Lovers and Liars Trilogy by Sally Beauman
Chapter 38
AT EIGHT PASCAL WAS in Hampstead. He watched the slow dawn. At eight-fifteen, he was back in Gini’s empty Islington apartment. At eight-twenty he was back outside in his car.
He drove south fast, then turned west toward St. John’s Wood. He felt as if he had been driving and telephoning for centuries. He had not slept or eaten. His mind felt as white as the lightening sky.
He had had all night to look at his fears. He had had all night to listen to unhelpful people with no knowledge of Gini’s whereabouts, and all night to alternate between dialing Islington and this rented house he was now approaching. His mind rang with the sound of unanswered questions and unanswered telephones.
As soon as he reached the St. John’s Wood house, and pulled fast into its drive, he could see that the lights, like the telephone, were back on. There was a band of light just visible at the edge of the closed downstairs curtains. Pascal felt a fugitive hope. Calling Gini’s name, he ran inside.
The emptiness of the house hit him at once. He could smell, feel, see, hear she was not there. Very well, he told himself, he would leave for Oxford, right now—that was what he had planned. Then, turning, feeling disbelief, he saw the flashing light on the phone.
His heart leapt. He felt a second’s sweeping optimism, then a fear. It would not be Gini, he told himself—warned himself—as he pressed the playback control. It would be another trick or warning or deception. Then he heard her voice, and the air felt bright.
He listened intently. He replayed her message five times. Her voice sounded almost as usual, strong and warm: She did not sound as if she were in trouble. She told him she was well, that she was safe and returning to London. Then—distinctly—Pascal heard a man’s interjection. He said, “Ma’am.” There was a brief pause, during which something was said that Pascal could not hear. What followed was strange. Gini mentioned Beirut, the places where she used to meet him. This part of her message was abruptly cut off, and was again interrupted by a polite but firm interjection from the man.
She must have been calling from outside London, then, presumably from Oxfordshire. The man with her could only have been one of Hawthorne’s bodyguards—who else with an American accent would address her as “ma’am”? Pascal stared at the phone. He had no way of knowing when the message had been recorded, but he was sure that Gini had been trying to communicate something to him, something she was certain only he could understand.
The places we used to meet in Beirut…Pascal stood there, tense and alert; he listed the places one by one in his mind. Sometimes that café by the harbor, sometimes her hotel, sometimes his own room, to which he had given Gini a key that first day. Where else? Several times outside his local mosque, which was a few blocks from his room, on the edge of a shady, tranquil square. He could remember seeing Gini, sitting on a bench in that square, waiting for him to arrive. Then, twice, at least twice, he had met her outside an Arab school, midway between her hotel and his room, and he could remember the voices of the children at play behind the school walls as he ran, and she ran, and he took her in his arms. Was there anywhere else—anywhere he had forgotten? He could replay the geography of those three weeks day by day. Where, where did she mean? And then it came to him: the mosque. There was a mosque here too, almost opposite the ambassador’s residence—and driving fast, it was two and a half minutes away.
He ran out to his car, reversed out into the street. He reached the park at a quarter to nine, slowed, and stared. The park entrance, and its ring road, were closed.
Closed to traffic perhaps, but not to pedestrians. He drew up at the junction opposite the park gates. The gates had barriers across them, and two uniformed policemen on guard. No cars were being admitted, but, as Pascal watched, a jogger and a woman with a small dog were allowed through. He turned left, then left again, and parked. He ran back toward the entrance gates. As the police came in sight, he slowed to a more inconspicuous pace; he made sure that the camera slung around his neck was inside his leather jacket, and concealed.
He walked past the two policemen, who gave him a cursory glance, and turned right along the ring road. As soon as he was out of sight of the policemen he began to run fast. Ahead of him now, around a bend in the road, was the mosque and the residence. Next to the residence lodge was the pedestrians’ gate into the main acres of the park. Pascal slowed as he passed.
