Stuart Pawson - Some By Fire

"And I'm Charlie." I told him.

"Right. Let me see… in 1970 I was gaining work experience on company law with a firm of solicitors in Colchester, Essex. Do you need any more than that?"

"No, that's fine. Do you remember going to a party in April of that year? It might be helpful if I tell you that the party coincided with the Apollo 13 moon mission, which was the one that nearly ended in disaster."

The corner of his mouth twitched, but I couldn't tell if it was a stifled smile or embarrassment or something else. He tried to speak, hesitated, and tried again. "Party?" he mumbled, his thoughts miles and years away.

"Apollo 13," I prompted.

"Yes, I remember," he admitted, struggling to appear impassive.

"Can you remember anybody else who was there?"

He thought about it, but all he could remember was that he was a lawyer. "No," he replied, shaking his head.

"Maybe I can jog your memory. Did you meet a young lady called Melissa Youngman there? She was quite distinctive-looking. Had dyed red hair."

The description was unnecessary because he was already holding his head in his hands. He pulled at his hair in a parody of despair and cried:

"A lawyer! My kingdom for a lawyer!" When he recovered from the shock he said: "What's she doing? Kiss 'n' telling?"

"Not that I know of," I replied. "Her name keeps cropping up in our investigations and they brought us to you. What can you tell us about her?"

"God!" he croaked, grinning at the memories. "If this gets out I'm finished. What can I tell you about her? Nothing, Charlie. Nothing at all."

"Didn't you have an affair with her?"

"An affair! We had one night of rampant lust and that was it.

She left me gasping for release, trying to beat the door down to escape. I never went out with her or anything because I stayed well away. That's all."

"I believe you were interrupted," I said.

He suddenly looked grave. "You know about that?" he replied. "God, that was awful. Her parents came marching in. It was very unpleasant.

I tried to be reasonable, said I loved her, we were engaged and stuff like that, but she didn't give a toss. She called them names. And her language… it was fucking this and fucking that… to her parents. Not a night or a young lady I choose to remember, Charlie. Thanks a bunch for reminding me."

"It had to be done. So how did you meet her? Were you introduced?"

"Yeah. This so-called friend introduced me to her. I think she had been his girlfriend and he wanted rid of her. She looked interesting and she was bright, very bright. We both had a bit — a lot too much to drink, and that was that."

"What was this friend called?"

After a long pause he said: "No. I've told you enough for the moment.

You tell me a bit more about the reason for all this."

"Fair enough," I replied. I told him about the fire five years later, and the girl with purple hair that we thought was Melissa Youngman. If she'd put Duncan Roberts up to the fire, who was she working for? It was enough to convince him.

"OK," he replied. "The person who introduced us was called Kingston.

Nick Kingston. He lectured in psychology."

Kingston rides again, I thought. "How did you meet him?"

Mo sat back in the chair, which was invisible under his bulk, and folded his arms. He raised a knee and pressed it against the table, which moved away from him so he had to put his foot back on the floor.

"Let me tell you about my background," he began. "You have, here before you, a member of the royal family of Swaziland. Now, before you are overwhelmed with respect and deference let me tell you that my grandfather, the king, had two hundred wives, of whom my grandmother was about number one hundred and seventy. He died in 1983 after ruling for fifty-two years, which made him the longest-serving monarch ever. I was a bright child, so I was sent to England for my education and was expected to take up a position in government after I'd qualified." He held his arms wide and proclaimed: "I could have been Prime Minister by now!"

"What happened?" I asked.

"Usual story. I fell in love with a white girl in the office. Couldn't really see her baring her breasts at the annual Reed Dance, so we settled here. She was a bit of a radical; espoused what our enemies call left-wing causes, as if that were an insult, and here we are." He waved a hand at the walls. "Business is good, as you can see."

"That's interesting," I told him, because it was. "You have a colourful background."

"But what's it got to do with Kingston? I'll tell you. King Sobhuza, my grandpa, was a very wise man. He embraced modern technology, where possible, but strove to maintain traditional values. Witch doctors the ones who cast spells on people and dabbled in the black arts were outlawed, but the more benign ones are still tolerated and even encouraged. For instance the iNyanga are herbalists, and the iSangona are foreseers of the future. I wanted to explore the psychology of traditional medicine and started attending Kingston's lectures. I'd approached him and he said it was OK, which I thought was very kind of him. Unfortunately, as I got to know him better, I changed my mind. He was more interested in the witch doctors than I was. He was forever asking me about their powers and the type of things they could do. He believed in astral travel and all sorts of oddball stuff, and thought they had the key to it and the knowledge would be lost forever if someone, namely him, didn't write it down. He saw me as his key to that knowledge."

"Was this after the party?" I asked.

"Yeah, I suppose so. I was starting to have doubts about him by then, though."

"In what way?"

"I realised he was strange. He was into keep-fit and martial arts, things like that. Yoga. He didn't feel pain. He could snuff out a candle with his fingers, very slowly. It was his party trick. And the same with cold. Christmas Day he used to join the swimmers in the sea at Southend or somewhere. I tell you, Charlie, Nick Kingston is a weird cookie."

"It sounds like it. You don't know where he is now?"

"No, 'fraid not."

"Did you fall out or just drift apart?"

"It was a fairly gradual process. I saw him one evening and Melissa was with him again. We fell into conversation, naturally, but it was obvious that she'd told him all about that night. They were laughing at me behind their hands, so to speak. I decided he'd been patronising me; I was just another backward nigger to him. They weren't my kind of people, so I split."

"They sound a lovely couple."

"Made in heaven, Charlie. I'll tell you who might be able to help you.

A girl called Janet… Wilson, I think it was. She had been to school with Melissa. They shared a house. She was a lovely person, just the opposite of Melissa. I have an address somewhere, but it'll be twenty years out of date. God, she'll probably have a grown-up family by now."

"I've met Miss Wilson," I told him, unable to hide my grin.

"You've met Janet?"

"Mmm."

"Did she…" A broad smile spread across his face, like the sun breaking through and illuminating the savannah. "Was it Janet who put you on to me?"

I nodded.

"Hey, that's great," he declared. "How is she?"

"She's fine. Family grown up and her husband's left her, but she's doing nicely."

"Fantastic! She was a lovely girl; a real sweet. Not like Melissa.

Will you give her my number, please?"

"Sure. No problem."

I thanked him for his help and left. Outside, I rang Dave on my mobile and told him that Kingston had dominated the conversation once again.

He said he'd put his new friends on to it and agreed to meet me at the car.

He was waiting when I arrived, eating an ice-cream while sitting on someone's garden wall with his jacket over his shoulder, hooked on a thumb.