Murder by Magic (14 page)

Skelgill
twitches his shoulders in a gesture of ambivalence.

‘The
local bobby said he’d seen him in Coniston – that’s five miles.’

DS
Leyton squints hopefully at the map on the wall above his boss.

‘It’s
near as dammit, Guv – same neck of the woods.’

DS
Jones clears her throat – since Skelgill’s underwhelming response to her
‘discovery’ she has remained silent, but now she appears to have gathered her
thoughts.

‘Given
what we know about William Thymer’s –’ (she hesitates, realising she is
restricted in what she can say in front of DS Leyton) ‘ –
superstitions
...
it would suggest he understood the purpose of the charm.’

She regards
Skelgill keenly, and then glances at DS Leyton; he has the look of one who
realises he is in the dark.  Skelgill decides to enlighten him – on
a limited basis, at least.

‘When
I found the tramp’s shelter – it was decked with branches of elder
– and there was a circle marked around it, called a pentagram –
these are supposed to ward off... spirits.’  He fishes behind him into a
jacket pocket and extracts the necklace, still in its polythene bag.  ‘So
is an amber charm, apparently.’

DS
Leyton’s pained expression suggests he would like to understand how his
superior has arrived at such wisdom – but that he knows it is not for him
to ask.  After a moment he grins amiably, and shifts his bulk with a
groan.

‘You
sure he wasn’t batty, Guv?  I mean, twenty-five years in the forest
– if you’d asked him he’d probably have told you Mrs Thatcher was still
prime minister.’

Skelgill
looks perplexed.

‘Is
she not?’

DS
Leyton seems relieved, and laughs at Skelgill’s jest – but now DS Jones
seems determined to keep the discussion on a more serious track.

‘Logically,
Guv – he could only have been given it, found it, or stolen it.’

Skelgill
is unmoved.

‘Charity
shop?’

Though
just plausible, this suggestion seems more designed to avoid jumping to one of
the other conclusions offered by DS Jones.  It is typical of Skelgill
– and frustrating for his subordinates – that he will resist linear
thinking at all costs – sometimes apparently flying in the face of
perfectly good reasoning.  At this moment he looks content to accept what
is a quite startling piece of new evidence – that there may have been
some interaction between Leonid Pavlenko and William Thymer – and then to
park it, so to speak.

However,
when the smug countenance of DI Smart insinuates itself between the jamb and
the door of his office, evidently preparing to deliver some bad news, Skelgill
casually rises from his seat, dispenses a curt, “Don’t go away” to his bemused
sergeants, and barges past his adversary without a greeting, apology or
farewell.

He
reappears about ten minutes later to find his subordinates have done his
bidding, and DI Smart gone.  Their glum and guilty expressions, however,
portend of an outcome they are each reluctant to impart.  Skelgill, on the
other hand, is strangely exuberant.  He dons his jacket and loads its pockets
with his essential accessories.

‘Right
Jones – let’s go.’

‘Go,
Guv – but DI Smart said –’

‘Smart’s
overruled.  I’ve just seen the Chief.  Come on.’

‘But...
where, Guv?’

‘You’re
going home – toothbrush, passport, overnight bag.’

DS
Jones rises; she holds out her arms in an appeal for more information.

Skelgill,
already at the door, turns back.

‘Manchester
airport – noon flight for Kiev – via Schiphol.’

Now DS
Leyton apes his female colleague’s pose.

‘What
about me, Guv?’

‘Leyton
– you’re giving me déjà vu – is it you that speaks Ukrainian, or
Jones?’

‘But,
Guv –’

‘Leyton
– I need you here – we’ll be back tomorrow night – in the
meantime email your Captain Shevchenko and tell him we’re coming to his meeting.’

‘There’s
a McDonald’s!’

‘Shouldn’t
we get checked in, Guv – in case there’s any problem with the reservation
– you know what Admin can be like?’

