Authors: James Craig
‘What’s that?’
‘Don’t worry about it.’
For a moment there was silence. Then Horatio heard a click by his left ear. At the edge of his field of vision, he saw a small red light begin blinking on the improvised collar. The man took Horatio’s hand and brought it up to the collar so that he could feel the small device, about half the size of a cigarette packet, attached to one side.
‘Just don’t make any sudden movements.’
‘Why not?’ Horatio wanted his mum. He wanted to cry.
‘Because now, sonny, now you’re wearing a bomb.’
There was nothing Debbie could do to help him now. Clenching his buttocks tightly, Horatio watched his member belatedly start to droop. There was a noise from behind him that could have been disgust, could have been amusement. Through the open doorway, Horatio gazed forlornly at the front door, willing it to open and for his parents to walk into the hall. Where were they when he needed them? Watching a bloody musical!
Overwhelmed by confusion and self-pity, the boy found himself unable to speak.
‘Maybe you should pull up your trousers.’
‘Okay.’ To his own ear, Horatio’s voice sounded small and far away. With exaggerated caution, he did what he was told.
‘Don’t worry,’ the voice chuckled. ‘As long as you don’t try anything silly, you won’t set it off by accident.’
After buttoning his jeans, Horatio wiped his nose on the sleeve of his shirt. ‘What do you want?’
‘That’s none of your business.’
‘Not my business?’ Horatio echoed, incredulous. Feeling a gentle hand on his shoulder, he kept his eyes straight ahead. Meanwhile, on the TV, Debbie was on to her next scene. He watched ruefully as she writhed in simulated ecstasy in front of a bald man with the over-developed torso of a steroid-abusing body-builder. The girl was certainly putting her own body and soul into it. For a moment, Horatio was again transfixed. Not for nothing, he mused, had she won Best Anal Performance at the recent British Adult Video Awards Ceremony.
‘Switch it off,’ the voice commanded.
Horatio picked up the remote control and switched off the TV. In an instant, Debbie, his last link with normal life, disappeared into a black void. He dropped the remote on the sofa. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘Just sit still.’
Horatio started nodding, then thought better of that.
‘When the police arrive, answer their questions clearly and simply.’
‘Okay,’ said Horatio, though not understanding. Sensing the man step away from the sofa, he lifted his left hand to touch the device on his neck. Tears were not far away. ‘How long do I need to keep this on?’ There was no reply. He was suddenly conscious of the accelerated beating of his heart. ‘How long?’ Horatio repeated.
‘That depends,’ the man said finally.
‘On what?’ The boy’s eyes were welling up.
‘On nothing that is in your power and control, so just sit tight. The police will help you. Just make sure they don’t try and take off your collar.’
‘No?’ It sounded like a question.
‘No. If they try to do that,’ the man said slowly, ‘then it will be . . .
kaboom
.’
‘Osmund Caine.’
‘Mm.’ The inspector smiled as he savoured the pleasant burning feeling in the back of his throat. Having developed a taste for Irish whiskey in his twenties, he was a confirmed Jameson’s man. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy a nice glass of single malt when it came his way. And at 50.8 per cent proof, the Bladnoch would certainly help to take the edge off what was sure to be an uncomfortable meeting.
Towering over him, Sir Michael Snowdon pointed at the figures on the canvas. ‘It’s called
Bathing Beach
and was painted in 1938.’ The old man must have been well into his seventies but he still cut an imposing figure. Six foot two, with a shock of white hair and clear blue eyes, he wore a navy blazer with a spotted handkerchief sticking out of the breast pocket and grey slacks. His red and white striped shirt was open at the neck and there was a Patek Philippe Golden Ellipse on his left wrist. ‘That was almost a decade before a French structural engineer called Louis Réard came up with the idea working on the American nuclear tests at Bikini Atoll.’
‘I see.’ Not knowing what else to say, Carlyle looked imploringly at his sergeant for some help. However, sitting in an oversized armchair, Joe Szyszkowski was too busy tucking into a large slice of Lady Snowdon’s Victoria sponge cake to notice his cue. Looking like a stranger in her own drawing room, Veronica Snowdon herself hovered nervously at the window,
waiting for her husband to dispense with the pleasantries and get down to the matter in hand.
