As Easy as Murder

Six

The boys were on the clubhouse terrace when I returned, each drinking what I hoped were only colas, and not Cuba Libres. Bacardi hangovers are not recommended on the morning of the biggest day of your life. I’d barely sat down before a spritzer arrived, in a tall glass, with ice and a slice of lemon. The barman there knows how I like them.

‘How did you do?’ I asked.

‘I finished five under,’ Jonny replied. He smiled. ‘When you left, Auntie, you took my competitive edge with you.’

‘Just as well I did,’ I said, cheerfully. ‘It wouldn’t have done you any good, the day before a tournament, to have your ass whupped by a middle-aged woman.’

‘Never happen,’ he drawled, ‘and you’re not middle-aged.’

‘Don’t you believe it. Five years ago, you’d never have got to four up on me.’

His eyes gleamed, and I saw a flash of his uncle. ‘Five years ago, I’d have been giving you a lot fewer shots.’

‘There is that,’ I conceded.

‘What did the cops want?’ Uche asked, boldly. For an instant, I registered annoyance in Jonny’s eyes, as if he’d known that I’d have told them in my own time, without being pushed. . or not, if that was my choice.

‘They had something they weren’t quite sure about,’ I said, carefully, ‘and they thought that I might be able to help.’

‘And were you?’

‘Not really. All I did was confirm what they suspected already.’ I didn’t want to get into it, so I told him a lie that wasn’t, not really, or the truth, but not quite. ‘Alex Guinart, my cop friend, quite often asks me about things that concern the British community in St Martí and L’Escala. Everything’s urgent to him, hence the summons.’

That seemed to satisfy his curiosity. We finished our drinks, Uche paid for them, then we went our separate ways, he back to the rented house and Lena’s family, Jonny and I to St Martí.

We travelled in silence. . if you don’t count Norah Jones, and many people wouldn’t. . till we reached the bridge that leads into Torroella, across the River Ter. ‘That was a load of crap, wasn’t it?’ Jonny said, just loudly enough to get my attention.

‘What?’

‘The way you fobbed Uche off.’ He laughed softly. ‘You have a way of telling people to mind their own business without them realising they’ve been told.’

‘If I do, maybe it’ll work on you.’

I must have spoken more sharply than I’d intended; I sensed rather than saw him frown beside me. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured, sounding just like Tom does when he’s pushed his luck too far. And making me realise that I couldn’t treat the two of them in the same way.

‘No,’ I blurted out. ‘I’m sorry, Jonny, I shouldn’t have snapped at you. You’re absolutely right, I did fob him off, but I shouldn’t do the same with you. I’d be pissed off if you weren’t open with me, so. . They wanted me to look at a dead man.’

‘Jesus!’ he hissed. ‘Why? Was he clutching a piece of paper with your name scrawled on it?’

‘Written in his blood? No. They thought I might have seen him before. And they were right. So have you.’ I told him who I’d seen, lying dead and desecrated in the suburban forest.

‘Wow!’ He whistled. ‘What do you think; that he tried it on again but picked on the wrong bloke?’

An interesting assumption, I thought, and probably the basis of the continuing police investigation, once Alex rid himself of the irrelevant connection with Patterson. ‘That’s quite possible,’ I agreed. ‘Anyway, it’s got nothing to do with us, at least it won’t be once my friend shows Tom a sketch to confirm the identity as close to one hundred per cent as they can get. But what am I talking about?’ I contradicted myself out loud. ‘That won’t, will it? They haven’t the faintest idea who the guy is, and whatever Alex says, they’ve got a very slim chance of finding out, unless someone comes forward to report a missing person.’

‘Ouch. Was it a mess?’ he asked. His question was serious, not ghoulish. It sounded sympathetic, in a strangely literal way, but I don’t imagine it’s an experience we could have shared.

‘That’s why they’re having to show Tom a sketch of the scar on his chin,’ I replied. ‘I couldn’t look at the guy and say positively that it was him.’

‘You shouldn’t have had to,’ he growled. ‘Couldn’t they have shown you a sketch too?’

‘Don’t worry about me, Jonny,’ I assured him. ‘I won’t wake up screaming. I’ve seen worse.’

