisted he had no double vision, no dizziness. His eyes weren’t closed up and he could breathe freely enough through one nostril. He thought he might have lost consciousness momentarily, maybe not. John wondered anxiously whether he was lying to him, to minimise it all. He spent some time trying gently to persuade him that they should go to Casualty, but it was useless. Tom had a mind of his own. He wasn’t a kid any longer.

  But he was still John’s son, no matter how old he was. Still in trouble, still in pain. And those things ate at John the same as they always had. He tried to keep his reactions under control. It was the first time he had seen Tom in over a year. There were complications in their relationship, a dynamic to watch out for. He couldn’t just wade in and tell him what to do. ‘Could you please tell me something about what’s going on?’ he asked again, quietly. It drew no response. ‘I need to know, Tom. I need to know some detail.’

  ‘I think it’s better if you know as little as possible.’

  ‘Not true. There might be stuff I need to know – stuff you’re unaware of. Listen. Listen to what I have to say. I’ll tell you what I know. Then you tell me what you think you can.’ That drew a blank too, but he started talking anyway, telling him what was going through his head. ‘You remember Grenser?’ he said. ‘It was a big case I had when you were little. Operation Grenser. It started in 1990. You were only five years old, so maybe you forgot it. It was …’

  ‘Grenser. Your case. Obviously I remember it.’ He saw Tom frown, then pull down the passenger-side sunshade and stare at his mouth in the mirror there. ‘You were working it all my life, Dad. How could I forget it? The missing girl.’

  ‘Right. Lauren Gower. Rachel is her mother. You met Rachel once, at my place …’

  ‘Did I?’ He was still frowning, fingers in his mouth now. ‘Another smashed fucking tooth,’ he muttered, then grimaced with pain. ‘I don’t recall meeting her,’ he said.

  ‘Doesn’t matter. But you know what that case means to me, right?’

  Tom shrugged, then folded the sunshade back up and stared out of the window.

  ‘I spent nearly half my career trying to find out what happened that day, back in 1990,’ John continued. ‘Lauren Gower was kidnapped. She was thirteen months old. You probably don’t recall any of the details.’

  Tom sank lower in the seat. John thought he might be gritting his teeth. Was he listening? Or thinking about what he was going to do next? Thinking about getting even, somehow. He’d seen him like that before too. ‘She was kidnapped from a crèche in the clinic where her mother worked,’ John said. ‘You remember the name of the clinic?’

  Tom looked at him, eyes narrowed, as if to ask, what the fuck has this to do with anything?

  ‘I imagine not,’ John said, moving his eyes back to the road. They were going through the outskirts of south London now. ‘But it was called the Wellbeck Clinic.’ He glanced over and saw Tom still looking at him, but the expression behind the eyes was changing. The thoughts were beginning to slot into place. ‘It was owned by a woman called Elizabeth Wellbeck-Eaton,’ John said quietly. ‘It was her clinic Lauren Gower was taken from.’ He saw the penny drop, but then puzzlement replaced the anger. He kept quiet for a bit, glancing from the road to Tom and back, watching him trying to make sense of it, if there was any sense to make. Finally Tom met his eyes again. ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘The woman you were with – just now, tonight – she was Sara Wellbeck-Eaton, right? That was her name?’

  Tom nodded, then sighed. ‘Yes.’

  ‘You think it’s a coincidence? My case – all the time we spent investigating the Wellbeck family and their staff – and now you’re involved with them? It could be, I suppose. It doesn’t have to mean anything.’

  His son said nothing, and wasn’t looking at him now. He was thinking, chewing his lip and running through it. John started to tell him about the enquiry. He told them Liz Wellbeck had been interviewed, told them that at the time she was staying on an island called Ile des Singes Noirs. Tom interrupted him. ‘How did you know I was with Sara?’

  Sara. First-name terms. John noted it, noted the body language. ‘A colleague called me tonight, told me about the All Ports Alert. He gave me as much info as they had. Including facts related to Sara Eaton.’ He told him then about the news item about the island, and the suspicions that Sara Eaton had been kidnapped. ‘Were you there?’ he asked. ‘Were you on that island?’

  ‘Yes. We were there. But she wasn’t kidnapped. We got away.’

  Silence. John bit his tongue. He had a file full of questions, but he said nothing. He kept his eyes on the road and they continued for minutes like that, saying nothing.

  ‘People were killed,’ Tom said eventually. ‘It was bad.’ He sounded dazed.

  ‘It was a kidnap attempt?’

  Tom shook his head. ‘I don’t know. Who knows? We just concentrated on getting away. I guess it was. They looked like Somalis, some of them. Not all of them.’ Another silence, then: ‘I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to find her.’

