The Circle Now Is Made (King's Way Book 1) (23 page)

“I’ll have a word with Bart and Si, and one or two of the lads from the club as well,” said Eddy. "Oh, and the Mendez twins - I’ll ask 'em to keep their diving gear handy.”

“Don’t let any info get to the wrong ears,” urged Greg as he prepared to leave, “and remember, don’t take risks - but on the other hand, don’t call the law too soon.”

“OK. But keep your granny's eggs in mind.” Eddy fished a battered mobile phone from a shelf above the bar. "It's perfectly safe to call me with this; it has my number in it. There's only a few quid on it, so don't use it unless you really need to, and
don't try to top it up whatever you do
."

"Cheers." Greg pocketed the phone. He knew better than ask questions.

He lost no time collecting the Ulster and making for the address Sarah had scribbled. He was surprised to find that Baxter Street contained a number of upmarket four and five floor apartment blocks lining either side of the road. He quickly parked at the rear of the block he wanted, Edgecumbe House, and scaled a short flight of marble steps to a lift in reception. On reaching the top-floor flat he saw that the door was already open and the lights were on inside. "Must have a party going," muttered Greg on hearing Dixieland jazz blaring away.
"The music sounds like Nigel's choice."

Unable to make himself heard, Greg nosed his way cautiously in. "There you are." Greg heaved a sigh of relief on seeing Nigel seated near an open window in the seductively lit lounge, his back to Greg, a whisky beside him on the glass-topped table. “I was getting worried, didn’t you hear me knock?” It became suddenly clear that Nigel had heard nothing. Greg almost passed out when he saw his face. Or what remained of it. Nigel had apparently been seized from behind and a gun fired into the back of his neck. Much of his face was spattered over the open curtains. Greg fled the scene in horror, praying no one had seen him, though sickeningly aware of a CCTV camera in the lift area. He took the stairway. For the first time since his drunken nightmare, he needed a stiff drink, though fortunately his most pressing need was to flee the awful scene. Mercifully, Greg didn’t find out until later that Jacky’s body lay in a poo1 of blood in the main bedroom. Yards from Nigel… A pistol in her hand.

He drove blindly away, aware that if he was stopped he'd end up in a cell. Possibly for life. Seized with sheer panic, he was unable to reason for a while.  Except that he must stay clear of major roads and get back to Bromyard. Nigel’s body was certain to be found within hours, he reasoned. By morning at the latest. 

Slowly, a pattern of reason and logical order of progress began to form in Greg’s head. Whatever course he now took, he decided, Nigel was history, so he'd be best employed sorting out the rest of the mystery in relative safety.
Likely to be more difficult without the info Nigel might have provided though
.

It was around three when Greg arrived back at Wyndham’s cottage. He immediately concealed the car in a derelict cowshed at the rear of the building, confident he'd not been followed. He then knocked Wyndham up and impressed on him the importance of keeping quiet about the car.

“If the police should come along for any reason, just act dumb!”

Wyndham eyed Greg suspiciously, obviously wondering if there wasn’t a hint of sarcasm behind his words.

Greg bedded himself down on the settee and tried to get some sleep, though he found it almost impossible, and it was still dark when he decided to make tea. He was quickly joined by his host though - who insisted on cooking breakfast despite Greg's protests that he felt sick.

The pair sat at the scrubbed pine table while Greg explained, as plainly as possible, what had happened, though he avoided relaying too much of the horror for fear of alarming Wyndham.

“So I’ve got to find this spot on the map as soon as possible.” Greg pointed to the location in the book, “But we’d better walk, I think - I don’t want to risk using the car.”

“I walked a lot farther 'n that to find tramp,” said a predictably excited Wyndham.

The spot was a short distance out of Bromyard town - and several miles from the cottage, so the pair wasted no time getting started. It was almost eight-thirty when they reached the location: a fork in the road near the middle of the Downs, a high open area with few trees.

