Peter James: Dead Simple

AR5000 Receiver 'Cyber Scan'. Incredible 10Khz-2600Mhz Frequency Range! The AR5000 advances the frontiers of performance, providing excellent strong signal handling, high sensitivity and wide frequency coverage with microprocessor facilities to match including 5 independent VFOs, 1,000 memory channels, 20 search banks, Cyber Scan fast scan and search including all mobile frequencies. Scanning and search speed is 45 channels or increments per second...

He turned to Branson. 'You're the best techie I know. I think I have already guessed what this thing is - can you confirm?'

'It's a state-of-the-art radio frequency scanner. It's the kind of thing used by Citizens' Band radio nuts to find new friends, to eavesdrop on police radio networks or on mobile calls.' Grace nodded. Then to Emma-Jane Boutwood he said, 'Do we have any evidence that Ashley Harper was ever into Citizens' Band radio either in her current incarnation or any previous one?'

'We don't,' she said. 'No.' He looked at the colour picture of the scanner. A large silver box on its own legs, with a dial on the front, and the same perplexing array of knobs and buttons you'd find on any complex piece of radio kit. 'So, on Tuesday night her fiance disappears. Wednesday afternoon at two-thirty she legs it to London and buys a radio scanner for two and a half thousand quid. Any good theories why? And how the hell did she knew how to use it?' 'Desperation?' volunteered Nick Nicholl. 'I don't buy that,' Grace said.

'She obviously genuinely did not know where he was,' Bella Moy suggested. Grace nodded distractedly. That made sense, but to him it did not fit. 'She might have known that Michael Harrison had a walkietalkie. Perhaps it was to try to communicate with him?' Emma-Jane Boutwood said. 'Or - how about - to listen in to who else he might be communicating with?' Grace was impressed. 'Yes, good thinking.' He looked around. 'Any more theories? OK, let's park this for a moment. Any other progress?'

'Yes,' Nick Nicholl said. 'After you left Ashley Harper's house, Joe Tindall started pulling up floorboards. We discovered an envelope full of receipts behind a chest of drawers we moved - it might have fallen there accidentally or it might have been hidden. Most of the receipts don't seem that interesting to us, but there is one here you should see.' It was for 1,500 pounds from a company with a Maddox Street, London Wl address, called Conquest Escorts. Underneath the name was the legend 'Discreet, charming male and female escorts for every occasion'. Two dates were shown - the previous Saturday, the intended day of Ashley Harper's wedding, and the previous Monday.

'Turn it over, Roy,' Nick Nicholl said. 'Take a look at the other side.'

Grace turned it over and saw written in ballpoint pen the name Bradley Cunningham. His mind shot back to the conversation he had had with Ashley, in her house, on Friday night. He could remember her sitting there so dejectedly, talking about her Canadian uncle, saying, 'We adore each other... he took the whole week off just so he could be at the rehearsal on Monday.' '

She's faked an uncle?' he said, puzzling.

'She's faked a whole lot more than just an uncle - E-J will tell you in a minute,' Glenn Branson said. 'Take a look at this first.'

He handed Grace a photocopied sheet of A4 paper. It was a faxed instruction to Bank Hexta, registered on Grand Cayman Island, to transfer the sum of 1,253,712 pounds to a numbered account at Banco Aliado in Panama. The instruction was signed by both Michael Harrison and Mark Warren, and the date and time at the top showed 11.25 p.m., the previous day. Grace read it through twice then frowned at Branson.

'This is about twenty minutes before he went off his balcony.'

'Yes, correct.' Grace thought about the note found in Mark Warren's pocket. 'So he went and transferred the money in order to save his friend's life. Then he goes and tops himself?'

'Maybe they had some big debt to pay. Panama could be tied up with Colombia - the Colombian mafia - maybe they got themselves into shit on a loan? They pay it off, and Mark Warren then tops himself?' 'It's a reasonable theory/ Grace said. 'But these two guys have been doing pretty well. They have this huge development at Ash down - twenty houses - that could make them several million. Why top himself for - what would his share be - a few hundred thousand pounds?' 'So he makes the transfer and then is killed.'

'That's a more elegant theory,' Grace said. 'I spoke to Cleo Morey at the mortuary just now. There's a Home Office pathologist on his way down. We might have a bit more information later today.' DS Bella Moy then told Grace she had some information from the phone company. Vodafone had logged activity from Michael Harrison's mobile between 10.22 p.m. and 11 p.m. the previous night, and there had been several 999 emergency calls made from Michael Harrison's phone, but on each occasion the operator could not hear anyone at the other end and got no response to her questions. 'What about the cell mast?' 'I was just coming to that, Roy. Vodafone have been very helpful this morning, and we already have from them the location of the closest cell radio mast to Michael Harrison's phone,' she said. 'Where is it?'

Her face fell a little. 'This is not such good news - it's in the town centre of Newhaven, and the one mast covers the entire town.' 'Well, it's some help,' Grace said. 'Any coincidence that Newhaven is a Channel seaport?' 'I've already put out an all-ports alert,' she said. 'For what?' 'For Ashley Harper and for Alexandra Huron - that's the name she was using in Canada four years ago.' She clearly had more to say, so Grace let her go on. 'I checked on her Audi TT car. It was leased by her, in her own name, from a dealer in Hammersmith a year ago. All payments are up to date and kosher. Same with her house, leased, but the lease expires at the end of this month.' 'To coincide with her wedding?' Branson suggested.

'Quite possible,' Emma-Jane said. 'Then on a hunch I had our new recruits do a trawl of all the car and van rental firms in the area, and gave them all of Ashley Harper's previous names in addition to her own. Nothing showed up under the name Ashley Harper,' she said. 'But at ten past midnight - this morning - a woman called Alexandra Huron rented a Mercedes saloon from a local Avis at Gatwick Airport, using a Toronto Dominion Bank of Canada credit card. The assistant who dealt with the customer has now positively identified her from photographs as Ashley Harper.'

'CCTV cameras,' Grace said. 'What I--' Glenn Branson raised a hand. 'We're already on the case. We're already having every camera checked between Gatwick and Newhaven from the time she picked up the car.' 'She left her house about an hour before you went there, Nick,' Grace said to DC Nicholl. 'Yes.' 'Do we know how she got to the airport?'

'No.' Grace fell silent. For a few moments no one had anything to say. He was busy thinking through all the timings last night - when he had been to see Mark Warren, when he and Glenn Branson had visited Ashley. Mark Warren being taken out to the forest to help locate the grave. The money being transferred. Mark Warren's death. Ashley renting the car under a different name. Now he knew what her game was; that was clear enough. And he knew that they needed to find her. Absolutely nothing else mattered at this moment than to do that. And quickly. If it wasn't already too late.

84

'Strewth, woman, four fucking suitcases - what's the matter with you, Alex?'

'What do you mean?' 'I'm not helping you lug four fucking suitcases, that's what I mean.'

'So we'll get a porter.' 'And what about theexcess baggage charge?' 'We're travelling Club, Vic; they have a big baggage allowance. Relax.'

'Fucking relax? Why can't you just leave all this shit behind, buy new stuff in Sydney - they have shops there, you know!'