The Valley of the Shadow (29 page)

“Just a moment, sir,” she told Scumble, who picked up his phone, happy not to have to deal with the obstructive super.

“Megan,” said Ken in a low voice, “I’ve got a couple of questions.”

“Ask away.”

“You’ve given up trying to get the names of their relatives already in this country?”

“The boss says it’s not really our business—so far, at least. If some other agency wants to follow it up, that’s up to them.”

He nodded. “Reasonable. And the relatives will lie low of course, especially once it gets into the press. I haven’t seen any news items, papers or on the box, by the way, and this all started two or three days ago.”

“It’ll break tomorrow, when the local paper comes out. I couldn’t prevent their cub reporter interviewing the Nayaks. The telly missed it because they came ashore in filthy weather and the cameramen had all retired to the nearest pub.”

“You did a good job there, pulling this chap out.”

“All in a day’s work,” said Megan, blushing, “though as a matter of fact, I was off duty at the time. Any more questions?”

“Yes. Is it certain that the bloke you call the ‘captain’ knew how to get to the cave, or could it have been his crewman leading the way?”

“Good point. Jay—Ajay Nayak, the ex-copper—was in the last boatload, so he wouldn’t have seen. I ought to have asked someone from the first load.”

“Can’t think of everything. You seem to have covered it pretty thoroughly.”

Scumble put down the phone. “Now that’s a man I wouldn’t mind working with! He’s sending a man right away to the accommodation address.”

“Newsagent’s,” Megan murmured to Ken.

“The post office will have to wait till the morning. He’ll send someone first thing, when they open. Not that there’s much chance of getting a description of whoever set it up, at this stage. It couldn’t very well have been the captain, as he was at sea. Probably Lenny. If we can find him, the post office or newsagent people may be able to identify him.”

“Lenny’s the man who crewed on the yacht?” Ken asked.

“That’s right, according to Gopal Nayak. What I want to know, Sergeant, is where you come into all this business?”

“In the end, sir, the agencies concerned decided they couldn’t begin to deal with the illegal entry of these people until the criminal investigation is completed. So my instructions are to help you in any way possible.”

“And report back.”

“Well, naturally, sir, I’m expected to turn in a report.”

“Huh. You’d better go to Falmouth with Pencarrow tomorrow. You may conceivably be of some use to her. Know anything about shipping?”

“No, sir, afraid not.”

“Pity. You’ll be questioning the harbourmaster, and it always helps to know what you’re talking about, especially as we haven’t much to go on beyond a youngster’s memory of a flashing lighthouse. You have an appointment at half two. A busy man, apparently.” The phone rang. “Damn, what now?”

Megan got it. A smile spread across her face as she listened. “Thank you, sir, thank you very much.” She hung up. “The Plymouth chief inspector, sir. Kalith Chudasama has come round and the doctor says we can probably talk to him tomorrow, after ten a.m., if the consultant says he’s well enough.”

Scumble actually smiled. “Well done, Pencarrow. You—”
Brrr-brrr.
“Dammit, what
now
?” Impatiently, he grabbed his own phone. His face darkened. “All right, Eliot, I’ll be with you in … half an hour. Switchboard, get me a driver.” He slammed down the receiver and stood up. “I suppose it’ll be Dawson,” he said gloomily to Megan.

“What’s gone wrong, sir?”

“Eliot ran the mugger to earth. He’s holed up with his girlfriend and baby and threatening to set fire to the place if they try to arrest him. You can go home now, Pencarrow. Tomorrow: Plymouth, Bodmin, Falmouth. I hope you know what to do. I’m off.” He strode out.

“Fire engines,” said Ken wistfully, “sirens, ambulances. It’s a pity to miss the excitement. Hospital and harbourmaster sound awfully dull in comparison. Come on. I’m going to take these reports with me and reread them tonight, but I’ll buy you dinner first. White Hart any good?”

“Typical provincial hotel fare. It’ll do. We’ll go dutch.”

“Independent, that’s what I’ve always liked about you, Meggie—Megan.” But it didn’t stop him liking long-legged blond models better. “You buy me a drink, and I’ll spring for dinner.”

Dinner at the White Hart would put a hole in Megan’s budget. They might have the same rank, but London pay was better, and Ken had private means as well. Besides, she was too tired to argue, and starving. Had she eaten lunch? She couldn’t remember. “Okay. Thanks.”

“You can pay me back by telling me all the bits that didn’t make it into the official reports.”