‘Where, for Pete’s sake?’

There were a couple of answers to that. I chose the safe one. ‘I was a nurse, remember. I’ve been in operating theatres. I did anatomy as part of my training. And I worked for a while as a volunteer in an African war zone. But we won’t go into any of that. All you need to understand is that Alex Guinart wouldn’t have put me in a situation he didn’t know I could handle.’

‘A murder mystery, eh,’ he said, as the CD changer moved Norah on and replaced her with the Drive-by Truckers; just at the right time, I reckoned, as a change of mood was called for. ‘Right on our own doorstep. Or am I getting ahead of myself?’ he added. ‘Could it have been suicide?’

I chuckled, grimly. ‘If it was, it was very definitely the assisted kind.’

The other band from Athens, Georgia, cranked up the volume at that point and so conversation was out for the rest of the journey, or rather until my car’s Bluetooth cut it out automatically as it picked up a call. ‘Yes,’ I said, the simple command to accept it.

‘Okay then.’ Shirley Gash’s voice, never subdued at any time, boomed out from the speakers. ‘What the hell’s up? There have been cops going up and down our road all day, and now one of my neighbours tells me she saw you heading in the same direction. What’s the story? I’ve asked a couple of the Mossos people, but they won’t say a word.’

‘Neither can I right now,’ I told her. ‘I’m driving and I’ve got a couple of roundabouts to negotiate.’ I had been thinking, though. I might have talked Alex out of talking to Patterson Cowling, but that hadn’t killed my own curiosity. I rather fancied a chat with the man myself. But it would be difficult to separate him from Shirley, in which case. . tough on him.

‘If I call you back in fifteen minutes on your landline, will you be in?’ she persisted.

‘Yes, but I’ll be busy.’

‘Meet us for supper?’

‘No, I’ve got hungry lads to feed, but I could probably meet you somewhere later, for a coffee.’ I glanced at Jonny, and managed to ask, just by raising an eyebrow, ‘Will you stay in with Tom?’ He nodded.

‘That’ll have to do, then,’ Shirley conceded. ‘We’re going to eat at La Clota.’

‘Fine, I’ll join you about nine-thirty; but don’t get involved with anyone else, or my lips will stay sealed.’

‘We’ll ask for a private booth,’ she said. I laughed: they don’t have any.

I called in at a fish shop on the way home, and bought three monkfish, fairly small, as that species goes, but still well big enough for each of us. Jonny had never seen one before, not in its entire state. They’re ferocious-looking bastards, all mouth and teeth, but they’re fantastic when they’re baked in the oven. The lady offered to take the heads off, but I declined. There are two thumb-sized pieces just behind the eyes; the best part of the fish, my son and I agree.

I’d just closed the oven door on them when Alex Guinart arrived, with a sketch, and with the Magda woman, still silent, looking as if she might have had other plans for the evening. I hadn’t told Tom that he was coming. It wasn’t only that I didn’t want him asking me why, and dragging me into telling him about my trip to the woods, but also because I wanted him to have a clear mind when it came to look at the thing, his instant reactions always being the most reliable.

I’d have struggled to get his attention anyway; as soon as he arrived home, and had taken Charlie for his early evening run, he engaged Jonny in a detailed debrief of his round over Pals. Pros can remember every detail of every shot they play, and so it went on for some time. Indeed the last putt had only just fallen when the door buzzer sounded, a few seconds after the church bells had rung seven for the first time. Don’t be confused when you come to St Martí; they always ring the hour again, at two minutes past, in case you missed it before, or lost count.

Alex told Tom what he wanted, not quite following the party line that we’d agreed, but safely enough. ‘Remember the man you saw,’ he said, ‘the man who tried to rob Mr Cowling? The photo we have doesn’t really show the scar on his chin. Take a look at this drawing and tell me, if you can: did it look like this?’ He handed over the sketch; my son studied it for a few seconds and nodded.

‘That’s it,’ he confirmed. ‘Like a scimitar. Has he done something bad?’