  ‘She’s gone?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it. If you can just take me to my place. Then I’ll sort it. Sorry. You were the only person I could call.’

  ‘Your place might be risky. They might be looking for you.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘The police. Because of the alert. I’m not sure what the position is.’

  ‘I’ll take the risk. I have to. I need to get something, change. I’ll be there a couple of minutes only. You can drop me wherever. You don’t have to be involved. I don’t want you to be involved. I don’t want to force you into any uncomfortable decisions.’

  ‘I know my priorities, son. I’m an ex-detective, but even when I was working I was always your father, first and foremost. You know that.’

  Tom stared away again, but said nothing to that.

  ‘What happened in Brussels?’ John asked. ‘Someone must have died there. That was the info.’

  ‘They want me for that?’

  ‘I think they’re just fishing. Your mug was on a CCTV shot, with the girl. The info says you kidnapped her too.’

  Tom nodded. ‘Glad I didn’t rely on Belgian justice, then.’

  ‘Did someone get killed there?’

  ‘We went to find Liz Wellbeck’s PA. We found her dying, her place ransacked. Some guy appeared covered in blood, so I chased him. He fell off the roof.’ He looked over at his dad and smiled crookedly, without humour. ‘It’s true. Sounds crap but it’s true.’

  John shrugged. He believed him, but he could see that Tom thought he didn’t. ‘Where’s the girl now?’

  ‘The girl? You mean Sara?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘She’s not a girl. She’s a woman.’

  ‘OK. Where is she?’

  ‘Alex fucking Renton said he’d help us. Instead he did this to me and then drove off with her.’

  That didn’t surprise him. ‘Drove off? What do you mean?’

  ‘Took her. He took her. Some fucking gangland deal.’

  ‘Kidnapped her, you mean?’

  Tom nodded. ‘I tried to stop it, but couldn’t. Alex knows who has her. He’ll tell me who has her. I need to get to him. Quick.’

  ‘That’s not the way to handle it, son.’

  ‘I knew I shouldn’t have told you anything. You going to call it in? You’ll get her killed that way.’

  ‘He say that?’

  ‘Kill her, hurt Jamie. That was the threat.’

  ‘It makes no difference. Still the best thing to do would be to call it in. We should call it in quickly. How long ago …’

  ‘They’ll kill her if you do that.’

  ‘They always say that.’

  ‘And often they carry it out. So don’t tell me what is and what isn’t the case, Dad. I said I didn’t want to talk to you and here we are. I knew exactly what you were going to do. I should have kept my fucking mouth shut.’
/>
  ‘I’m not going to do anything. Not without you saying I can.’

  Tom looked sceptically at him. ‘You mean that?’

  ‘I mean it. But you need to think clearly about it. This is all crucial time lost. You know how it works as well as I do …’

  ‘I’m not calling anything in. It would be a complete waste of time. All that would happen is I’d end up in a cell for three months, then on a boat to fucking Belgium. Then I wouldn’t be able to do anything. I will find out where she is. I will find out who has her …’

  ‘By going to the thug who did that to you?’

  ‘He took me by surprise. It won’t happen again. I know him well. I know how to handle him.’

  ‘You think you do …’ John shut up. Tom was no good at fighting, not aggressive. No good at standing up to bullies, or dealing with threats. He let things build up, get on top of him. But he had a threshold, and if it all got too bottled up he could blow. Then he was pretty scary. But that didn’t make him any better a fighter. In the past when he’d lost it he’d usually come off worse.

  ‘I’m not a kid any more,’ Tom said. ‘I can look after myself.’

  John nodded. ‘You could always look after yourself,’ he lied.

  ‘Let’s do it like this,’ Tom said. ‘I’ll tell you what’s happened, provided you drop me near my place and give me three hours before you call it in. Three hours.’

  John nodded. ‘I won’t call it in at all if you don’t say I can.’

  ‘You won’t be able to help yourself, Dad.’ Tom turned and smiled weakly at him. ‘That’s what you’re like.’

  ‘OK. We’ll do it that way. If that’s the way you want it. Three hours. Now tell me.’

  Tom started to talk at once. John realised immediately that he desperately needed to tell it, because he was in some kind of shock. Until he’d told it to someone, the whole horrific tale would lack a sense of reality, and that would make him feel like he was going mad. That was how the mind handled this level of brutality. John had seen it many times in his career. The telling of the story made it real, brought it home, gave perspective. Sometimes even the criminals needed that. Very occasionally that led to a confession. Not often.