‘Caine was an interesting character,’ Snowdon continued. ‘He worked for the Military Police during the Second World War, then went into teaching.’ He took a sip from his own glass, which he had filled far more sparingly than the inspector’s. ‘It’s a nice addition to our small collection.’
‘Yes.’ Frowning, Carlyle watched Joe take another bite of his cake. Irritatingly, Victoria sponge was one of the few cakes he himself didn’t like; the cream put him off.
‘We only just got this painting recently, as it happens – at a GAC auction in St James’s.’
‘GAC?’ Carlyle enquired. Unlike Lady Snowdon, he was in no hurry to get down to the matter in hand.
‘The Government Art Collection,’ Snowdon explained.
‘I didn’t know they had one,’ the inspector mumbled, still not remotely interested.
Joe popped the last of the cake into his mouth and washed it down with a mouthful of Earl Grey tea. ‘I read about that the other day,’ he interjected cheerily. ‘The whole collections’s worth billions, apparently.’
‘I’m not sure about that.’ Snowdon signalled for the inspector to take a seat. ‘Maybe low hundreds of millions, rather than billions.’
‘Not that billions are worth much these days,’ Carlyle shrugged, ‘given the complete and utter mess we’re now in.’
‘At least we’re all in it together,’ Joe quipped, ‘as our Prime Minister likes to say.’
‘Yeah, right,’ Carlyle muttered.
‘Anyway,’ said Snowdon briskly, ‘that collection has always been a fairly mixed bag, it has to be said. Little more than bits and pieces which have been added over the years, here and there. It’s most certainly not a collection in the sense of something put together by someone with an overarching vision, who has sought to create a coherent whole. And it contains few if any top-notch items. But it certainly is big. Having basically been ignored for
decades, now they’re selling bits of it to help pay off some of the national debt.’
‘Good luck with that.’ Bending his knees, the inspector slowly lowered himself on to the edge of a four-seater cream sofa. ‘Maybe they can raise enough to bail out some small provincial building society that no one has ever heard of.’
‘Every little helps,’ Joe quipped, as he licked his fingers clean.
Manners!
Carlyle wanted to glower at him but couldn’t summon up the energy. ‘It’s not like there’s much point having a government art collection, anyway.’
Just another example of politicians taking the piss, in Carlyle’s opinion.
Plus ça change
.
‘You have to remember that art has long been seen as a useful tool of diplomacy.’ Snowdon smiled. ‘The collection was first set up in the 1890s, when MPs decided that it would be cheaper to hang paintings on the walls of British embassies around the globe rather than spend money redecorating them.’
‘That’s the great thing about our elected representatives,’ Carlyle grumbled. ‘Always focusing on the important stuff.’
‘At its peak,’ Snowdon continued, politely ignoring the plebeian boorishness of his guest, ‘before they started selling things off, the collection contained around twenty thousand works located in embassies, consulates and official residencies in more than a hundred and thirty countries.’
‘You know a lot about it.’ Satisfied that his hands were now clean, Joe wiped a crumb from his mouth.
‘I was a civil servant,’ Snowdon reminded him.
‘Of course,’ Joe nodded.
‘Michael was Permanent Secretary in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office,’ Veronica Snowdon chipped in. Apparently resigned to the meandering nature of the conversation, she fluttered nervously across the inspector’s field of vision and took a seat in the chair opposite Joe. In a grey, long-sleeved woollen dress and a brown cardigan, she looked smaller and more frail than he remembered.
That explains the gong, Carlyle thought. For services rendered. For all that he liked the man, the inspector was acutely conscious that Sir Michael Snowdon was a true pillar of the Establishment. By definition that meant he had to be handled most carefully.
‘I had a very nice Gillian Carnegie on my office wall for several years,’ Snowdon mused. ‘It was amazing how it could lift the spirits.’
‘Mm.’ The inspector smiled weakly.
‘I hear that the Prime Minister has even put a neon art installation in Downing Street,’ Joe contributed. ‘Apparently it helps brighten up the place.’
Carlyle stared into his whisky. That boy is just a wonderful repository of useless information, he thought. Not for the first time he was pleasantly surprised by Joe’s ability to master small talk. It was not something he had ever been any good at himself.
