Evan Blessed

by Rhys Bowen

  “Just after ten.”

  “I must have fallen asleep.” She sat up. “I came to make us some dinner. Luckily I arrived about ten minutes before your mother and I’d taken possession of the stove so there wasn’t very much she could do, except to look at my mushroom risotto as if I was feeding you monkey brains or cooked dog. Accompanied, of course, by a recitation about how your father always had a proper meal when he came home. I don’t know what she’d have done if I’d told her I used to be a total vegetarian.” Bronwen chuckled.

  “So what did she do?”

  “When she saw she wasn’t going to be allowed near the stove she stumped back to Mrs. Williams in a huff, muttering that Mrs. W. had made her famous steak and kidney pie and if you still felt peckish you could always visit her later.”

  “I do feel peckish, come to think of it,” Evan said. “D.I. Watkins and I grabbed a meat pie and a pint earlier, but the pie tasted like cardboard.”

  “I can warm up some of the risotto,” Bronwen said. She got up and headed for the kitchen. “So, I’m dying to hear about the piece of music. Did they think it was some kind of clue or threat?”

  “We’re definitely taking it seriously,” Evan said. “There were no fingerprints on the paper. To my mind, that must tie it in with the bunker. Most of the items there had been wiped clean, and the only good prints came from a stockboy at the supermarket.”

  “The same person, eh?” Bronwen lit the gas and spooned rice into a saucepan. “Why do you think he contacted you particularly?”

  “Perhaps he thinks I’m the not too bright one on the team, so he’d rather deal with me.”

  “Or the other way around. He’s read about some of the cases you’ve solved in the paper and he thinks you are the one worthy of matching wits with him.”

  “Oh come on, Bron.” Evan looked embarrassed.

  “No, I mean it.” Bronwen looked up from stirring rice. “You’ve had some publicity about some of the cases you’ve solved. Why else would he send you clues if he didn’t want to match wits with you?”

  “It’s strange, isn’t it? If he’s managed to spirit away a girl with no trace, you think he’d be glad to get away with it, not draw attention to himself and risk getting caught.”

  “They do say criminal types often have big egos, don’t they?” Bronwen said. “Perhaps he can’t bear the fact that the police seem to have made no progress. He’s giving you a little help.”

  “And if he’s the type who clearly enjoys taking risks, which he must do by constructing that bunker almost under the noses of everybody who hikes on the mountain, he might get his kicks from being one jump ahead of the police. Leading us by the nose only to show how clever he is.”

  Bronwen nodded. “Which presupposes he still has the girl alive, do you think?”

  Evan considered this. “There would be no point in leading us on if the girl was already dead. He wants us to come and find her. And if we get too close, then he’ll dispose of her.” Evan took a deep breath. “God, I feel so angry about this, Bronwen. Watkins feels the same—that we should be doing more, but we aren’t sure what to do.”

  “Can’t they extract DNA from evidence these days?”

  “They can. The lab tech said they can extract DNA from the saliva if he licked the stamp, but if the bloke’s DNA isn’t on file anywhere, then how do you match it?”

  “Of course.” Bronwen stopped stirring and looked up. “And what about that music on the radio yesterday? Do you think it’s the same person sending you another message?”

  “I suspect it has to be. Two musical clues in two days is more than coincidence, isn’t it? And why ask for some classical piece to be played for us? I’m not known for my love of classical music.”

  “Neither am I, really,” Bronwen said. “I like some of it, but I wouldn’t call myself a music buff.”

  “I’m going round to the radio station in the morning to see if they have the request letter on file there, or if it was called in, the number it was called from. What was the piece again? It didn’t mean anything to me so I couldn’t remember when Watkins asked me. A shipwreck, wasn’t it?”

  “It was from Rimsky-Korsakov’s Sheherazade symphonic suite. I’ve heard it before but it’s not anything I know terribly well. I wonder if the title is important? He must have chosen it for a reason.”

