The Knowledge_A Richard Jury Mystery Page 7

  “According to Aero. He got the last message, as far as we know, before Patty took off to Dubai with this guy.”

  A brief silence followed, as they (presumably) bemoaned the fate of Patty Haigh.

  “Poor little tyke,” said Janet Swift, one of the few women drivers.

  “You’re talkin’ about Patty Haigh,” said Kevin O’Malley. “You think ‘poor little tyke’ is a good description?” He laughed, and the rest of the bar echoed his laughter.

  Waterloo Station, London

  Nov. 2, Saturday morning

  9

  In Waterloo Station, Jury met up with some of the drivers who had actually followed Robbie’s cab before it stopped and the shooter made his exit. They did not, they said, get a real look at him. But of course none of them had known yet what was going on with the guy.

  “How many kids are there supplying you with information?”

  “There’s five,” said a driver named Michaelson. “All told: four at Waterloo, two at Heathrow.”

  “That’s six,” said Jury.

  “Make it six, then,” said Michaelson, happy to have Jury do the math.

  “What about Victoria? None there?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Gatwick?”

  Heads shaking.

  “Stansted?”

  Another round of head shakes.

  “King’s Cross or St. Pancras?”

  Shake. Shake.

  “Why only Waterloo and Heathrow?”

  Robbie said, “That’s where they want to be. Been here for some time when we found them.”

  “Found them?”

  “I mean, met up with them. One of them—Jimmy, it was—saw a fare leave Michaelson’s cab without paying. Michaelson called after this bloke, but the guy just hurried off. This kid Jimmy went up to Michaelson, said they could stop him. For a quid.”

  “I asked, ‘Who’s “they”?’” Michaelson said. “‘Me and me mates.’ Jimmy said. So I says, ‘Pound apiece,’ and Jimmy says, ‘You’re on,’ and took off like a lightning bolt. Couldn’t’ve been more ’n four, five minutes later when security had this guy in tow and I collected my forty quid from him. A minute later, Jimmy shows up. ‘How’d ya like that?’ he says, wanting not only pay, but praise. He got both.”

  Michaelson went on: “So I ask this kid if he’s at Waterloo every night. He says, ‘Every night but Thursdays.’ I say, ‘Why not Thursdays?’ and he says, ‘Violin lessons.’ And he takes off.”

  “Violin?” said Jury. “He’s learning to play the violin?”

  “Learned. He’s really good. But not, he says, good enough.”

  “Then Jimmy has parents and they can’t be poor.” Jury expected a round of nods here, but got the same blank looks. “Well, somebody’s paying for this kid’s music lessons, and the violin’s hardest of the lot.”

  Robbie said, “Maybe Jimmy.”

  “The boy’s paying for his own lessons?”

  “You don’t know this kid. He really wants to be a master at it.”

  “What about the kids’ families? Where do they live?”

  “You don’t think they’re tellin’ us?” said Michaelson, snorting around his cigarette.

  “We don’t know nuffin’ about ’em,” said Kevin O’Malley. “They’re reg’lar clams, they are. You don’t think we’re tellin’ Social Services about ’em, do you?”

  “No,” Jury said, but he thought: picking pockets, con games, shoplifting. These kids could grow up to be master criminals. He said so.

  “No.” All the drivers agreed on this, though it was Robbie who said, “They don’t want to be criminals. They want to be cops.”

  Jury stared.

  Robbie laughed. “A Scotland Yard superintendent? Man, you’d be a hero.” He paused. “You and Joshua Bell.”

  “Are any of these kids here now?”

  “Prob’ly,” said Kevin. “But they’re all over the place. It went from Jimmy to Henry to Martin to Suki. Easiest one to find’s Suki. She’s nine, ten years old. She pretty much hangs out in front of the City Café.”

  “Thanks,” said Jury.

  The cabbies nodded and lit up.

  The little girl, possibly ten, but looking only seven, stood outside the café with her black-and-white mutt on a lead, looking starved—starved not in fact but in effect.

  As Jury approached, he took a five-pound note from his clip, scrunched it up and put it in his coat pocket with a bill from British Telecom. As he drew abreast of her, he pulled out the bill, feigned reading it studiously and let the banknote fall to the ground near her dog and her feet. He went a few steps before he heard, “Mister!” He turned.

