As Easy as Murder

Thirteen

Alex called me early next morning, just as Tom was leaving for school and Jonny was heading down to the beach with a mat, a towel and a book, a story called The Loner that I’d just read and thought he might enjoy. He couldn’t begin his schedule-planning with Brush until America woke up, but the European Tour press officer had warned him that he might have quite a busy day dealing with media, and so he decided that he’d better grab some relaxation time while he could. We’d spent the rest of our dinner date walking through old memories, some of them mutual, others confessions of a sort. The most surprising to me was Jonny’s revelation that he’d got a girl pregnant in his second year at college, a psychology major who hadn’t been as clever as she’d thought. She’d insisted on a termination, and he hadn’t argued. He’d felt guilty ever since; another reason for his self-imposed emotional isolation.

‘Don’t,’ I told him. ‘Her choice, not yours. That’s a moral maze and you were too young to get lost in it.’

‘When you found you were pregnant with Tom,’ he ventured, ‘after you and Uncle Oz had split up, did you ever consider having an abortion?’

‘Not for one micro-second,’ I replied. ‘Oh, I made a very bad choice in keeping him secret, but I was always going to have him. You see, the difference between your girl and me. . I loved his dad.’ I looked him in the eye. ‘That’s why you’re screwed up about women, Jonny, isn’t it? It’s got fuck all to do with concentrating on your career.’

‘True. There are whispers already that I’m gay. Even on the amateur circuit, if you don’t have a girl in tow you’re looked on as odd. Among the pros. . look no further than at the Ryder Cup. A guy gets divorced and there’s paper talk that the other players’ wives will freeze him out. They shouldn’t even be there! It’s a golf match, for fuck’s sake!’

His outrage made me laugh. ‘If you make the team next year,’ I suggested, ‘and you don’t have a girlfriend, you may find that your mother doesn’t share that view.’

I was still smiling as I picked up the phone next morning. ‘Can I come up for coffee?’ my friend asked.

‘And croissants, if you play your cards right. I’ve fed my guys, but I haven’t had my own yet. But shouldn’t you be heading in the other direction, for your office?’

‘You’re forgetting,’ he chuckled, ‘I’m acting boss. I decide where I go. Anyway, this is business of a sort.’

‘You’re not wrong,’ I agreed. ‘I have something to tell you as well.’

By the time he arrived, just over half an hour later, I was showered and dressed, out of the house dress that I normally throw on when I get out of bed, and into denim cut-offs and a baggy T-shirt with a Gaudi motif, that I’d bought in Barcelona. By that time also, I’d phoned Shirley.

Her voice sounded bleary, and I guessed her eyes matched. ‘Sleepless night?’ I asked her.

‘Pretty much.’

‘I take it he hasn’t been in touch.’

‘No, not a cheep; not a phone call, not a text, nothing. He’s a son of a bitch; that’s the long and short of it.’

‘Maybe not,’ I said. ‘Maybe there was a good reason for him going, one that he couldn’t tell you about.’

‘Huh,’ she snorted. ‘That doesn’t wash with me. My idea of a partnership is that you don’t keep secrets from each other.’

She was quoting me back at myself. I’d said the same to her, word for word, not long after I’d moved back to St Martí and we’d renewed our friendship. ‘Yes,’ I conceded, ‘but remember this. We know that the man worked in a culture of secrecy. It’s his way; the sort of lifetime habit that can be hard to break.’

‘Are you trying to tell me you know something?’

‘No,’ I replied, truthfully. ‘I’m not trying to tell you anything. I’m asking how you are, that’s all.’ I heard the gate creak. ‘Look, I’ll come up and see you later. Bye for now.’

Alex reached the door just as I opened it. I let him in and told him he should go to the first-floor terrace, unless he didn’t want to be seen with me that early in the morning.

‘People will talk, you mean?’ he laughed. ‘Let them, I’ll be in good company. People talk about you all the time, Primavera. For example, did you enjoy dinner last night? Are you sure the boy’s your nephew?’

‘How the hell did you know that?’ I demanded. ‘Have you got a spy in the village?’

‘Only you, my dear, I assure you. No, I called the office before I came here, and the sullen Magda was very quick to tell me about you. She and her boyfriend had dinner at Can Coll last night. She saw you walk past and go into Can Roura with, as she described him, your young lover. She added that a little later, when they were leaving, she looked in, through the open door and saw you kissing him.’

