Death of a Stranger (14 page)

“Oh, yes! We live round
there
.'' Simon was glad, as Benjamin pointed, to see that both parents were occupied with sales. “You can get through to the shop from the inside but where we live is just like anybody's house, you go …''

“So you can be absolutely private when you want to,'' Simon commented provocatively, at the end of a satisfyingly detailed account of the access to the Charters home and its ground floor arrangements.

“Yes, but when I'm writing and so on I like to be …'' For the second time the face was assailed by fear. “I used to go to the greenhouse that burned,'' Benjamin finished in a mumble.

“I'm so sorry. That was an awful thing to happen. But at least you'll get compensation for the fire from your insurance company. Be able to build another greenhouse. Get more help in the shop.''

“Yes!'' Suddenly the boy's face shone. “ We will!'' he went on defiantly. “It'll be great for Mum and Dad!''

It wasn't the reaction Simon had expected, but it was intriguing enough, coupled with his covert study of the boy's parents and the anguished looks they exchanged when they found themselves face to face, to take Simon to a remote part of the garden area. There, strolling along a deserted alley, he rang his temporary employer.

“I'm at the Golden Rose … Yes, a great deal of tension … Go in tonight? If I can enter without breaking, Mr Taylor. That's trespass enough. I'm sorry …'' He waited, absently admiring the colourful flowering bushes that lined his path. “No, I'm sorry. But Guernsey's like Britain was fifty years ago and people don't lock doors and windows so there's a chance … Yes. Right. I'll talk to you tomorrow.''

Back at the Duke of Richmond, Simon banished his coming nocturnal enterprise from his mind while he enjoyed an excellent and leisurely dinner and thought about Lorna and Tim and Anna, trying to suppress the apprehension that always threatened a trio of subjects which should have given him so much pleasure. If things went as he hoped, life in the future would be very good. Tim was the focus of his apprehension; he didn't worry at all about Lorna, of course, and not so much about Tim's new wife, although he had no reason to believe she would help him …

“You're a long way away, aren't you, Simon Shaw?''

“I'm sorry? Oh. Hello.''

It was the prettiest and most interesting of the girls he had danced with at the wedding, flanked by her parents. Simon, for a good-looking man, was not overly vain, but, unsolicited, she had given him her telephone number and he did wonder, as he took in her provocative but slightly reproachful smile, if she had suggested the Duke of Richmond Hotel for a family dinner outing in the hope that he might still be staying there.

“Mummy, Daddy, this is Simon Shaw from Tim's wedding.'' Politely, the parents indicated that they remembered. “Awful about his mother, Simon.'' Tim had warned him that most events, private as well as public, quickly became common knowledge on the island. “How is she?'' At least there was no sub-text to the question: his connection with the Le Pages was assumed to be via Tim.

“Getting better,'' Simon assured her with relief, turning his inward attention to trying to remember the girl's name.

“Deserted tonight, Simon?''

“No. I'm meeting the family at the Princess Elizabeth later.'' As he lied Simon was aware of a slight inward regret. In ordinary circumstances he would have been happy to see this girl again.

“Come along, Caroline. The waiter's at our table.''

It was the father who had obliged him.

“Look, Caroline,'' he said quietly to the girl. “ I'll give you a bell before I leave.'' With Lorna confined to the hospital and his stay on the island extended, there was no reason, now he thought about it, why he couldn't invite her one evening for a late dinner.

“Great!'' Temporarily satisfied with the small victory, the girl turned to her parents. “ Lead on, Daddy!''

Looks and smiles from across the restaurant distracted Simon for the rest of his meal from thoughts of what lay immediately ahead, but when he reached his room he began to think solely of his mission. He lay on his bed for a waiting period which seemed interminable. He had not lingered over his coffee as he had intended, afraid of being invited to the girl's table and having his concentration diffused just as he was coming up to the time when he should be honing it. He had learned from experience that he needed all his wits about him on sorties like this, and that he must limber up mentally before take-off.

