The Case of the Black Pearl Read online

  As she rose to go, Patrick heard himself asking, ‘May we meet again?’

  Marie Elise observed him with warm brown eyes. ‘For a crêpe, maybe.’

  He would settle for that and hope for more. ‘How do I get in touch?’

  ‘Le Chevalier.’ She threw him a farewell smile.

  He watched the tall, slim figure pass the covered carousel and disappear behind the children’s boating pool. Oscar emitted a low sound that resembled a smothered howl. He looked up at Patrick, his eyes accusing.

  ‘We’ll both see Marie Elise again,’ Patrick promised.

  On his way home, he went by Le P’tit Zinc. There was no one there he knew, the tables commandeered by festival delegates. Patrick headed for the Irish pub, hoping to catch Stephen.

  The outside tables were packed with smokers, but Stephen wasn’t one of them. He’d quit some years before, but occasionally succumbed after a couple of pints of Guinness. Patrick and Oscar headed inside.

  Once his eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, he checked out the tables and those standing at the bar. A fiddler was blasting out an Irish jig over the loudspeakers, accompanied by a bodhran player who turned out to be a pretty young woman. The fiddler was male and of a similar age. They were in another world, and paid Patrick no heed as he pushed past their tiny stage to reach the dark corner that Stephen preferred. His friend was seated with a ginger-haired bearded chap with a face roasted red by the sun.

  ‘Ah, Patrick,’ Stephen said in his inimitable Irish brogue. ‘There you are. Come and join us.’

  He gave Oscar the required attention, consisting of telling him how handsome he was while ruffling his ears. Vanity satisfied, Oscar plonked himself down under the table, while Patrick slipped alongside Stephen in the booth. As if by magic a barman appeared and asked about drinks. Stephen ordered three pints of Guinness without consulting his companions.

  ‘You didn’t come here to drink French wine,’ he told Patrick, firmly.

  Stephen indicated his companion. ‘This red-faced man is my cousin, Colm MacColl from Cork.’

  Colm from Cork said not a word in response and Stephen continued, taking delight in his introductions.

  ‘My friend Patrick de Courvoisier, on the other hand, is from nowhere. Or at least nowhere he wants us to know about. From his accent and knowledge of whisky, I suspect connections to Scotland. From the fact that he speaks several languages fluently, I suspect a polyglot upbringing, possibly a parent in the military or diplomatic service. He is also an expert in a number of physical skills, diving being one of them. The rest I prefer not to know about. Currently he lives on the old French gunboat in the harbour.’

  Patrick nodded at Stephen’s ruddy companion who didn’t look fazed by either introduction. Stephen continued in his inimitable fashion.

  ‘Colm on the other hand is not a man of action but a man of words. He is an author and a playwright, no less. Famous from Cork to Dublin and all places in between. He is also, like yourself, a rather fine diver.’

  His cousin accepted this mixed bag of compliments with good grace.

  The pints of Guinness having arrived, the two cousins toasted one another, then Patrick, in Gaelic.

  ‘If you want to talk about this man,’ Stephen told Colm conspiratorially, ‘I suggest we use the Gaelic. As far as I’m aware he doesn’t understand Irish.’

  ‘Apart from a few curses I learned from you,’ Patrick said.

  Introductions complete, Stephen got straight to the point. ‘So, what are you here for?’

  ‘Is it that obvious?’

  ‘I saw you earlier with an attractive lady. Either she ruined your evening by turning you down, or you had other things on your mind,’ Stephen said, astute as always. When Patrick didn’t answer immediately, Stephen made a swift comment in Irish to Colm who nodded and vacated the table, taking his pint with him.

  ‘OK, let’s have it.’

  ‘I’d like to take a dive near the black yacht in the west bay,’ Patrick said.

  ‘Why? There’s nothing down there but sea grass and sand.’

  ‘A young woman disappeared from that yacht two nights ago.’

  Stephen whistled through his teeth. ‘And you think she went overboard?’

  ‘I don’t know what happened to her, yet.’

  ‘Have the police been informed?’

  ‘Her sister doesn’t want the police involved.’