I felt myself flush up. ‘Yes, platonically. Alex. .’

‘Hey,’ he said, in his soothing voice, ‘I believe you. But even if your tongue was down his throat like she said, it’s your business, not mine. Most certainly it’s not Magda’s. She is not going to enjoy the job I’m going to give her when I get to Girona. I’m only telling you because I don’t want you to hear the story first from anyone else. For all I know, she’s phoned a newspaper by now. For her sake, I hope not; I’ll end the career of anyone I catch spreading gossip from my office. Now,’ he said, briskly, ‘come on, girl, what about these croissants?’

I served them up on a tray, on the terrace, five minutes later. He’d finished the first of his before he said anything more. When he did, he began, ‘Jorge’s done some good work for me. He’s established that Christine McGuigan was what she said she was, a freelance journalist and photographer who used the name Christy Mann because it looked better on by-lines.’

‘It’ll look good on her tombstone too,’ I said, a little cruelly, I concede.

‘She was, as we knew already, twenty-seven years old,’ he continued, ‘born in Cork, Ireland, where her widowed father still lives. The Irish embassy in Madrid came up with her life story pretty quickly. She trained as a photographer on an evening paper in Dublin, then had a spell as a sports reporter with a satellite television station that’s no longer in existence.’ He paused. ‘She moved to Spain just over a year ago; that’s when she decided to become Christy Mann apparently. Since then she’s operated mostly on the Costa del Sol, but in other areas whenever she was given a specific commission. Most of her video work was for websites, but she did contribute photography to newspapers in Britain, Ireland and in Spain; all of it was as Christy. As Christine, she was a member of the National Union of Journalists of the UK and Ireland, but that lapsed. She never resigned formally; just stopped paying her subscription.’

‘What brought her to the golf tournament?’ I asked. ‘Did you find any lead in her room to who it was who hired her? She told me she was from an internet station that she called Spotlight Television, but given what became of her I don’t believe that any more.’

He picked up his second croissant. ‘Primavera, we didn’t find anything. She was in the Novotel, right enough; she checked in on Thursday afternoon; as Christine McGuigan, incidentally, even though there’s no evidence of her having used that name in Spain before. She had a lime-green suitcase, the clerk recalled. There was no sign of it, or anything else, in her room; it had been stripped bare. There was nothing left, not so much as a toothbrush.’

‘Bugger,’ I murmured. ‘Her killer really didn’t want her identified, did he?’

‘Clearly not,’ Alex agreed, ‘as he’s shown by removing every clue to her identity, including her face, as he did with his first victim. I’m sure he didn’t expect her to be traced to the Novotel, but he covered that base just in case. But this time, we’ve been lucky, thanks to your run-in with her. And to me asking for her passport,’ he added. ‘Jorge’s established that she’s used the name Christy Mann since arriving in Spain. It’s on her tax identification document, on her bank accounts, in the telephone directory, everywhere we’ve looked.’

‘Then why did she have her Christine passport on her when you asked her for it?’

‘Because it’s the only photo ID she had, and the airline she flew in on insist on that. She had to book her flight under her real name. Incidentally, she did that only on Wednesday, proving that she got a short-notice summons from whoever hired her.’ He grinned. ‘All that subterfuge overcome by a couple of pieces of blind luck. Without them, I doubt that we’d ever have identified the body. But we have, and that gives us an advantage. The murderer thinks he’s free and clear, but he’s not. Hopefully, just knowing who she is will lead us to him.’

His voice was more confident than his eyes. ‘But you’re no nearer to knowing what links her to the man in the woods, are you?’ I observed. ‘Or to understanding what got them killed.’

He shook his head, ruefully.

‘Then let me make your day,’ I said. From under the breakfast tray I took the large envelope I’d left there, and handed it to him. He opened it and withdrew a series of photographs, prints that I’d made, using my own camera as an interface with my computer, of the images on Christine McGuigan’s memory card.

He stared at them, one by one. ‘What the hell are these?’ he hissed.

I told him, and explained how I’d come by them. ‘She had no interest in selling photographs of Tom,’ I said. ‘The connection between your two bodies is what, or rather who, you suspected it was after the first murder. It’s Patterson Cowling, and it seems bloody clear from his reaction that he knows it too. Yes, Alex, his disappearance is your business after all.’

He looked at the images, in silence, over and over again. He finished his second croissant, and his coffee. I poured him a refill.

