‘I can access our records from over there. I suggest that I continue here for the next two hours, and then take the train. We need to know if Caxton and O’Grady are in the vehicle in the UK, but we need to place them near to the scene of the crime.’
‘Sorry, Wendy,’ Isaac said. ‘You’ll need to stay in London, no souvenirs for you, no late-night drinking with Bridget.’
‘That’s understood,’ Wendy said.
Bridget leant over, touched her on the arm. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll bring you back a big box of chocolates, as well as a bottle of beer.’
‘I’d rather the farmer that took a fancy to Emily,’ Wendy said, Larry having recounted the story earlier.
‘If he fits in my bag, I may just do that,’ Bridget said.
***
Giles Helmsley may have been credited with a high intellect, a PhD from Oxford University, but he was not the man to administer drugs, especially the narcotic kind. It was five in the morning when one of the two men who had helped Helmsley with Lawrence knocked on the door of his flat.
‘It’s Michael,’ the man said. His visit was not appreciated in the building where the radical academic lived, a door opening on the floor below, a curious person looking out, telling whoever it was to keep the noise down.
‘Mind your own business,’ Coyote said, with a few expletives. It was not the addict’s name but the moniker taken from a cartoon that he answered to. He thought it made him sound cool; it did not. It only made him appear to be more stupid than he actually was. A typical anarchist follower, Helmsley would have admitted if pressed.
‘What’s up with him? Has he left?’
‘He’s not moving. I’ve tried shaking him, even threw water on him, but nothing.’
Helmsley pulled Coyote inside the flat. ‘Shut up and sit quietly while I get dressed.’
Coyote wrestled with the concept of quiet, and he moved around the flat, looking at this and that, staring out of the window. He was shaking and sweaty, and in need of a fix, and the professor had taken his drugs and given them to Michael the night before.
Helmsley came out from his bedroom, put on a coat that was hanging from a hook on the back of the door to the flat. He then grabbed the addict, not willing to call him by his silly name, and dragged him out. On the landing outside, Coyote said, ‘It’s Michael, he’s dead.’
‘For Christ’s sake, be quiet,’ Helmsley said, increasingly annoyed that the man knew his address.
As they walked down the stairs, Coyote was still complaining, grabbing hold of the bannisters, brushing up against a couple of the doors. One of the disturbed residents opened his door and made a comment; Coyote tried to get free and to smash him one. ‘That’s all they understand,’ he said.
Giles Helmsley had kept his anarchist beliefs separate from where he lived. He had a cause to follow, a cause that required sacrifices, but not his. To his neighbours, he was a quiet, studious man, and now that was unravelling as Coyote continued to cause trouble. Outside, on the street, he gave the addict a smack across the face with an open palm – it had some effect. In the Jaguar, cold at first, but soon warmer with the heater, the two men drove to the dosshouse.
Inside on the floor, lay Michael Lawrence. ‘He’s not dead,’ Helmsley said. ‘He’s still breathing.’
‘He’s OD’d,’ Coyote said. The other occupant of the room, another addict who preferred being called ‘Stud’ to Gerald, continued to sleep, his snoring raucous. Helmsley opened a window, the cold air taking some of the smell in the room. He phoned Emergency Services.
Chapter 28
When Bridget arrived at the railway station in Brussels, Jules Hougardy was waiting outside for her. She was as impressed with the man as Emily and Larry had been. It was late afternoon by the time she arrived, and although she had spent the morning checking through the databases, attempting to access CCTV footage of the cross-channel tunnel and the ferries, it hadn’t been entirely successful. Forensic analysis of the Land Cruiser had not come up with anything more. The vehicle, returned to the owner after its now known sojourn on the continent, had been patched up, driven along rough tracks, had its underside bashed, its bodywork scratched, before being subjected to an amateurish three-month restoration by the owner. It had then been sold on to another off-road enthusiast. Any evidence of Belgium, Caxton, and O’Grady was long gone, apart from a sample of the Peugeot’s paint. The only piece of good news was the confirmation that the vehicle had crossed into mainland Europe three days before Samuels died, and had returned two days after. No doubt the delay in the return had been to check that the vehicle wasn’t wanted by the police: the usual practice being to park it somewhere prominent, somewhere legal, somewhere the police would have been checking. If it was still there after a couple of days, then it was safe to drive.
‘I’ve booked you into the same hotel as Inspectors Matson and Hill,’ Hougardy said, ‘but first, we must have dinner. I’ve arranged a local place, somewhere the tourists avoid. All they want is fish and chips, but for you, the works.’ Bridget remembered Emily’s comments about the Belgian police officer’s love of fish and chips, but that was not what she ate. For her, it was Carbonnade Flamande, a beef casserole cooked in wine. For dessert, waffles and ice cream. The meal was delicious, the company excellent, and she made sure to phone Wendy on her return to her hotel.
‘Perfect gentleman,’ Bridget said.
‘The evening wasn’t a total success then,’ Wendy said.
‘It was. Tomorrow I’m meeting with his team
