Playing With Fire

Chapter 18

It was a struggle just to cling to consciousness, Banks found. But the longer he stayed awake, the better his chances of staying alive. He could hardly move; his body felt like lead. He knew that he had to conserve whatever strength he had, if he had any, because when Keane set the fire, as he was certain to do, he was going to leave, and Banks might have just one slight opportunity to get out alive. If he was still conscious. If he could move. Neither McMahon nor Gardiner had got out alive, and the thought sapped his confidence, but he had to cling to what little hope he could dredge up.

“I’m doing this,” Keane said, “because you’re really the only one who suspects me. Annie doesn’t. And she won’t. I know you haven’t shared your suspicions with her or anybody else. I’d have been able to tell from the tone of her voice. I’m not an official suspect. And I’m pretty certain I’ve covered my tracks well enough that with you out of the way, I’m in the clear.”

Burgess, Banks found himself thinking, in his muddled, muddied way. Dirty Dick Burgess. Keane had no way of knowing that Banks had enlisted Burgess’s help. He also knew that if anything happened to him, Dirty Dick would have a good idea who was behind it, and that he wouldn’t rest until he’d tracked Keane down. But a fat lot of consolation that was to him if he was dead.

Banks felt himself slipping in and out of consciousness as Keane’s words washed over him, some of them resonating, some not connecting at all. All he could think, if you could call it thinking, was that he was going to die soon. By fire. He remembered again the image of the little girl etched forever into his mind, sculpted by the fire into an attitude of prayer, kneeling by her bed, a charred angel. “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.”

Banks heard the door open and felt a brief chill as the draft blew in. It revitalized him enough to make that one last attempt to move, but all he could manage was to roll off the sofa and bang his head on the sharp edge of the low coffee table. As he lay on the floor, the blood dripping in his eye, fast losing consciousness, he heard the door shut again and then the sloshing of petrol from the can. He could smell it now, the fumes overwhelming him, and all he wanted to do was hug the floor and fall asleep. The andante from “Death and the Maiden” was playing, and Banks’s final thought was that this was the last piece of music he was ever going to hear.

Annie felt no real sense of urgency as they drove along the Dale to Banks’s cottage. Only that she had to see Banks, to talk to him about what she had discovered and what she was beginning to suspect. But Winsome was behind the wheel, and whatever inner alarms were ringing in Annie seemed to have communicated themselves to her, and she was doing her best Damon Hill imitation.

She slowed down as they passed through Fortford. A few lights showed behind drawn curtains, and here and there Annie could make out the flickering of a television set. One bent old man was walking his collie toward the Rose and Crown. There was a long stretch of uninhabited road between there and Helmthorpe, nothing but dark hills silhouetted against the night sky, distant farm lights and the sleek shimmer of moonlight on the slow-flowing river.

There were a few people out on Helmthorpe High Street, mostly heading for folk night at the Dog and Gun, Annie guessed. The general store was still open and the fish-and-chip-shop queue was almost out into the street. Annie was still hungry, despite the salad sandwich. She thought of asking Winsome to stop. She didn’t eat fish, but if the chips had been cooked in vegetable oil, then they might go down nicely with a pinch of salt and a dash of malt vinegar. But she held her hunger pangs at bay. Later.

Winsome turned sharp left, past the school, with only a slight screeching of rubber on Tarmac, and slipped smoothly down into second for the hill up to Gratly. Just before the village was a narrow laneway to the right, leading to Banks’s cottage, and as they approached, a car came out and turned right, heading away from them. It wasn’t Banks’s Renault.

“That looks like Phil’s car,” Annie said.

“Are you sure?” Winsome asked.

“It can’t be. He told me he was still in London.”

Winsome stopped before turning into Banks’s drive. “Shall I follow it?”

Annie thought for a moment. It would be good to know for certain. But if it was Phil, what on earth had he been doing visiting Banks? “No,” she said. “No point in a car chase over the moors. Let’s do what we came here for and see if Alan’s in.”

Winsome turned into Banks’s drive, and ahead she and Annie could see the flames climbing up the curtains in the living room. Christ, no! Annie thought. No. Not after all this. She couldn’t be too late. But they were flames, all right, and they were all over the front room.

