Screen Savers

Chapter 21

This time, there was no need to pull a stunt to get to see Joe Donn. Prim called him and asked if we could visit him again. He must have taken a shine to her, for he agreed without a murmur.

We took the Z3 out to Motherwell; it’s a bit of a toy, that car. How many times in Scotland would anyone actually want to drive one with the top down? Very few indeed, but that Friday was one of them; as I drove along the M74, past Strathclyde Country Park with its fun fair and its rowing course, the wind sent Prim’s hair flying out behind her and tried to find its way inside my wrap-round shades.

Mr Donn was polishing the Jaguar when we drew up in front of his house. He looked at our car, nodding approval. I repositioned the electric hood, locked it and the car — okay, it was a good neighbourhood, but you can’t be too careful when you drive a flash motor like ours — and followed him into the big brick house.

He was as well-dressed as he had been before; still casual, but Calvin Klein, this time, from head to foot as far as I could see.

‘So what is it this time?’ he asked as he showed us into his study. ‘Will I save you the trouble by confessing now?’ I stared at him.

‘Okay, I admit it,’ he chuckled. ‘I once went to a conference, met a woman and charged her dinner to the firm on my expenses. There you are, you can shop me to Susie; then I suppose I’ll have a visit from her polisman boyfriend.’

‘No, Mr Donn,’ said Prim. ‘That won’t happen. Everyone fiddles their expenses a bit — even Oz.’ That wasn’t true, but I let it pass.

‘Last time we were here,’ she continued, ‘we told you that someone had been threatening Susie. It’s a bit more serious now; there’s been an attempt on her life.’

In a second, Joe Donn’s face seemed to turn as grey as his hair. ‘You what. .?’ he gasped.

‘Someone torched her car,’ I said. ‘She was meant to be in it at the time, but by pure chance, no one was.’

‘Do the police know who did it?’

‘The police wrote it off as an accident,’ I lied, technically. ‘We’re still handling this thing, and we’re still looking for your nephew. Have you seen him since we were here last?’

He shook his head. ‘No. Nor, as I said, do I expect to. Stephen’s a bad lot. I had hopes for him, but he’s let me down all along the line. My last words to him were something about not darkening my door again.’ He glanced at Prim. ‘Only I didn’t quite put it like that.’

‘Do you have a photograph of him?’ she asked.

Donn nodded. Some of his colour had returned, I noticed, but he was still pale. ‘I should have. Hold on a minute; I keep my photographs upstairs.’ He hurried from the room.

We wandered into the conservatory as we waited, admiring his big, immaculate garden, amused by the practice golf net in the far corner. ‘Nice place this,’ Prim murmured. ‘D’you think we should buy something like it?’

‘What, in Motherwell?’

She give me her ‘Daft bastard’ look. ‘I was thinking of Florida, actually.’

‘We’ve got two houses already.’

‘But neither of them has a garden.’

‘Exactly.’

It’s a thing about Prim. She’d really love to have green fingers, but in fact she’s death to anything with roots. Last December, my sister Ellie gave us a poinsettia, and Prim announced that she would look after it. A week before Christmas, the one remaining red leaf fell off.

We were so busy admiring the place, we didn’t notice or care that Joe Donn’s minute had stretched out to fifteen. It was only when he coughed behind us that I glanced at my watch and realised how long he had been gone.

‘That’s a funny thing,’ he said, looking slightly puzzled. ‘I thought I’d plenty of photos of Stephen, and yet I can’t find one. Come back through here though; there’s one thing I do have. After we both left Gantry’s, I took him on a golfing trip to Portugal. I had my video camera with me and I shot some footage, with Stephen in it. If I lend it to you, maybe you could have a print taken off that.’

We followed him back into the study, where he opened a cupboard, revealing rows of neatly labelled Super 8 tape cassette boxes. I watched him as he pointed his way along the second row, until he came to a box labelled Portugal. He took it out, and flipped it open; it was empty.

‘What the hell?’

‘Could it still be in the camera?’ Prim asked.

‘No chance. I never took out the tape I used last time I was in Spain. It’s still there. I’m meticulous about my tapes. This one’s been pinched.’

‘In that case, Mr Donn,’ I told him, ‘it looks as if your Stephen’s a shy lad. He doesn’t want anyone to have his photograph. I appreciate that you’ve fallen out with him, but does he have a key to your house?’

‘Yes he has. I never bothered to have it off him; he’s my own flesh and blood all said and done. He could have nipped in any time I was at golf.’

I glanced at Prim. ‘Only one thing for it then, love. We’re going to have to go back to Barassie.’