a loose raincoat and a black hat. He had stopped at the reception desk, and
stood there for a while, his back to the camera throughout, appearing, to
Steele at any rate, to peruse some of the information leaflets on display
there. Then the receptionist had turned to pick up a telephone; there had
been a movement. Very little, no more than a flick of a wrist, and the
appearance of something small flying through the air and falling behind
the counter; only the appearance, that was all. Unless you added the fact
that a few seconds afterwards, as the receptionist ended her call, the man
had walked off, without turning, towards the hotel's side exit.
The only certainty that Stevie Steele had at the end of the day was that
there was nothing else on those security tapes. They were patchy in their
quality and, worse, they switched from camera to camera. He had walked
around the hotel and confirmed what he suspected, that each one had a red
'live' light and that anyone with half a brain would be aware when he was
being filmed and when he was not.
The only other slim clue to the identity of the actress's persecutor was
that one, cryptic e-mail message from the threateningly named John Steed.
It was the only potential lead he had left, and he was even beginning to
doubt that. Sure, its use of the word 'bitch' was offensive, but it was still
possible that it was nothing more than a letter from a fan with an odd turn
of phrase.
The only chance of finding out lay in the Newcastle cafe from which it
had been sent. He opened the door and stepped inside.
172
AUTOGRAPHS IN THE RAIN
Stevie Steele was something of a Net-head himself; he had a home
computer and an e-mail address, through which he had built up a small
network of friends around the world. He knew what a cyber-cafe was, a
drop-off point at which those without their own Internet connection, or
more likely, people travelling away from home, could buy on-line time,
and coffee while they used it.
He could see their value in big tourist centre cities, and in airports, but
he was slightly surprised that there was sufficient custom on Tyneside to
drive such a business. As soon as he stepped inside he could see that his
scepticism was justified.
The cafe side of the business seemed lively enough, but the three
computer terminals which sat on desks against the far wall were all idle. A
screen-saver was displayed on one, but the others were switched off.
As he looked at it, a middle-aged woman approached him; she wore a
designer suit, and a pleasant smile. 'Can I help you?' she asked, in a tone
which suggested that that was genuinely what she wanted to do.
'Mrs Egremont?'
'Yes.'
'I'm DS Steele; I called you this morning.'
'Ah yes.' The smile stayed in place, but behind it was something that he
had seen many times before, the natural uncertainty sparked by a visit from
a policeman.
He tried to put her at her ease at once. 'I'm grateful you could see me so
quickly,' he said. 'It's nothing to do with you, really; I'm trying to trace a
customer of yours.' He reached into his jacket and took out the printout of
the Steed email.
This was sent on November the ninth through Hotmail, from this
location. The User-id is "John Steed", but that mailbox hasn't been used
since. I'm hoping that you can recall something about him that will help us
trace him.'
Paula Egremont frowned. 'Is this nuisance mail?' she asked.
'You could say that.'
'Let me look at my diary.' She walked over to the till counter and took
out a book from a ledge underneath. 'November nine, you said?'
'That's right; a Thursday.'
She opened the desk diary and turned over page after page until she
round that date. Her lips moved unconsciously as she read. 'Yes!' she said,
at last, with evident satisfaction. T do remember him. I had a visit from a
coffee rep. that day; he had supplied me with some poor quality stuff and
we had a row about it.
'While we were having it, the only other person in the place was my
only Internet customer of the day. A young man, in his twenties; cleanshaven,
wearing jeans, Timberland boots, or something of that ilk, and a
heavy donkey type jacket.'
'You know him?'
She shook her head. 'Never seen him before or since. But the truth is I
don't have all that many Net customers, so I tend to remember them fairly
easily.'
'Can you tell me anything else about him?'
'He had a pale complexion, and he wore rimless glasses; could have
been Gucci. We didn't say much to each other though. He came in, asked
for a coffee, pointed at the machine and I switched it on. I'd just given him
his coffee, when that damn rep. came in. By the time I'd finished
complaining to him, he was signing off.
