Vanished

Chapter 35

In the squad room everyone had gone home with the exception of Laura and Ridley. She was absentmindedly dismantling the incident boards, and he was watching her from his office as he pulled on his coat. He knew what she was thinking. ‘It’s not over, Laura.’

‘It feels over, sir. DCI Lewis has his kingpin due to arrive and we have two of the killers who seem to be victims themselves. And I don’t like the fact that we weren’t involved in all of that. Today feels like someone else’s victory.’

Whilst Laura voiced her feelings, Ridley moved to her side.

‘We won’t stop until we know for certain if this man Steve claims is the kingpin, is the same man who stepped from the Jag on the night Avril was murdered. And we won’t stop until we have Adam Border. Nothing’s over.’

‘Do you think he is alive, sir?’

Ridley frowned. ‘It’s possible, Laura, but if he is dead, we need to find his body. He’s been a long time missing. No one can just vanish.’

Jack sat on the Underground, heading for home. As he listened to a lady shout into her mobile about the cost of play therapy being akin to daylight robbery, and watched a young girl snog her boyfriend with such desperation that anyone would think he was off to war, Jack finally made up his mind that he and Maggie definitely needed to be a two-car family.

As with Laura and Ridley, Jack also felt that this case was not ready to be closed. There were far too many loose ends which were currently being ignored in favour of celebrating the arrest of a kingpin who might or might not have been the top man, seeing as many drug gangs used decoy leaders who were paid handsomely to take the fall if ever the police got close. In Jack’s far more analytical mind, there were still too many unanswered questions such as how Jason Marks fitted into the picture, and what part was played by Adam Border — two people who came and went freely from the Jenkins household, without anyone batting an eyelid. And who was the man seen driving the Jaguar, passing over items that could have been paper forensic suits, so no one was covered in Avril’s blood when she was dismembered? From the footage of Michael Mahoney’s arrest, Jack could not be certain that he was that man because they had no facial recognition. Steve Lewis was congratulating himself and his team, but they still had to prove Mahoney was their big-time drug dealer, and Ridley and his team still had to prove Mahoney was complicit in Avril Jenkins’ murder.

Jack was also concerned about the death of Tania Wetlock, even more so now that Foxy had told him about the remnants of a rectal enema present in her body. When administering a rectal enema, a syringe would normally be used, and yet nothing was found at Tania’s flat. But the biggest piece of evidence for Jack was the knowledge that Wetlock was not the sainted surgeon everyone thought he was. No one else was currently privy to the fact that Tania seemingly died from an overdose administered in the ‘Wetlock way’, or how he used to sell drugs to medical students when he was a much younger man — but Jack would need these accusations to be more than just hearsay before he could use them against Wetlock.

The Underground stopped at Holborn and there, on the wall of the tunnel, squarely framed by the window, was an advert for a Jeep Renegade. Now that was exactly the sort of thing Jack thought his family needed as their second car!

Maggie was lying face down on the floor of Hannah’s playroom making growling noises and pretending to swim across the carpet, whilst Hannah strode around, arms in the air for balance, screaming at the top of her lungs. Watching from the doorway, Jack was very unsure of the rules of this particular game.

‘She thinks I’m a shark or something,’ Maggie explained. ‘Doesn’t matter. Really, we’re just practising her walking whilst she’s on the carpet where she’s safe. Did your mum tell you about the day nursery on the way to the hospital?’ Jack’s blank expression told Maggie that this was the first he’d heard of it. Maggie started talking again before he could ask the one question she knew he would. ‘It’s not expensive compared to most round here and, yes, she does need to start going. She’s mobile now and needs to be socialising with other babies. Your mum is amazing, Jack, but we’ve got into the habit of just assuming that she’ll say yes when we need to pick up extra shifts or work late. Apart from her night classes, your mum’s got no time to herself. She’s like a live-in nanny. And she’s still young.’ Jack frowned, uncertain if Maggie was insinuating that his mum should get back out there and find herself a new man. Again, she could read him like a book. ‘All I’m saying, is that she needs friends her own age. Just like Hannah.’

All the while Jack and Maggie had been talking, Hannah had been running in circles and screaming with her hands high in the air to counterbalance her still-wobbly legs. Now exhausted, she wrapped her arms round the outside of Jack’s knees and wedged her head between his thighs. She then panted and giggled whilst she got her breath back. When Jack gently tried to move away towards his office, she stepped on top of his feet, so he had to take her with him. As father and daughter waddled along the landing, Jack told Maggie that his leave would more than likely be extended if the Tania Wetlock investigation was ongoing.

‘I can’t believe they’re treating you like a suspect!’ Maggie said.

He tried to explain that the champagne bottle found in Tania’s bedroom was potentially damaging as it had his prints. ‘But Ridley knows I’m not guilty of anything: he’s given me leave to protect me from suspension.’ Jack then prised Hannah off his legs, kissed her several times all over her face and handed her to Maggie. ‘If I need to stay out of sight, I will.’

As Jack disappeared into his office and closed the door behind him, Maggie suspected that his relaxed reaction to being kept away from the squad room meant that he was up to something on his own which Ridley probably knew nothing about.

As the days passed, Jack’s office got messier by the hour and none of it was his doing. While he sat at his desk, researching artists such as Modigliani, Degas and Picasso, his peripheral vision was assaulted by items which had no business being here. Half-used pots of paint, pinboards waiting to be wall-mounted, and dozens of old toys waiting to be advertised on eBay — together with the recycled boxes, envelopes and padding that would be used to send them to their new homes — made concentration on the task at hand difficult. But eventually he managed to tune them out.