The lodge gates were firmly closed. He could see little of the residence itself as he passed it, for it was shrouded from the road by trees and thick evergreens. Through gaps in the foliage he could glimpse white vehicles. He checked himself. It was difficult to be certain, but what looked like two ambulances were drawn up outside.
Pascal quickened his pace. He jogged the sixty yards or so to the mosque the other side of the ring road. On this, the side facing the park and residence, there was no entrance. A low fence divided the mosque from the road. No one was standing there; no one passed. He looked over the fence and saw that the area surrounding the mosque, its outbuildings, and its interior courtyard, was large. To his immediate left was the mosque itself, with its glittering dome; directly in front of him was the courtyard and the high, very high, minaret, and to his right were further buildings, all deserted, their doors closed.
The entrance to the courtyard, mosque, and minaret was eighty yards ahead, fronting a main road. Pascal looked to the right and left, then vaulted the dividing fence easily and dropped down to the ground. It was a few minutes past nine when he reached the courtyard. He stood below the minaret and looked around him. There were a few pedestrians on the main road beyond. Cars passed there, and people, but the courtyard was deserted. He looked around him; he glanced up at the height of the minaret, squinting against the strengthening sun. No one. Nothing. Did Gini really mean him to wait for her here?
He did wait, for ten or fifteen minutes. At nine-twenty, unable to stand it any longer, he crossed the courtyard again, vaulted over the fence and back into the ring road. He hesitated, then went into the park.
He was now, he realized, in the place where Gini had been the day McMullen first approached her. He was standing, as he knew she had, on a small knoll, a rise of ground, under a clump of young chestnut trees. He could see both the mosque and the residence gardens clearly. He could see that high fence around the residence gardens, with the camouflage netting Gini described strung between its bars. He could see the gaps in the tree cover that were the results of the tree-pruning Gini had mentioned. He frowned at the fence, glanced over at the mosque behind him, moved across to a nearby bench, and sat down.
His eyes scanned the park. It would be another beautiful clear winter’s day, but it was still early for a Sunday, and it was cold: The park was as yet almost empty. He could see some joggers making the circuit, several people with dogs, a couple by the boating lake, a father with two children in the small playground, and beyond that, where a bridge passed over a conduit from the lake, two people, an elderly man and a woman, feeding bread to the ducks.
He could feel something edging its way forward from the back of his mind. There was a sense here, a meaning in the apparently random views, and he was very close to it, could almost grasp it. He lit a cigarette and began to think very hard.
James McMullen was alive—that was the first thing. He might not know it for certain, but he felt very very sure. If the dead man on the rail line were wearing McMullen’s signet ring, had been carrying McMullen’s ID, then that suggested McMullen had staged his own death. But why?
If Gini had been certain he had done so by the time she placed that call, why direct Pascal here to the mosque? Was it simply that she herself was nearby, in the residence, and she wanted him to know that? Or was there another reason, a hidden message?
Time was passing, passing. Pascal stared around him with infuriated despair. Joggers, a father with two children, an elderly couple, a perimeter fence, a mosque. Pascal rose, he began to pace. He looked back at the mosque, but it was still deserted. Should he go back
He walked deeper into the park, closer to the lake, then turned, frowning, looking back the way he had come. It was nine forty-five now, and more people were entering the park. Pascal stared back at the gate by which he had entered: He saw a group of teenagers with skateboards, a pair of lovers hand in hand, two men, one in a track suit, one in a Barbour jacket, a woman pushing a stroller. He thought: At ten. I’ll go to that lodge at ten, and I’ll make them let me in. But even as he thought that, he could still feel that comprehension inching its way forward from the back of his mind.
He began to walk back toward the gate, and the mosque, and as he did so, approaching that grove of young chestnut trees, it came to him. He stopped dead. He thought: a knoll; rising ground.