  ‘We’re talking about the Russian’s yacht? The one who paid for the movie?’

  Patrick marveled at how little bypassed Stephen.

  ‘You know about the Heavenly Princess?’ he said.

  ‘I know it has a decompression chamber and that they ended up having to use it for one of their stuntmen in the Black Pearl shoot.’ Stephen made a dismissive noise. ‘Amateurs.’ He studied Patrick. ‘So who is this missing woman?’

  ‘The star, Angele Valette.’

  Stephen made a wow expression. ‘And the press haven’t got wind of it?’

  Patrick shook his head. ‘Not yet.’

  Stephen contemplated him. ‘That’s not all, is it?’

  ‘She was wearing the black pearl when she disappeared.’

  ‘Holy Jesus.’ Stephen whistled. ‘I bet the owner isn’t happy.’ He paused, something dawning on him. ‘The Russian’s looking for her too?’

  ‘I presume so.’

  ‘Then we’d better find her first,’ Stephen said with conviction.

  Les Trois Soeurs lay in darkness. Oscar ran ahead, sniffing the air. The closer he got to the boat, the more agitated the dog became. There was something or someone aboard that the dog didn’t like.

  Patrick’s first thought was that Marie Elise might have returned, but he dismissed that immediately. Oscar would be delighted if it was Marie. His hair wouldn’t bristle, and he wouldn’t be emitting a threatening growl.

  Patrick cautiously lowered the walkway. Oscar made to run aboard, but he stopped him with a sharp command. The little bulldog was in attack mode, his teeth bared. Patrick trod the walkway as quietly as possible, Oscar following. He stopped and listened, hearing nothing more than the lap of water against the hull, then flicked a switch, flooding the boat with light. Nothing stirred, yet Oscar continued to growl in a menacing manner.

  Patrick lifted the hatch and descended the steps to the cabin. Almost immediately the nauseating smell hit him. Fresh blood, just beginning to turn in the heat. The mess lay on the table where he and Marie had eaten from the shellfish platter. The platter was gone, now replaced by something furry and dead, where langoustines, pink and juicy, had previously sat.

  Oscar went mad, launching himself at the table, filled with bloodlust. Patrick dragged the dog into the engine room and shut the door. He stood for a moment, observing the dead rabbit, analysing what its presence in his cabin might mean.

  To say the word ‘rabbit’ on board a boat was the same as uttering the word ‘Macbeth’ in a theatre. Bad luck of the highest order. To find the real item lying, throat cut, entrails strung out, on his dining table said much more than that.

  Patrick fetched a refuse bag from under the sink and scooped the rabbit’s remains inside, knotting the top. He deposited it in the nearest bin ashore, then washed the table, leaving the cabin door open to get rid of the smell. Oscar’s mad scrabbling at the engine-room door had lessened once the corpse had been disposed of. Patrick let him out and Oscar rushed to the table looking for his prey, meeting only the strong smell of disinfectant.

  Patrick went through the rest of the boat. Nothing appeared to be missing and there were no further ‘messages’ left for him to find. He poured himself a whisky and sat down on the leather couch, the memory of his earlier and more pleasant encounter there with Marie eviscerated.

  It was then he spotted the envelope on the floor behind the cabin door.

  Of high quality, embossed, his name beautifully written on the front, he knew immediately what it was, and who it was from.

  SIX

  Who exactly
was Patrick de Courvoisier? He knew who he had been, and what he had left behind. Status. Recognition. A place in the hierarchy. Those in positions of power had deemed his withdrawal as inexplicable, irritating and quite unbelievable. After all, did he not know that London was the centre of the universe?

  Those had been the parting words of his then superior. Even the term ‘superior’ had irritated.

  Patrick’s answer had been, ‘I don’t care.’

  He still remembered Forsyth’s expression. How do you marry arrogance and disbelief? Not easily. Forsyth lived in a bubble of the state’s making. A bubble so certain of its omnipotence, necessity, endurance, certitude and righteousness that anyone questioning its existence had to be mad.

  So in Forsyth’s eyes, Patrick de Courvoisier was mad. And probably bad.

  Patrick decided he liked that version of himself. It played truer than any of the previous ones.

