False Impression (14 page)

The eighteen-wheeler
drew up beside her. She slowed down, he slowed down; quarter of a mile to the
turn-off, the next sign declared. She saw the exit in the distance, grateful
for the first shafts of the morning sun appearing through the clouds, as none
of her lights were now working.

Anna knew that
she would only have one chance and her timing had to be perfect. She gripped
the steering wheel firmly as she reached the exit for the 1-90 and drove on
past the green triangle of grass that divided the two highways. She suddenly
jammed her foot back down on the accelerator, and although the van didn’t leap
forward, it spurted and managed to gain a few yards. Was it enough? The truck
driver responded immediately and also began to accelerate. He was only a car’s
length away when Anna suddenly swung the steering wheel to the right and
carried on across the middle and inside lanes, before mounting the grass verge.
The van bounced across the uneven triangle of grass and onto the far exit lane.
A car travelling down the inside lane had to swerve onto the hard shoulder to
avoid hitting her, while another shot past on the outside. As Anna steadied the
van on the inside lane, she looked across to see the eighteen-wheeler heading
on down the highway and out of sight.

She slowed down to
fifty, although her heart was still beating at three times that speed. She
tried to relax. As with all athletes, it is speed of recovery that matters. As
she swung onto the 1-90, she glanced in her wing mirror. Her heartbeat
immediately returned to 150 when she saw a second eighteen-wheeler bearing down
on her.

Pot-belly’s
buddy hadn’t made the same mistake.

A
s the stranger
entered the lobby, Sam looked up from behind his desk. When you’re a doorman,
you have to make instant decisions about people. Do they fall in the category
of ‘Good morning, sir’ or ‘Can I help you?’ or simply ‘Hi’? Sam studied the
tall, middle-aged man who had just walked in. He was wearing a smart but
well-worn suit, the cloth a little shiny at the elbows, and his shirt cuffs were
slightly frayed. He wore a tie that Sam reckoned had been tied a thousand
times.

‘Good morning,’
Sam settled on.

‘Good morning,’
replied the man. ‘I’m from the Department of Immigration.’

That only made
Sam nervous. Although he’d been born in Harlem, he’d heard stories of people
being deported by mistake.

‘How can I help
you, sir?’ he asked.

‘I’m checking up
on those people who are still missing, presumed dead, following the terrorist
attack on Tuesday.’

‘Anyone in
particular?’ asked Sam, cautiously.

‘Yes,’ said the
man. He placed his briefcase on the counter, opened it and extracted a list of
names. He ran a finger down the list and came to a halt at the Ps. ‘Anna
Petrescu,’ he said. ‘This is the last known address we have for her.’

‘I haven’t seen
Anna since she left for work on Tuesday morning,’ said Sam, ‘though several
people have asked after her, and one of her friends came round that night and
took away some of her personal things.’

What did she
take?’

‘I don’t know,’
said Sam. ‘I just recognized the suitcase.’

‘Do you know the
girl’s name?’

Why do you want
to know?’

It might help if
we could get in touch with her. Anna’s mother is quite anxious.’

‘No, I don’t
know her name,’ admitted Sam.

Would you
recognize her, if I showed you a photograph?’

‘Might,’ said
Sam.

Once again, the
man opened his briefcase. This time he extracted a photo and passed it across
to Sam. He studied it for a moment.

‘Yes, that’s
her. Pretty girl,’ he paused, ‘but not as pretty as Anna. She was beautiful.’

As she swung
onto the 1-90, Anna noticed that the speed limit was seventy. She would have
been happy to break it, but however hard she pressed down on the accelerator
she could still only manage 68mph.

Although the
second truck was still some way behind, it was closing on her rapidly, and this
time she didn’t have an exit strategy.

She prayed for a
sign. The truck must have been only fifty yards behind her, and closing by the
second, when she heard the siren.

She was
delighted at the thought of being pulled over, and didn’t care whether she
would be believed when she explained why she had careered across two lanes of
the highway and onto the exit ramp, not to mention why her van was missing both
bumpers and a mudguard and that none of its lights were working.

She began to
slow down as the patrol car sped past the truck and slipped in behind her. The
officer looked back and indicated that the truck driver should pull over. Anna
watched in her offside mirror as both vehicles came to a halt on the hard
shoulder.

It was over an
hour before she was calm enough to stop looking in her wing mirror every few
minutes.

After another
hour she even began to feel hungry, and decided to pull into a roadside cafe
for breakfast. She parked the van, strolled in and took a seat at the far end of
the counter. She perused the menu before ordering ‘the big one’ – eggs, bacon,
sausage, hash browns, pancakes and coffee. Not her usual fare, but then not
much had been usual about the past forty-eight hours.

Between
mouthfuls, Anna checked her route map. The two drunken men who’d pursued her
had helped her keep to her schedule. Anna calculated that she had already
covered around three hundred and eighty miles, but there were still at least
another fifty to go to reach the Canadian border. She studied the map more
closely. Next stop, Niagara Falls, which she estimated would take her another
hour.

The television
behind the counter was reporting the early morning news. The hope of finding
any more survivors was fading.

New York had
begun mourning its dead and setting about the long and arduous task of clearing
up. A memorial service, attended by the President, was to be held in Washington
DC, as part of a national day of remembrance. The President then intended to
fly on to New York and visit Ground Zero. Mayor Giuliani was next to
appear
on the screen. He was wearing a T-shirt proudly
emblazoned with the letters NYPD, and a cap with NYFD printed across the peak.
He praised the spirit of New Yorkers, and pledged his determination to put the
city back on its feet as quickly as possible.

