I cut him off. ‘Right well I think I’ve heard enough about land laws. What did he find, this man of yours?’ He cleared his throat and looked suitably chastened, but that might just be the default expression of posh men so it was hard to tell.
‘Well it’s been hard work, as I say. A tangled web. David, that’s my associate’s name, he’s spent two months on this, trying to make contact with the company, but a phone number in the Cayman Islands which doesn’t work isn’t much to go on. Often these companies don’t even have a real office out there, just hiring a room so they have an address. Eventually, he hired an investigator who deals with this sort of thing to dig out who owns the company and where they are.’
I was getting impatient now, and visiting hour was whizzing by. ‘With respect, George, I hired you to deal with all of this and it sounds like you’re doing a marvellous job, but sometimes you don’t need to know how the sausage was made, and I’ve got spa treatments lined up back to back this afternoon, you understand?’
‘Right, yes, sorry. Well. Well. David finally, after a lot of misdirection and fobbing off, found the owners of the flat. They live in Moscow and are none too keen on replying to emails. So he went out there last week and made contact with them on Thursday. He explained your plight and asked if there was any way they could help – a housekeeper who might have been in the flat for example, or a CCTV camera. It was a long shot, of course, but it was worth trying. And what do you know?’ Thorpe was looking as jolly as a school boy now. ‘They told David that they had CCTV cameras up the wazoo! Said it was standard at all their properties. David could hardly keep up the pretence of calm professionalism when they said they had one on their balcony, concealed by a small bush. And did they keep the tapes, asked David. Why yes, said the Russians. They kept everything on a database of course. It was best, though they didn’t elaborate on exactly why it was best.’ He stopped for breath as I held mine. ‘David has a copy, Grace. He’s watched them and they will be in the office as soon as the footage has been verified by an expert. It doesn’t show the entire balcony, but it shows enough – you’re not in scene when Caro takes her final bow.’
I nearly fell to the floor in relief. A feeling like the sun warming your body on the first day of summer enveloped my body and I grabbed Thorpe’s hand without thinking about what I was doing.
‘Thank you. Thank you. I don’t know what I can say but thank you. And David. And the Russians. Thank you.’ He looked pleased, the blush rushing up his face once more.
‘Well, we’ve done our job and it’s all very good news. I can’t get you out today sadly, but you’ve only got a few more weeks in here and there can be no doubt that this footage will exonerate you completely.’ A bell buzzed and he looked at his watch and gathered up his papers. ‘I’ll be in touch the moment we have news. In the meantime, hold tight. And keep this all quiet until it’s official.’ I thanked him again and shook his hand. As he turned to go, George Thorpe looked round at me and said, with some embarrassment, ‘Do they really have a spa in here?’
*
And that, as they say, was that. I walked back to my cell, fists clenched in excitement, barely able to focus on where I was going or what I was doing. Kelly was sitting on the lower bunk, using a piece of string to thread her eyebrows and singing Beyoncé songs in a key I’m not sure the lady herself has ever been acquainted with.
‘You look white as a ghost, mate,’ she said, as she looked up at me. ‘Bad news from the brief?’
I told her what Thorpe had revealed. I was too excited not to, all my usual front was gone. Stupid to tell Kelly anything, really, but what harm could it do now? She was genuinely sweet about it, grabbing my hand and offering to hook me up with a friend of hers in the Angel who rented rooms with no need for references. I’d managed to keep my flat on while I’d been in this place, it was a stretch but it was important for me to know that there was something waiting for me when I got out. Even though I knew it wouldn’t be my home for much longer. Once the money came through, I’d be looking to upgrade as fast as possible. And even if I wasn’t, there was no way I’d be renting a room off some dodgy mate of Kelly’s. Nothing in life was that desperate. She pulled out her secret phone and started typing, presumably looking to alert her slum landlord friend to a possible new tenant before I talked her down. I hoped the offer didn’t mean she thought we’d be continuing our relationship in the outside world. Kelly was a limpet I found it hard enough to detach in here, if she had the freedom to travel and the use of a mobile I’d be completely at her mercy. Visions of her turning up at my house with facemasks and a cheap bottle of wine loomed ominously in my mind. Not quite the new life I had envisaged.