‘Later. Your son?’
‘I’ve not seen him, not for two months.’
‘Anywhere we might find him?’
‘He’s got a cousin, lives in Croydon.’
‘Address?’
‘I don’t know. Jayden Conroy. My sister’s son, he made good. He and Waylon grew up together as children before his mother found herself another man and moved away, something I should have done.’
‘We have a concern about your daughter.’
‘It’s not the first time. I do my best, but it’s not easy, you must know that.’
‘Social services will advise, but I suggest you pack a bag for her, a change of clothes. She’ll need to be examined, probably at the hospital.’
‘I’ll go with her. Waylon?’
‘We need to ask him questions relating to the death of Warren Preston.’
‘Not my Waylon, not him. I know he can be dangerous, but he’d not kill anyone.’
Ross knew that Conroy’s mother did not believe one word of what she had just said. He felt sorry for her. It wasn’t an emotion that he would hold for long; he had a job to do, and sentimentality didn’t figure in it.
***
Larry Hill remembered his last encounter with Spanish John. It had been eighteen months previously, a homicide, a man by the name of Bevan Harris, a minor criminal adept at cracking safes, getting into any locked building and disabling the alarm.
Larry had known Harris by sight, a Geordie from Newcastle, in the north of the country, easily recognisable by the cartoon figures tattooed on his arms. He was neither charismatic nor agreeable, with a sour look and a foul mouth. Apart from his unique skills, he was a man that had few friends, other than Spanish John’s brother and an ugly mutt of a dog.
Akoni was the brother’s name. Larry had googled it and found that it meant someone who is a brave warrior and has excellent leadership qualities. Neither attribute could be accorded to the small weasely black man when he was hauled into Challis Street Police Station on a Tuesday night.
Harris and Akoni had argued vehemently in the morning, a dispute over money, although nobody who had witnessed the affray could remember the details, and if they could, they weren’t about to tell them to a police officer.
Even Larry had to see the humour in the two men fighting. The tattooed white man, over six feet tall, with a long dark beard and with an accent and a choice of words that sometimes left others looking for a translation, and the five-feet-six inches Akoni, skinny and shaven-headed.
According to those that had been there, why they were fighting wasn’t apparent, but Akoni had acquitted himself better than expected, getting in under Harris’s guard, a flurry of punches to the stomach before retreating. In the end, the two men tiring, the anger appeased, they had embraced and gone into a pub for a pint, Harris’s ugly mutt relegated to sitting outside, looking at its master through an open door.
As Akoni had sat in the interview room, stating his innocence, a dissolute friend of the deceased from Newcastle, a man who had a genuine grievance in that Harris had stolen his woman from him and brought her south, was arrested for the murder. Harris, for all his faults, could draw women to him, whereas Akoni, small and agreeable to talk to, a good patter in chat-up lines, couldn’t.
Then, when Akoni left the police station, he was approached by two uniforms and asked for the registration papers for the top-of-the-range BMW that he was driving.
He was detained once again, although Larry wasn’t directly involved, not that Spanish John would listen to reason, as it was Challis Street where Akoni had been arrested.
The BMW and other luxury cars were being stolen off the streets in London, put into a container and shipped off to Africa, to countries that drove on the left. With sufficient bribes, they would reappear a continent away.
Akoni acquired the vehicles, delivering them to an industrial estate to the north of the city. Spanish John was investigated, but nothing was ever proven. Larry always thought that the smarter brother wouldn’t have risked dealing in stolen cars; drugs were more his style, easier to conceal, easier to sell, a higher profit margin.
The three men met at a restaurant in Kensington; Spanish John was paying, not out of courtesy to the police, but because Larry was accompanied by Gus Vincent.
Spanish John, taller than his brother, carrying more weight, not only in fat but in gold jewellery, his fingers bedecked with rings, a heavy gold chain around his neck, a Rolex on his wrist, embraced Vincent, scowled at Larry.
‘What do you want, Hill?’ the criminal said.
‘Two women, one man murdered,’ Larry said. No reason to mention Preston, he thought. A gang member in Canning Town wouldn’t interest a man to whom violence came easily.
‘My brother?’
‘If he hadn’t driven that car over to Challis Street, we wouldn’t have caught him.’
‘Not too smart, Akoni. I was angry, angry enough to have done something about it.’
‘You wouldn’t have. Spanish John, let’s not pretend here. I know what you are, and you know who I am.’
‘What I am is an honest businessman, just you remember that. You’re right, I can trust you. What do you want from me?’
‘We need to find someone.’
‘The two women, the man?’
‘An unknown woman at Kensal Green Cemetery, Janice Robinson and her father, Hector.’
‘I knew her father, not well. He was a nobody, why kill him?’
‘We don’t know. We’re fairly sure who knifed him, but we can’t prove it.’
‘Janice?’
‘Did you know her?’
‘I paid her the occasional visit, not in that dreadful bedsit, before she reached the end of the road, before the drugs destroyed her.’
The drugs you sell, Larry thought but did not say. He looked over at Vincent, studying the menu. Their eyes met. Vincent did not approve of what his former pupil had become, but he wasn’t a man to make waves.