  There had been good reasons for his departure. The powers that be knew them, as did he. They just weren’t up for discussion. His previous employers had taken his already impressive skills and honed them. Patrick was grateful for that, although he no longer wished to use those skills in the way they wanted him to.

  Duty was something he now abhorred, because it had so often trampled on what he deemed to have value: ordinary people going about their ordinary lives.

  Patrick lifted his whisky and went to sit on the upper deck, a now subdued Oscar at his heels. Oscar was loyal, but he wasn’t subjugated, and he was unwilling to do what he didn’t approve of. Patrick liked that about the little bulldog. It was something he was striving to achieve himself, but old habits die hard, especially if the powers that be had a hold over you.

  Sitting under the awning, he read again the latest missive that had been delivered to the boat in his absence. A summons. Couched as an invitation, but a summons nonetheless. Patrick regarded the gold-rimmed card. They were calling him back. A siren call, which he’d already decided to ignore.

  His life was here now. His patch was Le Suquet. The jobs he took on were the ones he chose. He said where. He said when. He said how much. It was a line from a Hollywood movie about a beck-and-call girl, but it echoed his own thoughts entirely.

  Patrick tore the gold-rimmed invitation in two and turned his attention back to the job he’d chosen to take on: find the missing starlet.

  His thoughts strayed to Camille Ager, and from there to Marie.

  Contemplating the two women, another female face rose in his mind. For a moment he permitted himself to view it, then swept it from his memory. That’s what gold-rimmed invitations brought with them. Memories that were best forgotten.

  He swallowed his whisky and stood up, intent on heading for bed. He was physically tired from the swim out to the black yacht, but he wondered whether his brain was yet ready to shut down.

  Below decks, order was restored. The scent of both blood and disinfectant had dissipated. If bad luck had been laid on him, he did not feel its presence – in the cabin or in his thoughts. Intrigued maybe, but certainly not cursed. Already the game begun by the arrival of Camille Ager had taken form on the chessboard. If anything, the dead rabbit was a diversion; a subplot designed to deflect him from what he should be considering.

  If the Russian was aware than Patrick had entered the frame, would he try to warn him off in such a manner? Psychology was not, he thought, a tactic much used by the Russian. It involved time, and it might not have the desired outcome. Beating someone to pulp was much more likely to succeed.

  So if it wasn’t the Russian who’d delivered the gutted rabbit, then who was it?

  He rinsed his whisky glass and set it to drain. Lying by the sink, he discovered a small silver ring and realized immediately that it must belong to Marie. She’d insisted on rinsing the plates after their meal. The sight of a beautiful woman washing dishes at that sink had amused him. Mainly because it had never happened before.

  So Marie had taken off the ring before rinsing the plates. Had she simply forgotten it or had she left it there on purpose, offering a reason for him to contact her? He examined it in the light. Comprising a delicate threading of silver strands, it also had a hallmark that identified its worth, but no engraving. Patrick sat it up on a shelf for safety. He would explain to Chevalier that Marie had left it, and ask for her number. It was worth a try.

  The presence of the ring had transformed his earlier dark thoughts, just as her visit had done. Patrick allowed himself a few moments of anticipation, then headed for bed. His contemplation of who might have massacred the rabbit, he left for tomorrow.

  He had hoped that the ring might provide him with sweet dreams, but instead his sleep was punctured by lurid images of entrails. Rabbit-sized ones and then the larger human kind. He saw a body lying on snow, turning the white to red. The face wore a grin, or was it a grimace? Drawing closer, Patrick recognized his own face in death.

  He woke, gasping for breath as he always did when the nightmare revisited him. Annoyed with himself he rose, bathed in sweat, and went back out on deck.

  This was the time he liked best. Too late for the night-time revellers, too early even for the fishermen or the marketeers. Le Suquet slumbered amid its maze of secret alleys and passages, intricately layered buildings with red-topped roofs that clung to the hill, climbing ever upward until they reached the castle.

