"We could have a pudding while we're here," said Mike, with the enthusiasm of the ill-fed, when he saw the sign.
"No way," I stated.
I led him through a stile in the dry-stone wall at the back of the car park, and paced out twenty-five steps along the wall side. "There it is," I told him, pointing at the white package, still wedged between the stones where I had concealed it the night before. Mike fished it out, holding a corner between finger and thumb, and dropped it into a plastic bag.
"Fraid I handled it quite a bit," I confessed, then asked: "Any guesses what it is?"
"No, not yet, but it looks interesting. I'll have it analysed in the morning."
We drove down the hill in silence for a while. Eventually Mike said:
"How do you want us to play this, Charlie?"
I'd filled him in on the background on the way up. "Softly-softly, if possible. Somebody's out to nail me, so I'd like to keep it under wraps. Let them have to try again. If that stuff's self-raising flour there's no harm done. If it's something else, we've a problem."
"Thanks for the "we". I think we can both kiss goodbye to our night on the tiles. I'll go straight in with this, see if I can raise a friendly expert; and I don't want it hanging around me for too long.
You'd better get something down on paper: if we're keeping quiet we'd best cover our backs."
I'd been looking forward to seeing Kim again, but never mind it gave me an excuse to call her sometime in the future. I set to work on the word processor in the spare bedroom-cum-office and put down for posterity the events subsequent to the mysterious phone call. Then, because I felt wide awake, I typed out the story of my trip to ABC House, and the visitation of Chief Constable Hilditch. I ran off three copies and sealed them in separate envelopes.
Seven a.m. the phone rang. It was Mike Freer. I'd forgotten that the Drug Squad are night owls. He sounded agitated. "It's heroin. I had half a gram analysed. The Professor said it's the purest he's ever seen."
"So where does that leave us?"
"Easy on the "us", Super Sleuth. It leaves you with half a kilogram of Bogota's best; street value about two hundred thousand quid."
"Jesus! I'll take it. Where is it now?"
"It's sealed in a jiffy bag with my name on it and in our safe. It should be okay there. Trouble is, your story is that it was planted on you to incriminate you; our story, if we tell it, is that it's the biggest individual haul we've ever had. Over the top's hardly the word."
"You mean nobody would believe me."
"Somebody decided to make you a rich man, because they had a grudge against you? Would you believe it?"
"No. They must be swimming in the stuff, whoever they are."
"And they're clever. What's your next move?"
"I've written three reports," I told him. "I'll lodge one with Gilbert Wood this morning. Hopefully that will keep us in the clear. I don't want to go public yet, if that's okay with you. Somebody's invested a lot in me, let's see what their next move is."
"Anything you say, Sheepshagger. Are you sending me a copy?"
"In the post this morning. Thanks for your help, Mike, I appreciate it."
"No problem. Meanwhile, we'll have a look for your Parker friend. Who knows, you could qualify for a transfer to the Drug Squad yet."
As soon as the morning's formalities were over I collared Gilbert Wood in his office. I asked him to sign and date one of the envelopes across the flap, and gave it to him for safekeeping. Next, when he was sitting comfortably, cup of decaffeinated in hand, I told him the full story.
Gilbert looked grave and thoughtful. "Jesus Christ, Charlie, you've poked a gorilla in the arse with a sharp stick this time. When do you get your twenty-six and a half years in? Is it before me?"
"We don't qualify for good behaviour or ill-health, Gilbert, we're both full-termers."
"I'm working on it. We've probably enough to bring Cakebread in and spin his premises. It's not very satisfactory, though, and we'd not root out the Force connection. Let's just clarify what we've got so far."
Gilbert pulled an easel out of the corner of his office, with a large flip-chart on it. The first pen he tried didn't work. He put it back on the ledge and selected one that did. He wrote:
TRUSCOTT DID SOME PAINTINGS Then he added:
CAKE BREAD (ABC) MOVED THE PAINTINGS "Hilditch knows Cakebread," I suggested. Gilbert wrote:
CHIEF CONST. FRIENDS WITH CAKE BREAD
"What next?" he asked.
"Why do you save the pens that don't work? Why not sling them in the bin?"
"It might start working again. What next?"
"CC knows Charlie's on his tail," I told him. He put:
CHIEF CONST. FINDS OUT CP IS SUSPICIOUS
I wasn't happy about the ambiguity, but I let it go. In a sudden burst of inspiration Gilbert added:
DRUGS PLANTED ON CP WERE THE PAINTINGS SWITCHED? IS TRUSCOTT DEAD?
We stood back and admired his handiwork. Gilbert selected a different-coloured pen and drew arrows on the chart. "We've established links there, there and there," he said, indicating the top four lines, 'but we've nothing to show that the drugs are part of the same scam. They might be totally unrelated. I hate to be the one to tell you this, Charlie, but there's other people around who don't like you."
"Mmm, I know, that's what I've been thinking. Heroin is a highly marketable commodity, though. Which is easier to get rid of: three paintings or fifty million quid's worth of smack?"
"You mean they stole the paintings and traded them for the drugs."
"That's the theory," I stated, 'except that maybe they didn't steal the paintings. Maybe they just traded the forgeries."
"Jesus Christ, no wonder Truscott sounded scared when you talked to him. Drug barons are not the people to meddle with."
I gazed at Gilbert with my brow furrowed and a deadpan expression on my face, trying hard not to smile. "Gilbert," I said, 'do you have to keep using our Saviour's name as an expletive? Some people might find it offensive. In fact, I believe I do. Why can't you just use plain old Anglo-Saxon like everybody else?"
"Oh no!" He put his hands to his head in exasperation. "Don't tell me: my DI's found God!"
"No I haven't!" I declared.
"Then it's a woman," he stated triumphantly, stabbing a forefinger at me. "You've found a woman and she's found God."
"Rubbish. Anyway there's something else to add to the chart."
"You're blushing! I've never seen you blush before."
"No I'm not. Truscott "Yes you are. Hey! It's the lady in the video, isn't it? She looked all right, definitely too good for you. What about Truscott?"
I was relieved to get back to business. I had a feeling that I'd lost that little skirmish. "The conversation I had with him at Beamish," I began. "I've been over and over it in my mind, and I'm certain he said that the Picasso was damaged and he didn't think it had been switched.
He pretended he didn't know, as if the pictures had passed on from him.
But then he bequeaths me the Picasso, real or forged, in his will."
Gilbert thought about it. "Which proves what?" he asked.
"Just that Truscott is a liar," I stated. "He knew all along where the Picasso was. He had it himself."
TRUSCOTT IS A LIAR
Gilbert added to the chart.
"And there's another thing you ought to know," I said.
"Too late, the sheet's full." He pulled it off the pad and started to tear it into shreds which fell into his bin.
"Cakebread's just flown off on his hols in his own plane."