TWENTY-EIGHT

‘I don’t suppose,’ Morris said, turning south, ‘that Ashford is the gastronomic capital of Kent, but at least there’s a motorway heading that way, with the car hire place just by a junction. So we’ll change this car and grab a snack and then report to Freya.’

There was a tiny edge to his voice; he really hadn’t enjoyed her pulling rank, had he? And what was that about his promotion? Why hadn’t he shouted it from the housetops? Now didn’t seem to be the time to ask, however. His face was very grim, and not just because of the chaos as we approached Junction 11, where he’d hoped to get access. For some reason we were being diverted via all sorts of highways and byways.

‘Last time they had Operation Stack the police allowed heavy lorries to park right across the roundabout, so you couldn’t get on or off Stone Street,’ I said. ‘Sorry, I should have thought of that. Back up the hill again and I’ll navigate you across country, via Wye. A couple of nice pubs there, too,’ I said.

‘Ashford first,’ he said. ‘Just to please me. Ah, you were right. Look who’s coming towards us. Your friend in the Audi, I fancy. Head down now, Lina. And brace. I may have to risk the insurance excess.’

Head down, I braced. Apart from as hard an acceleration as the Fiesta permitted, nothing happened.

‘Stay down. I think he’s trying to turn. Is there a left turn I can risk?’

‘Stowting. Brabourne. Then look out for Hastingleigh and Wye. Tell me when I can come up.’

The car lurched – by the feel of it he’d almost lost it on a hard left turn, but he righted it and pressed on. He slowed.

‘Tractor ahead. I wonder . . .’

Only one side of the car could have been on the road. We bucked all over the place. Finally, we lurched back left, to the sound of someone’s horn.

‘Poor bugger. Bad enough having a tractor that size coming towards you, let alone a car overtaking it, not just on your bit of road but on your bit of greensward too. OK, Lina, you can come up now. I don’t think the Audi will manage that. What worries me, though,’ he mused, ‘is how he managed to discover our route.’

‘From there you’ve pretty well got to head north or south. Maybe he tried north and gave up, knowing you’d be delayed if you headed south. Satnav or local knowledge,’ I added with a shrug. ‘Unless you think—?’

He didn’t seem to think anything, at least not aloud, but that might have been because he needed a lot of concentration to pick his way through the lanes.

‘How did you get on with the colonel?’ I asked at last.

He threw his head back and laughed. ‘Not as well as someone else was getting on. The poor man appeared at his front door in the shortest silk bathrobe I’ve ever seen. Pink, embroidered with roses. You could actually see –’ He choked. ‘The thing is,’ he managed round his giggles, ‘he was carrying the biggest vibrator I’ve ever seen. And a woman, no doubt the owner of the robe, was calling from upstairs. So I muttered something about it obviously not being convenient and backed away. And do you know what he did? He asked for my card and tried to tuck it . . . And then he went off and got his own card and handed it to me just as if . . . Anyway, I’m supposed to call him this evening. Oh, Lina!’

Thank goodness the road was clear. At last he had to pull over to mop his eyes. ‘The trouble is, we’re no further forward with the surveillance issue. But I tell you, organizing it is definitely one job I shall delegate.’

The car hire people were inclined to be sniffy about the dust all over the car, and they didn’t appreciate my quip that it could have been mud. Anyway, we were soon equipped with yet another set of wheels, and we found a pub on the edge of what seemed to be car-showroom city.

‘Council of war,’ Morris said as we ate chicken salad. ‘I could do with making a lot of phone calls and sending a lot of emails. There are other investigations in progress I need to keep an eye on. It won’t be very exciting.’

‘I’m not a kid, Morris. In fact, I’m so behind with my work, if you could use our cottage as your temporary office, it’d help me. Unless you want to beg a room from Freya?’

‘I’ll call her – see if there’ve been any developments. Hmm. Her mobile’s off, and just in case there is a mole problem, I won’t risk the main phone line.’ He left a message to call him. ‘Your cottage as office sounds very good. Will Griff be there?’ he asked, not quite casually. ‘By the way, I’m afraid I’ve got to dash back this evening. The nanny’s still got problems. Sorry, Lina.’ He kissed my hands. ‘We’ll get this sorted, won’t we?’

