Chapter 28: Chapter 28

James We fall into silence again.

After a minute Klempner touches his ear again. “Michael doesn’t sound very happy,” he comments, his voice dry. “He can’t find them. Nor Ben.” He checks his phone. “Nothing from Marco either.”

Has someone warned them?

Richard?

Has Charlotte got them out of sight?

“You won’t find them, Klempner,” I drawl. “When Charlotte goes to ground, no-one finds her. She had a lot of practice at running when she was younger. If you had trouble keeping tabs on her as a child, what do you think your chances are now?”

He scratches at a cheek-bone, fixing his gaze on me. “It occurs to me that I have the ideal hostage to draw out my daughter.”

I’m keen for a change of conversation. “How did you do it? Get a bug on Michael’s car?”

He hesitates, as though deciding whether to answer. “The very first time you visited me in the prison.

You have to hand the keys over when you sign in. From there…”

“All you need is a corrupt guard. And we already know you have one of those.”

That something flickers over Klempner’s face again.

Yes, regret…

He removes the earpiece, plugs it into his own phone and lays it on the tabletop. “We might as well listen in comfort. You can keep up to date with events too.”

Fuck you…

But the speaker gives out little other than a grinding sound which I assume is Michael’s car engine.

Is my car bugged too?

Did we ever travel to the prison in it?

Racking my brain, I try to remember.

No… Michael always drove…

Klempner drums his fingers. “While we’re waiting,” he says, “do you mind if I ask you a couple of things?”

“Such as?”

“Such as how Conners comes to be still alive? I’ll admit that took me completely off-guard. As far as I was concerned, he’d been at the river-bottom for the last two decades.”

Can it do any harm to tell him?

“Mitch outwitted you. Knocked out the guard, sneaked in to where you were holding him and they exchanged the guard’s body for Frank’s.”

Klempner stares into space, nodding slowly. “Really? Clever of her. I never suspected. Brave of her too. I wasn't in a good state of mind that day.”

“Mitch paid a heavy price for her courage. She won Frank but lost Charlotte… Jenny.”

His head falls back against the stone wall. “I always expected Mitch to come back for her baby. I never understood why she didn’t. You know… she’d told me once that she would never have abandoned a child.”

Why would they have talked about something like that?

“Mitch didn’t abandon her. Conners told her you murdered Jenny.”

Klempner sits bolt upright, eyes slitting. “Did he…” he hisses. “And why did he say that?”

I shrug. “So far as I can tell, to stop Mitch going after her. He wanted to disappear.”

“In other words, to save his own useless skin?”

I shrug again, hold out my palms.

Klempner sneers. “Cowardly bastard. I've never hidden behind a woman's skirts. He didn’t deserve her.”

I rub behind an ear. “Now on that, I’m with you one hundred percent.”

Klempner regards me, lids lowered. “You like her? Mitch.”

“I barely know her. But yes, what I’ve seen so far, I like. Like mother, like daughter. And I’m fucked if I’ll let you use me as leverage to hurt either of them.”

From outside, the crunch of tires on uneven ground and the growl of an engine. Klempner stands. “Our chariot awaits. Up you get, James.”

*****

Michael The blindingly bloody obvious finally hits me between the eyes.

Fuck!

I bang the dashboard with a fist.

Stupid. Stupid.

I’m trying to drive through the City one-way system in traffic. If I go on foot…

Think with your brain. Not panic and adrenalin…

Spinning the steering wheel, I squeal across two lanes and a junction, cut in front of a taxi driver, then park up, two wheels on the kerb.

Ignoring the screeched curses from the cabbie behind me, giving only passing thought that the car is likely to be towed, I set off at a run, abandoning car, bug and all.

*****

Hot, lungs heaving, heart pumping and dripping with sweat, I burst through the doors of Francesca’s department store.

The tearooms are on the top floor. Middle-class ladies with crimped hair and primped clothes look at me askance as I head for the elevator. One prize example makes a show of wafting the air by her face as at the last moment, I take the escalator instead, so I can scan the shop floor.

On the fourth storey, it's almost empty. A couple of tables are still occupied, but empty cups and plates strewn with crumbs say they’re almost done.

Other tables are being stripped, wiped and reset with white linen, silver cutlery and flowers. A pair of swing doors open to the sound of kitchen clatter and a man in blue overalls pushing a floor polisher.

There’s no sign of Charlotte, Mitch or Kirstie.

Wiping my dripping forehead on my sleeve, I’m heading for a woman wearing a black dress, white apron and sensible shoes when the phone buzzes in my pocket.

“Ben? You found them? I’m in Francesca’s now but there’s no…”

He cuts me short, sounding oddly hollow, a touch of echo in the background. “No, they’d gone when I got there about twenty minutes ago, but the waitress who’d served them said she overheard them talking about going to see a movie afterward.”

“Did she hear which movie?”

“No. I asked, but she didn’t know.”

Christ. How many fucking cinemas are there around here?

Then I realise I spoke out loud.

There’s a short silence then Ben says, “I make it eight. I’m heading for the West End. I started with the nearest. I’m in there now, at The Royal. I’ll ask at the desk if they’ve seen them.”

“Right, you cover that end of town. I’ll head the other way down East Street. Keep in touch.”

“I’ll do that Bro.”

And once more, I set off at a run.

*****