Streaking (3 page)

Before he moved off, Canny permitted himself one last glance at the three models. Two of them were staring; one wasn't. It was the one who wasn't to whom he addressed himself, although he didn't look directly at her and spoke distinctly enough to be heard by everyone at the table. “I need an early night,” he said, carefully making his apologetic tone ring false. “I have to go home—Daddy's so ill that he might not last the week, alas. Henri will have to do without me for quite a while, I fear—I hope he won't miss me too much.”

The frowns that greeted this speech were all male. Canny heard a whispered Arabic phrase, and had seen enough of the Makhtoums at Ascot and Epsom to know that it meant “the luck of the devil”. He smiled. There was no need to take it personally. Long experience had rammed home the lesson that no one ever credited his own good fortune to the devil, or anyone else's to the angels.

Having observed her whispered conversation, Canny wasn't entirely surprised when Lissa Lo got up too. He didn't read anything into the coincidence; it wasn't unusual for women to get up and follow him when he left a table—many of the women he encountered on a day-to-day basis loved winners, and not a few were masochistically intrigued by evident disinterest that wasn't overtly queer—but Lissa Lo was in an altogether different class. It was said that she never got out of bed for less than Stevie Larkin got for playing a game of football, but that you couldn't get her into one for what he got paid for a whole league season, whoever or whatever you might be.

As Canny walked away from the table, though, the model moved on to a convergent path. He didn't look around to see what kind of expression Stevie Larkin was wearing, but he could imagine it easily enough.

“I'd better call it a night too,” the model said, as they made their way over to the cashier, walking in step but not quite together. “The boat's waiting to take me to Nice—the jet has to be in the air by six. I have to put down at some ridiculous RAF base west of York, so that a fast car can whisk me off to Harewood House for a shoot.”

Canny frowned, partly because of a momentary confusion as to the significance of the word “shoot” and partly because her reference to the RAF base west of York rang such an eerie bell. “Do you mean Church Fenton?” he said, as he stood politely aside to let her cash up first.

“Yes—do you know it?”

He only hesitated for a moment before answering. “The family pile's only twenty miles away,” he admitted. “Approximately north by north-east—a little place called Cockayne. Church Fenton's practically local—two hundred miles more local than Heathrow, at any rate”

“Cockayne! How charming.” The model's delicately-etched eyebrows increased their curvature slightly, delicately but firmly implying that she was fully capable of savoring the resonance of the name. “In that case, I suppose I ought to offer you a lift.”

The rainbow quality of the streak took on new meaning as Canny calculated the possibilities implicit in the invitation. The rules forbade him to waste his erotic energies on frivolity, of course, but the majority of his ancestors had taken a very dim view of the supposed pleasures of the bedchamber, so that wasn't surprising. They were Yorkshiremen, after all. The fact that his father had always sided with the rules probably had as much to do with the Earl of Credesdale's disapproval of his son's attitude to life as with any real fear of diminishing the brightness of the family's lucky streak.

Well, why not?
Canny thought.
If Daddy's share of the pot is all but exhausted, why shouldn't I be able to turn a thirty-six-to-one hit into a thousand-to-one shot? And why shouldn't I treat myself, if the opportunity does arise?

He was careful, though, not to take too much for granted. It was entirely possible that all he was being offered, by Lissa Lo and Lady Luck alike, was a lift to Church Fenton.

“I have to go back to my hotel,” he said, in a deeply apologetic manner that—for once—wasn't feigned. “There mightn't be time to get up the hill, pack my cases and get back down again before your boat casts off.”

“Why don't you try?” she said. “The boat's practically on the doorstep. I'll hold it for you for...oh, an hour should still leave plenty of time. Not a moment longer, though.”

“If you really wouldn't mind,” Canny said, in frank astonishment, as the cashier rammed wads of bills into a leather-clad bag.

