The Button Man: A Hugo Marston Novel (23 page)

As he sipped his coffee, Hugo half expected to see Merlyn appear in front of him, her almond eyes laughing at him for thinking he could get away with making the trip alone. She’d been unhappy the whole way down from Hertfordshire to London, and they’d driven in almost total silence. After dropping her off, Hugo had called the office and sent two men to Pendrith’s address in Chelsea, getting a phone call twenty minutes later to tell him what he expected: no one home, and no sign anyone had been home. A quick look through his mail slot at the mail piled inside his door, using a handheld snake camera, had told them that.

So maybe, just maybe, the old man was in Paris.

Hugo left his table and checked in at the Eurostar terminal thirty minutes before the train’s departure time, picking up a paperback from an open kiosk en route. Not happy with his reading choices, he was pleased to get to his seat and find an almost-new copy of the
Bookdealer
, the trade journal for the book trade. A knowledgeable, if infrequent, collector of old books, Hugo sank into the thin pages of the magazine with the same delight his wife took in her shopping catalogues, the long articles and old-style ads from antiquarian dealers beckoning him into a world that was familiar and safe.

But Christine was on his mind, had been since they’d spoken a few hours earlier, just briefly, as he waited outside the embassy grounds for a taxi. She’d been busy and sounded happy, doing more talking than listening, and Hugo knew without asking that these were signs she had no immediate plans to return to London.

She was and always had been, without doubt, his most interesting study. Serial killers, psychopaths, and arsonists had always presented a challenge, held a fascination for him. But while their specific acts were different, they all had strings of similarity that tied them together, familiar tales of neglect as babies, abuse as children, abandonment as teens.

Christine, on the other hand, presented a multitude of contradictions that he’d yet to figure out, but that had initially attracted him to her. She’d been the Dallas socialite with a soft spot for the underprivileged, her charity work coming from the heart, not for show. She’d traveled, too, shown an interest in the world and perhaps from that she possessed a confidence in her place in it that was rare among her spoiled friends. Ultimately, Hugo knew that her place was in Dallas, near her family, her work, those same friends. She loved shopping and so should love London and Paris, at least that was the logic he applied to the situation, and one that he used to appeal to her. But logic and Christine were occasional friends, meeting up when the circumstances were right, not seeking each other out at the behest of others, including Hugo. She enjoyed London only a little, Paris even less.

He tried to keep his mind on the magazine, scanning the reviews and an article about French poet Arthur Rimbaud and his love affair with Paul Verlaine, a brief relationship fueled by passion, absinthe, and hashish. But Hugo couldn’t entirely escape the present, his eyes wandering to the platform outside his window, the soft hiss of the doors whispered reminders that Pendrith and Walton were out there somewhere, perhaps watching him or perhaps being watched by someone else, by some faceless person responsible for a growing list of dead and disappeared.

The voice of the station announcer echoed from the platform, giving his rendition of the traditional “All aboard!” Hugo looked over his shoulder as he heard chatter behind him and saw a handsome couple in their fifties checking their tickets for seat numbers.

All well in their world
, he thought, suddenly conscious of where he was going, and why. With no sign of Pendrith or Walton, despite police inquiries into both men, that alarm bell ringing in the back of his mind had grown only louder. His chest tightened with a sudden and powerful unease. Maybe he should have let Merlyn come. What if she, for some reason he couldn’t yet fathom, was the next person in this bizarre case to disappear without a trace?

Hugo didn’t notice when the train began to move out of the station, so smooth, like the caress of a mother’s hand on her child’s sleeping brow, and he was momentarily disoriented by what he thought was movement on the platform.

Almost immediately, though, he felt the familiar nudge and pull as the train picked up speed, heading north out of the station before making a firm right-hand turn past the towering and unsightly gasometers behind the King’s Cross rail station, and then burrowing into a covered bridge that funneled the sleek train into the ground, lights flickering past the dark windows.

Hugo blinked at the sudden return to the surface, feeling like a mole, or better yet a long worm, appearing out of the earth into daylight.
A disappointed worm
, he thought, as the dirty brick and stone buildings of east London passed by, the view full of warehouses and run-down housing estates, depressing and drab until he spied the magnificent Queen Elizabeth II suspension bridge, which bore the M25 motorway, the road encircling the city, across the River Thames. The train dipped down, though, not up, burrowing again to get them under the Thames, bursting back out the other side into the countryside, trees and hedges now a blur and the motorway traffic beside them sluggish, unhurried.

As the train rocketed south through rural Kent, Hugo felt himself relax into his seat, the greens and browns of the countryside massaging his mood, the villages tucked into the chalky hills appearing and disappearing like reassuring mirages in the desert, but offering him real, not imagined, comfort.

Feeling better, Hugo set about putting his travel time to good purpose. He’d already phoned Bart Denum, his subordinate at the embassy, and given him some research. He wanted to know more about Ginny Ferro’s life and also get some background on Pendrith and Walton. In his experience, people’s actions were rooted in the past, their motives connected to events they might not even remember. Even though he was bemused by most of what was happening, Hugo thought maybe he could reach back in time and grasp one of those roots and grope his way to some solid answers.