The popular beauty spot looked bleak and desolate on the drizzly March morning as Greg stood scratching his head. “Nothing much here,” he said staring around. “The message says this is the location for the drop - but when? How could Nigel, or anyone, be expected to know when this
drop
takes place?”

“What do you mean?” It was now Wyndham’s turn to scratch his head.

“Oh nothing.” Greg had no wish to confuse his friend further. "I'm sure Nigel would have known something. In fact I'm sure the whole message must have made sense to him, but he’s no longer available, is he?"

The pair trudged despondently back to the cottage, wondering where to go from there.

“Time’s not on our side,” sighed Greg, “but I haven’t come this far to give up now. Even if Penmaric’s legacy's worthless, I’m determined to find out what it's all been about.”

“Shall we have a look at car again?” suggested Wyndham. “P'r'aps there’s summat been missed.”

Greg shrugged. “Nothing to lose.”

The pair examined the car thoroughly for an hour or more, scrutinising almost every inch, inside and out. Wyndham, much to Greg’s annoyance, seemed fascinated with the large toolbox, carefully inspecting each item with meticulous care.

“I don’t know what you expect to find in there,” said Greg as the giant gazed with fascination at each of the contents in turn. A compartment in the box contained wire-wool, a pot of black paint, a small bottle of thinners, two touch-in brushes, and several squares of thick flannel; Wyndham examined them one by one.

“We’re getting nowhere!” said Greg impatiently, “There's nothing of value here, and had there been it would have been found before now. Let’s go and have some coffee and think about it.” Greg felt frustrated, desperate, helpless, and Wyndham wasn't the brightest of people to look to for inspiration.

“I’ll go and put the kettle on,” said Greg as his angular friend began looking over the car again, “see you when you're ready.”

Greg was on his second cup when Wyndham appeared in the doorway. The gormless smile had returned, and he smelt strongly of petrol, or thinners… or both.

“You haven’t been taking anything to pieces have you?” Greg blenched as the giant nodded in affirmation.

“'Aven’t took too many bits off, an' I can remember most on 'em,” said Wyndham, a look of boyish guilt on his face. He leaned sideways to pick something up from beside the doorway. Something he meant to surprise Greg with. And surprise him he did.

Slowly the raw-boned creature raised his arm, and held it forth. Dangling from his hand was a white, sausage-like arrangement doubled into a loop - rather like sheep’s intestines. Greg shuddered, almost wishing Wyndham hadn’t found it. The package comprised of eight
sausages
- each about four inches long - a
white powdery substance encased in each of the thick, polythene skins. Each of the 'sausages' was further encased in a long ‘outer tube’, pinched at intervals with cable-ties to form the string

“Oh Christ!” whispered Greg, “enough cocaine to get us locked up forever. Where was it?”

The giant expounded, in his deliberate manner, that he’d wondered why someone would carry paint in a toolbox. “So I decided to see if it 'ad ever been used.”

"And?"

"It has, but on'y in one place!"

Wyndham led Greg back to the car and showed him the flange and screws around the petrol pump, mounted on the body at the rear of the car - completely exposed on the immodest veteran. The flange and each of the screws, when carefully examined, were meticulously touched in, though slightly less glossy than surrounding paintwork.

“I found these an' all.” The giant showed Greg a number of neatly cut, hand-made sealing gaskets. “In tool box.”

“They're spares for the petrol pump,” said an astonished Greg. “It’s so obvious...” he faltered “...well
now
it is… that the pump's been removed times over - and any signs of disturbance carefully touched in.
That
was the modification to the tank Nigel mentioned – to allow more storage space no doubt!”

Greg watched as Wyndham re-fitted the pump, though felt humbled in doing so, and congratulated him.

“Wyndham, you have a knack for seeing the obvious - problem being now that we’re saddled with a load of cocaine we never wanted.”

“Weren’t expectin' drugs,” replied Wyndham apologetically. "Thought it might a' been jewelry or summat."

