Widows

by Lynda La Plante

  “Now then, love, isn’t it about time you told us who did this to you so we can lock ’em up and keep you nice and safe?” Resnick asked gently.

  Fran smiled and patted Resnick’s hand. “You’re a lovely man,” she said. Her cold and clammy sausage fingers tickled the back of his hand and he desperately wanted to pull away. “I wish I could tell you, my love,” she went on, “but I just can’t remember. I ain’t lying to you. I’ve had a bump to the head. I can’t picture the fella at all. I think I blocked it, you know. Trauma does that, the doctor said so. It blocks things you don’t want to remember.”

  “Your little trauma doesn’t do that, Fran, money does. Where d’ya get the money for all that booze?”

  Andrews stopped timing Resnick. Fifteen seconds!

  “I do run a business, you know. I can earn money!” Fran insisted.

  “What you going to do if he comes back, eh? Pour him a whisky?”

  “He won’t come back!” Fran howled in fear. “Why would he?”

  Resnick had Fran on the back foot. “Well, you did come to the station of your own free will, my dear . . . and we’re here now, ain’t we? What if he’s watching you?” The fear in Fran’s eyes grew as Resnick continued. “He doesn’t seem the tolerant type, and if he thinks you’re telling us stuff, he might just visit you again. But tell us who he is, and we’ll take him off the streets and put him behind bars. Then you can sit in your lovely little flat and get pissed, safe in the knowledge that he’s not going to be knocking on your door anytime soon.”

  By the time Resnick had finished, Fran was blubbing awful, childlike sobs, her belly bouncing up and down as she squeezed the air from her lungs in short, sharp bursts. Andrews felt so sorry for her that he took out his handkerchief and handed it to her. As she loudly blew her nose, Resnick stood up sharply, knocking the pouf over.

  “Take her in for obstructing the police,” Resnick instructed Andrews. “Come on, love, get to your feet. I’ve had enough of you lying to me.”

  Fran wailed and held her hand out to Andrews who, without thinking, took hold of it. “Ooh, don’t take me in! I’ve told you everything I know. I can’t remember no more, honest I can’t.”

  Andrews pulled his hand away from hers and tried to get her to her feet. It was like trying to lift a dead weight.

  “Please don’t take me in,” she wailed. “I wish Boxer was here—he’d look after me. Where’s Boxer? I want Boxer!”

  “Boxer’s dead,” Resnick spat. “Killed by whoever it was who beat you nearly half to death. If you care for Boxer, you’ll tell me who did this to you!”

  Fran’s wailing went up an octave. Andrews backed off to save his ear drums. Resnick had the decency to pause and let the woman grieve for a moment. Once she’d wailed long enough, he crouched back down in front of her.

  “Now you listen to me, Fran.” Resnick said firmly. “If you’ve been paid to keep your mouth shut, me and you are going to fall out big time.”

  “I ain’t—”

  “Shut up and listen, because I’m running out of patience with you! I know you’ve been hurt, but others have been hurt worse.” Resnick leapt up, grabbed one of the shopping bags of booze, held it up and leaned in close. “Who gave you the money for all this? I know you don’t earn enough renting rooms in this fleapit. Who? Come on Fran, who?” As Resnick waved the heavy bag in the air, one of the handles snapped, sending the bottles crashing to the floor. Brown frothy beer flowed across the carpet. Fran lurched forward with another howl.

  “Aargh, me beer! Me beer!” Fran buried her face in her hands and wept again.

  Resnick was now very red in the face, frustrated at not being able to break Fran. “You tell me who attacked you and who gave you the hush money—”

  “I don’t know! I don’t know! I told you a thousand times. This nice man come and asked to see Boxer and I showed him upstairs. The other one come later . . . the one that hit me. I didn’t know either of them. I swear I didn’t. I can’t remember nothing else.”

  “Try!” Resnick barked.

  “I was so tired. I said to this woman—”

  Resnick interrupted. “What woman?”

  “The one that rang. I said, ‘He’s gone out,’ I said.”

  “Just a minute!” Resnick focused in on this new detail. “A woman phoned for Boxer?”

  “Yes, I just told you.”

  Andrews watched as Resnick’s tone changed again. “When, Fran?” he was willing her onward. “When did she call?”

