Stephen Leather - Midnight

‘But why were the police involved anyway?’ she said. ‘You were just going to talk to her, right?’

‘That was the plan,’ he said. ‘But she went and spoiled it by killing herself.’

‘What?’

‘Hanged herself, just before I got there. Didn’t Thomas tell you any of this when he called you?’

‘He was only interested in why you’d gone to Abersoch. I said you’d been tipped off about your sister and then he asked me about Robbie. I figured that something was up so I told him you knew about Constance, but I said I didn’t know who gave you her name.’

‘Smart girl.’

‘Yeah, well, I called you but your mobile was off.’

‘They’d taken my phone off me,’ said Nightingale. ‘They took bloody everything off me, as it happens. Kept me in a forensic suit all afternoon and I didn’t get back to London until after midnight.’

‘Why did she kill herself?’

‘No idea,’ he said. ‘There was no note, and according to the cops she wasn’t depressed. I got there, the door was open, I went inside, she was hanging from the banisters. And the Welsh cops are adamant that she’s not my sister.’

Jenny frowned. ‘But she was the only Constance in Abersoch. I checked.’

‘Robbie got it wrong, then,’ said Nightingale. ‘Or somebody was pushing the pointer thing on the Ouija board.’

‘There were only the two of us, Jack, and I certainly wasn’t pushing.’

‘And there’d be no point in me sending myself on a wild goose chase,’ said Nightingale.

‘So what went wrong? We did everything we were supposed to do with the Ouija board, didn’t we? We got through to Robbie and Robbie said your sister was in Abersoch.’

‘Strictly speaking, we asked him where my sister was and we got two words. Constance and Abersoch. And that’s all we got. Maybe talking to the recently departed isn’t an exact science.’ He sipped his coffee again. ‘Or maybe the cops are wrong. I never knew that I was adopted, right? I was thirty-two years old before I found out that Ainsley Gosling was my real father. He did my adoption in total secrecy and he’d have done my sister’s adoption the same way. He hid his trail and he hid it well.’ He sighed. ‘I’ll give it a day or two and go back to talk to her parents. I need to nail it down for sure.’ He put his coffee mug back on the desk. ‘Much happen while I was away?’

‘You had a phone call from that solicitor in Hamdale. Ernest Turtledove.’

Nightingale frowned. Turtledove was the man who had turned his life upside down when he broke the news that William and Irene Nightingale weren’t Jack’s real parents and that he was actually the son of a Satanist and devil-worshipper, who committed suicide after naming Nightingale as his sole heir. ‘What did he want? Is it about the estate?’

‘Said he needed to see you. I asked but he wouldn’t say what it was about. He said that it was private.’

‘I’m not schlepping all the way out to Hamdale on a whim,’ said Nightingale. ‘Can you get him on the phone for me?’

Jenny went through to her office to make the call. A few minutes later she shouted that Turtledove was on the line.

‘Mr Nightingale?’ said the solicitor hesitantly, as if he was expecting someone else.

‘Yes,’ said Nightingale. ‘My assistant said that you needed to see me.’

‘That’s right. Something has come up.’

‘What, exactly?’

‘I’m afraid I can’t go into details over the phone,’ said the solicitor. ‘I really need to see you in person.’

‘You’re more than welcome to come to my office, Mr Turtledove.’

The solicitor sighed. ‘I don’t travel, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘My leg, you know. I can’t drive, and you know what public transport is like.’

‘It’s a long trip either way, Mr Turtledove. Can you at least tell me what it is that’s so important that you need to see me in person?’

‘I have to give you something.’

‘Why didn’t you give it to me three weeks ago when I first came to see you?’

‘Because it has only recently come into my possession,’ said the solicitor. ‘I do apologise for this, Mr Nightingale, but I have been given strict instructions and I have to follow them.’

‘What is it you have to give me?’

‘It’s an A4 envelope.’

‘Why not courier it to me?’

‘I really can’t, I’m afraid. As I said, I do have strict instructions.’

‘This is connected to Ainsley Gosling, I assume?’

‘I assume so, too,’ said Turtledove. ‘Can you be here this afternoon?’

H amdale was just a dot on the map and it wasn’t much bigger in real life: a cluster of houses around a thatched pub and a row of shops that would have been out of business if Tesco or Asda opened up within twenty miles. Nightingale left his green MGB in the pub car park and smoked a Marlboro as he walked to Turtledove’s office, which was wedged between a post office and cake shop. He stood outside the cake shop as he finished his cigarette. The cakes were works of art, birthday cakes in the shapes of football pitches and teddy bears, layered wedding cakes with ornate icing, cakes shaped like cartoon characters. A sign in the window announced the shop’s internet address and the fact that they could do next-day delivery anywhere in the United Kingdom but not Northern Ireland. A pretty brunette in a black and white striped apron smiled at him and Nightingale smiled back. He tossed his cigarette butt into the street and pushed open the door to the solicitor’s office. A bell dinged and Turtledove’s grey-haired secretary looked up from her old-fashioned electric typewriter.

‘Mr Nightingale, Mr Turtledove’s expecting you,’ she said. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

‘I’m fine, thanks,’ he said.

She started to get up but Nightingale waved for her to stay put. ‘I know the way,’ he said.

He opened the door to Turtledove’s inner sanctum. The solicitor was sitting behind a large oak desk piled high with files, all of them tied up with red ribbon. There was no sign of a computer in the office, or of anything that had been manufactured within the last fifty years. There was a single telephone on the desk, a black Bakelite model with a rotary dial, and a rack of fountain pens with two large bottles of Quink ink, one black and one blue.

‘Mr Nightingale, so good of you to come,’ said Turtledove, pushing himself up out of his high-backed leather chair.

‘I just hope it’s worth my while,’ said Nightingale.

Turtledove extended a wrinkled, liver-spotted hand. It might have been Nightingale’s imagination, or poor memory, but the solicitor looked a good ten years older than the last time they’d met. The lines on his face seemed deeper, his eyes more watery and his teeth yellower. He used a wooden walking stick with a brass handle in the shape of a swan’s head to steady himself as he shook hands with Nightingale. Even his tweed suit seemed older and shabbier, the elbows almost worn through and the trousers baggy at the knees. ‘Please, sit down,’ said the solicitor as he limped back around to his chair.

‘What do you have for me, Mr Turtledove?’ asked Nightingale.

The solicitor lowered himself into his chair with a soft groan. ‘I’m afraid I have to ask you for some form of photo identification,’ he said.

‘You know who I am, Mr Turtledove. I was here just three weeks ago. I’m Ainsley Gosling’s sole heir, remember?’

‘Please, Mr Nightingale, bear with me. I am instructed to confirm your identity before I give you the envelope.’

‘Where did this envelope come from?’ asked Nightingale, pulling his wallet from his trouser pocket.

‘From the same law firm that sent me your late father’s will,’ said Turtledove.