Smoke & Whispers (9 page)

So think about that for a moment, Sarah. Think about Gerard taking the wind from your sails. Had he simply been trying to distract her attention?

She arranged herself into a more comfortable thinking position. The distraction theory was a possibility, but it would need working through. If Gerard had made up his story about finding Zoë’s business card, it had to be because he knew Sarah had been in his room; had guessed she’d seen the card; and figured he needed a reason for having it. Except he couldn’t
know
she’d been in his room – could only speculate – and why would he do that? Straightforward paranoia?

Well. You couldn’t rule it out.

Because there was an aspect to their both being at the Bolbec that only dawned on Sarah now: if it wasn’t a coincidence, then it must bother Gerard as much as it bothered her. She remembered his reaction on first seeing her: that flicker in his eyes. A hint of shock, or possibly fear. If it wasn’t a coincidence, then Zoë must be the point of connection, because Sarah had no other reason for being here.

So maybe that was it: she’d brought up Zoë, and he’d just headed her off at the pass. He was a businessman, after all. They invented the contingency plan. And didn’t have to be sure a bad thing might happen before working out ways of avoiding it.

A chain of reasoning which suggested one big shiny link: that Gerard having Zoë’s card in his possession was a bad thing. Was something he needed an alibi for.

And then something else struck her. Gerard might have known she’d been in his room because he’d been there too.

Sarah sat very still after having that thought, as if movement would make her lose her mental footing. She became aware of sounds she hadn’t noticed until then – that not far away, there was music playing; that the street outside was not deserted; that hotel rooms always
ticked
, as if her very presence were subject to a timer – but through all that, she clung to the thread she’d just cast through the day’s maze. What if it had been Gerard himself who’d returned to his room while she was inside it? One of those possibilities which made you see the picture differently: now it was a vase; now it was a cat on a pogo-stick.

First things first, she thought. Was it even possible? She cast her mind back, and the timing worked. Gerard had been in a meeting, that much was true. He’d left the hotel when that taxi picked him up, and had headed off to join, as it turned out, Gannon, Harper and Wright. After which, they’d gone their separate ways.
I’ve been wandering round,
taking in the sights. These chaps had better things to do. We’ve
just reconvened.

So he could have come back to the hotel.

Sarah shook her head; not because she was denying the train of thought she’d just boarded, but because it was too horribly plausible. Gerard had phoned her while she’d been cowering in his bathroom, yes, but could easily have done that from the other side of the door . . . She’d talked to him, but not until after the man in the room had left. He might have wandered no further than the floor below before calling again. It could have happened. It could have happened. She closed her eyes. The phone rang.

Jesus –

It was the room phone, on her bedside table. She stared at it a moment or two, as if it were an entirely unfamiliar object, before picking up.

‘Ms Tucker?’

That twang. She knew who that was. ‘Barry?’

‘Ah . . . You’ve not checked out.’

‘Oh, lord . . .’

‘Don’t worry, no biggie –’

Hotel rooms always
ticked
, as if your very presence were subject to a timer. Which, of course, it was.

‘I should have been gone by noon, shouldn’t I?’

‘We have a twelve o’clock punch-out, but you weren’t around. It’s okay, Ms Tucker. Like I said, we’re not exactly choking for space. Do I take it you want to stay another night?’

‘Yes. Yes, I’d better. Look, I’ll come down and –’

‘No need. I’ll change your booking. No one’s gonna turf you out, don’t worry.’

‘Thank you, Barry. That’s really kind.’

‘No problem, miss.’

‘What time is it, anyway?’

It was dark outside – she’d drawn the curtain – but it was February, it was Newcastle. It had been dark for ages.

‘Just gone seven thirty.’

‘Thanks, Barry.’

She hung up. His voice had brought her back to reality, but she wasn’t ready for great chunks of it yet. She didn’t want to think any more about Gerard, about Talmadge, about Gannon, about spiders; she didn’t want to eat again; didn’t want to drink. Didn’t know what she wanted, except maybe to sleep, but it was too early for that. She plucked the
Big Issue
from the floor, and collapsed back on the bed. Half-read an interview with a Hollywood star, whose hobo-chic rendered him plausibly homeless himself, then had to put it away when a
have you seen this woman?
box brought Zoë too painfully to mind. She thought of the river: how cold and black and heartless it ran; and how hard it must feel, approached from a height. Being in there for any length of time wouldn’t do anyone good. The long-term effects would be dreadful, if the short-term effects didn’t kill you.

