Verwandte Artikel zu Name To A Face

Name To A Face - Softcover

Goddard, Robert

 
9780552152129: Name To A Face
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0552152129 ISBN 13: 9780552152129
Verlag: Corgi, 2008

Inhaltsangabe

The brain-teasing new thriller from the 'master of the clever twist'.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Robert Goddard's first novel, Past Caring, was an instant bestseller. Since then, his books have captivated readers worldwide with their edge-of-the-seat pace and their labyrinthine plotting. He has won awards in the UK, the US and acrossEurope and his books have been translated into over thirty languages. In 2019, he won the Crime Writers’ Association’s highest accolade, the Diamond Dagger, for a lifetime achievement in Crime Writing.

Von der hinteren Coverseite

A centuries old mystery is about to unravel...

When Tim Harding agrees to do a favour for a friend by bidding on his behalf for an antique ring at auction, little does he know of the secrets that tie the ring to three tragedies: the sinking of HMS Association off Scilly in 1707, a murder in Penzance thirty years later and the drowning of a journalist diving at the Association wreck site in 1999.

But the ring is stolen before it can be sold, and a shocking murder follows. Harding is quickly drawn into a web of conspiracies surrounding the ring's origins and finds, close to the heart of the mystery, a young woman he is certain he recognizes, even though they have never met. As he goes in search of her identity, his life begins to fall apart. Somewhere, a perilous truth awaits him, coupled with a terrible realization: those who uncover that truth are not allowed to live...

Robert Goddard is:

'The master of the clever twist'
Sunday Telegraph

'Second to none when it comes to duplicity and intrigue...A master of manipulation'
Daily Mail

'One of Britain's finest thriller writers'
Time Out

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter One


Few of Jardiniera's clients lived in Monaco, for the simple reason that few residents of the principality possessed a garden. The high-rise apartment blocks jostling for a tax-free footing on its expensive square kilometre of the Cote d'Azur left little room for the landscaped riots of greenery to be found in the grounds of villas to east and west.

An exception to this rule was, however, one of Jardiniera's best clients. Barney Tozer was in fact rather more than a client, having bought himself a slice of the company and with it the implicit right to prompt attention whenever he required it. He had also bought himself, at a price Tim Harding should only have been able to guess at but actually knew to the last eye-watering zero, the penthouse apartment in one of the most prestigious blocks in La Condamine. Thanks to the sheerness of the rock face against which the block had been built, the penthouse came complete with its own garden, perched at the level of the next road above, commanding a fine view of the yacht-crammed Port de Monaco and the sparkling blue vastness of the Mediterranean.

An electronically operated shutter-door set in the high stone rear wall of the garden gave access to a double garage, sparing its owner the need to squeeze his four-wheel-drive giant into the communal garage in the block's basement and allowing Harding to drive his Jardiniera truck in off the road after entering the four-digit code he had been trusted with on the number-panel attached to the entryphone.

Harding was a well-built, broad-shouldered man in his late forties, brown hair bleached blond enough by the sun to camouflage the streaks of grey, skin so deeply tanned that his blue-grey eyes sparked brightly, frown- and smile-lines more or less equally pronounced on his evenly featured face. Gardening for a living had kept him physically fit, but something in his faze, something wounded and wary, suggested that people had always been a greater mystery to him than plants.

He parked the truck on the hardstanding in front of the garage and climbed out into the cool, clear, light-filled air as the shutter-door completed its well-lubricated descent behind him with a reassuringly solid clunk. Harding was dressed for work, in jeans, boots and skiing jacket, although he happened to know that no soil would be turned or shrub pruned this morning. He happened to know, but was obliged to pretend he did not. Which was only one of the reasons for the discomfort he felt.
The morning was fine but chill. Winter and spring were still taking turns this early in the year, even on the Riviera, where the locals seemed to regard anything other than warm, settled weather as a personal affront. It was a quiet time for Jardiniera. Many of their clients were away. Most of the gardens they tended were ticking over gently, with little need of anything beyond routine maintenance. Harding knew he would be unable to plead pressure of work as an objection to doing what was going to be asked of him. He knew, in fact, that he would be unable to raise an objection of any kind. Even though some instinct he suspected he ought to heed told him he should.