‘I’m
starving, Jones – those in-flight meals wouldn’t feed a hamster.’

‘There’ll
be plenty of cafés for a snack – our hotel’s near the city centre.’

Skelgill
sinks back reluctantly in his seat.  The taxi driver, surly and swarthy in
equal measure, shows no indication that he comprehends his hungry passenger’s
wishes.  The interior of the cab smells of stale cigarette smoke; the creamy
tan upholstery is creaky and cracked with age; and there are no rear
seatbelts.  Externally, the speed limit appears to be optional.  With
a hawk-like anxiety Skelgill has been watching passing sights en route from
Boryspil – unkempt farmland stretching flat to the horizon, the sudden
high-rise shock of Darnytsia Raion with its quarter-of-a-million inhabitants,
and the colossus Rodina-Mat, an Iron Lady of sorts, a severe stainless steel
amazon rising with sword and shield from the silvery Dneiper’s wooded banks on
the outskirts of the city proper.  As they strike through the suburbs his
expression of alienation grows with the proliferation of signs, Cyrillic script
shrouding the mundane in secrecy; thus good old McDonald’s has double
cheeseburger appeal.  He voices his concern.

‘Aye
– but what are you getting? – this is all gobbledegook.’

‘I can
read some of it, Guv – look – over there, for instance.’

A rank
of cloud is invading from the east, hastening the arrival of dusk; in
anticipation, Kiev is lighting up.  DS Jones indicates a huge yellow neon ahead
and to their left that runs along the roof of what resembles a grand Parisian
hotel: it reads both
ARENA CITY
and
APEHA CITI
.  Skelgill
ducks to get a better view, screwing up his face.

‘So
what are you saying – P is R and H is N?’

‘That’s
right.’

‘Why?’

‘
Y
is
U
, Guv.’

Skelgill
is about to berate her, but he notices the grin that she is unable to suppress.

‘I
think I’ll leave this up to you.’

He
folds his arms and resumes his twitchy surveillance.  The traffic is dense;
ubiquitous moulded saloons jostle with luxury limousines and SUVs, and battered
boxy Soviet-style vehicles, an amalgam that is foreign to his eye and in the
wrong carriageway.  There are plenty of pedestrians abroad – the
weather, at least, seems not dissimilar to that they have left behind, now
cooling to single digit Celsius; most figures wear dark coats, though younger females
he notices splash colour, a gold bag, a silver jacket motif, extravagant spangled
boots with bouncing trimmings.  The architecture thus far has been irregular
and unremarkable, largely twentieth century; sporadic high rise, chimneys,
aerials; more often austere-looking apartment blocks, generally five or six
stories in poor repair, an assortment of precarious balcony extensions stealing
ramshackle air space; occasional shabby shops at the ground floor; cranes and
bill-stickered hoardings mark work in progress; indeed he is reminded of
Manchester – and their hotel, a concrete 1990s tribute to Soviet-style
architecture, built on an island of high ground in correspondingly inauspicious
surroundings, reinforces this impression.  They halt beneath utilitarian cement
arches that must surely conjure fast food.  The driver abandons them to
clamber out unassisted, though when DS Jones tips him a Euro note in exchange
for their bags his countenance illuminates and he wishes them a successful visit,
in impeccable English.

Skelgill’s
appetite thus further subliminally whetted, he insists they register, drop
their bags in their rooms, and meet in “two minutes” to head straight
out.  However, while DS Jones more or less complies with their compact, he
keeps her waiting a short while.  When he arrives in the lobby she is resting
in a casual seating area that overlooks the vehicular approach and car park; he
notices she has attracted the attention of a couple of brown-suited porters who
loiter untidily inside the sliding glass doors.  They observe his
movements as he picks her up and together the detectives cross the broad floor;
however, when approached they straighten respectfully and give a coordinated
bow of their heads.

‘Get
the feeling we’re being watched?’

‘Not
especially, Guv.’

