As Easy as Murder Read Online Free PDF

Barcelona consulate are going to miss you.’
    ‘I’ll miss them too, but not enough to change my mind. Nothing’s going to do that; my boy needs me more than my country.’
    ‘I can understand that. Be happy, and keep in touch.’
    I pocketed my mobile and turned back to face the throng. Alex and Gloria had moved along, with Marte, my god-daughter, tagging along in Tom’s care. She’s getting disturbingly close to school age, another constant reminder of the passing years. I was about to rejoin them, when Shirley’s bellow stopped me short. ‘Hoi, Primavera, you haven’t forgotten tomorrow, have you?’
    I stared as she and Patterson approached, focusing on her alone and trying not to look at him at all, in case something in my expression betrayed me. Spooks must be experts at reading people, I reasoned wildly. ‘What about tomorrow?’ I asked, puzzled.
    ‘Golf,’ she exclaimed. ‘Girona. Christ, you have too.’
    She was right. I had; stuff had intervened.
    ‘Leave the girl alone, Shirley,’ Patterson laughed. ‘Not everyone’s as keen as you to watch guys whacking balls around a field.’
    ‘It’s the guys we’re going to watch,’ she retorted. ‘Isn’t that right, girl?’
    ‘If you say so.’
    ‘I do. What time are you picking us up?’
    ‘Eh?’ was all I could gasp.
    ‘Come on, you don’t want Patterson to have to drive, do you? Not on his first trip here. Let him see the countryside.’
    ‘I’m all for that,’ I replied, ‘but can’t he see the sights with you behind the wheel?’
    ‘Sure, but who’s going to point them out? Besides, I’m a terrible driver.’
    The only thing that makes Shirley’s driving terrible is her insistence on approaching Formula One speeds on public highways, but that was reason enough for me to agree. I had spent a few journeys in her passenger seat with my eyes shut tight. ‘Okay,’ I conceded. ‘Nine o’clock, your place. But we’ll have coffee and croissants before we set off.’
    ‘Done deal.’ She frowned briefly. ‘Oh, by the way, Ben was looking for you earlier.’
    ‘Did he say why? Does he have a problem?’
    ‘Maybe he wants you to look after the baby.’
    Benedict Simmers, our village wine merchant, had settled down; he had fallen in love with a beautiful girl from Barcelona called Tunè, and in June of the previous year they had produced a small angel, name of Lily. She had pushed all my ‘broody’ buttons, and I’d become a regular volunteer babysitter. I looked around trying to spot him among the crowd, and eventually I did, paused in mid-bustle, talking to his mother and sister. He saw me at the same time, and waved me across. ‘No problem,’ I told him, as he approached. ‘Do you want to leave her with us, or have us come to you?’
    His eyes said ‘puzzled’ until he worked it out. ‘Oh no, no,’ he said, hurriedly. ‘It’s not about that. Someone’s been looking for you, that’s all. He phoned my shop asking for your phone number. Jordi’s in there just now, looking after things, and naturally he wouldn’t give it, not just like that, to a stranger. So he told the guy to leave his number and you’d call him back, if you felt so inclined, that is.’
    He fished in his pocket, produced a scrap of paper, and handed it over. It took me a few seconds to decipher Jordi’s scrawl, but eventually I made out the name ‘Wigwe’, and a phone number that could have been an American mobile, to judge by the format.
    ‘Wigwe?’ I muttered, wracking my brains. ‘I don’t know anyone called Wigwe. I’m absolutely certain of that. Never have done.’
    Ben grinned. ‘Remember it was Jordi who took the message. The name’s as likely to be Smith or Jones.’
    True, but I focused on Wigwe in the meantime. Forename or surname? Whichever, where the hell could a handle like that have originated? It couldn’t be an intermediary from Gerard, could it, I wondered as I scratched around for a clue? From the postmark, his letter