First Horseman, The (13 page)

‘Sorry,’ said the man, putting his seatbelt on. ‘I didn’t mean to trespass.’

Stafford got a good look at his face. He had apologised for something he was planning to do but had not yet attempted. He stood back from the car to let it pull out and away. Was that blood on the driver’s shirt? He memorised the number plate. Lady Arabella had been right: the situation was fishy, very fishy indeed. How observant of her, how clever. And how negligent of himself not to have CCTV that could see on to the road at the perimeter. He huffed to himself and set off towards the gate.

There was a sudden eruption to his left and a horse crashed across the bank and down on to the road. Lady Arabella trotted over to him. ‘So, what do you think?’ she said, appearing slightly excited.

‘Up to no good,’ said Stafford. ‘No doubt about it.’

‘I’ll make sure the estate keeps a keen eye open,’ she said.

‘Much appreciated,’ said Stafford, sketching the faintest of bows.

‘I shall probably see you tomorrow,’ she said gaily, turning the horse around.

‘I hope so,’ said Stafford, knowing full well that he would be standing on the ha-ha apparently waiting for pigeons when she rode by.

It would be another wonderfully bitter moment. He retained the desires of a man in his prime but not the reach. Thirty years previously he would have made a play for her, but now, like a decrepit climber, he had to stand back and admire the magnificent prospect of the peak rather than risk humiliation and injury by attempting to conquer it.

He wondered why she indulged him by always riding by at the same time each day. She must be, as he was, a creature of habit, routine and discipline.

He allowed his head to drop as he walked to the gate.

Kate looked out of the window of the large salon. She could see Stafford trudging up the gravel drive, shotgun over his arm, looking like the master of the estate. The mansion was huge, empty and strangely friendly for an echoing and potentially scary old house. She had imagined that big houses like this would feel cold and haunted, like a vandalised mausoleum in an abandoned wood. Instead the massive building felt like a home that had been loved and filled with comfort. It would be a haven from which she was sure to be ejected as soon as Jim made contact with his butler. Then she would be adrift in the freezing seas of a dangerous world.

Was she wanted by the police?

Where could she go?

Home to her parents to face the music?

She had nowhere else to run to.

Was the maniac Renton looking for her?

She felt trapped by a series of binding problems, penned in by an infinity of awful outcomes.

She was tugging at her hair, she realised. She dropped her hands, then flicked away the strands she had broken or torn out and let out a little groan. If only she was smart enough to know what to do. If only she could fly above it all and see her whole predicament laid out in a simple diagram. If only she could just evaporate and reappear somewhere else at some other time.

‘Really?’ said Jim, as Stafford’s voice cut in and out, beamed across the international network. Kate had shown up at the house and was staying there. That was unexpected. Perhaps it meant that Jane would magically reappear in his life at the most impossibly awkward moment. He smiled at how ironic that would be.

He liked the idea that Kate had sought him out. She was his kind of girl. And he was as lonely as hell. ‘Of course,’ he said, in reply to Stafford’s enquiry as to whether she could stay.

The connection was frustratingly fractured and he was unsure whether the choppiness was creating the concern in Stafford’s voice or whether it was real.

‘Anything else I need to know?’ he asked.

‘No … stage.’

‘Say again?’

‘… stage.’

‘Say again,’ said Jim, looking out at the South Carolina forest.

‘Not at this stage.’

‘OK,’ said Jim, ‘over and out.’ He hung up. He gazed across the fawn leather back seat of the Lincoln Town Car to Cardini, who sat impassively, like a marble statue in a suit. ‘So tell me about your client McCloud,’ he said.

‘When the environment is right, I will be happy to do so, but it would not be appropriate in this car.’ Cardini looked at him gravely. ‘We should be at his compound in about another hour, inside what is allegedly the largest private home constructed in America in the last fifty years. It is a house of truly palatial proportions. Even the kings of France would have approved.’ He went on reflectively, ‘Though it must be said that modern methods render the construction of titanic buildings a modest challenge. No more are giant structures works of genius, like the European cathedrals or the monuments of the ancients.’

‘How big is his place?’ asked Jim, scratching his head.

‘Big enough for a small army,’ said Cardini. ‘Perhaps even a large one.’

