The Dave Bliss Quintet Read Online Free PDF Page B

happy if I were dead. Perhaps that’s the plan. That’s why I’m here on my own — no backup, no witnesses.
    â€œYou are not to tell anyone of this mission. Do you understand? Not anyone.” Richards repeated, his face saying he meant it. “As far as everyone is concerned you are on indefinite convalescent leave and no one else will know — not even the force admin officer. If anyone enquires they’ll be told — honestly — that you are sick,” he said, before adding forcefully, “This is very big case.”
    Big or dodgy, Bliss thinks, downing the Scotch, seeing Edwards’s fingerprints everywhere.
Set Bliss loose on some risky adventure where the best possible outcome is an anchor around his neck ten miles out in the Med.
    He might just be on holiday! screams his inner voice again, desperately wanting him to believe it. Then, with a sudden realization that he has absolutely no idea what is going on in the rest of the world, he finds a pay phone and calls Samantha.
    â€œHow are you? Have you found him yet?” she blurts out as soon as she hears his voice.
    â€œShhh — you’re not supposed to know.”
    â€œWhat’s up? Do you think my phone is tapped? Dad you’re just a cop, not James Bond.”
    What to say?
My last will and testament is under the mattress in the spare bedroom. You can keep the car
.
    â€œI’m OK, love. Just thought I’d give you a call,” he says. There is little point in burdening her with worries of Edwards. Particularly as he may be mistaken — hopes he is mistaken.
    â€œThere is something you can do, though,” he says, realizing that now the informant has surfaced, Morgan Johnson is a huge step closer to being real. “Maybe you could ask a few discreet questions — who wants him and why. Make sure I’m not chasing a wild goose.”
    Samantha senses there is something else. “And …?” she queries.
    Warning himself he is getting paranoid, he tasks her to phone Edwards on a pretext. “Just to make sure he is home,” he says. “Tell him you’re doing a survey on the police suppression of free speech. That should get him going.”
    â€œOK. If I’ve got time.”
    â€œPlease, Samantha,” he begs, then warns in afterthought, “Make sure you use a pay phone.”
    But what if he’s not at home? Bliss sets himself puzzling as he puts down the phone, wanders across the road to the seawall, removes his shirt, and painfully plucks a few grey hairs from his chest as he ponders, What if he is here in the South of France? What does that prove?
    He could be working on his defence.
    He could be, but surely his best defence would be the mysterious disappearance of the prime witness — a certain detective inspector of close acquaintance.
    He wouldn’t risk that.
    Not personally, maybe, but I bet he’d like to. Not only did you uncover an inconvenient murder that he’d swept under the rug for his own benefit, you also screwed up his restaurant business and broke his wrist.
    That’s all in the past, he tries telling himself, but knows that Edwards has a long memory.
    The morning drags with frustrating slowness, and Bliss spends much of the time tugging at a recalcitrant hair as he lounges in the warmth of the mid-morning sun, cogitating on the Edwards problem while listening to Brubeck playing “Black and Blue” on the radio of the beach café behind him.
    Given a choice, Bliss might simply kick back and golf away the rest of his life, but he fears that “out of sight” will certainly leave him “out of mind,” and the disciplinary board will let Edwards off the hook. Even with his evidence, Edwards is still capable of squirming his way out of the dung heap he’s piled up for himself. Not that he needs to. He has enough names, dates, and places in his little black book to finger most of his colleagues