Although Greg was no closer to the elusive
buried treasure,
he was confident Penmaric had been near the centre of the ring, probably having met his death at the hands of one of the gang – as he was sure had been the case with Nigel. He shuddered to think that the haul must have been in the Ulster as he'd driven it across Spain.

 “The thing I don’t understand, Wyndham,” Greg said as they walked back to the cottage, “is why police haven’t found the cocaine. They
must
have checked the Ulster thoroughly.” 

When they reached the cottage, Greg decided to re-check the dates against an elaborate Lunar Almanac that Wyndham produced. "Given to mother it were."

"Very different from your average calendar, if you don't mind me saying," remarked Greg.

Wyndham looked sheepishly at the floor, as if embarrassed. "Were from my aunt as I call her – she's a Lady of the Earth."

"I see," Greg, puzzled but seeing no mileage in pursuing the matter, looked up the date of Penmaric’s death on the calendar, then cross-referenced it against the desk diary.

"
That's
what it is, Wyndham!" he exclaimed as he looked for the date. In the front planner section was, among others, a Hebrew Lunar Calendar highlighting the old-moon and new-moon periods in pink and green respectively. "It's Rosh Hodesh, not Rose Hodesh. Rosh is pronounced Roash: Isaac obviously thought that was a name, too! The period covers the moonless and new moon nights. He commented on it being dark when he'd last seen the dinghy, and Penmaric died the following morning, of course."

"Isaac said it were night before circle were cast," said Wyndham.

"Yes he did; what would he have meant by that?"

Wyndham looked concerned, as if betraying a confidence. "'T'were always new moon when my aunt cast 'er circle."

"I'm assuming that has something to do with a Pagan or Wiccan ritual," concluded Greg, not wishing to press Wyndham further. "But it confirms what I thought. The consignment must always arrive on a moonless night. The gang obviously use a fixed constant to lessen the need for messages - and a moonless night would be invaluable to bring the stuff in. After he’d landed each consignment, Penmaric must have driven up here later in the morning to drop off his cut." He pointed to the calendar. "First crescent day.”

Wyndham was mystified: he’d been proud of his achievements prior to Greg's complex revelation. Now he was lost again.

“But what about pictures?” he asked, but all Greg could do was shrug.

“No idea!” he replied honestly. "But we need to get this moved right away." Greg turned his attention back to the "string of sausages" lying on the doorstep. He recalled reading many years earlier of a minor royal being caught with thousands of pounds worth of cocaine in a binocular case - and the report hadn’t said the binoculars weren’t in there too!

“I wonder how much this lot’s worth by comparison.” Greg drew an imaginary knife across his throat. “If ever we’re caught with it!”

The colour drained from Wyndham’s face as he registered the gravity of the situation.

“P'r'aps we can get rid of it by leavin’ it on downs,” he suggested.

“That’s not such a bad idea,” replied Greg, grinning at the simplicity of the solution, “but I’d like to see who collects it.” The pair had no idea if anyone
would
collect the consignment - or show at all - though Greg was by now convinced that if the tryst was honoured it would be during the early hours of Thursday.

“So, according to that the next shipment's due in …tomorrow night!” Greg gasped as he sat at the table, almost tugging his hair with anticipation. “I must let Eddy know.”

“Are you going to ring police an' all?” asked Wyndham.

“I'll leave that to Eddy. They’ll be on top like a ton of bricks if I call from this area again... What's wrong…?"

Wyndham wasn’t listening. He’d crossed the room and was about to pull the curtain aside.

“Don’t let anyone see you!” snapped Greg urgently. “What are you looking at?”

Greg peered through the faded net. He could see an old Merc outside and breathed a sigh of relief. “Hud and Ten. It
must
be Vance who's behind them: he'd like Penmaric’s legacy intercepted to simplify purchase of the estate. All so he can continue his racket - I'm sure of that now.”

“Do you think as that’s why drugs weren’t delivered by boat this last time?” asked Wyndham innocently, “'cause Penmaric died?”