'He finished his coffee, paid and left.' She smiled, apologetically. That's
all I can tell you, I'm afraid... apart, oh yes, I nearly forgot, apart from the
hat. He was wearing a black hat.'
I
174
50
Detective Sergeant Jack McGurk grumbled quietly to himself as he drove
down the country road. Dan Pringle was a good guy to work for most of the
time but when he felt under pressure he tended to share it around.
When he started to indulge in creative thinking, anything could happen;
his bright idea of keeping Mercy Alvarez' Country Fresh Trout under secret
video surveillance was a prime example.
It was fine in theory, cost-effective policing that did a job without tying
up teams of detectives round the clock, but in practice some poor bugger
still had to go and change the tape every so often; first thing in the morning
too, to lessen the chances of his being spotted. Of course, secrecy being the
watchword, and Dan being too new in the division to know whom he could
trust completely, that poor bugger just had to be Jack McGurk.
The sergeant had mixed feelings about his transfer to the Borders; it
would mean a move south, away from the city. Even now he was living
through the week in a furnished police flat in Newtown St Boswells. On
the other hand Dan Pringle had more or less promised him that if he did the
job for three years he would swing him a quick promotion to inspector.
That was a distant prospect, though, as he stopped beside the fence which
bounded the woods in which the video cameras were hidden in a
camouflaged box. He could approach through the trees without any danger
of being seen from the farm, and the road was so isolated that he could
leave without attracting any other attention.
The downside was that at daybreak the forest was still dark, and the
trees were dripping wet. He took his rubber boots from the well of the
passenger seat and pulled them on, then slipped into his Barbour, slapping
the deep pockets to make sure that he was carrying the fresh tapes and fully
charged batteries.
He made his way through the woods; it was Thursday morning and he
was making the trip for the third time, so even in the gloom he knew the
/> way fairly well. It had taken him half an hour to find the box on his first
morning, and he had only just managed to avoid being spotted by the
manager as she made her first round of the tanks.
The box opened from the back; he slipped the cameras out, one by one,
exchanged the tapes, then finally replaced the depleted batteries. Finally,
his job done, he risked a look across the clearing.
McGurk would have crept away had he not noticed the door; Kath Adey's
cottage lay open to the morning chill, yet there was no sign of her. Quickly
he glanced around the compound. The Suzuki jeep which he had seen on
his first visit, and which he had assumed was hers was still there, parked
beside one of the sheds. He listened; there was no sound but the beat of the
pumps, and the steady splashing of the circulating water.
And then he looked at the tanks. Maybe the fish were asleep, for there
were no signs of trout breaking the surface, no signs offish snapping at the
food, insect or artificial, which he had noticed there before. Yet there was
something, something much bigger than any trout, something in the tank
nearest the cottage, something floating face down.
'Oh shit,' Detective Sergeant Jack McGurk muttered as he forgot all
about secrecy, breaking his cover to rush across the clearing, rubber boots
flapping awkwardly as he ran.
176
51
For many years, Andrew John had worn a beard. Although it had disappeared
shortly after the arrival of its first grey hairs, Andy Martin imagined it in
place still, as he took a seat in the banker's small office in a depressing
concrete building in the Grassmarket. John was a good friend and occasional
golf partner of Bob Skinner and had proved invaluable to him over the
years, as a sounding board in the business sector.
'Sorry to drag you in here so early, Andy,' he began. 'But I'm only
paying flying visits to my office this week. That's one of the bad things
about the commercial side of our business.' He gave a quick, bright laugh,
and glanced around the small dull room. 'Or maybe it's one of the good
things.
'I spend more time in my customers' offices than I do in my own.'
'I used to be able to say the same,' said the Head of CID. 'Now I'm
scratching around for excuses to get out of the office. I found one the other
day, though,' he continued. That's what brought me here.
'I had occasion to pay a visit to a trout farm near Coldstream . . .'
'Oh,' exclaimed Andrew John, rolling his eyes at the detective and leaning
back in his chair. 'Country Fresh? The Welly-boot Contessa?'