The countryside was impressive to a British guy. There were no fields or villages or towns. Instead there were miles and miles of forest. It had been burnt down by the early settlers, who had washed the ashes for potash, then shipped back the extract of a whole ecosystem to Britain as fertiliser. Just as they had killed the buffalo for its skin and the birds for a few feathers, they had murdered the virgin abundance of America for a fraction of the whole.

The land had been farmed until the pillaged soil could no longer support agriculture. Then, abandoned, the forest had returned and reclaimed it. In a few hundred years all that outrage and turmoil had come and gone and left no trace.

The Town Car slowed and pulled off the highway. After about half a mile they arrived at a gatehouse. A guard came to the driver’s window and the driver signed a form. The guard glanced into the car and returned to his gatehouse. The barrier in front of the vehicle dropped into a hole in the road and the gate with its hinged fence swung up. The car drove forward and up a hill. Jim looked around, expecting to see a large house at any second, but as they went over the brow there was nothing except another hill, covered with trees.

‘You may wish to sit back,’ said Cardini. ‘We have several miles to go yet. The McCloud compound is on a quarter of a million acres.’

‘I don’t do acres,’ said Jim. ‘How big is that?’

‘Four hundred square miles.’

Jim sat back as instructed. ‘Huge.’

Cardini nodded. ‘Much of it is mountain. No use for anything except hunting.’

They passed up a steep rise.

‘You’ll see the house when we come over this ridge.’

Jim sat forward.

The nose of the car dropped and the car turned around a curve that looked down into a broad valley. Jim’s jaw dropped. ‘That’s not a house. It’s like a Vegas casino without the flashing signs.’

Below was a massive pink building, part modern glass holiday resort and part fantasy cartoon fortress. It was built in the shape of a triangle, like a big hotel, and at the end of each spur there was a pink Disneyesque castle. It looked like a collaboration between a futuristic architect and a three-year-old with a pack of crayons.

Jim was grinning. ‘What the fuck?’

‘What indeed?’ said Cardini. ‘Only great wealth can create such true art.’ A crooked smile crept over his lips.

Jim strained to see more of the building as the car swept around the bend and the trees quickly obscured the view. ‘Why is it pink?’

‘Ah,’ said Cardini. ‘That would be because it was McCloud’s late wife’s favourite colour.’

‘Right,’ said Jim. ‘Why not?’ He laughed. ‘I’ll look it up on the net when I get back.’

‘I’m afraid you won’t be able to,’ said Cardini. ‘McCloud made his money from satellites and, oddly enough, there are no pictures of this area on any public satellite images.’

‘Impressive,’ said Jim. ‘I wouldn’t want anyone to see it if it was mine either.’ He sat back again, wondering whether all his money would drive him bonkers one day too.

Renton sat in his office, deep in thought. He felt weak and ill. He had thought the wound below his chest was trivial, but now he could tell he had sustained more than a flesh wound. He had taken off his shirt and put on a clean white lab coat to cover himself.

He cast his eye over the glass vial on his desk top. Just two-thirds of the contents remained.

He would put a drop of the serum on his tongue, then read the work of great mathematicians. Under the influence of just a tiny drop, the meaning of obscure works unfurled in his mind. What was impenetrable to him in normal circumstances was suddenly revealed. Ideas that seemed isolated in their relevance seemed joined together in a tapestry of revelation. He saved these moments for special times and rationed the priceless elixir with which Cardini had bought his undying devotion.

Now he would resort to the serum to repair his wound. He peeled off the plaster, lips pursed against the pain of the adhesive tearing out his body hair. There was a congealed scab, a bruise around the wound and an ugly swelling that was growing steadily.

He had to get the samples back. The girl was irrelevant. The samples were everything.

He took the hypodermic and filled it with half of the vial’s contents. He injected the wound with half of the measure and the rest into a vein in his forearm. He felt the warmth rush through his body immediately and a sudden exhilaration in his mind. He would allow himself an hour for healing, then set off again to the house where the girl had taken the samples.

He picked up his copy of Godel’s
On Formally Undecidable Propositions of Principia Mathematica and Related Systems
and set the slideshow of his favourite pictures running on his twenty-eight-inch monitor.

The face of a man whose brains had been ejected by a large-calibre bullet through the side of his skull filled the screen. Renton smiled to himself and opened the book.

Kate looked at the long table, laid at the end just for her. ‘Can I eat somewhere less formal?’ she asked sheepishly.