‘Stealing is bad, Tom,’ Magda announced, stolidly. I winced. Only the second time she’d opened her mouth in my presence all day, and she had to go and say something stupid. Nobody likes being patronised: there’s an age at which kids recognise it and my lad had reached it at least a year before.

‘I know that,’ he replied, politely, then beat her at her own game. ‘It’s one of the Ten Commandments.’ He might not believe in God, but he can cite him as evidence when necessary. ‘But he didn’t actually steal anything from Mr Cowling. I stopped him and he ran away.’ He paused. ‘Of course,’ he added, as if he’d had a revelation, ‘there’s a Commandment against trying to steal too, the one about coveting.’ Magda shifted from one foot to the other; they hadn’t covered that in her training course.

‘What I meant,’ he went on relentlessly, looking at Alex once again, ‘was, has he done something else? You haven’t caught him, or you wouldn’t be asking me to look at a drawing.’

The inspector shook his head, in confirmation. ‘No, we haven’t. But when we do find him, we have to be absolutely certain that we’ve got the right man. You understand?’

‘Yes, Alex,’ he replied. Of course he did: he understood that he was being spun a line, and Alex, being a family friend, probably realised that. But he knew also that if he told him the whole story, my wrath would fall upon him, and he didn’t fancy that.

‘Thank you, Tom,’ he said. He was prepared to leave it at that, but my son wasn’t, not quite.

‘It’s nothing. Will I have to be a witness if you do catch him?’

‘I can’t see that being necessary.’ More carefully chosen words. He sniffed. ‘Are you cooking fish, Primavera?’

I nodded. ‘And tomatoes, chopped garlic, and some lightly sautéed potatoes.’

He smiled at my guys. ‘Lucky you. It’ll be a while before I get to eat. Come on, Magda,’ he said, ‘let’s go. We’ve got what we came for.’ He patted Tom on the shoulder. ‘Thank you again, my friend.’

He almost headed for the door, but his cop’s reflexes kicked in and stopped him. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, offering his hand to Jonny. ‘We haven’t been introduced. Are you visiting Primavera?’ he asked, as they shook.

I hoped that he wasn’t wondering ‘Toy boy?’ then realised that the Magda person almost certainly was. ‘Tom’s cousin,’ I said, briskly, ‘my nephew; Jonathan Sinclair. He’s going to be living with us for a while, as he gets his new career off the ground. You’ve met their grandfather, Oz’s dad.’

‘Of course,’ he exclaimed. ‘It all fits now. I remember Mac mentioning you. You’re a golfer, aren’t you, which explains why. .’ he almost continued, ‘. . why Primavera was so pissed off when I hauled her off the golf course,’ but stopped himself just in time to leave that can of worms unopened. ‘Alex Guinart. Primavera’s my daughter’s godmother; that makes us family, of a sort. Nice to meet you; see you around.’

He timed his exit perfectly, just as the oven alarm sounded. The monkfish was pretty damn good, I have to say. (I don’t really have to, but I will.) I wish that I’d been in a better mood to enjoy it, though; as it was, my mind was running ahead, to my date later in the evening. Jonny offered to clean up after we were done, but I told him that his time would be better spent studying his yardage charts and getting his head right for day one of the Catalan Masters. So I packed the dishwasher, while Tom got on with his task. We have a ritual every time we eat baked monkfish. Afterwards, he boils the heads and bones in a big stock pot; it makes the basis of a great fish soup. Stinks the kitchen out, but it’s worth it.

By the time I’d showered, using my most expensive body wash to ensure that I’d rid myself of the last vestiges of fishy smell, one of my pet hates, and prettied myself up, I was running slightly late, but only by Scottish standards. Fifteen minutes’ slippage in L’Escala is still classed as being on time.

Shirley and Patterson were still on their dessert when I arrived. The restaurateur offered me a menu, but I declined. . for a couple of minutes, then succumbed to a bowl of pistachio ice cream. The place was busy; the evening had turned cool, as it does quite often at the end of May, and so the diners had opted for inside tables rather than the terrace. Ours was in a corner by the window. It was the closest thing to a private booth that La Clota has. . but when I surveyed the other customers I spotted an English lady, who knows both Shirley and me, and who is so relentlessly inquisitive that she makes Tomás de Torquemada seem like a chat show host.

