Chapter 23
This is a Top Ten rule. Once you’ve interloped a place, don’t ever, ever return to it.
There are a couple of exceptions. If you’ve left something behind, and you realise within about half an hour, and it’s safe to, then go back.
But if you’re doing your job, you won’t have left anything.
And normally I’ve locked up the place perfectly behind me, or as perfectly as possible, so getting in again will be a pain.
Balfour Villas is the other exception to this rule, but that’s only because I know about the unique legal limbo it sits in.
Even then I try to treat it like a new place each time.
And although this isn’t exactly a return interlope, here I am now, staring at the rightful owner of a home I broke into a few years ago, as he shuffles down the hall and through a door I already know leads into a green-wallpapered drawing room.
When was it? I haven’t been in this part of town for years. Were these people the owners at the time? I have a horrible feeling they were: I remember all the decor, for one. It’s not déjà vu, which is apparently just getting some wires crossed in your brain. I have literally vu’d this place déjà.
All these thoughts go through my head in the seconds between recognising the house and Em turning to look at me as I stand gawping. ‘What’s the matter with you?’
‘I’m just … remembering something.’
‘OK, well, you just sit quietly. We’ll talk.’
Elle is glancing at both of us from the doorway and beckoning. As we approach, she asks her sister: ‘Is he all right?’
‘He’s having a madeleine moment. In Search of Lost Crime.’
‘Very funny,’ I croak.
We cross the threshold into the reception room. It’s full of those extremely posh sofas that start to hurt your spine after five minutes, and tatty cushions that might turn out to be sleeping terriers. Elle does the introductions. ‘These are my colleagues, Mr Denton. Or is it Sir Simon?’
He waves a mahogany hand. ‘Please. Simon.’
We smile and murmur our names. It’s all coming back to me now. This was their secondary residence when I was here. He’s some sort of aged industrialist, mineral rights and things like that. He and his family were living in France full-time. It was a safe bet.
Behind him, a woman maybe ten years younger than Sir Simon enters, holding a tray. She’s got a cooler and more calculating eye than her husband, even when she’s just handing out cups of tea and offering round the biscuits. ‘Lady Patricia,’ Denton says, taking a cup and twinkling.
‘Well,’ Elle begins, ‘these are my – oh, thank you, lovely – these are my colleagues. We’re conducting an internal review of Harcourt and Wallace, and your property – your previous London residence, that is – came up as being one of concern.’
‘Chepstow Crescent?’
‘Exactly. We gather you sold it through this man.’ Elle holds up her phone.
‘Oh, yes. Don’t remember his name. Nice chap.’ Sir Simon crunches a Garibaldi.
‘David,’ Lady Patricia says.
‘That’s right. David was one of our agents until recently. Could you tell my colleagues about your discussions with him? What you just told me?’
‘I’m sorry, why are we discussing this?’ Lady Patricia is hawkish suddenly. She looks sideways at her husband: You old fool, what have you told them?
‘These people are investigating something about the agency, dear,’ says Sir Simon. ‘This agent man is dead. They think something was awry.’
‘It won’t go any further than an internal investigation,’ says Elle. ‘And you’ll be strictly anonymised.’
I wouldn’t buy this line myself, nor try to sell it, but Elle is so demure that she’s actually kind of convincing.
‘We’ll tell you as much as we know,’ Lady Denton says. Those words are only ever said by people who are about to give you a deeply partial version of the truth. ‘The firm came highly recommended, you see. By some dear friends.’
‘Roger and Jean,’ Sir Simon murmurs.
‘Yes, exactly. We can ask them if they’ll talk to you. They said we had to specifically ask for David. Well, we did, and he came round, looked at the place, told us what he thought it was worth – I think it was about twelve, he said, wasn’t it?’
I will never stop being astonished by the way some people casually mention eight-figure sums of money.
‘Well, he said that if we sold the place through him direct, he’d cut the commission in half. More than, actually. Obviously the standard commission on a place like Chepstow Crescent – what is it, one or two per cent normally? – would have been a serious sum of money.’
‘Hundreds of thousands,’ Sir Simon chimes in.
Yes, I want to scream, but it doesn’t matter when you’re selling your home for twelve million quid. Good thing I don’t scream it, because Elle picks up the baton: ‘So naturally you wanted to save a bit of money if you could.’
‘Well, yes,’ Lady Patricia says. ‘He said we could do it using his solicitor at the firm, that it would all be arranged. Who was buying it again?’
‘Some consortium,’ Sir Simon says. ‘We wanted to know it was all above board, of course, and we quizzed David on how it could be. He said it was due to him playing a slightly different role in the transaction – what was it, a search agent, an introductions agent? Something like that, anyway.’