“Call the fire brigade,” Annie said, unbuckling her safety belt and jumping out before the car had even come to a full halt. “And tell them there’s danger to life. A police officer’s life.” That might speed them up a bit, Annie thought. The local station was staffed by retained men, and it would take an extra five minutes for them to respond to their personal alerters and get to the station. Rural response time was eighteen minutes, and there’d be nothing left of the cottage by then.

Annie couldn’t just stand there and watch the place burn. She knew that the worst thing you could do with a fire was open the door and supply more oxygen, but opening the door was the only chance she possibly had of getting Banks out alive. If he was still alive.

Annie pulled the wool blanket from the boot of the car. Luckily, the rain had left a few puddles in Banks’s potholed drive, so she rolled it around quickly to soak it, then she wrapped it around herself, paying special attention to covering her hair and face.

Winsome had her car door open by now, mobile still in her hand. “What are you doing, Guv?” she yelled. “You can’t go in there. You know you can’t.”

“Did you ring?”

“Yes. They’re coming. But you-”

Annie went up to the door.

Locked.

“Guv!”

Rearing back, she kicked at the area around the lock. It took her three tries, and it hurt her foot like hell, but she succeeded in the end. The door flew open and the fire surged, as she had expected. She heard Winsome shouting behind her against the roar of the flames, but she couldn’t stop now. She took a deep breath and rushed inside. She had only seconds, if that.

The smoke was thick and the petrol fumes seeped through the blanket she had wrapped around her mouth and nose. As soon as she was inside, Annie could feel the intense heat licking at her, the tongues of flame on her legs and ankles. She hadn’t believed fire could make so much noise. She called out Banks’s name, but she knew he wouldn’t be able to answer. He would be drugged, just like the others. It was a small living room and Annie was fortunate to know her way around. She had been there often enough to know about the low coffee table between the sofa and armchairs, for example, so she wasn’t going to trip over that.

The flames roared and smoke billowed. A painting fell off the wall and the glass smashed. Annie’s eyes were stinging. She needed to breathe again. Her lungs felt as if they were exploding.

Then she saw him, just a leg, through the smoke down on the floor near the table. She rushed over to him. No time for subtleties, now, Annie, she told herself, as she threw the table over, grabbed Banks’s legs with both hands and tugged. The limp body slid across the carpet. Annie’s arms strained at her shoulder sockets.

Banks banged his head on the leg of the table as Annie pulled him around its edge. She couldn’t see clearly, but she sensed that the open door was right behind her. All she had to do was keep on pulling him, moving backward. She thought she was going to keel over from the heat and smoke, but she kept dragging him, and soon she felt the chill of the outside piercing the blanket over her back. Almost there. A part of the ceiling fell down close to her, and flames singed her eyebrows. Annie couldn’t go on. She felt her strength waning, her legs beginning to buckle under her. So close. Her vision shimmered. Her knees bent and she started toppling forward.

Then she felt herself bodily lifted and practically thrown across the lane. As she landed unceremoniously in the mud, she was able to rub her eyes and see Winsome finish the job, drag Banks’s body out of the doorway to safety. Annie breathed the fresh air deeply and let herself fall back, hair and arms spread out in the mud, still wrapped in her damp blanket.

Winsome was outside the cottage now, and a few more feet would free Banks from the flames. His head bounced down the steps. Annie didn’t know if he was dead or alive. She didn’t even want to look at him for fear he would be grotesquely disfigured by the fire, or just lying with his eyes wide open.

Finally, Winsome set Banks down a few feet from the cottage and hurried over to Annie.

“You all right, Guv?”

“I’m fine,” said Annie.

“That was a bloody stupid thing to do, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Alan…?”

“I don’t know, Guv. It took all I had to get the two of you out of there.”

Annie flung off her blanket and took a deep breath. And another. The cold fresh air made her feel dizzy. The two of them went over and squatted beside Banks. His clothes were smoldering, so Annie put the damp blanket on him. His face was blackened by the smoke, and she really couldn’t tell if he was badly burned or not. She didn’t think so, hoped to God not.

