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Authors: Rhys Bowen

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BOOK: Evan's Gate
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“And what would that mean for you, trying to build it up again?” Roberts asked.
“I don’t know. I haven’t met the listed buildings bloke yet,” Evan said.
“You should ask him if you need to re-create the smell,” Mr. Owens said.
“The smell?” Evan asked.
“Yes, old Rhodri, last shepherd up there, always kept a lamb or two inside the place. Well, it wasn’t very big and it always smelled like a zoo in there—cross between a zoo and wet wool. You’d need to re-create that, I’d imagine.”
“Evan, do you want this toad in the hole or not? It’s sitting here getting cold,” came Betsy’s high, clear voice toward him.
“Excuse me, gentlemen. Dinner calls.” Evan made his way back toward the bar.
“Make the most of this. You won’t be allowed in here anymore when you’re married,” Evans-the-Meat called after him. “The little woman will expect you to spend your evenings at home with her.”
“As if your wife ever sees you in the evenings, Gareth,” Roberts-the-Pump said.
“Ah, but it’s different when you’re newlywed. You have to break wives in slowly, over the years, don’t you?”
Evan picked up his plate, suddenly not so hungry. They were right. He should have gone straight to see Bronwen. She’d been waiting all day for news about the cottage. He carried the plate through to the lounge, set it down on the nearest table, and ate it as quickly as possible. Then he drained his glass, put the plate back on the counter, and went to leave.
“Where are you off to now in such a hurry?” Charlie asked him.
“I haven’t told Bronwen about that damned inspector yet.”
“See, what did I tell you?” Evans-the-Meat called triumphantly from the fire. “Once they get you hooked, they have you dancing like a bloody puppet. You’ll be next, Barry, boyo.”
“Don’t you listen to him,” Betsy said. “Just because his wife doesn’t want him at home because he’s a pain in the you-know-what.”
Evan heard the laughter as he pushed open the door into the cold night air. He walked briskly up the village street, past the shops and the row of cottages, until he came to the low wall of the school playground. Like many old-fashioned village schools, the Llanfair schoolteacher’s residence was at one end of the school building. This practice was dying out as children were bused to newer schools in the towns. There was talk that the Llanfair school would be closed as soon as the new steel-and-glass building was finished outside Porthmadog.
Evan almost broke into a run as he crossed the playground and
tapped on Bronwen’s door. She opened it looking like a long-ago figure from folklore, her ash blonde hair loose over her shoulders and wearing a floor-length robe of deep blue.
“Oh, Evan, I’d almost given up on you. I was about to go to bed and read.” She raised her face for his kiss. “Come on in, you poor thing. Have you been out all this time looking for the little girl? You must be starving.”
“Actually,
cariad,
I’ve already had a bite to eat.”
“What was it—bread and cheese?”
“Toad in the hole.”
“My, but your cooking skills are improving. I’m impressed.”
Unfortunately it was just not possible to lie to Bronwen. Evan gave her a guilty smile. “I popped into the pub and grabbed a quick bite to eat. There was nothing in my fridge, and you’re right, I was starving.”
“Then why on earth didn’t you come up here? I could have fixed you something.”
“You were the one who told me I had to learn to fend for myself.”
“That doesn’t mean that I don’t understand that there are times when you’re too tired to want to cook, you daftie. I’m sure the food they serve down at the pub is taken straight from a package and microwaved—full of stuff that’s not good for you.”
“It filled the spot, but now I’ve got the most awful indigestion because I gulped it down as quickly as possible, knowing that you’d be waiting for me.”
“I don’t know.” Bronwen smiled, shaking her head. “You men. I’ll be glad when I can finally look after you and make sure you eat properly. Sit down. I’ll pour you a brandy to settle your stomach.”
Evan sat by the fire that Bronwen always lit on cold days and watched her moving around the kitchen, her hair and her robe floating out around her as she moved, as if she was a magical creature of no substance. Again he was overcome by the wonder that she had chosen him. She brought back a brandy snifter with
a generous amount of cognac in it. “Here. Get that down you.” She pulled up another chair beside him. “Now, tell me all about everything—first the cottage.”
