Gavin Lyall - Blame The Dead

I'd've liked to know what thatof course meant, but maybe I'd gone far enough in the thorn country. 'How long have you been living in England, Mrs Fenwick?'

'About sixteen years now. Are you going on trying to find out what happened to Martin?'

'Well, sort of. You haven't heard anything about why he was going to France? What he was taking, or anything like that?'

She looked at me for a moment, then said, 'No. I haven't heard a thing, I'm afraid.'

I just nodded, letting the lie sink in. It had been beautifully done; if I hadn't known it was there I'd never have felt it hit.

'I'm not really being much help, am I?' she asked kindly.

'Oh, I don't know-'

'Had you thought he could have been being blackmailed?'

I paused and just looked at her sweet smile. She sipped her gin calmly.

'No,' I said slowly. 'I hadn't really thought that. Why should I?'

'Well, it does sound so much like it. He's taking something to a secret rendezvous to hand over to strangers… that was right, wasn't it?'

'Blackmailers aren't killers. The golden goose and all that.'

'I suppose not.' She sighed, as if sorry to see a good theory go down.

'Anyway – blackmailed for what?'

'How would I know? What do men with a flat in town get up to?'

'I don't know," I said carefully.

'Have you met Miss Mackwood? '

I suppose if she'd painted it on a board and then hit me over the head with it, I might have got the message stronger. Just might.

I nodded.

'Pretty little thing, isn't she?'

I nodded again.

'Have you got a cigarette?'

'Sorry. Don't smoke.'

'Clever you.' She stood up with an easy flowing movement. 'I'll just… would you like Willie to run you back down the hill?'

Upon the command 'Dismiss!' you execute a right turn, a normal salute, then break off and proceed in an orderly fashion back to your quarters.

I said, 'That would be very kind.'

I hadn't had any lunch and it was too late for any pub to have anything edible left, so I'd just have to live on the canapés I'd lifted. For the first half hour I drove fast – not because of the Scotch, or at least I didn't think so – but because if I went slow I'd have time to think and that would muddle me even more.

But past Sevenoaks the train slowed me anyway. And maybe it was time I really tried to remember the Fenwick I'd known. No, not 'known'; just met.

He'd picked me up at the put-down place for Huston station. My idea; it's a one-way underground street so you can easily spot if somebody's being followed by a car that doesn't stop or doesn't let anybody off. But nobody was.

My first impression was of a man near fifty who'd probably stand up at just under six feet. Neatly dressed in a checked country suit (abroad counts as country to some people), with shortish greying hair and trim slight sideboards as his one concession to fashion. Generally fit-looking and tidy: you'd think he was Something in the City and you'd be right. And seemed a nice bloke. Had I ever learned anything more?

Driving south he'd told me as much as he ever did about the job: just that I was to be there at a rendezvous in Arras in case somebody or bodies unknown turned nasty. I should have asked more, of course, and a couple of times I'd probed gently, but… had he headed me off? Would he have told me if I'd asked him head on?

Then we'd chatted about the weather, the Common Market, a bit about cars – neither of us knew or cared much, but it's standard masculine manners – and rugger. He'd said he was married and I'd said I wasn't, not any more, and we'd left it at that. Maybe he'd seemed a little concerned – preoccupied – but most clients in this work are ready to climb the walls.

We went Folkestone-Boulogne instead of Dover-Calais -just because it seemed less likely – and I bailed out before we reached the boat. Then we 'met' in the bar after I was pretty sure nobody had picked him up. He took water with it, I took soda. Significant?

The drive to Arras was quiet; I suppose both of us were thinking ahead. One thing, though: halfway along, he'd asked, 'Are you carrying a gun?' Most people wouldn't say 'carrying'; it's more or less a professional word. I said, 'Yes.'

'What type?'

'Are you interested in pistols?'

'Not all that much, but I met a lot in the Army: Control Commission in Germany in forty-five. Even had to carry one, at times."

'Walther PP chambered for short nine-mil.'

'The old.380 round? Not too common, are they?'

'They are now. Standard gun in a lot of British police forces. Small enough to hide, doesn't shoot into the next county, makes a nice big bang. For me, the idea's to scare them, throw them off their aim. I don't usually get a chance for a really careful shot; the assassin gets that.'

I'd picked the word carefully; my last attempt to probe. But he just gave a grunt of laughter. 'Oh, there won't be anything like that.'

Well, so I now knew something he hadn't known.

But not much more. Because, in a way, I still agreed with him. Thereshouldn't have been 'anything like that'. Fenwick just wasn't the type to get shot, and believe me, I know the type. Most of my bodyguard clients just can't count the number of people anxious to get a shot at them, nor the good reason for each shooter. That's why I like payment in advance. But Fenwick? No. It just doesn't happen to people like him. Except when it does, I mean.

Back home, I reheated the last of the breakfast coffee and washed up the breakfast bits and pieces and turned on the television and turned it off again when it was just football scores and finally settled down 'to ring Jonas Steen in Bergen. Now, there are several things you need to know about ringing a total stranger whose number you don't know – the office number on the notepaper was no use for a Saturday – in a foreign country, but the first is the most important: you shift the Scotch and the soda across to the telephone table before you even start. It saves a lot of dashing to and from the cupboard in the next hour or so.

So finally I got through. The line wasn't all that clear, so I couldn't guess much about him bar that he wasn't senile and his English was very good.

'My name is James Card. You knew Martin Fenwick, I think.'

'Yees.' Rather reluctantly.

'Well, I was with him when he died…'

'Why didn't you stop it?' Sharply.

'I would have if I could, believe me. Now, you wrote to Mrs Fenwick about a book – right?'

'Why? Why do you ask?'

'I might be able to help you. What book were you talking about?'

'I didn't send him any book.'

I laid off to consider that. It sounded like a lie, though four hundred miles of telephone wire don't make these things easy. But if hehad sent the book, what did that mean?

I asked, 'Well, where did he get it from, then?'

'I don't know. I don't think I want to talk to you any more.'

'Now hold on. I may have the book. What one were you asking Mrs Fenwick about?'

I had the problem that must sometimes occur to people who ride alligators for a living: who's in charge around here? Steen sounded scared, but what of? Did I have some hold over him or was 1 begging from him? It helps to know these things.

I said, 'Who does it legally belong to, then?'

'The owners, of course.' Andthat was a power of help, too.

'Do you want it back, then?'

'It doesn't matter. I am stopping now.' And stop he did. Suddenly I was just sitting there staring at a humming phone and my left hand actually hurting, I was clutching so hard.

So I said, 'Damn, damn, damn.' Then I said, 'But don't think that you have seen the last of James Card. There is no mountain high enough, no sea deep enough, to hide you from my relentless pursuit. Unless it costs too much, of course.'