wondering, when you come back, would you like to move into my spare room?’
‘I dunno. I’d like the kids to have as much time as they can with their parents together.’
‘But you’re not together,’ she pointed out. ‘You may be under the same roof, but you’ve separated.’
‘True,’ he admitted. ‘I’ll think about it. If I do, maybe those calls will stop.’
‘Maybe.’
‘So you’re still having them!’ he exclaimed.
She cursed herself for letting her guard slip. ‘There was another,’ she admitted.
‘Just one?’
‘Well, two.’
‘Right, in that case the intercept goes back on, and no arguments.’
Suddenly, Alex felt too weary to argue. Besides, there was that bloody cat: that had been more than annoying, it had been scary. ‘Okay, if you say so,’ she conceded. ‘I’ll phone Neil.’
Seventy-nine
James Proud sat in his armchair and closed his eyes. In his mind he went over every step of his investigation looking for a loose end that had not been tied off. He had been thinking about it for most of the afternoon, and now, well into the evening.
As he did, a feeling grew within him, a sense that there was something he was overlooking, something glaringly obvious, that a real detective would have picked up in an instant. A real detective, sure, not a pen-pusher cop like him. He made pictures of every scene, every meeting, every phone call, but nothing stood out; he could follow Bothwell’s trail to bloody Kirkliston, but no further; nobody knew where he and Montserrat had lived in Edinburgh after that. Nobody.
He sat bolt upright in his chair. ‘You bloody fool, Proud!’ he roared, as he sprang to his feet. ‘Chrissie, I’m going out for a while,’ he told his wife, as he paced out into the hall, not realising that she was in the kitchen and could not hear a word he said.
Snatching his coat from its hook he rushed out of the front door, without looking back, and stepped into his car. He knew where he was going; he knew exactly where he was going, and why the hell had it taken him so long to work it out? He swore that he would never criticise a detective officer again.
It was a long trip, across the city; the consolation was that when he arrived at his destination there were few cars parked in the narrow street, and so he was able to pull up immediately outside. He strode up the path to the front door and pressed the bell, hard. It took a while for the man inside to answer, but Proud had expected that: he was very old.
‘James,’ he said, as he saw him standing there. ‘How good to see you again.’
‘I’m glad I caught you in, Mr Goddard. I was afraid that you’d be out on your bike.’
‘The road’s a little too slippery for that, and anyway, I tend not to cycle after dark. You can’t trust drivers these days, you know. Come on in. Will you have tea?’
The chief constable followed his one-time teacher into his comfortable old house. ‘I’m in a bit of a rush, I’m afraid,’ he replied. ‘There’s something I need to ask you about old Adolf.’
Goddard’s eyebrows rose. ‘Indeed! I’ve been reading about him in the newspapers. What a remarkable turn of events. To think that he was on my staff for all those years, and instructing children, after doing that: it’s appalling. And you think he killed both his other wives as well?’
‘We’re certain. It’s about Montserrat that I need to ask you. When we spoke last, you told me that you went to look for him after he failed to return to school.’
‘Yes.’
‘Can you remember where? The only address we have for him in Edinburgh is out of date.’
‘That’s easy. He lived in the very next street. In fact he lived in the very same house that awful man was killed in, number twenty-two Swansea Street.’
Eighty
The ability to sleep on board aircraft had eluded Skinner all his life. He had envied Shannon as she dozed in the next seat, while he fidgeted, locked into the in-flight entertainment system as a means of passing the time, but ultimately switching off a movie that even James Andrew would have found puerile.
Nonetheless the flight had allowed him valuable thinking time, away from the distractions of the previous week. The one thing from which he could not escape was the worry over his daughter’s telephone persecutor, but he took comfort in the fact that she was not too far from the ferocious protection of McGuire and McIlhenney, and also in her ability to handle herself in most situations.
He had forced her situation to one side and thought about his own. There was no mystery any more: Piers Frame’s answer to his question had simply confirmed what he had known already. In London nobody was under threat, other than those who deserved to be.
In the US the situation was slightly different: people in a corner were unpredictable, often dangerously so, and especially if they saw a way out. He looked at Shannon again, and reached a decision.
The flight had touched down just before midday at Dulles International. The diplomatic passports that had exempted them from security at Heathrow worked their magic again at US Immigration. He had just finished calling Alex when they were approached by a bright-eyed young man in a Brooks Brothers suit that was pure Ivy League, made, almost certainly, in the Far East. ‘My name’s Ryan,’ he announced. ‘I’m from the embassy.’
The twenty-five-mile drive from the airport into the capital proved to be a guided tour, but Skinner was happy to let their escort do the talking, and he in turn was sufficiently experienced not to ask any questions. When they reached 3100 Massachusetts Avenue, they were handed over to another sharp suit. From the breadth of the shoulders that it enclosed, the Scot guessed that the wearer was not the cultural attache.
‘I’m Lee Ferry,’ he told them, as he led them into a small office behind Reception, ‘head of security for the building.’
‘Has my package arrived?’ asked Skinner.
‘Yes.’ Ferry unlocked a desk drawer, removed it, and handed it over.
The DCC ripped off the brown-paper wrapping to reveal a box. He opened it and took out the pistol that he had found on board the
‘You have a destination?’ the security chief asked.
‘Yes, and a route. All I need is a car.’
‘With diplomatic plates?’
‘Preferably.’
‘No problem. When do you want to leave?’
‘Right now.’
‘You don’t have time to meet the ambassador?’
Skinner smiled. ‘I doubt if he would want to meet me, Mr Ferry.’
‘Maybe not,’ the security chief conceded. ‘Sir, I’m not asking what you’re doing here, but if you wish, I’ll go with you.’
‘Thanks, but no. I’m going alone.’ He turned to his companion. ‘I’m afraid I mean that, Inspector. You’ve done a fine job, and I’m sorry to cut you out at the end of the road, but there are a few ways this could turn out and none of them are pretty. I need total freedom of action and don’t ask what I mean. We’re booked into the Jefferson Hotel; check in, do some sightseeing while there’s daylight left, and I’ll see you when I get back.’
She frowned. ‘You do mean “when”, boss, don’t you, not “if”?’
‘Of course I do. Don’t read too much into the gun: it’s a precaution, that’s all. Lee, where’s the car?’
‘Out back, sir.’ Ferry hesitated. ‘Can I ask you one thing?’
‘Sure, but I don’t promise to answer.’