It was no good. She had to do something. There was no point being here otherwise.

Doing something without going anywhere meant her mobile phone, of course. Vicky had called earlier: she’d forgotten that. She dug her phone from her coat pocket. ‘Vicky? It’s me. Sorry about earlier.’

‘I thought you were going to call straight back.’

‘Well, like I say, I wasn’t able to talk.’

‘Only it’s not like I’m not busy.’

Sarah was about to apologize again, in standard Sarah fashion, then recalled that Vicky was used to dealing with Zoë. ‘Vicky? I couldn’t talk, okay? Get over it. Now, what did you have for me?’

There was a pause, and she wondered if she’d hurt the girl’s feelings. But then Vicky laughed. ‘You kind of sound like her.’

‘That’s the effect I was aiming at,’ she admitted.

‘Okay,’ Vicky said. ‘Well, I’ve got Zoë’s e-mails. She kept her inbox pretty clean.’

Sarah could believe it. Paranoiacs make good housekeepers.

‘And she emptied her deleted folder regularly too. Not much in there. I can retrieve it for you, of course, but it’ll take a little longer.’

Of course. ‘What did you find?’

‘What are you looking for?’

‘Anything to do with a Gerard Inchon. G. Inchon. Or anything like that.’

‘Sec.’

Sarah waited.
Zoë Boehm – what an extraordinary thing. I
found her card, on the mantelpiece in the bar.
So he said. So he said.
What are the chances?
Billion to one.

‘No. Nothing.’

‘. . . Nothing at all?’

‘Unless he’s calling himself Mervyn Cleate. Nope, that’s viagra. Or Douglas Button. Nope, that’s viagra.’

‘I get the picture. Is that her inbox or her deleted stuff?’

‘Both. I’m flipping between the two. The new mail in her inbox, the last two weeks’ worth, is mostly spam, plus a couple that look like work offers. There’s one from somewhere called Roleseeker Services, saying they’ve invoiced her for the names, whatever that means.’

Probably headhunters. Zoë did background checks for headhunters, to weed out chancers with credentials downloaded from the web. ‘But nothing from Inchon.’

‘There’s an odd one, though. Just from at.’

‘Just from at? What’s that mean?’

‘You know. At. The a with a little circle round it you get in e-mail addresses.’

@, Sarah realized. ‘What’s it say?’

‘“Missing you”.’

‘That’s all?’

‘That’s all. No return address or anything. So it’s not been replied to.’

‘I didn’t know you could do that. Send an e-mail without an address.’

‘Yeah, well. You can.’

‘When did it arrive?’

Vicky told her. It was the day after Zoë had checked out of the hotel.

‘And she’d read it?’

‘Opened it, certainly. Didn’t delete it, either.’

‘But no reply.’

‘Nope.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘You get this little arrow icon when –’

‘Right. Got you.’

‘So she didn’t, no. But hang on. I haven’t checked her sent items.’

Sarah could hear Vicky clicking the mouse, talking to her computer. It didn’t talk back. ‘No, that’s wiped too. I can retrieve it from the server, but –’

‘It’ll take time, I know. Thanks, Vicky.’

‘No problem. I’ll get back to you.’

Sarah stood once the call was over. There wasn’t a lot of room for pacing, but she needed to be on her feet. She walked to the window, pulled the curtain back. The street below was lamplit, with not a soul in sight.

@, she thought. At. A.T. Alan Talmadge.

8

Down on that same street twenty minutes later Sarah felt insubstantial herself, as if, in peering into the ether Zoë had left behind her, she’d caused that ether to peer back into her. It had hollowed her out. A walking shadow, she made for the railway station; crossed the road upon reaching it, then headed up a slantwise street flanked by a hideous-looking club and a kebab shop. A board outside a newsagent’s indicated that all was not well with the local football team, and she couldn’t help absorbing this information even while more important things clamoured for her attention. Because this was what your head did, when it wasn’t playing tricks. It stored information for later retrieval, when it might be just what you needed to ace the pub quiz.

