“No, I’d best go back.”
“Would you like something to eat before you leave? I can easily make you an omelet.”
“No, I should be on my way,” she said, standing. “But thanks for your kind offer. It’s a two-hour journey, and I’d prefer not getting back too late. I seem to have lost my appetite, anyway.”
“I’ll call for a cab, then,” Kingston said. “But before I do, I’d like you to answer a simple question. Because what happened today is, I think, related to events that took place many years ago, before you were born.”
She looked puzzled. “What’s the question?”
“It’s about your mother—what she did before she moved to Canada, when she was living in England, in the fifties. Has she ever told you about her life then?”
Sophie shrugged. “Yes, of course. It was nothing that special, though. Why are you asking?”
“I’m going to level with you. I’ve been trying to find out more about her brother. What he did back then. That was the reason Emma and I went to see your mum at Beechwood.”
“Her brother? Reggie?”
“Yes.” Kingston nodded. Should he tell her or not, that Reggie was really Brian Jennings? That the money that bought Beechwood had been stolen?
No, he decided. The less she knew right now, the better.
“What about Reggie?” she asked.
“Have you any idea who would have wanted to kill him?”
She frowned, looking perplexed. “Why on earth would I?”
“I don’t know. I was just wondering, perhaps, if your mum knew something and didn’t want you to know, that’s all.”
“I wouldn’t put it past her one bit. I told you how secretive she is.”
Kingston gave a little smile of encouragement. “I thought that might be the case. I hope you didn’t mind my asking.”
“No.” she shrugged. “Why don’t you ask her, again?”
“When we find her I will,” he said, walking to the phone to call for a cab.
22
AT THE FRONT door, Kingston wished Sophie a safe journey home, telling her to call him immediately if she received any news of her mother. In turn, he promised to get back to her if he came across more information on the house and its owners. This was a white lie—he already knew how to obtain this information: an online resource that had helped him solve a case about a missing colleague, several years ago. He purposely hadn’t mentioned it. In her present state of mind, Sophie could easily take it upon herself to find out who owned the house and, on impulse, do something foolhardy that could endanger both herself and her mother. That could slam the door on what appeared to a viable line of inquiry, the chance of a break of some sort. As she went down the steps to the waiting cab, he gave a long sigh of relief.
In his office, Kingston turned on his iMac and typed landregistry. gov.uk in the search bar. Land Registry, created in 1862, was a government agency that maintained records of more than twenty-three million titles and evidence of ownership of land and property in England and Wales. The world’s largest property database, it processes £1 million of property every minute. He was pleased to see that his membership was still active and he could submit his search request right away.
He typed in 236 Chiltern Terrace, London NW1 in the space provided and followed the onscreen instructions. In less than two minutes, he had the information he was seeking:
Title Number: WS8765990
Date: June 19, 1995
Address of Property: 236 Chiltern Terrace, London NW1 8LD
Price Paid: £3,600,000
Registered Owners: St. Giles Partners LLC Greyshill Lodge, Coleshill, Buckinghamshire HP7
Lender: Worthington Building Society
Kingston studied the information, disappointed that no personal names were listed. “St. Giles Partners,” he murmured. Grace Williams had said that her brother had once owned a house in the Chalfonts, Buckinghamshire. Problem was, the Chalfonts comprised the villages of Chalfont St. Giles, Chalfont St. Peter, and Little Chalfont, not to mention the hamlet of Chalfont Common. Grace hadn’t said which.
Rubbing his eyes, Kingston decided that it was too late and too confusing, and that he was trying to make something out of nothing. While waiting for the page to print, he got to thinking. If, by chance, it were Chalfont St. Giles where Reginald Payne aka Brian Jennings had once lived, then there could be some kind of connection between him and St. Giles Partners. The village was tiny. It was speculative leap, but if it proved right, it also meant Jennings could have known the people who owned the house in Primrose Hill and the one in Coleshill, a hamlet that just happened to be right next door to Chalfont St. Giles. What all this implied, he wasn’t sure. “Forget it,” told himself, knowing he was probably chasing rabbits anyway. He put the computer to sleep and went to the bedroom.
At breakfast that morning, he’d solved barely half the Times cryptic crossword clues; attempting to finish it would help take his mind off things during supper and beyond. At times like these, the puzzles were the perfect palliative, helping him escape, if for only a while, from pressing problems, like the crucial one facing him now. For the first time—and he couldn’t say why—he had an uncanny feeling that he was getting a little closer to seeing a glimmer of light through the labyrinth of unsolved incidents and crimes. Were only one or two of them connected? Perhaps more? Or were they all inextricably tied together in some way? A chain of events spanning more than half century had always seemed unlikely, but if the house in Primrose Hill was a link in that chain, he was determined to find out where it led. And he had a plan.
Meantime he found himself struggling to solve the next clue: Honestly? No, otherwise (2,3,3)—two letters in the first word, three each in the following two. Staring at it, trying to decipher its meaning, he started to wonder if he might not be better off reading a book rather than putting his already taxed brain through more intellectual gymnastics. Then, just as he was about to put the puzzle aside, he focused on the word otherwise, muttering, “another way to put it.” That could be it, he realized: another way to put Honestly—an anagram. A few seconds later, after shuffling the eight letters, he’d solved it: On the sly.