  “What does ‘Sheherazade’ mean? What’s it about?”

  “It’s Tales from the Arabian Nights.”

  “Weren’t they all tall tales about giant birds and genies in bottles?”

  “That kind of thing.”

  Evan shook his head. “Well, I can’t see a connection there—unless we’re dealing with an Arab. What about the shipwreck part? Could he be holding the girl on a boat? There are some old wrecks around the shoreline here. I suppose we’d better take a look at them in the morning.”

  Bronwen put a plate of food in front of Evan. “It seems to me the most obvious clue you’ve got is that Deb and Dad are dead. Known facts.”

  “We’re working on that. So far I’ve only been able to come up with one missing girl called Debbie, and she was a fifteen-year-old who vanished hitchhiking on her way home from the pictures in Birmingham. She seems to be a possible runaway. It doesn’t seem a likely tie-in.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” Bronwen said. “If we believe the music, then the father and Deb were punished because they did something to displease the music writer. I wonder, whose dad? His own?”

  “No way of finding that out,” Evan said. “We can’t look into the sons of every older man killed in the past twenty years.”

  Bronwen watched him eat. “He expects you to solve it, Evan,” she said. “Otherwise he’d never have sent you the clue. It must be solvable. Somewhere around Britain there must be a missing Deborah, unless, of course, he means the other kind of deb—you know, a debutante.”

  Evan looked up from his food. “A debutante? I thought they stopped doing that years ago, didn’t they? When was the last time girls were presented at court? Before I was born, I think.”

  “I know they’re not officially presented anymore, but there are still upper-class girls who have a season and who meet the queen at a royal garden party, so I suppose you could still call them debs. I went to school with a couple of girls like that, so I know they still exist. The Honorable Amanda Fanshaw-Everingham was one.”

  “You’re making that name up.” Evan laughed.

  “I’m not. She was definitely a real person. And God, was she thick. Penny Mowbray was the other one who moved in royal circles and had a coming-out ball. Awfully well connected. Her father played polo with Prince Charles and her elder sister was dating a minor royal. But she was fun. One of my best friends, in fact.” Bronwen grinned at the memory. “She almost got me expelled.”

  “Doing what?” Evan was intrigued. He knew almost nothing of that stage of Bronwen’s life. He knew she’d been to a girls’ boarding school while her parents were abroad, but he hadn’t realized it was the kind of exclusive school where the girls dated minor royals.

  Bronwen was still smiling. “When we were in the sixth form we borrowed the games mistress’s car to go and meet some boys from the nearby boys’ school. Penny assured me that she’d learned to drive, you see, and that we could borrow the car and nobody would ever catch us. Only she didn’t confide until too late that she’d only driven on a disused airfield. She wasn’t used to traffic and she’d never driven in the dark. We didn’t dare turn on the headlights in case someone noticed us. We actually knocked some poor man off his bike and the police were called. There was an awful fuss.”

  “I’m sure there would have been.”

  “Luckily, it wasn’t too bad. The chap wasn’t badly hurt and his motorbike wasn’t damaged and Penny’s family was so influential that the school didn’t want to lose her, so they let us both stay. But we were terrified for a while. It taught me a lesson. Not Penny, though. She just thought it was a lark.”

  “Have you stayed
in touch? You could invite her to the wedding.”

  Bronwen shook her head. “You tend to lose touch with schoolfriends when you go to university. And now I’ve lost touch with most of the uni crowd too.”

  Evan reached out and took her hand. “Bronwen, I don’t want you to feel that you’re cut off in a backwater, you know. If you want to go and visit friends, or have friends to stay here—it’s fine with me. If there are people you want to have to the wedding …”

  She leaned over and planted a kiss on his forehead. “You’re very sweet, you know,” she said. “But strangely enough I’m perfectly content with where I am and who I am. When will you get that into your head?”

  Evan gave her a long hard look before he went back to his food.

