Connections

by Hilary Bailey

  I stood up and went to the bar where by looking across I could just make out what the photographs showed. I saw Tallinn, in black and white, standing in a Moscow street. The photograph looked like the one which I’d seen in the German newspaper, probably part of the same set. I left the barmaid putting my pint on the bar and went close enough to hear Joe say, “That’s him.”

  This was my moment. I went up to the table and asked the guy, who turned out to be Joe Carter, if I could have a word. The other, Dominic, turned round to look at me. Joe stared hard into my face. It was obvious they thought I was making some kind of official enquiry, and they didn’t like it.

  Dominic answered on his friend’s behalf. “What’s it about?”

  Joe said, “Who are you?”

  “Do you mind if I sit down?” I asked and did so anyway. I said, “I’m not the police. I’m not an official of any kind. But you two are in trouble.”

  I opened my briefcase and took out my business card which I handed to Joe, who studied it and handed it to Dominic. Then I took out the photographs Hoppo had taken at the girl’s funeral – Joe and Fleur under a tree, Dominic standing holding the bereaved mother’s arm.

  “Where did you get those?” Fleur asked. At the same time she took my business card from Dominic and scrutinised it.

  “I said someone was taking pictures, didn’t I?” the young girl, Melanie, remarked. “Why?” she asked me.

  “What’s it about?” Dominic asked.

  “I’m here to find out,” I told him. “But I’m telling you again – you’re in trouble. It’s connected with something that took place about five years ago in Gordon Mews. Does that ring any bells?”

  “Yes,” said Joe suspiciously.

  “They said you robbed the place.”

  “We never,” he said. “Who told you?”

  The landlord had come out from the back and was staring.

  “The owner told the police you robbed the place,” I told Joe. “The cops were looking for you, then you disappeared. That’s all true, isn’t it? Look – I’d rather not talk here. Can we go somewhere private?”

  Fleur was looking very anxious. I didn’t at the time know why. She was eager and incautious enough to suggest her own flat. Joe and Dominic disagreed, not trusting me not to pull out a gun and kill them, a not entirely ridiculous suspicion. Class came into it, as it always does in this country. Fleur recognised in me a familiar sort of figure – I could have been her Uncle Charlie, even if I was the uncle they never talked about. The others saw me as the Man, he who arrests you, prosecutes you in court, goes around taking names.

  I spoke to Fleur directly. “We can sit here going through our business, if you like, in front of a pub full of people. But if anyone comes looking we’re pretty visible. Let me tell you some things. Then you judge whether we should go on sitting here.”

  I said I had been hired to find them twice, once after the supposed robbery, then two months ago. I told them I had commissioned the photographs of the funeral. I didn’t mention having been hired to murder them. I did tell them a businessman and the Security Services were interested in them. “Do you know why?” I asked.

  They were shaken, but not as shaken as they ought to have been.

  Joe Carter played for time. He said, “For the first time in our lives we’re going straight. Even paying PAYE, stamps, the lot. Maybe they’re after him because he’s Irish,” he said, indicating Dominic.

  “Where does this come in?” I asked, indicating the photographs of Tallinn on the table.

  Dominic stood up. “We’d better go to yours,” he said abruptly to Fleur. He went over to the bar and spoke to the landlord, who nodded. He handed him something. When he returned, he told me, “The landlord knows where we are and he’s got a key.”

  “Fair enough,” I agreed, thinking that wouldn’t help them much after I’d got them inside the flat and killed them.

  As we all trooped across the road to the flat Dominic looked at Melanie and then at Joe. Joe stopped in the middle of the road and said, “Melanie, I want you to go home.”

  She made a fuss but Joe was firm and eventually she went off after kissing him passionately, trailing away, looking back like a kid sent home when the big ones go off to do something exciting.

  When we got to the stairs going up to the flat the two men jumped me and hustled me into some shadows by the garages. They’d signalled it in time for me to have evaded them or got my retaliation in first, if I’d wanted to. But I didn’t.

