by Karen Swan
She looked back at him with renewed focus, her brain quick to spot a contradiction. ‘Well, why would she have left him if she’d been secretly in love with him for years? She’d married him for heaven’s sake. She got him.’
‘Jealousy can be hard to live with, Miss Fisher. And Valentina made for a beautiful ghost.’
Allegra glanced across at Isobel – her head was resting in the cradle of her hand, her complexion waxy – and wished she’d come here alone. She should never have involved her in this. Isobel wasn’t renowned for handling shocks like this well.
‘Is there anything else we need to discuss, or can we go?’ Allegra asked, grabbing her sister’s hand and squeezing it hard.
Annen looked surprised by her sudden change in tone. ‘No. I just wanted to appraise you of the ongoing investigation.’ He rose from his chair. ‘Are you staying in Zermatt long?’
‘A few more days,’ Allegra said, rising too. Isobel followed after like a child. ‘We’re arranging a private memorial service for Valentina later this week, so . . .’
Annen nodded. ‘Has the transfer for custody of the remains been completed?’
Allegra blanched at the terminology. ‘Yes. That’s why we came. We signed the paperwork just now.’
‘Good.’
‘Where do we collect the possessions that were found with her?’ Allegra asked, holding Isobel lightly by the elbow as she came to stand by her. Her sister looked like she was going to keel over. ‘The policeman at the desk said they’re not stored here.’
‘That’s right. They’re with the SLF,’ Annen said, hurriedly scribbling a name and address on a piece of paper. ‘I shall tell Connor to expect you.’
‘What’s the SLF?’ Allegra asked, merely glancing at it before zipping it safely in her pocket.
‘The Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research. Better known as the Swiss Anti Avalanche Agency.’
‘Oh.’
Annen held out his hand. ‘I’m sorry to be the bearer of such bad news. I know this information must be very difficult to accept.’
He didn’t know the half of it. He couldn’t possibly understand that his revelations hadn’t gained them a grandmother; he’d lost them one.
Allegra shrugged, shaking his hand with extra firmness. ‘Nothing surprises me, Sergeant,’ she said briskly. ‘My sister and I know better than to have any faith in anyone but each other.’
And linking Isobel’s arm through hers, she led her sister through the police station and away from the sergeant, who stared after them with pity growing in his eyes.
Chapter Nineteen
‘I like the Angel Gabriel best. Check him out – he’s got cheeks like Barry.’ Isobel held up the wooden angel with a tipsy giggle. ‘Angel Barry.’
Allegra took it, chuckling lightly. The nativity scene Isobel had all but snatched from the gift shop’s window was now recreated on the coffee table before them. A large stable had been detailed with traditional Swiss motifs in the woodwork, and the nativity figures were all crafted from wood, but the baby Jesus lay in a manger with a real straw base and soft leather whip-stitched blanket, the kings were robed in beautiful velvet cloaks, the sheep had genuine fleeces . . . The quality and craftsmanship were undeniable. She studied the angel more closely, sure she’d seen it before.
‘I agree you were right to get this. It’s beautiful. Something he’ll have forever.’
‘Yeah,’ Isobel beamed, falling back to her prostrate position on the sofa again. ‘Just so long as we don’t eat till March and I hide the Visa statement from Lloyd, it’ll be fine.’
Allegra looked up. ‘Listen, why don’t I give this to Ferds for his Christmas present?’
‘Uh-uh. No.’ Isobel shook her head firmly.
‘Why not? I haven’t got him anything yet and it would do me a massive favour not to have to worry about it.’
‘Legs,’ Isobel said sternly, ‘I know exactly what you’re doing.’
‘What am I doing? I need to get Ferds a present and you’ve just bought a present. Just let me give him that and you can get him something else.’
The two sisters blinked at each other before Isobel scrambled off the sofa and threw her arms around Allegra’s neck. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you,’ she mumbled into her hair. ‘You’re the best.’
‘No, I’m just living in terror of you,’ Allegra replied. ‘I’ll never forget your face when I gave him that Steiff bear. Even now, there are still times I wake up in the night in a cold sweat.’
