Текст книги "Chameleon"

Автор книги: Jackson J. Bentley

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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 27 страниц)

Chapter 33

Stratfield Turgis Village, Nr Basingstoke, Hampshire. Wednesday, 11 am.

It was a week since the Hokobus had met their fate and Pete Lowden still thought about them every hour of every day. In an effort to shake off his despondency, Dee had despatched him to follow up on Simon’s research into Gillian Davis’ origins.

Thus it was that on a rare foray to this unfamiliar part of the country Geordie unexpectedly came across a fellow North Easterner. He shouldn’t have been surprised. After all, his heart felt rendition of the local folk song, ‘Wherever you go you’re bound to find a Geordie’ at the Black Horse on Friday nights had become a regular performance. Now, sitting in front of a real fire in a comfortable lounge, he was helping an attractive middle aged woman recall her childhood by sharing stories about how Newcastle had changed over the years since she had left.

Geordie’s magic with middle aged women had worked again, and he had been warmly welcomed in by Angela Hult, widow of local poacher Les Vaughan. Simon had suggested that Geordie should start here, as it was rumoured that Les Vaughan had abused Gil Davis before taking his own life. Simon suspected that there was some truth in the rumour, given that his wife so despised her husband that she would not even attend his funeral.

After the reminiscences and some strong builder’s tea, the two new friends spoke quietly and intimately about her past.

Angela Hult was born on Tyneside and had entertained dreams of being a vet, but her schoolwork was not of a standard that enabled her to enrol at university. So, at the age of seventeen she started work as a veterinary assistant in Northumberland, where she worked with horses. It seemed that she had found her calling in life, because soon she was working in Bishop Auckland with a famous racehorse trainer, who marvelled at her ability to get sick and injured horses back to their best so quickly. Initially the horse racing vets dismissed her talent, suggesting that her early successes were flukes, but as she performed her miracles more consistently her reputation grew.

At nineteen she found herself living in stable lads’ accommodation near Newbury and on a drunken night out she met the handsome, but disturbed, Les Vaughan. Despite all the warnings, she married the man because she was smitten and he treated her so well. Sadly it didn’t last. He was lazy, relying entirely on her income, he was unfaithful often on their marital bed when she was working, and he was brutal.

At twenty one she had seen enough, and was planning to move back to the North East when Les beat her very badly before taking her money and going out on a drunken binge. A local man named Nick Davis, known to help battered wives, called around when he heard about her injuries. When she refused to face the disparaging looks of the doctors and nurses at Newbury General Hospital yet again, he tended her wounds. Nick was gentle and understanding; he was a little older but quite attractive. Angela fell a little bit in love with the brother of the local squire, and uncle to Gillian Davis.

When she had been administered to, and comforted by, Uncle Nick, he left to seek out Les Vaughan. He apparently found him because Angela had a call the next morning from a casualty nurse asking her to visit Les in hospital. She didn’t go. His mother went instead.

Geordie was intrigued at this glimpse into country life. This was the closest he had come to an everyday tale of country folk since his mother made him listen to the Archers’ omnibus edition on Sunday mornings as she roasted the beef when he was a child.

“Angela, there was a rumour of a bit of a scandal about the time Gillian was born; it seems that Mr Davis wasn’t her real dad. Did you know that?”

“Oh yes, Pete, this is a village. Everyone knows everything, there are no secrets here. It was before my time but it was village folklore long before Nick spilled the beans during one of our long talks. There were a lot of those. They were intended to let Les know I was protected, and it worked.

Nick told me that he had his eye on the new estate manager at Tallgarth House; she was a ‘pretty little thing’, he would always say, but I think he was head over heels in love with her without ever telling her. Her name was Andrea Jane Bailey and she was one of the first women to graduate in Estate Management at Reading University. Nick explained to me that they spent all of their spare time together, but he just couldn’t find the words to tell her how he felt, and then Denton Miles turned up for an internship. Suddenly Andrea was spending every waking hour with Miles, and some non waking hours, too, I suppose.”

Angela giggled. It was the sound of a young woman’s giggle. It was light and it was infectious. Geordie smiled.

“Anyway, he left, she was pregnant with Gillian and then she fell ill. She died very quickly after the birth, if I recall the story correctly.”

“Did you know Gillian as a child?”

“Of course. Like most girls she loved horses, and she trailed around with me, for days sometimes, but that was before she discovered shooting. We were right proud of her when she started winning medals.” Geordie laughed at Angela’s accent which suddenly morphed into a mix of Geordie dialect and West Country brogue. Angela giggled again.

“I’ll be saying this is my one and that’s your one next, won’t I? I’ve been here too long,” she joked.