Amedeo Modigliani was a fascinating artist who seemed capable of painting a captivating portrait including none of the sitter’s personality at all. He was, in Jack’s eyes, the exact opposite kind of artist to Henrick Chi, who managed to capture the very soul of a person. Although Jack had never heard of Modigliani, he knew who Degas and Picasso were, and both were listed as being in Frederick Jenkins’ original collection, authenticated by none other than Jason Marks. Jack immediately decided that now Marks was no longer a person of interest to the Drug Squad, there would be no conflict of interest if Jack asked for his input.

On Wednesday, Jack arrived at the Casa Manolo on the King’s Road in Chelsea, about twenty minutes before Jason Marks, instantly noting that the Spanish food and wine selection looked fabulous.

Jason walked in wearing tan chinos and a pristine white T-shirt. Over one shoulder he wore a man-bag and, over the other his jacket hung from a finger. Before sitting sat down at the table, he ordered at the bar a selection of dishes from the tapas menu and a bottle of Beronia Gran Reserva Rioja, all of which he’d clearly ordered numerous times before.

‘I hope you don’t mind. You’ll thank me when it all arrives,’ he said. Jack’s quick smile hid the fact that he had been hoping for a beer and a meal that came on a plate which would only be touched by him.

Jason sat a little way back from the table with his legs crossed, and looked at Jack with a defensive gaze. ‘This is completely informal, Mr Marks,’ Jack assured him. ‘You don’t have to answer any of my questions, but I’d appreciate it if you did.’ Jason straightened his knife a quarter inch, so it was in line with his fork. Then he seemed to relax. Jack got straight to the point. ‘Did you witness a will for Avril Jenkins?’

‘Several months ago, I do believe I did,’ Jason replied. ‘That is to say, she put a piece of paper in front of me and thrust a pen into my hand. There was a name in the header, which told me it was something from a solicitor. I can’t recall the name.’

Jack asked if Jason knew the name Adam Border. He nodded vaguely. ‘Arnie Hutchinson let it slip that he’s the new beneficiary of Avril’s will. And that he’s gone AWOL. Or he’s dead. Either way, Terence is preparing to fight for what he firmly believes is his. Terence claims that a son can’t exist because Frederick would have known about him. He’s also banking on the fact that Avril was a bigamist.’

Jack asked what evidence Jason had of that. ‘Chinese whispers. Someone said to someone. All I can say is that nothing would surprise me about Avril Jenkins. If she was already married when Frederick proposed, I have no doubt whatsoever that she’d lie about it. She had a childlike view of life. She’d have spoken without thinking and worried about it later.’

‘Did you ever meet Adam Border?’

‘I met the man who tended her garden. I never asked, or was told, his name. But if that was him, she didn’t treat him like he was her son. She treated him more like he was her toy boy. An unseemly ruse if he was her offspring.’

The wine and food arrived, and all conversation paused whilst Jason tasted and approved the bottle chosen, then visually checked the tapas dishes he’d selected, shifting the tiny bowls until they formed an aesthetically pleasing pattern on the table.

‘In truth, I was Freddie’s friend and only really dealt with Avril after his death,’ he said. ‘Freddie could be a tricky customer at times. Moody. Probably bipolar, in hindsight. He could be paranoid, too, which is why he rarely relinquished control of the reins with investments. He questioned my valuations and expertise, but he also paid me well so I could live with it. Freddie did have a stunning ability to spot an up-and-comer. He’d follow the careers of students, attend their little local art exhibitions, then pounce on collections he guessed would one day be worth money. And he was right most of the time.’

Jason fell silent again while he selected a spoonful of food from each of the tapas bowls, arranging them in neat piles on his plate, like paint on a palette. It was only now Jack realised that Jason had ordered food by colour and not by content.

‘What was I saying? Oh yes, Freddie. He learnt from his dad, who really was an art collector. The old boy spotted Andy Warhol early, but his real passion was the Dutch masters. Mr Jenkins was the real talent, and an obsessive collector. After he died and Freddie inherited the lot, he learnt fast — but then, dear God, Avril was a nightmare. She was one of those people who bought and sold based on whether she liked the look of something. Preposterous! She stopped insurance payments and sold on a whim. She decimated poor Freddie’s vault.’

Until this moment, Jason had been providing information that Jack already had, which was exactly what Jack wanted him to do, so he could be certain that he’d not overlooked anything. But a vault? What vault?

Jason explained that during a bout of paranoia, Frederick Jenkins had had a secret vault built beneath the cellar in order to safely store his art collection. ‘Avril moved Rossetti’s Venus Verticordia from the vault to above the fireplace. I told her not to. The heat, I said. The heat will destroy it. She couldn’t care less. She liked it, so that’s where it was to live.’ Jason became almost mournful. ‘Her worst crime was selling a Degas pencil drawing without seeking my advice first. And a rather unusual Van Gogh which, thank the Lord, turned out to be a fake. I would have given my eyeteeth to have been allowed just one peek inside that vault. What a vision it must have been to see it filled with masterpieces! I only knew of its existence because once when I was in the hallway, just about to leave, he came out of the kitchen carrying a canvas that needed to be authenticated, and he said he had been down in the vault. He said no one, not even Avril, was allowed down there.’

Jack sipped from his glass of wine to give himself a moment to think. So the vault beyond the cellar — which they’d all assumed was built to be used as a secret drug factory — was in fact a private art gallery which had been in existence decades before the drug dealers showed up. Once again, Jack was privy to information that no one else had, simply because his gut had told him to keep probing with someone who’d been dismissed from the inquiry days ago.

But did it mean the art angle was now more pivotal than the drugs?