I Am Pilgrim (53 page)

reason, instead of trying to communicate in a language he didn’t understand, I took it into my head to bow to him. He thought this was about the funniest thing he had ever seen and did a pretty good bow

back. The mothers and the other kids, all of whom were watching, laughed, and that only encouraged

him to bow several times more to the crazy American.

The only person who didn’t think it was funny was his mother. ‘How did you find me? My note made it clear, I’m not willing to argue—’

‘I’m not here to argue,’ I interrupted. ‘I want you to come to the French House with me.’

That took some of the horsepower out of her anger. ‘Why?’

‘I think Dodge was killed, and we may be able to prove it.’

‘Murdered? How did anyone get on to the estate?’

‘I don’t know. The first step is to prove there was somebody else in the house. I think we can do that.’

She thought for a moment then shook her head. ‘No. The evidence clearly shows—’

‘Forget the evidence. Evidence is a list of the material you’ve got. What about the things you haven’t found? What do you call that – unimportant?’

It was a quote from my book and I immediately berated myself – again I had stepped outside my

legend – then I remembered the book had been packed as part of my on-plane reading and I let the self-admonishment go. Cumali still wasn’t convinced.

‘We have to do it now – before the investigation is closed,’ I pressed.

‘No – my superiors have already signed off on it.’

I had to work hard not to lose my temper. ‘If I turn out to be right and the Bodrum police have released the body and returned people’s passports, there’s going to be hell to pay. Not from me –

from the highest levels of government.’

She wavered. The other mothers and kids started to head to school, waving goodbye to Cumali and

her bowing son.

‘I can’t go now,’ she said. ‘I have to drop my son at the nanny’s. The car is broken, it takes time—’

‘I’ll drive you,’ I replied, pointing at the Fiat.

She didn’t appear to like it, but, equally, she couldn’t see any way out, so she nodded in agreement.

The little boy, on the other hand, thought it was great and took my hand as I walked them to the car.

Cumali opened the back door, ushered her son inside and climbed in beside him. It was bad enough

for a Muslim woman to share a car with a man she barely knew; for her to travel in the front seat would have been unthinkable.

As she gave directions, I spoke over my shoulder. ‘I think you should call your office – tell them

something has come up and get them to delay sending the file to Ankara.’

She didn’t respond, so I glanced in the rear-view mirror and saw her staring at me, cold-faced. It

wasn’t going to be pretty when she heard my idea, but there was nothing I could do about that. After a moment I saw her take out her cellphone and she started speaking in Turkish.

She hung up and told me that she’d left a message for her chief and had asked several of her colleagues to meet us up on the southern headland. Calling in reinforcements, by the sound of it. I didn’t get a chance to say anything about it – the young guy started speaking animatedly in Turkish. I looked in the mirror again and saw Cumali listening hard. It was obvious she wanted him to know that his thoughts were valued and, the more I watched, the more I realized she had endless patience with

him.

‘My son wants me to tell you that we are going to the circus on Thursday,’ she translated. ‘He says

we’ll start with the Grand Parade and then watch acrobats and lions, clowns—’

‘And snake charmers,’ I added. ‘I saw it when I was arriving – please tell him it looked like a great circus.’

Cumali translated, the boy laughed and quickly it turned into what sounded like an argument.

Finally, she explained: ‘My son said to ask if you would like to come with us but I said you had a meeting that night – you were very busy.’

I caught her eye in the mirror. ‘Yeah, a shame about the meeting,’ I said. ‘I would have liked to come. Please apologize to him.’

She spoke to him in Turkish, then told me to make a left and stop twenty yards up the road. We pulled up outside a modest house with a row of garden gnomes along the front path, a kid’s slide on a square of grass and a Coca-Cola distribution warehouse opposite. The engines of two large trucks,

manoeuvring in and out of the drive, were so loud I didn’t get a chance to say a proper goodbye to the little guy before his mother had him out of the car, through the gate and walking towards the house.

