Hand in Glove (60 page)

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Land Rover into first gear. “I must go. When you see Charlotte, send her my regards.”

“I will. But I’m sure she’ll want to thank you in person.”

“What for? In the end, it was you who pulled it off. Pretty neatly, too.” One end of his mouth curled up in a concession to a smile. “Go home and make her happy, Derek. It’s good advice—for both of you.”

With that, and the faintest of farewell nods, he released the clutch and moved off towards the exit road.

Derek stood watching the Land Rover until it had vanished from sight. It was, he rather thought, the first time Frank had addressed him by his Christian name. If the purpose was to emphasize his parting piece of advice, it was hardly necessary. One reason for flying home was to see Charlotte as soon as possible. And he did not intend to do so simply in order to say goodbye.

What was Charlotte doing now? he wondered as he made his way back into the terminal building. Colin would have conveyed the good news to her long since. Perhaps they were sharing a celebratory drink.

Or perhaps not. Either way, he felt sure he would be able to persuade them to share one with him. There was, after all, a great deal to celebrate. For the first time in months, not a cloud was to be seen on any of their horizons.

“They’re not going to give up, are they?” said Spicer, as the doorbell rang for the fifth or sixth time. “Who the bloody hell is it?”

“I’ve no idea,” said Ursula. “I’m not expecting anybody.”

“Well, you’d better get rid of them. Stand up,
Miss
Ladram. Very slowly.”

With the gun still only an inch or so from her face, Charlotte rose from the sofa. She did not know what to say or do and could only obey dumbly. There had to be a way out, surely. The conviction was almost as strong as her fear. After all that had happened, it made no sense for her life to end like this, snuffed out in a moment of panic and stupidity. Yet why should it make sense? To expect it to was perhaps her greatest fallacy. And perhaps also her last.

“Walk ahead of us into the hall,” Spicer said to Ursula, stepping behind Charlotte and twisting back her left arm with his own while pressing the gun into the nape of her neck, where she could feel the barrel cold and hard against her skin. Ursula moved past them and a prod of the gun told Charlotte to follow. The door-bell rang yet again 428

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as they edged out of the lounge. “Open the damn thing! But only wide enough to tell whoever it is to sod off. Remember: try anything stupid and I’ll put a bullet through your sister-in-law’s head.”

Ursula hesitated momentarily, then started towards the door. A vague and bulky shape could be seen through the panel of frosted glass above the letter-box. There was no doubt in Charlotte’s mind who it was. But Ursula would not recognize him. Nor would Spicer—unless he identified himself. The door was fitted with a chain, but Ursula left it hanging where it was as she turned the handle and moved to block the narrow opening.

“Mrs Abberley?” Charlotte heard Colin say.

“Yes, but—”

“Where’s Charlotte?”

“She’s not here. And I don’t know who you are, but—”

“Colin Fairfax-Vane.”

“What?” Spicer’s grip on Charlotte’s arm tightened. He too had heard the name.

“Look, I know she’s with you. I saw her go in. Why don’t we stop playing games?”

“This isn’t a game. Please leave.”

“I’ve no intention of leaving.” Ursula tried to close the door, but without success. Colin’s weight was more than sufficient to prevent her. Then, as he pushed and she pulled, the handle slipped from her grasp and the door flew wide open, bouncing back against its stop.

“All I want to do is—” Colin’s lips froze as he barged past Ursula and looked down the hall.

“I’ve got a gun,” said Spicer. “And I’ll use it if I have to.” He was frightened. Charlotte could tell as much by the panting of his breath in her ear and the vice-like intensity of his hold on her arm. He was frightened because the odds had changed, because events were running out of his control, because there was too much for him to watch and consider.

“Who . . . Who are you?” asked Colin.

“He’s Brian Spicer,” said Ursula from close behind him. “The man who framed you for Beatrix’s murder.”

“What?” Colin’s frown of incredulity changed as Charlotte watched, disbelief hardening into anger. And Spicer too was watching, reading the same emotion in his face. In as many seconds as it had taken Ursula to speak, Charlotte’s frail hopes of a peaceful outcome

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had vanished. Why had Ursula done it? Why, unless she no longer cared what happened to anyone except herself ?