‘I’ll have fish,’ he said.
Spanish John signalled the waiter, Italian by his halting English and appearance. ‘A bottle of your finest red,’ he said.
‘Steak for me, heavy on the chips,’ Larry said to the waiter.
‘Make that two,’ Spanish John said.
‘We’re not certain that the murders are over.’
‘Assuming I can help, what do you want?’
‘We have only one firm lead, a woman who I met at a house in Holland Park. Subsequently, we found out that she had been at the first murder site.’
‘You’ve lost her?’
‘Initially, we couldn’t do anything when we first came across her, and we were forced to believe that she wasn’t important, but now…’
‘Scratch your back, you’ll scratch mine, is that it?’
‘I’m with Homicide, not narcotics. That’s not my concern, not now, but murdering people is. Janice and Hector make no sense.’
‘You reckon there could be more?’
‘We don’t know. I’ve got eyes out there looking for one woman. I could do with some help.’
Spanish John saw himself as Godfather to his community, a benevolent figure who supported the local charities, gave money to a homeless shelter, helped out the occasional family down on their luck. A man who weighed his misdeeds with the good he did, a man that the police regarded with suspicion, but little proof.
The gangster took a sip of his wine, clinked glasses with Vincent and Larry. ‘Give me the photo. If she’s around here, we’ll find her.’
***
Gwen Pritchard stood outside the house in Holland Park, the photo blown up and on a large board secured to the front gate. It wasn’t the first time that a police officer had been in the street, but before the picture had been an identikit based on Larry’s recollection, and there wasn’t any shortage of women who matched Analyn’s description.
It was a thankless task, and it was cold, so much so that Gwen was looking forward to a break from stan
ding outside the house. She decided she’d stop after talking to the first twenty people, mainly retirees with nothing better to do, and school pupils off to the first lesson of the day: the females looking up at the tall constable, pleased to talk to her; the adolescent males taking the opportunity to speak to her, some of them misbehaving, one getting a rebuke for getting too close, another for a smart comment.
Nobody knew anything, which wasn’t surprising as the house hadn’t been occupied for more than a few weeks, and there was a rear entrance down a lane at the back, a remote control to open the sliding gate.
‘I remember her,’ the next-door neighbour said when Gwen, tiring of the street, knocked on the door. ‘I could see her from my bedroom window, not that I could hear. I don’t make a habit of looking in other people’s backyards, seeing who’s who, but these days, you can’t be too careful, can you?’
The lady was in her seventies, obviously very well off financially judging by the antiques in the house, the oil paintings on the wall. Gwen had studied art and had once considered a career in the restoration of paintings, soon discounted as it had only been a fad brought on by her parents who saw the police force as a dead-end job, only suitable for the lower echelons of society. Her parents were snobs, she was not, but she could act the part if required.
‘New money, singers, we’ve had them all down here. No breeding most of them and some of the parties…’
‘Next door?’ Gwen glanced up at a Matisse, his blue period, a caricature of a nude female. It was genuine from what she could see, worth a fortune.
‘I can’t say I approved of the two of them, but they were quiet, hardly ever saw them.’
The story had already been told to other police officers, Gwen knew, having read the reports.
‘Cavorting?’
‘The two of them in that house together.’
‘Ian Naughton, the man in the house, said that his wife was away, and the young Asian woman was a housemaid, looking after the children. Not that we’ve ever found proof of that.’
‘I spoke to her once. My dog, a sweet little thing, wouldn’t harm a fly, had found a break in the wall and had gone into their garden.’
‘I know that this has been mentioned by you before, but I’d appreciate it if you’d tell me in your own good time.’
‘I can tell you come from breeding.’
It wasn’t mentioned, not by Gwen at Challis Street, and never by Detective Superintendent Goddard, but she had had a privileged upbringing; money wasn’t a determining factor in her life, but having a vocation was.
The two women were seated in the front room of the house. It was warm, too warm for a policewoman in uniform.
Gwen took off her jacket, the dog in question coming over to sniff around.
It was, Gwen decided, neither sweet nor little, but a giant poodle, its coat clipped regulation style.
‘What can you tell me about the woman?’
‘Asian, not sure which country, but then it’s not so easy.’
Gwen handed over the photo.
‘That’s her, a good likeness. No idea why she’d want to be with him.’
‘A relationship?’
‘I saw them out there. Late at night, but I can see well enough. The two of them…’
‘Making love?’
‘I wouldn’t call it that, not him and her. He must have been in his fifties, she, just a teenager.’
‘We believe her to be in her twenties. A lot of them do look younger than they actually are. When you spoke to her?’
‘She didn’t say much, just got hold of Boris, not that she liked dogs, held him at a distance, and handed him back to me.’
‘You’ve got the photo. Anything else you can tell us?’
‘She wasn’t happy to be there. I saw her another time arguing with him in the back garden.’
‘He hit her?’
‘I heard him say that it was up to her, but the repercussions would be on her head and her family's.’
‘Which you understood to mean?’
‘They left that night. I didn’t think any more about it, but that’s her in the photo. Is she in trouble?’
‘We don’t know, but it’s suspicious. What do you know about the murder in Kensal Green Cemetery?’
