Alex opened the boot and put their bags in, laying his leather jacket on top. ‘Okay,’ he said, slamming the lid down. ‘Let’s get going.’
‘And let’s hope to God that we’re right about Sapphire being there,’ Kingston rejoined, getting in the car.
‘Don’t say that, Lawrence.’
‘She’s there all right, Alex. I’m certain of it,’ he said.
Alex got into the Alfa and started the engine. He waited while Kingston groped for the seat belt and struggled to get comfortable in the cramped quarters. Breathing heavily, Kingston finally managed to snap the buckle closed. ‘Just as bloody well I’m not claustrophobic,’ he grunted. ‘Driving my TR4’s like being in a Roller compared to this Italian sardine tin.’
Alex ignored the remark and concentrated on negotiating the narrow winding lanes out of Steeple Tarrant. Soon they were humming along the A345 to hook up with the motorway.
More for idle conversation than anything else, Alex speculated about what would happen to the rose, once it was all over. Kingston, from the beginning, had been committed to the idea of the rose being handed over for research. He was steadfast and vociferous on the matter. Launching into one of his endless discourses, he reminded Alex that plants of all kinds, even toxic ones, were playing an ever larger role in treating various diseases and infirmities. ‘Digitoxin, used medicinally to treat heart arrhythmias and congestive heart failure, is extracted from the foxglove plant,’ he said. ‘Feverfew, the pretty, miniature, daisy-like plant, helps relieve migraines, arthritic pains and nausea; and Taxus baccata, the English yew, yields taxol, a promising chemical in the fight against cancer.’ Kingston chuckled. ‘It would certainly be ironic if the blue rose, deadly as it is, were to yield a miracle drug.’
‘Considering all the other bizarre circumstances surrounding Sapphire,’ Alex said, ‘I wouldn’t be the least surprised if it did.’
‘One way or another, Alex, we have to make sure that whatever happens to the rose – regardless of who ends up owning it – it is made available for research.’
‘You might have a job persuading Wolff.’
‘I know.’ He waited for a moment until they had passed a long ten-wheeled lorry, then continued. ‘It’s a fitting paradox that a great number of plants that can take lives are also capable of saving lives. Alex, I have a compelling belief about this rose. Beyond its colour and toxicity, I’m convinced that it could hold the key to unlocking genetic information that botanists and biochemists have been trying to fathom for centuries.’
He gazed thoughtfully out of the window for a while, then turned and looked at Alex, smiling. ‘There’s another plant I forgot about, Alex. Good old henbane, Hyoscyamus niger. It’s used for a sedative and sometimes as an analgesic – effective in treating Parkinson’s disease. Quite deadly, though,’ he chuckled. ‘Want proof? In the early nineteen-hundreds Dr Crippen used it to kill his wife.’
‘Charming.’
‘Interesting case. He was arrested aboard ship. First time a criminal had ever been apprehended using radio air-waves. Scotland Yard was tipped off by the ship’s captain, whose suspicions were aroused when he saw two men kissing.’
‘Really!’
‘Turned out one of them was Crippen’s mistress, disguised as a man.’
‘You making all this up?’
‘No, old chap. Ethel, I think her name was.’
For a few miles they drove in silence, Kingston studying the map.
‘By the way, I didn’t tell you about my little ruse, did I?’ said Kingston, looking up from the map.
‘Ruse?’
‘Yes, I think you’ll like it,’ he said. ‘It’s quite ingenious.’
‘Lawrence, I’ve already got the jitters about this whole Compton’s thing. Suppose we get down there and find that Compton knows bugger all about the rose having been stolen – that there is no rose there. Why couldn’t we have just phoned him first?’
‘We’ve been through that, Alex. You don’t think for one minute that he’s going to admit to anything on the phone? It is stolen property you know. Anyway, about my idea.’
‘If this is one of your “creative ideas”, I’m not sure I want to hear it. This is not some kind of bloody commando operation! You don’t have camouflage outfits in that bag of yours, do you?’
Kingston looked mildly offended. ‘There’s no need to get stroppy, you know – it’s quite simple – a little devious perhaps, but not harmfully so. Here’s how it works…’
Chapter Twenty-three
The rose that lives its little hour is prized beyond the sculptured flower.
William Cullen Bryant
The loud slamming of a door woke Kate with a start. Shouting followed, voices raised in anger. An argument was going on downstairs. She slipped out of bed and groped her way around it, following the duvet, as her eyes adjusted to the darkness. Reaching the door, she placed an ear against the cold oak panel. She heard nothing. The argument must have ended. The only sound was the monotonous croaking of the frogs outside.
She was part way back towards the bed when she heard one of the men speak again. His voice was not quite loud enough for her to make out the words. She stood very still. In the past, if she had heard them at all, their voices were always muffled, impossible to understand. Tonight was different. They must be in the hallway. She tiptoed back to the door, placing her ear against it.
‘For Christ’s sake, shut up! I don’t want to hear any more about it.’ The voice was certainly American, though Kate detected an underlying accent. It sounded vaguely Italian.
‘I’ll give it a couple more days and I’m getting the fuck out of here.’
‘Tell that to Wolff.’ The Italian voice again.
A period of silence followed. Then she heard a creak on the staircase.
‘Where do you think you’re going?’
‘Jesus! Relax, Marcus. I was only going up to see how the little lady’s doing.’ His accent was very American, lazy-sounding, as if he could have been slightly drunk.
A shiver ran through her. She didn’t like the sound of it. ‘Get down here, you stupid son of a bitch,’ the man with the Italian accent shouted. He seemed to be the one in charge.
She pressed her ear even harder against the door. The stair creaked a couple more times. She hoped the other man was backing down and not coming up the stairs.
‘I decide who goes up there and when.’ His voice was angry and loud. ‘Me. Do you understand?’
If the other man answered, she didn’t hear it.
She thought they’d probably gone into one of the downstairs rooms when she heard them again.
‘How many fuckin’ times do we have to go over this, Billy? How many goddamned times do I have to repeat myself? All I know is that Ira has finally made a deal with this Sheppard guy. He’s not really–’ She couldn’t catch the next words. She figured that one of them was now in the hallway and the other was somewhere else because she was only hearing one side of the conversation.
‘Don’t keep asking me the same dumb question. I don’t fuckin’ know!’ He punched the words out. ‘They’re meeting at a place called Compton’s on Sunday. That’s all he told me. That’s all. He wants me to–’ She lost the end of the sentence.
A brief silence followed. Then the argument resumed, but less contentiously. It was now much harder to hear what they were saying. Kate could only pick up snatches of their conversation.
‘I don’t know, Ira didn’t say.’
Another silence.