Holding her own breath, Annie leaned forward and listened for his. She thought he was still breathing. She wished she had some oxygen, wished that the firefighters and the ambulances would hurry up. She didn’t even know whether it would help to give him the kiss of life, or if it would only make things worse. Live, you bastard, live, she whispered, Winsome beside her, hand on her shoulder, and in the distance she heard the welcome sound of a fire engine.

It was the middle of the night when Annie finally got home from the hospital, exhausted beyond belief, leaving Detective Superintendent Gristhorpe to keep a bedside vigil. There was more paperwork to do, of course, always more paperwork, but that could wait until morning.

Banks wasn’t out of danger yet. He still wasn’t conscious, for a start. Annie told the doctor that he had most likely been drugged with Rohypnol, or something similar, probably mixed with alcohol. The flames had done some damage, mostly to his right leg and side, which had been closest in proximity to one of the seats of the fire, and to one side of his face. They were second-degree burns, with blistering, which would be extremely painful and cause some scarring. Banks’s shallow breathing had prevented the high level of smoke inhalation that might have done more serious damage more quickly, and the bumps on his head from the table and steps were superficial.

Annie moved around like a zombie. She knew she should go to bed but she was certain she wouldn’t be able to sleep. She needed a drink; she knew that much at least. She didn’t often drink spirits, but tonight called for something stronger than wine, so she poured herself a stiff cognac and coughed when she first tasted the fiery liquor.

When she caught a glance of herself in the mirror, she was surprised at the muddy hair, sooty face and the frightened eyes that looked back at her. The doctor who had examined Annie and Winsome had been reluctant to let her go, but there was no real damage and no real reason to keep her. She had insisted she was fine. And she was, physically. Her muscles ached, and her foot was bruised and swollen from kicking the door in, but other than that she had been spared the ravages of fire and smoke. She had probably been in the burning cottage for no more than thirty seconds, she reckoned. Of course, the station officer had given her a bollocking for going in at all, but she sensed that he did so because it was expected of him, because it was his job, and that he secretly approved. He must have known, as Annie did, that there was nothing else she could have done to save Banks’s life.

Phil. Phil Keane had done all this. He had enlisted his old polytechnic pals McMahon and Gardiner to help him with the art scam, and they had got together and turned on him. For that, he had killed them. It had to have happened that way. It was the only thing that made sense now. Philip Keane, not Leslie Whitaker, was Giles Moore. Philip Keane, not Leslie Whitaker, had assumed William Masefield’s identity, and perhaps even killed him, too.

Annie would never understand in a million years how she could have felt so close to someone capable of doing what he did, of thinking she was in love with him, of sharing his bed. The thought made her skin crawl.

She realized that Phil, or whatever his name really was, was one of those rare creatures indeed: part charming con man, part cold-blooded killer. Con men didn’t usually kill, not unless they were cornered and could see no other way out. And that was what must have happened. The threat of exposure. Of ruin. Of prison.

Phil Keane made people feel special so that he could manipulate them. Chameleonlike, he metamorphosed from one identity to another, leaving chaos in his wake. And he did it for profit and self-protection. Annie shook her head in disbelief at her own blindness. How little we know even those closest to us, she thought. Phil Keane kept his true self locked in a dark, secret place nobody could ever penetrate. You saw what he wanted you to see, believed what he wanted you to believe.

And he made you feel special.

Annie tossed back the cognac and poured herself another large one. What the hell. She felt as if she had been raped all over again, and right now she didn’t know if she hated Phil more for killing McMahon and Gardiner, and for almost killing Banks, or for deceiving her so completely. He had used her all along, of that she was certain. While he hadn’t known he was going to kill McMahon and Gardiner, he had been in a criminal partnership with them by August, when he had pursued Annie, and he had no doubt thought it would be useful to get close to someone with inside knowledge of what the local police were thinking and doing.

And to cap it all, the bastard had got away.

There was a huge manhunt going on, even now, but Annie doubted they’d find him. After all, he was a chameleon. If it had been a television drama, of course, they would have hushed up Banks’s survival, let the world believe he was dead, and Annie would have waited for Phil to get in touch, to come and offer his sympathy and condolences on the loss of her friend.

