Caught in the Light (35 page)

She left early, which I'd half expected with Amy home from school. She was clearly in a hurry as well, though not enough of one to slip past me. I was at her side while she was still stowing her bag and an armful of files in the boot. And I was waiting to surprise her when she closed the boot and turned round.

"Oh my God!" she said, starting backwards. "What are you doing here?"

"We need to talk, Faith," I replied, reminding myself to sound calm and reasonable.

"I disagree." She made to move past me to the door, but I blocked her path. "Please, Ian," she said, pulling up and treating me to the tight-lipped frown I knew so well. "You're being impossible."

"I just want to talk. It won't take long."

"But I don't want to."

"A few minutes of your time. That's all I'm asking for."

"No, it's not. You're asking me to listen to more of the kind of paranoid nonsense you served up on Sunday."

"A few minutes, Faith." Despite what she'd said, I could see she was softening. She still felt something for me, even if it was mostly pity. "Come on."

"All right." She shook her head in irritation. "But if you start accusing Conrad of conspiring against you again '

"I won't accuse him of anything. I just want to draw a few facts to your attention. It's up to you what you make of them."

"A few facts? Somehow I doubt it. But get in the car anyway. If we stand here arguing any longer we'll have an audience." She nodded towards the office windows behind me, then brushed past.

She'd already started the engine by the time I lowered myself into the passenger seat. With a crunch of gears, she started off, sweeping out of the car park and round two corners to a quieter road bordering a school playing field. There she pulled in and stopped.

"Well? What are these facts, Ian? As far as I'm concerned, the clock's started ticking on your few minutes."

"I'd better come straight to the point, then. You remember Isobel Courtney?"

"Of course I remember her. What's she got to do with this?"

"Daphne Sanger, my psychotherapist, the one who contacted you, she knew Isobel Courtney. She even went to her funeral. What's more, five years ago she was living in Barnet. Isobel must have gone there to see her."

' "Must have" doesn't sound like a fact to me."

"I think I can prove it if I have to."

"You don't have to for my benefit. I don't care why she was there. I know all too well why you were."

"You spoke to Daphne. You know she exists."

"So?"

"She's gone missing. From home as well as from her practice. Phone her yourself and see."

"Why should I want to?"

"Because Conrad also knew Isobel Courtney. Her old next-door neighbour in Clapham will happily describe the man who called round asking questions about her within a year of her death. And you'll recognize the description. I promise you that."

"No, I won't. If you think I have the slightest intention of '

"It was him, Faith. Don't you see? Isobel. Daphne. Conrad. Me. You. We're all connected."

"Rubbish."

"How much do you know about him?"

"Enough."

"Precious little, I suspect, when you analyse it. I'll bet he's a biographical blank. A man of mystery. Maybe that's part of his appeal. But ask yourself this: what's he hiding?"

"Nothing. He's a sane and sensitive man. You just don't recognize the type."

"Where was he born?"

"I don't know. I haven't asked him."

"Are his parents still alive?"

"I... He hasn't mentioned them."

"Any brothers or sisters?"

"Not as far as I know."

"What did he do before Nymanex? I mean, what career path has he followed?"

"Stop it." She turned round in her seat and glared at me. "I'm not going to let you interrogate me. Certainly not about Conrad."

"You haven't been able to answer a single question about him, Faith."

"Where are the facts you promised me?"

"In front of you. The ones I've turned up. And the ones you haven't."

"I haven't been trying to. I dare say Conrad couldn't quote my life history back at you if you challenged him to. Are you suggesting I'm hiding something?"

"Just think it through. You met at the National Gallery, right? Who made the first move? Who spoke to who?"

"Mind your own business."

"It was Conrad, wasn't it?"

"What if it was?"

"You've been set up. Just like I have."

"Oh, for God's sake." She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair in a typical gesture of exasperation. "This is getting us nowhere. I'd like to drive home now, Ian. Alone."

"Promise you'll be more inquisitive about his past."

"I'll promise nothing."

"He'll be evasive. And, if you persist, he'll lie. I guarantee it. He's not what you think."

"You don't know what I think. I'm not sure you ever have."

"At least keep Amy away from him."

