Queen's Witness: a Mystery Where Three Worlds Collide in Violence by Peter Watson

Author:Peter Watson [Watson, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC 031060, FIC 031030, FIC 031010, FIC 037000, FIC 022000, FIC 05000, FIC 000000
Publisher: BookBaby

4

By 9.15 next morning Matt had showered, shaved and breakfasted. Early for him. He’d eaten in the restaurant rather than his room, calculating that would give him more chance to see the lay of the land. It didn’t. A few of the American tourists had also eaten in the dining room but neither Diana Coleridge nor Fishlock. Where were they? he wondered. Still in bed? He told himself to slow down, not to jump the gun with such a thought.

At about nine-twenty he left the dining room and strolled towards reception. His aim first and foremost was simple, to find out which room Fishlock was in. In these days of anonymous plastic keys, it was no longer possible to watch as a guest deposited his or her key at reception, with a number on it, and then wait while the receptionist slid the key on to a numbered hook, next to a pigeon hole. But there were other ways.

He strolled out past reception, nodding to the tourists he had met the evening before. They were standing about, some in scarves, others in tweed hats, all with cameras and wearing big white trainers. He wished them a pleasant day.

He opened his car, got in, and drove off, as if he were leaving for a day’s work at whatever he did. Like many British towns, Arundel had been spoiled by a maze of one-way streets, a system that made sense to planners but no one else. It took him about five minutes to drive in a rough circle and return to the hotel. He passed a vegetable market, a skateboard park – both already busy – and a fire station, the vehicles standing outside in the sunshine, their doors wide open.

As it was still quite early, he found a parking space directly across from The Castle. Without a traffic warden in sight, he was able to sit in the car and watch the tourists as – slowly, slowly - they straggled out of the hotel and climbed aboard the coach. He saw Fishlock, in a neat blazer and striped tie, paying especial attention to Mrs Aronson, the woman on her own. Finally, about ten minutes late, the coach pulled away. Matt waited where he was for another ten minutes, just in case someone had forgotten something and the coach returned. Then he drove his car to the hotel car park and went off in search of the High Street. Time to put phase one into operation.

His first stop was a stationer. There he bought the brightest note paper and envelopes he could find – bright yellow as it turned out. The kind of virulent green-yellow Zita would have called vomit. He then found the Post Office and went in. Opening up the sheets of paper, he took one and wrote on it: ‘Good evening Mr Fishlock – or should we say George Biddle? We hope you are enjoying your new life.’ He then addressed it to ‘Mr Fishlock/Atlantic Travel, The Castle Hotel, Arundel.

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