Just as this conclusion entered Charlotte’s mind, Ursula seized her chance. She pushed Colin hard between the shoulders. Caught off balance, he stumbled forward. As he did so, Spicer, clearly believing he was about to be charged, hurled Charlotte to his left and raised the gun. He fired as Charlotte fell. She heard the explosion somewhere above her as she struck the newel-post at the foot of the stairs and crumpled to the floor. Then, as she twisted round to look, she saw Colin spinning back against the opposite wall, clutching at his side, grimacing with shock and pain. Ursula had ducked out through the doorway and vanished. But Spicer, who must have realized she was the only one of them likely to know where Maurice’s cash had been hidden, was making after her, running down the hall and swearing as he ran. Charlotte and Colin did not matter to him now. Only Ursula—and the money he had to believe she could still lead him to—figured in his thoughts.

As Spicer plunged out through the doorway, Charlotte scrambled to her feet and moved towards Colin, who had slid slowly down into a sitting position between the umbrella-stand and a console table, leaving a barometer swaying on its hook like a pendulum above him.

There was blood oozing between his fingers where he was clutching his left side, but he seemed almost to be laughing as he gazed blearily up at her.

“Hello, Charlotte. Are you all right?”

“Of course I am.” She crouched beside him, consumed by a desperate wish that he should not die. It would make a bitter waste of all their efforts—hers and Derek’s and Beatrix’s as well—if Colin should die now, victimized by the Abberleys to the very end. “Let me see the wound,” she said anxiously.

“No. Phone for an ambulance. Better . . . use of time. Where . . .

Where’s Spicer?”

“I don’t know, but—”

The wail of a siren cut across her thoughts. It was near by and drawing nearer by the second. Colin heard it too and frowned at her.

“You . . . You’ve already phoned?”

“No. I don’t understand.”

“Never mind.” His voice faltered as his concentration seemed to drift. “Listen . . . There’s something . . . I have to tell you . . .”

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But his words were swamped by an invasion of noise. There were two sirens now, both very close, each wail distorting and amplifying the other. Then there was a crunch of braking tyres on gravel, a slamming of doors, followed by a shout of “Put that down!” and other shouts Charlotte could not catch. A second later, Chief Inspector Golding burst through the doorway, panting hard.

“Miss Ladram! Are you all right?” Then he saw Colin and shouted over his shoulder: “Ambulance! Straightaway. One wounded.

Val! Come and do what you can.”

D.C. Finch hurried past him and knelt beside Colin, waving Charlotte aside. She stood up slowly and looked at Golding, aware there was much to say and ask but too battered and confused by the rush of events to do more than gape at him.

“It’s OK,” he said. “Spicer’s given himself up. We nearly ran him over in the drive. We moved in as soon as we heard the shot.”

“Moved in?”

“We’ve been tailing you since we let you go this morning to see if you’d contact the kidnappers. This isn’t at all what we anticipated.”

He nodded down at Colin. “Why was he with you?”

“He was just . . . trying to help. How is he?”

D.C. Finch glanced up at her. “Well, he isn’t losing too much blood, but . . .” She shrugged. “Don’t worry. The ambulance will be here soon.”

“Hurts like buggery,” mumbled Colin. “Not that . . .” He tried to grin. “Not that I speak from experience.”

“Miss Ladram,” said Golding. “What was Spicer doing here?”

She was about to reply when Ursula appeared in the doorway, smiling hesitantly, as if what she had done could be atoned for with a brisk apology and an ingratiating word. “Thank God you’re all right, Charlie,” she said softly.

“Ask
her
what Spicer wanted,” said Charlotte bleakly. “Ask
her
how she got the better of him.”

Golding frowned. “Mrs Abberley?”

Before Ursula could respond, an officer Charlotte recognized as Sergeant Barrett loomed up behind her. “Sir!” he exclaimed. “Important news from Divisional HQ.”

“What is it?” snapped Golding.

“Mrs Abberley’s daughter’s been released. She’s in the hands of the Spanish police—safe and well.”

C

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TWENTY-SEVEN

Colin Fairfax—whose additional surname the National Health Service declined to recognize—did not die of his wounds.

Unlike Tristram Abberley, he was destined to make a complete recovery. Indeed, after an initial twenty-four hours of alternate agony and oblivion, he quite enjoyed being a patient in Wycombe General Hospital. He realized he was over the worst as soon as he stopped regarding the nurses as mother substitutes and began indulging in sexual fantasies about them. From then on, he positively revelled in the celebrity status conferred on him by the dramatic circumstances of his admission and, but for the management’s puritan attitude towards drinking and smoking, could happily have contemplated a lengthy stay.

He decided at the outset to plead total ignorance where the events of 10 October were concerned, claiming to the police that he had driven Charlotte to Swans’ Meadow at her request and without the first idea what might be happening there or in Spain. When she and Derek told him the whole story, he was confirmed in his judgement.