Lady Patricia nods. ‘Yes. He knew of a buyer who wanted just that sort of place. They had their own lawyers, and they were pukka too. So that was fine. It all went through just like he said. And we had saved a really good amount of commission. I’m sure he wasn’t doing it out of the kindness of his heart, but …
’ She trails off. But you were careful not to look too hard in case he pulled the offer away.
And you made sure to ask just enough questions so he could assure you it was proper, for deniability’s sake later on. Honestly.
‘Well,’ Em says. ‘That is interesting. Thank you for telling us.’
‘Obviously, if we’d even thought there was any impropriety going on …’ You obviously did think that.
‘I understand,’ says Elle. ‘This won’t go any further. We’re just trying to ascertain what Mr Harcourt’s practices were like, and this is very helpful indeed.’
‘Well, he did a great job for us. Got us quite a bit more than we thought we’d get. And we’ve been jolly happy here.’
‘It’s a beautiful place,’ I say.
‘Thank you.’
I can’t stop myself talking. ‘It must need a lot of security, I’d imagine?’
‘Oh, yes.’ Sir Simon is oblivious. ‘But we’ve never had any trouble.’
Lady Patricia looks at him rather sharply. ‘Yes we have, Simon.’
‘When?’
‘The …’ She tails off and glances at us.
I try to stare back blankly, but I have to know. I just have to know if they know I got in. I think it was about a fortnight I was here.
She continues. ‘We had squatters once.’
‘No.’ Em sounds appalled, and looks at me. ‘Did you hear that, Francis?’
‘About five years back. They covered their tracks well, but we could tell the place had been ransacked.’
‘Nasty business,’ said Sir Simon. ‘They must have got frightened and left. Just as well for them.’
‘Did they take anything?’ I ask.
‘Yes, a few lovely objects. We’re just lucky we weren’t here at the time.’
That’s robbers, I want to say. You’re confusing us with robbers. I certainly didn’t take anything, despite there being a lot of rather vulgar jewellery lying around the place. I bet they claimed on the insurance.
Did I leave things in a bit of disarray? I wasn’t quite as careful back then. For God’s sake, who’s careful aged twenty-three?
‘The police were useless,’ says Sir Simon, and I breathe again. ‘We’ve tightened security since then. We got you all on camera arriving, and we’ll get you again as you leave!’
Elle and Em laugh. I need to splash some cold water on my face. I ask directions to the cloakroom, and listen carefully as Lady Patricia tells me where to go, despite knowing it’s the second door down on the left.
After some polite thanks and goodbyes, Lady Patricia retreats, and Call Me Simon sees us to the door.
‘Oh. One last thing,’ says Em, in her best Columbo. ‘Did you ever find out who bought your former home? Chepstow Crescent?’
‘Knocked on the door a few years later, just to say hello and see what they’d done with the garden. I must say, I was not impressed. Middle Eastern lot. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were dodgy.’ Sir Simon leans closer. ‘I just think they’re very different to us, don’t you? Societally, I mean?’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that,’ says Em, stepping back and looking at the marble porch.
‘I think you find corruption everywhere under the sun if you know where to look.’ She smiles guilelessly at Sir Simon.
And with that minor parting shot against a thousand years of jingoism, we take our leave.
I clock three separate cameras on our way to the street.
Back outside the gates, Em hugs her sister. ‘Elle, you genius. How did you get the details of the last house and Dead Man Davy being involved? No, don’t tell me. Jonny.’
‘Yeah. He found the cached Land Registry files.’
‘So Davy had his own little operation, selling homes with hardly any commission, avoiding the actual firm.’
‘That’s why Mrs P says none of those properties were Harcourt and Wallace ones,’ I say.
‘And if he did that for all the homes in that ledger …’
‘That’s a lot of money Harcourt and Wallace would have missed out on.’
‘And Wallace had a big row with him a few weeks ago. Maybe he’d found out what was going on.’
Elle’s brow crinkles. ‘So then Wallace … killed him?’
‘It’s possible, I suppose.’
I think of something else. ‘That’s why his solicitor looked so terrified when I visited the office. He might have been the weak link. Perhaps Wallace used his evidence to confront Davy.’
‘Wow.’
‘But it still doesn’t make sense for Davy to slash the commission,’ I say. ‘Even if he was getting a much bigger chunk all for himself, that’s a thumping discount. Davy had an expensive life. He must have had another way of making the cash back.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Probably something to do with those companies.’
‘Yeah. Let’s ring Jonny.’
We all agree this is a great idea and we’ve done a great day’s work. As we head home, I switch on my main phone. A message bumps onto the screen:
You’re going to pay for everything you’ve done, Al. And more.
I glance at Em. She’s on her phone, but when she looks up in response to my hard stare, she seems totally oblivious. I don’t suppose … No. Just so unlikely. It can’t be her sending them. Nobody’s that good an actor.
Of course, if it’s not her, or Elle, or Jonny – although now I’m starting to have worries – then it’s another bit of my past catching up with me.
Either way, great stuff.