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.“And has he got a passport?” I demanded.“Alf?”“He has now.”I groaned, clutching my head.Oh God, why did I ask that? Now I knew! A false passport probably, and – oh crikey, yes, of course, a thousand pounds in folding readies stashed in his pocket.I gulped.Kindly donated by yours truly, not two hours ago.No wonder he’d wanted more.“And you? You and Lance? They’ll be back to question you in the morning, surely?”Mac lit a cigarette and sucked hard.“I’m sure they will, and we know nofing.All we know is what Alf told us, that Vi left him.Packed her bags ‘cos she’d had enough of ‘im and went to Spain to stay with a friend, and as far as we know, that’s where she still is.Right, Lance?”Lance was still staring miserably at his shoes.“Right,” he muttered bleakly.“And Alf? Where’s Alf, they’ll ask.”Mac shrugged, expressionless, just as he no doubt would in the police station.“Alf? Dunno.Really, dunno, guv.Christ, I’m not my brother’s keeper, am I?” His blue eyes widened innocently at me.Oh, but he was, he most definitely was, and always had been.And I had no doubt that in the not-too-distant future, Mac would be joining his brother in Puerto wherever-it-was, taking the whole family with him, upping sticks, buying a little villa, running up a few haciendas with the help of his masonic brothers and sons, before going on to buy a bigger villa, with luxury pool and then retiring to run a beach bar.Mac had neatly averted disaster all his life, slipping and sliding, ducking and weaving, just one step ahead of his clumsy, not-so-sure-footed brother, but always there to stretch back a hand to catch Alf, should he need one, should he fall.I crouched down beside him.“So why tell me?” I breathed.“Why not just tell me what you’ll tell the police? That you’re not your brother’s keeper and you haven’t a clue where he is?”“Because you know us too well and you know about Alf’s stupid letters and you’re too bleedin’ smart into the bargain.I had you fooled wiv the Trinidad and Tobago stuff, which, incidentally, happens all the time round our neck of the woods, but I knew I’d have to tell you if the old bill came snoopin’.They just came a bit sooner than I’d hoped, that’s all.We should have ‘ad Alf away days ago, but these fings take time to arrange, if you know wha’ I mean.”“No,” I said firmly.“I don’t.”And I didn’t want to know either.Didn’t want to know about false passports, false identities, someone to meet him on the other side, no doubt.Let’s face it, there’d have to be.I couldn’t see Alf getting to Tooting on his own, let alone Marbella.No wonder it had taken time to arrange – and then a safe house somewhere, with someone to look after him until Mac could get out there.And of course extradition was still lax in some areas on the continent.For all the Spanish protestations that they did their best, if you knew the right people, it was still possible to lie low, and if the heat was turned up, why, you could always get on a boat and hop across to Marrakesh until things cooled down.And meanwhile, yes, meanwhile, poor old Vi lay a-mouldering in a shallow grave somewhere.Mac caught my eye.“An accident, remember?” he said sharply.“He loved her, orright? Really loved her.You saw ‘ow he was for weeks afterwards, beside ‘imself he was, weren’t he?”I nodded.That much was true.I remembered them all coming back that weekend: Alf in tears; Spiro, with presumably not a clue what was going on but joining in on the waterworks front anyway out of sheer solidarity; Mac, pale and tense, hustling them all to work like demons that morning, taking their minds off the horrors of the past couple of days with some hard graft; and Lance – no.No, of course, Lance had been here that weekend.It was the weekend that Claudia had gone missing.I suddenly remembered rushing to the pub to look for her, but finding him on his mobile phone instead, talking to his father, looking deadly serious, grim.And then I remembered his strange reluctance to call the police to find Claudes…I turned.“You knew? When I found you in the pub?”“Only that Vi was dead,” he said quietly, “and that it was an accident.I didn’t know what Dad was planning to do, but I knew enough not to get the police round here if I could possibly help it.” He regarded me squarely.“Although I would have done, Liwy.Had we needed to.”I nodded.I believed him too.Believed both of them, knew instinctively they were both telling the truth, and knew instinctively that the police wouldn’t believe them and would nail Alf, and that life was so unfair.But where did that leave me?“I’m counting on you to stay shtumm, luv,” said Mac quietly.“Not to lie or anyfing, not to tell any porkies, right, but just to say nofing.Say you don’t know, orright?”I looked at him, then glanced away.Across the river, the fireflies were dancing in the beams of the low evening sun.It sounded so easy, didn’t it? Just don’t say anything.Say you don’t know.I swallowed.“You need to know, Mac, that I can’t do that,” I said quietly.“I won’t go to the police, won’t actually seek them out, tell my story, spill the beans, but if they come here asking me questions, I won’t stay ‘shtumm,’ either, as you call it.I have to tell them all I know.The letters, everything.You need to know that.”I held his eye firmly as he looked at me long and hard.Finally he nodded.“Yeah, well, I rather thought you’d say that.Rather expected it.Two different walks of life, eh, luv? Two codes of practice, somefing to do with morals and duty – rules, too, I expect.”“Something like that.”“Yeah, well, when the chips are down, I make me own rules.” He eyed me beadily.I eyed him nervously back.There was a pause [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]