Concentrate.

Of Talmadge’s involvement, there could be no doubt. First the jacket; then the e-mail. He was not merely leaving his fingerprints at the scene, he was setting up flares around it, to mark his location to passing aircraft. And Zoë had known this; had either followed him here, or known she was being followed.

If she had been following, it was because Alan Talmadge had been leaving a trail. And the trail Alan Talmadge left was dead women.

Without breaking stride, Sarah pinched the bridge of her nose between finger and thumb. It was no simple task, deconstructing Zoë’s motives. What she needed was Zoë’s input.
You kind of sound like her
, Vicky had said . . . So, where would Zoë start? She’d start with Gerard. Gerard was involved somehow; was Zoë-connected, but denying it. And had acquired a list of names, at the top of which was Gannon’s. Whatever Sarah had thought earlier about Gannon’s roots – his substance; his family ties; all those things that made him definitely not Alan Talmadge – he still needed looking at. Which was why she was now headed straight for the brightly lit Asian grocery looming up on her left. Lots of cards taped to its windows, offering cheap foreign phone calls and Bollywood DVDs. Local furniture for sale. And Internet connections, at 75p an hour.

The man at the counter was sweet, thanking her profusely for paying for the service he was providing, and pointing out the vending machine, which offered too much choice to tempt Sarah. Anything that produced coffee, cocoa, tea and cola from one nozzle was for emergencies only. But she sat on a stool next to a young Chinese woman and opened a browser. Instantly, she could have been anywhere. A browser was a portal, sucking the user inside. There were those who never emerged.

She Googled ‘Jack Gannon’, added ‘Newcastle’ to narrow it down, then had a rethink when all she hit were genealogical sites. Jack was a popular name, but wasn’t it short for something else? Jackson? James? She reduced it to ‘J Gannon’, which didn’t help, then keyed ‘storage’, and started getting hits on the family company. First up was its website, which didn’t mention Jack, but whose ‘About us’ page named one Michael Gannon as the firm’s founder, originally Gannon Haulage of Walker. ReGoogling, she skipped through a page or two and found her attention snagged on a gobbet of text:
acquitted on charges of kidnapping
and assault.

Sarah clicked the link.

It opened a page on the local newspaper’s archive which told her that Michael Gannon had been acquitted on charges of kidnapping and assault. These related to dealings he’d had with business rivals – rivals who’d since gone out of business. Quotes from Michael Gannon’s solicitor indicated that all concerned were glad this ludicrous matter had been dismissed out of hand, and that any further suggestion that his client had been involved in the unfortunate events would be rigorously dealt with. The date was November ’87. A photograph showed a man much heavier than Jack, moustached, and with a look in his eyes somewhere between triumph and contempt. It had been taken as he emerged from the court building. If he’d worn that expression during the trial, he’d probably have come up guilty.

She had no notebook. The shop sold them, but she wasn’t sure there was any point. Jack Gannon’s father had once stood trial for assault. With the snap judgement everyone’s prey to, based on one photo, Sarah had decided he’d probably been guilty, but what difference did that make? So Jack’s father was a local gangster: that didn’t make Jack a psychopath. She returned to the search engine. With new terms to throw in the mix, she found more references to Gannon senior, but nothing on Jack. She sat back. Bit her lip. Thought hard. Got her phone out.

‘Vicky?’

‘Again?’

‘Sorry. Are you in bed?’

‘Course not. I’m imming with friends in LA. What’s up?’

Instant messaging? She’d ask another time. ‘Sorry. It’s just something you said – Roleseeker Services?’

‘They e-mailed Zoë, yes.’

‘Did they say they’d received Zoë’s invoice? Or invoiced her?’

‘Invoiced her, I think. Sec.’ She was tapping away: imming fellow webheads? But no: she went on, ‘Yep. Please find attached invoices, terms and conditions, yada yada.’ More clicks. ‘Hundred and twenty quid. No details, just an invoice number. You want it?’

‘No, that’s okay.’

‘Plus their address. Eldon Square, Newcastle.’

‘. . . Right,’ said Sarah.

