Quintin Jardine - Alarm Call

I handed my laptop in to Reception for safe keeping and, while I was there, asked the day manager if he knew where Damon and Pythias was. He didn’t, but his young assistant did: she told me that it was a cafe in either Kinross Avenue or Broxton Avenue. . she wasn’t sure which, but they were adjoining and less than a mile away.

We could have taken the Jag, but that might have caused us a parking problem at the other end so I decided that it was best to walk. Prim was in shorts too, a pair she’d bought at the airport in Minneapolis: her legs had the nice light tan that I remembered, but then so had the rest of her.

We walked down Wilshire as the girl had directed us, then crossed it, turning right into Westwood Boulevard. Kinross Avenue was only a hundred yards along, to the left: we walked along it, but saw no Damons and no Pythiases either, so we carried on until we found Broxton.

The whole area was familiar, and all of a sudden, I knew exactly where I was. When Prim and I had done our brief and ill-fated LA living bit, we’d stayed with Miles and Dawn in Beverly Hills for two or three weeks, until we found a place of our own to rent. The home town of the stars is very close to Westwood Village. It, in turn, is very close to UCLA, and so it has a nice student feel about it. We’d liked it and so we’d hung out there from time to time. I looked up the tree-lined avenue and there it was, on the other side of the street, the place we were looking for, a cafe with an indoor area and open-air seating under a veranda on the edge of the sidewalk. We’d actually had a drink there a couple of times, although I’d never noticed what the place was called.

‘Why the hell did he pick this?’ I asked.

‘I think I know,’ said Prim. ‘Paul used to ask me about you and me, and what we’d done when we were in California together, before it all went bad.’

‘It was bad from the start.’

‘No, it wasn’t. You may say that now, but it wasn’t all bad. That weekend in San Francisco was good for us, and so were the days we spent down here. Maybe you had given up on us even then, but I hadn’t. I told Paul about it, and he’s remembered. He’s been taking me to places I know, places I’m familiar with.’

She had a point: it certainly looked that way. ‘He’s also keen on meeting you in the open. First Union Square, now here.’

‘He’s cautious, that’s all. If he’s been planning this for a couple of years, he’s not going to take any chances, and he’s certainly not going to be stupid enough to go anywhere near you, other than in the middle of a crowd.’

‘Would it help if I wasn’t here?’

‘It’s too late for that. If he doesn’t see you now, he’ll wonder where you are.’ Again, I had to agree with her. ‘Let’s go across there,’ she said.

I wasn’t so keen on that; I guess that getting shot the day before had made me a little more cautious. I didn’t want to repeat the experience, and while there was no evidence that Wallinger had anything against me personally, I was paranoid enough not to fancy the idea of being a sitting target.

‘No,’ I told her. ‘It’s only twenty to three. We stay out of sight until then.’ I looked around and spotted a bookshop, another crime specialist. . Americans are very big on mysteries. . more or less directly opposite Damon and Pythias. ‘Let’s go in there.’ I didn’t give her the chance to object; I took her hand and marched towards it.

The store was wonderfully cool; its air-conditioning was helped by Venetian blinds, but they were angled so that we could see out and across the street.

There was a man behind the counter, but nobody else in the place. ‘Hi there,’ he greeted us. ‘Welcome to the Mystery Bookstore. My name’s Shelley; can I help you?’

He wasn’t a tall guy, and he’d eaten a few lunches in his time, but the thing that would have made him stand out in any crowd was his remarkable taste in shirts. The one he had on would have made Duffy Waldorf, American golf’s sartorial legend, look like an Amish elder: its sleeves were ablaze with delicate colours, and its centrepiece seemed to be a map of all of the islands that make up Japan. (For geographic simpletons like me, it had ‘Japan’ emblazoned across it.) The rest of the available space on his ample chest was filled by images that I took to denote the country’s varied culture, including a depiction of Mount Fuji and, for some reason, two baseball players. I thought about asking him where the sumo wrestlers were, but decided against it, in case he thought I was getting personal.

‘Just browsing,’ I told him, and turned to a stand of books, although in truth I could have browsed Shelley’s shirt for the rest of the afternoon. I picked up a few volumes and looked through them, glancing across the street every so often to observe the cafe action. There wasn’t much. It was gone lunchtime so the place was reasonably quiet, although a few Saturday-afternoon shoppers. . or browsers. . had stopped off there. A couple of kids vacated a table, a couple of ladies took another, and a slim, bearded guy in shades and a light jacket came out of the indoor area, but that was all. Prim saw nothing: she had been trapped in conversation with Shelley, who was trying to sell her a collectable publisher’s proof of The Day of the Jackal.

He failed with that pitch, but I bought a signed copy of the new Michael Connelly, to thank him for the use of his premises. He blinked at the name on my credit card, then placed me. I asked him if he had any of the Skinner books in stock, but he told me they usually sold out fast.

At two minutes to three we crossed Broxton Avenue and took a table in Damon and Pythias. Our backsides were hardly on the chairs before a girl came to ask what we’d like to drink and to explain that we were in a vegetarian restaurant. She looked like a cheerleader; the place was cheap and cheerful so I guessed that its staff. . and maybe most of its customers. . were students. I told her we’d like a chilled bottle of Pinot Grigio, some still water, and that we’d already eaten.

Having been distracted by the bookstore, Prim was back on edge, big-time. Her eyes were all over the avenue; as she picked up her wine-glass I saw that her hand was trembling slightly. I covered it with mine, to still it, and as I did so I was aware of a young man standing behind me.

He was wearing a waiter’s apron and he was shifting from one foot to the other. ‘Sir,’ he ventured, ‘would you be Mr Oz Blackstone?’

I nodded. The kid wanted an autograph, he could have an autograph, and then get the hell out of the way; I waited for him to hand me a book and pen.

Instead, from behind his back, he produced a brown envelope, and handed it to me. ‘I was told to give you this, sir.’ He reached into a pocket and took out a Nokia cell-phone. ‘I was also asked if I could let you use this.’ He gave it to me. ‘It’s mine,’ he explained quickly, in case I thought it was a gift. He was okay on that score: I know the mobile phone industry is pushy but it doesn’t yet hire students to give them away free on the streets. . or does it?

As I stared at it, the thing began to sing; I think it might have been Beyonce Knowles, but all those divas sound the same to me. Prim had been watching the whole performance, incredulous, but the musical ring-tone sparked her into life. ‘Answer it!’ she snapped at me, as if there was a chance I wouldn’t.

I pressed a green button and put it to my ear. ‘Hello, you thieving, kidnapping bastard,’ I said.

‘Nice to speak to you at last, Oz.’ The accent was smooth, bland, professional and American. ‘You told my mom we’d met before, but I’m afraid I can’t remember it.’

It was as if his voice was a trip-wire inside my head and I’d stumbled over it. I felt myself explode. ‘The next time we speak, you’ll remember it, Wallinger. Thanks to you I’ve been taken away from my family, compromised, embarrassed and nearly fucking killed. When I catch up with you, you will be picking teeth out of your arsehole.’