Wyatt - 06 - The Fallout Read Free

desire. The fallout from something like that is often very
simple: all bets are off.

    At 9.05 he returned to the phone box
and called the insurance company again. Heneker had the surging enthusiasm of
his trade. Heneker here, Mr

    He waited for a name. Wyatt didnt
give him one. Instead, he said, Ive got the Asahi jewels.

    He pictured the man, the white shirt
and sombre suit and darting calculations. Heneker recovered quickly. Shall we
discuss where and when and how?

    And how much, Wyatt said.

    How could I forget, Heneker said.

    * * * *

    Two

    It
wasnt strictly true that Wyatt had the Asahi jewels. He had one piece with
him, a white gold necklace set with a dozen chunky emeralds, but the remaining
piecesrings, necklaces, brooches, pendants, tiaraswere still locked away in a
concealed safe on board the yacht. Taken together, they were too bulky to cart
around and too valuable to dump if he found himself in trouble. At the same
time, he was not interested in fencing the jewels piecemeal or removing the
stones and melting down the settings. To do that involved time and too many middlemen.
Wyatt wanted to offload the Asahi Collection quickly, for a lump sum, the
reward offered by the insurance company. The emerald necklace was simply his
hook. It was the most eye-catching piece, promising more, yet also an easy
thing to dump if the deal went sour.

    Wyatt headed down Elizabeth Street,
musing upon the twists and turns of his life. The Asahi Collection, touring
Australia and New Zealand, had been stolen from a Japanese superstore in
Melbourne. Wyatt wasnt the culpritthe actual raiders were policemen using
security information supplied by Springettbut Liz Redding had suspected Wyatt.
Theyd both wound up in Port Vila, where Wyatt had discovered the hiding place
of the Collection. Hed not revealed its location, not even when, on the voyage
back, he and Liz had moved from being thief and thief-taker to being lovers.

    Wyatt had almost been able to
imagine a life with her. In the end, though, she was a cop, and Wyatt was a
hold-up man with a long history that would not withstand close scrutiny, and so
he was on the run again.

    The meeting place was an undercover
car park on Lonsdale Street. He went in, climbing to the third level, where he
prowled among the shadows. The ceiling felt very low, the air sluggish, fumy
and full of hard-to-place noises. The simplest sound was flat, hollow, booming.

    He waited behind a concrete pillar.
Heneker had described himself as tall, a bit on the thin side, wearing a blue
suit, carrying a Time magazine. When the insurance man finally
appeared, Wyatt observed him for a couple of minutes. Heneker looked uneasy,
the magazine held against his chest as though to ward off arrows. Wyatt
supposed that hed be nervous if he were in Henekers shoes, and he stepped out
into the weak light. Mr Heneker.

    Heneker turned to him with relief. Thought
you werent coming. He coughed. What have you got for me?

    Wordlessly, Wyatt handed him the
necklace. Heneker took it, wiped his sleeve across his face, and said, A fake.

    Wyatt faltered, just for a second. Maybe
the lights not bright enough for you.

    Heneker looked around nervously,
then said, his voice low and complicitous: You dont understand. Its a copy.
Theyre all copies, the entire collection.

    Wyatt said nothing. He went onto his
toes, ready to slip into the darkness.

    Good copies, mind you, Heneker
said, getting back some of his nerve. Youd need to be an expert. I mean, the
settings are real enough, the white gold itself is worth a few bob, but the
stones are all high-class fakes. He shrugged in the gloom. The Asahi
management got cold feet. Didnt want to pay the insurance premium for the real
stones so we worked out a special deal for display copies. The collection
toured right through New Zealand and Australia with no-one the wiser.

    So why didnt you tell me to piss
off on the phone?

    Heneker waved the necklace in the
air. These arent cheap copies.