‘That means something, yeah? Zoë was in Newcastle, and she wanted something from these people. Hang on.’ She was clicking away again: she must have a hands-free phone. A teenage girl, in her bedroom on a school night, and so wired into the world she needed a hands-free set, in case anyone called while she was imming LA. Round a dinner table, Sarah might have found that food for a state-of-the-nation address. As it was, it was kind of useful. ‘Placements and opportunities, their site says. You want the url?’

‘I’ll Google it. Thanks, Vicky. Sorry to disturb you.’

Ending the call, she found the firm’s site: it offered, as Vicky had said,
placements and opportunities
. She thought about Gerard’s list of names, Jack Gannon’s at the top. The rest, she was sure, made up the crowd Gerard had invited to his soirée. What had he said? That she’d know what it was like, being in a new town.
You want to leave your marker
with the movers and the shakers.
To do which, he’d needed to know his target group, so he’d acquired a list of the city’s worthies from a local headhunter’s. Except, of course, he hadn’t. Zoë had. So Zoë had been working for Gerard, and everything Gerard had told Sarah was a lie. Why didn’t that surprise her?

She wondered what the job had been. It wasn’t as if Gerard needed a private eye to conjure a list of names; he must have legions of PAs and office-bodies for jobs like that. And this dropped into a growing list of other questions: why was Gerard staying in, let’s face it, a dump like the Bolbec Hotel?
Malmaison’s full
, he’d told her.
Chelsea are
in town
. Nice line, but it didn’t ring true. No, Gerard was staying at the Bolbec for the same reason he hadn’t used his staff to do his research: he didn’t want them to know what he was doing, or where he was. Which meant he was up to something dodgy, Sarah decided; then had to revise that a moment later. Would Zoë have involved herself in something dodgy?

Well. You couldn’t rule it out.

The screen-timer hit sixty minutes, and her browser died. She considered buying another session, but decided she had enough to think about, not that any of it had drawn her closer to Alan Talmadge. Another thought struck, and she closed her eyes, trying to visualize the list of names she’d found in Gerard’s room. Jack Gannon’s had been at the top, and it was unlikely that alphabetical sorting would have left him there. Were the names ranked in order of importance? John M. Wright’s hadn’t featured at all.
John’s here with me
, Gannon had told her. But maybe Gannon was at the top because he’d been the reason for the list in the first place.
Find me some people to go with this man
, the instruction might have run. Whatever Gerard was up to, Gannon was at the heart of it, and Gannon came from a family of crooks.

I’m a career criminal
, he’d told her.

Sarah had thought he’d been joking.

Leaving, she wandered aimlessly for five minutes before finding an alternative-looking restaurant and deciding she was hungry. One bowl of chunky lentil soup and a slab of black bread later she was back on the street, trying to work out what she’d forgotten to do, other than forgetting to let the hotel know she was staying another day – oh Christ: she was staying another day, and hadn’t told Russ, who must be crawling walls. Her hand was reaching for her phone even as the thought formed.

People brushed past, their voices thick with beer. It wasn’t far off ten o’clock, and was cold, damp and dark, but boys in short-sleeved shirts were just warming up.

Her home landline switched to voicemail, so she left a quick message then tried Russ’s mobile. When he answered there was background noise: jukebox, voices, drink being taken. ‘Sarah?’

‘You’re in the pub.’

‘I’m in the pub. Where are you?’

‘Not in a pub. I’m still in Newcastle, though.’

‘You’re still what?’

‘Still at the hotel.’

‘Still? Why haven’t you checked out? Jesus, sorry, I should have – what happened? Was it her?’

‘I don’t know, Russ.’

‘Sarah? What do you mean – you couldn’t tell? Oh fuck, I’m saying this wrong. I’ve had a few pints. Was it awful? I’m so sorry, darling.’

She could feel tears starting, and didn’t want to cry, not here on the street. She swallowed. ‘It was awful, yes. Horrible. The woman – she’d been in the water, Russ. I couldn’t tell if it was Zoë or not.’

‘But didn’t they – wasn’t there evidence? I mean, she wasn’t naked or anything, was she?’

‘She was wearing Zoë’s clothes. Or clothes that could have been Zoë’s. And she had Zoë’s wallet and stuff. I told them it was Zoë.’