Finally, he turned to me. ‘Primavera, you are a remarkable woman, and I’m proud that you’re my friend. But in the real world, little lady detectives don’t exist. As the last few days have shown you, close up, the real world is a very dangerous place. I thank you for giving this to me. Now I tell you in all seriousness: whatever it is you think you might do from now on, forget it. Every aspect of this, including Mr Cowling’s disappearance, is now a police investigation.’

‘But I could help more,’ I protested. ‘As for danger, I’ve known more in my life than you have, mate.’

He nodded. ‘I’m sure you have, in the days when you didn’t have a son.’

He had a point there, but I wasn’t giving in that easily. ‘Man, I’m not suggesting that I go chasing people with guns. But-’

‘No.’

‘You’re not even going to ask why he might be-’

‘Yes, but I’m not going to ask you. Primavera, I’m adamant. Up till now in this, I’ve humoured you, and yes, you’ve been very useful. But no more. Come on, don’t you have other work to do? Aren’t you going to get involved in your brother-in-law’s wine business?’

He had a second point. I had indeed promised Miles that I’d go there that very week for a tour of inspection by the manager.

I added a third. So what? From any viewpoint, Shirley had had a narrow escape. Whether he was only running from her voracity, or whether from real or perceived danger, he was not the kind, manly, uncomplicated, loving companion she thought she’d found and as far as I was concerned she was well shot of him. If he was out in the jungle with man-eating tigers on his tail, that was his problem. . as long as my friend wasn’t on the menu herself.

‘You’ll look after Shirley?’ I asked. No, the way it came out it was a demand, not a question.

‘I will,’ he promised, getting my point, that someone might imagine she knew where Patterson was headed. ‘I’ll have her house watched, round the clock.’

‘You’ll only need to cover the back entrance,’ I said, ‘in Plaça Puig Sec. I’ve seen prisons with walls and gates that are smaller than she has at the front.’

‘I know,’ he agreed. ‘But just to be sure I can put movement sensors in her garden.’

‘I think you’ll find that she has them. Anything bigger than a cat going through there sets off her alarm. You don’t need to tell her about this, do you? At the moment she doesn’t realise that Patterson’s in danger.’

‘I must. If there’s any sort of a threat to her, however slight, I have a duty to make her aware of it.’

‘In that case I could-’

He smiled. ‘No, Primavera. Credit me with a little diplomacy. She does know about the work he did, I take it?’

‘Yes.’

‘That makes it easier.’

‘And raises another question. Do you report this to your own. .’ I paused, knowing nothing about Spanish security services. ‘Who exactly could you report it to?’

He frowned. ‘I might be an acting intendant, Primavera, but I’m still only a regional cop. I’ll tell the directorate in Barcelona about this new development and what I’m doing about it. They can take it from there. I imagine they’ll talk to the British. Indeed, it may be that Mr Cowling has done that himself, by now, and that they’ve pulled him out. It’s the best part of a day since he dropped out of sight; he could be in London by now.’

‘If he caught a flight, you’ll trace it, yes?’

‘Yes, but if he caught a train, from Perpignan for example, across the border in France, then we couldn’t.’

‘Unless he bought his ticket with a credit card.’

‘True, but. .’ He broke off, laughing. ‘Woman, would you stop doing my thinking for me! However hard you try to make yourself invaluable, you are not involved in this. Go on, be a mother, be a champion golfer’s secretary, sell wine. Be whatever you want, but please don’t try to be an investigator.’

My croissant. . they are in essence lumps of baked carbohydrate waiting to be turned into body fat, so I eat only one at a time. . still lay untouched on the plate. I snatched it up, withdrawing from further argument.

‘That’s a good girl,’ Alex chuckled, really chancing his arm. If I’d had access to his soft bits, they’d have been at risk.

But I did no more than grunt, and gaze ahead, from the terrace across the square, where the cafes, other than Meson del Conde, which was closed, were readying themselves for what would be inevitably a quiet Monday, since May still had a couple of days to run. As I did, a newcomer to the village appeared, with a bag slung over his shoulder, and distinctive, by his bewilderment and by the colour of his skin.

I stood, and waved. ‘Uche!’ I called out, unnecessarily, for he had seen me. ‘Jonny’s caddie,’ I explained. ‘He’s moving into one of the apartments above Can Roura. Come on up,’ I instructed him.

