Devil's Breath Page 5

Although every nerve in Addy’s body was telling him that was exactly what he should do. Go back.

  PART II

  Ashore

  Chapter 9

  FAME

  Drownings off the coast of Southwest England are not unusual. Tragic, of course, for all concerned, but hardly rare. The usual safety warnings about fog and tides and winds and waves generated by low pressure systems go unheeded, and people sally forth, thinking the dramatic storms are so beautiful, and the surges are such a lark, and the warnings don’t apply to them because they’ve lived near the sea all their lives and they know what they’re doing.

  In winter, the danger is more obvious, with blustery El Niño–spawned winds and waves that breach the crumbling sea walls of quaint old resorts like Monkslip-super-Mare. The freezing wind alone keeps most sensible souls indoors, warming their hands by the fireplace as they wait out the worst of it. Cliff falls are not uncommon as nearby bluffs endure a ruthless daily pummeling, and water-soaked headlands erode under the relentless pounding of waves. The damp permeates every aspect of life and death: even funerals are postponed as the ground becomes too soggy for gravediggers to dig. Those people sitting by their fires start to talk about moving to the center of England, where surely they would be spared all this.

  Even in the spring, when Monkslip-super-Marians start to emerge from their candy-colored cottages, the warm air can be deceiving, for the water still is freezing, and deadly.

  Still, the death of Margot Browne was something, well, special. That it received the sort of international media attention it did was due partly to the fame of its victim, and partly to the glamorous party of people surrounding the victim just before her death, all of them feasting and laughing and also, it would appear, plotting and feuding. The victim, fifty-eight at the time she died, was an actress, once a goodish if flamboyant one, now more famous for having once been famous than actually being famous. And now really, really famous for having been found floating dead in the harbor of Monkslip-super-Mare under mysterious circumstances.

  If only she could have seen the headlines, mused her former paramour as he sipped his morning coffee. Himself renowned as a director of blockbuster movies that even he found appalling, Romero Farnier as a young man had dreamed of fame, but fame of the immortal kind, fame such as the Coen brothers or David Lynch or Alfred Hitchcock could claim. Or François Truffaut, his idol. He even allowed himself to dream of directing a Shakespearean play. Why not, now? He and Branagh were good friends.

  But, no. Instead he found himself directing tiresome actors in imbecilic movies that were more about special effects than about good old-fashioned storytelling, and fending off requests from the studios to do more of the same. He had long since gotten used to the riches his potboiler movies brought in; he was well off, if a bit overextended. Now he hungered for the real thing: FAME.

  For Romero Farnier wanted to live forever. He was sixty, and he figured he had twenty-five good years left to him. But when was his ship finally going to come in?

  He turned to where the news report of Margot’s demise continued on page five, but his mind wandered. He was bored, and anyone of his acquaintance could tell you that Romero Farnier when bored was a force to be reckoned with, if avoiding him altogether were not possible. He was at heart an excitement junkie and he knew it, so the death of Margot Browne should at the very least have livened things up for him. It probably would have done so, had he not found himself, his crew, and all the guests aboard his yacht on the night in question grounded until further notice while the police conducted their inquiries into Margot’s death.

  Even though they were grounded in luxurious accommodations in the Grand Imperial, one of the legendary Victorian hotels fronting the coast, Romero had things to do and people to meet. The delay was just galling. He could have kicked up a fuss, and if too many days passed he would do just that, but for now it was best to put on a face of amiable good will and heartfelt desire to cooperate to the fullest with the authorities, and so he had advised his crew and passengers.

  Margot always did have a gift for complicating his life. It looked to be a gift that carried over into the grave, from beyond the grave. Damn her.

  Damn Margot Browne and all her petty little problems and her screwed-up life to hell.

  She had always been like this, even as an effervescent, sparkly, up-and-coming young actress of stunning beauty. In life, and now in death, Margot was just a pain.