When he left the hotel he wore a long mac over his sharp black business outline. The night porter nodded, blank-faced, as he went out, and Simon imagined the knowing look he wouldn't be quite able to hide when he returned an hour or so later.

It was a fine, clear night, but he could have wished for cloud. At least the moon was no more than a sliver, but every constellation discovered by man seemed to be in sight from zenith to horizon, and he reduced his nerves a notch by standing in the car-park and picking out the few he knew, led by the Plough.

It was a quarter to two in the morning, and he encountered neither vehicle nor pedestrian on the narrow roads he threaded north. He had studied the terrain the day before, and was able to park in the first of his earmarked possible places: an outer corner of the car-park of a large new hotel a quarter of a mile from the Golden Rose.

Still in the car, he took off the mac and put on the black hood. It had no cover for his face, and he wore it simply to conceal the natural brilliance of his hair, his one feature any witness would recall. After drawing on the close-fitting dark gloves that allowed his fingers most of their dexterity he got out of the car, locked it, and set off at a jog trot – if someone spotted him, it would be better to appear absurd than suspicious.

He had been afraid of his bruises, but to his relief he was scarcely aware of them, and if he had not had a mission he would have enjoyed the sensation of rhythmically moving, aware of his health and strength, the soft cool of the air on his cheeks, the regular thwack of his trainers on the grass verge. He reached the entrance to the Golden Rose sooner than he wished, came to a halt as he looked each way to reassure himself there were no lights other than the lamps illumining the wide gateway, then ran swiftly between them.

The complex was in total darkness, but the starlight showed him there were still a number of cars scattered about the forecourt. Beyond it to the right of the building was public access to the outdoor sales area, and to the left a fence bridged the gap between the peripheral hedge and the building. Behind it was access to the private house, and Simon skirted the left side of the car-park close to the hedge to reach the fence. The gate in it was locked, but it was not yet a trespass to vault it, as he could have reached the other side had he risked crossing the forecourt and going round the back of the sales area.

He landed on gravel with a gritty thud and minimal reaction from his injured shoulder, and froze against the gate, a mercifully dark rectangle in the pale pine of the fence, listening for a sound in response. But there was only the murmur of an owl and the brief shriek of its victim before the silence was restored. Treading cautiously on the crunching pebbles, Simon loped diagonally from the door in the fence to the nearest door to the house, where he froze again. This door, both Benjamin Charters and Anna had told him, led into the kitchen, and beside it was a window, its transom open.

The door was locked, and as he deployed his equipment down through the transom space to give access to the catch on the main window he found himself hoping it would be locked too, that all other windows and all doors would be locked so that he could vault back over the gate and run back to his car and not go where he could never admit to Tim Le Page that he had gone. But when the equipment reached the catch he discovered that the window was merely closed and all that was necessary was to raise the latch and push gently against the glass from inside.

So, fate had bid his trespass go ahead. Simon froze again before climbing over the sill, but the world remained profoundly silent. This time he landed noiselessly on tiles, and pulled the main window to behind him before crossing the kitchen by starlight and passing through its open door into the hall. Here he used his small torch for the first time, turning it on to a staircase and four partly open doors. The first door revealed a large sitting-room, curtains undrawn so that he could see the outlines of the heavy furniture. The second, also with curtains drawn back, contained a sewing machine and an ironing board with iron propped up on it. A kitchen-style cabinet was the only piece of furniture with drawers, and after a few seconds' hesitation he moved on to the third room. Here the curtains were closed, but Simon's torch showed him that it was an office or study with two desks, one a heavy roll-top and the other a large knee-hole.

The roll-top was locked, and Simon turned his attention to the knee-hole. It had four drawers on each side, all of them unlocked, and in the bottom right-hand one he found something that made him draw a sharp breath and take hold of his third piece of equipment, which was round his neck.

