Dead Man's Time

Apologist said. ‘I can’t tell you. You have to believe me. I’m truly sorry.’
    He noticed for the first time music playing. A choral sound. ‘Ode To Joy’, although he didn’t know its name, nor did he appreciate the irony. Classical music wasn’t his
thing. It sounded sinister and creepy. He saw the tail lights of a vehicle ahead, through the windscreen. They seemed to be following it along a dark country lane.
    Then he felt the vice-like grip on his left thigh again.
    ‘Stop!’ he screamed.
    But the grip kept tightening.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ the Apologist said, ‘but I have to make sure you don’t try to run away. I’m sorry if I’m hurting you, I really am. The gentleman who wants
to see you won’t be nearly as gentle. Trust me. Now the code, please.’
    Moore gave him the four digits. He saw his captor tap them in and the display came alive.
    The vehicle in front, a Range Rover, halted and the Mercedes stopped behind it. A man walked up to the rear window, and Ricky Moore became increasingly afraid. He heard the window go down, felt
the cool breeze on his face, smelled freshly mown grass, heard the rumble of the Range Rover’s engine. He saw his iPhone being passed through the window, then it closed again.
    ‘Hey! I want that back,’ he said.
    His captor said nothing. Several minutes passed. The Range Rover remained static in front of them. Then, suddenly, it drove off. The Mercedes followed.
    ‘My phone!’ Ricky Moore said.
    The Apologist squeezed his thigh again, even harder, and he shouted out in pain, anger and fear.
    ‘Sorry.’

21
    A half-smoked cigar, with undisturbed ash on the end, lay in the large glass ashtray, beside a crystal tumbler of Midleton whiskey, Gavin Daly’s regular tipple, for which
he paid £267 a bottle. The thought of what the rare Irish whiskey cost gave him even more pleasure than the taste. It meant there was a little bit less of his fortune for his idiot,
debt-ridden son, Lucas, to get his hands on after he was gone, although he had no problem leaving it to his sister’s granddaughter and family. But at this moment, for one of the few times in
his adult life, his son was proving useful.
    Dressed in his blue smoking jacket, Daly was seated at his wide, leather-topped desk in the study of his magnificent Palladian mansion, ten miles north-east of Brighton, blinking away tears.
Trying to occupy his mind by focusing on the rare J. J. Elliott clock he was checking for a client before freighting it later this week to an important auction in New York, while he waited for some
of the people he had phoned today to call him back.
    There were only a limited number of dealers in the world who handled really high-end vintage clocks and watches. Most of them were straight, but over the years he’d had a good relationship
with the straight ones and the crooked ones. He’d put the word out and reckoned there was a strong chance that if any were approached by someone trying to sell his father’s watch, most
of them would phone him.
    Although he was ninety-five, he had never really retired, just gradually wound down over the years. Even now he still kept an eye on the shop that bore his name in the Brighton Lanes, despairing
because his son was letting the business slide away. Not that he really cared, he had more than enough money to see out his days in the style in which he liked to live. And he still had a few
clients whom he advised on timepieces, and for whom he sometimes bought and sold, such as this clock he was selling for a wealthy English collector, which kept him occupied.
    His chest pains from angina, becoming increasingly frequent now, were returning. His doctor had told him to stop drinking and smoking, but what the hell did it matter? He popped a nitroglycerin
tablet under his tongue, waited until it had dissolved, then relit his cigar. He’d always had an eye for fine craftsmanship, and this clock was a particular beauty. Its square case, with its
fine marquetry and gold inlay, was a masterpiece of carving, and its movement, with a single hammer to strike its large brass gong, was exquisite. It would never tell the time as accurately as one
of today’s quartz watches you could buy for a few quid, but that was not the point.
    He made a small adjustment to the length of the pendulum, then put his tools down. He was tired, and his mind was all over the place. He’d barely slept a wink last night; he just felt sick
all the time. Sick with