Could Calder forgive himself? He didn’t know. More whisky.
A few days ago everything had been fine. Of course the accident in the Yak had been a harrowing experience, but it was one that he could cope with. Todd’s injury was bad, but he had been able to reassure himself that it wasn’t his fault. He was good in tough situations.
But now, now it was all too much. Suddenly, he knew it was all too much.
He couldn’t justify what he had done with Kim. There might be explanations, but no justification. It made him angry that he had been so weak. That he had turned himself into the kind of sex-crazed, selfish, callous bastard who would sleep with another man’s wife when the man was in a coma. Really, what kind of person would do that? And it couldn’t be changed: he couldn’t undo it, he couldn’t apologize, he couldn’t make it better or make it go away. Todd would almost certainly never find out, but Calder would know. He’d know for the rest of his life.
More whisky. A big gulp that hurt his raw throat. That pain was good.
It was that act, sleeping with Kim, that had undermined his defences, made him less able to cope with what had happened to Anne.
He wished he had someone to talk to about it. Sandy. Kim. Anne. None of those would do. He had grown away from his old friends in the City and although he had made some new friends in Norfolk, none was close enough for him to fall apart on. He missed his mother. She would be, what, sixty-four by now, if she had survived. She would be there for him, for Annie and him.
He struck the sand with his fist. But of course his mother had died, hadn’t she? Died because he had missed the bus from school and she had driven too fast along country lanes to pick him up, and met a farm worker driving too fast the other way. He had picked over his role in that tragedy so many times in the past, surely he didn’t need to do it again. Not now.
But that was the point. He had this image of himself as a tough guy, someone who could take difficult decisions quickly, who could take risks and win, who was in control of his own destiny. But that wasn’t him at all; he was a reckless idiot who ruined the lives of the people around him.
His father would be coming tomorrow. Of all the people he could conceivably speak to to try to straighten himself out, his father was bottom of the list. Since his mother had died the relationship between father and son had frozen over. The doctor never missed an opportunity to criticize his son’s choices, be it on what to study at which university, his activities in the City, or even his choice of girlfriends. Calder’s discovery that the old man was a compulsive gambler had hardly helped things. His father’s criticisms always stung, but tomorrow... tomorrow he wasn’t sure whether he could face them. In fact, he wasn’t sure whether he could face tomorrow at all.
More whisky. The pain was dulled now. The crabs were blurred. It took him several seconds to locate the sailing boat, now entering the creek.
At least the police would get Cornelius.
The key to the whole thing was Martha van Zyl’s death in 1988. Todd had been asking difficult questions about it and he had nearly been killed. Then Kim and Calder had started asking difficult questions and there had been an attempt to kill them. It was obvious who was behind these deaths: Cornelius, perhaps with some help from his weasel son Edwin. Calder knew very little about South Africa or South Africans, but he did know that it was a brutal country and that Afrikaners like Cornelius had been responsible for much of that brutality.
He smiled. He’d enjoy attending Cornelius’s trial.
Then a thought struck him. Would the police be able to bring a case against Cornelius? He was a wealthy, powerful, intelligent man, well capable of paying people to do his dirty work for him, professionals who would keep their distance from him and from their own handiwork. It would be tough for the police to gather the necessary proof to connect him to the two crimes. They would have to link the explosions to an unknown assassin, and the assassin to Cornelius or Edwin. The assassin could be anyone: an American, a South African, a London criminal. DI Banks looked clever, but she wasn’t that clever. The police would question Cornelius who would hire an excellent lawyer to advise him to say very little. Calder’s smile disappeared as he realized the man would walk free.
The anger welled up inside him. Here he was beating himself up for the injuries that had been done to Todd and Anne, when actually he knew who was responsible for them, and that man was going to get away with it. OK, he could hardly blame Cornelius for what he had done with Kim, that was something he was just going to have to live with, but everything else... that was down to Cornelius. And he, Alex Calder, was going to take the shit for it for the rest of his life. And not just him: Anne and William and Phoebe and Robbie and Todd and Kim.
More whisky.
The sun was drifting down towards the horizon. Tomorrow beckoned. A horrible day, the first of many vile, unimaginably ghastly days stretching into the future, days in which Calder could do nothing, days in which Cornelius plotted his takeovers and counted his millions. Calder couldn’t face tomorrow. He couldn’t face the inaction.
He hauled himself to his feet. Marsh and sea spun about him. He took an unsteady step forward and focused on the ridge above his house, willing it to stay in one place. He pulled out his mobile phone and called Alfie, the local one-man taxi firm, telling him to meet him at his cottage and take him to King’s Lynn station.
Calder bought two litres of bottled water in an attempt to sober himself up on the train. He also tried to keep himself awake, but it didn’t work. He remembered the train pulling out of Cambridge station and the next thing he knew it was jolting to a stop at King’s Cross.
He ignored the disapproving stares of his fellow passengers and staggered off the train on to the platform. It was dark now. He could feel a headache developing, and worse, his resolve weakening. He still had a small amount of whisky left in the Laphroaig bottle, which was wrapped in a plastic bag, but he lurched into a shop at the station and bought another half-bottle of White Horse. He found a quiet corner and took a swig. The whisky had its effect, warming him up to further action.
He made his way to the taxi rank and slowly and deliberately read out Cornelius’s address to the driver. It wasn’t far to Regent’s Park, and the driver let him out in front of a terrace of fine cream-stuccoed houses with imposing columns beside the doors. He squinted at the numbers, found the right house, and walked carefully up to the door. He blinked as a security light switched itself on, and rang the bell. A moment later, the door opened, and Cornelius stared at him in surprise.
‘Alex?’
‘Can I come in?’
‘All right.’ Cornelius stepped back and led Calder through the hall to a sitting room. ‘Is something wrong? Is it Todd? Or Kim?’
‘No,’ said Calder.
‘Do you want to sit down?’
‘No,’ said Calder again.
Cornelius looked at him suspiciously. ‘I can tell you’ve been drinking,’ he said.
‘My sister was blown up today.’
‘My God,’ said Cornelius. ‘I’m sorry. Was she...?’
‘She’s alive,’ Calder said. ‘But she’s lost her leg. Maybe both her legs.’
‘Christ, man. How awful. Sit down.’ Cornelius indicated a chair. Calder ignored him.
‘Aren’t you going to ask how it happened?’ Calder said.
‘Yes... yes. What on earth happened?’
‘Someone put a bomb in my car. They meant to blow me up. To stop me asking questions. About your wife.’