  She held out the crumpled banknote. “You dropped this,” she said in a small, soft voice.

  “I did? Why, thank you. You’re very honest.” When she looked demurely away, he added, “So’s your dog.”

  She looked back and laughed. “He’s really honest. His name’s Reno.”

  Reno did a bit of tail-wagging and gave a yap.

  “Reno? That’s a city in Nevada. Lots of gambling.”

  “I know. I almost named him Vegas. I like gambling.”

  “Well, I think Reno deserves a reward.” He went for change in his pocket.

  She said, “Oh, no, sir. We don’t need a reward, not for just picking up a bit of money and giving it back.”

  Her look was that of the most honest citizen who had ever trudged through Waterloo. Big eyes, melting. It was so fake Jury wanted to laugh. “Doubly honest. Well, then, would you join me for lunch? If you’ve time for it.”

  “Oh, I’ve got time. Can Reno come too?”

  “Absolutely. He can have lunch.”

  Then she looked a little defeated. “But I don’t think they’ll let him in.”

  Jury smiled. “I think they will.”

  Just inside the door, a sharp-nosed woman, with dark hair pulled back as if for a hanging, said crisply, “We don’t allow dogs in here.”

  “You do now.” Turning his body from Suki in order to shield the ID, he pulled it from his pocket and held it out.

  She jumped. “Oh! Well, I should call the manager.”

  “Why? Is he strangling the cook?” He turned back to Suki. “Pick a table.”

  Suki headed for the booths, Reno trotting by her side.

  When they had settled in, the dog under the table, Suki looked at him wide-eyed. “Are you famous?”

  “Not yet.” He picked the menu out of the metal holder.

  “Then how’d you get Reno by her?”

  Looking at the menu, not at her, he said, “Same way you do, Suki. By being clever.” Briefly, he looked up at her. She seemed perplexed.

  A waitress came mincing over, set down two glasses of water and stared at Suki. “You again.”

  “Me again.” Suki read the menu, thought a bit. “What are you having?”

  “Hm. I don’t know. But have anything you want for both of you.”

  The waitress, whose name tag said “Maureen,” looked around for the other half of the “both.”

  Suki smiled broadly. “I’ll have a super club, macaroni cheese, a ham sandwich—”

  The waitress said, “Goin’ for it, girl, aren’t you?” She smirked.

  Jury gave her a look like granite. “Take the order, Maureen, without the editorializing, please.”

  She frowned at whatever that meant.

  “I’ll have a double hamburger, rare, no mustard, no ketchup, no pickle, nothing on it at all. And a double order of chips.”

  Frown still in place, now probably at such spartan burger habits, she noted this down and started to move away.

  Jury stopped her with, “And two bowls of water.”

  “What? You mean glasses of water. But I brought you—”

  “No, I mean bowls.” He held up two fingers. “Two.”

  “For what?” She was back now.

  “Hasn’t this place ever heard of finger bowls? Or do we have to go to Park Lane for something so
simple?”

  “What’s it for?”

  Suki said, with no small measure of contempt, “Sticky fingers.”

  Looking put-upon, the waitress marched away.

  Jury said, “Suki, were you meeting someone outside before?”

  “Me? Meeting?” As if meetings were as foreign as finger bowls.

  Which were duly served, along with the waitress’s curiosity. Which went unfulfilled.

  Jury watched her leave. “Okay, mine first.” He reached the bowl of water under the table to Reno.

  Slurp slurp slurp.

  “Shall I put mine down too?” Suki whispered.

  “Let’s try and keep one bowl on the table for Maureen’s eyes. When the first is empty—” Jury looked. “It is. Now yours.”

  Suki laughed, clearly enjoying this conspiracy, lifted her bowl carefully and set it under the table. She picked up the empty bowl, brought it back.

  Slurp slurp.

  “Reno gets so thirsty. That was a good idea.” And she looked at Jury, avid. “You must be the Wonder Keeper.”

  The Wonder Keeper was pouring water from his glass into the empty bowl, holding back the bits of ice. He very nearly blushed. “Suki, I’ve been called a lot of things, but never a Wonder Keeper.”

