Quintin Jardine - On Honeymoon With Death

‘Who else, then?’

‘Another of Prim’s cast-offs?’

‘I only know one of them, and another by sight. It wasn’t Fortunato, and it wasn’t that waiter bloke.’

‘Then chances are it was a punter. Anyway, you said it yourself. If it was Miller, you’ll never prove it. So forget it. Let’s go home.’

Susie settled what there was of the bill and we stepped out into the cold, crisp night; she wore the coat which she had bought in Barcelona, and I had on my heaviest jacket. I thought that there was a chance that the photographer might still be hanging around, so, rather than walk straight along the Passeig to the spot where the Mercedes was parked, I led her in the other direction, round the side of El Roser II. We stopped at the small headland which looks across the great bay towards Ampuriabrava and Rosas.

We stood there for a while. Susie admired the twinkling lights on the other side; I pretended to do the same, but all the time I was glancing round, to see if we had been followed. If it was Miller, and if he was still there, a broken nose would be only the start.

But there was no one lurking, either with a camera or without. Eventually we walked on; past L’Olla and El Pescadors, two cheek-by-jowl restaurants which are open all year round, then back to the car.

Although I knew that there was no longer any threat to Susie, I bolted the doors automatically once we were home. ‘Nightcap?’ I asked.

‘Not that sort,’ Susie replied.

I felt accustomed to her being there with me, even though it had been less than three days. I knew that it was short term, an encounter, an adventure; but in its course my life, or at least my outlook on it, had changed dramatically. Old delusions had been swept aside and new truths had taken their place. I knew myself now, for sure, and I had my wee Glasgow provocateuse to thank, or blame, for it. I felt as if I would be ready to live in the real world again. . in a couple of days.

‘Come on then,’ I said. She was wearing the dress that she had worn to Shirley’s the night before. She undid a single catch at the one covered shoulder; it slid gently to her feet and she was naked. I lifted her clean out of her shoes and carried her upstairs, once again.

Our first night, or morning, had been sudden and violent, our second had been filled with my anger. Our third was different, it was gentle, warm, and assured. Maybe it was because we knew that it had to end, but we were terrific together. We knew what each other wanted, what to do, where to go. And, into the bargain, we fitted together, piston and cylinder precision-matched like a Formula One engine.

If we had been trying to tire each other out, which we weren’t, then the outcome was a draw. We slipped into sleep together. I dreamed. I saw the two of us, on a sailing boat, knowing that we were due in harbour but without a wind to blow us home.

When I woke next morning, she was standing at the side of the bed, looking down at me, and she was dressed. ‘I’m going home, Oz,’ she said. ‘I’ve just phoned the airport, and they can get me on to a flight this afternoon.’

I wasn’t surprised; I had known that the third night was it. Still I asked her. ‘Wait another day?’

She shook her head. ‘No. If I did that, it could fuck up my game-plan big-time. I might start to want you in that way after all.’ She smiled. ‘Not love you, you understand. Susie doesn’t love. Just want you.’

‘Okay.’ I stepped out of bed, right side as always. I’m superstitious that way; I never get out of bed on the wrong side. ‘You put the coffee on. I’ll shower and dress, then I’ll drive you down.’

‘No, I’ll get a taxi.’

‘You’ve got one: no arguments.’

We ate a quick cereal breakfast then I loaded Susie’s case into the Voyager, and we took to the road. We spoke very little on the way down, not at all, in fact, just listening to CDs, until we were past the hilltop prison. ‘What would have happened over the last couple of days, d’you think,’ I asked, ‘if you hadn’t gone down those stairs?’

‘I don’t know,’ she admitted, with a smile. ‘I caught you off-guard, and it was wicked of me, but I needed you awful bad.

‘Probably we’d just have had a nice chaste weekend, but. . You weren’t exactly in the best frame of mind yourself, were you?’

I had to agree with her. In truth, I still wasn’t, but that was something to be confronted later, even though a wee, lurking, bit of me wanted to say ‘Fuck it’, and get on that plane with Susie.

‘I’m glad you came,’ I told her. ‘I don’t regret what happened, and I’m not going to feel guilty about it. You were right about many things, one of them being that I like women. I enjoyed you, Susie; I loved having you, one might say. I hope you enjoyed me too.’

She smiled again at my sudden declaration. ‘You were all right,’ she conceded. ‘Yes, okay, it was great; never better.

‘But that’s the least of what you did for me. Three days ago, when I walked up your drive, I was hurting, I was insecure and, for all that my business is doing well, inside I had the self-esteem of a gnat. Now I feel like me again, I know where I’m going and I have the self-belief to get there.

‘I was glad when I found that Prim was in the States. I was glad to have you to myself. I never meant to blurt out the truth about her and Fortunato, but I don’t regret that either. You don’t deserve to be allowed to live a lie; even if I do understand why she kept those things from you.’

‘Do you think it would have made any difference to how I felt about her,’ I asked her, ‘if she’d told me the whole story from the start? Every fucking detail?’

‘No.’

But it does now , I thought to myself. It means that she’s not the person I thought I married .

‘I just wish she had, though,’ I said.

‘Maybe, but now you’re even. You’ve got a secret to keep from her.’

‘What if I don’t want to?’

‘Hey, I thought you’d stopped kidding yourself. You won’t because it’s in your interests not to. Sure you’ll say that it would only hurt her, but in terms of this great new career of yours, it could hurt you more. You’ll stay with her.’

‘But what if I didn’t? What about you and me?’

She gave me a look that bored into me even though I had my eyes on the road ahead. ‘I thought we’d agreed how you and I are going to be in the future. You’re going to be the strong man behind the Gantry throne.’

‘Yeah but what if. .?’

‘No what ifs,’ she exclaimed, suddenly, sharply.

‘We’re too alike, Oz. We’re hard, clever, ruthless, ambitious, rich and however many other adjectives we’ve got in common. The thought of you and I together full-time scares the hell out of me, as it should you. You get on with your life, I’ll get on with mine, and we’ll be there for each other as need be. That’s all I can handle. Susie doesn’t love; Susie can’t love.

‘Deal?’

‘Sure, it’s a deal. Oz doesn’t love either, not any more. Just as well, eh?’

It was Sunday, so the airport was relatively quiet. I parked and we walked together to the check-in, me wheeling that bloody great case behind me.

The departure gate was at the top of a big escalator. Having ditched the luggage, we rode up it arm in arm, Susie, clutching her passport and boarding card. At the top she turned towards me.

‘One last confession,’ she said.

I looked at her, intrigued; I’d thought that everything lay bare between us. ‘When I came out here, I wasn’t just concerned about the Castelgolf thing: I knew it was a con. The other investors and I finally twigged a few weeks ago that something was up. We put detectives on Chandler and Hickok, and we heard about the suicide, supposed, when it happened.