‘We will.’ I kissed his in return.

I’d much rather not have spent the afternoon toiling in the stillness of my workroom, but there was something very nice about knowing that Morris was working in our office, just below my feet. Griff had been all too glad of an excuse to get out into the garden, bringing death to weeds and the wrong sort of insect. Eventually, knowing that Morris had resolved to be home by seven, Griff summoned us for late afternoon tea, complete with his home-made lemonade – well, home-made everything.

Goodness knows what we all talked about. I think Griff reported on a test match, but none of us wanted to go inside and watch it, or the tennis that would no doubt have fascinated Steve White. Griff mentioned the Proms, too, but then realized he hadn’t been entirely tactful.

‘So long as it’s a different orchestra,’ Morris said with a grin, ‘that’d be a great idea. You could stay over and meet Leda again. But check with me before you book anything; I may have to go abroad again, but not for too long, with luck.’

‘You youngsters and your peripatetic amours,’ Griff sighed, smiling benignly, leaning back, eyes closed.

It was all too tempting to do the same, my hand safe in Morris’s.

A mobile burst into Beethoven. Morris’s. He hauled himself to his feet and, with a quizzical smile, headed in the direction of the rotary washing-line that Griff pointed to without bothering to open his eyes. Morris muttered a bit and cut the call, coming back to me and dabbing a kiss on my forehead before settling beside me again.

I didn’t move. Not until my phone sounded too. Just an ordinary ringtone.

‘Go on, take the call. I’ve got to be on the move any moment now anyway,’ Morris sighed, getting to his feet.

Pulling a face, I drifted to the spot by the washing-line whirligig that Morris had vacated. ‘Pa?’

‘You got that police chappie of yours there, Lina?’

‘Yes.’

‘Put me on to him, would you?’

‘He’s just on his way back to London.’

‘Won’t take a second. Put him on anyway. I want to talk to him about the snuffbox.’

Summoning Morris, I passed him over to my father.

At first he looked amused, even resigned. But then he looked increasingly serious and fished out his own mobile to make one-thumbed notes. When he cut the call, frowning, he used his own phone to make another call. That done, he came back to the table and sat heavily. ‘Just how compos mentis is he, Lina?’

Griff surfaced. ‘Since my darling girl took him in hand he’s improved a great deal. He’ll never be anything but an old soak, but he’s coherent enough. Does Sudoku like shelling peas. Always beats the contestants on quiz shows.’

‘So we can trust his memory?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Good. He’s just remembered who he saw use the original snuffbox. A neighbour, whose son became an actor. There is just one other thing, though. He says he phoned Freya Webb and was told she wasn’t there. I guess he misdialled and got put through to the main switchboard. Apparently, he told the person at the other end what the problem was – and was told they’d send a couple of officers over as and when.’

Griff and I exchanged a glance. ‘Pa doesn’t really do as and when, does he?’

‘So I gather. Hence he’s summoned me. We have a problem, Griff,’ he added, glancing at me. ‘There might just be a mole in the control room. I think Lina’s father has just invited the wrong people to visit him.’

I started to run, God knows where.

‘Hang on! Where are you going?’ Morris grabbed my arm. ‘Riding to the rescue’s one thing. Making a phone call is easier.’ He passed me my mobile. ‘Tell him to let no one in. No one at all.’

‘And then what? Just sit it out?’ Griff, rarely on my father’s side, demanded.

‘Yes – but not in his wing,’ I said, thinking again. ‘He can let himself through the security door into the main building. All those lockable rooms . . .’ I yelled instructions down the phone to my father, who was now thoroughly confused, and who could blame him? ‘Pa, just do as you’re told – OK? I’m on my way.’ I looked at Morris, trying not to let my lip tremble. ‘And you must be on your way too. Leda can’t babysit herself.’

He shook his head. ‘Plan C. I’ll phone my mother. I know it means I’m a bad father, but she gets to be a good granny. Griff, will you call Freya’s private number from your landline? She needs to know what’s going on, quite clearly, and I don’t want to risk poor mobile coverage. Here, take Lina’s phone.’