‘Let’s move on for coffee,’ I suggested. Patterson looked puzzled, but Shirl had done her own looking around and got the message. They paid the bill and we left. We didn’t go far, only a few hundred metres, to a night bar called Octopuss; it tends not to get busy until later on and isn’t a haunt of the British ex-pat chattering classes. It does have a corner table, and we took it, even though the place had just opened and we were its only customers.

‘Well?’ Shirley said, with an expansive beam, once a coffee and a large goblet of Bailey’s had been placed in front of her. ‘Out with it, Primavera. What was all that fuss about this afternoon? Someone told me after I’d spoken to you that they saw an ambulance driving away, and that the woods have all been closed off by cops, lots of them. But that’s all I’ve heard.’

I ignored her and looked directly at Patterson. ‘A body was found there this morning. A man. He was killed there, then stripped of all his clothing and possessions. But it wasn’t a robbery, that wasn’t what it was about. Whoever did it blew most of his face off too. You can guess why, can’t you?’ I asked. I hoped that I wasn’t going to bring anyone’s wrath down on the head of John Dale, but I had another friend to protect, and she was closer.

‘Yes,’ he replied, quietly. ‘To prevent identification, or to hinder it as much as possible.’

Shirley looked at us from one to the other. ‘Why’re you asking him?’ she murmured.

‘Because he’s got a passing interest in the stiff, a personal interest, even.’ I switched my gaze back to him. ‘It was the guy who tried to steal your wallet the other night.’

Patterson saw the complete picture, at once. ‘And the police wanted you there to help them confirm that?’ I nodded. ‘Which means that you reported the incident after all?’

‘Yes. I live here, mate; I have friends in the police. I couldn’t let a thief run around here with a free hand. I’m sorry, that’s not how I work. I gave them Tom’s detailed description and Stan’s mobile image. . the same one I saw you copying on to your phone. They called me because the person who took a shotgun to his face left a couple of pieces intact. It was him; no question. They still don’t know who he is, though. How about you? Have you managed to identify him?’

My friend laughed. ‘How could he?’ she gasped.

‘Because he used to be a spook, Shirl. Is Patterson Cowling the name you were born with?’ I challenged.

He sighed, then smiled. ‘It’s the name on my birth certificate, Primavera, I promise you.’ He turned to Shirley. ‘I’m afraid I’ve given you a slightly edited version of my past, dear. But it is my past,’ he added, ‘I promise you that. I am completely retired. I’ve moved on to a new life, even if I’ll never be able to talk about the old one.’ He looked back at me. ‘I was warned that you’ve been asking about me, but they assured me that you’d be discreet.’

‘As I have been,’ I told him. ‘So bloody discreet that I’ve even kept the cops from picking you up.’

He winced. ‘For which I thank you.’

‘Don’t mention it. So? How did your trawl go? Do you know who the dead guy is?’

He shook his head. ‘No, which means that he’s probably nobody, other than what he seemed at the time, a rather inept pickpocket, Eastern European, maybe, rather than British, as Tom thought.’

‘In that case,’ I asked, ‘why’s he in a fucking morgue in Girona, with the shreds of his face that they picked off the trees in a box alongside him?’

‘Probably for reasons completely unconnected with me,’ he replied. ‘I don’t know why the hell whoever killed him didn’t simply burn the body.’

‘Because they’d have burned the woods down with him,’ I pointed out. ‘The ground’s covered in pine needles. They can spread fire as fast as you can run away from it, faster with a wind blowing. If they’d tried to cremate the poor bastard, the flames would have spread right up to Shirley’s door.’

His partner was looking at him in the way that characters do at the end of a Poirot on television, as they look at the perpetrator of the crime of the week once he’s been unmasked by the preening little Belgian. I guess they’d be having a conversation once she got him home, but I had a feeling they’d survive. Shirley’s a very understanding lady, and she’s been my friend for long enough to be able to take the unexpected in her stride.

‘So,’ I continued, ‘you promise we can still call you Patterson?’