Little hints, little clues he had overlooked began to fall into place one by one. Why had McMullen taken him and Gini to that hideout in Oxfordshire? Because it was misleading, that was why. It directed their attention away from London, away from here. This was the place where Lise had met McMullen in the past: Pascal had suspected some collusion between Lise and McMullen before—but supposing that collusion went further than he had realized? Could Lise have been planning an attempt on her husband’s life with McMullen from the first, even in the days when they walked in this part of the park together? Had McMullen, when he met Gini here, had a dual purpose: Had he intended to contact Gini, and at the same time finalize his plans?
I’ve been an idiot, I’ve been a fool, Pascal thought, and he ran down from the knoll to the perimeter fence of the residence gardens. He could see nothing beyond the camouflage netting and the shrubbery, but he could hear voices in the garden beyond. He swung around, white-faced, frowning, looking at the lay of the ground. No, he thought; no, it isn’t possible; the ground doesn’t rise sufficiently, the cover around the gardens is too thick and too high. In the distance, a church clock tolled ten times. Pascal stood there, frozen, trying to see how McMullen might have planned this, how it might be done.
Not from inside the gardens, surely—any attempt at entry would set off a million alarms. From outside, then? But from where? And how could McMullen know of a time when the ambassador would be in the gardens, unless that was something he could arrange, for certain, using Lise. Pascal stared around him: the grass, the rising ground, the mosque, the ring road, the high white arch of the brilliant winter sky.
He understood about one minute before he saw James McMullen in the distance. He understood when he looked at that newly made gap in the garden’s protective tree line, the gap Lise Hawthorne had instructed be made. He understood when, turning his eyes a few degrees farther to his left, he looked at the mosque and its minaret, a minaret that was over one hundred feet high.
For one tiny instant he traveled back to his own past. Beirut. Belfast. The snipers who could position themselves with such lethal efficiency high up, on a tall building, firing down—a perfect line of fire.
At exactly that moment he saw McMullen one hundred yards away from him. He was removing his Barbour jacket; he wrapped it around something else which he had just picked up from the ground. He moved out of the gate, beyond the park hedge, and into the ring road. Pascal began to run. He thought: It’s Sunday. It’s the third Sunday in the month. That’s how they planned it. It’s now.
As Hawthorne led Gini out onto the terrace at the back of the house, there was a crackle of radio static. The group of people watching Lise had swelled: There were at least ten of them, Gini realized, as they parted to let Hawthorne through. Two nurses, a woman in a maid’s uniform, who was crying, a manservant, the paramedics, and no less than three security men. Malone was standing at the edge of the terrace, looking toward Lise. Gini saw him frown, lift his arm, and speak into the microphone in his cuff.
“Get these people inside,” Hawthorne said in a voice icy with anger as they passed through. Gini glanced back and saw that the command had been given to Frank Romero, who began to usher these bystanders indoors. Only one nurse and one paramedic remained, waiting. As Hawthorne led her down the steps from the terrace and onto the lawn, both Romero and Malone moved into place behind him, about twenty yards back.
“Just stay there, for Christ’s sake,” Hawthorne said, swinging around and speaking in a low voice. “Just let me deal with this, will you? Wait there.”
Romero hesitated, Gini saw, then stopped. Malone ignored the directions. He fell back a little, halting only when Hawthorne and Gini halted. Gini saw him frown again, then scan the gardens, that perimeter fence. Following Hawthorne, she approached the white bench.
Lise did not move until both of them had walked around the bench and were facing her. She looked at them blankly for a second, then—as if she were a hostess at some embassy party, she rose to her feet. She clasped Gini’s hand with icy fingers.
“Gini,” she said, “you’re here. How lovely. Isn’t it the most wonderful day? Such sun—it’s quite warm here in the sun, look.”
She sat down again on the bench, motioning Gini to sit beside her. Gini looked at her uncertainly. Her face was chalk-white, but two patches of color came and went in her cheeks. The sun was out, and very bright—that was true—but it was still bitterly cold. Lise looked as if she had a fever. On the side of her face, Gini saw, there was a darkening bruise. Lise stared at her closely, then gripped her hand in her thin fingers. She shivered again.
