‘You speak Hindi too? Is there no end to your talents?’
‘I don’t. Someone summarised it for me.’
‘Are they valuable?’
‘They’re irreplaceable to the people who lost them. It’s not about money, it’s about belief.’ Helen let go of the amulet and the pendant, which felt suddenly hot in her hand. ‘They’re very old, ninth century I think, so, yes, in monetary terms they’d fetch a fortune from a collector.’
Charlie snorted scornfully. ‘If it’s such a high-profile case in India, Letitia’s running one hell of a risk. They’re way too recognisable. Even she can’t be that stupid.’
‘Who isn’t that stupid?’
Chapter Thirty
Letitia’s cut-glass voice rang out across the warehouse just as the overhead lights came on, and they froze into living statues. On the steps behind Letitia were two men, her chauffeur and someone Helen hadn’t seen before, a short, rotund Indian man with a moustache. Perhaps the owner of the warehouse.
Whoever he was, his bulk was blocking their only way out.
Charlie stepped closer to Helen, clutching the screwdriver in her hand, and Helen felt the cold metal against her trouser leg.
‘Don’t,’ she whispered.
Charlie ignored her. ‘We know all about your scam,’ she shouted.
Letitia came towards them, all perfume, pearls and Hermes handbag. ‘Do you indeed? That’s really not terribly convenient.’
‘We know how you’ve been at it for years, selling off stolen antiques as copies and pocketing the change.’
‘Shut up, Charlie,’ Helen hissed.
‘What an imagination you have. I’m just a businesswoman.’
The Indian man came up beside Letitia and stabbed a chubby finger at them. ‘You know these burglars? Who are they?’
‘It’ll be all right, Mr Singh. I’ll handle it. One of them’s my niece, the other …’ Letitia made a dismissive gesture.
‘It’s all on your computer,’ Charlie continued, undaunted. ‘There’s nothing you can do. Right now copies are winging their way to every agency I could think of. The Met, FBI, Interpol, they all know what you’re up to. Probably on their way here now.’
Letitia cocked her head sideways, pretending to listen. ‘They must have the wrong address. I don’t hear any sirens.’
‘They’ll be here.’
It was all bluff, and Charlie couldn’t quite hide it. She hadn’t e-mailed the files to anyone except herself. No one was coming. As for Helen, her anger was greater than her fear. Finally she may have found the person responsible for her mother’s death. The sense of betrayal rose like a sour taste in her throat, and she swallowed it back to stop herself from being sick.
‘Why?’ she asked, a bitter note in her voice. ‘You had it all. Money, respect, a company on its way to mega success. With a bit of careful politics you could’ve had it your way. Why jeopardise it? Why kill my mother?’
‘Kill your mother? What makes you say that?’
‘The shopping bag, with the elephant on.’
‘So I have one of her bags. What of it?’
‘It proves you had her killed. That bag was on the back seat, with me. I remember it like it was yesterday. You took it.’
Letitia’s voice went from cool to icy. ‘It proves nothing. You were a child, and no one mentioned a bag disappearing. Who’d believe you now?’
Helen’s cheeks flamed, and she recalled her humiliation in Wilcox’s office.
‘You’ve been a thorn in my side ever since you came back,’ said Letitia. ‘First sticking your nose into my business, then wrapping Mother around your little finger so she’d bequeath you her shares.’
‘I know why you killed her,’ said Helen. ‘She was passionate about the company, just like you, but you were going to ruin it, and she couldn’t let that happen.’
‘My father,’ Letitia snapped suddenly, ‘worked his fingers to the bone to build up the company. Before my parents met, he started from nothing and was nearly crushed by some of the big auction houses several times. When he died, my mother worked her fingers to the bone.’
‘I know all that. What did that have to do with my mother?’
‘She wanted control. Full control.’ Letitia sent Helen a pitying look. ‘She wanted to get rid of me and teamed up with one of our shareholders, passing him information about … my side business, that he could use against me.’
‘Moody.’
Letitia smiled nastily. ‘There was something poisonous about Mimi. Everything she touched just shrivelled up and died. I wasn’t going to let her do that, to me or the business which my father – and my mother – gave their life’s blood to preserve.’