  Chapter 10

  MAX TUDOR, FRONT AND CENTER

  Even the Reverend Maxen “Max” Tudor, also reading the paper over his own morning coffee, recognized many of the names mentioned in the story. There were only one or two unfamiliar ones: Maurice Brandon, identified as a stylist, whatever that was. Something to do with interior design, was it? And a passenger named Belinda Bower, who was identified only as a crew member. It was implied she was some sort of witness to the drowning or accident.

  But of course he recognized the name of his friend and sometime colleague DCI Cotton of the local constabulary, who was heading up the investigation.

  The others mentioned in the story Max knew or knew of vaguely because he was a great fan of the cinema. There was a screenwriter named Addison Phelps whose name Max thought he recognized from the credits of a recent spy thriller, for example. And an actress named Tina Calvert. Although she was clearly a minor character in this particular real-life drama, photos of her must have been readily available, as most of the papers featured her or, more precisely, her plunging neckline, which some enterprising photographer or other had managed to capture at a high angle from above. Her face, while beautiful, seemed incidental. Then there was an actor named Jake Larsson—no photo or further information or credits provided. For an actor, how that omission must have stung. And there had been a “yoga instructress” on board the luxury yacht, but she went unnamed.

  Also there had been a Baron and Baroness Sieben-Kuchen-Bäcker—there could only be one couple of that name in all the world, although it was not a baronetcy with which Max was familiar. So many of these little baronetcies came and went, and so many were extinct, dormant, or forfeit.

  The death of Margot Browne, while immensely sad, was of no immediate concern to Max, nor were the bold-faced names of those who had accompanied her on her final voyage. Her death seemed merely an occasion for the tabloids to unearth their files on the woman they had deemed a bombshell not long ago, and to tsk-tsk over her fate. Comparisons were made to other “celebrity drownings.” The whole was illustrated with an unflattering photo of Margot taken in recent years. She was shown leaving a Los Angeles nightspot, caught in the glare of the camera’s flash, looking pale and haggard, one bony, veined hand raised as if to shield her eyes or fend off the photographer.

  Max vowed to remember Margot in his prayers that morning, to thank her for the many hours of vicarious pleasure she had given her viewing public. (She had been, truth be told, a frightful actress with a tendency to overplay every part, but still she’d possessed great beauty and a sort of presence, and she had excelled at offering the innocent escapism that to Max was the entire reason for the existence of film.) And then he folded the paper, kissed his wife Awena and baby son Owen good-bye, and walked to St. Edwold’s Church to conduct the morning service in Nether Monkslip.

  He stopped into the vicarage that evening to find on his desk a hastily scribbled note from Mrs. Hooser, the housekeeper. It was then Max began to understand there would be no escape from this particular production.

  Chapter 11

  GEORGE GREENHOUSE

  The trip to London wasn’t difficult—the Harry Potterish change of trains in Staincross Minster was the only tricky part—but then Max had made the journey many times before. In his briefcase he carried a sermon that was in the middle of a good polish; he felt it was going rather well. The weather eased his journey by ignoring that morning’s forecast of rain.

  Max hailed a taxi at the London station and was quickly deposited at a hotel near Thames Hou
se. From the anonymous hotel he walked to MI5 headquarters, by force of habit keeping a lookout for anyone who might be tailing him. It was a slight risk in his case, but the first rule was always to assume you were being followed and to act accordingly. Old habits from MI5 never died.

  A quick pass through security before he arrived at the familiar, rather anonymous office to which he had been summoned.

  “Good to see you again, Max,” said George Greenhouse, shaking Max’s hand before pointing him to a worn, comfortable seat in front of his desk. It was a dark leather chair Max recognized from years before, a chair in which he’d received his marching orders on many occasions. It was also the chair from which he’d tendered his resignation from MI5, on a black day so long ago when he’d felt he could take no more, and could only think of turning swords into plowshares. He’d recently come full circle when, in trying to escape the violence of his past, he’d inadvertently put his beloved Awena’s life at risk. It was at that moment he’d realized there was, for him, no escape.

  “And I’m sure you’re wondering why I got in touch,” George continued.