A young woman, probably in her late twenties, dark-haired and badly obese, opened the door and

kissed the little boy on his head. As Cumali spoke to the nanny, it gave me a chance to think again about the furtive moment in the park. The easy take-home was that it had been caused by the boy’s Down’s syndrome, that his mother had instinctively tried to protect him from my intrusion. But I didn’t believe it was that – both Cumali and her son were totally comfortable among the other people and kids. No, I had a feeling it was something quite different, but I had no idea what it might be. A mother and her child, playing in a park – so what?

By then Cumali was returning and her son was standing in the doorway, lifting his hand in farewell

to me. Even though I was behind the wheel, I managed to perform a fairly good bow, and his face lit

up. He gave me two back.

Cumali climbed into the back seat and I remained looking at her son for a moment. He was a great

kid and it was a terrible thing – there was no way to spin it, I’m sorry to say – it was a terrible thing that I ended up doing to him.

I put the car in gear and drove towards the French House.

Chapter Twenty-four

CUMALI’S COLLEAGUES HAD already arrived, and the tall gates were open. We drove down the long driveway and found three of them waiting near their cars, all in plain clothes, smoking, a couple on their cellphones.

Two of them looked like your average gumshoe. The other one, though, had corruption written all

over him. He was in his mid-forties, tall and overweight, a sausage-fingered vulgarian in a slick suit.

Cumali introduced him, but I was damned if I could catch his name. To be on the side of the safe – so to speak – I decided to call him ‘Officer ’.

As the cops rang the doorbell, my cellphone vibrated in my pocket. It was the fourth time since I

had found Cumali at the park, but I decided again not to answer it. I guessed – I hoped – that it was somebody from the Uffizi, and I didn’t want to have to rush through an explanation. I would need plenty of time to take them through what, I assumed, would be one of the strangest ideas they had ever heard.

There was no answer to the bell and Cumali opened the door with her pass key. Inside, it was as gloomy as ever and, though I hadn’t been in this part of the house, I led them through a baronial dining room and into the library. The only thing that had changed since the previous evening was that the curtains had been drawn and I assumed that, after I left, Cameron had spent time in the room with the memory of her dead husband. Unless, of course, I really had heard a door close and whoever else

was in the house had come and sat in the library for the evening.

I drew the curtains back, let the light flood in and turned to face the four Turkish cops. ‘I told Detective Cumali that I don’t believe Dodge was alone on the night he died. I think a visitor came into this room – somebody he knew.’

‘How did they get on to the estate?’ the guy I was calling Officer asked belligerently. Typical.

Frightened we were going to waste time down that rabbit hole, I went back at him just as hard. ‘Go

with it for a minute – assume the visitor knew how to beat the system, say he knew a place where the cameras didn’t mesh, figure he found a way over the wall, think
anything
right now. It doesn’t matter.’

‘Okay, hurry up then,’ said one of the gumshoes.

I ignored him. ‘The lights are off, the curtains are open – it said so in the crime-scene report.’ I pointed at the leather armchair. ‘The two of them are here – the visitor standing, Dodge sitting next to his stash. He’s on a binge and he’s not leaving.

‘But the visitor ’s got a plan – he’s going to induce Dodge to go down to the gazebo then tip him

over the cliff.’

‘What does he say to get him down there?’ the officer interrupted.

‘I don’t know,’ I replied.

‘Sheesh – what do you know?’

‘I know that while the visitor is speaking to him, the fireworks start,’ I said. ‘It begins with a white star exploding over the headland. Everybody says it was huge—’

‘Yeah, you could have seen it in Istanbul,’ the other gumshoe offered. I smiled politely – Istanbul

was five hundred miles away.

‘But that was the one thing the killer hadn’t thought about,’ I continued. ‘The nature of fireworks.’

The cops all looked at each other – what was the FBI idiot talking about now? Fireworks were fireworks.