She listened patiently as he went through the whole encounter.
“Well, I think it sounds positive, don’t you?”
“I hope so—if the listed buildings man isn’t even more officious than Mr. Pilcher. Anyway, I’m going to get busy myself. As soon as I’ve got a moment of free time, I’ll start digging out the sewer line and have a plumber come to check it.”
“I wish they’d hurry up,” Bronwen said. “I can’t wait to get in there and start painting and putting up curtains and making it look like home.”
Funny things women look forward to,
Evan thought. He reached across and stroked her hair.
“And what about the little girl? You didn’t find her yet?”
Evan shook his head. “No trace of her. I kept hoping that she’d just wandered off and got lost, but that doesn’t seem likely now. We’ve had our blokes combing the whole area and asking at all the houses nearby.”
“So you think she was kidnapped?”
Evan sighed. “It was most likely her own father who took her. He’s a Russian and was planning to go back to Russia.”
“Well, that’s better than other options, isn’t it?” Bronwen said, staring thoughtfully into her own glass. “At least she’s still alive, and he’ll look after her and there’s a chance of getting her back.”
“When you put it that way, you’re right,” Evan agreed. “We’ll know more when he’s been traced. The ports have been alerted so he can’t flee the country with her.”
“Well, that’s good then.”
Evan leaned back in his chair, feeling the cognac flowing through his system. “I’m so whacked, I don’t think I’ve got the energy to go home,” he said.
“Who is telling you to?” Bronwen gave him a teasing smile as she got to her feet and ruffled his hair.
On a level area of paddock outside the house, a large tent was being erected. Shouts of men and the sound of guy ropes being hammered into the soil echoed back from the valley walls and made sheep look up and trot off in alarm. Old Tomos Thomas stood on his doorstep, scratching his head.
“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble,” he said to the men standing beside him. One of the men was his grandson, Henry Bosley-Thomas. The other, managing to look like an advertisement out of
Hare and Hound
for the elegant country squire in well-cut slacks and a checked vyella shirt, was Henry’s father, Hugh Bosley-Thomas, creator of their hyhenated surname.
“You asked the family to help you arrange a party for your birthday, Father,” Hugh said, in a voice that betrayed time at an expensive public school and then Oxford.
“I didn’t think you counted yourself as family any longer. Haven’t exactly been coming to visit too often, have you?” old Tomos said.
“Let’s not spoil today with talk of the past, Father. I was happy to do it.”
“Yes, but I didn’t mean a bloody great circus tent. What are you planning to put in there—a lot of bloody elephants and a wire
walker?” The old man, in contrast, spoke with a soft Welsh lilt. He looked like any other sheep farmer from the area—his face weathered from a life in the outdoors, his high boots caked with mud, his flat workman’s cap on his head.
Hugh gave him a tense smile and glanced swiftly at Henry. “We had to invite all the neighbors, Father. You know what bad feeling it would create if anyone was left out.”
“So what’s wrong with passing around a few beers and packets of crisps at the pub?”
Hugh glanced at his father and realized he was being baited. Old Tomos always had liked to tease. He had always made sure that he put his boys in their place, didn’t want them to get above themselves, no fancy ideas. Luckily he hadn’t succeeded, Hugh thought. He and his brother, Robert, had both done extremely well at Oxford. They had gone into business together, marketing farm products, and had prospered. Now he lived in the stockbroker belt near Guildford in Surrey and had conveniently forgotten he had started life on a Welsh farm. Until now, of course—summoned back here by the old man and his eightieth birthday party.
“I told you nothing fancy,” old Tomos repeated. “I don’t want none of your posh foreign eats.”
“We know that, Grandpa,” Henry said, stepping up on the other side of the old man as he made his way toward the marquee. “It’s going to be a simple cold buffet—ham, beef, prawns—all the things you like, and then they’re going to have a spit outside, barbecuing lambs.”
Tomos turned and smiled at him. “You’re a good lad, Henry. You’ve done well for yourself in spite of everything.”
“In spite of everything?” Hugh demanded. “He was brought up to nothing but the best. He damned well should have done well for himself.” He looked across at Henry. “So what’s wrong with your wife?”