“What happened to Denton Miles, do you know?”

Angela gazed into the fire and paused before answering.

“The story goes that he returned to the States to run his family farm in Virginia.”

“Would Gillian have known who her real father was?”

“Absolutely, yes. Nick told her as soon as she was old enough to understand. She would talk to me about taking one of the horses and trekking to Virginia; she was six or seven at the time and didn’t understand where the USA was.”

“Angela, don’t answer this if you don’t want to, I won’t be offended.” He paused as she turned to look at him; sadness cloaked her wet eyes.

“Pete, its all in the past now. I had one rotten husband who I loved madly and then a wonderful husband who loved me madly, if only the two burning passions of my life had coincided in one man. Both are dead now; one shot, and one the victim of an unexpected heart attack. It’s just me now. Maybe it’s best that way.”

“You’re still young. You’re an attractive woman.”

Angela smiled at the compliment and pre empted the question.

“Les didn’t kill himself, you know,” she blurted out. Pete showed his surprise.

“Nah. He was way too selfish for that. I remember the day, though. He had been setting traps on the estate and he came home grinning all over his face, and, standing right over me, he rubbed his groin where his trousers were damp and said two words, ‘Young meat’. I tell you, Pete, I nearly killed him myself. Not for my benefit, but I couldn’t bear to see another life ruined.

A little while later he went out to clear his traps and he never came back. I called Nick to ask if he knew what was going on. Let’s face it, his niece was fourteen, pretty as a picture and the only young teenager in the village. Nick told me that Les had assaulted Gillian and had committed suicide out of remorse. With more than a little help from Nick, I suspect. That little girl was the light of Nick’s life. Anyway, suicide or no suicide, Les Vaughan didn’t deserve to live and so there was no sorrow in the village at his passing, just relief.”

Tears flowed down her cheeks and her shoulder shook as she continued speaking through sobs.

“I loved him you know, and yet I still wonder how anyone could love a bastard like that. I couldn’t bring myself to go to his funeral because, for all that he did, and was, I still loved him and I didn’t want to be seen to shed a tear for him in public.” She broke down, and Pete pulled her into his shoulder with his arm around hers.

***

Pete had calmed Angela. It had taken fifteen minutes but she was now back to her ebullient self. Even her Geordie accent was making a comeback.

“Here, it’s a long way back to London. Take a couple of these.” As Geordie watched, Angela rolled a mini quiche and a corned beef pasty into a sheet of greaseproof paper.

“I made them myself. Don’t know why, really, I rarely eat them. Pete?”

She paused and handed him his packed lunch, looking up at him.

“None of this is going to hurt Gillian, is it? I mean, I know you are a close security operative, it says so on your card, but she isn’t in trouble, is she?”

Pete thought about the answer and lied to Angela for the first time.

“No, we’re helping her meet up with her father. They’ve been separated for too long.”

Angela’s expression changed from one of concern to one of peace. She lifted her hands to either side of Pete’s face and drew his face down to hers. Standing on the tips of her toes, she kissed him softly but fully on the mouth.”

The tough bodyguard blushed.

“It’s not often I get kissed by a handsome man these days,” Angela murmured.

“I didn’t recall kissing anyone; I thought I was the one being kissed,” he replied rather ungallantly, but with a smile on his face.

“Well, when you live in a village called Stratfield Turgis, you take your fun where you find it,” she said in defence of her actions.

Geordie gave Angela a last hug and then set off to find the Chameleon, and he thought he knew a good place to start.

Chapter 3 4

Security Service Director General’s Office, Thames House, London. Wednesday, Noon.

Barry had been in this office only twice before and in both cases he had left the office with a demotion. This time he was on sure ground. He had solid evidence that his employer’s representative had not only bullied and discriminated against him in the workplace – cause enough for unfair dismissal – but it was about to become common knowledge that the Director had been sleeping with Barry’s wife. The service would want to sweep that tawdry mess under the rug.

Monica Stewart-Smith could now legitimately claim the title Dame of the British Empire. The award had been made just a year before for services to Her Majesty’s Government. She had spent her career in the security services and had been a surprise appointment when the last incumbent, a Labour government toady, lost the coalition’s confidence after wholly misreading the public appetite for increased security and reduced freedom.

‘Ballbuster’, as the DG had been known since the 1980s, had shattered the glass ceiling long before anyone had known there was such a thing. Unlike the ‘boys’ club’ that ran MI5 in the 1970s, Monica had known that the fourth and fifth man would eventually have to be exposed, and so she planned her career accordingly. Well placed memos and reports naming them were sent and ignored, but once the two men were exposed her memos mysteriously came to light and she appeared to Margaret Thatcher, the current PM, to be a prophet whose predictions were both accurate and troubling.

