‘Herrin?’ Her mother sounded weary, too old for a woman who hadn’t yet reached retirement. Perhaps it was the line, which hissed and clicked like a shortwave radio. Ellie would have to get the phone company to look at it next time she visited. ‘Like the bird?’
Ellie spelled it out. ‘I think he might have known Dad.’
‘Ah …’ A sigh, like a willow rustling in the wind. For as long as Ellie could remember, a distance had entered her mother’s voice whenever the subject of her father came up. ‘Nye had so many friends. I didn’t know them well, you know. Things were different then.’
Ellie drew a deep breath. ‘When Dad … died … it was just a car accident, wasn’t it? No one thought there was anything suspicious.’
A long pause.
‘It was a long time ago.’ She closed the door, gentle but absolute. ‘When are you coming home, Eleanor?’
‘Soon,’ Ellie promised, ashamed. ‘Work keeps me so busy. But I’ll be there for Christmas.’
‘And Douglas?’
‘He’s fine.’
‘Will he come for Christmas too?’
Ellie bit her lip. ‘I don’t know.’
‘It would be nice. You make such a lovely couple together.’
When she’d hung up, Ellie logged on to the bank’s main system and looked up the account for the Spenser Foundation. She remembered the name from the cheque they’d sent when she won the essay competition: she’d wasted half an afternoon enjoying the sheer possession of it, touching the stiff paper that spoke of wealth, admiring the bank’s crest stamped in the corner. The first time she’d crossed paths with Monsalvat Bank. She’d even let herself imagine not depositing it — keeping it as a trophy. But in the end, five hundred pounds was five hundred pounds.
The account information appeared on-screen. Ellie stared.
In the entire history of the Spenser Foundation, there had only ever been two transactions. In March of last year, five hundred pounds had been transferred in electronically. Two months later, it had been withdrawn in the form of a cheque — made out, though the system didn’t record it, to Ellie Stanton. Nobody had touched the account since then.
So where did the money come from? She could see from the prefix it was another Monsalvat account. She clicked to get its details.
Legrande Holdings. This account was much busier, a steady stream of comings and goings. But while the money travelled out in all directions, it seemed to come from one principal source. Saint-Lazare Investments (UK) Ltd.
Her pulse was racing, though there was nothing wrong about what she was doing. She clicked to view the Saint-Lazare account.
ACCESS DENIED
Ellie tasted cigar smoke in her mouth and looked up. Blanchard was leaning against the door, watching her with his usual inscrutable expression. How long had he been there?
‘I didn’t hear you knock.’ Trying to be casual, she brushed the computer’s trackpad to close the open window.
‘You were concentrating very hard. I did not want to disturb.’
‘I’m just tired.’
For a moment, she imagined telling him everything — Harry, Brussels, John Herrin. All she wanted was for Blanchard to wrap his arms around her and reassure her. Harry was a fantasist, a lunatic worming his way into the gilded life she’d been given.
But there was just enough in his story to give her pause. Not the bald facts, which were unbelievable, but the spaces around them. Her mother’s silence when she mentioned John Herrin. The Spenser foundation’s accounts. A sense of ACCESS DENIED, secrets she wasn’t privy to.
You don’t say anything to Blanchard without being sure of your ground.
Ellie’s face had pinched in thought. Blanchard read it as tiredness. ‘Perhaps you need to rest. I was going to ask if you wished to join me for dinner tonight. There will be clients there,’ he added apologetically, ‘but they are quite civilised.’
Once again, his frank stare seemed to look right through her, as if he could see her heart somersaulting inside her chest. She knew she shouldn’t. She’d spent three weeks in Brussels persuading herself that it had been an aberration, a one-off mistake she could redeem by forgetting it. But Blanchard aroused a hunger in her, an animal instinct that dislodged all right and reason.
‘I’d love to.’
And even as she said it, she knew she would go to her flat beforehand and put some clean clothes and bathroom things in her bag. Just in case.
Footsteps in the corridor released her from Blanchard’s stare. Destrier’s thick frame filled the doorway. He shot Ellie a furious look that made her wonder what she’d done.
‘Got a minute?’ he asked Blanchard.
‘They’ve got to her.’
Destrier paced his office. He was angry and sweating, though the air conditioners kept the room at a steady twenty degrees and the monitors bathed the room in a cool soothing blue. ‘She tried to access the Saint-Lazare account.’
‘So? She knows she’s working on a deal for them.’
‘Look at the history.’ Destrier pointed to the screen. ‘Spenser Foundation, Legrande Holdings, Saint-Lazare. She’s following the money. She’s also just called her mother, which she hardly ever does, and started asking some odd questions.’
He pressed a button. Ellie’s voice filled the room through the recessed speakers, as real as if she were standing beside them.
‘When Dad … died … it was just a car accident, wasn’t it? No one thought there was anything suspicious.’
‘Now where would she have got an idea like that?’
‘You’re supposed to be able to tell me,’ said Blanchard acidly.
‘Well, we can both guess who it was. How and when, I don’t have a fucking clue.’
‘I told you to watch her.’
‘You also told me to keep a light footprint and not let her get suspicious. She’s a smart girclass="underline" she’ll notice if we go in too hard. One of my chaps already thinks she might have made him in the art gallery in Brussels.’
Destrier thought for a moment.
‘We can fix her phone. There’s a toy we can install that turns it into a microphone, broadcasts even when she thinks it’s off. Kills the battery quick, though, which she’ll notice. Might miss some important calls.’
Blanchard nodded. ‘Do it. If she stops for five minutes, if she is not in her office or the apartment and you do not have sight of her, turn it on.’
‘Even at night?’ Destrier gave him a sly leer, which Blanchard affected not to notice.
‘Especially at night.’
‘She still hasn’t told the boyfriend, in case you’re wondering,’ Destrier called after him.
She almost pleaded ill and called it off. Even though it was his birthday, arranged for weeks, she almost persuaded herself it would be kinder on him not to go. But that would be unforgivable cowardice. Her only consolation in the whole affair had been that Doug didn’t know how badly she’d betrayed him. To do something to hurt him, however minor, was more than her conscience could bear. So she went.
In the second week of December, Oxford became a ghost town. The students left, taking their noise and confidence and sense of ownership; in their wake came the hopefuls, interview candidates hoping one day it might belong to them. Desperate for companionship in their solitary ordeal, they clustered together and roamed the streets in groups twenty or thirty strong. Five years earlier that had been Ellie. She scanned the faces as she passed them and wondered what would become of them.
Doug could tell that something was wrong. She kept on catching him giving her anxious looks. He asked ten times if she was feeling OK; each time Ellie gritted a smile and said fine, just working too hard. Eventually he took the hint and stopped asking, but she could see the concern on his face. Every time he opened his mouth, even to clear his throat, she had to stifle her terror. Is there someone else? Are you cheating on me? But he never asked.