Skelgill
perhaps unfairly stares down the bellhops; his features remain stern as he and
DS Jones begin to move away from the doors.

‘You
know how they give you free toiletries – like in a kit, in your bathroom?’

‘Aha.’

She
sounds apprehensive, anticipating what is coming.

‘Mine
had condoms in it.’

Skelgill’s
gaze picks up the trajectory of a pigeon, as though the bird is an unexpected
sight.  There is a pause before DS Jones replies.

‘So
did mine, Guv.’

Skelgill
lifts his head in silent acknowledgement.  The pigeon passes beyond view
and he looks briefly sideways at his colleague.

‘What’s
that all about?’

‘Maybe
it’s a marketing campaign.’

They
are descending flights of steps towards a busy road – four lanes of
fairly heavy traffic flow in either direction.  This conversation seems to
peter out, but their emergence from the hotel’s semi-private environs brings
new distractions.  Though they move purposefully, it is not clear which of
them leads – until Skelgill reveals he has delegated (if not
communicated) the task.

‘I
take it you’ve sussed out the rendezvous?’

As is
frequently the case, DS Jones is one step ahead.

‘We’re
meeting Captain Shevchenko just off Khreschatyk – that’s the main
street.  It’s the way up to the
Maidan
– Independence Square
– I thought we should at least see that in case there’s no time tomorrow
– we’ve got about half an hour.’

Skelgill
shrugs.  It is probable he would prefer any such casual sightseeing to
take in the river – especially since the airline magazine has informed
him that the Dneiper, Europe’s fourth longest, is noted for the legendary
beluga
,
the European sturgeon, and once produced a specimen of fifteen feet and the
weight of five men.  Absently he takes a series of pronounced breaths, and
then exhales, as though the act has brought a revelation.

‘You
can tell we’re a long way from the sea – the air’s not fresh, like back
home.’

DS
Jones glances skywards, as if she expects Skelgill’s notion to be somehow
manifested as a visible phenomenon.

‘You
know, Guv, it reminds me of London – apart from...’

‘Aye?’

‘Well
– the people.’

Skelgill’s
eyes become busy with passing citizens.  A stream of elderly women all
seem attached to plastic carrier bags.  A youngish man has a laptop satchel,
its strap a diagonal black sash across his pale mackintosh.  A plump older
man in a bulky blue ski jacket and a grey tartan cap is reading a pink notice
plastered to a lamppost; the foot of the page is perforated and he reaches up
and tears off one of the strips.  An officer in smart greenish-blue military
uniform, matching collar and tie, gold buttons and braid and insignia, and a
ridiculous field visor hat, stops – and stoops – to present a coin
to a female beggar, soot-blackened though well-fed and semi-larval, half
emerged from a grimy sleeping bag.

‘I
don’t think they look so different from us.’

‘That’s
my point, Guv – do you see anyone who’s not Caucasian?’

He
nods pensively, but any further comparison to London is dispelled as they round
into the southern end of Khreschatyk.  This grand boulevard is
unequivocally Iron Curtain, lined as it is by continuous ranks of neoclassical
Stalinist architecture.  Such an impression is not lost upon Skelgill.

‘I can
just picture the Red Army tanks rolling along here.’

DS
Jones glances anxiously about.

‘Not
too loud, Guv – I think it’s a sensitive subject.’

Skelgill
ingenuously chastises himself with a gurning expression.

Ranged
around the north-east end of the Maidan self-important buildings converge like infantry
battalions that have advanced so far and now realise they are not all going to
fit.  In somewhat garish contrast to their stark socialist modernism, their
vertical masculine lines standing to attention, that capitalism has seduced
this city is revealed by their incongruous crowning tiaras: giant neon logos,
effeminate and elaborate, supported by extensive scaffolding.  Skelgill is
surveying these sponsors for a not-so-hidden meaning.

‘Jones
– look – there must be another McDonald’s round here.’

His
colleague grins, though she checks the time in her palm.