The PM was keen to promote a woman to high office in the security service but the Home Secretary was having none of it, until Peter Wright blew the lid off the security services’ culture of secrecy. Faced with overwhelming pressure, the Home Secretary gave in and Monica Stewart-Smith became the agency’s first female director. Sidelined during the Labour years, she bided her time and at the ripe old age of sixty two she replaced the DG, who had unfathomably been promoted after the Iraq ‘sexing up’ affair.

In another era, ‘Ballbuster’ would have been out in the field terrorising Eastern Bloc spies, but today hers was the task of ensuring that MI5 survived as a separate entity, despite a recent government report suggesting that all of the security services could be merged to save millions of pounds every year. She knew that bad publicity would give her enemies the ammunition they needed to close down an organisation which many in high places believed had become too powerful.

The DG’s office was fussy and feminine. Pictures of small children graced the wide expanse of desktop, and gifts from foreign counterparts were tastefully displayed. An Apple Mac Desktop with a TV sized screen stood at one corner. White and sleek, its workings were all enclosed in the monitor screen and so it needed no base unit. A matching wireless mouse and keyboard completed the IT picture.

There’s no way in the world that set up is in compliance with IT policy, Barry thought uselessly.

“OK, Mr Mitchinson.” The voice would have been unexpectedly light and attractive to anyone who had not heard it before. It did not match expectations. “We have a problem.”

The Director General stared at Barry and continued without referring to notes. “Chief Inspector Brabham from the Metropolitan Police has informed me that Gordon’s death looks to have been a suicide. He wrote a note on his computer using a keyboard which contained only his prints. No one went in or out of his office during the critical period. The man clearly felt that the ‘Chameleon’ would try to repay his attempted assassination of her by exposing him to the press and anyone else who would listen. He was also having regular sex with your wife and other unsuitable women. God only knows what he let slip in post coital pillow talk.

Now, most other occupants of this seat would simply buy you off with a promotion and apologise for one of our own destroying your marriage. But not me.”

Barry wasn’t merely shocked; he was stunned by the way events were unfolding.

“Mr Mitchinson, I am minded to let you go. You could talk to the press, but I would ask you to remember your obligations under the official secrets act. You could claim unfair dismissal, but we both know that you won’t do that. You have far too many skeletons in your own cupboard.” The woman removed her half moon spectacles and glared at Barry.

“So, please, don’t tempt me to go public with what I know.” She lifted the glasses and placed them back on her nose, halfway down so that she could look over them.

“Here is my one and only offer to you. You are suspended on full pay whilst the investigation into this suicide examines the Director’s relationship with your wife. You ensure you let your wife know you forgive her and that you wish to make a go of life as a married couple. Whether you want to or not is irrelevant to me. Now is not the time for a messy divorce citing a suicidal MI5 Director.

Finally, you find Gillian Davis and ensure that, through incentives, debriefing, rendition, or whatever it takes, she does not feel the need to unburden herself to the media. If she does, I guarantee you that you will lose your job, your wife, your home and everything you hold dear. You created the monster, you deal with the monster.

Report back to me in four weeks with your assignment fulfilled and you will find yourself in a plum appointment anywhere in the world you wish, as long as it is somewhere where you can’t do any harm. Perhaps Maureen Lassiter would be able to accompany you.”

With that single sentence Barry realised that, whilst the police might see a suicide, Monica Stewart – Smith suspected a murder. Luckily, the victim had been something of an embarrassment, and so the Director General was prepared to sacrifice justice for the continuation of her beloved MI5.

“I was wondering if I might take early retirement, actually, given the intolerable embarrassment I would inevitably face if I returned to work after the suspension.” Barry knew he was pushing his luck.

“Barry – may I call you Barry? From what I know of you, I believe you to be the kind of deceitful, incompetent low life we needed so badly in the cold war but whom we now need no more. Nonetheless, you complete your assignment and I guarantee that you will receive a pension that would make a banker blush.”

Barry smiled and Dame Monica looked down at a document on her desk.

“Now, get out of my office,” she snarled.

Chapter 3 5

Number 1, London Bridge, London. Wednesday, Noon.

It had been a busy morning and Dee was exhausted by her efforts to keep up with the young movie star, who seemed to have a Victorian work ethic. People may criticise these young stars and say that they are spoiled, or that they have an easy life, but Dee knew that Katie Norman worked hard, and as a result she spent her days racing from meeting to meeting.