“I really wouldn't,” she assured him. “I'll probably try to take a nap on the boat, but I can never sleep on planes—I'd be glad of the company. It's a pity that the news about your father has spoiled your lucky day.” She glanced at the cash that was stacking up in the bag, but she obviously meant the outrageous good fortune that had thrown him at the feet of a woman whose private jet was landing two hundred miles closer to his home than the scheduled flight he'd intended to catch.

“Yes it is,” he agreed, prepared for the moment to regard the coincidence in exactly that light. “They say that these things always balance out in the long run, but there's no compensation for losing a father.”

“Mine died some time ago,” she said, “but I know what you mean. People who think that things always balance out don't understand the real nature of chance, do they?”

She turned away as she said it, denying him not only the opportunity to answer the rhetorical question but also the opportunity to look into her lovely eyes in the hope of figuring out exactly what she meant to imply.

CHAPTER THREE

Stepping out of the air-conditioned casino into the warm night air was like stepping into a bath. Sweat immediately began to form on his brow. The Mediterranean coast benefited from sea breezes, of course, but the sea never cooled enough to impart any real freshness to them. In Paris, it was said, thousands of people were dying from the heat every week. That was partly because so many doctors and other medical workers took their holidays in August, just like everyone else, but it was mostly the fact that the temperature never got much below blood heat, even at night. In Bordeaux, so rumor had it, even the age-old habit of throwing all the doors and windows open in the darkness before the dawn and then sealing the shutters tight against the sun wasn't saving the populace from cooking slowly in their skins. Even in England—in Yorkshire, no less—the temperature was ten degrees above normal. No wonder his father had run out of energy with which to fight his cancer.

Mercifully, the cab was air-conditioned. It got Canny to the hotel in less than fifteen minutes, despite the tight bends it had to negotiate as it climbed the sheer face of the lavishly-overbuilt cliff. The driver was perfectly happy to wait for him, in order to make a return journey to the quay.

A breeze was stirring the foliage of the syringas in the garden as Canny made his way up the old stone steps, but it made little difference to the cloying warmth of the night. It seemed, in fact, to have a more tangible effect on the shadows gathered around him, which rippled and swayed in a curiously serpentine fashion. The soughing of the wind in the branches was easily imaginable as the hissing of snakes.

Canny always tried to listen to what the shadows were trying to tell him, but he couldn't help wondering whether Stevie's sports-psychology symbolism was playing games with him. He still felt a little nauseous, and a little fearful, but that was only to be expected, given the violence and complexity of the streak. Sometimes, darkness was perfectly natural, even when it shifted restlessly as he passed by.

The night-manager was waiting at the desk to see if Canny needed anything further, and Canny explained the change of plan.

“I'll just pack the essentials in a single bag, if that's okay,” Canny said. “Could you have the rest packed up properly in the morning and send them on? I'll send Bentley to pick them up at Leeds airport.”

“Of course, Monsieur.”

“Thanks. Can you get the stuff from the safe and have my bill ready in twenty minutes?”

“Yes, Monsieur.”

Canny went up the stairs two at a time rather than waiting for the elevator. He only had to go up to the first floor.

Because it looked out on to the elevated rear garden—the monks' garden, it was called, although Canny doubted that the hotel had ever been a convent—the room didn't have the feel of a first-floor room. One could easily jump from the balcony to the lawn without serious risk of injury. The balcony doors were closed, of course, and the curtains were drawn, but the first thing Canny did was to draw them open and open the door to let the breeze in so that the stuffiness did not become too oppressive as he packed. He switched on a bedside lamp and then switched off the strip light, so that he wouldn't be displaying such an obvious beacon to every moth in Monaco.

He pulled out the smallest of his suitcases and placed the leather-bound bag from the casino in it before going to his drawers. He'd been on the move for more than two weeks, so he had a fairly extensive survival kit, but he had a reserve wardrobe at home so he didn't need to worry too much about the possibility that his luggage might not follow him as quickly as it ought. He stripped off the clothes he was wearing, though, and put those in the case. Before getting dressed again he went to the bathroom to use the facilities and collect his shaver and toothbrush.

