Playing with Fire (19 page)

“What's the difference?” Banks asked.

“Wood pulp makes far inferior paper,” Phil replied. “It's weaker and discolors more easily.” He leaned forward and tapped the table. “But the point I'm trying to make is that if you want to forge an artist's work, you'd damn well better make sure you use the same materials he did.”

Banks took a sip of his Theakston's bitter. Phil was working on a half of XP, slowly, and Annie stuck with fruit juice. “Makes sense,” Banks said. “Go on. Where do you find that sort of thing?”

“Exactly the problem. There are several places he might look for the paper,” Phil went on, “and one of the best sources is an antiquarian book and print dealer. Not everything they sell is expensive, but a lot of it is old. The endpapers of old books are especially useful, for example, and books usually have a publication date to guide you as to the age of the paper you're using.”

“What about prints?” Banks asked. “I mean, wouldn't some old drawings be dated, too?”

“Yes, but that's not always reliable. They could easily be copies of etchings, made posthumously, in another country, even, and until you've developed a very good nose for the genuine article, you wouldn't want to slip up by believing what you read on an old print.”

“What about canvas?” Banks asked. “Aren't most paintings done on canvas?”

Here Phil allowed himself a slight smile, which Banks pounced on as not being entirely devoid of condescension. He was starting to like the man less and less moment by moment, and he was enjoying the feeling very much.

“Quite a lot are,” said Phil, “but the same applies as to paper, except you don't find canvas in books. You try to seek out old worthless canvases. Quite often what you find determines which artist you forge.”

“I see,” said Banks. “And you think Thomas McMahon was a forger?”

Phil glanced at Annie, a concerned expression flitting across his face.

“Phil only said that could be one possible explanation of McMahon's odd purchases from Whitaker's,” Annie said.

“Yes,” Phil added. “I'm not making any accusations or anything. I didn't even know the man.”

“Wouldn't matter if you did make accusations,” said Banks. “McMahon's dead. He can't sue you.”

“Even so…”

“The problem is,” Banks went on, “does any of this have anything to do with his murder, and if so, how? Shall we order lunch?”

Phil looked around. “Look, I know a cozy little place out Richmond way that serves the most tender roast lamb you've ever tasted in your life.” He looked at Annie. “And I hear they do a delicious vegetable curry, too. What say we head out there?”

 

Mark awoke the next day still very much alive, and he realized that he probably had the fleece-lined overcoat to thank for that. Even in his favorite leather jacket, he would have been too cold in the barn. He didn't know what time it was because he didn't have a watch, but it was daylight, and a hell of a lot warmer than it had been during the night.

He had slept surprisingly well, he thought, but exhaustion will do that for you. He must have run and walked well into the night. And it was the first real sleep he'd had since the fire. Rubbing his bleary eyes, he cast a look around at his surroundings, a half-demolished barn littered with rubble and sheep droppings. It stank of piss, too. Time to move on. He wished he could have a hot cup of tea and something to eat, some bacon and eggs, perhaps. He wouldn't get far on the ten quid in his pocket and a bit of loose change, but at least he could buy himself a couple of small meals. It would be nice
to find a proper toilet, too, somewhere he could wash his hands and face. If only he could find a café. Hardly likely in the sort of classy villages you got around this part of the world. No greasy spoons or lorry drivers' cafés.

It was nearly one o'clock, he saw by the church clock in the first village he came to. Christ, he hadn't realized he'd slept in
that
long. You could hardly call the place picturesque. This was one the tourists would drive straight through without even slowing down. There was one Tarmac main street of squat red brick houses with the red pantile roofs so common in East Yorkshire, a post office, general store and newsagent's.

The village was dead quiet, apart from some faint pop music coming from the shabby-looking local pub, the Farmer's Inn. There was a blackboard outside advertising bar food, and Mark noticed that he could get a ham-and-cheese sandwich for £2.99, or a roast beef lunch with Yorkshire pudding, vegetables and roast potatoes for £5.99. What should he do? Go carefully and save enough for another sandwich later, or blow nearly everything on a hearty lunch? Finally, he decided on the latter course, mostly because he was starving. He hadn't eaten since they kicked him out of jail.