Barney Tozer was on the terrace beyond the swimming pool, leaning back against the balustrade that guarded the drop to the roadway far below. He was in the middle of a phone conversation and did no more than raise a hand to acknowledge Harding's arrival. This was no surprise. He was a man who spent so much time on the phone that his right shoulder was permanently lower than his left, giving his whole body a slightly skewed, misshapen appearance. He was about the same age as Harding, but did not look so well on it, a substantial paunch filling out the loose sweater he wore above baggy trousers and deck shoes, his thinning hair cropped short, a second chin wobbling beneath his jaw as he spoke. But the obese and gleaming watch lolling on his wrist hinted at the other kind of pounds he had acquired an excess of over the years, not to mention the euros, dollars, yen and Swiss francs. He was, Harding needed no reminding, a seriously wealthy man.

There was a vagueness about the source of this wealth. Barney Tozer's company, Starburst International, dealt in timeshare properties and the luxury end of the holiday market, but Harding had always found it difficult to believe that such business could yield profits on the scale its chairman and managing director's lifestyle suggested it did. Harding was no expert, of course. He knew that. And he knew there were other factors complicating his relationship with Barney. One of those was that he actually liked the guy. Barney was a generous, affable, garrulous, down-to-earth Cornishman who hardly fitted the tax-exile stereotype. He and Harding had become drinking buddies over the last couple of years—friends, for want of a better word, though there were in truth too many secrets between them to make it quite the right word.

Harding crossed the modest but manicured lawn and made his way slowly round the pool to where Tozer was standing, scanning the lemon trees and hibiscuses as he went to confirm that they were looking well, even though he knew his host would be unlikely to notice their condition unless they shed their leaves and died in front of him. The phone call was ending in murmured farewells. By the time Harding reached the terrace, it was over.

" 'Morning, Tim," said Tozer, slipping the phone into his pocket and smiling broadly. "Hope you haven't had to make too much of a detour to fit me in."

"Not at all. There's a villa on Cap Martin I'm going to visit this afternoon. I might be in line for quite an ambitious landscaping job there."

"Your speciality."

"Well, it's supposed to be." So it was, although general care and maintenance accounted for more and more of Jardiniera's business. "Anyway, what can I do for you, Barney?"

"Come inside. We can talk over coffee. Unless you fancy something stronger." Tozer winked over his shoulder at him as he headed towards the patio doors leading into the apartment.

"Coffee's fine, thanks."

"Have it your way."

But Harding was not going to have it his way. That he already knew. Forewarned was not in this case forearmed.

"Carol's at the beautician," Tozer explained as they traversed the huge, modishly furnished lounge en route to the kitchen. "Seems to spend more and more time there. Says that's a sign of middle age. Could be a sign of covering up for torrid sessions with a gym-freak toy boy, of course. How's a husband to know?"

"I expect she really is at the beautician, Barney."

"Yeah?" Tozer smiled back at Harding. "You're probably right."

He was right. There was no doubt about it. The real doubt surrounded the question of whether Barney knew why Harding could be so certain on the point. And that doubt seemed to have been growing recently, to a degree guilt alone could not explain.

"Black, no sugar?" They had reached the kitchen, fitted out like the lounge in the very latest style and its most expensive version.

"Please."

Tozer flicked a couple of switches above the slate worktop. A kettle roared into life. A grinder devoured a hopperful of beans. In less than a minute, the coffee was brewing. Tozer lit a cigarette during the interval, not troubling to offer one to Harding, a confirmed non-smoker.

"Planning something new for the garden, Barney?"

"Hardly. That's Carol's province."

"I just thought—"

"I didn't ask you round to discuss bloody pot plants."

"No. I guessed not."

"I bet you did." Tozer looked thoughtfully at him...

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Verlag
Corgi
Erscheinungsdatum
2008
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0552152129
ISBN 13 
9780552152129
Einband
Taschenbuch
Auflage
1
Anzahl der Seiten
480
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Terminal Video
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