‘A young woman. Was she involved, her next door?’
‘She’s a person of interest, someone we need to find before it’s too late. Any help–’
The woman interrupted her. ‘I’ll tell you what I know, not that I was nosey, but she wasn’t the first woman in that house. There had been others.’
‘Why wasn’t this mentioned before?’
‘You know…’
‘I know somebody who’s taken more than a casual interest in her neighbours. Before this goes any further, and being nosey is not a crime, just mischievous and in bad taste, you’d better tell me the truth.’
‘I saw two other women.’
‘Describe them.’
‘One was Asian, the other was white, not sure where from.’
Gwen opened up her smartphone, scrolled through the photo gallery, showed one of the images to a woman with an unhealthy interest in spying on her neighbours.
‘That’s the white woman,’ the neighbour said. ‘Who is she?’
‘She’s the woman that was murdered in the cemetery.’
Chapter 17
It seemed that Analyn, the mysterious and most important person for the team to interview, was at the Holland Park address under some duress and that Ian Naughton was involved in a shady business where women were possibly trafficked. But that assumption was flawed in that the woman on the grave was English, her DNA’s genetic markers confirming her ancestry.
If Analyn and the other Asian woman seen by the nosey neighbour were brought into the country either illegally or legally, under contract or not, it didn’t explain why the murdered woman had been at the grave with a man.
The early-morning meetings at Challis Street continued. Larry still struggled with his weight, Wendy with her arthritis, and Isaac with Jenny’s advancing pregnancy, the morning sickness, the occasional mood change, the decision to put the flat on the market and to buy a house. It was only Bridget who seemed immune as she spent her days with her computer, the evenings enjoying a glass of wine, and watching soap operas on the television.
Chief Superintendent Goddard would occasionally be in Homicide, not that Isaac concerned himself too much, except that the man would ask penetrating questions which the team couldn’t answer.
‘Still no idea who the dead woman is?’ Goddard said.
‘Not yet, but we’re getting closer,’ Isaac said, realising that it was a stupid reply.
‘I read the report,’ Goddard continued. ‘Long on detail, short on fact, but that’s the problem, isn’t it? You’ve run out of ideas.’
Isaac, as the senior investigating officer, wanted to deny, to offer up a fervent rebuttal, but he knew that it was best to let his senior have his say. The pep talk and the criticism were the way the man operated, and he wasn’t a tyrant, not like Commissioner Davies.
Homicide, Challis Street, was a special focus for the man, especially after the commissioner’s favourite, Seth Caddick, had been brought in to replace Isaac firstly and then, after his promotion to superintendent, Richard Goddard. On both occasions, Caddick had left with his tail between his legs, but he was still there, champing on the bit, eager to prove his worth.
Isaac and Goddard had no time for the man, an incompetent sycophant, sucking up to Davies, but he wasn’t the only one in the Met. There were more than a few who succeeded through adroit manoeuvring, waiting their time, moving in to grab the accolade, retreating to the shadows when someone needed to take the blame.
On a couple of occasions, Isaac had considered leaving, finding himself a more regular job, head of security for a company overseas, but each time he had stayed, although the salaries on offer had been inviting. And as he had reflected with Jenny the night before, more money wou
ld come in handy. They had spent a couple of hours looking at their finances, the price they could sell the flat for, the mortgage they would need to take for a house.
‘We’ll manage,’ Jenny said. ‘And when the baby’s old enough, I can find a job.’
The expected promotion to superintendent hadn’t occurred for Isaac and wasn’t likely to as long as Davies remained in control.
‘We’re making a concerted effort to find the Asian woman,’ Larry said.
‘Yes, I know all that, but why’s it taking so long. Assuming she’s relevant–’
‘She is,’ Larry interrupted the chief superintendent’s flow.
Not a good idea, Isaac thought, as he cast a steely glance over at his DI: keep quiet, it inferred. Larry took the hint and picked up his mug of coffee from the desk, grasped it firmly and sat back.
‘As I was saying, assuming she’s relevant,’ Goddard continued. ‘And now we’re using criminals to find her. It’s irregular.’
Isaac and his team knew it wasn’t, as did the chief superintendent, but others in the police force, isolated from the reality, back-room boys, politically correct aficionados, believed that criminals were to be arrested, not consorted with.
Richard Goddard had to deal with those people, as did the team in Homicide, but it was a reality that couldn’t be avoided. Sometimes those you despised were the best people for the job.
Spanish John, one of the more distasteful in terms of the business he conducted, the people whose lives he ruined, was a man close to the street. He was a man that Larry trusted, and had even enjoyed his company at the restaurant.
‘Without the woman, we’re going nowhere,’ Isaac said. We can place her at three locations of interest; she’s the glue the brings the investigation together.’
‘We do what’s necessary,’ Larry said.
‘Any money to exchange hands?’ Goddard asked.
‘Not from me.’
‘And this, Spanish John, can get a result?’
‘No guarantees, sir, but he can cover more territory than me. He’s also checking on Ian Naughton. He doesn’t want murderers in the area any more than we do; bad for business, more police on the ground.’
DCI Isaac Cook Box Set 2 Page 136