He’s there for reassurance. Elizabeth Best had been highly motivated to kill Viktor Illyich. Threatening to kill her friend had been the masterstroke. But it is always worth checking these things. And Viktor’s apartment is close to the heliport at Battersea, so it’s an easy trip for the Viking. After this perhaps he will go for sushi, which is hard to come by in Staffordshire. There is a good place called Miso in Stoke, but the Viking is banned from there after he accidentally discharged a firearm in the bathroom. He is not good with guns. Shouldn’t have one really.
The Viking looks around the penthouse. It is nice, sure. Perhaps lacking a feminine touch. The view is very pleasant. There’s the London Eye, there’s Big Ben, there’s the Bank of England. You could launch a rocket attack on any of them from Viktor’s balcony. Wouldn’t that cause a stir? The Viking realizes he is thinking a lot about rocket attacks at the moment. Mainly because he has just bought a rocket launcher. It was an impulse buy, because, when you have as much money as he does, there are very few novelties left, and also because you can buy rocket launchers directly with Bitcoin. So far all he has done is blow up a barn.
The Viking works out the geography of the shooting, from the live audio he heard. He realizes that Elizabeth must have walked Viktor through a large open archway to his right, then down the carpeted corridor and into the shower room. He traces these steps.
No one has heard from Viktor since the shooting, which bodes well. The rumour mill is suggesting he is dead. It is causing some panic in certain circles, which is lovely to see. The Viking walks into the shower room.
It has been tidied up, of course it has, Elizabeth Best is a professional. At some point someone with a bit of authority will notice that Viktor is missing, and at that point the penthouse will be searched for clues. The Viking assumes that Elizabeth will not have left any. There will be no crimson blood spattered up the wall, no brain stuck in a plughole.
But there should be a bullet hole somewhere, maybe even the bullet.
The Viking holds out an imaginary gun, and points it at Viktor’s imaginary head. He pulls the trigger, and estimates the path the bullet would have taken. It should really have passed straight through the shower screen, but it clearly hasn’t. It should have lodged itself somewhere deep inside the Turkish marble wall tiles, but, again, it clearly hasn’t.
The Viking knows that the bullet passed through Viktor Illyich; he has seen evidence of the exit wound. So where is it? Is Elizabeth Best taller than Viktor? Was she shooting downwards? The Viking looks lower, scanning the walls. Nothing.
Was the gun angled upwards? Was that how spies killed you? The Viking raises his gaze, but still there is no bullet hole. As his eyes scan the mirror on the far wall, he spots it. The hole in the ceiling. The Viking looks up, almost directly above the spot where he is standing. The spot where Elizabeth Best would have stood. A bullet hole. The bullet fired directly into the ceiling.
The Viking stares at the hole. He recognizes that it means a number of things.
It means, firstly, that Viktor Illyich is not dead. The bullet he heard was fired into the ceiling, not into Viktor Illyich. Which further means that Elizabeth Best takes him for a fool. She has misunderstood his abilities. The Viking does not like that one bit. He sighs.
Because the most important thing it means is that he will now have to kill Viktor Illyich himself. And, of course, to punish Elizabeth, it means he will also have to kill Joyce Meadowcroft.
Which is vexing. Most vexing.
46
Joyce
Joanna came down for lunch today with her man, the football chairman, and I, of course, have an ex-KGB colonel in my spare room. So I had some explaining to do.
I’m only glad she wasn’t here the other day when Viktor was covered in mud. I know I have a power shower, but even that struggled.
I explained that Viktor was an old friend of Elizabeth, and that he was staying, temporarily, while he was having work done on his flat. Joanna asked Viktor where his flat was, and Viktor replied that it was in Embassy Gardens, and Joanna said, is that the one with the swimming pool, and Viktor agreed that it was, and the football chairman (he is called Scott) said those places were worth millions, and Viktor agreed again, and Joanna said, so you’re having a million-pound apartment done up but you’re staying with my mum, and Viktor said he couldn’t imagine a finer place to stay in all of England, and Joanna said, level with me, is something dodgy going on here, and we admitted that, yes, something dodgy was going on, and I showed Joanna the photo of Viktor in his grave and said we would tell her all about it at lunch. Joanna turned to Scott and said, well you can’t say I didn’t warn you, she didn’t use to be like this. Scott asked Viktor which football team he supported and Viktor said Chelsea, so Scott said he knew people at Chelsea and could get Viktor a special hospitality box and to come and watch a game sometime, and Viktor said not to worry, he already has one.
I sent Joanna to the fridge on a pretext, and she clocked the almond milk straight away. She said I should really buy the low-sugar almond milk, but you could tell she thought it was a step in the right direction.
Alan likes Scott, by the way, which I’m taking as a good sign. Although, thus far, Alan has liked everyone.
They have just left. Scott has a Porsche; he showed it to Viktor, and Viktor nodded in that way men do. Joanna took me aside and asked me if there was anything going on between me and Viktor, and I told her there wasn’t, and she gave me a look halfway between relief and disappointment. He is very lovely, Viktor, very kind, but he’s not my type. Gerry was my type, Bernard was my type. Perhaps another one will be along one day. He’d better get a move on though, I’m nearly seventy-eight.
Ibrahim had us all round to his last night. He showed us Heather Garbutt’s poem, the one that Connie Johnson found, and he showed us the note. The note that was not written by Heather Garbutt. So who wrote it?
I have persuaded Elizabeth to come on a little trip with me. To Elstree, where Fiona Clemence films Stop the Clock. You can get there on the train. Joanna knows someone who knows someone who knows someone, and I’m hoping we might get the chance to say hello. And, you know us, a chance is all we need.
By the way, I am reading Given in Evidence. One of the books by the Chief Constable. I only picked it up because there’s a Hilary Mantel looming on my bedside table, and I didn’t feel up to it yet.
It is not at all bad, he really draws you in.
Someone tries to murder the boss, Big Mick, in some gangland family in Glasgow, but the bodyguard dives in the way of the bullet. So the book is all about the gangland boss trying to work out who tried to shoot him. It sparks this big gang war, and you can tell Andrew Everton is a policeman, because it all sounds real.
The fun thing in the end, after all this bloodshed and plenty of swearing, is we find out that the bodyguard was the intended victim after all: his girlfriend caught him cheating. So no one was trying to kill Big Mick, and all the carnage was for nothing.
I’ve read a lot worse, that’s all I’ll say. I can still see the Hilary Mantel out of the corner of my eye. I know I’ll enjoy it, but I’m going to need a run-up.
Do you know another thing I thought when I was reading Andrew Everton’s novel? I thought maybe I should write a book.
47
The text comes through as Elizabeth is getting into bed. It is the Viking.
You have made a big mistake.
Has she? Elizabeth thinks about the photo.
The bullet. The bullet that missed.
The Viking has been into Viktor’s apartment. How is that possible? He has seen the bullet hole. She has been sloppy. But, really, how on earth could he have got in?
This is my final message. I am coming for you all.
So now they will have to find the Viking. Find him before he finds them. Stephen looks over towards her.
‘Trouble?’
‘Joyce can’t get her thermostat to work,’ says Elizabeth.