‘Thank you. I knew I had to do something, but I couldn’t quite face going to your lengths.’
‘It’s due for another trim soon,’ I said, running my fingers through my hair, which was now almost half an inch long.
‘Hello, Guy,’ she said quietly as she entered the living-room-cum-office.
‘Mel! Great to see you! Davo says you’re just the lawyer we need. And we get a personal delivery service.’ He rushed over and kissed both her cheeks. She glowed.
‘I make it a point to see my clients face-to-face.’
‘Good. I’d show you around the office, but this is it. That’s Owen over there. Wave to the nice lady, Owen.’
Owen raised a hand while not moving his eyes from the screen.
‘Here you are, David,’ Mel said, taking an envelope out of her briefcase. ‘I think you’ll find these an improvement on the old documents.’ I took them.
‘Do you want a cup of tea or something?’ I asked.
Mel hesitated, glanced at Guy and then looked at her watch. ‘No, I’ve got a meeting in the West End. I’d better be off now.’
‘I thought you said she’d gone grey,’ Guy said as Mel shut the door.
‘That was last week.’
‘You were right about her chest.’
‘I thought you said you’d given up women?’
‘Yeah, but it’s only Mel. That was a bit odd. It’s a long way to come just to stay for two minutes. She could have sent the papers by courier.’
‘Mm,’ I said.
‘Never mind. As long as she’s a good lawyer.’
She was. The new documents all made perfect sense to me. Since Torsten hadn’t signed the original papers yet I had the new ones couriered to Hamburg. Guy wasn’t concerned by the lack of communication from Torsten, but I nagged him into chasing him up. We needed to know for sure that the cash was there before we moved into a new office and put more people on the payroll. Guy had no success. Torsten was out of town until the following week.
We had some luck with recruitment. The media were beginning to notice the dot-com wave and people wanted to ride it. Gaz brought on board a young sports journalist called Neil from a regional newspaper in the Midlands. Owen somehow found someone whom he would deign to work with, Sanjay, a football-mad programmer. We signed up Amy Kessler to be Head of Merchandising. She was a friend of a friend of Guy’s, an American MBA who had worked for Adidas in Germany for a couple of years. She seemed frighteningly competent.
Guy and I realized we had too many chiefs and no Indians, and so I gave my old secretary at Gurney Kroheim a call. Actually, she wasn’t exactly my secretary, she was more of a general dogsbody for about eight people. She was an Australian woman called Michelle. I had been impressed with her attention to detail and her cheerfulness. Although we weren’t friends, I had always been careful to treat her with respect, something that most of my colleagues in the new Leipziger Gurney Kroheim hadn’t done. When I told her what we were looking for at ninetyminutes.com she jumped at the chance, even though it meant a significant cut in salary.
We found an office. It was in Britton Street in Clerkenwell. Plenty of other dot-com companies were springing up in the neighbourhood; there were four other start-ups in our building alone. Importantly for us, the internet access was excellent. But the best part was that we could move in immediately. Which was good, because we needed somewhere to put our new recruits.
My father phoned me.
‘You haven’t cashed my cheque.’
‘No, Dad.’
‘Why not?’
I took a deep breath. ‘I don’t think ninetyminutes.com is a good investment for you.’
He was not impressed. ‘I should be the judge of that.’
‘I know, but... Look, how much have you got saved beyond this fifty thousand?’
‘That’s none of your business. Now please cash my cheque. I’ve always trusted you, David; now it’s time for you to trust me.’
I hesitated, weighing it up. I was right; this was a bad place to put his retirement nest egg. But he was right; I should trust him. And things were really rolling. Of course, I couldn’t guarantee ninetyminutes.com would succeed, I wasn’t even certain we would get our initial funding, but I did feel good about it. And my father wasn’t looking for guarantees.
I sighed. ‘OK, Dad, if you’re positive about this. I’ll cash the cheque this afternoon. Thank you.’
‘Thank you’, he said. ‘And good luck. I’m counting on you.’
‘I know.’
I put down the phone with the nagging feeling that I had just made a big mistake.
16
July 1987, Côte D’Azur, France
I stood at the front door as the police car carrying Guy drove out of the courtyard, followed by Tony in his Jeep. I heard rapid footsteps on the stairs. A moment later Mel and Ingrid joined me, wearing the T-shirts they had been sleeping in.
‘What’s happened?’ Mel asked.
‘They’ve arrested him.’
‘Guy?’
I nodded.
‘Oh, my God!’ She put her hand to her mouth, her eyes wide. Another shock. I wasn’t sure how many more she could bear.
I described Guy’s arrest.
‘I can’t believe they’ve taken him,’ she said. ‘David, you must tell them they’ve made a mistake.’
‘I can try. I’m sure he is innocent. But I doubt Inspector Sauville will take my word for it.’
‘But what possible reason could they have for suspecting him?’
‘They must have found a footprint somewhere,’ Ingrid said, ‘Guy’s footprint.’
‘If they have, I’m sure there’s an explanation,’ I said. ‘After all, why would he kill Dominique?’
‘There’s no reason why he’d kill her,’ said Mel fiercely. ‘It’s that scumbag Tony. It must be.’ She collapsed into a chair and began to weep, gently at first and then in earnest, huge sobs wracking her shoulders.
Ingrid shot me an anguished glance and put an arm round her. Mel was cracking up. I couldn’t blame her, but there was little I could do to help. Ingrid led her outside to the terrace. Miguel had heard the commotion, and a couple of minutes later he materialized with breakfast.
Then Owen appeared, bleary eyed. ‘What’s the fuss?’ he asked, picking up a croissant and stuffing it into his mouth.
I told him.
He stopped chewing in mid-mouthful and stared at me, as though unable to comprehend what I had just said. ‘Shit,’ he whispered at last.
‘I’m sure they’ll let him go soon,’ I said. After all, Owen was Guy’s younger brother and I thought he deserved some words of comfort.
Owen ignored them. ‘Why did they arrest him?’
‘I think it might have something to do with a footprint.’ I described again Sauville’s visit.
‘Shit,’ Owen repeated. He looked anxious, almost panicked. His reaction was nothing like the sullen indifference he had displayed when his father had been interviewed at the police station. But then I knew how strongly he cared about his brother.
‘They’ll let him go,’ Mel said, her face damp with tears. ‘They’ve got to let him go.’
Owen glared at her. ‘What do you care, you slut?’
She just looked at him. Stricken with shame and self-loathing, she couldn’t answer.
‘Owen!’ I snapped. ‘There’s no need for that!’
Owen scowled and disappeared back indoors.
It was a long morning. I sat on the terrace and took refuge in War and Peace: past page 900 and going strong. Ingrid read her own book next to me and Mel withdrew to her room to lie down. And cry, no doubt.
It was eerily peaceful in the garden, with the quiet disturbed only by the competing hums of the bees in the lavender and the distant traffic a long way beneath us. No sign of Guy. Or Tony. Or the police. The action was all going on down there, in that scruffy police station in Beaulieu.