‘No, I didn’t. I knew that since John wound up the atelier money has been tight for him. But I didn’t know things were that bad.’
‘Did you know that he owes the bank a lot of money?’
‘No.’
‘Did you know his wife has left him?’
‘I didn’t know that either. Look, it’s been a while since we spoke.’
‘Would you say that he was the type of fellow to bear a grudge?’
‘Phil? No more than anyone else. Look, if you’re asking me if he’s the type to commit murder then the answer is absolutely not. Besides, if he did have a grudge against John why would he take it out on Orla?’
‘Why indeed?’
‘On the other hand.’
‘Yes?’
‘I was just thinking. No one has seen or heard of John in almost two weeks. To be quite frank with you, Chief Inspector, the last time we spoke I lied to you. I said I didn’t think he would try to get in contact with me. The truth is, I did, kind of. And since he hasn’t I’ve begun to fear the worst.’
‘So have I,’ said Amalric. ‘So have I. Look, I’d better go. My sister is calling. She and I — we’re supposed to meet some old school friends at a restaurant in town tonight.’
‘Oh?’ I was trying to conceal the panic in my voice. ‘Which one? Just in case I ever go back there.’
‘L’Auberge de Tourrettes. Do you know Tourrettes?’
‘A little. It’s very pretty. I’ve always rather envied Philip having a house there.’
‘Yes, that’s the restaurant I’d recommend, if you’re ever back here.’
‘As good as Claridge’s?’
‘In its own way, yes, perhaps.’
‘When you see him, say hello to Philip from me.’
‘I’ll do that.’
‘And enjoy your dinner.’
As soon as the Chief Inspector had rung off I called John to tell him to take a taxi back to the Château Saint-Martin, immediately. But he wasn’t answering, so I sent him a text and asked him to acknowledge it straight away. He didn’t.
At the same time I tried to do a Google search for L’Auberge de Tourrettes on my iPhone, but I had already exceeded my monthly data download limit and I had little choice but to go back into Philip’s study and, ignoring his bloodshot staring eyes, to try and find the restaurant on his iMac. From the Google map it appeared that L’Auberge de Tourrettes, on Route de Grasse, was about 200 metres from La Cave de Tourrettes, on Rue de la Bourgade and on the opposite side of the town square where, earlier on, I’d parked the Bentley. As soon as I had located the restaurant where the Chief Inspector was dining I removed my Google searches from the iMac’s browsing history, just in case some resourceful cop attending the murder scene decided to check that, too. Then I wiped the keyboard and tried to call John again.
The Chief Inspector hadn’t ever met John, but he was a clever man and I was sure that if they did run into each other — in the Place de la Libération, perhaps — a thin beard wasn’t going to fool him, even at night; when cops are looking for missing persons and fugitives they always construct photofits and facial composites of how that person might look with a beard, glasses, or a different hairstyle. Amalric would almost certainly have committed those pictures to memory, and if he hadn’t he would certainly have loaded them onto his smartphone.
Once again John didn’t answer his phone, so I called the restaurant and asked them if the Englishman was still there on the terrace. They told me he’d paid the bill and left about ten minutes before, and I guessed that almost certainly he was now sitting outside one of the many bars on the Place de la Libération, nursing a cognac, girl-watching and probably not even hearing his ringtone. It was more than likely that in just a few minutes John would see Amalric parking his car and — what was worse — that Amalric might see him.
Three murders are quite an investment and it was obvious that all of my efforts to turn John into my secret employee would be rendered futile if he was arrested. Realizing I now had little option but to go back into Tourrettes-sur-Loup and fetch him from under the Chief Inspector’s nose, I cursed loudly, for there was just as great a risk that I myself might bump into him.
I jumped back into the Bentley and took off in a spray of gravel. Naturally I could have wished for a less noticeable car; but with the hood up it was dark inside the passenger cabin and there was every chance of not being recognized.
A few minutes later I entered the Place de la Libération and slowly made my way anti-clockwise around the square, steering carefully around the Sunday night tourists for fear of knocking one down, and pausing in front of one café and then another until I was back where I started, with no sign of John anywhere.
On my third trip around the square — and in front of the Café des Sports — I turned right and drove a short way along the Route de Vence, with still no sign of John. A hundred metres further on I steered the Bentley around a miniroundabout and approached the square again, this time from the east.
‘Where the fuck are you, John?’ I muttered through clenched teeth as once more I entered the square. This time I followed the road into the car park that occupied the centre and circled again. All the time I was repeat-dialling his phone every ten seconds.
Then I saw him sitting on the edge of a water trough next to the Café des Sports like some feckless teenager, except that he had a brandy glass in one hand and a cigar in the other. He was talking to a bicyclist clad from head to toe in matching blue Lycra who was filling his water bottle from the public tap.
I tapped gently on the horn, lowered the passenger window and stopped the Bentley.
‘Get in,’ I said as urgently as I dared in front of the cyclist.
John drained his glass, laid it and a banknote on a table behind the trough, and opened the car door.
‘Quickly,’ I said.
John jumped in, hauled the car door shut and I pressed my foot gently on the accelerator.
‘Where the fuck were you?’ I said. ‘Why didn’t you answer your phone? I’ve been round this fucking square four times.’
‘I was in the public toilet,’ he said. ‘Sorry. Is there a problem?’
I didn’t reply. I’d meant to turn left again — around the square — so as to avoid the Auberge de Tourrettes further on, but the way into the main square was now blocked with traffic and the driver of the van behind me was too impatient to let me wait. So I drove on and, anxious to avoid going past the Auberge on the left, I turned right onto the Route de Saint-John, and along to the Route du Caire, which led up to Phil’s villa. I had no intention of going back there, of course, and the Château Saint-Martin was in the opposite direction, but just then, beside a short rank of parked cars opposite the foot of the Route du Caire, I saw Chief Inspector Amalric get out of a blue Renault with a busty-looking blonde who looked much too young and pretty to be his sister; they paused and then, arm in arm, came toward the Bentley.
‘Christ, there he is,’ I muttered and pulling down the sun-visor, turned sharply up the Route du Caire.
In my rear-view mirror I saw him turn — to look at the Bentley? I told myself Amalric probably had other things on his mind at that moment, such as getting in the blonde’s pants, but I couldn’t be absolutely sure he hadn’t seen my face.
‘Would you mind telling me what the fuck is going on?’ demanded John.
‘That’s one of those Monty cops back there,’ I said.
John let out a curse and turned sharply in his seat to look back, but we were already round the corner.
‘The detective who called me last night in Èze.’
‘What the fuck is he doing here?’
‘He’s going to see Phil in the morning,’ I said.
‘I knew that bastard was going to sell me out,’ snarled John. ‘Fucker.’
‘Relax,’ I said. ‘That’s not going to happen.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because I know Phil. Look, shut up and let me think for a moment, will you?’