  “I did, rather,” said Max. “I got the message from your man Melville arranging the appointment, but he didn’t give any indication what it might be about. He said you wanted to meet for lunch, but for that you would have rung me yourself. The word ‘lunch’ coming from anyone connected with your office often meant, in my day, ‘death-defying exploit involving guns and knives.’ Am I right?”

  “Quite right, Max. Although hopefully, there’s nothing that risky involved this time, and the stakes aren’t quite as high as what you’re used to: a smuggling operation, we think, but we can’t get to the bottom of who or exactly what—although almost certainly drugs are involved. Stuff turning up everywhere in London and beyond but MI6 can’t figure out the source nor the courier. Where we want to send you in is only our best guess, you understand. But in a situation where subtlety and an ability to mingle with all sorts is required, I can’t help but think of you.”

  Like John le Carré, Max had been recruited while still an undergraduate at Oxford, dreaming amidst the spires, the pealing bells, the golden buildings of Cotswold stone. He’d been chosen not only for his obvious intelligence and self-possession but for a certain quality of awareness—a cognizance hard to define, but once seen, not forgotten: a quality essential for a spy. Today they would call it mindfulness and despite the word’s New Agey associations, it came closest to describing Max, thought George. Max let nothing slip past him for long.

  This, thought Max, was laying it on rather thick, and immediately all his defenses against flattery went up. Max was used to being courted and sought after, and being told that he and only he could do such and such. In his duties as the Anglican priest for his tiny parish, the things that only he could do were endless, and ranged from quelling insurrections of the Nether Monkslip Book Club to convincing Miss Pitchford that Suzanna Winship had not meant to give offense at the last meeting of the Women’s Institute, although Suzanna almost certainly had intended to do so. In the case of MI5, George was surrounded by men and women every bit as capable, Max felt, as himself. This was in fact not true, and George knew precisely what he was about, for Max had been a uniquely intelligent, brave, and stalwart operative—their undercover superstar.

  Max’s saving grace was his humility.

  “Certainly it’s not a matter I could go into on the phone,” George continued. “I think we all have learned to our sorrow that phone calls and text messages and probably even carrier pigeons can be intercepted too easily these days. Much better to have a trusted human intermediary, wherever possible, and a face-to-face chat.”

  In an office routinely swept for bugs, thought Max—an unmarked office nearly as illusory as the rooms of 221B Baker Street. If one didn’t know better, the outer door to George’s inner sanctum might lead to a broom closet. Max waited, remaining quite still, the expression on his handsome face open, attentive, and alert to nuance. George launched into one of his little preambles. Max was used to this, and knew that George was simply gauging the mood of his audience before he got round to the point. As for Max, he had been expecting this day when he would be called back into the field, although perhaps not quite so soon as it had come.

  “You’ve seen the papers?” George said at last, winding down after a foray into the weather and who might win the FA Cup. He’d asked Max about life in the village and laughed appreciatively at Max’s description of the fallout from the water balloon–firing catapult on the village green for the last Harvest Fayre, which had demolished the Women’s Institute’s edible flowers demonstration. George further was to gather that the struggles for supremacy over the Bring-and-Buy table were becoming the stuff of legend.

  But George’s animated, bushy eyebrows settled down as the topic took a serious turn, finally lowering over the piercing black eyes that had earned him a raft of nicknames over the years. Max’s own favorite was “The Demon Fielder,” although he still had only the vaguest idea what that meant. Perhaps some holdover from George’s days on the cricket fields. “I’m referring to the news concerning a drowning in your neck of the woods—to mix my metaphors.”

  “You don’t mean the actress who drowned off a yacht anchored near Monkslip-super-Mare? Margot Browne? Why, yes. Yes, I did see the news of that.”

  “I do mean Margot Browne—one and the same. As far as the outside world is concerned at the moment, she simply fell off a yacht and drowned. Got a bit tipsy, the winds were a bit stronger than normal for the time of year. By some of the more dramatic accounts she might almost have been blown overboard, caught by a rogue wave. It’s a common enough ending in those waters, however. Of course the nearer you get to Cornwall the more these incidents seem to occur.”

  “Yes. Quite. The waters can be terribly hazardous, even in summer.”