"Get out of the car. Please."

"All right. I'm going. But for all our sakes, Faith, don't trust him."

"I'll tell him what you've said. All of it. Just because I do trust him."

"There'll come a day when you won't." I eased the door open and searched for some parting words that would linger in her mind after I'd gone. "I don't expect you to admit to any misgivings about him. But I'll bet you have some. I'll bet, deep down, there's something about him that worries you. Believe that feeling even if you don't believe me."

"Goodbye, Ian," she said firmly, though no more firmly than she would have done even if my warning had struck home.

I knew better than to say any more. I could only hope I'd said enough. I climbed out onto the pavement and watched as she drove away. It could go either way now. She might see through him. Or not. And I wasn't sure which was the more dangerous outcome.

I had no wish to return to the all but empty flat that was the closest I had to a home, so I stopped off at Tim's lab. He was just packing up and needed little persuading to step down to the White Horse for a drink. I told him more or less everything that had happened since Sunday, everything that I could swear to anyway. He seemed less impressed by my discoveries than I'd hoped and unconvinced by my tactics where Faith was concerned.

"You should have waited till you had some hard evidence. I don't think Nyman will have much difficulty talking his way out of what you've come up with so far."

"I can't afford to wait. He may spring some new surprise on me at any moment. I don't like him being close to Faith. And I especially don't like him being close to Amy."

"She'll be back at school and out of harm's way next week."

"Yes. So she will. But next week seems an eternity away. I have to pin something decisive on him. And I have to do it quickly."

"How?"

"I don't know. There's no-one else I can question about Isobel Courtney."

"You'll have to go after Nyman himself, then."

"Yes. Which means talking to Nicole. She may be able to give me some clues about his past. But she isn't going to like being asked, I can tell you. I virtually had to promise she wouldn't hear from me again just to get his address out of her."

"Do you want me to ask her?"

"You?"

"Why not? At least I'll be able to reassure her you're not in the grip of a personal fantasy."

"Are you sure I'm not?" I looked him in the eye, offering him the chance to say whatever he truly felt.

"As sure as I can be." But he hadn't quite met my gaze as he'd replied. Even for Tim, there remained an element of doubt. Just as there did for me.

"You know," I began, 'while I was in Chichester .. ." Then my voice trailed into silence as my desire to confide in him faded. Some secrets were better not shared. "Forget it. It doesn't matter."

"What about Nicole do you want me to speak to her?"

"Yes, please, Tim. It's a good idea."

"Well..." He beamed at me. "Somebody has to have them."

Tim's good idea left me nothing to do. And nowhere to go. I should have gone back to the flat after we'd parted. Instead, I drove across Putney Bridge and round to Castelnau. I parked some way from the house and approached on foot. There were lights in the downstairs windows and one on in Amy's bedroom as well. If she twitched back the curtain, she'd see me standing beneath the streetlamp, looking up at her. But the curtain didn't move and I went no closer. It was too soon to try again. If Nyman was there, it would end badly. And, if he wasn't, it might end no better. Tim was right. I needed more than second-hand coincidences. I needed proof. Until I had some, I could only turn and walk away. Like a wandering loner who sees the lights of someone else's home and feels a stab of envy as he passes by, I couldn't afford to stop.

Back at the flat, I stared round at the bare walls and sparse furnishings. The place looked and felt unoccupied. I'd been living in it for nearly three months without even unpacking. It held nothing of me. Maybe, I thought, as I ran my finger through the layer of dust on a tabletop, there was nothing of me to hold.

I walked across to the bed and lay down, letting my eyes rest without focusing on the blank grey ceiling. Fear was creeping up on me. I could sense its approach. It wasn't some sudden panic. It was a gradually mounting terror of what I'd be if this went on for another three months. Everything was slipping away from me: job, family, lover; security, self-confidence, sanity. I'd walked into quicksand and all my struggles had only sucked me in deeper.

I started with surprise at the first bleep of the phone, jumped from the bed and hurried across to where I'd left it on the table.

"Hello?"

"You've been busy, Jarrett." It was Nyman's voice, cool and dark as the night beyond the uncurtained windows. "Hope I'm not interrupting anything important."

