say much but I thought it strange for her to be sailing on her own. She looked frightened. She told me she had been out sailing alone and had got caught out by the bad weather. Then I saw the boat advertised for sale in the newsagent’s window in Portchester a week ago last Monday.’
That would have been on 9 March, thought Horton. ‘After Luke had visited your father.’
‘Yes. I arranged to view it that day and she told me her husband had died. She wanted to sell it. I said I would think about it and let her know by the end of the week. It was perfect for dealing with Luke.’
And if Venetia had told Horton this, would he have been able to save her? He doubted it. He certainly wouldn’t have been able to save Luke Felton.
‘So you arranged to meet Luke at Portchester Castle on Tuesday evening and walked with him around the shore towards the yacht. It was dark so no one would see you. You invited him on board, pretending it was your yacht and Willow Bank was your house. I suppose you told Luke you had only been visiting your father. You killed Luke, but not with a knife.’
Horton had been over that yacht viewing it on Thursday and he would swear there wasn’t any evidence, and certainly no blood.
‘I strangled him. Took the yacht out, dumped his body and brought the boat back again. It was so simple. I’d been prepared to take an impression of the boat keys to get another set cut but I didn’t need to. When I returned to the house, after viewing the boat, there was a set hanging on a nail just inside the door to the utility room. I took them and placed the keys she’d given me there while pointing to something in the garden. She seemed rather distracted and nervous and didn’t notice.’
And she’d said nothing to Horton about missing a set of keys. Even if she had, he and Uckfield would have assumed her killer had taken them along with the yacht.
The sound of a movement outside caught Horton’s attention, but he didn’t turn to investigate. He was more concerned about what Chawley might do with the piece of wood he was holding, and ducking out of its reach. But Cantelli had arrived. Good. Horton witnessed a flicker of surprise in Chawley’s eyes and braced himself for Chawley to make a swing at him with the wood. Then suddenly a blow from behind struck Horton on the side of his head. For a split second he wondered why Cantelli had hit him, before the deck of the steamer rushed up to meet him and his world went dark.
TWENTY-SIX
His head hurt. That was a good sign. If he felt pain he couldn’t be dead. He tried opening his eyes but the pygmy inside his skull was using it as a drum. He was vaguely aware of someone moving, and he could hear voices. They didn’t sound like Cantelli and neither did they sound very heavenly.
He concentrated on opening his eyes and hoped his head wouldn’t explode. This time he succeeded. Gradually the light filtered in. His eyes travelled up two pairs of legs, one sitting and the other standing. His heart leapt into his throat as he found himself staring at Gavin Chawley’s terrified face. Chawley was pressed on to a hard chair, his feet bound tightly with the chain that had stretched across the gangplank and his arms wrenched behind him and tied with something Horton couldn’t see. But it was the man beside him with a knife pressed to Chawley’s throat that concerned and horrified Horton. He stared into the hollowed, lined, dirty face and knew he was looking at the man responsible for scratching the emblem on his Harley. It was also the hooded figure he’d glimpsed in the boatyard — the Georgian.
He staggered up. The Georgian shouted, ‘One step and I kill him, like he killed my Eliso.’
‘Reason with him, for God’s sake,’ Chawley choked, his face contorted with terror.
Like you reasoned with Venetia, or rather Eliso, her real name, Horton felt like saying but didn’t. It wouldn’t help matters. As he stared into the Georgian’s deep-set dark eyes full of hatred and anger, he rapidly searched his brain to find a way of resolving this without anyone getting hurt or killed, which was looking increasingly unlikely. And where the hell was Cantelli? His heart somersaulted so violently that he felt sick. Surely the Georgian couldn’t have killed him. But no, Cantelli wouldn’t have come alone. But if he had. . Horton went cold inside. He had to resolve this and rapidly. Cantelli might be hurt and in need of urgent help. Horton didn’t even want to contemplate that he might be dead.
Urgently Horton addressed the Georgian. ‘I’ll see that he is tried and convicted for Eliso’s murder.’
The Georgian spat vehemently on the floor, making it perfectly clear what he thought of that. Chawley’s eyes stared, wide and frightened. Speedily, Horton recalled his hostage-negotiation training courses. Hostage takers fell into three categories: terrorists, criminals and the mentally disturbed, or the mad, bad and sad as they were generally referred to. Horton thought he was staring at all three in one man.
Though his mouth was dry and his palms damp he said evenly, ‘Was Eliso your girlfriend?’
‘My sister.’
Chawley gave a strangled sob as the Georgian clasped a big rough hand around his throat, forcing his head back while the knife pricked at its side.
‘You thought I’d killed Eliso at first, didn’t you?’ Horton quickly said.
Chawley stared at Horton, terrified.
Horton continued steadily, though his heart was racing. ‘You decided to follow me so that I could lead you to her killer.’ And he’d been very expert at that. Horton recalled seeing a motorbike the day he and Cantelli had followed Rookley into the cemetery, and he’d heard one when he’d been pushed in the lock. He’d also seen one when with Cantelli a couple of times, and with Uckfield, but he hadn’t noticed anything following him to Rowlands Castle or here, though two had overtaken him and one, which must have been the Georgian, had waited in a side street and watched him turn into the industrial estate. Following him to the paddle steamer, he’d patiently waited and listened until he knew the whole truth.
Chawley was pleading with Horton with his petrified eyes. Horton pressed on. ‘When you thought I wasn’t doing my job in looking for Eliso’s killer you left another message, this time on my yacht. You’ve waited a long time to find your sister.’
‘What’s that to you?’ he demanded roughly. Chawley’s eyes popped in his terrified face as the hand squeezed tighter.
‘I’d like to understand,’ Horton said, praying that he sounded genuinely interested. He was, but not half as interested as he was in resolving this rapidly and without anyone getting killed. ‘Please tell me about Eliso,’ he prompted, willing the Georgian to reply.
The man eyed Horton sceptically. There were several seconds before he replied, but they seemed like minutes. Gruffly the Georgian said, ‘I’m from the region of Shida Kartli, part of South Ossetia.’
That explained the Kartli coat of arms, thought Horton.
‘I was captured by the Georgians two years ago in the fighting and escaped to Poti, where the captain of a container ship took me to Istanbul. He told me he had taken my sister out of the country some years ago and put her on board a cargo ship sailing to Naples. She told him she was going to live with an Englishman near a castle by the sea.’
Poor Eliso, thought Horton. She thought she was going to live a fairytale existence. Some bloody fairy tale.
‘I got the name of the cargo ship captain who had taken Eliso to Naples and waited in Istanbul for him to arrive. In January he came. He told me that Eliso had sailed from Naples with a man in a boat. He was taking her to a place called Portsmouth. I came with this captain to Southampton.’
And Horton guessed he had stolen the motorbike there.
‘I went in search of this castle by the sea, and there was Eliso walking down the street. I followed her.’