  Patrick had no love for the modern Cannes that stretched eastwards along the bay, nor for the elegance of the Croisette’s manicured palm trees and flower displays. He preferred the Saracen town where life had begun. He loved the old town’s resilience and the prickly nature of its inhabitants. Which is why he’d ended up on a French gunboat in Le Vieux Port. Oscar, hearing him come back on deck, had deigned to join him, despite the late hour.

  The sound of an argument punctured the late-night serenity, causing Oscar to give a warning growl. Patrick identified a man and a woman on a nearby balcony, overlooking Place Massuque, their French as rapid and incisive as gunfire. Eventually they ceased and went inside and silence descended again. Patrick directed his gaze out to sea. From here he could just make out a row of lights he identified as belonging to the Heavenly Princess.

  He had been right to think, when he spotted Camille Ager on the quai, that she was bringing trouble his way. He relished that feeling again, his skin prickling, the scent of rabbit’s blood in his nostrils.

  The sun rose just after six. Patrick stirred from his shallow sleep and went to fetch his dive suit from the engine room. He had his own air tanks, but in this instance he would make use of Stephen’s supply. It was a short walk along a deserted quai. The occupants of the neighbouring motor yachts were fast asleep; the local fishing boats, les pointus, already departed.

  Stephen was on deck. ‘I have to be back for a class at nine thirty,’ he reminded Patrick.

  ‘No problem.’

  The heavy, flat-bottomed boat chugged out of the harbour, wetsuits swaying on the overhead rail. Colm appeared from below with a flask of coffee, its strong aroma sharpening Patrick’s senses as he poured out two cups. The Irishman’s face looked less fiery in the dawn light, but he was as reticent as ever. Last night Patrick had assumed Colm had been unable to get a word in edgeways. Now it looked as though he was naturally taciturn, or only half awake. Or maybe he preferred to commit all his fine words to paper.

  The sea appeared flat calm until they crossed the line of buoys where it began to exhibit a long, slow swell. The Diving Belle, by the nature of her hull, was an uncomfortable boat if you suffered from seasickness. Patrick had watched some of Stephen’s tourist divers go green as they exited the harbour. Once in the calmer waters between Sainte Marguerite and Saint Honorat they usually rallied and, embarrassed by their display of weakness, tried to make up for it by taking chances underwater, much to Stephen’s irritation.

  They were fast approaching the Heavenly Princess. The decks were empty, the partygoers sleeping off their excesses of the night before. Through binoculars, Patrick co
uld make out a few crew members moving about, no doubt clearing up the mess. No one seemed interested in the battered dive boat making its way sedately past.

  Patrick joined Stephen at the wheel.

  ‘How far do you want to go?’ Stephen asked.

  ‘She was anchored closer to the island for the launch party. A scene from the film was shot at the fort. They wanted that as a backdrop.’ Patrick recalled Chapayev’s studied gaze in that direction, when he’d been aboard the black yacht the day before. Both the Russian and his henchman had been concerned about something, but what?

  Stephen dropped anchor as close to the rock face at Fort Royal as the depth allowed, then all three men got kitted up. Patrick had no idea what they were looking for, but if the Heavenly Princess had anchored here the night Angele had disappeared, then the area was worth checking out.

  In his past life, Patrick had rarely dived for pleasure. Like a champion swimmer who entered the water only to train or perform, diving for Patrick had been part of the job. He occasionally came out with Stephen, but more often absented himself from Cannes to travel to more challenging diving locations around the world, to hone his skills, in case he might have to rely on them again in the future.

  Today wouldn’t prove to be a difficult dive; merely a reconnaissance mission in fairly shallow water. Nothing to get excited about.

  Despite telling himself this, his entry into the water still brought a rush of adrenaline. Much like he experienced at the gaming tables of the casino, or when he’d spied Camille Ager walking towards him along the quai.

  As he looked round the calm, quiet and weightless universe, a castagnola emerged from the rocks below. A vivid blue, the tiny fish approached Patrick’s mask inquisitively, seeing its reflection there. Soon it was joined by others, darting around him.

  Patrick noted the location of the anchor rope to orientate himself, before kicking off through the shimmering blue cloud. Below him, white sand drifted between great swathes of sea grass, punctured by the occasional stony limestone outcrop.