Capital Offence

Chapter 13

As Jamie returned home that evening, he bumped into Fiona in the hallway. She was recently twenty, and although she had her mother’s symmetrical features there was something of her father’s character about the eyes which made her seem altogether less predictable than Linda. God alone knew what sort of a future she’d have as the daughter of a media target like Jamie.

“Have you checked your emails today?”

“Yup.” She breenged on down the hall with her usual speed. Her voice floated back to him, after she’d turned the corner towards the kitchen. “Why?”

He followed her through to the comfortable Aga-heated limed ash kitchen which formed the hub of family activities.

“Nothing particular.” Jamie felt this was a bit limp, and also realised that unless he pressed the matter it would drop there - her mind was already several non sequiturs ahead. He tried another approach. “Did you hear Donald this morning, he was -”

Fiona’s instant and emphatic “No” interrupted the inconsequential chat he’d been about to make about police surveillance.

“Donald’s dull.”

What the hell? What was she so bent out of shape about? Bloody hormones. He went to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of wheat beer. Fiona looked keen to get the conversation back on an even keel...

“I’m not gonna fall for a scam, if that’s what you’re worried about. There was something, a phone number, but it wasn’t for me. Spam.”

Jamie looked blank for a moment.

“Junk mail,” she continued.

“No, it was just I was expecting something and it hasn’t arrived, and I wondered if it had gone to your mail instead of mine.” A pause. “You know, if the default address check box was wrongly checked on our mail setup thingy. Or something.”

Fiona looked at him as if he had been abandoned in the last century. Then she turned to start dialling on her mobile. As she tapped the screen, Jamie tried again.

“This e-mail, is it still there?”

“Shit,” exclaimed Fiona, “You’ve made me forget the number I was dialling.” She started to look it up again in her address book, scraps of paper falling out from between the worn pages. As she started to tap it in again she spoke over her shoulder. “I binned it.”

Jamie left her to her conversation - he knew from experience that she’d be tied up for the next hour or so. Through in the study, the computer was still switched on. He quickly logged on to Fiona’s mail account. Nothing was ever bloody simple! But at least it suggested that the message had got through. He accessed Fiona’s mail box for a poke around.

Under ‘folder’ it said:

Folder                        Unread            Total

Inbox                        0                        47

Trash                        ?                        ?

There was just a chance that the Trash hadn’t emptied automatically if the mail account hadn’t yet been shut down. He double clicked on it and the list of contents appeared on the right, while the number in the folder updated to ‘1’.

The message was from vaila@northlight.co.uk.

He opened it.

There was a single sentence:

If I did meet an Eskimo, I’d shake him by the hand!

And underneath was an 07887 telephone number - a mobile!

And underneath that were three capital Xs...