Exposure (19 page)

Julia had described her very well, he thought, shaking hands and accepting an offer of a cup of coffee. An independent, outspoken lady, the type that used to be called the backbone of England, before the national spine began to crumble … He put the cynicism away. He didn't think like that so much now. Julia had made him optimistic.

The bottle was half full, instead of half empty. She was always slipping into his mind when they were apart.

The solicitor was there. He was tall, with spectacles and untidy tweedy clothes. But no fool. The eyes were wary.

‘Now,' Jean Adams said briskly, ‘I presume you've come to try and change my mind, Mr Harris.'

Ben said quietly, ‘No, Mrs Adams. I wouldn't presume such a thing. I only want to fill in the details a little more and to ask you one or two questions, which might help us. Without involving you.' He glanced at the solicitor as he said it. He got no response. The old boy was deeply suspicious. He switched back to Jean Adams.

‘I'd like to say we understand your decision and we sympathize with it. King has managed to frighten and bully his way out of trouble from a lot of people. Important people with resources. That's why we undertake not to use the affidavit if you decided to sign it.'

‘In which case,' the solicitor interrupted, ‘why ask for it if you wouldn't use it? There doesn't seem much point.'

Ben had anticipated that question. ‘Documents can be shown to members of your profession, sir, in confidence. It can influence their judgment and the advice they give their clients. That was the only contingency we had in mind. And the affidavit would be lodged with you, naturally. Mrs Adams could withdraw it or refuse to produce it if she wished.'

Jean spoke up quickly. ‘You didn't tell me that, Dick. That sounds quite reasonable.'

‘It sounds very reasonable,' he answered, ‘except that a court can order you to produce evidence once its existence is established. Mr Harris, I've advised Jean not to get involved with your newspaper investigation of Harold King. I'm here to make certain you don't persuade her otherwise.' He gave Ben a look of frank dislike.

Ben hesitated; he wasn't getting anywhere. He didn't want to play his only ace so quickly, but he hadn't any choice.

‘Mrs Adams,' he said, ‘I don't like to say this, but did it occur to you that King might have tried to murder your aunt?'

‘Oh come on – I must protest!'

Ben ignored the solicitor's interruption. He was watching Jean Adams. Her face had flushed, and then the colour drained, leaving her very white.

‘No,' she said. ‘Please, Dick, be quiet for a minute—' One hand rose to silence her adviser. ‘No, it certainly didn't. It was an accident. She was blind drunk, according to the hospital when the ambulance brought her in. Good heavens—' She pushed back a wisp of hair. ‘Good heavens,' she said again.

‘You couldn't have proved anything even if she had died,' Ben went on. ‘Her drinking was his alibi. But just think about it. He'd lost his head and told her the truth about himself. He was in her hands. I'll go further. I started looking into Harold King ten years ago. I am convinced that the murder of a business opponent in the Caribbean and the so-called fatal accident of another business opponent in this country were orchestrated by him to protect him from a takeover. Your aunt told you he'd admitted murdering unarmed British prisoners. He ill-treated your aunt. He hated her. Do you really think he would have risked being exposed? Look at the timing – ten days after she saw you, she had a near-fatal fall. King wouldn't stop at murder. I'll tell you what I want, Mrs Adams. I don't want to drag your family through the mud. I don't want to cause you any worry or distress. I want to find out what happened to those prisoners in the Western Desert. That's what I want to hang on Harold King. And you are the only person alive who knows he admitted it.' He stood up. Neither of them said anything. He saw the solicitor move close to her chair. She looked pale and very old.

‘Thanks for seeing me,' Ben said. ‘I'm sorry if I've given you a shock. I'll see myself out.'

He was in the hall when the solicitor caught up with him. ‘What you've done is disgraceful,' he said. ‘You've no proof, and, even if it was true – nothing can be done about it!'

‘Please, Dick,' Jean Adams came out, ‘you mustn't abuse Mr Harris.' She came up and opened the front door for him. ‘I'm going to think about it,' she said. Ben Harris took her hand. It was trembling slightly. ‘I owe it to my aunt if he really did that. Aunt Phyl believed him about the prisoners. I'll be in touch, Mr Harris. Goodbye.'