  Her pointed chin rested between her fists as she looked at him. “I don’t know anybody who would ever have thought of finger bowls.”

  “The Queen, maybe?”

  She laughed as Maureen tramped unobligingly back with the hamburger and chips. “Rest’s not done yet.” She seemed glad to impart the bad news. She left.

  “More water!” Jury called after her.

  Suki was clearly excited to see one of the burgers being broken into bits, then deposited on the plate of chips, and most of the chips redeposited onto the hamburger plate.

  “Does Reno like chips?” Jury asked, lowering the plate.

  A few soft woofs were his answer.

  Maureen returned with Suki’s lunch. “Here’s your order.” She set down the sandwiches and the macaroni cheese.

  Suki gasped at this huge assortment of food. “Thanks.”

  Jury was breaking up the second hamburger patty when he said, “Suki, remember the man you followed on Friday night?”

  Suki’s cheeks were bulging, chipmunk-like. “Sure. He was really big.”

  “You’d be able to identify him, then, if you saw him again?”

  “Uh-huh.” She swallowed and nodded.

  “Are you certain he was the same man that your friend Martin saw?”

  She frowned. “Of course I am. We’ve followed people before. And the guy with him was wearing a uniform, but he wasn’t really a cop. Not the way they were talking.”

  “In police uniform but not a policeman.”

  “Waterloo Station security. I mean disguised as station security.” She shrugged. “I don’t know, but I do know it was the same guy Robbie had in his cab.”

  “But how can you be absolutely sure?”

  She gave him a look that might have cast doubts on his Wonder Keeper abilities. “Because it went from Jimmy to Henry to Martin to me. We don’t make mistakes. If we did, we’d be useless.”

  Jury put the second burger on a paper napkin and reached it under the table.

  “Reno, too,” said Suki.

  Jury glanced up. “Reno?”

  “Never forgets a smell.” She opened the ham sandwich and reached the ham under the table.

  “Good for Reno. You know about Patty Haigh, I expect.”

  “She got on the plane with this man we were watching,” said Suki, matter-of-factly.

  “Yes. Is Patty a friend of yours?”

  “She’s friends with all of us.” Suki tilted to look under the table, then sat back up.

  “Are you worried about her?”

  “Worried?” Frowning, Suki looked as if worry were foreign to her experience. She shook her head and pulled the menu out from its little aluminum holder. “I wish I was as smart as Patty. She can do anything.” She scanned the bottom of the menu.

  “Perhaps. But that’s an incredibly chancy step to take, just getting on an airplane with a stranger, much less one who shoots people.”

  Suki shrugged. “By now, Patty’s probably flying the plane. Can I—we—” She pointed down at Reno. “—have some sticky toffee cake?”

  Nairobi, Kenya

  Nov. 2, Saturday afternoon

  10

  The plane landed at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport at around three on Saturday afternoon and again Patty wondered, as she had in Dubai, if the local police would be on their toes and nail B.B. She was getting tired of it all being down to her, although at this point she almost hoped that police wouldn’t get him—she had begun to like him, given how well he’d treated her.

  She had to admit, her tiredness had been offset by the comforts of Emirates. She’d had a little cabin all her own with a big TV and a table for eating, which she made a lot of use of; at one end of the first-class cabin there was even a spa where she could take a shower. Since B.B. didn’t want his shower time, she took another one. Then she decided a shower would be nice before she tried to sleep and managed to get a third one by telling the flight attendant she felt faint with the heat.

  When they had landed in Dubai at eight forty-five that morning, she was cleaner than she’d ever been in her life.

  But then, in the lavish airport in Dubai, B.B. had dropped the little bomb on her that he was getting a connecting flight to Nairobi. Right now, he wanted to see her safely delivered into the custody of her aunt? uncle? before he left.

  Now, for Patty to have a reason to go there, Aunt Monique would have to be in Nairobi. But she’d have sent someone to tell Patty … a housekeeper! Right over there, a regal-looking black woman in a bright headwrap and caftan was waving to someone. Patty appropriated the wave before whoever it was meant for could get it, saying to B.B., “She must have sent her housekeeper. Over there!” Patty waved and took off toward this uncomprehending woman whose eyes widened at Patty’s rushing approach. In order to make the woman smile welcomingly, Patty said to her, “Did anyone ever tell you you look just like Lena Horne, that great singer?” And smiles and small talk followed, Patty practicing her few words of Swahili. The woman helped her with pronunciation. Then she rushed back to B.B. and told him that the housekeeper said her aunt was in Nairobi, not here anymore, and that (Oh, I don’t know what to do!) Patty was to fly there.