‘Absolutely. That’s my name; it’s on my passport, on my bank accounts, attached to my National Insurance, NHS record, state and civil service, everything.’

‘Hold on a minute,’ Shirl intervened. ‘I thought you guys were pretty much public figures these days.’

Patterson nodded. ‘At the very top level, yes. The heads of the intelligence and security services aren’t called by a single initial these days; they’re publicly accountable to a parliamentary committee. But the rest of us, those of us lower down the ladder? Hell, no. We work in the dark.’

‘Like the man in the woods?’ I murmured.

‘Not in the same way at all.’

‘So you were management, rather than field level.’

‘Senior management latterly, but always an office worker.’

‘What did you do?’ Shirley asked.

‘I can’t tell you any more than I have already, love, honestly. And please, you can never talk about it to anyone else.’ He looked at me, directly. ‘Either of you. Are you all right with that?’

‘I am,’ I told him. ‘I’ve already spoiled your scent for the police. As for this old trout here, I trust her with my secrets, and you can do the same. How’s your Russian?’ I added.

‘Crumbled, through disuse. I can still understand some, but that’s it.’

I pushed it a little further. ‘And your Arabic?’

‘Non-existent. It never existed. Now please, Primavera.’

‘Okay,’ I promised. ‘I will probe no further, and I won’t ask any more questions.’

He smiled. ‘There would be no point. Your friend Mr Kravitz doesn’t know about me. I’ve never appeared on his radar, and when I was active I never had occasion to make use of his skills and services.’

If he said that to shake me up, he succeeded. Mark Kravitz was a guy I’d known for years. Oz and I met him when he provided minder services for Miles on a movie project. After that he did some discreet stuff for Oz on occasion and he’s been more than useful to me from time to time. For most of his career he’d styled himself a ‘security consultant’, a broad-brush picture of what he actually does. Mark was a fixer, and an intelligence gatherer; he operates on the edge of that community.

Patterson had meant to make a point by mentioning his name, and I took it. He was letting me know that when he’d been tipped off that I was checking up on him, he’d had the same job done on me, and that he was much better placed in that respect than I was.

‘I never even thought of speaking to Mark,’ I told him. ‘He can’t afford to go rattling cages in MI5. Besides, his MS limits him pretty badly these days.’

‘So I understand.’ He grinned. ‘You have a limitation yourself, of course. When you accepted your attachment to HM Diplomatic Service, you signed the Official Secrets Act.’

‘I don’t have that job any longer,’ I pointed out.

‘It doesn’t matter. That signature doesn’t go away, and its meaning can be interpreted very widely.’

‘Is that a threat?’

‘God, no,’ he protested. ‘One of the things I was told about you was that threatening you would be a waste of time. Indeed it might even be counterproductive. But there are some people in my former walk of life who aren’t as circumspect as me, and who have no sense of humour.’

‘I know. About three years ago I met one of them, a woman who called herself Moira.’

He smiled. ‘Yes, I believe that she did threaten you, and that a friend of yours made sure that it backfired on her. It’s all on your MI5 file. You may be interested to know that she’s now an administrator in GCHQ. . and she hates Cheltenham with a passion, it’s said. But there are others like her, only a lot more subtle; old guard who do not believe in freedom of information. So no, it’s not a threat, just a word of caution.’

‘I’ll take it on board. You appreciate that all I was doing was looking out for Shirley’s interests, just as she’d do for me. The last thing I want to do is compromise you.’ I paused. ‘Mind you,’ I continued, ‘I still think that for the dead guy to choose your pocket to pick, out of all the people in St Martí that night. . that’s a hell of a coincidence.’

‘I couldn’t agree more. That’s why I’d still like to know who he was.’

‘And who killed him?’

‘Maybe I don’t want to know that.’

‘You don’t think that you might have caused it, do you?’

‘You don’t mean that I might have ordered it, do you?’

‘No,’ I said, defensively; that had never occurred to me. ‘But could someone in your old service have been. . how do I put it. . a wee bit over-protective?’

He shook his head. ‘No, no; not for a second. I’m not that important, Primavera.’ He smiled as he said it, but there was something in his eyes that suggested to me that he might not have been as convinced as he was trying to sound.