Isobel shot her an earnest look. ‘Legs, those tag thingies in the ear are such a choking hazard.’
‘Iz, those bears are highly collectable, and Steiff have been making them for over a hundred years. I think they know what they’re doing.’
Isobel went back to the sofa with a laugh. ‘Yeah, well, I don’t take chances where my little man’s concerned,’ she said, falling back on the sofa once more and stretching out languidly, her hand finding the glass of Bordeaux safely stashed next to the sofa.
They lapsed into quiet again, only an incomprehensible soap on TV providing any soundtrack to the little apartment. Isobel began flicking through the channels as Allegra settled into reading the papers.
‘You know, I just don’t believe a word of it,’ Isobel mumbled five minutes later, draining the glass.
‘Of course not,’ Allegra said, resting her iPad on her bent knees and looking over at her sister as she opened a second bottle. ‘There’s no way Granny would have done any of what he said. It’s all going to turn out to be just a tragic accident.’
‘Yeah,’ Isobel agreed, but Allegra knew she’d be back on it again in a few minutes. They had been stuck on the same loop ever since leaving the police station, Isobel refuting the allegations against their grandmother, then finishing a glass of wine; refuting the allegations . . .
Isobel stuck out her arm, frantically waving the remote around as she tried to change channels. ‘God, there must be something in English,’ she muttered, briefly stopping on some prank home-videos show. ‘I swear I saw that on You’ve Been Framed.’
Allegra’s eyes flicked back up, just in time to see a man in trunks dive-bombing onto a frozen-solid pool. ‘They just syndicate the material internationally, I expect. Cheap programme-making.’
She went back to her iPad as Isobel flicked through another few channels, before her arm dropped suddenly and she twisted back on the sofa to look at Allegra again. ‘I mean, the whole bloody notion of it is completely preposterous! What they’re saying Granny did, that’s like me dying, you hooking up with Lloyd afterwards and then doing a runner to America a year later and bringing up Ferds to think you were his mum!’
Allegra dropped the iPad back down again. ‘Exactly. It’s completely unbelievable. And that’s what reassures me it’ll all be OK, Iz. Somewhere along the line, they’ve got one vital fact wrong.’ She knew it wasn’t the typo – not now she’d seen the marriage record of Lars and Anya for herself. The Fischer family with a ‘c’ was her family. ‘It only takes one mistake to skew an entirely innocent turn of events into something more sinister. We just have to keep reminding ourselves that we both knew Granny and we know she wasn’t capable of that.’
‘Yeah, exactly,’ Isobel said, nodding vehemently, her eyes fixed on Allegra.
Allegra tried to smile reassuringly, hoping she was hiding the doubt that was drifting like a solitary black storm cloud in her mind. Because how did they explain away that their grandmother had married her sister’s husband? That was fact, noted not just in the parish records but also the civic registers. And what possible justification could she have had for taking a child away from its father? If her explanation was so innocent, why had she kept it a secret from their mother all these years?
She smiled a bit wider, and Isobel – placated, for the next few minutes anyway – twisted back again on her sofa. Allegra took another sip of her wine and returned to flicking the virtual pages of the FT. It soothed her to absorb herse
lf in the machinations of big business. There was a safety in numbers she could always rely on – she understood how to smell panic, the first top notes of confidence – and she found comfort in the rhythms of the markets. She knew how this game was played, at least.
Her eyes scanned the business pages: ‘Unemployment Levels in the US Stuck at 6.7%’; ‘FD of Tesco Resigns Hours Before Results Due’; ‘Pharmaceutical Giants’ $40bn Merger Talks’; ‘Hedge Fund Makes £6bn Profit in Q4.’
She stopped flicking and double-clicked on the last headline, her hand flying to her mouth as she saw Pierre’s photo. Tucking her knees closer to her chest, she began reading avidly. It was essentially a profile piece on Pierre’s return to prominence – PLF was now third in the market and officially the same size as the world’s largest commercial bank, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, running a fund of close to $40 billion. Kemp was profusely name-dropped, but that wasn’t what kicked the breath out of her. It was the timing of this.
