‘With Carl?’ Ben said, narrowing his eyes.
‘He warned me that Carl might be in danger. Promised to meet me and explain everything, when he’d found out more. And that’s the last I heard from him. Next thing I knew, he was dead.’
Ben looked carefully at Drew. He seemed to be telling the truth.
‘A mugging gone wrong,’ Drew went on. ‘Just another statistic. There are so many fatal stabbings in Britain these days, what’s one more? But I knew that this was connected. And I knew that Finley had been right and that Carl was in danger.’
Ben frowned, but said nothing and went on listening.
‘That’s when I decided I had to get him out of there. If I’d still had parental access, it would have been so much easier. Instead, I had to plan this whole kidnap thing, as fast as I could. I found a forger in Brittany who could do the false passports. Dyed my hair for the photo and used Photoshop to doctor Carl’s picture. I took all my money out of the bank. Bought a wig and a fake beard that made me look like I used to before I’d cleaned myself up, and a load of padding that I could stuff under my clothes to make me look fat. Paid six months’ rent to this old farmer for a static caravan in a field overlooking Bonne Nuit beach. Very secluded, the perfect place I could take Carl after the snatch.’ Drew shrugged. ‘Then all I needed was a weapon of some kind. I’m not the most physical guy. I needed to be able to intimidate Mike somehow and get him into the cellar. I thought about using a knife, but what if there was a struggle and somehow Carl got hurt? That’s when I thought about using a fake gun. Not,’ he added, ‘that I’d have had the faintest idea where to get a real one. But that way, I could carry off the kidnapping without any risk of anyone being injured if it all went horribly wrong. I found one in a secondhand shop that looked real, at least to me. And it worked on Mike, too. Everything went exactly as I’d planned. Carl played his role very well.’
‘He knew?’
‘Oh, yes. We were secretly in touch the whole time, by phone. He wanted to get away as much as I wanted him out of there. So off we went. I hated having to lock Jessica in the cellar, but I’d no choice. After we left the house, I drove Carl straight to the caravan. I burned the wig, the beard and the body padding. Quickly dyed his hair to make him look like the passport photo. I’d timed it all so that we could catch the last ferry. If by some chance Mike and Jessica had got out of the cellar by then and raised the alarm, the police would be looking for an overweight bearded guy looking like a dosser, accompanied by a little fair-haired boy. It didn’t happen. Nobody looked twice at our passports on landing in France. It was so easy. We jumped on a train and came down to Monaco. I’d planned to stay here a few more weeks and then move on somewhere more permanent. We’d have started a new life.’ Drew shook his head forlornly. ‘And I was sure we’d made it. Until today, when you came along.’
Ben thought for a moment. ‘So this whole plan came about because you thought that Carl was in danger from Mike?’
Drew nodded. ‘I’m still certain of it.’
‘And you couldn’t just have told Jessica, instead of resorting to kidnap?’
‘What, you think she’d have believed me?’ Drew snorted. ‘She’d have seen it as a ploy, that’s all.’
‘Fine. Let’s talk straight here, Drew. You’ve told me about Mike’s meetings with these other men. The way he seemed to be passing on some kind of material that somehow related to Carl. Then there’s whatever it was that Finley found out that made him think Carl was at risk. Are you saying that Mike belongs to a paedophile ring? Was Carl being abused?’
Drew shook his head. ‘No, he wasn’t being abused. It’s not that. It’s something else. Something even worse. Carl knew all along that Mike wasn’t what he seemed to be. The creep was always asking him all these little questions. Playing mind games, like he was observing his responses. Studying him like a lab rat, Carl said. Carl couldn’t get into his head. Which is odd. But he could sense something about the guy that made him uncomfortable. I believe that Finley discovered the truth behind it all.’
‘What do you mean, Carl couldn’t get into his head? Ben asked, totally baffled. Sensed what?’
‘That’s why I needed you to come here,’ Drew said. There’s something I have to show you.’
15
Ben waited, confused and impatient, while Drew fished a video cassette out of a bag and fed it into a VCR. Prince Al-Naseem’s giant TV screen flashed into life. ‘What are you showing me, Drew?’ he asked. The ten minutes had been up long ago.
‘Just watch,’ Drew said. As the video began to play, Carl put his head round the door and came back into the room. ‘Is this—?’ he began, and his father nodded.
Ben quickly realised that he was watching a high-quality home video. The image was steady, as if the camera had been mounted on a tripod in the hands of an expert. ‘Did you film this?’ he asked.
‘August 2001,’ Drew said. ‘Our family holiday near Málaga.’
The screen showed a village square, surrounded by old whitewashed houses and shaded from the sun. The square was bustling with people, who seemed to be crowding to watch some spectacle taking place, many of them craning their necks to see. Whatever it was, it was generating an excited buzz of chatter.
As Ben watched, the camera panned smoothly across to reveal what the crowd were so interested in. Sitting opposite one another at a café table were two chess players. On one side, playing black with a look of intense concentration, was a swarthy middle-aged man with the deep tan of a native of southern Spain; on the other side, playing white, was a younger, smaller Carl in shorts and a T-shirt. However long the game had been going on for, there were only a few pieces remaining on the board. After a few more moments’ careful deliberation, the Spaniard picked up his surviving bishop and cut diagonally across the board to threaten a white rook. The move caused a murmur among the crowd.
‘That’s Ángelo Martín,’ Drew said. ‘He was the Spanish chess champion eight years running.’
With hardly a pause, Carl reached for his threatened rook and slid it across to capture the second black knight. It took a couple of moments for the spectators to realise why Ángelo Martín was now gaping at the chessboard in disbelief. Gasps broke out.
‘Checkmate,’ Carl said calmly.
Cameras began to flash. ‘He’s done it again!’ said on offscreen voice in Spanish. ‘It’s impossible,’ said another. ‘Nobody beats Ángelo Martín just like that. He’s the champion, for Christ’s sake!’
Drew paused the video, the frozen image of the humiliated champ’s dark expression filling the screen. ‘He hadn’t been playing long. Had you, Carl?’
‘’Bout four months,’ the boy replied casually, trying not to look too proud of himself.
Ben stared at them both. ‘Explain what this is about.’
‘It was just a fluke, how it happened,’ Drew told him. ‘We’d rented a place in this little village, and that afternoon the three of us were having a drink in the square. I’d bought Carl his chess computer not long before, and he was sitting quietly playing when this friendly local guy at a nearby table took an interest in what he was doing. He spoke English and seemed pretty impressed with Carl’s moves, giving him tips and advice. Before Jessica and I knew it, a proper chessboard had been brought out and the two of them were playing a real game.
‘It was only then that we realised the man was Ángelo Martín. He started out playing gently, letting Carl take a few pawns. But then things started getting more serious. Carl was wiping the board with him. He seemed to be able to anticipate every move in the champion’s mind, foil every strategy before it even had a chance to develop. Carl had always shown some odd abilities, but this was the first time I began to realise how strong his gift was.’