  Max was assembling in his mind everything he could remember of the news story. He’d not paid that much attention at the time: It had been one more tragedy in a newspaper that more and more seemed to compete for space over which terrible story to highlight that day. As he recalled, the actress had last been seen at a dinner party on board the yacht of famed film director Romero Farnier. Romero, it was noted, liked playing the host; he collected people, surrounding himself with all sorts who interested him, generally show-business types plus, for added sparkle, whatever minor nobs he could manage to scrape together. According to later reports, Margot’s complete absence from the ship wasn’t noticed until the next morning—noticed by her “traveling companion” Jake Larsson, identified further only as “an actor.” Margot had in fact been swept nearly out to sea at some point during the night, only to be washed up with the seaweed on the incoming tide in the harbor of Monkslip-super-Mare.

  Max relayed this summary, adding: “But she didn’t fall?”

  “Not according to the preliminaries, and not according to our agent, who was traveling aboard the yacht—traveling undercover as a guest of the director, moving under the name Belinda Bower. Her real name is Patrice Logan. I think you may know Patrice?” George’s deliberately bland expression revealed what he knew full well: Max had once known Patrice, and very well indeed.

  Oh, God. Max had not seen this coming. A long-ago memory surfaced of full soft breasts pressed against his back as he slept in his old London flat. Sometimes he would wake in the morning with his arm numb where her weight had rested on it all night; he’d not wanted to wake her by attempting to disentangle himself. Then there was that shampoo she always used that smelled of green apples, a scent that could still catch him unawares if he smelled it on another woman. Next to Awena, she had the most beautiful long hair he’d ever seen.

  There had been those nights when the two of them staggered in, already barely existing on just a few hours of sleep, but still with more than enough energy to make love. The closer their jobs had brought them to danger on any given day, it seemed, the more fuel was added to their desire for each other. The greatest ap
hrodisiac was the certain knowledge that every day might be the last. But now—he had not in fact thought of Patrice in some years, certainly not since he’d met Awena, but immediately his memories of Patrice and her remarkable beauty flooded in. It was just like watching an old black-and-white film, something with a suitable backdrop of one of the world wars, grainy footage of longing good-byes, of star-crossed lovers clinging together at deserted train stations.

  “Yes,” said Max. “Yes, I knew Patrice from when I was in Five. Actively in Five, I mean.”

  George cleared his throat. He didn’t like putting Max on the spot, but it was necessary to clarify the relationship right away so as not to compromise the mission. If Max’s current personal situation might be affected, confounding the investigation, he, George, might have to think again. This was Max, after all, a good man and true, but Max was only human. And his wife Awena, presumably, was only human as well. Empath, clairvoyant, New Agey healer, or no.

  Max meanwhile was deciding how far discretion might be confused with deliberate muddying of the waters, when George saved him the trouble, saying, “You were an item once?”

  Max nodded. “A bit more than that, sir.” The “sir” was a holdover from former days but calling the head of MI5 “George” was something he couldn’t often bring himself to do. “We were in fact quite close; we lived together for a time.” The truth was they two had collided like meteors glancing off each other before spinning off onto different paths in space. The impact of Patrice on his life had been immense, intense—perhaps too much so. Definitely, too much so. “Too hot, not to cool down,” as the Cole Porter song went.

  But Max thought he would spare George these little amorous details. Instead he said, “You know how it is: You forge a very strong bond with a person who understands what it is you do for a living, because they are in the same business you are, taking all the same risks. And there is no one else for miles round who could possibly understand. Certainly there is no one to confide in on the outside, living in that bubble as we did.” This was as nice a way as he could find to say, “There is less lying involved that way,” because George was married to a civilian, and presumably could never share exactly how he spent his time. The people in his life who meant the most to him—his wife and family—were necessarily in the dark about much of what he did all day. Max doubted he could entirely hide his doings from Awena, even to protect her from the evil he well knew was out there. She had that preternatural ability to see through lies and subterfuge, which was unusual in a woman of such integrity. Generally, in Max’s experience, it took one to know one.