  “But now we’re speaking of weddings,” Bronwen said cautiously, “now I have you trapped—I would like to find out when you might possibly be free.”

  “Bron, I leave the choosing of brass bedsteads in your capable hands,” Evan said.

  “It’s not just that, Evan—although I am going into town tomorrow to see if my wonderful antiques dealer has come through on his promise. My parents will be arriving in a couple of days and there are still so many things up in the air. How many people have you invited from the village, for example? Have you just issued a general invitation? How many are likely to show up? I need to know because Mummy would be furious if so many locals showed up that her friends and relatives didn’t get enough to eat and drink. And we still haven’t told the caterer exactly what we want in the way of food and drink. I know we discussed a possible menu, but …”

  “Whatever you think is best,” Evan said.

  “Evan, that’s not good enough. It’s your wedding too.” She stood over him, arms folded defiantly.

  “Bronwen, you knew when you agreed to marry me that I’m a policeman, and when I’m on a case, that case has to come first. I don’t know when I’ll get a day off. Maybe not until the wedding. I’m sorry, but that’s just the way it is.”

  “But at least you can take the time to discuss things with me.” Bronwen still sounded aggrieved. “The caterer has to know our menu very soon.”

  He reached out and drew her to him. “Bron, listen. I know nothing about the kind of food and drink your parents like. You’ve met my mother. If she was catering the wedding, it would be dainty sandwiches with the crusts cut off, Welsh cakes and wedding cake, and tea. She might allow one glass of champagne each for the toast.”

  “Which reminds me,” Bronwen added. “Your mother did mention that Mrs. Williams was very put out that she hadn’t been invited to do the eats. Apparently she always does the eats for local weddings. It’s a tradition.”

  “Oh dear.” Evan looked up, half smiling. “You know she really does cook well, and she was very good to me when I first came here.”

  “Good to you? She tried to fatten you up like a prize turkey—and marry you off to her awful granddaughter.”

  Evan laughed. “She was good to me, Bron, and I don’t like to upset her. Don’t you think we could ask her to make some of her fabulous cakes?”

  “I suppose we could,” Bronwen said.

  “And so that we don’t tread on any more local toes, why don’t we buy a whole lamb from Evans-the-Meat? I’m sure the caterer can arrange for a barbecue spit.”

  Bronwen’s face lit up. “Perfect. See I knew I only had to discuss it with you. We’ll order assorted hors d’oeuvres, salads to go with the lamb, and the wedding cake, accompanied by various small delicacies baked by Mrs. Williams. That should satisfy everyone.”

  “See how easy that was. I knew there was no reason to get in a tizzy about something as simple as a wedding.”

  Bronwen smiled. “I suppose I’m pushing my luck if I want answers on the music to be played at the ceremony?”

  “So long as it’s not the Shipwreck from Sheherazade,” Evans said, “or music that spells out anything, I don’t care.”

  Chapter 13

  He sat at his computer and called up Finale, his music composition program. His fingers, poised above the keyboard, trembled in anticipation. He knew exactly what the notes were going to spell out this time and he almost salivated in anticipation. But he mustn’t rush things. Give them time—time to search and to fail. And then—then he’d strike. Everything was prepared. Even though the secret room on the mountain had been discovered, he really had to congratulate himself how quickly and smoothly he had made alternative arrangements. More convenient really. And definitely more of a challenge. He loved challenges. But he must stay calm and not be too eager. There would only be one opportunity. He couldn’t risk making a mistake.

  Evan had risen with the sun, his head buzzing with things that had to be done that day. The moment he’d discovered the musical clue, everything changed. Until then he’d half believed that Shannon Parkinson had met with an unfortunate accident on the mountain and her body would be discovered in a disused mine shaft or deep in the lake. Now he was sure that all the pieces belonged together. The man who left no fingerprints in the bunker was the same man who had sent the strange musical threat. They were dealing with the kind of twisted mind that enjoyed playing games and staying one step ahead of the police. This kind of thing was completely outside Evan’s sphere of experience and he felt cold chills every time he remembered that he had been singled out as the recipient of the letter. Why had the man chosen him? There had to be a good reason. Was he the one charged with finding the girl before it was too late?

