‘Where did the gun come from?’ Mark asked.
‘It was mine; I brought it with me, just in case. I kept it in Shirley’s safe, in a lockable box; I told her there were bonds in it.’ His eyebrows twitched, and the corners of his mouth flicked upwards in a brief smile. ‘I never imagined I’d need it, but it came in handy this morning. It impressed Kalu, that’s for sure. Didn’t it, mate?’ He paused. The bound man’s traffic signal eyes turned towards him. There was no arrogance left in them, only pain and fear.
‘We brought him here,’ his captor went on. ‘We made him admit to everything. . he isn’t really very brave, by the way, not nearly as brave as his son; a few whacks with that golf club and he was screaming at us to stop. When he was finished, we knew everything. That was when we made him call Lars and tell him to meet him here, to get rid of me once and for all. We had the opposite in mind, and everything was going our way until you three showed up. Why the hell didn’t you just wait outside for a minute longer?’ he growled. ‘I’d have killed them, even if Uche had bottled it. Now they’re both going to walk out of here.’
‘Looks that way,’ Mark agreed. He looked down at Martinsson, who was fully conscious once more, still face down, but aware. ‘But when you do, big fellow, you’re going to sing for your supper, aren’t you? You’re going to tell the whole story to Interpol, you’re going to admit to killing Genchev and McGuigan, and in return you will not be extradited to the US, and you won’t be executed for Beau Lucas’s murder.’ He drove his stick, hard, into the back of the Swede’s neck. ‘Aren’t you?’ he growled.
‘Yes, yes!!!’ the fallen killer yelled.
‘That’s the deal, then.’ He turned to Alex. ‘I think you should take this one outside now,’ he suggested. ‘Uche will help you, I’m sure.’ He watched as the cop and the chemist hauled the former Scandinavian golf champ to his feet and dragged him from the room, from the old, dark house, into the bright day outside.
‘There you are, Mr Cowling,’ Mark said, easily. ‘You can relax.’
‘How do you work that out?’ Palmer retorted. ‘How long will it be before this thing here hires someone from his jail cell to finish me off?’
‘You wouldn’t do that, Mr Wigwe, would you?’ Mark asked.
The traffic signal eyes locked on to his. ‘Oh yes,’ he hissed. ‘That is exactly how it will be. This man will go into a meat grinder, feet first. My oldest son will watch him, and then he will follow. Lars’s children too, if necessary. That’s why he’ll change his mind about giving evidence.’ He smiled, through the blood and the broken teeth. ‘You people have made certain of that, of all of it.’
Mark took a few steps forward, to stand above Kalu in his chair. As I watched him, I felt my heart heading for my mouth, as I had a premonition of the immediate future. ‘That’s not quite how it’ll be,’ he murmured, then put the pistol he had taken from Uche against his father’s forehead and blew his brains all over the wall behind him. As easy as that. I didn’t scream, but Palmer did.
‘You see? It’s cheap to talk about killing people,’ Mark told him. ‘Even about killing yourself. Doing it, though. .’
He had tossed the weapon on to the floor by the time Alex came charging back through the front door, his own gun raised and held in both hands. He pointed it at Mark’s chest. ‘What the hell have you done?’ he yelled.
‘Followed orders,’ my other friend said, as I took in what I had just seen, and as Robert Palmer wiped furiously at the blood that had splattered over him. ‘My remit was extended this morning, as soon as the Americans heard what we’d turned up. You’re not here, Intendant Guinart. You didn’t see this; you’ve never met Kalu Wigwe, only his son, and the man you’ve just arrested after he confessed to two murders. Now either shoot me, or put your gun away. Either way, I don’t give a toss, but it’ll be better for you if you do as I say. It would be more grateful of you too, considering that I’ve just made you a hero.’
I pulled myself together, got hold of Alex and drew him away, back outside, where I hugged him until he’d stopped shaking.
Uche didn’t say a word. He looked at Palmer, as he emerged with Mark, and Palmer nodded. That was all.
‘What about. .?’ I nodded towards the house, as I looked at Mark.
‘I have to make a phone call,’ he told me, ‘that’s all. Nothing will be left behind.’
He did, and then we headed back down the track. I gave Alex the keys to my jeep, since it was the only vehicle there that was capable of taking a six-foot five-inch handcuffed man, and two escorts: him, and Mark at the wheel.
‘What about me?’ Palmer asked his saviour, as he reached the first vehicle, the one he’d blagged from the care hire company.
‘Nothing. You weren’t here either. I didn’t call you Mr Cowling by mistake, a couple of minutes ago. You still are him, and if you choose, you always will be.’ He took in the man’s doleful expression and smiled. ‘Don’t feel so sorry for yourself,’ he said. ‘You’ve still got Palmer’s money, rather than some spook pen-pusher’s pension.’
‘Let me give you some free advice,’ I added. ‘Get yourself on the first plane to Singapore, look for a hotel overlooking the marina, and check the guest list. Get there before Friday and you’ll find a large lady waving at sailors from her bathtub. Tell her I sent you and that she should let you in.’
He blinked. ‘Anything you say, Primavera,’ he murmured, as if he wasn’t quite sure what he was hearing or doing, but reckoned that the smart thing would be not to argue.
‘And me?’ Uche followed up, solemnly.
‘How do they address an emir in Nigeria?’ Mark asked him.
‘Sir, would be the usual form,’ he replied.
‘In that case, sir, you’ve just inherited. If I were you I’d get to Girona Airport, hire new air crew. . you two desperados were right not to kill the Kiwis; that would have ruined everything. . and fly back to Lagos as soon as you can get a take-off slot. You have two brothers to look after, from what I gather, and a lot of cleaning up to do within your family business.’
‘But what about. . the human growth hormone that I made for my father? My sadly late father?’ he added, without a trace of grief in his voice
‘What about it? All you did was invent a synthesising process for a naturally occurring substance. That might be hugely profitable for certain people, but I think you’ll find that it isn’t illegal in itself. As I see it, the only law you’ve broken is a small one involving kidnapping, but the Mossos d’Esquadra won’t be following that up. Get out of town, mate.’
Uche looked at me. ‘But Jonny. .’ he began.
I tried not to smile, but didn’t get close. ‘I have some bad news,’ I advised him. ‘Jonny said to tell you: you’re fired.’
Seventeen
I never saw Mark Kravitz again. When I called the Nieves Mar later that day, I was told that he’d checked out. I didn’t call him, because I decided that for a while, silence between us would be best. Things you regret; too many people to whom I never said, ‘Safe journey onward. Your touch upon my life was fair and good.’
Three months ago I had a phone call from a stranger who introduced himself as Detective Chief Superintendent Graham Metcalfe. He told me that my friend had finally run out of treatment options and that his MS had moved on to a new, aggressive and irreversible phase, and he explained that Mark, being Mark, had decided not to hang around for the inevitable but instead had taken an overdose of carefully stockpiled sleeping pills, washed down with a nice claret, from a very good year. At once, I remembered what he’d said to Patterson Cowling, in the abandoned house, about it being easy to talk about killing, even killing yourself, but. .
Patterson Cowling? Yes, that’s who he is again, as far as the entire population is concerned, indeed as far as the whole world is concerned, apart from a few spooks and two women who will never meet him, although the General Register Office says that he’s their father. He took my advice, he made it to Singapore on time, and joined Shirley in her first-class suite. I’m sure she gave him hell for putting her through same, but the man she got back was the one she’d known, and they are now in the process of living happily for as long as ‘ever after’ lasts.