‘I think
we ought to head to the meeting point, Guv – it’ll probably take us five
minutes to walk back – we’ll be able to eat there.’

Skelgill
casts about forlornly.  It will soon be dark – almost eight p.m.
– and perhaps the two-hour time warp is contributing to his premature hunger
(though his subordinates might testify that it is a permanent condition). 
The sky is blanketed by an evenly padded quilt of stratus, the gentle bulge of each
pocket tinted pink by the setting sun; indeed its rays pick out the lavish golden
domes of the city’s holy places as if they radiate of their own volition.

But
with no fast-food joint actually in view, Skelgill makes up his mind.

‘Right,
let’s go.’

He has
his bearings, and strides away, and DS Jones scampers to catch him.  He
remains a yard ahead as they retrace their steps southwards along Khreschatyk,
until – prompted by her maps app – DS Jones reaches to pinch his
sleeve and veer across the broad pavement towards a high stone arch. 
Beyond is a narrower thoroughfare, immediately distinctive for its chic.  Raised
terraces wrapped in smart awnings mark several restaurants; there are boutiques
and a high proportion of luxury cars, mostly prestigious German marques –
though a gleaming white Range Rover catches Skelgill’s eye.

‘Now
it reminds me of Bond Street, Guv.’

‘Aye,
well – you’d know better than me.’

‘It’s
this one, Guv –
Pechera Vid’my
.’

‘Sounds
like a fish restaurant.’

DS
Jones shakes her mobile phone.

‘I
could see what translate says.’

Skelgill’s
response is to take a striding leap at the wooden steps, but once over the
threshold he halts and widens his eyes in an effort to adjust to the relative
gloom.  Beneath the canopy the terrace is more like the interior of a
bar.  There is scant lighting other than ambient street neon, and candles
in jars upon the tables.  A western pop video plays out from screens
suspended at either end of the space.  The seating recalls the VIP area of
a nightclub, low-backed rectangular sofas in pale leather arranged around broad
glass-topped coffee tables into a series of cubicles, in two rows.  Despite
a healthy sprinkling of patrons, the terrace is unmanned as far as staff are concerned. 
No one seems to be dining as such, though he discerns that some customers have
plates of finger food.

He
leads the way down the aisle to a vacant booth on the balcony side, achieving a
view both along the street and back towards the entrance.  DS Jones settles
on the sofa perpendicular to his, facing the curtained doors of what must be
the restaurant proper.  While she appears relaxed, Skelgill is agitated
and looks unwilling to drop his guard.  In the next cubicle, seated
together in the same position as DS Jones, are twin girls, perhaps aged twenty. 
They are strikingly attractive and immaculately presented.  Their dresses,
one a shimmering silver, the other pearl, look expensive, silky, clinging to
contours and exposing bare shoulders; Skelgill’s darting gaze, ostensibly
seeking a waiter, continually returns to the groomed blonde heads and smooth
bronzed cleavages.  Occasionally sipping French mineral water, they lean
in together, conspiratorial, swaying over mobile gossip, tapping with crimson
talons at what amuses them.

DS
Jones must notice Skelgill’s continual distraction, for she turns to glance
pointedly to her right.

‘No
sign, Guv?’

Skelgill
affects to notice something in the street and leans out behind his sergeant to
stare beyond her.

‘Not
that I know what to look for.’

‘DS
Leyton’s email said he’d be wearing a three-stripes jacket – but I
wondered if something got lost in translation – you know, to do with his
rank?’

But Skelgill
is only half listening – his gaze has become fixed upon the darkened
doorway of a designer store – and there it is again: the firefly glow of
a cigarette.  As he narrows his eyes, the tiny orange ember reappears
– apparently one last long draw, for it is sent tumbling through the air
and a slim figure of medium height detaches itself from the sentry box of shadow
and swiftly, easily, unobtrusively moves beneath the glow of the streetlamps and
crosses towards the restaurant steps.