“I simply cannot be in London for four days without visiting JJ,” she had announced after a dress fitting in the Savoy Hotel, where she had dropped her bags after the long flight, showered, tried on a borrowed dress for that evening and stuffed her face with croissants slathered with orange marmalade.

The driver pulled up at the rear entrance of Number 1, London Bridge. The London Dungeon was located opposite, and Katie looked at the waxwork experience with longing, before deciding she just did not have time to visit one of her favourite tourist venues. It wasn’t so much the exhibition that she remembered as much as the fact that it had been the last time they had enjoyed a day out as a family before her parents’ divorce. Her dad was now her part time adviser, whilst retaining his job as a University Lecturer, and her mum was busy with her new French husband and family. She didn’t really see enough of either of them or her adorable baby sister, Cosette. But that couldn’t concern her now.

The office building loomed over them as they entered at basement level and took the long escalator to ground level. As they stepped up the moving staircase people looked, glanced away and then looked again, just to confirm this was indeed Katie Norman, better known as Clara Campbell from the blockbuster film series.

A few seconds later Dee stood with Katie as a security man signed the two women in. He explained that he would have to announce them and obtain permission for their unscheduled visit. Katie smiled sweetly and said that she wanted it to be a surprise, and if he would let them in she would pose for a picture with him. A moment later the man was around the visitors’ side of the desk and Dee was taking a photo of Katie and her new friend on his mobile phone.

“Thank you so much, you have been very sweet,” Katie crooned as she pecked the man on the cheek. He almost melted back into his chair.

“Seventh floor, Upstream Tower,” the guard managed to say as he regained his composure. The two companions took the elevator in the Upstream Tower and left the dark marbled lobby behind.

***

JJ, as he was known to Katie, or more correctly J Jackson Bentley, was absorbed in his writing when they arrived at the door to his office. His gaze never lifted from the computer monitor. But he sensed a presence at the open door.

“What is it, Lucy?” he asked, assuming it was his PA at the door.

“I was wondering if you could invent another character for me. She’d have to be a bit older now, of course.”

His face lit up at the sound of Katie’s voice, and he stood up to collect her in his open arms as she raced across the office. Dee smiled and looked through the large picture window situated right behind the famous author. From that vantage point she could see the north bank of the Thames, St Paul’s, the Gherkin and the rest of the city. Off to the side Dee could see Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. It was an office view to die for, and one which was probably only affordable to a best-selling author.

Dee and Katie sat on the comfortable leather sofa in the office whilst JJ ordered some drinks and sat on a chair opposite them. He stretched forward and offered his hand to Dee.

“Hello. My young friends call me JJ but my real name is Jeff. And you are?”

“I’m Dee Hammond.”

“Mrs Dee Hammond,” Katie noted pointedly before looking at him with a fake scowl. “He’s a wicked ladies man, you need to watch him.”

“I’m taking care of Katie’s close protection for her stay in London.”

“Mmmm,” the author hummed. “Perhaps you’d better give me a card. I may need some close protection myself soon when I announce that this current book is the last Clara Campbell novel. Actually, you are so pretty you could double as my escort for the evening signings as well.”

“You see, less than a minute and he’s at it already,” Katie interrupted, sighing.

JJ smiled and explained that he was happily married and that he generally eschewed the limelight. He was a genial, slightly overweight man, in his mid forties, Dee guessed, but his humour was infectious and soon all three were laughing. It didn’t take long for Dee to see that Katie saw JJ as her mentor. He had known her since she was a nervous twelve year old, when he would make her laugh with his silly stories and his rants about everything from stalking fans to ingratiating politicians.

All too soon for Katie her mobile rang and Dee looked at her watch. They had to go; another appointment loomed large on the horizon. As they left, Katie kissed the author goodbye and set off towards the lift. Dee shook JJ’s hand and was about to leave when the jollity slipped from his manner and he spoke quietly but earnestly.

“Dee, I love that girl like a daughter. Please take care of her. There are some real crazies out there, and last year Rod Donkin made a lunge for her at the Fashion Awards, and although the police brushed it off as a drunken lark it looked to me as if his intentions were menacing.”

“Rod Donkin, from Big Brother?”

“Yes, that’s the one. Alleged minor celebrity and stalker of famous young girls. If you need confirmation of the risk he poses, ask that country singer about his daughter’s encounter with Donkin, and she was only fifteen at the time.”

“OK, thanks for the heads up. I’ll be especially vigilant, and if I get her back to the States safely do I get a signed book?” Dee asked lifting the mood. JJ smiled and bid her a fond goodbye whilst offering his help, should she ever find that she needed an overweight, balding author with horn rimmed glasses.