He took a couple of photographs, returned the papers carefully to the drawer, and closed it. Then ran towards the faint source of light from the hall.

One moment he was treading lightly and confidently, mission accomplished beyond his most extravagant hopes, the next there was a soft woolly mass between his feet and he was hurtling towards the wood-blocked hall floor, knocking over a small table as he fell and sending whatever it was displaying crashing to the ground.

And the woolly mass was screaming out its shock and fury as it fled up the stairs.

So black cats aren't so lucky
. Simon chastised himself for the distracting thought as he leapt back on to his feet, discovered himself to be unhurt, and stood frozen and listening.

“Who's that?''

At least the voice, male, had come from upstairs. But he was unable to unfreeze.

“Is anybody there?''

Now there was the sound of feet, and a sleepy female voice in the distance. Panting with gratitude at finding his mobility restored, Simon fled back to the kitchen and plunged out through the window, retraced his diagonal to the fence and hurled himself over. He hugged the peripheral hedge even more closely than he had hugged it on the way in, and when he had darted through the gates he flung himself into the ditch immediately outside them which he had discovered that morning ran between hedge and verge along the continuation of the lane beyond the Golden Rose. It was so deep the coarse grass almost met over his head, and he decided to stay there until he was sure he was not being pursued, or until a pursuer had passed his hiding-place.

A few minutes went by in a silence broken only by the sounds of hunting and dreaming animals and birds, and a pulse throbbed painfully in his shoulder as the adrenalin drained away. Simon wondered if the Charters were assessing the significance of the break-in, trying to decide whether it was a simple burglary or an attempt to discover more about their greenhouse fire. He had left the papers he had photographed precisely as he had found them, and despite the unlocked desk drawer he was still hopeful his break-in would be interpreted as no more than a search for disposable goods aborted by the family cat. It looked as though Bernard Charters was not coming in pursuit, but he would surely be telephoning the police – Simon thought of Tim with a pang – and his move now must be to put space between himself and the area of the Golden Rose as speedily as possible.

Cautiously he raised his head from the ditch. The lane was clear in both directions, and the only sounds still came from the surrounding fauna. So he pulled himself up on to the verge and began the run back towards his car.

He had scarcely got into his stride when he heard the sound of an engine behind him. The straight stretch of lane beyond the Golden Rose had been empty when he left the ditch, so the vehicle must have come from the nursery. There was no ditch this side of the gates, so all he could do was to shrink back against the hedge. The headlights of the vehicle were raised as he faced it, so dazzling him he was unable to see any details of it, not even how large it was, or how many people were inside it. It seemed to him that it hovered for a lifetime, its dual beam drilling into his eyes until he raised his hands to protect them.

But at last, like an aircraft that has been powerfully motionless while it prepares its engines for take-off, the car hurled itself at the hedge as if it was the start of a runway. Simon saw the silhouette of the driver as it bore down on him, and then saw nothing.

T
he afternoon start to their delayed honeymoon meant that Tim and Anna could go into work in the morning. Colleagues in police and practice had urged them to begin their break the evening before, but both found themselves, to their mutual rueful amusement, unable to keep away from their respective work places while there remained a few hours of possible working time.

But they promised to meet at the hospital at noon, and then go home to complete the packing they had begun the night before. There was little left to do: the arrangements for Duffy and Whitby had been reinstated the previous day, and Robin or Clare would collect the dog at two o'clock. Clare rang as Anna was about to follow Tim out of the house, to tell her she had a new lady arriving that afternoon to take up residence at the nursing-home she owned and ran, so that the collector would be husband Robin, whose freelance artistic commitments could be more easily suspended.

“I'm sorry not to see you again before you go, dear one!'' Clare purred, in the deep soft tones that so well matched her handsome bulk. “ But I'm enchanted you and Tim are on the way at last, and I hope you'll manage not to worry about Tim's mother or anything else while you're in Scotland. I'll go and see Lorna, and take her out if she feels like it, we rather hit it off.''