‘Ah, yes,’ Snowdon replied, ‘a red neon light saying something like
Grab the future
, or some such childish vacuousness. They put it in a hallway outside the Terracotta Room. It makes the place look like a nightclub, so I’ve heard.’
Joe smiled at his boss, who clearly didn’t have a clue what they were talking about. ‘It was a gift to the great British nation from the celebrated Peruvian artist and performer Yulissa Vasconzuelo.’
Carlyle stared at him blankly.
‘She’s famous for . . . something or other.’
‘That certainly sounds like Edgar Carlton’s cup of tea to me,’ Carlyle sneered.
The inspector deferred to no one in his hostility towards the Prime Minister, a profound personal dislike derived from professional experience. Before getting the keys to the front door of 10 Downing Street, hobnobbing with Peruvian artists and changing the art on the walls, Carlton had stymied an investigation into a particularly sordid case involving rape and murder. The officer in charge had been one J. Carlyle.
Veronica Snowdon gave her husband a look that said
Get on with it
. ‘Thank you for coming, Inspector,’ she said as a cue.
‘Yes,’ said Snowdon, tipping a nod to Carlyle and Joe Szyszkowski in turn, ‘we very much appreciate you both coming.’ He took a nervous sip of his scotch before continuing, ‘Especially given that this has never
really
been your concern.’
‘It is our pleasure, sir,’ said Carlyle gently, as he launched into a variation of the same speech that he had given several times before. ‘We,’ he gestured at Joe, ‘knew your daughter and had great appreciation for her work. I was in touch with her, before she died. We will always be happy to do what we can.’
From behind his tumbler of whisky, Michael Snowdon nodded sadly. It was almost two years now since Rosanna Snowdon had been found with a broken neck at the bottom of the stairs in the communal entrance to her Fulham apartment building. Pretty, and coming from a rich family, the girl had already made a minor name for herself as a local television presenter, so the press had soon been all over it.
She had also been one of Carlyle’s contacts.
Rosanna had fallen down the stairs. Tests showed that she had been drunk at the time, so it could have been an accident. At the same time, there was also evidence that she might have been pushed. The local police had come under immediate pressure to find a suspect and the name in the frame was Simon Lovell, a thirty-two year old with learning difficulties. Lovell was an obsessive fan and borderline stalker who regularly patrolled the pavement outside the presenter’s flat. Rosanna had come to the inspector to ask for help in ending this harassment. For his part, Carlyle liked the girl well enough, even if her shameless ambition made him uncomfortable. Besides, she had helped him during the Edgar Carlton case and he owed her a favour or two. When she looked to cash in his IOU, he made all the right noises without actually investigating what could be done. Thus, after she took a dive down the stairs, it was a matter for the Fulham police and he was happy to leave it well alone.
Seemingly more distraught than anyone, Lovell was only too happy to confess to the killing. However, the trial was a fiasco. In the absence of any forensic evidence, everything rested on Lovell’s statement. On the morning of the first day the judge was told that Lovell had a mental age of eight – gaining him the inevitable tabloid moniker of ‘Simple Simon’ – and hence a willingness to sign anything that was put in front of him. The case was thrown out before lunch on the first day.
After Lovell was released, there was nowhere for a moribund investigation to go. The coroner had ruled the death ‘suspicious’, so foul play had not been ruled out. Meanwhile, the case would remain in limbo unless or until a killer was identified and caught. Rosanna’s parents were left in a legal and emotional no man’s land that made the parent inside Carlyle shiver and the policeman inside him think, There but for the Grace of God.
On more than a couple of occasions, the inspector had wondered whether he could have done more at the time to help the young woman. While not exactly overcome by guilt, he was aware that he could have acted differently – or at least faster. Whenever this happened, he would quickly tell himself to stop brooding on something that was beyond his control. As Shakespeare said,
What’s gone and what’s past help should be past grief
.
Past grief? Try telling that to the parents of a dead girl. So here he was, drinking Sir Michael’s whisky, while trying to sound vaguely supportive. Staring into the single malt, he tried to remember how many times now he had sat here saying nothing of any import.
Three? No . . . four
.
This was his penance. The inspector genuinely hoped that these little get-togethers gave his hosts some comfort. Otherwise they were pointless.