  He made himself a cup of tea, then scrambled into his clothes and drove down the hill. He passed Mrs. Williams’s house just in time to see his former landlady bringing in the milk bottles. She waved and called out to him. He waved back. At least he’d been spared breakfast with his mother.

  A half hour’s drive brought him to the seaside resort of Llandudno, favored by genteel English holidaymakers in the eighteen hundreds. The bygone elegance still lingered in the design of the long promenade and some of the faded seafront hotels. Evan drove past the main shopping center and located the radio station by its transmission tower. He went inside to find a hive of activity. Bore Da North Wales started at seven o’clock and it was seven-ten when Evan walked in.

  “Are you our talk show guest?” the receptionist asked as he stood looking around at the bright mural on the reception area walls. It was a stylized rendition of Llandudno with the Snowdon range behind it.

  Evan told her his business and was soon shaking hands with Dewi Lewis while the Beatles strummed their way through “I Want to Hold Your Hand.”

  “Constable Evan Evans?” the small, sprightly man said. He had been a well-known former comedian in his younger days and retained his stage presence and his chirpily bright voice. “I remember playing the request a couple of days ago. Getting married, eh? Rather you than me, mate. Tried it three times. Ended up a pauper.”

  Evan explained about the musical clue and the sinister coincidence that a strange piece of music had been requested for him.

  “I thought it was an odd choice for a wedding,” Dewi Lewis said. “Something about a shipwreck, wasn’t it? Frankly I thought someone was having a good laugh at your expense.”

  “I hope you’ll be able to help us catch him,” Evan said. “So what I need to know was how the request came in?”

  “We get them all ways. Phoned in, postcards, and of course via e-mail these days. Siannaid, our program coordinator, will be able to help you. Down the hall, to the right. Whoops—Beatles ending, gotta run.” He darted back to his seat, put on his headphones, and addressed the mike with a bright smile.

  “He wants to hold your hand, Noreen. How about that? I’d keep this one. Most of them want something quite different these days, don’t they?”

  Evan left him to seek out Siannaid. “We log all requests in a big book,” she said. “That way we can check if someone is trying to get on the air all the time, or is bugging someone. See, here’s this week’s. The one for you came by postcard.”

&nbs
p; “Do you think you still have it?”

  “Probably.” She got up, rummaged in a file, then waved it triumphantly. “See, here it is.”

  Evan took it. It was posted in Bangor. The words on both sides were printed, not written. “Signed, ‘A well-wisher.’ No name,” he said. “I’d like to take this with me. We’ll need to test it for fingerprints.”

  “Be my guest,” she said.

  “Oh, and Siannaid,” Evan hesitated at the doorway. “If you get any more requests for me, or for Inspector Watkins or D.C. Glynis Davies, will you call the Caernarfon police station right away and let us know?”

  “Be happy to,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to help solve a crime.” She scribbled down the request on a notepad and pinned it to the corkboard behind her.

  If only all the public was that keen on helping the police, Evan thought, as he swing the ear in the direction of Colwyn Bay and police headquarters. In the forensics lab he had the postcard tested for fingerprints. The problem this time was too many, as opposed to too few. The postcard would have been sorted, handled by a postman, then by various people at the radio station. Evan knew that he could probably track down the various postal and radio employees to match their fingerprints, but his gut told him this was a waste of time. The sender would have left no fingerprints. He would have taken no chances this time, either.

  He glanced at his watch and saw that he’d better put his foot down if he wanted to make it back to Caernarfon for the eight o’clock briefing.

  As Evan came into the room on the dot of eight, he was startled to see D.C.I. Hughes standing by the white board like an impatient teacher. Two uniform branch sergeants and Glynis Davies sat staring at him in silence.