  They searched me fairly expertly, even checking my socks. Dominic asked me for the combination to my briefcase. I told him what it was and he put the case on the ground and opened it. It was a giveaway all right. Toothbrush and razor, clean shirt, a wad of cash – sterling and dollars – my passport, chequebooks from two banks, one foreign. He sussed that the bottom of the case was false – in it there was a second passport in another name and a third bank book. He didn’t make an issue of this, since the compartment was apparently too small to conceal a weapon. Though it did. A coil of thin wire with a metal handle at each end – a garrotte, in fact. A pointless weapon for an amateur, but effective in experienced hands like mine. What you do is cripple the first man and strangle the second with the garrotte while the first is helpless. It takes about thirty seconds if you do it right. Then you do the same to the first guy. If you know what you’re doing, it’s not too hard, and it’s quick and quiet.

  Dominic obviously noted that I was packed for a speedy if not unceremonious departure, but he didn’t comment, though when he straightened up his eyes were knowing.

  We rejoined Fleur at the foot of the stairs. She looked very grave. She’d also remembered something. “Ben may be there.”

  “We’ll sort it,” Dominic said. “Just put your head in and see if he’s there.”

  We went on upstairs, Dominic and Fleur in front.

  “Who’s Ben?” I asked Joe.

  “An old boyfriend,” he told me.

  On the landing Fleur went to a door and put her key in the lock. Dominic unlocked the flat next door and a dog bounded out. He instantly peed up against the balcony wall then wagged his tail to excuse himself. He seemed a nice animal.

  Fleur had her door open and was calling, “Ben! Ben! Are you in?” She turned to us. “He’s not.”

  And we all went into her flat and Fleur turned on the gas fire and offered to make a cup of tea. The offer was accepted. She went off to put the kettle on and the three of us sat down and looked at each other.

  “I’ve shown you mine. You show me yours,” I suggested.

  “When you said these people were after us, meaning us no good, what was that about?” Joe asked.

  If I was going to tell them I thought I’d tell them while the woman was out of the room. “They want to kill you,” I told him.

  He burst out, “Fuck’s sake – what’s this about? We’ve done nothing.” He paused. “I don’t believe it,” he said to me.

  Dominic looked at me evenly and asked, “How were they planning to do this?” I didn’t reply but I looked hard at him and he understood. He burst out, “Jesus Christ!”

  “We’re all in trouble,” I said. Well, he knew I was, after searching my case and seeing I was ready to travel far and fast.

  Fleur came in with the tea and put it down. She’d been thinking, which is what women do while waiting for the kettle to boil. They get a brooding look, like witches, as they stare at it waiting for it to start bubbling, and then they turn round and say something penetrating, often something you don’t want to hear.

  She asked Dominic, “Have you told him anything?”

  He said, “No. I’m wondering if this isn’t your story as well.”

  She said, “I don’t think there’s any point in hiding anything. We’ll just have to trust each other.” She turned to me. “I think it’s got something to do with my father.”

  I was shaken, partly, but also reassured. Something was starting to make sense. If Richard Jethro
– heading up among other things, a hundred-million-pound bank; brokering the funding for the much-desired East-West railway link; about to be Chairman of the Government’s Economic Council and in general the blue-eyed boy of City and governmental circles – needed help from the highest levels, he could get it. He could, for example, ask the Home Secretary for his assistance. Who would pass his request down the line until it reached, for example, someone like Adrian Pugh.

  Dominic Floyd looked at me. “We’re putting it all together,” he said. “Not that it makes a lot of sense. We’ve just got the pictures of the Russian from a friend of Fleur’s.”

  “Tell me,” I said.

  Which he did, relating the miserable tale of the girl, the rape and beating and their clear view of the two men together, Jethro probably and Tallinn almost certainly. The light falling on this sorry affair became stronger.

  Fleur asked, “What would my father be doing with a man like that?”

  Dominic answered, saying what I was thinking. “He was in business with him. But where do we come in?”