‘Where would you like to be?’ said Stafford.

‘The kitchen?’

‘The kitchen,’ said Stafford, not quite as a question but as if eating in there would provide him with some logistical problem. ‘Of course,’ he said, after the shortest of pauses. Jim often had dinner in the kitchen. He smiled. ‘Come along then. It’s downstairs.’

The kitchen was a large red-brick cavern furnished with the latest equipment. A giant table in light wood stood in the centre. It was clearly the focus for the preparation of giant meals, and its surfaces carried the scars of many years’ service. Behind it was a huge Aga, in scale with the table. It, too, looked as if it had been specified to cook in bulk.

Stafford pulled out one of the chairs and offered it to Kate. She sat down. ‘Would you care for a glass of wine?’ he asked.

‘Thank you.’

‘Red or white?’ he queried.

‘White, please,’ she replied.

‘I have a nice Pouilly-Fuissé,’ said Stafford.

‘Lovely,’ she said, not knowing what kind of wine it was. ‘Did you speak to Jim?’ she dared to ask.

‘Yes,’ said Stafford, stripping the lead foil from the bottle. ‘He sends his regards.’

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Great.’

He twisted in the corkscrew. ‘He didn’t say when he’d be back. It might be a few days.’

‘I don’t mind waiting,’ she said, ‘if that’s OK.’

The cork came out with a sharp pop. ‘Of course,’ said Stafford. ‘I’m sure that will be fine.’ He sniffed the cork, then poured the glass and brought it to her.

‘Aren’t you having one?’ she asked.

‘Perhaps when I retire,’ he said, ‘if there’s any left.’

‘I won’t drink a whole bottle,’ she said, laughing.

‘Very good,’ he said. ‘Would you care for a starter?’

The entrance to McCloud’s house was like the reception area of a large office complex. It was a white marble space accessed by two revolving doors. A party of three, two security men and a tall, thin, sandy-haired man of about thirty, was waiting for them.

‘Professor,’ the young man greeted him, throwing a concerned look at Jim. ‘We’ve been waiting keenly. Who is this?’ There was a hint of disapproval in his tone.

‘My assistant, Dr Jim Evans.’

‘We weren’t anticipating another guest.’

‘My apologies,’ boomed Cardini, ‘but you gave me insufficient notice to inform you.’

‘This is not within the protocol,’ the man said, his voice rising in pitch as he cast another glance at Jim.

Jim stared back at him steadily.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Cardini. ‘You must clear it with Mr McCloud or we shall leave.’

‘Mr McCloud is in no condition to clear anything,’ the sandy-haired guy said sharply, bristling with annoyance.

‘Then,’ said Cardini, straightening to his full height, ‘we shall leave.’

The man seemed to sag. He shook himself. ‘No, no,’ he said, as if the idea was silly. He stepped forward quickly to offer Jim his hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, of course, Dr Evans. I’m Joe Marius.’

Jim shook his hand and Marius stepped back.

‘Come, Professor,’ he said, pouting at Cardini. ‘Let’s lose no more time. Mr McCloud is in sore need of your attention.’

‘Lead on,’ replied Cardini.

Marius spun on his heels and strode ahead in fast staccato steps, the click of his soles sharp on the marble surface.

There was a picture of water-lilies on the wall. Jim wondered whether it was a real Monet or a fake; he couldn’t tell. He’d only be able to judge if there was a price tag on it. If the first number was trailed by seven zeros it would be genuine – or, at least, sold as such. Artworks, he had learnt, were the most valuable objects by weight in the world. A few pounds of Impressionist made the equivalent in gold seem pretty worthless.

Jim had thought about buying some Van Goghs after seeing the old movie with Kirk Douglas. All the experts had assured him of his great taste, but when he discovered that Van Gogh had painted a thousand pictures in ten years he was left wondering how the hell a crazy, poverty-stricken drunk could have made a fantastic picture every three days for a decade. It seemed unlikely that a sane hard-working artist could have made two masterpieces a week so he concluded that many, perhaps most, of the thousand paintings must be fake. Jim lined up dozens of them on his computer screen, courtesy of Google images, and it seemed to him that, from the styles, at least three painters had been involved. However, none of the experts who fawned over him seemed to see that so he had dropped the idea of becoming an art collector.