The news camera
cut to JFK, where an airport spokesman confirmed that the first commercial
flights would resume their normal schedule the following morning. That one
sentence determined Anna’s timetable. She knew she had to touch down in London
before Leapman took off from New York if she was to have any chance of
convincing Victoria... Anna glanced out of the window. Two trucks were pulling
into the parking lot. She froze, unable to watch as the drivers climbed out of
their cabs.

She was checking
the fire exit as they entered the cafe. They
both took
seats at the counter, smiled at the waitress and didn’t give her a second look.
She had never previously understood why people suffered from paranoia.

Anna checked her
watch: 7.55 am. She drained her coffee, left six dollars on the table and
walked across to the phone booth on the far side of the diner. She dialled a
212 number.

‘Good morning,
sir, my name is Agent Roberts.’

‘Morning, Agent
Roberts,’ replied Jack, leaning back in his chair, ‘have you anything to
report?’

‘I’m standing in
a vehicle rest stop, somewhere between New York and the Canadian border.’

‘And what are
you doing there, Agent Roberts?’

I’m holding a
bumper.’

‘Let me guess,’
said Jack, ‘the bumper was at one time attached to a white van, driven by the
suspect.’

‘Yes,
sir.’

‘And where is
the van now?’ asked Jack, trying not to sound exasperated.

‘I have no idea,
sir. When the suspect drove into the rest stop to take a break, I must admit,
sir, I also fell asleep. When I woke, the suspect’s van had left, leaving the
bumper with the GPS still attached.’

‘Then she’s
either very clever,’ said Jack, ‘or she’s been involved in an accident.’

1
agree
.’ He paused, and then added,
What
do you think I should do next, sir?’

‘Join the CIA,’
said Jack.

‘Hi, it’s
Vincent, any news?’

‘Yep, just as
you thought, Ruth Parish has the painting locked up in the secure customs area
at Heathrow.’

‘Then I’ll have
to unlock it,’ said Anna.

‘That might not
prove quite that easy,’ said Tina, ‘because Leapman flies out of JFK first
thing tomorrow morning to pick up the painting, so you’ve only got another
twenty-four hours before he joins you.’ She hesitated. ‘And you have another
problem.’

‘Another
problem?’ said Anna.

‘Leapman isn’t
convinced you’re dead.’

“What makes him
think that?’

‘He keeps asking
about you, so be especially careful. Never forget Fenston’s reaction when the
North Tower collapsed. He may have lost half a dozen staff, but his only
interest was the Monet in his office. Heaven knows what he’d do if he lost the
Van Gogh as well. Dead artists are more important to him than living people.’

Anna could feel
the beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead as the line went dead. She
checked her watch: 32 seconds.

‘Our “friend” at
JFK has confirmed we’ve been allocated a slot at seven twenty tomorrow
morning,’ Leapman said. ‘But I haven’t informed Tina.’

Why not?’ asked
Fenston.

‘Because the
doorman at Petrescu’s apartment block told me that someone looking like Tina
was seen leaving the building on Tuesday evening.’

‘Tuesday
evening?’ repeated Fenston. ‘But that would mean...’

‘And she was
carrying a suitcase.’

Fenston frowned,
but said nothing.

‘Do you want me
to do anything about it?’

‘What do you
have in mind?’ asked Fenston.

‘Bug the phone
in her apartment for a start. Then if Petrescu is in contact with her, we’ll
know exactly where she is and what she’s up to.’

Fenston didn’t
reply, which Leapman always took to mean yes.

Canadian Border
4 miles declared a sign on the side of the road.

Anna smiled – a
smile that was quickly removed when she swung round the next corner and came to
a halt behind a long line of vehicles that stretched as far as the eye could
see.

She stepped out
onto the road and began to stretch her tired limbs. Anna grimaced as she looked
across at what was left of her battered transport. How would she explain that
to the Happy Hire Company? She certainly didn’t need to part with any more cash
the first $500 of any damage, if she remembered correctly. While continuing to
stretch, she couldn’t help noticing that the other side of the road was empty;
no one seemed to be in a rush to enter the United States.

Anna progressed
only another hundred yards during the next twenty minutes, ending up opposite a
gas station. She made an instant decision – breaking another habit of a
lifetime. She swung the van across the road and onto the forecourt, drove past
the pumps and parked the van next to a tree – just behind a large sign
declaring Superior Car Wash. Anna retrieved her two bags from the back of the
van and started out on the four-mile trek to the border.

‘
I’m so sorry, my
dear,’ said Arnold Simpson as he looked across his desk at Arabella Wentworth.
‘Dreadful business,’ he added, dropping another sugar lump into his tea.
Arabella didn’t comment as Simpson leant forward and placed his hands on the
partners’ desk, as if about to offer up a prayer. He smiled benignly at his
client and was about to offer an opinion when Arabella opened the file on her
lap and said, ‘As our family’s solicitor, perhaps you can explain how my father
and Victoria managed to run up such massive debts, and in so short a period of
time?’

Simpson leaned
back and peered over his half-moon spectacles.

‘Your dear
father and I,’ he began, ‘had been close friends for over forty years. We were,
as I feel sure you are aware, at Eton together.’

Simpson paused
to touch his dark blue tie with the light blue stripe, which looked as if he’d
worn it every day since he’d left school.

‘My father
always described it as “at the same time”, rather than “together”,’ retorted
Arabella. ‘So perhaps you could now answer my question.’

‘I was just
coming to that,’ said Simpson, momentarily lost for words as he searched round
the scattered files that littered his desk. ‘Ah, yes,’ he declared eventually,
picking up one marked ‘Lloyd’s of London’. He opened the cover and adjusted his
spectacles.

When your father
became a name at Lloyd’s in 1971, he signed up for several syndicates, putting
up the estate as collateral.