Cigarettes were offered from a matching box. After lighting up Kate and me, Millie was dismissed. Kate indicated I should retake my chair and took the one opposite. It looked like she was trying to turn it into a cosy fireside chat.
Not if I could help it.
“Bottoms up, McRae.” She raised her glass. I did too. We sipped warily. “Now, what can I do for you? I don’t owe you any more money, do I?” She was all innocence and condescension.
I felt my resolution and my carefully prepared questions melting in the heat of her gaze. Some women were made to be viewed by firelight. It turned her blonde hair to silver and cast shadows that accentuated her neat nose and strong cheekbones. Her skin was carved marble. I took a bigger swig and felt the whisky bite my throat and burn my insides with resolution.
“I was well paid, Miss Graveney. Maybe too well. I want to know why you’ve been conducting this charade?”
She raised the pale curves of her eyebrows. “Charade?” She took a deep pull on her cigarette.
“The faked death of Major Philip Anthony Caldwell.”
She didn’t blink. She was good. She knew I knew, and had it all prepared. “Why, Mr McRae, what a lurid imagination you have. But even if it were true, I’m sure you’re such a good detective that you could tell me, mmm?”
Sarcastic bitch. My anger grew at the way these people were making a jackass of me.
“OK, Miss Graveney. Here’s what I think. I think Tony Caldwell is alive and that you tried to deceive me about his death. I don’t know how you contrived the bombed-out flat; that seems a step too far just to convince me Tony was dead. I do know that Liza Caldwell and Tony are not man and wife, or if they are, it’s another charade, possibly protecting you. How am I doing so far?”
She blew out a plume of smoke. “But why on earth would we want to do such a thing? I mean why bother?” Her tone made it sound like she meant why would someone like her bother for a worm like me.
“Because I was snooping around, trying to fill in the gaps from this.” I indicated my head wound. “And you’ve got something to hide, Catriona.”
She snorted and tried to look offended, an easy role for her. But she didn’t deny the name. “What could I possibly want to hide from you?”
“Your marriage to Caldwell?”
She laughed. It seemed genuine. “Don’t be silly.”
I was beginning to get really pissed off. “An affair, then?” I accused desperately.
She shook her head. “Mr McRae, I’m sure in your… circle, affairs are simply the stuff of scandal. But with us…” she shrugged and her glance round the sumptuous room couldn’t make her superiority any clearer. Her voice dropped to a sarcastic whisper. “And anyway, you can’t have a proper affair if you’re not married.”
I wanted to hit her. “Then what’s all this about, for god’s sake, if it’s all so beneath you!”
I had an instant’s warning. The creak of a door and a footstep on the wooden floor behind me.
“I’ll tell you why, McRae. Or may I still call you Danny?”
That cool voice, that smooth, tough voice that sent me on my way to France, pulled me to my feet in a heartbeat. He ambled into the room from a doorway behind me.
Tony Caldwell hadn’t changed much. Still slim, about the same height as me, slicked-back sandy hair and neat moustache. The difference was in the eyes; once calculating they now looked cunning, older and more tired. Too many late nights?
I got my bags by lying awake and staring at the ceiling in the hours before dawn. What was keeping him up? He was smiling in that special mocking way of his; he used it to poke fun at me and the other agents during training if we got something wrong.
“You look well for a corpse,” I said.
“And you look fine, Danny. Much better than when I last saw you. Thought you mightn’t make it, you know. Pretty beat up.” He walked over to the drinks cabinet and pulled out the Scotch. “Top up, anyone?”
“Why, Tony? Why all this… contrivance? What are you hiding?”
Tony filled his tumbler, walked over and stood behind Kate’s chair, an elegant pose for the family album. But whose family? “We’ve got nothing to hide, old man. It’s you we were hiding from.” He smiled in what he thought was a sympathetic manner.
“Dear god, Tony, what were you afraid of from me?”
His voice was sweet and sickly. “You’re not well, old man. I mean really not well. Damn shame. I mean not your fault. But you came back in terrible shape and the quacks who know about such stuff said you were a bit – how shall we put it – barmy.”
I’d had enough of this. “That’s such shit, Tony! They wouldn’t have let me out if I was mad. I’ve lost some memories, not my marbles!”
He tried to look earnest. It came out patronising. “Danny, you’ve seen my reports and the psychiatrist’s report. He thought you’d be delusional, paranoiac, wanting to blame someone. The likelihood was that you’d blame me. You were too dangerous. Didn’t want you to flare up, don’t you know?”
Damn him! It was true enough for whatever case he was making against me. Then a thought struck me. “How did you know I’ve seen your reports on me?”
“I heard about your little break-in. Went a bit far, that. Afraid it sort of bears out what we’re all saying, old chap.”
Who told him? Cassells? I was feeling swamped now; a little truth could become a big lie with clever words. I fought back.
“That still isn’t grounds for sending me chasing wild geese. All you had to do was meet me and tell me what you knew. That’s all. I wanted to find out, Tony. I wasn’t blaming you.”
“But here you are. Wouldn’t let it go, would you. Always saw you as the terrier type. Like the rest of your clan. Get your teeth into something and you’d cling to it till the death. Great spirit. For a war. But not now, do you see? Besides… ”
“Besides what?”
“The psychiatrists didn’t have all the facts, did they?”
I knew what was coming. I felt nausea rise.
“They didn’t know about the little problem in France. The little French girl.
Did they? And I ’spect if they had, they might have decided to hang on to you for a bit. I couldn’t take that chance.” He moved out from behind Kate’s chair and stepped closer to me. “Couldn’t let you near me or mine, d’you see? Done it once and you might do it again, right?”
His concerned eyes searched mine. I could feel the weight of his argument piling on me like a rock fall. Wouldn’t I have done the same, in his shoes? I was casting about for a way to fight back. I searched my treacherous memory for the list of questions I’d been planning to pose. I grasped at one. “Do you mean you were so concerned for your safety – and Liza, and your… wife or girlfriend here…” I waved in the direction of Kate who was watching us intently from her chair. “… that you blew up the house you were using? And why were you using another house anyway? Doesn’t this place have enough hideaways?”
I thought I’d connected for a moment, then his smile flickered back into life.
“Serendipity, old chap. The house belonged to a friend of ours. Used to pop in for drinks and such. But the house was empty when it went up. Our friend spends winter in the South of France. Can’t blame him, can you? Must have been a gas leak or something. Gave us the notion of taking me out the picture, d’you see?
Very convenient.”
“Very.” I couldn’t hide the sarcasm. “And the shoes, the beautiful blue shoes?”
I directed this at her, sitting with a smile on her face, or was it a smirk? “I quite liked those shoes you know. You should have searched harder, McRae. I’d have liked them both back.”
I was getting desperate now, angry with them and myself for my inability to break down their smug faзade. My questions were coming out more and more shrill.
“You turned this into a game, didn’t you? It became something to amuse you! What the hell are you doing in this house anyway, Tony? Why is Kate registered as your next of kin? What’s going on here?”