Ben walked down the short path, past the rose bushes, already trimmed back before their winter pruning, and the watcher in the dark blue Volvo parked on the opposite side of the road, lowered his road map and logged him out on his tape recorder.

‘Ben,' Julia said gently, ‘you did the right thing. We need that affidavit. It may never be used – you said it yourself.'

‘I know,' he admitted. ‘But she looked so bloody shaken – I felt a real shit, J. I suppose I haven't been at the sharp end of the job for so long I've gone soft. You sit in an office and send other people out to suck blood. I didn't feel good about it.'

Julia kissed him. ‘I know, but you still did the right thing. We both think King tried to kill that poor woman. And if we can follow this lead through and come up with a war crime like shooting British prisoners – we've got him, Ben. Under the new law he can be prosecuted!'

Ben said slowly, ‘There's no guarantee she'll do it, even now. Her legal chap will bust a gut trying to talk her out of it. But I just felt she'd come to a decision when I left. I think what I said tipped the balance. Anyway, she said she'd call us, so we'll have to wait and see. Thanks, love.'

‘For nothing,' Julia said softly. ‘Stray cats and old ladies – big, tough Ben Harris – you're rather a lovely man … I'm going to take you out to supper and then I'm going to bring you back here and spoil you absolutely rotten!'

‘Daddy,' Gloria King said, ‘what's the matter?'

He was slumped in front of the TV in his study, a cigar burning itself out in the ashtray. The programme was a mindless sitcom that she knew he would usually have switched off immediately. He looked tired and preoccupied. She came and perched on his chair and slipped her arm round him. ‘Are you still angry about that parcel?' she asked. ‘I'm so sorry, I tried to tell you …' Her eyes had filled with tears. Whenever he was distant with her, she felt like a miserable, guilty child, desperate to be forgiven.

King looked up at her. He took her hand and held it.

‘Don't be silly, darling girl,' he muttered. ‘Fuck the parcel. Fuck everything.' She sighed, flooded with relief.

‘Then what's wrong?' she persisted. ‘You're not yourself ever since you came back from New York. Is it the business? Isn't it going well?'

‘Not as well as I hoped,' he admitted. ‘I've got to find a lot more money than I reckoned, but I'll do it. It just needs a bit of fixing.'

He glared at the flickering screen, the muttered inanities and recorded laughter in the background. Joe Patrick was doing his job. He got the agency's reports faxed through, and faxed the copy direct to King's private-and-confidential number.

Ben Harris had gone down to Midhurst to see a Mrs Jean Adams. King felt as if his heart had stopped. The shock was so intense he couldn't feel it beat for some seconds. Jean Adams. The image of her swam in front of him, forty years out of date. Small, sharp tongued, an enemy. Phyl's favourite niece. It must be the same. Midhurst in Sussex where Phyl had spent her last years, his secret locked in the damaged brain. It must be the same Jean Adams. He relived in those few moments the confrontation when she came to see him, her dull husband in tow, and bought him off with a few hundred pounds. He was poor, when he should have been rich. But he was safe and free of Phyllis – the albatross he'd hung round his own neck. Jean Adams. He hadn't thought of her for years. She'd slipped out of his memory, as if she were dead like her aunt. But she wasn't. She was alive, and Ben Harris, back from his trip to Germany with Julia Hamilton, had gone down to see her.

His enemies had been ferreting around for years, trying to discredit him. Without success. His business deals were shrouded in layers of deceit, impossible to penetrate. He was a genius at covering his tracks with nominees, subsidiary companies and offshore operations. His criminal activities were protected by their own nature. Laundered money for drugs in the States, illegal arms supplied to all sides in Eastern Europe … He'd contacts among the secret world of the Mafia which were as interested in anonymity as he was. He had nothing to fear there, and he had made a huge fortune, most of which was banked and invested overseas. He glanced up at his daughter.

She said, ‘What is it, then? You're not ill, are you Daddy?'

He saw panic in her eyes. He smiled. ‘Ill? Don't be silly. I'm like an ox – you know that. No, it's nothing, just a little hiccup. I'll sort it out. I'll tell you about it one day. And I've been thinking – how would you like to give up that job with Hart Investments and come and work for me?'

