The Tomb in Turkey

TWENTY-EIGHT

It was a beautiful moonlit walk through Kayaköy from Morning Glory to the foot of the ghost town. There were even fireflies to be seen amidst the trees. But Jude was unaware of any of it. Her mind was too full.

Increasingly, it looked as though Barney Willingdon had been responsible for the murder of Nita Davies. Erkan’s logic had been convincing, and Henry’s suggested scenario of Barney turning on his mistress in frustration at his inability to function sexually did have a horrible ring of truth about it.

But there remained elements that were unexplained. And she still had difficulty in casting Barney, a man she had once loved, in the role of murderer.

Nor did it ever occur to her that going to meet him in this clandestine way might be putting her own life at risk.

Her mobile phone stayed obstinately silent. As she approached the flat area beneath the ghost town where the camels had hunkered down for the night, she tried ringing Barney’s number. But there was still no reply.

He’d said either he’d contact her or someone would ‘point her in the right direction’. In other words, she could do nothing by her own efforts, just sit and wait.

At least she could do that with a drink in her hand. There were a few more people in Antik that evening. By the fire, two women were busy pouring batter for gözleme. Jude decided she would order a white wine, but the owner, seeing her arrive, was already pouring her a cold Efes, so she didn’t argue when he brought it to the table.

‘Your friend is joining you?’

‘No, just me tonight. And just for a drink.’

‘Fine,’ he said and moved across to a table of German tourists who were noisily calling for more drinks.

Another man moved so silently that she was hardly aware of him until he was sitting on the chair next to her.

‘Hello,’ he whispered. ‘I have found Barney.’

It was Travers Hughes-Swann.

Jude swallowed down half of her beer and left some lira on the table to pay for it. Then she and Travers slipped away into the darkness. They passed by the battered Land Rover, which must have already been parked there when Jude arrived. Uncomfortably aware of the odour emanating from Travers’ body, she followed him to the edge of the flat area where the path led up into the ghost town.

‘He’s up in there, is he?’

Travers put a finger to his lips and nodded.

The soft soles of their shoes made no sound on the well-worn cobbles of the street. The moonlight was strong enough to show any unevenness in the path ahead. The noise from the restaurants below was filtered and thin, as if coming from a distant island. They passed the gaping windows of the roofless houses and, though Jude didn’t much care for Travers, she was grateful not to be alone in this necromantic landscape.

They climbed higher than she and Carole had done a few nights before. They went past the tall Greek Orthodox church and climbed on.

A sudden movement and clattering in the pathside grasses set Jude’s nerves jangling.

‘Just a goat,’ murmured Travers.

Then the road ahead of them was closed. Only by red and white tape on metal poles, but the hazard symbols and notices in English declared the area to be unsafe.

‘Is he up there?’ whispered Jude.

‘Yes. Do you want me to come with you?’

‘No. I think it’d be better if I talked to him on my own.’

‘Are you sure? Are you sure he’s not dangerous?’

‘No. I don’t think I’m in any danger. I really cannot believe that Barney murdered Nita.’

‘Oh? Do you know who did then?’

‘No. I just can’t work it out. Who killed her, and who moved the body.’

‘What makes you think the body was moved?’

Jude gave him a brief summary of Carole’s initial discovery and their fruitless trip back to Pinara on the Tuesday afternoon.

‘Hm. That’s interesting.’ But not interesting enough for him to ask any further questions. Travers Hughes-Swann pointed ahead, beyond the tape, where the uneven track climbed higher. ‘Go up there. Just round the corner on the left there’s a house whose door frame is still intact. Barney’s in there.’

‘OK.’

‘I’ll stay here on guard.’

‘Thank you. And thank you very much for finding him.’

‘The pleasure’s all mine. Particularly when I am doing it for such a lovely lady,’ he added, losing most of the brownie points he’d been accumulating of the previous half-hour.

Jude nodded thanks to him, bent down to get under the red and white tape and started on up the hill.