Screen Savers

Chapter 46

She came in the Freelander rather than the low-flying missile that was our Z3, but even then she beat breakfast by over two hours. She phoned me, mobile to mobile, from Farnham, not long after four a.m., to warn me that she was close by.

Mark met her at the end of the driveway and brought her into the house, where Miles and I sat waiting. Like Prim, neither of us had been able to sleep.

I was comforted by her arrival, and I believe that Miles was too. There’s something very capable about her, something completely unflappable, even — no, especially — in the most difficult situations.

You may remember the old joke about the bygone Prime Minister visiting a remote part of a last vestige of the Empire in Africa. As she stepped from her transport, the assembled natives cried out together, ‘Magumba! Magumba!’

‘What are they saying?’ the PM asked the High Commissioner.

‘It’s a traditional greeting, Madam,’ he rumbled.

‘Magumba! Magumba!’

They walked on a few yards until the High Commissioner cried suddenly, ‘Careful, Madam. Mind your feet. Don’t step in the magumba!’

I sometimes recall that story when I think of Prim. Not because she’s worked in one of the deepest parts of Africa, but because when the magumba hits the fan, there is no one I would rather have next to me than Primavera Phillips.

I’ve seen her in a crisis — like the time she saved our skins in Geneva, or the night she saved Jerry Gradi’s life in Barcelona — and on each occasion there was a calmness and an inner certainty about her that made me know that everything was going to be all right. That morning, as she settled herself beside me into the big soft couch in the mansion’s sitting room, clutching a mug of coffee, I had the same feeling.

‘Right boys,’ she began. ‘What have you done so far?’

‘We’ve talked all night,’ said Miles. ‘About Dawn, and about who might have taken her; but other than that we’ve done nothing.’ I showed her the note which Miles had found in the safe.

‘No police or he’ll know!’ she snorted. ‘Arrogant bastard! How will he know, exactly? He must think he’s the only person who ever kidnapped anyone. Doesn’t he realise that there are specialist teams set up to handle this sort of situation? You have called them, I take it?’

Miles shook his head. ‘I’m not taking that risk, Prim.’

‘The risk is in not calling them, man,’ she protested.

‘Look, this man tried to kill Oz’s nephew, your father, Susie and Mike. Now he’s got Dawn. Yet we still don’t know anything about him. For all we know this guy could be a cop himself.’

‘Miles, that’s paranoid.’

I put a hand on her thigh. ‘Maybe so, love, but it’s my enemy who’s induced it. He’s shown us how dangerous he is. Maybe that’s what all these attacks have been about; to establish that he is very serious, and to make us all very afraid of him.

‘Mark’s reading is right. This person has been very close to us all along. He chose the ideal moment to abduct Dawn, when Miles and I were away playing squash with Mark minding us. He had sussed the place out and knew how to do it. Up the fire escape, take Dawn quickly and quietly, leave the note, then out the same way, van at the back gate, and off. We reckon that he’s had at least two hours’ start on us, before we even knew Dawn was missing. He could have been in the Channel Tunnel within that time.’

‘But wasn’t it still a big risk for him to take? Weren’t there other people in the house?’

‘Only the staff, and none of them saw or heard her leave. One of the hired cars brought her home first. Nelson Reed and the rest of them waited and squeezed into Geraldine Baker’s car.’

‘What about the driver?’

‘From a car hire firm in Guildford. Miles called them to cancel tomorrow’s pick-up and in the process he found out that the car and the driver reported back in on time. So no way was it him. No, it’s someone who was watching the studio and took his chance.’

‘Or someone who was in the studio all along. What do you know about the production crew?’

‘They’re all pros,’ Miles answered. ‘Most of them, apart from the key people, who’re full-time, are specialists hired on a daily or weekly basis. They’ve all got industry track records, or they come from reputable agencies.’

‘Will they all be at the studio tomorrow?’

‘No. I’ve stood them down for the rest of the week.’

Prim glowered at him. ‘That’s a damn shame,’ she said.

‘Why?’

‘If you hadn’t, we could have seen who turned up. . and who didn’t.’

Her coffee was untouched, the mug cooling in her hands. ‘Call the police, Miles.’

‘I can’t, Prim. . not yet, anyway. Not until the guy’s made contact and told us what he wants.’

‘Why don’t you just read your script?’ she murmured.

‘What d’ you mean?’

‘You guys are making a movie about a kidnapping, aren’t you?’

Both of us looked at her, our sleep-deprived eyes suddenly wide. ‘So?’ I heard myself croak.

‘So in the script, the leading lady, my sister, is snatched from a country house. That’s a coincidence, is it not?’

She was right; it was such a bloody obvious coincidence that we had been staring obliviously past it all night.

‘So what does the script say that the kidnapper wants?’ she asked.

‘Ten million pounds lodged in a private bank in Lugano, accessible by code and transferable anywhere in the world.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means that the kidnapper is given the code and can make a call at once, moving the funds to another bank of his own choice, anywhere in the world. After that he’s free and clear.’

‘Okay,’ Prim said, ‘let’s wait for his call. Don’t tell the police yet, if you really feel that’s the way to play this. But if I were you I’d start getting ten million together right now.’

She swung her feet off the couch and stood up. ‘If that’s what’s going to happen, I’m going to grab a couple of hours’ sleep. You should, too. Where’s our room, Oz?’

She was right. There was no longer any sense in staying awake; our chains were being pulled hard enough as it was. We said good night — or good morning — to Miles, picked up Prim’s bag from the hall and went upstairs.

I was in bed, watching my fiancee undress, when a memory came back to me from the weekend. ‘Hey,’ I asked her, ‘what did Joe Donn want?’

She gasped, then grinned. ‘I’d forgotten all about that. He had something to tell me. I’m too tired, it’s not relevant and it’s too heavy to go into. But what he really, really wanted was to show off.

‘He’s been doing a bit of detective work — something that you should have thought of, actually. Remember that girl Myrtle, who had a fling with his nephew while her boyfriend was in the slammer?’

‘Sure, I remember her.’

‘Well, old Joe went to see her. She used to work for him, after all. He reminded her of an office outing, one they had all gone to during the brief time when Stephen was at Gantry’s, and he asked her if he was right in thinking that she had a camera with her.

‘Clever old guy.’ She chuckled. She shrugged her bra on to the floor, stepped out of her knickers, then reached into her bag and took out a stiffened envelope. As she slipped into bed she handed it to me. ‘She did, and when she dug out the photos she had taken, there was one of the boy Stephen. Joe had it blown up and gave it to me.

‘It doesn’t mean a thing now, but I decided to bring it down anyway. The original’s there too.’

I took it from her and shook out the two photos. One was a group shot, typical office party stuff; I barely glanced at that before picking up the enlargement and gazing at it sleepily. . then I woke up, abruptly.

I knew the guy. Oh, sure I knew him. But not as Stephen Donn, occasional book-keeper. I knew him as Stu Queen the spark, our movie electrician.

I was halfway down the corridor to Miles’ room when Geraldine Baker opened her bedroom door, and I remembered that I didn’t have a stitch on.