Cautiously, he walked inside. It wasn't one of those places where all conversation stops and everyone looks at you when you walk in, as in that werewolf film he'd seen on the telly in the squat, but he still felt exposed in his ill-fitting clothes, no doubt with a twig or two stuck on the hem of his overcoat and a smear of sheep shit on his jeans. He just hoped he didn't smell too bad.

The pub was exactly the slightly down-at-heels local you'd expect in such a village, which was probably why the food was so cheap. It smelled of last night's beer and cigarette smoke and was mostly full of hard-looking unemployed farmhands, who wouldn't be squeamish about a bit of sheep shit here and there. The landlord was a surly bugger, but he
copied down Mark's order and gave him a number, only turning his nose up when Mark ordered a small lemonade to drink. He didn't want to waste his money on beer. With the change in his pocket, he now had a little over four pounds left, and that might buy him a roll and a cup of tea for dinner, if he could find anywhere serving such fare. He'd worry about tomorrow when it came.

He realized he'd have to do something about the money situation soon, and it might mean a bit of burglary. He didn't like it, but he'd done it before, and he'd do it again if he had to. It was the one thing Crazy Nick had taught him, when he had forced Mark to come out on jobs with him. There was hardly a house he couldn't get into. Mark would never beg, but he would thieve if necessary. At least thieving took guts, and you didn't look like you'd just given up and sat down with your hand sticking out permanently.

Mark had one cigarette left, he realized, courtesy of the copper who had given him the clothes. He decided to smoke it
after
his lunch. He sat in a deserted corner by the window and looked out through the greasy glass on the empty high street. People would be eating their roasts behind their dusty net curtains, perhaps watching football or racing, as Crazy Nick did when he came back from the pub. If his team lost he used to smack Mark around. Mark's mother, too, sometimes, though she was a tough old bird, and you could tell Crazy Nick had to be really pissed to have a go at her. As often as not, he came out the worse for wear.

The telly was on behind the bar in the pub, sound off, and Mark was just in time to catch the local news. A tart with a microphone was standing by a burned-out caravan dripping with water the fire hoses had sprayed on it. Was that what he had seen last night, when he was running from Lenny's place? Then the screen displayed a still photograph of a man Mark had never seen before. The tart talked on for a while as the cameras lovingly panned over the scene of desolation,
then the film cut to footage of the two boats. Mark felt his breath catch in his throat as he looked on his former home again, now in daylight, with men in protective clothing going over the scene.

There was another reporter by the canal side, a man, this time. His name was captioned at the bottom of the screen, but it was too small for Mark to read. He was wearing a heavy overcoat and a scarf wrapped around his neck. He talked and gestured as the others, police officers, Mark supposed, went about their work.

Next came an old picture of Tom in the next boat, the man they said was an artist. He was barely recognizable from the photograph, but it was definitely Tom.

And then came the picture that grabbed ahold of Mark's heart and squeezed. He'd never seen it before, but it was Tina, maybe taken two or three years ago, before they met. Her blond hair was long, over her shoulders, and it seemed to glow with health. She was smiling at the camera, but Mark could tell it was a bit forced. If you didn't know her well, though, didn't know that telltale clenching of the jaw and shadows behind her eyes, then you'd never know. Time hung suspended. He almost felt as if she could see him, was looking right at him, and he wanted to call out to her, tell her he was sorry he had failed her, sorry he hadn't been there for her.

When the picture vanished as quickly as it had appeared, and the program cut back to the reporter by the canal, Mark stood up so quickly he knocked his drink over and ran out into the street.

 

Banks bowed out of the excursion to the pub out Richmond way, allowing Annie to go with Phil, which was probably what she wanted anyway, ate a hurried roast pork lunch at the Queen's Arms alone and returned to the station. Because it was a Sunday, things were slow, especially as far as forensics
went, but a major investigation was under way, and Banks's Major Crimes core team was hard at work.

