“You sure?” I asked, still doubtful.
“I’m sure.”
“And what about the ten grand?”
Richard shrugged. “Hang on to it for now. We all need walking-round money.”
“It’s a lot to be walking round with. Shouldn’t I be paying it back to the insurance company, or somebody?”
“They don’t know you’ve got it, they’re not going to miss it. Maybe you should just look on it as an early Christmas bonus for Mortensen and Brannigan.”
“I don’t know.
“Trust me. I’m not a doctor,” he said, wrapping his arms round me and nuzzling the back of my neck. Instant goose-flesh. You can’t fight your gonads. I hadn’t even wanted to try. Michael who?
The Turner household came to life round half past seven. The curtains in the master bedroom opened, and I caught a glimpse of Nicholas in his dressing gown. This time I’d come fully equipped for surveillance. I had a video camera in the well of the passenger seat, cunningly hidden in a bag made of oneway fabric which allowed the camera to see out but prevented anyone seeing in. I had a pair of high-powered binoculars in my bag, and my Nikon with a long lens attached sitting on the passenger seat. And five hundred quid of walking-round money in the inside pocket of my jacket. I’d left the other nine and a half grand with Richard, who had strict instructions to pay it into a building society account which I hold in a false name for those odd bits and pieces of money that it’s sometimes advisable to lose for a while.
At quarter past eight, Mrs. Turner and her two daughters emerged, the girls in the same smart school uniform. The Audi drove off. Two hours later, the Audi came back. Mrs. Turner staggered indoors with enough Tesco carrier bags to feed Bosnia. Then nothing for two more hours. At a quarter to one, Mrs. T came out, got into the Audi and drove off. She came back at ten past two, when I was halfway through my Flying Pizza special. If something didn’t happen soon, I was either going to die of boredom or go home. Apart from anything else, Radio Four loses its marbles between three and four in the afternoon, and I didn’t think I could bear to listen to an hour of the opinions of those who are proof positive that care in the community isn’t working.
Half an hour later, the front door opened, and Nicholas Turner came out. He was carrying a briefcase and a suit carrier. He opened the garage, dumped the suit carrier in the boot and reversed out into the road. “Geronimo,” I muttered, starting my engine. Within seconds, the screen told me that he had the buckle with him. I eased out into the traffic and followed him back through the park.
The traffic was pretty much nose to tail as we came down the hill toward the city center, so it wasn’t hard to stay in touch with the Mercedes. I kept a couple of cars between us, which meant I got snagged up a couple of times at red lights, but there wasn’t enough free road for him to make much headway. I realized pretty soon he was heading for the motorways, which took some of the pressure off. I caught up with him just before he hit the junction where he had to choose between the M621 toward Manchester and the Ml for the south and east. He ignored the first slip road and roared off down the Ml. In the Saab, it was easy to keep pace with him, which was another good reason for having swapped the Rover. I kept about half a mile behind him to begin with, since I didn’t want to lose him at the M62 junction. Sure enough, he turned off, heading east toward Hull.
We hammered down the motorway, the speedo never varying much either side of eighty-five. He’d obviously heard the same rumor I had about that being the speed cameras’ trigger point. When we hit Hull, he followed the signs for the ferry port. I followed, with sinking heart. At the port, he parked and went into the booking office. I got into the queue in time to hear him book the car and himself on to that night’s ferry. I didn’t have any choice. I had to do the same thing.
By the time I emerged, he’d disappeared. I ran to the car, and saw that the buckle was moving away from the ferry port. He was either going to dispose of it now, or it was going on the ferry with him. Either way, I needed to try to follow him. I drove off in the direction the receiver indicated, grabbing my phone as I went and punching in Richard’s number. The dashboard clock told me it was five past four. I prayed. He answered on the third ring. “Yo, Richard Barclay,” he said.
“I need a mega favor,” I said.
“Lovely to hear your voice too, Brannigan,” he said.
“It’s an emergency. I’m in Hull.”
“That sounds like an emergency to me.”
“I’ve got to be on the half-past-six ferry to Holland. My passport’s in the top drawer of my desk. Can you get it, and get here by then?”
“In my car? You’ve got to be kidding.”
I could have wept. He was right, of course. Even though it’s pretty souped up, his Volkswagen just couldn’t do the distance in the time. Then I remembered the coupe. “Shelley’s got the Gemini,” I told him. “I’ll get her to meet you outside the office in five minutes with it. Can you do it?”
“I’ll be there,” he promised.
I rang the office, one eye on the monitor, one eye on the road. I was probably the most dangerous thing on the streets of Hull. We seemed to be heading east, farther down the Hum-ber estuary. Shelley answered brightly.
“Don’t ask questions, it’s an emergency,” I said.
“You’ve been arrested,” she replied resignedly.
“I have not been arrested. I’m hot on the trail of a team of international art thieves. Some people would be proud to work with me.”
“Okay, it’s an emergency. What’s it got to do with me?”
“Hang on, I think I’m losing someone…” We’d cleared the suburbs of Hull, and the receiver was registering a sharp change in direction. Sure enough, about a kilometer up the road, there was a right turn. Cautiously, I drove into the narrow road, then pulled up. The distance between us remained constant. He’d stopped.
And the phone was squawking in my ear. “Sorry, Shelley. Okay, what I need is for you to meet Richard downstairs in five minutes with the Gemini. He’ll leave you his car so you won’t be without wheels,” I added weakly.
“You expect me to drive that?”
“It’ll do wonders for your street cred,” I said, ending the call. I was in no mood for banter or argument. I put the car in gear and moved slowly down the lane, keeping an eye open for Turner’s car. The Tarmac ended a few hundred yards later in the car park of a pub overlooking the wide estuary. There were only two cars apart from Turner’s Merc. There was no way I was going in there, even if he was offering the buckle to the highest bidder. With so few customers, I’d be painfully obvious. All I could do was head back to the main road and pray that Turner would still have the buckle with him.
I fretted for an hour, then the screen revealed signs of activity. The buckle was moving back toward me. Moments later, Turner’s car emerged from the side road and headed back into Hull. “There is a God,” I said, pulling out behind him. We got back to the ferry port at half past five. Turner joined the queue of cars waiting to board, but I stayed over by the booking office. The last thing I wanted was for him to clock me and the Saab at this stage in the game.
Richard skidded to a halt beside me at five to six. He gave me a thumbs-up sign as he got out. He picked up my emergency overnight bag from the passenger seat and came over to the Saab. He tossed the bag into the back and settled into my passenger seat. “Well done,” I said, leaning across to give him a smacking kiss on the cheek.
“You’ll have to stand on for any speeders I picked up,” he said. “It really is a flying machine, that coupe.”
“You brought the passport?”
Richard pulled out two passports from his inside pocket. Mine and his. “I thought I’d come along for the ride,” he said. “I’ve got nothing pressing for the next couple of days, and it’s about time we had a jaunt.”