She blushed. ‘Oh, Daddy! You mean it?'

‘Why not,' he went on. ‘It's about time. You're a big girl and you've got your business degree and five years with Harts – I've always had this in mind, Gloria. I want you working with me. One day, when I'm too old, you can take over. What do you say? Are you ready for the deep end?'

She hugged him, her face radiant. ‘I'm ready if you say so,' she said. ‘But you'll never be too old. Never.'

‘Sweetheart,' he said, ‘I'm not immortal.'

Gloria King spoke quietly. ‘You are to me.'

He sat on after she had left him. She was so excited, so happy that her face glowed. She'd need a husband, King decided. Clever, but not too clever. A man to support her, but never able to dominate. Father children. He liked that idea. The dynasty principle appealed to him. Pity if it was a Life Peerage because he couldn't pass it on … but never mind. Power was what matttered; titles without power and money were a mockery. Gloria would learn from him. Her mind was as quick as her body was clumsy. He'd teach her everything, and little by little confide some of his secrets to her. She wouldn't be troubled by scruples. She'd always appreciated that there were no rules in business except the cardinal one: don't get found out. He dreamed, planning the future for a little while. Then abruptly his heart quickened as he faced reality again.

His past was his one weakness. He never thought about it. He never thought backwards, unless there was a reason. Regret, nostalgia – these were a form of indulgence he despised. What was done was done and necessity was the only rationale. He had set out to survive because that was the only purpose in life. He'd seen other men die and there was nothing heroic about it. Just waste. Natural waste of the lesser breeds, the victims who would always fall before the strong. He was strong and he was clever. He had used Phyllis Lowe – he sneered mentally as he remembered her – sentimental, oversexed, enthralled to middle-aged passion. A natural victim.

A self-pitying drunk who'd brought her fate on herself. She'd goaded him into an act of madness, and paid the penalty. Not the full penalty as he'd intended. He'd always meant to abandon her in due time. But once he'd lost control that night, he knew he'd lost control of her. So he acted. But the blow hadn't been hard enough. It hadn't killed her. It had locked up his secret in her twilight mind and she'd died with it unspoken.

She'd left her whole estate to the niece, Jean Adams. The niece had been glad to pay him off, so she knew nothing sinister. And he had genuinely forgotten her existence in the years when he rose in the public domain, and became a symbol of ruthless power. He didn't fear exposure by the wife of a small-time stockbroker, if she was even still alive. He feared the German records in Nessenberg, and early on he had made a trip over to see the right people and closed off that avenue into a cul-de-sac. He had sympathizers with his story, men he could talk to as a comrade, men with secrets of their own. He thought he had blocked any possible investigation. And he had the power to silence his enemy and rival William Western when he attempted it, because Western had his own secret to protect.

But battle was imminent, and Western had decided on one last throw against him. Harris had gone back to Germany with Julia Hamilton, Western's brilliant protégée, and, this time, they had found a lead. And the lead had led to Jean Adams. And back from her to his dead wife.

He got up, heaving himself out of the deep chair. They could expose the truth about Phyllis's death, but it wouldn't be enough to damage him. He could explain the lies in his biography by the need to protect the poor alcoholic woman's reputation. It wasn't enough for Western to deal him a real blow.

He dialled the number, and Joe Patrick answered. ‘I want Adams' phone bugged.'

‘It'll be done tomorrow,' Joe answered. ‘The agency won't do it, but I have another source. How about Hamilton's place? Harris shacks up with her there. I can fix that, too.'

‘You do that,' King said. ‘And I want reports on the hour if anything comes up. You may have to pay Mrs Adams a visit.'

‘Just say the word,' Joe murmured. King hung up. There was nothing more he could do. Shut off now, slam the mental door. He had other things to think about. His financing of the take-over, his plans for his daughter.

Recognizing his own power induced a surge of confidence. It assured him he was invulnerable. Nobody would ever get near enough to the truth and live to tell the world about it. He could make sure of that.

6

Julia was in her office. Ben Harris had rung in to say his daughter, Lucy, had rung up out of the blue. She was in some kind of trouble. He was meeting her in Birmingham and wouldn't be in till the morning.