At least I had their undivided attention. ‘To be bright enough to be seen in Istanbul, it would have contained shredded magnesium. That’s common in big fireworks – for a moment, it turns night into

day. That’s why old-time photographers used it in their flashguns.’

‘Look,’ Cumali said. ‘Fireworks, magnesium – does this mean anything?’ It got a chorus of agreement from the others.

‘It means we’ve got a flash and we’ve got a subject – Dodge and his visitor,’ I replied. ‘All we need is film.’

I pointed at the two huge mirrors next to the fireplace. ‘Mirrors are glass backed with a coating of silver nitrate. What is silver nitrate? It’s another name for film stock – it’s exactly what they once used in movie cameras.’

Nobody said a word; they just stared, trying to compute it.

‘It was all here,’ I said. ‘A flash. A subject. Film. I believe we’ve got a photograph of whoever was in this room. I think it’s imprinted on the back of the mirrors.’

Still they said nothing, continuing to look at me in disbelief. I can’t say I blamed them – even I thought it was pretty wild.

Cumali recovered first. ‘Just to be clear – you think you’re going to “develop” the mirrors?’ she

asked.

‘Yeah.’

‘Where – One-hour Photo?’

I smiled but, before I could respond, the officer launched in. ‘This is ridiculous – photographs on

the back of mirrors,’ he sneered. ‘We’re wasting our time,’ and he motioned to the others to head out.

He probably had some criminals he needed to shake down.

I couldn’t help it, I turned on him. I’ve never had much stomach for corruption. ‘Why do you say

it’s ridiculous? Because it’s never been done before? The FBI are the guardians of the best crime lab in the world, you hear me? The best. We’re accustomed to pioneering things. How would you know

what’s ridiculous and what isn’t?’

The spark in his pudgy eyes and the curl of his lip told me I had made an enemy for life. I didn’t

care. Before things spiralled down any further, my phone went again and, glancing at the screen, I saw that it was an Italian number.

‘That’ll be the Uffizi Gallery in Florence,’ I told them. ‘I’m going to ask for their help in recovering the image.’

One of the gumshoes – apparently, he was the leader of the group – shook his head. ‘No,’ he said.

‘There won’t be any help – not from the dagoes or anyone else. The mirrors stay where they are. This is reaching for straws, or however you people say it.’

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Okay. I am now making a formal request, on behalf of the FBI, to take possession of the mirrors for forensic examination. If you refuse I will need your reasons in writing so that I can forward them to the White House and the relevant officials in Ankara.’

Silence. My phone rang again, but I made no attempt to answer it. We all stood there without a word. Just before the phone stopped, the leader shrugged. ‘Take the damn mirrors then,’ he said angrily. ‘Waste your time if you want to.’

‘Thank you,’ I replied. ‘Who do I call to make arrangements to get them down?’

The officer laughed. ‘No idea. Try the FBI lab – they know everything, I’m sure they can help.’

The two gumshoes smiled broadly. Cumali looked embarrassed by her colleagues but, when the leader motioned them out on to the terrace, she followed obediently.

As they lit cigarettes and walked down the lawn – enjoying the view, bitching about me I’m sure – I called the Uffizi back. Someone had alerted the director of the workshop, and it was to him –

probably the leading art-restoration expert in the world – that I explained what I needed.

Once he had stopped laughing, he got me to take him through it again. After a dozen or so questions he finally agreed – I guessed more for the challenge of it than any other reason – but made me understand that he had virtually no expectation it would work.

‘I suppose it’s urgent?’ he asked.

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Isn’t everything? I’ll get them to you as fast as possible.’

The moment he had rung off I made one more call and – from a far different quarter – also received a promise of help.

Chapter Twenty-five

THE MANAGER OF my hotel arrived at the french house with two beaten-up trucks and eight companions

who looked like they were on day release. Shame on me for judging them by appearance – they turned out to be some of the finest, most hardworking men I had ever encountered.