Quintin Jardine - Blood Red

‘I’m surprised he let you leave,’ Alex murmured.

I hadn’t considered that point. ‘I didn’t tell him I was going,’ I replied. Maybe if I had, he might not have been so nice. . I banished the thought.

‘How did they get into the place?’ he pondered. ‘It’s still clear that the old man was taken by surprise.’

‘I don’t know,’ I admitted. ‘But I’ll make a guess. Santi and Gerard’s father was a locksmith. There’s a back gate in Planas’s garden wall, and if you check, I’ll bet you find that it’s been picked, just as the lock on my store was opened without a key.’

‘All of that. Why?’ Lavorante asked. Justine was walking towards us, her dark hair falling around her shoulders, her eyes shining. She had gathered herself together completely. Indeed, it was more than that; an aura of triumph seemed to embrace her.

‘Because she worshipped her father,’ I told him. ‘I could see it in her eyes the first time we met, and every time she spoke about him after that.’

She stopped, a few feet away, and looked directly at me, as calm as anyone I’ve ever seen. ‘I’ll give you that much,’ she said. ‘I worshipped my papa.’ Then she looked at Alex, with a sneering smile. ‘Now go ahead and prove the rest of it.’

They couldn’t. They didn’t even have enough evidence for Captain Lavorante to be able to hold her that night, or to detain her at all. She walked out of the Alhambra, went back to the Palacio de los Patos, and checked out next morning. We found out later that she took a taxi to Granada-Jaen Airport, and flew to Madrid; I’m sure she had a key to Santi’s apartment. She never came back to L’Escala and nobody’s seen her since that night. Through a lawyer, she sold her town house in Carrer del Mig, and her mother’s place, which she’d inherited automatically, as the older child. Elena didn’t get a cent.

Two months ago, Angel Planas skipped town. He left to open the shop one morning and when Elena went there to join him, she found a note. It told her only that he was leaving, and had instructed his solicitor to make the business and their house over to her. He’d already disposed of the rest of his father’s property. So I guess Justine wasn’t blackmailing him after all. . or she really is that good at manipulating people.

Elena has what she has but she’s alone now. Maybe she’ll wind up back with Ben. I don’t know, but I hope so. Somebody deserves a happy ending out of all of this.

Gerard didn’t come back either. He went home to Granada as soon as he was released from prison, the day after Santi died, to take care of his funeral. It may turn out to be one of the great regrets of my life that I flew home next morning without thinking about that. If I’d stayed, if I’d been there when he arrived, maybe lots of things would be different now.

But then again. .

I had a letter from him a few days later.

My dearest Primavera

I’m sure that you will have heard me say this once before, on a recording, and I’ll admit it again. I love you. But I loved my brother too, and I loved Irena, and look what happened to them, so I hope you’ll understand that I’m more than a little afraid to expose you to the same danger.

There is also the fact that I still love God, although for the first time since I made my vows to him, he has a rival. I have many things to discover. Do I still have my vocation? Am I the poison to people that I fear I might be? Can I learn to love myself, as well as to love others? For at this moment I do not.

To find the answers to these questions, or as many as I can, I have taken leave from the priesthood. I’m going to enter a Benedictine monastery in Limerick in Ireland, for the next two years according to my present plan. There’s a boys’ school attached, and I’m going to teach Spanish.

I ask you to do something that you may find difficult, but maybe not, maybe it’ll be easy for you. Please don’t visit me there or try to contact me. Get on with your life, look after your fine boy, and let me work things out for myself. I have a weakness for you, and if I saw you it would probably overcome me, just as that woman overcame my poor brother. May God forgive me for introducing them the first time he came to L’Escala, for I’ll never forgive myself.

My love again, to you and Tom,

Yours ever,

Gerard

It took me a couple of boxes of Kleenex to get through that one, I’ll tell you.

I took his advice. I’m getting on with my life. I still have the falling dream every so often, but by and large I’m all right. I’ve settled into my job with the embassy, and I’m doing a fair bit of travelling, thanks to a lady called Catriona O’Riordan, once of the Royal Green Jackets, would you believe, and latterly a sub-lieutenant in the Rifle Regiment. She looks after the house, she looks after Tom and she even helps me run my silly, self-indulgent information booth; plus she makes me feel secure.

The wine fair happened, and was it ever a success. We sold two thousand tickets, the most we reckoned the venue could handle. Sales were sluggish at first, until finally, I used my secret weapon, my brother-in-law Miles Grayson. Like many famous Aussies, Miles has his own wine label, and it’s an expanding business. His latest acquisition is a small but high-quality producer, not far from the town of Cadaques, and one of the exhibitors at the fair. He’d never heard of it until I pointed him in its direction, but once he’d looked at the books and tasted the product he was hooked. When I announced that he would be on-site for all three days of the fair, the tickets went in the blink of a bloodshot eye.

Tom’s handling Gerard’s absence. I showed him the letter. He didn’t shed a single tear. Far from it; he smiled, gave it back to me and said, ‘He’ll be back.’

‘Son,’ I began, but he let me get no further.

‘Read it again. That’s what it says.’

I’ve tried, but I can’t share his certainty, his faith, I suppose. He’s nearer nine than ever now, and still acting as an altar server for Father Olivares, sometimes in the big church in L’Escala. The old man’s set aside any thought of retirement; I suspect that he’s keeping the seat warm for someone. . just as I am, I suppose.

I’ve decided that I will give him at least one of his two years. After that, if he hasn’t returned, I’ll either declare myself open for suitable invitations, or I’ll say, ‘Bugger this for a game of Benedictines!’ and head for Limerick.

Until then. .