  I said, “You’d seen him with Tallinn. Initially, he must have been afraid Vanessa would go to the police. So he got his story in first. It would be his word against yours and who would be most likely to be believed? Then he got rid of the flat, the only link between you and him. Vanessa hadn’t laid any charges against him, you’d all disappeared and there wasn’t any connection between him and the house in Gordon Mews.”

  “This is all ridiculous,” Fleur said. “All right, if it was my father, and if it was Tallinn, I can see why he’d try to cover up what happened. He’s a respectable businessman with a reputation to protect. He wouldn’t want to be involved in a scene like that. But the rest is rubbish. It’s got to be. Whatever happened, it was all over years ago.” She paused, looking mournful. “For him anyway. Not for Vanessa.”

  “If it’s rubbish why was I sent to find out where Dominic, Joe and Vanessa were by a Home Office official? Then a second time by MI6? Not to mention the death threats.”

  “We’ve only got your word for this,” Joe said.

  “You were the one with the conspiracy theory when Vanessa died,” Dominic told him.

  “Do you know anything about that?” he asked me.

  I shook my head. “No.” I didn’t know what he was talking about. I didn’t care. “Look,” I said, “I’m not here out of the kindness of my heart. I’m here to find out what’s going on in order to protect myself and my interests, because they’re being threatened.” I told them, “If you want to ignore me, fine. Go to work, come home, go to the pub, go to the pictures, play Sunday football for all I care. Then if one day soon one of you has a nasty accident, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  “All this can’t be true,” Fleur said. Suddenly she saw the light. “You came here to murder Dom and Joe?” Her voice was high and incredulous.

  I stood up. “Maybe,” I said. “But I’m not doing it, am I? What I’m going to do is disappear and try to negotiate my way out of trouble. This has been useful. I’m getting an idea of what went on and why. Not all of it, but enough to start protecting myself. In return I’ve given you a warning and you can’t say it isn’t fair. What you do next is your—”

  The front door opened.

  To his credit Dominic was across the room in a flash, hauling Fleur from her chair and pushing her down on the floor between the couch and window. Joe jumped up and flattened himself against the wall on one side of the door. I was behind the door on the other side.

  “Hey – Fleur,” came a cheerful voice. “Surprise.”

  “It’s Ben,” came Fleur’s indignant voice from the carpet. “God – you bloody, paranoid fools—” She began to struggle to her feet.

  It wasn’t a big flat. By the time Ben came in Dominic was surfacing from behind the couch, Fleur brushing herself down and looking irritably at him, while Joe was advancing from beside one side of the door. I stayed where I was. The dog was in the middle of the room, wagging his tail and hoping for more.

  Ben was an upstanding young man with a confident air. “Playing charades?” he said. “Look, Fleur, who I’ve brought with me.”

  A beautiful woman came in behind him. She wore a long fur coat and a matching hat. She had diamonds in her ears. I came out from behind the door.

  “Sophia,” Fleur breathed out in a horrified tone.

  “Fleur,” the woman said, advancing, her arms extended. She kissed Fleur on both cheeks, still smiling a smooth, social smile, and glanced round, taking in the flat and us. Beside her Ben was looking pleased with himself. “Ben and I have been together all day,” she told Fleur. “So he suggested I come back in the car with him and see if you were in. I hope you don’t mind the intrusion. I was eager to see you again.”

  Ben took over. “Sophia – Dominic Floyd and Joe Carter, neighbours.” He looked at me, suggesting he didn’t much like the fact that I was there.

  I said, “Julian Krantz,” which was the name on my other passport. Fleur frowned a bit but Dominic and Joe didn’t flicker.

  Ben said, to all three of us, “This is Fleur’s stepmother, Lady Jethro.”

  I knew that, because I’d seen her picture in Hello!

  “I must be going,” I said to Fleur.

  “Me too,” said Dominic. “Sorry to dash off, Fleur.”

  Joe didn’t say anything, just picked up his coat and headed for the door. An unceremonious departure.

  Outside the garages was a black Rolls-Royce with a peak-capped chauffeur standing by it, looking around warily and smoking a cigarette. The lights of the Findhorn Star lay ahead, inviting us. Heedless of the possibility of a lone gunman on a grassy knoll nearby we went inside, followed by the dog.

