Inhuman Remains

Twelve

It didn’t take Mark long; less than an hour in fact. I had only just returned to the hotel when he called me.

‘I’ll give you the good news first,’ he began. ‘There is no one answering your cousin’s description currently lying in a morgue anywhere on the Iberian peninsula.’

‘That’s a relief,’ I said. If there had been, I wouldn’t have fancied telling Auntie Ade.

‘But that’s all it means. Sorry to be blunt, but if Frank’s upset someone badly enough to have been taken out, they may have done a proper job and cleaned up afterwards.’

‘And that’s the bad news?’

‘No, or not all of it. None of the names you gave me is kosher. Yes, there are people who answer to Rowland, Macela and Bromberg, but none of them could possibly be linked to this casino project.’

My original doubts returned. ‘Are you telling me that the thing’s a phoney?’

‘No,’ he replied. ‘The company behind it is real enough, and that brings me to something significant. It’s registered in Luxembourg and the directors of record are your three friends. However, Lidia Bromberg only joined the board two months ago, following the resignation of Mr Roy Urquhart.’

‘Where did you find this?’

‘Certain records are public in Luxembourg, up to a point. The office of record of Hotel Casino d’Amuseo SA is hosted by a local corporate law firm called Pintore and Company. They were obliged to give me the information I asked for.’

‘Did they say why Frank resigned?’

‘That wasn’t minuted, but I did find out some other stuff. The authorised share capital of the company is one hundred million euros, one euro per share, and more than three quarters of it is issued, seventy-seven million, two hundred thousand shares to be exact. The directors’ personal shareholdings are. .’ He paused, for effect, I guessed. ‘. . one hundred shares each.’

‘So whose is the seventy-seven mil?’

‘The shareholder register will tell us that. Luxembourg law requires that it be kept at the company’s offices, but I’d have to turn up there in person to inspect it. One thing looks certain, though: your cousin was very good at his job, until he quit.’

‘What do you think’s happening, Mark?’ I asked.

‘The investors may well be about to make a shedload of money.

On the other hand, the lack of information on its principals gives cause for concern. If the company is operating under a false prospectus, then the shareholders’ funds are going to vanish, and probably pretty soon. They’re approaching the date by which they must have an AGM, the end of August. If the plan is to cut and run, they’ll do it before then. However, your meeting with Bromberg shows that they’re still fund-raising. It’s probably legit, but possibly bent. Can’t say for certain.’

‘If it is crooked, can the money be moved that easily?’

‘On the chairman’s authority, that’s all it takes. His signature, stamped by the company seal. That’s what the guy at Pintore told me.’

‘We can’t let that happen,’ I said. ‘We should dig a bit deeper.’

‘We? Prim, you should back off this. You’re only there to look for your cousin.’

‘Maybe I should, but it’s just become even more personal. It’s one thing that my cousin’s vanished without trace, but now I find that I have a meeting tomorrow with someone who might be out to steal my money.’

‘I can’t talk you out of going?’

‘No chance.’

‘Then make it as useful as you can. See if you can get me a photograph of Bromberg, even if you have to take it with your mobile.’

‘Will do. I can give you one of Macela right now, if you like.’

‘Do I ever like? How will you do it?’

‘I have an image of him on my computer back home. Give me your email address, and I’ll call my son and have him send it to you. He’s only seven, but he’s as computer literate as I am, probably more so.’ As he spelled the address out, I patched it into my PDA. ‘This is getting beyond a simple favour,’ I told him.

‘You’ve got me curious. Plus. .’ he hesitated ‘. . maybe Oz had a premonition. I don’t know, but when he asked me to find you, he said something else: that if anything happened to him, and you turned up afterwards, I should take care of you.’

I didn’t have an answer for that. I was too busy thanking my lucky stars that he had misunderstood the instruction totally.

‘Now,’ he continued abruptly, ‘is that everything?’

‘Well, not quite.’ I told him about the mysterious address near my hotel and about the city planner’s furtive visit.

‘Now that doesn’t sound too kosher,’ he declared. ‘It would be good to get inside. There might be an outside chance that Frank’s holed up in there. . or being held.’

‘Yes, but how? I can’t go back there. The lecher in the shop would spot me for sure.’

‘I appreciate that, but maybe I can arrange for someone to kick the door down.’

I was still wondering what he’d meant as I called Tom to ask him to send the image.

It was Adrienne who answered, not him. It took me a while to convince her I wasn’t covering up any bad news about her only-born. What I told her was essentially the truth, that he seemed to have resigned from the company at around the time she’d been expecting his visit, and that I was trying to find someone who could tell me where he’d gone. The someone might be the bloke whose photograph I wanted Tom to pass on, or it might be Lidia Bromberg.

She put my boy on the line; he was chuffed when I told him there was something important I wanted him to do for me. He still sounded brave and cheerful, but hidden in there I detected a hint that he might just be missing me. Just as well, for I sure was missing him.