‘You told them that? But you’re still not sure? Oh fuck, look, give me a moment, I’ll go outside where I can hear you properly.’

‘No. No, don’t. I’m all right, Russ. Don’t worry. But I’m going to stay another night, okay?’

‘You’re going to
what
?’

She couldn’t tell if he hadn’t heard, or just not liked what he’d heard. ‘I’m staying another night. I’ll be back tomorrow evening, Russ. Very soon. But I can’t leave yet. Not until I know what happened.’

There was a sudden squirt of noise: a collision of some sort, a squawked apology.

‘Russ?’

‘Jesus, look, I’ve just spilled this gentleman’s drink, I’d better – yes, yes, sorry, I’ll get you another. Sarah? Call me back, okay?’

‘I’ll call you tomorrow, Russ. I love you.’

‘Sarah. Love you. Look, I’m really sorry, I’ll just –’

The apology wasn’t for her. The phone cut off, and she was still here, still in the cold damp night, still alone, though surrounded by happy strangers.

Someone said, ‘Grab a granny night, is it?’

She realized she was heading away from the hotel – into clubland, by the look of it – so abruptly switched direction. And it wasn’t dark after all, she registered. There were lights all around; the beautiful blurred runniness of city neon, splashing reflections in windows and puddles. She’d forgotten what this was like. Even when her eyes cleared – the tears not falling, but soaking back into her – the colours remained a liquid rainbow in the air. She wished Zoë were with her. She wished she could point these lights out to Zoë, and dare her to find them less than beautiful.

In the dark the Bolbec resembled a trailer for one of those films in which misguided travellers check into their last night on earth. It was hard to dispel such thoughts once they’ve occurred, but Sarah did her best. The lobby was empty. It was after ten, and she was tired but not sleepy. She decided to have a drink.

Two men stood at the bar when she entered, and both gave her appraising looks without bothering to pretend they weren’t. She almost turned and walked back out – in some situations, too few men was as bad as too many – but Barry was already reaching for the Sauvignon. She was beginning to wonder how long his shifts were.

It wasn’t clear how she scored on these men’s charts, but a drink was a drink. And the fire, she noted, was lit.

‘Long day?’ Barry asked. Then: ‘I’m assuming you want a white?’

‘I’ll get that for the lady,’ one of the men said.

‘Thank you. But I’d rather get my own.’

‘Rubbish,’ he said. Apile of change sat next to his whisky glass, and he began fingering coins Barry’s way. ‘What’s the damage on a large white, Baz?’

‘Behave, Derek,’ Barry told him, pouring the wine. ‘It’s on your room, Ms Tucker.’ He slid the glass across.

Ms Tucker.’

‘Thanks, Barry.’

Derek’s mate snorted, and Derek said, ‘Now then, pet. No need to burn your bra.’

Sarah opened her mouth to retort, but Barry got there first.

‘That TV series where the guy falls asleep and wakes up in ’73? They got your life backwards, Derek. You should write and complain.’

Derek’s mate snorted again, and nearly fell off his stool.

Derek looked sheepish. ‘No offence meant, pet.’

‘None taken, lamb,’ she assured him.

Barry was pretty good, though. Wringing a laugh and an apology from a situation which might have turned nasty.

She told him, ‘Put the next round on my room too, Barry. Excuse me, gentlemen, I need a comfy seat.’

‘Mind the dragon,’ she thought she heard as she headed for the sofa by the fireplace. Didn’t get the reference, but understood it once she arrived.

Slumped in one of the rattan chairs, hunkered so low he couldn’t be seen from behind, was Gerard. On the table was a bottle of Macallan; its level below the label, its optic plonked next to it like an amputated digit. At lunchtime, she remembered, she’d wondered if he’d been drunk. There was no doubting it now.

‘Thought I told you to fuck off,’ he said without looking round.

‘Told you the same once, I remember,’ she said, lowering herself on to the sofa. ‘Didn’t fucking work.’

‘Sarah. Christ.’ He nearly attempted to stand, but sensibly gave up the idea. ‘Thought you were somebody else.’

‘Pleased to hear it.’

‘No, really, I – oh, hell.’ He swallowed what was left in his glass. ‘Those buggers by the bar still there?’