The less of the truth the police knew the better. Not least because he was in sole possession of one vital fragment of it. Charlotte seemed to have forgotten his attempt to share it with her, which was understandable in view of all that she had on her mind. And now, as the future stretched out enticingly ahead of him, he began to think it might also be providential.

On the day Colin was discharged, Derek drove up from Tunbridge Wells to collect him and take him back to his flat above the Treasure Trove. An heroic effort on Charlotte’s part had rendered this almost homely in his absence. She was waiting to greet him with champagne and canapés, which he deemed an ideal way to inaugurate a convales-cence during which his surgeon had urged him to forgo alcohol.

It was clear to Colin from the popping of the first cork that Charlotte and Derek had more to celebrate than his recovery or, 432

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indeed, the formal dropping of all charges against him by the police.

Their faces glowed with conspiratorial happiness and, though they were too bashful to say as much, it was obvious that love had blossomed during his stay in hospital.

“So,” he innocently enquired halfway through his second glass,

“What are your plans?” Deliberately, he had failed to specify which of them he was addressing.

“Well,” Derek replied defensively, “they’re a bit up in the air, actually. As of the end of the month, I shall be joining the ranks of the unemployed.”

Colin choked. “You mean Fithyan & Co. have sacked you?”

“Not exactly. We’ve agreed on a parting of the ways.”

“You mean they’ve sacked you.”

Derek grimaced. “Chartered accountants don’t use such expressions. I was . . . allowed to resign at short notice. But don’t worry. With FCA after my name, I should be able to find somebody who wants my services.”

“But before he starts looking,” Charlotte interposed with a smile,

“we’re going on holiday. A few recuperative weeks in the sun.”

Noting but not remarking on her use of the collective pronoun, Colin said: “Splendid idea! No objections from the police, I trust?”

“I’m not being charged with anything, if that’s what you mean.

Sam’s safe return seems to have defused their wrath. And Golding’s given up asking questions. He knows we slipped something past him, but I don’t think he’s going to be allowed to spend any more time trying to find out what. The Spanish police are still investigating the matter, but Sam’s given them so little to go on I imagine they’ll soon lose interest.”

“And how is Sam?”

“Up and down. Ecstatic one minute, depressed the next. I told her as much as I could, but I’m not sure she can bring herself to believe the truth about her father. She’s taking it out on Ursula, I’m afraid—refusing to talk to her, excluding her from her life. She’s even staying with friends until she goes back to Nottingham. It’ll be a long time before she trusts her mother again—if she ever does.”

“You aren’t expecting me to sympathize with the wretched woman, are you?”

“Of course not.
I
certainly don’t. In fact, I haven’t spoken to her since . . . well, since you last spoke to her. And I don’t plan to. I’ve decided to forget about my family—what’s left of it—and concentrate

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on myself.” She glanced at Derek. “And on those who I can be sure won’t let me down.”

“A sound policy,” said Colin, holding out his glass for Derek to top up. “I should have done the same long ago.”

Charlotte smiled. “And what are your plans, Colin?”

“Mine? Oh, business as usual. Re-open the Treasure Trove ASAP.

Scout around for new stock. Then sell it all at a huge profit in the run-up to Christmas. Some hopes, eh?”

“Nothing else?”

“What else should there be?”

“Oh, I don’t know. It’s just . . . When the police arrived, that day at Swans’ Meadow, you were trying to tell me something. But you never finished and in the confusion I forgot to ask you what it was. I’ve been meaning to ever since.”

“Really?”

“Yes. It seemed to be something quite important.”

“I don’t remember.” Colin grabbed at a cocktail sausage by way of distraction. “If and when I do, I’ll be sure to let you know.” He grinned uneasily and cast around for a change of subject. “Where are you going on this holiday, then?”

“The Seychelles,” Derek replied.

“Perfect! And so appropriate for a pair of lovebirds.”

Charlotte arched her eyebrows. “Who said anything about lovebirds?”

“Nobody. But I heard their distinctive song among the branches.”

Derek laughed to cover his blushes. “Why so appropriate, may I ask?”

“Well, the Seychelles are home to the
coco de mer,
aren’t they?”

“The what?”

“Haven’t you heard of it? It’s a species of palm unique to the islands. The nut of the female tree is shaped exactly like . . . But you’ll find out for yourselves soon enough. Why should I spoil the fun? Just think of me sometimes, labouring away here, while you’re . . . Well, just think of me.”

“We will,” said Charlotte. “And when we come back—”

“You can tell me what date you’ve fixed for the wedding.”

By late afternoon, the party was over. Colin stood at the window, sipping at a last glass of champagne as he watched Charlotte and Derek 434