  “She called twice. First time she spoke to Boxer.” Fran put her head in her hands again. She was flagging, getting tired and confused.

  “And the second time?” Resnick paused for Fran to think, then gently prompted her. “Listen, love, this is really important. What were you doing when she called the second time?”

  “Watching telly.”

  “What was on?”

  Fran looked up at Resnick. “Coronation Street.”

  “Good girl. So, the woman called during Coronation Street. What did she say?”

  “She said she’d been cut off the first time. But, well, now Boxer was out with the first man, the nice man, so she just hung up on me. Oh, God, Boxer!” Fran whispered almost to herself. “I ain’t never gonna see my Boxer again.”

  “Help me find who killed him, Fran,” urged Resnick. “If you ever felt anything for Boxer, help me!”

  Fran gripped Resnick’s forearm. “He came to the hospital,” she whispered. “God help me, he came to the hospital and said he’d kill me if I tell you.”

  I’ll fucking kill you if you don’t tell me, thought Resnick. What he actually said was, “I’ll protect you.”

  “He was tall with dark hair. Piercing eyes that was cold as ice. He weren’t no thug, Mr. Resnick, he was a gent. A cold, callous, bastard gent!”

  Resnick caught his breath. He pulled an A4 picture from his inside jacket pocket and showed it to Fran. “This man?”

  Fran pushed the picture away so her eyes could focus properly on it and, when she did, Andrews saw that it was the image of Harry Rawlins from Resnick’s office wall, complete with dart hole in the forehead. Resnick was sweating, his face beetroot red.

  “That ain’t him,” Fran said.

  “Look at it properly. Look at it!” Resnick shouted, waving the image of Harry Rawlins in Fran’s face. “It was him, wasn’t it?”

  “No.”

  “Yes. This is him! Harry Rawlins is the man that beat you senseless. Tell me, tell me—I know it was him!”

  Just as Andrews was working up the courage to step in, his radio crackled.

  “Get out! How can she concentrate?” bellowed Resnick. Andrews reluctantly left.

  When Andrews came back from answering the radio call, Resnick was still shaking the photo of Harry Rawlins in Fran’s face and shouting the same question over and over.

  “Was it him? Was it him?”

  Andrews toyed with the idea of radioing Fuller and getting him to come and talk the old man down, but then he’d be the station joke for not being able to cope with a raving lunatic pensioner. Anyone could see that Fran’s description of her attacker was a fit for Rawlins, but it was also similar to half of London, so why Resnick seemed convinced that a dead man had come back to life and beaten the shit out of Fat Fran, he wasn’t at all sure. Andrews put his hand on Resnick’s shoulder.

  “Sir, there’s been an important development just radioed through—”

  “Shut up, Andrews!” Resnick growled, shaking Andrews’s hand away. “Fran’s just about to confirm that she was assaulted by Harry Rawlins, aren’t you, Fran?”

  Fran looked up at Resnick, her face terrified at the possible repercussions of what she was about to reveal. “No, Mr. Resnick. It wasn’t Harry Rawlins. It was . . . it was Tony Fisher.”

  As they drove back to the Yard in silence, Andrews stole sidelong glances at Resnick, wondering if he should report his strange behavior to the DCI. Resnick looked drained and beaten, like he’d given
up altogether. He didn’t even smoke and he always smoked in the car. As they turned the final corner toward the station, Andrews braved talking.

  “The call, sir. It was from Fuller. The kid killed by the Post Office van this morning was Carlos Moreno. He’s the Fisher brothers’ wheel man.”

  Resnick didn’t acknowledge that he’d heard anything Andrews had said. He just stared out of the window.

  Chapter 26

  Fuller was pleased with his morning’s work—he’d got so much done without Resnick breathing down his neck. He grinned as he contemplated what sort of morning Andrews might have had. He bet it had been horrible.

  Fuller had a full report prepared for Resnick detailing every piece of incriminating evidence found in Carlos’s car yard. It looked as if they could, at long last, pin something on the Fisher brothers. One of the cars recovered was a brown Jag with frontal damage and false plates in the boot. A subsequent check on the false plates revealed a brown Jag had recently been involved in a job in Manchester, chased and lost by police. Fuller had the vehicle checked for prints and was beaming when he was told both the Fisher brothers and Carlos’s prints were found inside and outside the car, but the false plates were clean. This was real police work; this wasn’t chasing ghosts and Fuller felt good. The Fishers were alive and well and about to be arrested.