It seemed, somehow, very appropriate.
“For the last time, no. I’m not going to lend you the Land Rover.” Andrew was calm yet adamant. They were on their second glass of London Pride ale, sitting across from each other in Andrew’s art moderne living room.
Kingston had called Andrew earlier and told him about Sophie’s phone call and visit, purposely playing down the seriousness of Grace’s disappearance, knowing that if he were to tell Andrew the full story, he would instantly see it as yet another tempting-fate situation that Kingston had no business getting involved with.
After the first glass of ale, he’d told Andrew more about Sophie’s visit—not mentioning the gun and stressing the fact that the police were already involved—and then, his nascent plan of action. The underlying motive for doing so was to borrow Andrew’s old Land Rover.
The plan that he’d formulated overnight was simple and involved little or no risk. As soon as possible, he would camp in a car, out of sight, across from 236 Chiltern Terrace and observe vehicles coming and going from the house. His theory was equally straightforward: If the London house and the house in Coleshill were indeed owned by the same person or entity, there was a strong likelihood that the owner or owners would spend their weekends in the country, a time-worn English custom. If so, it would only be a matter of judgment as to which car to follow. He hoped that this would become evident if and when it happened.
The object of the exercise was twofold: first, to find out where the house in Coleshill was located, and second, to get a good look at the passengers. If Sophie was right—and he now believed she was—that her mother was being held hostage, then it stood to reason that her captors would want to move her to another location as quickly as possible. They would be smart enough to know that the police could return at any time with a
search warrant. Grace Williams showing up on their doorstep must have been an unwelcome surprise. And then there was Sophie’s intrusion to complicate matters. They had to move quickly. Getting her out of the house would be their top priority. If Kingston’s hunch was correct, there was a good chance that they would transfer her to the house at Coleshill.
The only hitch in his plan was that to conduct such a surveillance, he required an anonymous vehicle that wouldn’t draw attention or be remembered easily. His mint TR4 was out of the question, and so was Andrew’s pillar-box-red Mini Cooper. But Andrew’s old Land Rover was ideal. Andrew kept it at his house on the river and used it exclusively for hauling construction and garden stuff. It was drab green and showed every day of its fifteen years of use and abuse. But Andrew was being recalcitrant, even though Kingston knew that in the end he would agree.
“I’m really surprised you could come up with something so daft. It’s asking for trouble, and didn’t we all agree it was a closed case? And you even said that Emma was of the same opinion—that it was now a matter for the police.”
“You’re right. I did. But surely that doesn’t preclude my carrying out something as simple as trailing a car to find out where it ends up. As long as all the right precautions are taken, what on earth could possibly go wrong? Even if they spotted me—which is most unlikely—what’s the very worst that could happen?”
“Hello? Remember what happened to this face?” Andrew pointed to his cheek. “Come on, Lawrence. Let the police deal with it, for God’s sake.”
“Sophie’s already been to the police station and filed a missing-persons report. I forgot to tell you that. The police won’t take any immediate action—you know that—and by the time they do, it’ll be too late. The house will be clean.”
Andrew sighed.
“All right, as you wish,” Kingston said, getting up awkwardly from the Corbusier chair. “I need to move quickly because they’re not going to wait around. It’s now or never. For all I know, they have moved her already.”
“So what are you planning to do?”
“I’ll just have to risk it in the TR.”
“You could paint a Union Jack on the door.”
“Not funny.”
Andrew got up and disappeared into the kitchen. In no time he was back, dangling two keys on a fob between his thumb and forefinger.
“I’m doing this for only one reason, Lawrence, and that is to give you the least possible chance of getting into trouble—to protect you from yourself. If I don’t, I know damned well you’ll go anyway. You might also want to let Emma know what you’re up to. I doubt very much that she’ll approve.”
Kingston nodded, his expression as earnest as Andrew’s. He put the keys in his pocket. “Thank you. I won’t mess up. And I will tell Emma, of course. You can rest assured, too, that if things start to get even the least bit dodgy, I’ll chuck it in and head for home. That’s a promise.”
“All right, then,” Andrew said, still looking disillusioned.
“If it’s okay with you, I’ll drive down to Bourne End this evening and make the swap. I’ll take good care of her, don’t worry.”
“You know where the garage key is, right?”
“I do.”
“Call me if you run into any problems. At Bourne End, I mean.”
“I will.”
“You might want to lock it if you park it anywhere. There’re some tools and other gear in the back that I wouldn’t want to lose.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll take good care.”
“See that you do,” Andrew replied. “Of the car—and yourself.”
Kingston nodded.
He left, feeling much better about his doing the right thing.
23
TWENTY YARDS UP from 236 Chiltern Terrace, Kingston parked the old Land Rover on the opposite side of the street, under convenient shadows, between the wide-spaced streetlights. He glanced at his watch: nine P.M. It was getting darker. As luck would have it, the house was well lighted from a lamppost some twenty feet away. His sheltered vantage point gave him a clear view of the residence and, unless he dozed off, no vehicles could come or go without his spotting them. As he’d expected, there was little traffic and few pedestrians. Those that there were would think little of a gray-haired man sitting in his car with the newspaper propped up on the steering wheel.
