He went into his study, flipped open the lid of his laptop and logged on. Then cursed. The damned server was down.
And there was only one way to get it back up and running.
63
Max Candille was almost impossibly good-looking, Roy Grace always thought on each occasion he met him. In his mid-twenties, with bleached blond hair, blue eyes and striking features, he was a modern Adonis. He could surely have been a top model, or a movie star. Instead, in his modest semi-detached house in the suburban town of Purley, he had chosen to make his gift, as he called it, his career. Even so, he was quietly becoming a rising media star.
The bland exterior of the house, with its mock-Tudor beams, neat lawn and a clean Smart parked in the driveway, gave few clues about the nature of its occupant.
The whole interior of the house - the downstairs at least, which was all Grace had ever seen - was white. The walls, the carpets, the furniture, the slender modern sculptures, the paintings, even the two cats which prowled around like bonsai versions of Siegfried and Roy's cheetahs, were white. And seated in front of him, in an ornate rococo chair, with a white frame and white satin upholstery, sat the medium, dressed in a white roll-neck, white Calvin Klein jeans and white leather boots.
He held his china demitasse of herbal tea delicately between his finger and thumb and spoke in a voice that was borderline camp.
'You look tired, Roy. Working too hard?'
'I apologize again for coming so late,' Grace said, sipping the espresso Candille had made for him.
'The spirit world doesn't have the same time frames as the human one, Roy. I don't consider myself a slave to any clock. Look!' He put down his tea, held up both his hands, and pulled each sleeve back to reveal he wore no watch. 'See?'
'You're lucky.'
'Oscar Wilde is my hero when it comes to time. He was always unpunctual. One time when he arrived exceptionally late for a
dinner party the hostess angrily pointed at the clock on the wall and aid, 'Mr Wilde, are you aware what the time is?' And he replied, 'My dear lady, pray tell me, how can that nasty little machine possibly know what the great golden sun is up to?''
Grace grinned. 'Good one.'
'So, are you going to tell me what brings you here today, or should I guess? Might we be concerned with something to do with a wedding? Am I warm?'
'No prizes for that one, Max.'
Candille grinned. Grace rated the man. He didn't always get things right, but his hit rate was high. In Grace's long experience, he didn't believe that any medium was capable of always getting everything right, which is why he liked to work with several, sometimes cross-checking one against another.
No medium he had worked with so far had been able to tell him what had happened to Sandy - and he had been to many. In the months following her disappearance he visited every medium he could find who had any kind of a reputation. He had tried a few times with Max Candille, who had been honest enough at their very first meeting to tell him that he simply did not know, that he was unable to make a connection with her. Some people left a trail behind, all kinds of vibrations in the air, or in their belongings, Max had explained. Others, nothing. It was as if, Max told him, Sandy had never existed. He couldn't explain it. He couldn't say whether she had covered her own tracks, or if someone had done it for her. He didn't know whether she was alive or not.
But he seemed very much more definite about Michael Harrison. Taking the bracelet Ashley had given Grace, he thrust it back at the police officer within seconds, as if it was burning his hand. 'Not his,' he said, emphatically. 'Absolutely not his.'
Frowning, Grace asked, 'Are you sure?'
'Yes, I'm sure, absolutely.'
'It was given to me by his fiancee.'
'Then you need to ask her and yourself why. This absolutely does not belong to Michael Harrison.'
Grace wrapped the bracelet back in a tissue and carefully pocketed it. Max Candille was emotional - and not always accurate.
However, combining his comments on the bracelet with Harry Frame's, something did not feel right about it.
'So what can you tell me about Michael Harrison?' Grace asked.
The medium sprang up from his chair, went out of the room, pausing to blow kisses at the cats, then returned moments later holding a copy of the News of the World. 'My favourite paper,' he informed Grace. 'I like to know who's screwing who. Far more interesting than politics.'
Grace enjoyed reading it himself, sometimes, but wasn't about to admit that now. 'I'm sure,' he said.
The medium folded back a couple of pages then held the paper up so Grace could see the headline, with Michael Harrison's photograph beneath. 'MANHUNT FOR AWOL FIANCE'.
Then the medium looked at it himself for some moments. 'Well, see, you are even quoted in here. ''We are now regarding Michael Harrison's disappearance as a Major Incident,' said Detective Superintendent Roy Grace of Sussex Police, 'And are stepping up police manpower to comb the area he is believed to be in...''
Then he looked up at Grace again. 'Michael Harrison's alive,' he said. 'Definitely alive.'
'Really? Where? I need to find him - that's what I need your help for.'