“Nothing, why?”
“I mean why is she not here?”
“The same reason our current dear stepmama is not here, I’d
imagine.” He glanced across at his father, went to say something more, and caught his grandfather staring at him. “She thought it was a family thing and she’d feel left out,” he added quickly.
“Still no children?” Hugh asked.
“Not yet.”
“What’s wrong with that wife of yours, or aren’t you trying?”
Henry flushed. “Really, Dad, that’s none of your business.”
“It is my business. I need someone to take over the bloody firm someday. You won’t do it. Val and Nick won’t do it. God knows Suzanne can’t do it.”
“Why—have you asked her?”
“Look at her, as if she could run a multimillion-dollar company,” Hugh said, his voice laden with contempt. “Poor Suzie. What she needs is someone to take care of her. Is she still with old whatshisname?”
“So I gather.”
“He won’t ever marry her, will he? She’s wasting her time.”
“Obviously she doesn’t think so. She’s a grown woman, Father. Let her run her own life.”
“Yes, but look what a mess she’s made of it so far,” Hugh said. “Is she here?”
“Yes, she’s working away, decorating the marquee with Val and Nick.”
“Decorating?” Tomos demanded.
“You can’t expect people to sit down to dinner in a plain tent, Grandpa,” Henry said. “They’re covering the poles with flowers, so they tell me.”
“Bloody’ell,” Tomos said, pushing his cap back on his head. “I hope my neighbors won’t think that any of this poncing up was my idea. A simple get-together was what I said.”
“It’s good for everyone to be busy, Grandpa,” Henry said. “No time to think.”
His grandfather looked at him long and hard. “Maybe you’re right, boy,” he said.
“Right, everyone, thanks for coming in so bright and early on a Saturday morning.” D.I. Watkins surveyed the faces around him. Apart from Evan and Glynis there were two sergeants in uniform, one from Porthmadog and one from Caernarfon, who had been responsible for coordinating the searches.
“No problem. We want to do everything we can to find this little girl and bring her home, don’t we?” Evan said, and was rewarded with a dazzling smile from Glynis Davies, the other detective constable at the table and Evan’s senior in the department. As always he found himself thinking that those looks were wasted in the police force, as were her brains. She had it all—and she was dating the chief constable’s nephew—on a career track straight to the top, so it would seem. It would be easy to envy her, except that she was also genuinely nice—and a feast for the eyes.
He wrenched his thoughts away from her in time to hear Watkins saying, “And that seems like the only thing we can do right now, eh, Evans?”
“What was that again, sir?” Evan felt Glynis’s amused gaze on him, as if she’d been reading his mind. “Sorry, my brain’s still fuzzy this morning. Working too long without a day off,” he added.
“I was saying there is no point in any additional searches of the area until we’ve located the father. Rough night was it, last night?” he added, with a grin.
“Not particularly.” Evan managed a smile of his own. “And about not searching the area—one thing we haven’t done is to arrange for a search of the bay by boat. I know the waves were small and harmless and the beach stays shallow there, but there’s always the off chance of a rogue wave, isn’t there? We can’t completely rule out the possibility that she was swept out to sea. That would certainly explain how she vanished with no trace at all.”
“Good point,” Watkins said. “Can your boys arrange for that, Jones?” He turned to one of the two uniformed sergeants at the table. He was round and jolly looking, like an off-duty Father
Christmas, while the other was small and dour, with the rugged square jaw of the typical Welshman.
“No problem,” the jolly one said. “It’s worth doing, although if she’s drowned, her body will be washed up somewhere around the coast in a couple of days anyway.”
Glynis shuddered. “Don’t let’s think that way. Let’s stay positive and assume that she was snatched by her father. One good thing we know is that he hasn’t left the country yet, unless he’s using false identity documents and a disguise for himself and the child.”
“So he could be hiding out anywhere,” Watkins said. “You’ve been looking into his whereabouts for us, Glynis. Have you come up with anything positive to go on yet?”