At this point, while each fire was being investigated separately for cause and motive, every possible effort was being made to find the link between them that everyone suspected was there. When Banks dropped by the incident room, Winsome was back entering the green sheets into the HOLMES computer system; DC Gavin Rickerd was making sure everything was in its place, neatly logged and filed; DC Kevin Templeton was chewing the end of a pencil as he tried to gather information on any similar fires; and DS Hatchley was pondering over the bits and pieces he had dug up on Mark David Siddons. The phones rang from time to time, computer keyboards clacked and fax machines hummed. Everything was ticking over nicely, but just ticking over. Of course, everyone was on overtime except Banks. A DCI didn't get paid overtime.

Banks hadn't been back in his own office more than a couple of minutes when Stefan Nowak tapped at the door. “A moment?”

Banks looked up. “Good news, I hope?”

“I don't know,” said Stefan, standing at the open door. “But there's something you might like to see, if you've got a minute or two to spare.”

Curious, Banks followed Stefan down the corridor into the “new” part of the building, which they called the annex. It was just as old, in fact, but it used to be a hotel before Eastvale expanded from divisional HQ into Western Area Headquarters and knocked through the walls. Now it housed fingerprints, photography, scenes-of-crime and computers, among other departments.

Stefan stopped at a lab bench. “I thought you might be interested in this,” he said, pointing to a blackened cube about the size of a computer monitor. “We retrieved it from the caravan. Looks as if it was hidden in one of the cupboards.”

“What is it?” Banks asked.

“Well, it looks to me like a fire-resistant safe,” said Stefan.

“A fire-resistant safe? What on earth is a bloke living on his wits in a dilapidated caravan doing with a fire-resistant safe?”

“You tell me,” said Stefan. “I only found it and identified it.”

“Can you open it?”

“It might take a bit of brute force.”

“Any reason to treat it gently?”

“No. We've already checked for prints. Nothing.”

“So let's do it.”

Stefan had already got his hands on a small crowbar—from the police garage, he told Banks—and he proceeded to wedge it in the lock area and exert pressure. Nothing happened. He looked up at Banks. “Any safecrackers down in the cells?”

“I wish,” said Banks. “Keep at it. Fire-resistant or not, the fire must have weakened the lock a bit, at least.”

Stefan kept at it. Still nothing happened. “I think we might have to dynamite it,” he said.

Banks laughed. “Let me have a go.”

Stefan handed him the crowbar and Banks shifted it to the side opposite the lock, where the deep-seated hinges were. It was hard to see exactly what he was doing because of the fire damage, but he thought he had succeeded in inserting the sharp flat end of the crowbar between the body of the safe and the hinged door. Gently at first, he worked the crowbar up and down and managed to get it in another few millimeters. Finally, the first hinge cracked and it was only a matter of time before he broke the second one, too.

“Fireproof, but not Banks-proof,” he said, pulling open the door. He reached into the dark interior. “Looks like something's there.”

“What is it?” Stefan asked.

Banks pulled out the safe's contents, wrapped in black plastic bin liner, and placed them on the lab bench. Both men
looked down in astonishment. On the table in front of them lay some rolled-up tubes of paper and three bundles of twenty-pound notes, fastened with rubber bands, probably five hundred quid or more in each of them. Banks unfolded the tubes and saw a number of sketches of a castle, and a finished watercolor painting, about eleven by sixteen, of a view along a valley from the castle terrace.

“That's Hornby Castle,” said Stefan.

“How do you know?”

He glanced sideways at Banks. “I've been there. I do a lot of walking. It's near Kirkby Lonsdale. And this”—he pointed to the watercolor—“is the view from the castle. That's Ingleborough, one of the Three Peaks. I've walked them.”

The Three Peaks walk was a popular one, but it had always seemed just that little bit too eccentric for Banks. Not to mention exhausting. You had to walk more than twenty miles in twelve hours, climbing three bloody great hills—Pen-y-Ghent, Whernside and Ingleborough—as often as not in the pouring rain.

Banks looked at the sketches and the watercolor again. They looked old. There was no signature, but it was obvious enough, even to Banks's untrained eye, that he was looking at the work of J.M.W. Turner, or a close facsimile.