“Sing for my supper. All right. You never know what might help tomorrow.”

They managed to get a table in a corner of the dining room. Over excellent roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, she filled in the story, in a low voice. She couldn’t avoid talking about Aunt Nell’s part in the investigation, which was embarrassing and, she found out too late, unnecessary, as he hadn’t recognised the name Eleanor Trewynn. He thought it was very funny.

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell the world your aunt is turning into a second Miss Marple. She was mixed up in the jewel theft business, wasn’t she? It sounds a bit risky, though, sending her to find your smuggler.”

“We didn’t send her,” Megan said indignantly. “It was entirely her own idea. And what’s more, she’s probably the only person who could have done it, the only person the original informant would have talked to.”

“I must say, Boscastle sounds like a hotbed of villainy.”

“It’s always had a bit of a reputation. I read a history— Oh hell!” The words escaped rather louder than she had intended. She ignored the disapproving glances cast her way but lowered her voice again. “Avery. Chaz. I knew there was something!”

“Chaz Avery? The laddie who helped to pull you out? Would you mind explaining these oracular utterances?”

“I read a history of Boscastle. Avery owned most if not all of it in the first half of the last century. He was the squire and a magistrate, but by all accounts he was a first-rate villain. He had a finger—or a fist—in every available pie: buying and selling, fishing, mining, smuggling, even wrecking. And shipbuilding.”

“And Chaz is a descendant?”

“Don’t you think? Must be on the wrong side of the blanket. Avery never married, but he was a womaniser and one of his women could have taken his name. Chaz’s family is in shipping. He lives in Falmouth.”

“So knowledge of the caves might have been passed down, along with a tradition of shipbuilding, or involvement with ships. It’s pretty persuasive.”

“And gives us a whole lot more to present to the harbourmaster! It’s a nuisance that the local directory doesn’t cover that area. We’ll—I’ll have to go back to the nick—”

“Not on your nelly. Relax, Megan. It can wait till morning. You look fagged out.”

“Thanks a lot!”

“In a charming way. Pudding? I’m going for apple tart with clotted cream.”

*   *   *

When Megan reached the nick next morning, the duty sergeant told her Scumble had talked the mugger out of his hole in the early hours of the morning. “No damage done,” he said cheerfully, “except having been all sweet reason there, he came back in a tearing temper. But he won’t be in till after lunch and you’ll be well away. He said you’re to go ahead with yesterday’s orders. Report in when you can.”

“Plymouth, Bodmin, Falmouth. We’ve got directories upstairs, but can you round me up a street map of Plymouth, Sarge?”

“Sure thing, Sarge.” He grinned at her. “Taking the boyfriend with you, are you?”

“He’s not my boyfriend.” Megan tried to say it lightly. “I worked with him in London.”

“Odd how he keeps getting himself sent down here.”

“Didn’t you hear? After two visits, his superiors consider him an expert in the ways of the local yokels in this uncivilised corner of the country. Any coffee going?”

He glanced into his own mug, half full of cold, muddy liquid. “I’ll have young Arden make some fresh. He’ll bring it up, and the map.”

“Ta, Sarge.”

“Oh, by the way, you seen the paper this morning?”

“The local rag? No.” She hurried on her way before he could tell her about it.

Ken arrived before the coffee. He slung a couple of newspapers on the desk in front of her, the front page of the
North Cornwall Times
and the
Guardian
folded back to an inner page.

The local paper’s headline blared, “Heroic Rescue by Local Cop.” Beneath it was a head-and-shoulders photo of Megan, looking particularly po-faced, perhaps because it had been cut from the one taken when she’d had to escort her aunt down the hill in Port Mabyn in the course of her duties. Below the fold was a picture of the Rocky Valley inlet, taken in stormy weather with waves breaking against the cliff in showers of spray.

“You dived into
that
?” said Ken.

“It was calm that day,” Megan said defensively, turning to the inner page.

A smaller headline read, “‘My cousin saved us,’ says Gopal Nayak.” There was a photo of the three Nayak children, two solemn, wide-eyed little ones and Pal with his enchanting grin. For some reason, it made her want to cry. She hurriedly folded the papers and put the Falmouth district directory on top.

“I’ve found several Averys,” she said. “Rupert Avery, architect. That would be Chaz’s father. Business address in Falmouth, home address in Flushing—Mr. and Mrs. Rupert Avery.”

