“N-no . . .” I said, slightly reluctantly. “At least, not now. May I come and find you if I think of anything else?”
“Of course. In that case, adieu until dinner, when I shall emerge bronzed as a young Adonis, and basted as a Christmas turkey. Toodle pip . . .”
He puffed away, up the corridor. Ben and I watched as he rounded the corner.
“He’s the full package, isn’t he?” Ben said when he’d disappeared.
“He’s—he’s just so full-on. Do you think that character is all an act? Or is he really like that twenty-four/seven?”
“I have no idea. I suspect it started out as a bit of a pose, but it’s become second nature now.”
“And his wife—have you ever met her?”
“No. But apparently she really exists. She’s supposedly something of a dragon—daughter of a German count, and apparently quite the beauty in her day. They’ve got this incredible house in South Kensington, it’s full of original artworks—Rubens and Titians, utterly unbelievable stuff. It was featured in Hello! a while back and there were all these rumors that they were actually looted Nazi stuff and they got a tap on the shoulder from the IFAR, but I think that’s bollocks.”
“I can’t work out whether he said anything useful.” I rubbed my hands over my face, trying to scrub away the weariness that was starting to settle over me like a black cloud. “That stuff about Cole, that was weird, right?”
“Y-yes . . . I guess. But if it was around four, does that really help? And, to be honest, I’m starting to think that he’s maybe just making stuff up for effect. That thing about me having a girl in my cabin was pure bollocks. You do believe that, right?”
“I—” I felt a lump rise in my throat. I was so tired. I was so tired. But I couldn’t rest. Jesus, so much for this trip being the making of my career. If I carried on causing trouble like this I could end up with an address book full of enemies, not contacts. “Yes, of course,” I managed. Ben looked at me, as if trying to gauge whether I was telling the truth.
“Good,” he said at last. “Because, I swear, there was no one in my cabin. Unless someone got in while I was out, of course.”
“Do you think he heard us?” I asked, more to change the subject than because I wanted to know. “Before, I mean. The way he came round that corner—you wouldn’t think someone so big could creep up on you like that.”
Ben shrugged.
“I doubt it. I don’t think he’s the type to hold a grudge, anyway.”
I said nothing, but inwardly I wasn’t sure I agreed. Alexander struck me as exactly the type to hold a grudge, and enjoy holding it, too.
“What do you want to do now?” Ben asked. “Want me to come with you to find Bullmer?”
I shook my head. I needed to go back to my cabin, get some food inside me. And besides, I wasn’t at all sure I wanted Ben to come with me to see Lord Bullmer.
- CHAPTER 19 -
The door to my cabin was locked, but inside an open sandwich was resting on a room service tray on the dressing table, alongside a bottle of mineral water. It had been there some time, judging by the runnels of condensation on the side.
I wasn’t hungry, but I’d had nothing since breakfast, and most of that I’d thrown up, so I sat and forced myself to eat it. It was prawn and hard-boiled egg on heavy rye bread, and as I chewed it, I watched the sea rise and fall outside the window, its ceaseless movement echoing the restless thoughts that were running around inside my head.
Cole, Alexander, and Archer had actually been in the same room as that girl—I was almost sure of it. Her face had been turned away from the camera, and it was hard for me to remember the brief flash of features I’d seen through the open cabin door yesterday, but the jolt of recognition I had felt when I saw the picture had been like an electric shock—I had to hang on to that certainty.
Archer at least had an alibi—but I was beginning to realize that it was one that rested entirely on Ben’s evidence, and that he had his own reasons for wanting that room to be secure. And no matter how you spun it, he had deliberately lied