While he waited for Bart’s return call, Hugo reached into his overnight bag for a pen and paper. If he’d had the resources, he would have created a literal jigsaw of the puzzle that had him stumped, squares of paper he could spread out and connect physically to build a picture of what was happening. And, more importantly, why it was happening. But for now, a few notes would have to do. The words he wrote were, for the most part, unimportant, acting as reminders of the major issues and questions, and also as triggers for his thought process. As he began, it struck him forcefully that the missing pieces were different for each case.

He began with Ginny Ferro. She was dead, but it was not clear why. Suicide seemed unlikely, but possible. Accident seemed equally unlikely, yet possible. And if it wasn’t either of those, he was left with murder.

But who would kill Ginny Ferro? And why?

Hugo skipped to Harper’s own death in the churchyard. Certainly, it could have been self-inflicted. Hugo had seen many suicides that looked just like that. And given the movie-star couple’s penchant for cemeteries, the place seemed ideal. But it didn’t
feel
right to Hugo, even though he couldn’t say exactly why.

And where the hell were Pendrith and Walton?

Hugo tapped his notebook in frustration, irritated that he was unable to make the right connections, really make any at all. He was interrupted by his phone, the number coming up as the embassy. He silently hoped it wasn’t Ambassador Cooper.

“Hugo, it’s Bart.”

“Hey, Bart, get some sleep?”

“Not much, you?”

“None. So what did you find?”

“You’re not going to like it, I’m afraid.”

“Try me.”

“First you should know that the English cops are trying to cut you out of the loop. They found something and apparently haven’t told you.”

“I haven’t heard from them, so you’re probably right.” Hugo instinctively leaned back as the train flew into a tunnel with a loud
whump
. “I think we hit the English Channel, so I’ll call when we get to France in about twenty minutes.”

“OK, but before you go, you might want to know what they found.”

“You’re being a tease, Bart. What is it?”

“Not just what, but who. They found that reporter’s car with a body in it.”

“Whose body? Harry Walton’s?” When he got no response he looked at his phone. The signal had gone. He snapped it shut with a silent curse and settled back for a tortuous twenty minutes. His scribbled notes sat on the table in front of him like an unfinished crossword, a crossword where even the clues were starting to be withheld.

The train hit France at a hundred miles an hour, climbing into the lap of the French countryside only to accelerate onto the specially designed high-speed rail line, keeping the train tight to the contours of the land, sweeping up over rises and swooping down through its shallow valleys.

Hugo got Bart back on the line.

“Sorry, boss, wasn’t meaning to play games with you; I figured they’d have routers on the train and we’d be able to talk.”

“No problem. So tell me about Walton. I assume it was him in the car?”

“They think so. He’d been burned to a crisp, so they’ll be running dental matches, maybe a DNA check if they can. But the body size was right.”

“Any other signs of injury?”

“Like bullet wounds?”

“Anything.”

“Not that I know of.” Bart hesitated. “Boss, what exactly is going on?”

“I wish I knew. Too many people disappearing and dying, I can tell you that much. Where was Walton’s car found?”

“In a church parking lot, in Wakefield.”

“A church?”

“Well, not exactly a church. They were buildings owned by the Church of England.”

“But not an actual church or graveyard?”

“No. I looked at some photos, knowing about your little incident in the country, and you wouldn’t even know they were owned by the church. Sorry.”

“OK, thanks,” said Hugo. “Let me know as soon as they confirm the ID.”

“Will do.”

“And not that it matters, probably, but did you find much about Walton?”

“A little. Let me get my notes here. You writing this down, or want me to send these to you?”

“I’ll make notes, so just run through it for me.”

“OK. His father was a soldier in the first part of World War Two, sent home when he lost a leg. Mother a housewife who died when he was five. He had no siblings, grew up with his father, religious about going to church. And his dad had an interesting job after the army thing. He was an executioner, how about that?”

“Delightful,” said Hugo. “A grim reaper with a wooden leg.”

“Right. Seeing that got me reading about the process, and apparently they had two at every execution, and half a dozen on the Home Office books. They’d call them up when they had a neck to stretch.”

“Delightful, as I said. And Harry Walton, what was his career path?”

“Started work on the
Hitchin Gazette
, stayed there a few years before moving up to London to work shifts at the tabloids. Kept a roof over his head by working at some of the tourist attractions like Madame Tussauds, where there’s a wax figure of his dad, the last executioner, and the Tower of London. A whole year at Tussauds, actually, but he’s been freelancing for a few years.”

“No dirt or criminal history?”

“Nope, at least not as such. Only one odd thing, maybe not even that odd. Lucky, I guess you’d call it. He was a lottery winner a couple years back, which means he doesn’t have to work much. Must have taken some time off after the win because he wasn’t writing. Quit for about a year, best I can tell.”

“Can’t blame him for that. And Pendrith?”

“Hard to find much on him, I guess because of his background. Most of his official stuff is under wraps, but from regular web searches I didn’t see anything of interest. Not that I know what I’m looking for.”

“Me neither, Bart, I’m sorry. What are his major issues?”

“Politically? Well, he’s big into law and order. But then, who isn’t? Before he was elected, he was all about reinstating capital punishment but apparently read a bunch of studies and converted, said it was a waste of money and barbaric. Some thought it was a cynical switch of opinion to get elected, some thought it was real. I guess the electorate thought it was real and he’s stuck with the new view ever since, always voting against reinstatement. Let’s see, he also favored the recent wars in the Middle East, but he doesn’t like how much they cost. If I had to guess, I’d say budget issues were his next main concern. Tight bastard.”