A $6-billion profit in one quarter was a great result and certainly higher than she had been anticipating – although she knew their returns for the first three quarters of the financial year were well above the industry average – but the fourth quarter didn’t close for another two weeks, and under the rules set out by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, they didn’t need to file their F13 records for another forty-five days after that. So why was he jumping the gun, more than six weeks early?
She stared into the unblinking eyes that had once looked upon her kindly, admiringly, and thought she could guess. He was getting the report in before Besakovitch’s money was withdrawn. This number would be half a billion smaller next week, but it wouldn’t be officially reported until May next year, giving him plenty of time to get Yong’s business in and signed on the dotted line. This was a siren call to the Chinese businessman. Pierre had a new dream team, a star fund manager to manage their assets. How could he possibly ignore numbers like these?
How could anyone? Because this was also a message – to her, to Leo Besakovitch, that he didn’t need either one of them. Pierre hadn’t just closed the door behind them both, he’d locked it too.
‘Legs?’
‘Huh?’ She looked up. Isobel was leaning back at a contorted angle, her head tipped so that she was staring at her upside down. ‘You OK?’
‘Yes, of course. I’m fine. Why?’
‘You’ve just been reading that with your hands over your mouth like you were going to scream.’
Allegra realized her hands were still at her mouth and dropped them down. ‘I’m absolutely fine. Just . . . getting caught up with work stuff, as usual.’
‘But you’re not working at the moment.’
‘That’s just fine print. I’ve already had six offers left on my phone and I’ve not even spoken to anyone yet.’
‘So then why don’t you speak to them?’
‘Because I want a break before I go back,’ she said. It was only a half-lie. She felt like a lioness who’d been attacked by her own pride and had retreated for her own safety, but there was also unfinished business here. She had a lawsuit all wrapped up on her phone, she had job offers stored in her voicemail, and yet she wasn’t using any of it. She wasn’t acting, wasn’t moving. And that in itself was odd.
Perpetual motion had always been her game plan – never stopping long enough to place both feet on the ground lest she should become planted, always hopping instead from project to project, team to team, like a frog on lily pads, determined not to get her feet wet – because to get wet would be to drown.
Every day she was out of the market, she knew her old life was beginning to pull away from her like an ocean liner – moving in a slow, strong, sure steady line, unable to swerve back and scoop her from the seas. But there was only one person who could do that and she had to keep the door open for him – because he would come back for her; of that she was certain.
They’d been a team, the two of them. She knew him better than any of them – better, even, than his wife. She was the one he’d come to find late at night, a bottle of whisky and two glasses in his hand, knowing she’d still be in her office, talking through his worries with her as she sat and listened and understood. Just like she understood that it hadn’t been her Pierre that night. He’d acted out of character, urged on by Kemp and a desperate, reckless bravado in front of Zhou. He was hurt by his old friend Leo’s desertion and was trying to restore some pride. She knew all that. Of course she knew all that. She could even forgive it, because she knew he would be regretting it. So she’d keep waiting, just a little longer . . .
It wasn’t him she blamed.
She frowned, remembering something . . .
She got up from the sofa and walked into the kitchen, stirring the soup that was bubbling quietly on the stove. ‘D’you need anything?’ she called over.
‘Have we got any of those crisps left?’
Allegra emptied the bag into a bowl and brought it over.
‘I was just saying Notting Hill’s on. Fancy it?’ Isobel asked. ‘I mean, I know we’ve seen it a million times, but’ – she shrugged – ‘it’s this or CNN.’
‘Is it in English? Because I don’t think I could bear to hear Hugh Grant dubbed into German.’
Isobel laughed out loud at the thought. ‘Ha! I almost hope it is. That would be so funny!’
‘Fire away. I’ll just be a sec.’ And she disappeared into the bedroom, pulling from her suitcase the report Bob had compiled on Kemp’s activity on the Besakovitch fund. How could she have forgotten all about it? Holding it behind her back as she returned to the sitting room, and then hiding it from Isobel’s view behind a cushion, she curled up on the sofa and began to read. And learn.