The two men passed in the doorway, with brief introductions and a quick handshake. Most people are slightly disconcerted when they meet a uniformed cop, but Uche simply gave a brief courtly bow, managing to suggest that the honour was all Alex’s. I led him into the kitchen, stuck another couple of croissants under the grill, and offered him coffee. He opted for water, but scoffed the rolls as if he hadn’t eaten in days.

‘Is your father still here?’ I asked him.

‘Yes, until tomorrow. He’s given his crew a forty-eight-hour stopover in Barcelona.’

‘Ah, so his offer of a flight was bullshit.’

‘Possibly not; he’s a qualified pilot himself, and I’m sure he could have found someone locally who was qualified to sit in the other seat.’ He frowned. ‘However, you were right to turn him down; when he invites a lady to fly with him, he usually has more than travel in mind.’

I shrugged. ‘That’s not a crime. He’s a single man, isn’t he?’

‘Oh yes.’ I saw the same glint of anger as I’d noticed the day before. ‘Single, and singular.’

‘How was dinner?’

The smile returned. ‘Educational, as always.’

‘On whose part?’

‘Mutually, I would say. He told me that he had humoured me for long enough and that it was time for me to prepare myself for my future in the family businesses, and for the responsibilities that I’ll inherit one day in Nigeria, when I succeed him as emir. I told him that he looked pretty healthy to me. I added that I couldn’t possibly leave Jonny in the lurch, especially now that his career is secure for the next two and a half years, at least, and that he could go and. . the rest I leave to your imagination.’

It didn’t take me long to work it out. ‘That sounds like a full and frank discussion. How did he react?’

‘My father and I have been having such conversations for the last year and more, since I turned twenty-five.’

‘You’re twenty-five?’ I exclaimed. ‘I thought you were Jonny’s age.’

‘No, I entered college as a mature student. I did work with my father for a couple of years after I left Charterhouse. I persuaded him to let me study in the US, but now my course is over, he wants me back. Each time we argue about it he gives me a little more rope, as he puts it, but it’s getting short. We’ve agreed, more or less, that I’ll stay with Jonny for the rest of the Tour season, then we’ll re-examine the situation.’

‘Are you going to tell Jonny that?’

His eyes widened; they were green, like his dad’s, I noticed for the first time, but less vivid. ‘Of course; it wouldn’t be honourable to do otherwise. Where is he, by the way? Still sleeping it off?’

‘Swimming it off, more like; not that we drank a lot last night. He’s on the beach. You’ll find him easily enough; there won’t be many people there today.’

‘Good. However, first I should move into my new home, yes? Can you show me where it is?’

‘Of course.’

I led him back across the square and introduced him to his landlord, then went down to the car park, to help him with the rest of his luggage. It included Jonny’s golf clubs, and a holdall that Uche said was his also. I offered to take it all to my place.

‘The grip, yes,’ he agreed. ‘It’s mostly clothing from the sponsor. But the clubs, they’re the caddie’s responsibility, always. I’ll fit them into the penthouse, don’t worry.’

I took the bag from him and went home, to get on with my day. I tried to clear my mind of all the craziness that had filled it over the previous twenty-four hours and to switch it back to working woman mode. I made the call to the manager of Miles’s winery. He’d been advised of my appointment as a director of the company, and of my future involvement, so it didn’t come as a surprise to him. I hadn’t been sure how he’d react, but he was fine. We had a brief chat, during which he told me that he was looking forward to having someone on the ground that he could run things past, rather than having to make all his reports and proposals in conference calls to California. We agreed that I’d visit the bodega the following morning, and then I turned my attention to more mundane things, like the mountain of laundry that had built up during the week of the tournament. Jonny, God bless him, had said he’d do his own, but there was no point in separating everything out, so I ran it all together.

Besides, I recalled one of my father’s few profundities, that he’d shared with me on my eighteenth birthday. ‘They say, Primavera,’ he’d pronounced, ‘that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. That is, of course, nonsense. A man’s heart is reached most assuredly through his underpants. . by that I mean by washing, and above all ironing them for him, together with all his other garments. Ironing is the domestic task that man abhors the most, and if you relieve him of it he will be your servant in everything else.’

My old man is right about most things, but that one hadn’t worked with Oz. Tom was too young to be trusted with an iron, so I resolved to see how my nephew would react. I was putting the second load into the condenser dryer, down in the cavernous garage, when I heard the phone ring up in the kitchen, a couple of floors above. I ran upstairs and snatched it from the cradle, out of breath as I answered.