When he came back again there was a black-clad figure in a ski-mask standing by the bed, pointing a gun at him.

Canny's first thought was that he had been an utter fool to let the intruder in, given the serpentine quality of the shadows that had pestered him on his approach—whose real symbolism now seemed far more obvious than he had carelessly assumed. Even by the muted light of the bedside lamp, though, the shadows that were actually congregated in the room didn't seem panic-stricken. His unfocused fear hadn't amplified itself into alarm, let alone panic. The gun-toter didn't seem to have any immediate intention of shooting him—and probably wouldn't form any such intention, unless he did something stupid.

Canny tried hard to judge the expression in the bandit's eyes, but it wasn't possible. There was uncertainty, of course—but in a situation like theirs, there would always be uncertainty. In a situation like theirs, there would always be scope for chance to take a hand, for action to be inhibited or encouraged by a wayward whim.

“Don't move,” was all that the intruder said, in a voice so neutral in its quality that Canny couldn't be certain whether it was male or female. Canny knew that the thief had already spotted the leather-bound bag in the suitcase, imperfectly obscured by a crumpled shirt.
Now's the moment
, he thought, as the other moved to take the bag containing the forty-seven thousand Euros—but he didn't move a muscle. He felt safe, as long as he didn't precipitate another streak, and safety seemed enough, for the moment. He had already won one gamble at long odds—even if the highly-colored streak had contained some bad omens as well as bright ones—and it would undoubtedly be pushing his luck to conjure up another. He was five or six inches taller than the thief, and just as athletically built, and he had the Kilcannon luck on his side, but a gun was a gun and money was only money.

He did as he was told, and didn't move.

The intruder picked up the bag containing his winnings and weighed it carefully, but didn't bother to open it. He—assuming that it
was
a he—put out his right hand to flip aside the breast of the jacket Canny had discarded, exposing the wallet in the inside pocket, but he couldn't take it out without putting down either the gun or the bag containing the forty-even thousand Euros. After a moment's hesitation, he left the wallet where it was and turned back to Canny.

By that time, Canny had thought of several good reasons to justify his decision not to move. It simply wasn't worth it; the money might be slightly more than a drop in the ocean, but it wasn't anything he needed desperately—it certainly wasn't a sum worth risking his life for the mere possibility of its salvation. Then again, the streak he'd invoked in order to win it might well have generated aftershocks in the fabric of reality, of which this might be one—and even if the people were wrong who believed that there was some kind of ultimate account-book to be balanced, he couldn't take it for granted that the corollary disruptions of probability would all go his way. Nor could he be sure, now that his father was fading fast, whether the records were right to declare that his luck was heading towards its minimal level, or exactly when that minimal level would be reached. If he were now a mere victim of chance, just like anyone else, it certainly wouldn't be a good time to play the hero or the fool.

The reasonable thing to do—the
only
reasonable thing to do—was to let the thief take the money, slip through the curtains and vanish into the dark garden, saying “easy come, easy go” in the casually cavalier fashion that was, it seemed, the very essence of his public image.

But at a deeper level, Canny understood that none of those reasons was the
real
reason why he was standing still. While all of that was going through his mind, he knew that he was letting events take their course because he was paralyzed by fear. In some respects, he was only human. He could be startled, shocked, frightened...even petrified. Gambling
was
as natural as breathing to him, but the manner in which he played with cards and chips was still an act, a role, a performance. When he was precipitated out of that public persona by an event as outrageous as this one, his habitual self-confidence sometimes deserted him, leaving him with only the same instincts and reflexes to guide him as anyone else.

He didn't move because he couldn't. He was stuck.

He didn't even say anything. He waited in vain for chance to intervene in his favor regardless—for the thief to stumble and drop the gun, or for the police to burst in and spring a trap—but nothing happened. The flow of causality seemed inexorable, immune to the superimposition of a more generous alternative.