Chapter Twenty
Day Sixteen: Miniature Rocking Cradle with Whip-stitched Goatskin Blanket
‘Are you sure this is right?’ Isobel asked, clutching at a wall as she skidded on some ice. The backstreet they were walking down was no wider than an alley, here in the Hinterdorf area, or the Old Town part, of Zermatt, and though they were only two roads away from the Bahnhofstrasse, the splashy, sumptuous boutiques and hotels couldn’t have been further removed from the old rickety-looking wooden buildings along here, which were almost blackened from standing up to over three hundred Swiss winters. Some of the huts were only one room wide, most were balanced precariously off the ground on stone mushroom pillars, pretty whittled balconies protruded from chunky stone walls, and black-out shutters were boarded over the windows.
Allegra frowned in agreement. This couldn’t be right. She pulled the piece of paper from her pocket and read Annen’s notes again: Connor Mayhew, SLF, Schweinestall, Hinterdorfstrasse. She looked around her with an expression of disbelief. It seemed hard to believe that the Zermatt branch of the Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research – which had showed a modernist HQ in Davos when she’d Googled it last night – was going to be found somewhere down here. And yet they were in the right street. . .
‘Well, according to this it is,’ she said with a sigh, folding it back in her pocket. ‘Let’s keep going.’
They continued onwards, tired after a morning’s hard skiing on Gornergrat in which they had each tried to break the hundred kilometres an hour reading on their MyTracks apps (Isobel had managed it; Allegra had ‘failed’, at ninety-seven kilometres an hour) and taking tiny pigeon steps in their boots. The snow had become hard-packed beneath the taxis’ caterpillar tracks here, forcing them to clutch at walls for support as they peered up at each door, looking for a number or name.
But even when Isobel found it, she didn’t believe it. Set high on slate stilts with a stepladder up to it that was nothing more than a tree trunk with notches carved in alternate fashion up either side, the hut was about as far from an official agency building as you could imagine. It was only ten feet wide or so, with no windows at the front, and a shallow slate ledge only just protruded in front of the door to create some sort of standing area.
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sp; ‘Really? I’ve seen more official-looking barns,’ Isobel said sceptically.
Allegra stopped at the bottom of the ladder and stared up. ‘Schweinestall’ could be clearly seen etched into a small wooden plaque beside the door. There was no mistake – they were at the address Annen had given them.
Carefully, Allegra climbed up the steps. The shelf on which she had to stand was not more than a foot wide, and having knocked twice, she stood with her hands on the door, weight forward, like she was trying to push it down.
‘Be careful! Isobel said anxiously, ever the health-and-safety officer.
The door opened after a minute.
‘Ja?’ A stern face stared back at her, almost nose to nose.
Allegra dropped her hands quickly, resisting the impulse to step back. To do so would be to fall seven feet.
‘Connor Mayhew? Allegra Fisher.’
Nothing.
‘Sergeant Annen gave me your details. He said he’d call ahead to let you know to expect us?’
Mayhew frowned back at her – his default resting face, she imagined. Soft and cuddly he wasn’t. He looked like a man who had wandered into town after a year of living with wolves, although his wind-burnt, tanned skin picked out his eyes, and his hair seemed to suit him grey. In his mid-to late forties, she guessed, he had a long, rectangular face and tightly drawn mouth, a wiry build and greying stubble that was on its last day before it graduated to a beard. He was also exceptionally tall, even to her, and wore the unselfconscious clothing of someone for whom the kit was chosen on technical merits, not aesthetic – orange down jacket, a pair of yellow soft-shell ski trousers that were grubby on the knee, navy thermal roll neck. This, then, was the man who had brought her grandmother down from the mountain.
‘Valentina Fischer?’ she prompted, watching the recognition finally dawn in his eyes at the name and wishing they could do this inside, off the ledge.
‘Oh. Yes.’ He paused, stepping back into the room. ‘Come in.’