It was Shirley, or as she called herself, graphically, ‘The Prisoner of fucking Zenda’.

‘Alex Guinart’s just left,’ she said. ‘I guess you know what he came to tell me.’

‘Yes. Hence the jailbird crack, I imagine.’

‘He says I have to be accompanied everywhere I go, Primavera,’ she complained. ‘He’s been all through the house, inspecting the windows, checking the alarm system, and more than that, he’s had me look for anything that Patterson might have left behind.’

‘Did you find anything?’

‘Not a bloody thing. He’s even taken his clothes out of the laundry basket.’

‘Did you do his ironing for him?’ I asked.

‘Hell no!’ she barked. ‘Mine is mine and his is his; that’s what I told him from the off.’

‘My dad would tell you that’s why he’s left.’

‘Eh?’

‘Never mind.’

‘Right enough,’ she reflected, and I imagined her smile, ‘your dad is an odd bloke. But whatever the reason is, he’s gone and that’s an end of it. I’m over it. I’m not living like this, though, taking coppers with me to buy a baguette in the morning. Come and eat with me tonight, love, eh?’

‘Shirl, I would, but I’ve got the boys.’

‘Bring them. They can swim.’

I weighed that up. ‘No, sod it. I’ll feed them, then Jonny will Tom-sit for me, I’m sure. I’ll come up on my own.’

I hung up and returned to my role as domestic deity. I had just dumped a load of ironed clothes in Jonny’s room when he returned from the beach, using the back stairs as I’d told him so that he could get rid of the sand in the shower that I’d had installed for that purpose, one level above the garage, but below the house itself.

‘Where’s Uche?’ I asked him.

‘I left him on the beach,’ he replied. ‘There are a couple of Swedish girls down there, and he thinks he’s pulled.’

I frowned. ‘Does he need them both? Does sharing with friends mean nothing to the man?’

He laughed. ‘Uche does many things for me, Auntie P, but he doesn’t procure women.’

‘Are you going back down there?’

‘No. There’s stuff I need to do. First and foremost, I have to get myself a practice base. Having won there, I’ll have the courtesy of Girona for the next year at least, but I had a call this morning from the club where you and I played last week, offering me a slot as its official touring pro. I’ll need to talk to Brush about that, but it’s still only six thirty where he is. Before I speak to him, I have to get ready to go on telly. I had an email on my iPhone from the Tour press officer. The BBC want to interview me for the Scottish news tonight, and for the breakfast programme tomorrow; plus, the Tour wants something for its own website. They’re going to roll the three into one. There’ll be a crew and a reporter here in an hour. .’ something must have shown itself in my eyes, for he paused, then added quickly, ‘. . not here, at the house, just in the square.’

‘It’s okay,’ I told him. ‘You can use this place if you want; just don’t identify it, or us, that’s all.’

‘Nah, we’ll do it in front of the church. Location doesn’t matter to me; the important thing is that I’m in uniform, in the right clothing, wearing the right sunglasses, with every sponsor’s logo on display for the camera.’

‘What if they only shoot close-ups?’

‘They won’t. The press officer says that even the BBC understands commercial reality.’

I smiled. ‘Go on then. Turn yourself into a walking advertising hoarding. I’ll knock us up a salad while you’re doing that.’

Lunch, on the terrace, was interrupted by two phone calls from newspaper reporters. Jonny dealt quickly, but willingly, with each of them; there had been three others in the course of the morning, he told me.

‘I thought you guys just used Twitter and Facebook these days, and let the newspapers pick that up.’

‘Not me. I have a Facebook page, yes, but I’d like to hang on to something of a private life, so Twattering is out.’

I kept out of sight while he became a TV star. I stayed on my private terrace, reading the autobiography of a former prime minister of Great Britain; as I’d hoped, it helped me to doze off, and when I awoke, the whole circus was over and the clowns had gone.

Jonny was on the phone as I tottered back into the living room. ‘Yes,’ I heard him say, ‘I’ll do that,’ as he ended the call.

‘Do what?’ I asked.

‘Accept the offer from Pals,’ he replied. ‘Brush said he could probably have got me a touring pro engagement from Girona, or from half a dozen bigger clubs in the UK, but that it’s more important to go where it feels right. So I’ll call them, and from tomorrow I’ll practise there every day. Brush says he can fix me up with some pro days there, when I can fit them in.’

‘What are they?’