"What do you want?"

"I'd like to arrange a meeting. Just you and me. For a confidential word about matters of mutual interest."

"I'm on to you, Nyman. I know what this is about."

"Clearly you think you do. Faith was quite upset by your allegations. I really can't have you harassing her in this way. Since you believe me to be orchestrating a conspiracy against you, I suggest we discuss it man to man and put an end to the whole sorry saga."

"Suits me."

"Good. Now, as you know, I'm a very busy man. Accommodating you in my schedule at short notice is far from easy, but it can be done. I have a breakfast meeting tomorrow morning at the Savoy. The company launch will be collecting me from Charing Cross Pier at ten o'clock to take me back to Canary Wharf. Why don't you join me aboard and we can talk on the way?"

"Makes no difference to me where we meet, Nyman. I just want the truth."

"Excellent. I'll see what I can do for you. Tomorrow at ten."

It was another ludicrously perfect spring morning when I walked down through the parks next day to Whitehall, along the Embankment and under Hunger ford Bridge. The cherries were in blossom, the tourists were out, and nothing absolutely nothing -in the riverside vista echoed my sense of imminent crisis.

The launch was moored at Charing Cross Pier as promised, a sleek rapier-flanged craft with the vainglorious name Nyman Aqua recorded in ultramarine copperplate on the bow. I was welcomed aboard by the pilot. He was polite but unsmiling. And clearly expecting me.

"Mr. Nyman's not here yet," he announced. "Make yourself comfortable while we wait."

There was a large and airy cabin beneath the wheelhouse, but I preferred the bow, where I could scan the Embankment for Nyman. As it was, I didn't have to wait long for him to appear. No sooner had I looked up than I spotted him, halfway between Cleopatra's Needle and the pier head strolling casually along, the breeze ruffling his hair. He was speaking into a mobile phone as he walked, but, seeing me, paused by the parapet to conclude the call. As soon as it was finished, he nodded down to me and walked on.

A minute or so later, he was on the pontoon, exchanging a cheery word with the pilot. Then he was aboard, the engines were throbbing into life and we were casting off. Nyman tossed his briefcase into the cabin and joined me in the bow. He was wearing an immaculately cut lightweight suit and was smiling as broadly and warmly as if I were an old friend he hadn't seen for far too long.

"Grand day," he remarked as we nosed out into the river and the Embankment slowly sheered away from us.

"I wouldn't know," I replied, keeping my eyes fixed on his.

"Not getting to you, is it? Surely any photographer worth his salt should have a feel for the weather. Light. Temperature. Visibility. Don't they all play a part?"

"I'm not here to take photographs."

"No. Of course not. Just as well, probably." He spun round and stretched an arm towards the receding flank of the Houses of Parliament. "Correct me if I'm wrong, Jarrett, but didn't your hero, Roger Fenton, take a famous photograph of that when it was still under construction, with sailing barges in the foreground and Big Ben shrouded in scaffolding?"

"You're not wrong."

"When would that have been? 1857 or so?"

"About then."

"And Fenton was born ... when?"

'1819."

"Before photography was invented."

"Supposedly."

"Yes. Quite." He turned back to me, still grinning from ear to ear. "Quite so."

"Forget Fenton, Nyman. You and I both know this has nothing to do with photography."

"Does it not?"

"You're out to take some twisted kind of revenge for what happened to Isobel Courtney."

' "What happened to her." Don't you mean "What you did to her"?"

"You admit it, then?"

"I suppose I do. In a sense. But as for it having nothing to do with photography, well, you couldn't be further from the truth."

"It was an accident, you know."

"What was?"

"Isobel's death."

"Really?" He followed some spot on the South Bank with his eyes as we passed under Waterloo Bridge, glanced at his watch, Rolex gold flashing in the sun as he twitched back his cuff, then slowly returned his gaze to meet mine. He was no longer smiling. "Even if that were true, the question arises: does it make a difference? I mean, do intentions mitigate consequences? What do you think, Jarrett? If, just for the sake of argument, somebody ran over Amy in their car and killed her, would it make you feel better or worse if you thought they'd done it deliberately?"