But the reporters were on the scene almost as quickly as the fire brigade. This was big news. Banks was a well-known local detective with a number of successful cases under his belt. In no time flat, the local news on TV and radio was informing the good citizens of Eastvale and, no doubt, the rest of England, that DCI Alan Banks had been pulled from his blazing cottage by his heroic DI Annie Cabbot and DC Winsome Jackman, and that he was now in Eastvale General Infirmary. There was no way Phil wouldn’t hear that, and when he did, he would know the game was up. He would disappear and reemerge as yet someone else.

Annie smelled of smoke, and she wanted to go up and have a shower and get clean. She took her cognac to the bathroom with her. They would go over Keane’s cottage with a fine-tooth comb, she thought. Meticulous and fastidious as Phil was – and she had no doubt that he would have cleaned up behind him – the odds were that they would find something. A hair. A fingerprint. Something.

She stripped her clothes off and dropped them in the laundry basket. Already, she noticed, her foot was turning yellow, black and blue. At least it wasn’t broken. The doctor had told her that much.

Annie paused at the sink, gripping its edge, again looking at her black face. Like a soldier going into battle. She couldn’t understand the expression in her eyes now, didn’t know what she was feeling. Just before she turned to get in the hot shower, she noticed the toothbrush lying on the sink. It wasn’t hers. She remembered when Phil had stayed a few nights ago she had given him it to use, and it looked as if he had. She knew she hadn’t cleaned up the bathroom since.

Taking a plastic bag from the cupboard under the sink, she dropped the toothbrush in it. You never knew. It could contain Phil Keane’s DNA. Because one day they’d catch the bastard, and then they would need all the evidence they could get.

It was two days before Banks was allowed visitors at Eastvale General Infirmary, and Annie was the first to go in. Beyond the window, occasional shafts of sunlight shot through the cloud cover. Cut flowers brightened up the drab-olive room.

Banks lay propped up on his pillows, one side of his face bandaged and smeared with antibiotic salve, looking at the rain through his window. He looked spent, Annie thought, but there was still life in his eyes, life and something that had not been there before. She didn’t know what it was.

He had lost everything. Banks’s cottage didn’t exist anymore. She had seen it with her own eyes reduced by fire to nothing more than a roofless shell. Everything he owned had gone up in flames: his CDs, clothes, furniture, stereo, all his memorabilia, family photographs, papers, letters, the lot. He had nothing left except his car and whatever personal effects he kept in his office. Did he know this? Surely someone must have told him.

“How are you doing?” she asked, laying her hand on his bare forearm, near the spot where the needle rested.

“Can’t complain,” Banks said. “If I did, no one would listen.”

“Are they treating you well?”

“Fair to middling. Mostly I’m bored. Did you-”

Annie passed him the hip flask. “It’s not Laphroaig,” she said.

“Good,” said Banks, slipping it in the drawer. “I’m not sure I could stomach that stuff again.”

“What has the doctor said?”

“I should heal up okay,” Banks said. “But there might be some scarring. We’ll have to wait and see. At least the headache’s gone. Worst I ever had.”

“Pain?”

“Pretty bad, but they keep me dosed up. Ever burned your finger?”

Annie nodded.

“Well, multiply the pain by a few thousand and you’ll have some idea. Thing is, with second-degree burns the nerve endings stay intact. That’s why it hurts. I didn’t know that. The hair follicles and sweat glands, too. It’s only the upper layers of skin that are burned. You know what the worst thing is, though?”

“What?”

“The memory loss. I can’t remember a bloody thing, from the moment I answered the door to the moment I woke up here. Except for the taste of the whiskey. The doctor says it might come back or it might not. Which is a pretty bloody useless thing to say, if you ask me.”

“Tracy’s been by a couple of times,” Annie said, “and she’ll be back. Brian rang. He’s in Amsterdam with the band. Wants to know if you need him.”

“I shouldn’t think so,” said Banks. “I’ll be home in a day or so.”

Christ, thought Annie, the poor sod. He didn’t know. “Alan,” she said. “Look, I wouldn’t… you know… the cottage, I mean. The fire caused quite a lot of damage.”