Gini hesitated. She looked closely at Lise’s eyes. The pupils were huge, so large, so dilated that her eyes appeared black. What the hell is she on, Gini thought.
“It’s cold, Lise,” she said gently. “Would you like me to get you a coat?”
“Oh, no”—Lise gave a high laugh—“I’m not cold at all. It’s just such an amazing day. John, Gini and I will just sit here for a while in the sun. Why don’t you fix us a drink?”
“It’s ten o’clock in the morning, Lise,” he replied in a quiet voice. “I don’t think Gini wants a drink just yet.”
“Nonsense.” Her voice rose on a strained, almost coquettish note. “I’m sure she does. Champagne. A glass of champagne. You can drink champagne at any time of the day or night.”
Hawthorne frowned. He looked at Gini, who gave him a slight nod. He hesitated, seemed about to argue, then changed his mind. He turned away abruptly and strode back across the grass. At the terrace he stopped and beckoned to Malone. From across the lawn Gini heard a familiar sound, half-whine, half-hiss. Lise heard it too. Her grip tightened on Gini’s hand.
“Is his father there?” She shivered again.
“I think so. I can’t see him. Maybe he’s just inside the terrace doors.”
“We don’t have long. Listen to me.” Lise fixed those black eyes on Gini’s face. She stared at her very closely, frowning, as if she were finding it difficult to focus. She gave an odd little gasp.
“Tell me,” she said, “tell me quickly. Did you sleep with him? Have you slept with him?”
“With your husband, Lise?” Gini said gently. “No. Of course not.”
“Oh.” Lise gave a low moan. “Thank Christ.” She tightened her grip so her nails dug into Gini’s palms. “And you won’t sleep with him, will you? You promise me? As long as you don’t, you’ll be safe. I think you’ll be safe. He won’t harm you then. He won’t let his father harm you—” She broke off. The black eyes narrowed. “You are telling me the truth?”
“Yes, Lise. I am.”
“Did he try? I imagine he did,” she said with a violent shiver. “Did he make you touch him? That’s what he does—at least, he says it’s what he does. He could be lying, of course. Oh. I must think. I must think.” She lifted her hand, bunched it into a thin fist, and suddenly struck her own forehead hard, three times.
“There. That’s better.” She gave Gini a radiant smile. “You see, I have to talk to you before they take me away. Once I get in that ambulance, that’s it. He’ll have me certified. All the p
She gave a low moan of distress. Gini glanced over her shoulder. Hawthorne was still on the terrace, talking to Malone.
“Lise,” she began gently. “I don’t think James is dead. I think you’re wrong about that….”
“He is. He is.” Lise gave a little cry. “They brought him here last night. They killed him right in front of me. That animal Romero did it. They made me watch, Gini. Look. That’s James’s blood, here, on my dress….”
Gini looked down. The thin dress Lise was wearing was made of fine white linen. There was not one mark on it, of blood or anything else.
“Did he explain?” Lise said on a sudden sharp note. “Did he tell you lies about me? Did his father?” She clutched Gini’s hand. “You mustn’t believe him, Gini. He lies so terribly well, he always did. John is very very dangerous—especially for a woman. You must understand that. He can make women do things—he’s made me do such terrible things, Gini, vile things, so he can watch. He doesn’t love me, of course—did I explain that before? I think I did. But even so, when he gets bored with the girls, with the blondes, he always comes back to me. He humiliates me with other men. He likes that very much. I can’t tell you what he makes me do to them, because it’s so foul, so evil—but I don’t have any choice. Gini, look…” She trembled violently, and turned her face to display the heavy bruising. “John did that to me, last night. Tell your friend—Pascal, that’s it—tell Pascal. If he was taking pictures last night, it wasn’t my fault. John made me do it. And after he closed the shutters, then he hurt me so badly, Gini. Listen, and I’ll whisper it in your ear. I can’t speak it out loud, but I have to tell you what he did…”