  Fuller had already spoken with DCI Saunders and told him about the death of Carlos and the good news about the Fishers’ prints being on the Jag. He was still agitating to be moved to the Mayfair robbery team, and hoped this would help his chances. Saunders had congratulated Fuller on a great morning of hard work, but moved on, once again, to the subject of bloody George Resnick.

  “Where’s your boss?” Saunders had asked. “Chasing wild geese again, is he?”

  “Couldn’t say, sir,” said Fuller.

  “As soon as they’re back,” Saunders ordered, ignoring him, “I want to see Resnick and Andrews, separately, in my office. Do not let that man leave without seeing me.”

  Fuller had returned to the main office with a smug smile on his face. He knew where Resnick was and he knew that Resnick had been bullying Fat Fran into saying that she’d been assaulted by a dead man, because Andrews had told him over the radio. Fuller hoped that Andrews had the balls to drop Resnick right in it.

  Now, Fuller looked up when Resnick and Andrews walked back into the office. This is it, he thought. This is the day Resnick gets his papers. Fuller couldn’t help the smirk and Resnick saw it.

  “What you lookin’ so bloody happy about?”

  “I’ve identified the Fishers’ wheels man, sir. Didn’t Andrews tell you?”

  Resnick shrugged, uninterested. “Big deal. I got Fat Fran to admit that it was Tony Fisher that gave her a pasting.”

  Fuller was taken aback. Andrews raised his eyebrows and shook his head.

  “She’s that scared,” Andrews chipped in, “she’ll never give evidence against him. You could nick Tony Fisher, but we all know he’ll never admit it and, without her statement, why bother? He’d walk the same day, then be free to go back and give the poor woman another beating, or worse . . . kill her.”

  Resnick was lost for words; he’d never heard Andrews say so much in one go. Fuller offered:

  “So, if we could put Tony Fisher away on another charge, she might feel safer and open up then?”

  “You’re referring to your sterling police work with regards to the raid on Carlos’s car yard, no doubt?” Resnick said with a sneer. “Where’s this evidence that’s going to rid London of the Fishers then?”

  “On your desk, sir,” Fuller replied, pointing. If his report was good enough for Saunders, it was definitely good enough for Resnick. As Resnick picked it up, Fuller added, “Oh, yes—Andrews, Saunders wants to see you.”

  “What for?” demanded Resnick.

  “No idea,” said Fuller. Andrews shrugged and left the room.

  Resnick walked into his new glass annex office, turned and walked straight out again. “I asked for bloody blinds so I wouldn’t have to look at your ugly mugs all day. Where are they?” Resnick barked. “Get onto Alice—she’s the only way to get things done round here.”

  While Fuller went off to track Alice down, Resnick sat in his goldfish bowl annex, opened the Carlos Moreno file and began to read, picking his nose all the while. When Fuller came back five minutes later. Resnick tapped on the glass, smiled and beckoned him into his office.

  “Interesting report Fuller, very detailed and thorough,” Resnick said as he sat down and placed the report on his desk.

  “Thank you, sir,” Fuller replied. “As you can see, I have uncovered evidence that could put the Fishers away for car ringing and potentially link them to an illegal booze racket in Manchester. That then gives you a fighting chance of persuading the Fran woman to make a statement against Tony Fisher for the assault. If he’s already behind bars, she’s got nothing to be scared of.”

  Resnick looked up at him and shook his head. He tapped the report. “This is a bloody cock-up! The Jag had its real plates on it when you recovered it and it’s registered to the Fishers’ club, so their prints on the motor are worthless.”

  Fuller looked embarrassed. “Well, the false plates were in the boot . . . and they tie up with a brown Jag used on the Manchester job.”

  “So fucking what? The Fishers have an expensive lawyer who will crucify your case. In letting Carlos Moreno do a runner and get squashed to death by a Post Office van, you’ve given them a perfect alibi. If I need to spell it out, Fuller, you’re thicker than I thought. The Fishers can pin everything on Carlos and walk away.”

