Майкл Ридпат: The Predator

‘I’m fine. No more psychos creeping about my bedroom.’

‘Good. I’m worried that whoever threatened you on Saturday night meant business. Don’t do anything to provoke them, OK?’

‘Don’t worry. I won’t. I just want to forget about the whole thing.’

‘That’s easier to say than to do, I’d guess. What about Chris?’

Megan couldn’t bring herself to tell Eric about Chris’s ridiculous suspicions of him. At least, not over the phone. She decided to keep it vague. ‘I think he’s decided to go to the police and tell them all he knows.’

‘Isn’t that dangerous?’ Eric said. ‘I mean, it’s OK for him to put himself at risk. He knows what he’s doing. But that knife was left on your pillow.’

‘He seems to have made up his mind about it.’ Megan sighed. ‘We had a disagreement.’ There was a pause. ‘Where are you calling from now?’ she asked.

‘London. I’ve been in meetings all day.’

Megan’s heart beat a little faster. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got any free time while you’re over here? It’s just... it would be nice to see you, if you can manage it.’

‘Sure,’ said Eric. ‘I’d like that. Hold on a second, let me look at my calendar.’ Megan waited. She wanted to see him so badly. She had to see him. ‘Yeah, OK. I can come up to Cambridge tomorrow evening, if you like.’

‘All right.’ She didn’t want him to come to her rooms this time. Somewhere more neutral. ‘How about we meet at a pub?’

‘OK. Which one?’

‘There’s one called the Fort St George. It’s by the river. I’d give you directions, but I’m still a little confused where it is myself. But it’s a nice place.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Eric said. ‘I’ll find it. See you there at seven.’

‘OK.’ Megan smiled to herself as she replaced the receiver.

The early spring sunshine caressed Marcus’s tired features as he sat on the bench in St James’s Park. He was sure it was the right one, on the Mall side of the lake, by the footbridge, just as Eric had described it. He checked his watch. Five past eleven. Eric had said eleven o’clock.

He wasn’t sure what to expect: whether Eric would meet him, or someone else would. He had considered not showing up at all, but in the end he had decided to go ahead with the rendezvous. He had nothing to lose and he could use any help he could get. He still wasn’t sure what he would do once he found Duncan. But find him he must.

He hadn’t slept at all on the flight over. In fact, he hadn’t slept well for a couple of nights, since his conversation with Eric back in Vermont. He was tired, and he let his eyes close, lulled by the steady background traffic noise and the sound of ducks fussing on the water in front of him.

Suddenly he felt the pressure of something placed on his lap. He opened his eyes and saw a cheap black canvas sports bag. He glanced up from left to right. On one side, a couple were sauntering arm-in-arm towards Buckingham Palace. On the other, a man with dark hair creeping over the collar of his leather jacket was walking briskly away. Marcus shouted to him, but the man lengthened his stride. Marcus shrugged. It wasn’t Eric, and the messenger didn’t matter. What mattered was the bag.

He unzipped it. Inside were a single sheet of white paper and a dark blue plastic bag. He glanced at the paper. It contained two neatly typed addresses: Honshu Bank’s London office, and Duncan Gemmel’s home address.

He felt the plastic bag. It contained something small and heavy. He guessed what it was as he cautiously peered inside, keeping it all the while in the sports bag.

He was right. A handgun.

His heart beat rapidly and he zipped up the bag. He stared ahead, trying to decide what to do, oblivious of the tourists and office-workers strolling by.

There was no choice. He had known what he had to do since he had skied across the lake the day before; he just hadn’t been able to admit it to himself. But now, with the means lying there on his lap, he took the decision. He stood up and walked purposefully down the Mall towards Trafalgar Square, gripping the handles of the sports bag tightly.

‘Hey, Chris! Look at the screen! I don’t believe it.’

Chris, jolted out of his reverie by Ollie’s urgent cry, looked. On Bloomberg News was an announcement:

Radaphone in agreed €1.5 billion takeover of Eureka Telecom .

Chris scanned the details. It looked like a done deal. He dialled Bloomfield Weiss and got through to Mandy Simpson. ‘Have you seen the Eureka Telecom news?’ he asked.

‘Yes.’

‘What does it mean for the bonds?’

‘Good news for you, Chris. And good news for Bloomfield Weiss too. We’ve got Radaphone debt paying a twelve per cent coupon.’

Chris smiled to himself. Radaphone was a good credit: its bonds would normally trade at half that yield. ‘Where’s your trader making them?’

‘He says he’ll bid one-oh-seven. But that’s low. They’ll go higher than that.’

‘Excellent!’ said Chris. ‘Thanks, Mandy.’

‘Looks like Ian sold you a good deal after all,’ she said.

Chris thought about her words as he put down the phone. She was right. Ian had known all along that Eureka would be taken over. He had told Lenka when he probably shouldn’t. She had bought the bonds when she probably shouldn’t. Everything had gone according to plan. Except that neither Lenka nor Ian was alive to see it.

Ian had been right to be cagey with Chris. Chris had thought it was because Ian had deceived Lenka and was worried about being found out. In fact, Ian had told her the truth, but had been unwilling to admit as much to Chris. He was probably right to be careful. Ian would no doubt have argued that his guess that the takeover would happen was no more than a guess, but what he had done was close to passing on inside information. The fewer people who knew about that, the better.

For the first time Chris wondered whether he had been too cynical about Ian and Lenka. Perhaps she had meant more to Ian than Chris had given him credit for. After what had happened to them both, he hoped so.

This was good news for RBK. The price at which they had bought Amalgamated Veterans’ position had been fixed the day before. It had just gone up at least fifteen per cent. Chris smiled to himself. Khalid’s gain had been Rudy Moss’s loss. Carpathian definitely had a future now.

Chris dialled Duncan’s number.

‘Did you see the news about Eureka Telecom?’

‘Yes,’ Duncan said. ‘You had some of that, didn’t you?’

‘We had a lot of it.’

‘Khalid will be ecstatic.’

‘He was very lucky.’

‘Not entirely,’ said Duncan. ‘He got the market timing right, and he picked the right fund manager. He deserves to make money.’

‘And Rudy Moss deserves to lose it.’

Duncan laughed.

‘Seriously, thanks, Duncan. RBK really bailed us out.’

‘Don’t worry about it. My client’s happy. It makes me look good. In fact it makes me look bloody brilliant.’ Duncan chuckled. Then his tone became serious. ‘Did you talk to Megan?’

‘Yes, I did.’

‘And what did she say?’

‘She thinks we’ve got the wrong end of the stick. She thinks Eric couldn’t possibly have done it.’

‘That’s crazy. She went out with him, didn’t she? Maybe she’s biased. Maybe she still fancies him. Does she?’

‘I think so,’ said Chris, with difficulty.

Duncan picked up the tone in Chris’s voice. ‘Sore point, obviously. Hang on. If she thinks Eric’s innocent, then who does she think killed everyone? Me?’

Chris didn’t say anything.

‘I thought so,’ Duncan said. ‘Look, I understand why you wanted to talk to her. But we have to do something now. If she can’t see that she’s wrong about Eric, that’s her problem. You’ve told her everything you can.’