Once clear of London’s suburbs, Kingston had made good time to Bourne End, where everything had gone according to plan. The Land Rover had started instantly—Andrew was obsessive about his cars—and Kingston had left his Triumph in the locked and alarmed double garage. In the roughly two-hour round-trip journey, he’d had plenty of time to think about the various scenarios that could soon confront him and how he would deal with them. Though it was prudent to anticipate everything that could go wrong, he knew that trying to second-guess what might happen and how he should react was a wasted exercise. He would have to make snap judgments if and when circumstances demanded it. He must also call Emma, but not until he had something worth reporting. If she knew that he was in a car spying on a house in a wealthy London enclave, where an armed Grace Williams might be held captive, she would call the police immediately.
He put the thought out of his mind.
Opening the flask he had brought with him, he poured a stainless-steel cup of hot coffee. Also to help stay awake, he had the radio on, at a low level, listening to music, trying to imagine being in “their” place—meaning Grace’s captors, whoever they were—and what time they would choose to move her. All of this, of course, depended entirely on if she was captive there—and if so, whether that was their plan.
Night came and both street and pedestrian traffic dwindled from sporadic to virtually none for long periods. There was little or no activity at any of the houses within his angle of sight, let alone number 236. Primrose Hill was now as quiet and ostensibly as peaceful as any village in the Cotswolds. By two thirty he’d eaten the sandwich he’d brought along, as well as an apple, half a Cadbury fruit & nut chocolate bar, and had finished the coffee.
Around four o’clock he had his first scare, when a car approached slowly. It wasn’t until it was almost within forty feet or so that he saw it was a police car. He slumped as low as he could in the seat, praying that they hadn’t spotted him. It passed without slowing, and he let out a sigh and a mute blessing for the dark shadows.
He awoke with a jump and an ache in his lower back. It was still dark, but on the tiny scrap of horizon between the trees he could see the sky beginning to lighten. He looked at his watch: four forty-five. His first thought was that in the forty minutes or so that he’d dozed off, he might have missed something.
Five minutes later, the porch light went on at number 236. Kingston picked up his small Luger binoculars from the passenger seat and held them ready in his lap. For five minutes, no activity. It then occurred to him that the light might be on a timer. But that made no sense—why set it to go on at daybreak? He raised the binoculars.
His question was answered when a heavyset man with shaved head, wearing a suit and tie, emerged from the house. He closed the front door behind him and walked down the gravel drive. A minute later, Kingston saw headlights, and a dark-colored late-model Mercedes Estate pulled up alongside the porch. The man got out of the car and went back into the house. Kingston lowered the binoculars, reminding himself to be extremely careful at this point. The neighborhood would be soon stirring, and there was a chance of his being noticed by one of the residents of Primrose Hill, a stockbroker or type A personality who wanted to be in his City office at first light.
Almost fifteen minutes passed and Kingston was getting impatient, beginning to wonder yet again if he had been too hasty in supposing that something sinister was going on in the house. He had no hard evidence, and everything he knew was based solely on Sophie’s account of the incident. What was equally worrisome was that the police didn’t think the situation warranted immediate investigation, and they’d interviewed both
Sophie and the people in the house. According to her, they’d even conducted a cursory search.
His funk evaporated when the door opened again. The same man he’d seen earlier was now pushing a wheelchair, easing it down the shallow single step from the house to the driveway. There, he opened the rear door of the car. Kingston grabbed the binoculars.
“Sod it,” he muttered. Whoever was in the chair was only partially visible, blocked by the open door. Was it Grace Williams? He wanted it to be, praying for a clearer look.
At that moment, a second man emerged from the house. He was tall and wore a dark overcoat. Alongside him holding his hand was a well-dressed woman wearing a floppy hat. After some hesitation and a few words with the man, she got in the car through the rear door. Kingston figured that when the invalid was helped upright, prior to being eased into the car, there was good chance that he would be able to see the face. He gripped his binoculars tighter. The man behind the wheelchair helped the invalid to a wobbly standing position and then partially lifted her or him into the rear car seat, next to the woman.
At that instant, Kingston got a clear view of the invalid’s face.
It was not Grace Williams. It was an elderly man.
In quick succession, the wheelchair was stowed in the boot, the heavyset man got in the driver’s seat, the man in the overcoat slipped into the passenger seat, the car doors slammed silently shut, and the Mercedes eased out of the driveway onto Chiltern Terrace.
Kingston put aside the binoculars and the newspaper, turned the key in the ignition, and waited. He wanted to see which way the Mercedes turned at the end of the road before pulling out behind it.
Shadowing the car at this time of day shouldn’t be too difficult. And if he lost sight of it, he would just head to Coleshill as fast as possible, with the hope of beating them there. He still had no way of knowing if Coleshill was their destination, but as the journey unfolded he had a gut feeling that he would be proved right.
6.The Alcatraz Rose Page 17