  “Whisky?” I offered. “Scotch or Irish?” Joe and I had a Scotch and Dominic a glass of Paddy.

  “Back so soon?” said the landlord to me when I bought them.

  “This place drew us back like a magnet,” I told him.

  “Give him this, will you?” he said, indicating Dominic and handing me the key.

  “That is some stepmother,” Joe said, stunned, when I sat down. “Dominic – you’re the man for a bit of posh. Tell me what to do to—”

  “Fuck off, Joe,” said Dominic. “Sam – or is it Julian? – do you think Fleur’s in any danger?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “What do you think?”

  He said thoughtfully, “From the minute she told me about her father finding her I knew if she took money from him she’d move away. And from that moment he’s been trying to get her to take it. That woman’s not therefor nothing. Ben might think he’s bringing about a family reconciliation, but my idea is that they’ve been looking for the chance to get her back. She’s made it obvious she doesn’t want anything to do with them – and they’re still chasing her. If anything, her father’s trying to protect her. It’s this Tallinn I’m worried about. Do you know where he is?”

  “Probably Moscow,” I said. “The Germans want him and he’s got no reason to trust the Brits.”

  “That’s good news, if it’s true,” he said.

  “I’m worried about what she’s telling her stepmother and that prick of a boyfriend,” Joe said.

  “She won’t say anything,” Dominic told him. “Joe, I’m going to sneak back to the flat for my stuff. I’ll get yours too, if you want. Passports too. You’d better go and hang out at Melanie’s.”

  “Now you’re talking,” I told him.

  He told the dog to stay behind. Joe looked down at the animal, frowning. “He thinks it’s too risky there to take Jason,” he said. “That’s a bad sign.” He looked at me angrily. “I’m pissed off with this, really pissed off,” he said. “I was happy before all this.”

  “Don’t shoot the messenger,” I said. “Have you two got mobile phones?”

  They had. I took both numbers and gave him mine.

  We had another drink, mostly in silence. “I really don’t understand all this,” Joe said.
/>   “Nor do I,” I said. “It may blow over. Most things do.”

  “Storm in a teacup,” he said with gloomy cynicism.

  Dominic came in with a plastic bag, presumably containing the bare necessities of life on the move. He reported, “I called Fleur and told her not to say anything to her stepmother or Ben.”

  “What did she say?” asked Joe.

  “She said was I mad. Of course she wouldn’t.”

  “That Ben’s really keen on the Jethro millions, isn’t he?” Joe said. He turned to Dominic. “Dom – if we have to leave the country and smuggle Jason back in one more time I’ll be really annoyed.”

  I didn’t stay for the debate but stood up. “I’m off,” I said. “Keep in touch.”

  I was going down to Goolies’ place to arrange transport out of the country. Once the Protheros, Pughs and their masters realised I wasn’t going along with the plan to eliminate Dominic and Joe they might put out a warrant for my arrest, so I had to avoid going through the standard checkpoints. My arrangements depended on the availability of a man, a small boat and the right tide, so it could take a day or two, and meanwhile I wasn’t about to tell Dominic and Joe what I was going to do. Alliances can shift, in days, in hours…

  “Best of luck,” I said. I was starting to move off when I sat down again quickly, turning my head away from the window.

  Dominic glanced at me, then quickly from the window. He saw what I’d seen and said in dismay, “What’s she doing?”

  Fleur, Ben and Sophia Jethro had just got to the foot of the steps of Adelaide House and were moving towards Sophia’s car.

  “Has she shopped us?” asked Joe.

  Dominic told him, “She’s going back to Jethro’s to play the girl detective. Find out what’s going on.”

  “You’re kidding,” I said. “Would she do that?”

  “Oh yeah,” he told me. “She’s got a big space in her head labelled Joan of Arc. I don’t like it. It could be risky, even if Jethro is her father. I mean, we don’t know what’s going on. And is he really going to hand over the password to his computer? Or whatever? Could she make any sense of what she finds out? This is stupid.”