After a slight hesitation, perhaps born of trepidation and anxiety rather than any uncertainty as to what he ought to do, the intruder grasped the black bag tightly, moved smoothly across the room, and exited via the balcony. The curtain prevented Canny from seeing him jump, and the monks' garden absorbed the sound of his footfalls. It was as if he had vanished into the shadows like one more virtual serpent in a swarm.

Canny's thoughts immediately became unstuck. He snatched up the phone and pressed the button that would connect him to the front desk. The night-manager's response was immediate.

“You have intruders in the grounds,” Canny said. “In the monks' garden. One is dressed entirely in black, with a ski-mask and an automatic pistol. He's carrying a rectangular leather bag about fifty centimeters by thirty-five.”

“I have pressed the alarm, Monsieur,” the manager told him. “The police will be here within fifteen minutes.”

“I don't have time to talk to the police,” Canny told him. “Can you put me through to Henri Meurdon at the casino.”

“Yes, Monsieur.”

Meurdon was just as quick to reply. “Henri?” Canny said. “It's Canavan Kilcannon. I think you might have a spotter in the casino—or might have had when I left. When I got back to my hotel there was someone waiting to relieve me of my winnings. Nobody knew I had them till five or ten minutes before I cashed up, so they must have worked very fast indeed. Check your tapes to see if anyone left within the last half hour—and take a close look at the crowd around the roulette table. You might be able to identify him, or at least narrow the field. I can't hang around—I'll have to leave it with you.”

“I shall take care of it, Monsieur,” was all the Meurdon said. “You will get your money back, if it is humanly possible.” There was no surprise in his voice, just grim concern—but that was part of his standard performance, and what Canny had just told him hadn't been nearly sufficient to shock him out of it.

Canny didn't waste time wondering whether it might have been Meurdon who had tipped off the thief. Even if everything the manager had earlier said to Canny about being delighted to see him win had been so much bullshit, Meurdon couldn't afford to get involved in anything so stupidly brutal. He couldn't have people lurking in his casino to tip off muggers, either. Forty-seven thousand was a very tiny sum compared to the losses he might sustain if a rumor like that got around; it wasn't as if he was short of competition in Monte Carlo.

“Don't worry about the money, Henri,” Canny told him. “I just thought you'd appreciate the warning, in case you do have a snake in the grass. I hope it's a false alarm.”

“Merci, Monsieur.”

Canny rang off and resumed getting dressed. The most important thing of all, he thought, was not to let the unfortunate incident disrupt his plans too badly. It would be adding insult to injury if he were to miss Lissa Lo's boat, and not just because it would save him ten or twelve hours by comparison with Air France's flight to Heathrow and its British Midland connection.

He carried the suitcase down the stairs; it wasn't heavy enough now to require the elevator, although it felt a little better once he'd added the items he'd stored in the hotel safe. He signed the account and the credit card slip.

“The intruder was about five-four—sorry I can't do that in metric—and slimly built,” he said. “That's all I can tell you, except for what I said before. The lock on my balcony door hasn't been forced, although I can't be certain that he wasn't in the room before I opened it. You might want to check the wall and the balustrade, in case he left anything behind when he was climbing up.”

“What did he take, Monsieur?” the night-manager asked, insouciantly.

“Nothing of any importance,” Canny said. “I might have disturbed him, panicked him into running before he'd had a chance to go through my stuff and move on to other rooms. The bag wasn't mine—it belonged to the casino.”

“Ah oui,”
said the night-manager, nodding his head. “Monsieur Meurdon will doubtless take his own steps to recover it.”

“Apologize to the police on my behalf,” Canny said. “Explain about my father. I have to get down to the quay before the boat leaves, or I'll lose half a day. That could be the difference between seeing him once more and....”

“I understand, Monsieur,” the manager assured him. “I will take care of everything. Good luck, Monsieur.”

Canny thanked him, and hurried out. The cab pulled away from the curb just as the police car was arriving, but the police made no attempt to interrupt its departure.