‘Simply put, wealthy amateurs who fly in to play a round with me then fly away again. It’s similar to what we do under the sponsor deals. He’s renegotiating them, incidentally.’

‘Good for him.’ I smiled. I was taking to the mystery man, by the minute. ‘Where do you play next?’ I asked.

‘Portugal, next week. I could go to Wales tomorrow, but we would barely have time for a practice round before the tournament. Brush says there’s no better way to get demoralised than to win one week and miss the cut the next.’

‘Speaking from experience, is he?’

‘Hardly,’ he chuckled. ‘Clive says that Brush never won a tournament, or even came close.’ Just as he’d told me. ‘But he’s right, for all that. To be honest, Auntie P, mentally, I’m wasted. I’ll pull out of Portugal too, if my head isn’t right by next Sunday.’

I reached up and ruffled his hair. ‘Then you make sure it is. You can start by beating your cousin at a couple of video games tonight. He always wipes me out; I reckon that defeat will be good for his soul. If you don’t mind staying in with him, that is: otherwise he’s bound for a girlie night at Shirley’s.’

‘Hah! Where his soul would be seriously at risk. Sure, that’s fine by me. Uche can join us; Sweden didn’t quite work out as he’d hoped.’

‘Fine. I’ll make dinner for three in that case.’

‘No, you won’t,’ he shot back. ‘I need to cook, or I’ll forget how.’

I took him at his word. I showed him where the pots and pans were and what was in the larder and in the fridge. I’m American in my attitude to those. I saw a TV series last year in which the anti-hero kept a body in his SMEG for the best part of two episodes, without having to cram it in at all; that’s the size I like.

I went back to my book. I’d finished it by the time Tom got home from school, so I was well rested by the time I got to Shirley’s place. She wasn’t. For all that she’d said that she was over Patterson already, the process of mentally washing that man right out of her hair had taken a lot out of her. She was clad in the sort of garment that used to be called a catsuit, but wouldn’t have suited any feline I ever saw, and wearing the sort of slippers that your granny used to give you for Christmas, with imitation fur trimming and inch-thick rubber soles. She hadn’t bothered to attend to the black circles under her eyes; indeed she was wearing hardly any make-up.

Shirley has an open kitchen and when you’re invited there for dinner, you can usually scent what’s on the menu as soon as you walk through the front door. That night there wasn’t even the faintest whiff of salad dressing.

I didn’t have to point that out. ‘I’ve got nothing done, Primavera,’ she moaned. ‘I’ve been so bleeding busy that I’ve lost track of time. Don’t worry, you won’t starve: I’ll knock something up.’

‘Let me help,’ I said. ‘What have you got?’

‘Steaks, burgers, sausage, the makings of a salad; that’s what I was planning.’

‘Okay, babe,’ I declared. ‘Tomorrow is war but tonight we barbie! I’ll go and fire up that gas contraption outside, you do something about your slovenly appearance. You look like a fat old lioness in that thing. You have a million dollars, woman, so make yourself look like it.’

She grunted something obscene, but shuffled off in the direction of the stairs nonetheless. I did a fridge audit, peeled a few potatoes, cut them into chips and switched on the deep fryer. By the time she re-emerged, looking once again like the Grande Dame I know so well, we were in ‘ready to go’ mode, the garden table was set for two and there was a bottle of pink cava in a bucket right in the middle.

‘That’s better,’ she declared, as she took the glass I handed her and made its contents disappear faster than an unsuspecting celebrity snorts a line of coke for the hidden tabloid camera. ‘I couldn’t believe what I saw in the mirror. “Fat old lioness” was putting it mildly; more like a grizzly bear that had fallen through a tree.’

‘What made you so busy?’ I asked.

‘I’ve been on the internet all afternoon.’

I frowned. ‘Trying to trace Patterson?’

‘Hell no. Bugger him. No, I’ve been sorting out an escape plan from this place, and from Alex’s insistence on having cops follow me to the toilet, more or less. If Mr Cowling can do a runner, so can I. I’ve booked myself a cruise. Late booking; I leave tomorrow.’

‘Where are you going?’

‘As far away as I can get. I fly to Singapore first off, get on a ship there and spend three weeks on the ocean wave. Don’t ask me where we’ll visit, ’cos I don’t remember. I’ll be out of here, and that’s the main thing. Let our Alex try and park a police car outside that and see how he gets on.’

‘Do you need a lift to the airport?’