  B.B. had commented that this seemed an awfully slipshod way for Patty’s family to be behaving—very careless of her welfare. Had she been his own daughter, none of this would have happened.

  That she could well believe.

  He told her he would get her a ticket when he picked up his own boarding pass, but that they might not be able to sit together. Then he took out a money clip, removed a number of bills from it and handed them to her; she didn’t want to take his money but he insisted. “In case there’s some emergency, you must have money.”

  She thought that for somebody who shoots people, he was pretty nice.

  The plane left at ten thirty and the flight would take five hours. Patty was happy with this; there would be plenty of time for a shower. Two showers, unless B.B. wanted his. He told her he was sorry, but they would be flying in coach and there were no showers there.

  Patty had picked up a guide to Nairobi and a Swahili phrase book. Once the plane was in the air, she visited the washroom just to double-check. No showers. Then she concentrated on the Swahili phrase book, remembering what the Lena Horne woman had told her about pronunciation. Her studies done, she went up a few rows to visit B.B.

  * * *

  The plane landed in Nairobi. This time it was her Aunt Monique—a too-French name, maybe? But she had had to think of something in a hurry as she hadn’t expected to be making another leg of this journey with B.B. Why hadn’t he been caught yet? Was she supposed to follow him to hell? Even if she’d wanted to, there was no sense her trying to notify the
Kenyan police; they wouldn’t pay any attention to her. So it was good-bye to B.B., whose real name she still didn’t know, especially since for the Nairobi flight he’d used a second passport with a different name. She’d managed to get a glimpse of it when it had dropped from the counter. Now she was walking with him through the airport, Patty all the while searching for a likely Monique. Perhaps she shouldn’t have chosen a Kenyan for an aunt-by-marriage, but they were in it now, weren’t they?

  She was telling B.B. for the third time how Aunt Monique was really going to appreciate his helping her, but that she was kind of shy with strangers so she might not—oh, there she was! Patty had nailed a nondescript woman in her forties, dressed half in European style—that plain black dress, half in African—that boldly colored turban, clasping her handbag to her breast and looking as if the terminal were peopled by dips just waiting to snatch it, her eyes squinting as if her vision were bad. The perfect Monique.

  “Bye-bye, B.B.,” Patty called back, dancing away. She flinched. Had she really said that? She rushed toward the woman, who looked understandably astonished by Patty’s approach. Patty did her “Sorry, you look just like my cousin Mildred” routine, whereupon the woman became consoling, asking Patty the usual questions as to where she was supposed to meet her cousin, et cetera, with Patty being very imaginative in her search for answers as she glanced over her shoulder and looking satisfied as B.B. finally walked off. Free of police company, Patty noticed. You could just do anything in London, you could walk in with a gun and shoot people, and then go to Africa or anywhere.

  But back to business, thanking Monique, now seeing her cousin Mildred and hopping off again through the crowd and disappearing.

  Then there was security looking her over. Thank God it wasn’t British Social Services, at least. Patty was used to attention from the police, so she expected the puzzled look from two uniforms as she walked by un-Moniqued and otherwise unattended. But she still didn’t like the stares they were giving her.

  Patty slipped into the women’s restroom and into a stall, where she opened her backpack, pulled out her ginger wig and settled it expertly over her brown hair, shoving her hair underneath and adjusting the back of the wig. She always carried two wigs, the other being a washed-out blond. She pulled out a pair of sparkly rimmed glasses, removed her short jacket and put on a white sweater. She applied pale pink lipstick and very pale blush. She left the stall and wondered who this person was, reflected in the lake-like expanse of the restroom mirror. It was always a bit of a thrill when she didn’t recognize herself. But Ouch! The sparkly glasses were entirely too much, begging for notice. She shoved them back down in her pack and pulled out a pair with thin, narrow horn rims. Much better.