Banks looked at her as if she was confirming what he already suspected, and nodded. “Well, I’ll be out of here, at any rate,” he said.

Annie handed him a gift-wrapped package. “Everyone in the squad room put together for this.”

Banks opened it and inside found a new personal CD player and a copy of Mozart’s Don Giovanni.

“We didn’t know what you’d want,” Annie said. “It was Kev’s idea. I think it’s the only opera he’s ever heard of. There’s batteries already in it.”

“It’s fine,” said Banks. “Thank everyone for me.”

“You can do it yourself soon.”

Banks turned the CD player over in his hands for a few moments and looked away, as if the emotion were too much. “Have you caught him yet?” he asked.

“No,” said Annie. “Not yet. But we will. It’s just a matter of time.”

“Tell me what you’ve found out.”

Annie sat back in her chair. “Quite a bit, actually,” she said. “Greater Manchester Police found his BMW parked at the airport, which means he could have gone anywhere. We’re pursuing inquiries with the major airlines and at the railway stations, but nothing yet. And the cottage hadn’t been in his family for generations. It was leased from a couple who live in south London. We’ve got fingerprints and DNA, but there are no matches with anything on record yet.”

“So he’s clean?”

“Not quite,” said Annie. “Spectral analysis matched the petrol in the BMW’s fuel tank with that used at the Gardiner scene and…”

“And?”

“And at your cottage.”

“So he used his own car to visit Gardiner, too?”

“Had to,” Annie said, looking away. “He was having dinner with me at The Angel when the fire started.”

Banks said nothing for a moment. “Anything else?” he asked finally.

“His prints match a partial the SOCOs found on the rented Jeep Cherokee, which confirms what we already suspected.”

“That the killer was using Masefield’s identity?”

“Yes. The accountants digging into Masefield’s investments have discovered that he was dealing with someone called Ian Lang of Olympus Holdings, registered in the British Virgin Islands, but they’re not having a lot of luck tracing Mr. Lang or his company.”

“They wouldn’t have, would they?” said Banks. “Any more on Masefield?”

“All we know is that he was at university in Leeds at the right time, so I assume ‘Giles Moore,’ if that’s who we’re looking for, must have known him somehow and kept in touch. There’s every chance that Keane had something to do with whatever lost Masefield all his money, and that he killed him. But we can’t know for sure. Maybe it was just opportune. Maybe Masefield did commit suicide – everyone said he was depressed and drinking too much – and Keane found him dead, stole his identity and started the fire. But one way or another, he was involved in the death.”

“Yes,” said Banks. “And it would have been easy for him to pass himself off as Masefield if the two of them had a passing resemblance. It’s amazing what you can do with a pair of glasses, a different hairstyle or coloring, maybe a slight stoop and a little paunch.”

“Anyway,” Annie went on, “I talked to Elaine Hough again, and she reluctantly dug out a couple of old letters Giles Moore had written to her. She said she hadn’t wanted anyone else to read them. No detectable prints, unfortunately, but we do have samples of Keane’s handwriting, and our expert cautiously admits they might match. But they’re years apart, so it’s hard to be certain. Nothing that would stand up in court, at any rate.”

“It’s a start,” said Banks. “Can you show her Keane’s picture?”

“We don’t have a picture,” Annie said. “Another problem is that we can’t seem to dig up any background on Giles Moore. He definitely existed for Elaine Hough, and for McMahon, Gardiner and Masefield, and whoever else he hung around with in Leeds, but outside that, we have no record of him. You do realize we might never find out?”

“Someone like him,” Banks said, “is bound to be clever. Keane and Moore are probably only two of his identities. Maybe he’s Ian Lang, too. God knows who he is now, or where, but if I read him right, he’d have an escape route – and a new identity – all set up for an eventuality like this. I’ll bet he’s overseas already. He’s been at this all his life, Annie. Conning people, stealing identities. Maybe this is the first time he’s killed, maybe not. But he’s been at the game for a long time. Look how he conned us.”