“Based on the last address his wife gave us of a flat in Shepherd’s Bush, I’ve been in touch with the Met. They’ve checked the address, and the landlord says he moved out about a month ago. He left no forwarding address.” She looked around the group. “Then I’ve also been in contact with the Home Office, and I’ve got all the details on him from when he applied for asylum. The name on his application is Ivan Sholokhov, but I understand he goes by Johnny these days. Comes from just outside Moscow. Applied for asylum at our embassy in Berlin. Apparently he was on a Russian Mafia hit list because he was a truck driver and he refused to carry their drug shipments among his cargo.”
“A good guy, then,” Evan said thoughtfully. “One with a conscience because you can bet they would have paid him well to do it.”
“Who now has no conscience about stealing his daughter?” Glynis asked.
“Perhaps that is different in his mind. Who knows how the Russian mentality works?” Watkins said. “As her father maybe he thinks she rightfully belongs to him, and he’s outraged by the British system of justice that gave custody to the mother.”
“The mother was awarded custody—do we know that?” Glynis asked.
“You’re suggesting she might have been the one who took the
kid in the first place?” Watkins looked impressed. “A caravan on a deserted beach is certainly a good place to hide out, isn’t it? Can you check into that for us, computer whiz?”
Glynis grinned. “You men would be lost without me, wouldn’t you? It’s not that hard to learn how to use computers, you know.”
“Not for you, maybe,” Watkins said. “I took the course and I’m still in the dark. So you’ll check into the mother and the custody for us. Now what else should we be doing?” He looked around the room again.
“It’s now almost twenty-four hours she’s been missing, so I think it’s time to get the word out,” Sgt. Howell Jones said. “We’ve made up the posters for local distribution, and I’ll have my blokes putting them out as soon as we get the go-ahead from you, but what about going national?”
“We’ve sent out a general alert to the other police forces in the UK to be on the lookout for Sholokhov and the child,” Watkins said, “but we didn’t have a photo of him, just a description. Do we have a photo now, Glynis?”
“Right here.” Glynis held up a sheet showing a picture of a light-haired man with high Slavic cheekbones. “Shall I send this around now then, and the little girl’s photo with it again?”
“Good idea.” Watkins said. “Now what else should we be doing?”
“Alert the media,” Evan said. “Send them the photos and ask anyone who thinks they’ve spotted them to call us.”
“Right, Evans, do you think you can do that?”
“I’ll give it a try, sir,” he said, with what he hoped was conviction, while really having no clue about how one contacted media.
“Good man.”
“And what about Interpol?” Evan asked. “If he has managed to smuggle the child out of the country, maybe using a false identity, we should alert the Russian police and have them be on the lookout for them.”
“So how do we contact Interpol, sir?” Glynis asked. “That’s something I haven’t had to do yet.”
“I thought you were the only one in the department who knew how to deal with foreigners,” Watkins quipped. “Well, this is something I do happen to know about because there was that case involving the Greek family and the father who was prosecuted for taking his child back to Greece without the mother’s permission.”
“Oh, right,” Evan said. “I remember that one. Under British law he wasn’t allowed to take his child out of the country without permission of the other parent. But that wasn’t in Wales, was it?”
“No, but it came up in discussion at a training session, and the bloke who was doing the training was from the National Criminal Intelligence Service. He talked us through the various steps. So if this now counts as a criminal abduction, then the next step is to contact the NCIS. Then they get in touch with the Foreign Office, and they are our liaison with Interpol.”
“Liaison with Interpol. Well, doesn’t that sound exciting?” Sgt. Howell Jones joked. “What an exciting life you blokes lead. Much better than recovering stolen cars.”
“Do we have a last known address for him in Russia?” Watkins asked, ignoring the comment.
“I’ve got an address of next of kin and a place of birth,” Glynis said. “They would be a good place to start, wouldn’t they? I doubt he’d go back to his last known address before he defected, especially not if the Mafia are still after him.”
“Don’t you think all this may be a bloody waste of time and money?” The other sergeant spoke for the first time, a heavily accented Welsh voice. “I mean, if the father gets as far as Moscow with her, we haven’t a hope in hell of getting her back.”
BOOK: Evan's Gate
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