‘Thanks, love, but no thanks. I’m going first class; that means they send a car for me. Bloody decadent, I know, but like they say, I’m worth it.’

I refilled our glasses. ‘You sure are, gal. Now, since you’re going to be waited on hand and foot for the next three weeks, you can burn the burgers and the sausage. I’ll finish the chips and the salad.’

I enjoy my girlie evenings with Shirl, whether they’re at her place or mine, or occasionally on neutral ground; hair is let down, drink is drunk and truths are told. The selfish part of me was glad that Patterson was gone, since his arrival, and Shirley’s absorption in him, had put them under threat, but most of me was sorry for her, and angry with him, whether he’d been at fault or not. We ate and talked and laughed as usual that night, but through it all, his recent presence still hung around, like settling dust in the air after a big storm. I tried not to talk about him, but I couldn’t keep it up.

‘How did you meet him?’ I asked, when the ice-cream dishes had been scraped clean of anything scrapeable, and as Shirley poured Drambuie into two great glass globes, then desecrated it with ice cubes made from tap water.

‘I told you,’ she replied. ‘On the internet, after my best boy Tom showed me how to get on to the site.’ She paused. ‘Here,’ she added, ‘if you ever decide to have him christened, can I be his godmother?’

‘That’s a decision he’d take for himself, but if I were you I wouldn’t buy a new frock for the occasion. You’re his fairy godmother as it is; settle for that. But back to my question: I know he put you on-site, but once you were there, how did you and Patterson get together? Who made the first move?’

She raised her goblet to her lips. ‘He did, I suppose,’ she murmured. ‘It wasn’t one of those sites that works at random. It was much more personal than that. You write a bio, then upload it, with all your details and a photo. You enter criteria: the sort of person who attracts you, and the things that would turn you off. Well groomed, big dong, yes, scruffy, small dong, no; loves classical music, no, tone deaf, yes; that sort of info. You can either be reactive, that’s go a-hunting, or you can be demure, and sit and wait, as I did.’

Demure? I thought, but I let her continue.

‘I wasn’t there long before the site moderator sent me an email saying there was someone who’d like to make contact and asking if I’d like his details.’

‘Like the size of his dong?’

‘No, you daft bat; that comes later. His personal profile, a little bit of background, and his likes and dislikes.’

‘How did they describe him?’

‘Public servant, retired.’

‘I wonder how they vet their clients,’ I mused.

Shirley snorted. ‘That’s self-evident. Not too fucking well. There was I, starting to think that I’d found someone who was capable of looking after me, only for him to be some chickenshit bastard who hasn’t got the guts to tell me to my face that he doesn’t really fancy me, or who fucks off at the slightest whiff of a possibility that somebody might have got on to his past.’

‘Is that what Alex told you?’ I asked.

‘Yes. He said that there was a good chance that pickpocket bloke had been trying to find out who he was. They were working on that theory, and that Patterson had twigged to this. Now I’ve got Starsky and fucking Hutch parked at my back door, suggesting to anyone who might be wondering that I know where he’s gone when I really don’t have a clue, and if I did wouldn’t give a shit. I pointed that out to him, but he said he’d rather err on the side of caution if it was all right by me.’

From that, it seemed Alex hadn’t told her about Christine McGuigan’s murder. Why should he? I supposed. It was all over that morning’s press, and the presumed link to the other had been made public, but for all her years in Spain, Shirl can’t read either Castellano or Catalan worth a damn, and he knew that. Why alarm her more than necessary?

‘Did you have any hint he was going to leave?’

‘Course not. I dunno what the hell he thought. That I’d tie him to the bedpost if I twigged he was thinking about it? He really didn’t know me, Primavera, did he? The only thing I wanted from him was commitment. At the first sign it wasn’t there I’d have driven him to the airport myself.’

I nodded agreement, for I knew that to be true.

‘And yet. .’ She stopped. ‘No, I’m chasing things that aren’t there.’

‘Go on,’ I prompted. ‘What were you going to say?’

‘Nothing.’ She hesitated. ‘It’s just. . When we arrived at your place for dinner on Friday, there was a moment then, when I thought he was acting as if he’d been rattled by something. But that was all; just a moment, then he was his usual smiling self. You didn’t notice anything, did you?’

‘No, I didn’t,’ I told her. But I couldn’t have, could I? Because they’d barely arrived before I was outside punching lumps out of the soon to be late Christine McGuigan, for a reason that had turned out to be significantly off the mark.