Griff grabbed it, trotting into the house after us. ‘Hang on – I’ll just jot it down.’

‘Lina, you drive till I’ve spoken to Mum – OK?’

I did as I was told. Thrusting my phone back to me, Griff did the business with the gates, I shot out, and we were on our way. No, I didn’t try to listen in on Morris’s call. I was too busy wondering about reinforcements and making a decision.

‘Now call Robin,’ I said, as soon as he’d finished his call. ‘Pa trusts him. He’ll do what he says. And maybe Robin needs to be needed,’ I added, nipping round a heavy lorry, but only just making it. Dared I stop to let Morris take over? The road ahead was empty. My foot went down and stayed down.

‘Why this way?’ Morris asked as we sped up the main drive to the front of Bossingham Hall.

‘Better than the track. Safer than all those pot holes. We park and shin over the wall. Trellis – lovely foot holds. And a mounting block to land on. What are you waiting for? Hell, we’re not the first here.’

A familiar Audi sat in my usual space.

‘I’ll get armed backup. Direct number, of course. And you – you stay here.’ He held me, but not tenderly, while he made his call. ‘OK. Now what are you up to?’

‘Heading for the coal hole next to Pa’s kitchen. You and I secured all the other exits and entrances last time you were down, didn’t we? But not this. OK?’

It took two of us to drag away the huge metal sheet covering a chute. There was still some coal at the bottom. Morris went down first, crabwise, raising a hand to help me to do the same. Both using the torches in our mobiles, we picked our way through a maze of cellars.

‘We put locks on Pa’s cellar doors, remember, so I need to find a way up into the main house. Then it’s easy-peasy. Unless they’ve got Pa and he’s been forced to talk.’

We came up in the servants’ corridor behind the library. ‘We have to go through that door.’ I pointed. ‘The CCTV camera does a regular pan. I’ll wait till it looks up there, and then hare across. You wait till it does it again and do the same – right?’

The library door opened easily. But inside I stopped dead. It was either that or have my father smash a cast-iron poker over my head.

‘But you’re both black!’ he said, when I told him off roundly for using the N word. ‘How was I to know it was you?’

‘All the more reason not to use it,’ I said firmly. ‘Absolutely never these days – OK? So you did as Griff told you? Excellent.’

‘Except I think someone’s broken in. I didn’t have time to set the alarm, you see. Heavens, Morris, take your shoes off, man. And you, Lina. This carpet’s three hundred years old, or near enough.’

‘Lina, what are you doing?’ Morris hissed. ‘Come back here!’

‘I’ve not spent all that time sorting out Pa’s stuff only to have someone steal it! It’s his pension fund.’

‘Stay where you are,’ Pa snapped. ‘Let the man do his job. Are you going to arrest him, Morris? Take care, he may be armed.’

‘Correction,’ Morris said. ‘They may be armed. We’ve no idea how many we’re dealing with. That’s why we have to wait for back-up.’ He looked at me sternly, and then glanced out of the window. ‘Hell, now someone else’s arrived! Robin Levitt. And he’s just the sort to dash in where angels fear to tread. Damn. No bloody coverage!’ Then he saw me. ‘Stay where you bloody are, woman! What’s that?’

‘Pepper spray. Don’t ask. But if whoever’s in there tries anything nasty with Robin, he’s going to get an eyeful. They’ll get an eyeful. Whatever. OK, Robin will too, and he won’t like it. But it’ll give us a chance to disarm Chummie.’

‘For us read me. Put it down.’

I’d not seen him in policeman mode for ages. To my surprise, I did as I was told, plonking it on a side table. ‘Pa, stay here and try to get mobile coverage. There’ll probably be an almighty racket as we set off the alarms. That’s fine. Because I can pick my way round the rooms and end up near your front door. Via the link door, of course. Coming?’ I asked Morris.

He pointed at Pa. ‘Stay here. Right?’ And, like me, leaving his shoes behind, followed me out to the corridor leading to Pa’s wing.