  Fuller felt totally deflated. Resnick was right. The Jag was in for a service, so all the Fishers had to say was that Carlos must have taken the Jag to Manchester for the illegal booze racket. With Carlos dead, there was no one to argue with anything the Fishers might claim.

  Humiliated, Fuller turned to leave.

  “Wait,” Resnick said, opening the file again. “Your report says the tip-off about the Moreno garage was anonymous and made by a woman.” Fuller nodded. “An unknown woman also rang Boxer Davis at his bedsit the night he was killed.” Resnick clicked his fingers at Fuller. “Have a look in that box of my stuff down there for the phone tap reports on calls made.”

  Fuller searched through the box of files Alice had packed for the move. He found the phone tap report file and handed it over.

  As Resnick flicked through the pages and pages of calls made in and out of Dolly Rawlins’s house, Fuller spotted Andrews coming out of Saunders’s office. He looked depressed. Fuller cheered up. It was all coming to a head. All of Resnick’s short cuts, unprofessionalism and sidestepping of red tape, his crazed obsession with the Rawlins case, was coming out into the open and would see the end of him. Andrews would have just told Saunders about the picture of Harry Rawlins Resnick carried in his pocket at all times. Saunders would see him for the obsessed weirdo he was.

  Andrews knocked on Resnick’s open door. “DCI Saunders would like to see you, sir.”

  Resnick ignored him and continued to run his finger down the numbers called, checking to see if Boxer’s number or if the anonymous call to the police station on the night Carlos died was on there. At the bottom of the third page, the list of numbers suddenly stopped: no more recordings, no more notes, no more information. Resnick shot to his feet, knocking his chair over and slammed the file shut.

  “Well, I hope Saunders will be telling me what the bloody hell’s going on, because it seems he’s been keepin’ me in the dark and I won’t have it! First he stops the surveillance and then he stops the bleedin’ phone tap! What’s the point in me being here?” He stormed off toward his boss’ office.

  Andrews still had a faced like a slapped arse.

  “So, what did you say to Saunders?” Fuller asked.

  Andrews sighed and dug his hands into his pockets. “He did all the talking.”

  This was disappointing. Fuller had hoped Andrews would have be
en spilling the beans on Resnick’s lunatic moment with Fat Fran.

  “Resnick gave me a lousy work report,” Andrews continued. “And Saunders said I’d failed to make the grade, so I’m back on division and routine crime as of next month. I can’t believe it! I’ve always worked as hard as anyone else, done as I was told and never let Resnick down.”

  Fuller suspected Andrews was for the chop; he felt sorry for him and said as much, but the fact was that, although he was a nice bloke, armed robbery investigations were out of his league. Working on division, investigating thefts and criminal damage would be more his forte. “Don’t worry. This job’s a roller coaster,” Fuller said as he walked away. Then he whispered to himself: “I’m on my way up and you’re on your way down.”

  When the explosion went off in Saunders’s office, the whole annex heard the boom of Resnick’s voice as he shouted at the top of his voice. All eyes looked over to the DCI’s office, where Resnick could be seen through the glass partition, red-faced with anger and thumping his fist on Saunders’s desk. Turning his head, Resnick saw Fuller, Andrews and others looking at him. He flung open the DCI’s office door and stepped into the corridor.

  “You all havin’ a bloody good gander and gettin’ an earful, are you? WELL, ARE YOU?”

  Everyone in the annex suddenly pretended to be busy: there was a general rushing about and gathering up of papers, the typists typing frantically and officers picking up phones to make suddenly urgent calls. Except Fuller—Fuller stared Resnick down square for at least five seconds before looking away.

  “You know what?” Andrews said, as he watched Fuller gloating. “You’re a bigger bastard than he is. He doesn’t make a conscious decision to be a shit; you do.”

  Back in Saunders’s office, Resnick stood with both fists on the DCI’s desk as he leaned forward and glared at him. Saunders looked down at his memo pad and tapped it with the point of his sharpened pencil.

  “I withdrew the phone tap on the Rawlins woman when I found out about it a few days ago. For one, you had not sought mine or any other senior officer’s approval, which means it was illegal, not to mention the cost of having an officer monitor and write down the number of all the calls in and out, day and night. And I withdrew the surveillance for pretty much the same reason. I couldn’t justify two officers sitting outside the Rawlins house with Boxer Davis’s killer on the loose.”