“Flushing? Isn’t that in the Netherlands?”

“Maybe it was founded by Dutch traders? It’s across the Penryn River from Falmouth, and it’s where Victorian merchants and ship’s captains built their mansions.”

“Aha!”

“Paul Avery, same address. Perran Avery, same address. They all have separate phone numbers, though.”

“One big happy family? Or not, as the case may be.”

“Perran must be Chaz’s grandfather.”

“Why?”

“Just a guess, but Perran’s an old Cornish name. Rupert, Paul, and Charles—”

“Point taken. That’s it?”

“In the family mansion. But there’s Avery Maritime, Worldwide Freight Shipping, with an office on Duchy Wharf.”

“Bingo!”

PC Arden came in with a mug of coffee and the Plymouth map. “Coffee for you, Sergeant?” he asked Ken.

“No, thanks.”

“It’s no worse than the muck at the Yard,” said Megan, sipping.

“But I just had a splendid breakfast at the White Hart. Let’s have a dekko at that street map.”

They pored over it. “Here’s Greenbank Hospital.” Megan put her finger on it. “Now we just have to hope they haven’t changed the one-way streets again since this was printed.” She glanced at her watch. “It’s much too early to ring the Plymouth nick about the post office and newsagent’s.”

“Might as well drop in while we’re there.”

“Yes. I’ll leave a message in case they ring here.” She gulped down the last of the coffee. “You ready to go?”

Megan at the wheel of the unmarked car, they drove south in hazy sunshine, for the most part through rolling farmland, and across the Tamar Bridge. The hospital was easy to find, a vast Victorian spread with wings branching in every direction. She pulled into a spot in the car park with five minutes to spare.

“Your driving is much improved,” said Ken as they got out and started towards the building.

“I do a lot here. I never got much practice in London.”

“Megan, you ought to come back. You’re wasted here. And we make a good team.”

“We’re not doing this interview as a team, though. Apart from the doctor not allowing more than one visitor at a time, Kalith doesn’t need your intimidating presence.”

“Me! Intimidating!” He sounded injured. “You’re thinking of your boss.”

“Not your manner, idiot, though I know you can put it on with the best. But white, male, stranger, police.”

“You’re white and police, and the chances of him remembering you after what he’s been through are slight, if you ask me. But you’re right.” He sighed. “The doctor’s unlikely to let us both see him. You’re the obvious choice.”

“Besides, I’m authorised to be here. You, I suspect, are not.”

“Plymouth? Oh hell, Devon. Yes, I’ve got clearance only for Cornwall. It’s all yours.”

“Do you want to go for a walk?”

“No. We’ve no idea how long this is going to take.”

It took them some time to find the right ward. Then they were told the consultant had had an emergency case and hadn’t yet finished his rounds. The empty waiting room was dingy, hung with pallid watercolours of rural scenes, evoking the stillness of death rather than any sense of peace and comfort.

“What they need is to liven up the place with a few of Nick’s brightest landscapes,” Megan said tartly.

“Nick?” Ken was investigating a pair of urns. “Tepid tea or tepid coffee?”

“No, thanks.”

“Just what I was thinking. Twin hearts that beat as one. Why don’t you come back, Megan? We had a good thing going.”

“‘Had’ being the operative word.”

“You’re the one who left for the outer reaches of the kingdom.”

“You’re the one who moved out. And moved in with someone else.”

“Yes, well, we all make mistakes.”

“And go on making them, from what I hear.”

“Only because you aren’t there.”

“Nor am I going to be there.”

“Is there someone else? Who’s this Nick? Not that artist bloke who was involved in—?”

He
would
remember! “My aunt’s neighbour, that’s all,” Megan said firmly. “You’d better stop this, Ken. We’re about to quarrel and we’ve got to work together for the rest of—”

“DS Pencarrow?”

“Yes, Sister.” Relieved to get away, Megan followed the nurse.

“Mr. Chudasama’s going to pull through,” she said, leading the way, “but it’s been touch-and-go. You know what happened to him?”

“Pretty much. I … I was there when he was rescued.”

“Pencarrow! You’re the one who pulled him out! I thought it sounded familiar, but all these Cornish names sound the same to me.” She turned and looked Megan up and down. “Pleased to meet you. That was a job well done. Here we are.” Her hand on a doorknob, she went on, “Doctor says just five minutes, and I’m to stay. You needn’t worry, I won’t repeat anything I hear.”