Annie produced a cheap pocket-sized notebook bound in stiff cardboard covers and tapped it with her forefinger. “We found this at the cottage,” she said. “One of the SOCOs discovered a false ceiling in the wardrobe. The measurements didn’t agree. In it we found the notebook, a passport in the name of Ewan Collins, and about twenty thousand quid in fives and tens.”

“So he didn’t have time to get back there and pick them up,” said Banks. “Which means maybe he doesn’t have a passport – not one he can use, at any rate.”

“Which means he may well be still in the country.”

Banks looked at the notebook. “What’s that?” he asked.

“Roland Gardiner’s journal. It looks as if he started keeping it when Keane first came to visit, and it stops on the evening of his death. It’s quite touching, really. Elaine Hough told us Gardiner fancied himself as a bit of a writer when he was at the Poly.”

“Does it tell us anything?”

“Not really,” Annie said. “It’s more of a personal, poetic record than anything else. Gardiner was taken in by the excitement and romance Keane offered. It does help explain why they had to die, though. It was mostly McMahon’s fault. Not only did he get greedy, he also intended to try to pass off the Turner as genuine. According to Gardiner, he was embittered. He wanted revenge on the art world for failing to recognize his great talent, and he thought the best way to get it was to put one over on them. A big one.”

“And Keane?”

“Ever the pragmatist,” said Annie. “McMahon tried to blackmail him into helping authenticate the Turner. Said if he didn’t he’d pass on the names of all the fakes he’d channeled through Keane to the press, the police, the galleries, the dealers. It would have ruined Keane, and he’d probably have ended up in jail. McMahon could have claimed that all he did was paint them, not try to pass them off as genuine. Keane obviously realized what trouble McMahon could cause him, so the artist became more of a liability than an asset. And Gardiner was a loose end.”

“Why did Keane hang on to the notebook? Why not burn it?”

“Vanity,” said Annie. “It never names him, but it’s all about him.”

“What was Gardiner’s role?”

“Forger of provenance, letters, old catalogs, bills of sale. That sort of thing. Go-between for nonexistent owners, dealers and auction houses. McMahon could dash off the paintings, but that’s as far as his contribution went.”

“As we thought,” said Banks.

“Yes.” Annie paused. “We’ve also talked to Keane’s wife, who was less than useful, and we’ve been having a close look at his business. It was clever,” Annie went on. “Very clever. He chose lesser-known artists. Eighteenth-century English landscape painters. Dutch minimalists. Minor Impressionists. And McMahon churned them out in quantity. Sketches. Small watercolors. Nothing big enough to draw too much attention to itself. Ten thousand quid here, fifty thousand there, twenty, five. It all adds up to a tidy sum.”

“Christ,” said Banks. “Keane told us all this, you know. He told us everything we needed to know. He was toying with us. We just weren’t listening.”

Annie said nothing.

“Anything more from Whitaker?”

“I’ve talked to him again. He admitted supplying the paper and canvas for a small cut, most likely from McMahon’s take. He knows nothing about the real magnitude of what was going on, knew nothing about Keane, but he did know why McMahon wanted the materials and what he did with them. He also confirmed what Gardiner wrote, that McMahon was bitter and bragged about ‘showing them all.’ ”

“Are we charging Whitaker?”

“What with? Being an arsehole?”

Banks managed a weak smile, but Annie could tell it hurt. “Have you seen or heard anything of Mark Siddons?” he asked.

“No,” said Annie. “We’ve no unfinished business with him, have we?”

“No,” said Banks. “I was just wondering, that’s all.” He glanced toward the window again, and Annie could see he was looking at the scaffolding around the church tower.

Annie tapped the notebook again. “It really is odd,” she said, “the way Gardiner seemed to look up to Keane, hero-worship him, as if their scam was all that made life bearable, and when it was over…” She dropped the notebook on the bedsheet. “Well, you can read it for yourself.”

“Keane made him feel special?” Banks suggested.

“Yes. He made him feel special.” Annie leaned forward. “Look, Alan…”

Banks touched her hand. “Later,” he said.

Then the door opened and Michelle Hart popped her head in. “Not interrupting anything, am I?”

Banks looked over at her. “Well,” he said, “you’re a sight for sore eyes.”

Annie left the room.