The familiar faces acknowledge me—Roger, Margaret, Jean, Eric and Rebecca—along with a few new ones, two of Ali's brothers.
“How long have they been here?”
“Since lunchtime,” says Joe.
Ali will have called them. She is out of surgery and must have heard about Gerry Brandt.
Rachel spies me from across the room. She looks at me hopefully, her hands fidgeting with her collar.
“Did you talk to him? I mean . . . did he say anything?”
“He said he let Mickey go.”
A breath snags in her throat. “What happened to her?”
“I don't know. He didn't get to tell me.” I turn to the others and let them all hear. “It's now even more imperative that we find Kirsten Fitzroy. She may be the only one left who knows what happened to Mickey.”
Gathering the chairs in a circle, we hold a “kitchen cabinet” meeting.
Margaret and Jean have managed to find a dozen of Kirsten's ex-employees. All are women aged between twenty-two and thirty-four, many of them with foreign-sounding names. They were nervous about talking—sex work isn't something you advertise. None of them has seen Kirsten since the agency closed down.
Meanwhile, Roger visited the old offices. The managing agent had kept two boxes of files that had been left behind when the agency vacated the premises. Among the documents were invoices from a pathology lab. The girls were being tested for STDs.
Another file contained encoded credit card details and initials. Kirsten probably had a diary with names matching the initials. I run my finger down the page searching for Sir Douglas's initials. Nothing.
“So far we've called more than four hundred clinics and surgeries,” says Rachel. “Nobody has reported treating a gunshot victim but a pharmacy in Southwark had a break-in on September 26. Someone stole bandages and painkillers.”
“Call the pharmacist back. Ask him if the police pulled any fingerprints.”
Margaret hands me a coffee. Jean takes it away and washes the cup before I can take a sip. Someone gets sandwiches and soft drinks. I feel like something a lot stronger, something warm and yeasty and golden.
Joe finds me sitting alone on the stairs and takes a seat beside me. “You haven't mentioned the diamonds. What did you do with them?”
“Put them somewhere safe.”
I can picture the velvet pouches stitched inside a woolly mammoth in Ali's old room. I should probably tell Joe. If something happens to me, nobody will know where to find them. Then again, I don't want to put anyone else in danger.
“Did you know that elephants with their trunks raised are meant to symbolize good luck?”
“No.”
“Ali told me. She's got a thing about elephants. I don't know how much good luck it's brought her.”
My mouth has gone dry. I stand and slip my arms through my jacket.
“You're going to see Aleksei, aren't you?” asks Joe. I swear to God he can read minds.
My silence responds eloquently.
“You know that's crazy,” he says.
“I have to stop this.”
I know it sounds foolishly old-fashioned but I'm stuck with this idea that there is something dignified and noble about facing your enemy and looking him squarely in the eye—before you thrust a saber in his heart.
“You can't go alone.”
“He won't see me otherwise. I'll make an appointment. People don't get killed when they make an appointment.”
Joe considers this. “I'll come with you.”
“No, but thanks for the offer.”
I don't know why people keep trying to help me like this. They should be heading for the hills. Ali says I inspire loyalty but I seem to be taking kindnesses that I can never hope to repay. I am not a perfect human being. I'm a cynic and a pessimist and sometimes I feel as though I'm locked into this life by an accident of birth. But at times like this, a random act of kindness or the touch of another human being makes me believe I can be different, better, redeemed. Joe has that effect on me. A poor man shouldn't borrow so much.
The phone call to Aleksei is diverted through several numbers before he answers. I can hear water in the background. The river.
“I want to talk. No lawyers or police or third parties.”
I can hear him thinking. “Where did you have in mind?”
“Neutral ground.”
“No. If you want a meeting you come to me. Chelsea Harbour. You'll find me.”
A black cab drops me at the entrance to the marina shortly before ten. I lift my watch and count the final minutes. It's no use being early for your own funeral.
Spotlights reflect from the whiteness of the motor yachts and cruisers, creating pools like spilled paint. By comparison, the interlocking docks are weathered and gray, with life buoys hanging from pylons anchored deep in the mud.
Aleksei's boat, draped in fairy lights, takes up two moorings and has three decks with sleek lines that angle like an arrowhead from bow to stern. The upper deck bristles with radio antennae and satellite tracking devices.
I spent five years mucking about on boats. I know they float and soak up money. People with a highly defined sense of balance are more likely to get seasick, they say. I can vouch for my equilibrium but an hour in rough weather on a cross-channel ferry can still feel like a year.
The gangway has a thick rubber mat and railings with bronze pillars. As I step on board the vessel shifts slightly. Through an open doorway I see a stateroom and a large mahogany dining table with seating for eight. To one side is a bar area and a modular lounge arranged in front of a flat-screen TV.
Descending the steps I duck my head, which isn't necessary. Aleksei Kuznet is sitting behind a desk, his head lowered, reading the screen of a laptop computer. He raises his hand, making me wait. It remains there, suspended. Slowly the hand turns and his fingers wave me forward.
When he raises his eyes he looks past me as though I might have forgotten something. The ransom. He wants his diamonds.
“Nice boat.”
“It's a motor yacht.”
“An expensive toy.”
“On the contrary—it is my office. I had her built to an American design at a boatyard on the Black Sea near Odessa. You see I take the best from different cultures—American design, German engineering, Italian craftsmen, Brazilian teak and Slav laborers. People often criticize Eastern European nations and say they don't do capitalism well. But the truth is that they operate the purest form of capitalism. If I had wanted to build this boat in Britain I would have had to pay award wages, workers compensation, national insurance, design fees and bribes to keep the unions happy. It's the same when you put up a building. At any stage someone can stop you. In Russia or Latvia or Georgia none of this matters if you have enough money. That's what I call pure capitalism.”
“Is that why you're selling up? Are you going home?”
He laughs mordantly. “Inspector, you mistake me for a patriot. I will employ Russians, I will fund their schools and hospitals and prop up their corrupt politicians but do not expect me to live with them.”
He has moved across to the bar. My eyes flick around the stateroom, almost waiting for the trap to snap shut.
“So why are you selling up?”
“Greener pastures. Fresh challenges. Maybe I'll buy a football club. That seems very popular nowadays. Or I could just go somewhere warm for the winter.”
“I have never understood what people see in hot climates.”
He glances into the darkness of the starboard window. “Each man makes his own paradise, DI, but it's hard to love London.”