'Apart from the fact that Contessas are Italian, not Spanish, that's the
very lady.'
'What's she been up to?'
Martin held up his hands, palms outwards. 'Nothing. Nothing at all,
honest. I went to see her because we've had a couple of major thefts from
fish farms in that area. They both lost all their stock; had it hoovered up
into container trucks through big suction hoses.
'In both cases their security was crap. My guys visited her after the
second theft and saw that hers is too. She was a bit off-hand when they told
her she should improve it, so I went down to give her a slightly heavier
message.
'She told me she'd have to speak to you before she did anything, so I
AUTOGRAPHS IN THE RAIN
thought I'd have a quiet word with you too. We're about to recommend to
the insurers that they get very tough with farmers who use their policies as
alternatives to crime prevention provisions; I thought you should be aware
of that when she asks you for spending approval, or an increased facility or
whatever.'
'Thanks Andy,' said the banker. 'I appreciate that. Within these four
walls, it won't make my decision any easier, though. I'm as exposed to that
lady already as I want to be; to that whole sector in fact.'
Martin looked at him in surprise. 'Why's that?'
'Ach, most of these places are penny operations. There's so much fanned
salmon on the market now, either raised here or dumped by the Norwegians,
that it's depressing the price of trout. I used to have half a dozen trout
farmers as clients; most of them estate owners who saw it as a way of
making some extra money,
'Now I've got only two; Mercy Alvarez and one other. The other one's
all right for now, because he's worked out that the only way to profitability
is to add value to the stuff before you let it out the farm gate, by processing
on site. Mercy, though, she just raises it quick and sells it quick, so she's
dancing around the break-even line all the time. That's no use to me; I want
to lend to businesses that are going to expand and become more substantial
bank customers in the future.
'In that respect, fish farms are second last on my wish list.'
'What's last?' asked the detective, amused.
'Football clubs. They soak up tons of borrowing but how do you foreclose
on them?'
'You don't; you sponsor them.'
'Ah, in an ideal world you only sponsor them, never lend. Let some
other bugger do that!'
'So ... has Mercy been in touch with you since Monday?'
'No. But I've been away from the office, remember.' He leaned across
his desk and flicked through a pile of yellow message slips. 'Yes, there's a
note here asking me to call her this morning.'
'When you do get in touch with her, what'll you say?'
'Ach, I don't know. What's the damage likely to be?'
'I can't say for sure, but I can tell you it won't be any more than next
year's insurance premium, if she doesn't install
He broke off as his mobile rang. He took it from his pocket, excusing
himself as he answered.
I
Across the desk, Andrew John saw the chief superintendent's face darken.
'Fuck!' he swore quietly. 'I'm coming down, Dan. Is Dorward on his way?
Good?' He ended the call and put the phone away.
'The horse has bolted, Andrew,' he said. 'The fish have swum; use any
analogy you fucking like. Your customer's farm has been done; only this
time they've left a casualty behind, and it isn't a bloody trout.'
'What?' John gave him a look of pure incredulity.
'Kath Adey, the manager. Someone hit her over the head, then dumped
her in a fish tank. She's dead.'
178
Andy Martin made a point of learning by experience. On his second visit to
Country Fresh Trout, he left his MGF in the care of a uniformed constable
stationed at the head of the farm track and called for a police Land Rover to
take him along the rough last leg of the journey.
Dan Pringle was standing at the door of the manager's cottage as his
driver pulled up and he jumped out. A black panel van, with a spinning
ventilator on its roof, was parked outside, its rear doors open. As the Head
of CID approached his colleague he passed it, and glanced inside. A plastic
coffin lay on the floor, its lid alongside it; he caught a glimpse of a white
face, blue-tinged.
'Tell me about it,' he asked quietly.
'Jack found her,' said the superintendent, the only person on the scene,
apart from Martin himself, who was not wearing a white tunic. 'He came to
change the tapes in the video, and he saw the girl, floating in the tank.'
'What did the doctor say?'
Autographs in the Rain Page 24
