Capital Punishment

by Robert Wilson

  They looked at each other for some time, Skin’s blue eyes unsmiling, penetrating. Dan let him do it, let him know he wasn’t being too fly for his own good.

  ‘And?’ said Skin, after some moments.

  ‘Well,’ said Dan, making a forward motion with his hands.

  ‘I want to hear you say it, Nurse.’

  ‘We have knowledge, opportunity and, with a bit of work, we could have the capability, too.’

  ‘In English, Nurse: single syllables.’

  ‘We know who the girl is, and where she is: that’s the knowledge. We man one of the three security shifts in the warehouse where she’s being held: that’s the opportunity. All we have to do is find some alternative accommodation: and that would give us the capability.’

  ‘So you mean . . . what exactly?’

  ‘We take over the kidnap.’

  ‘Right. That’s what I wanted. I need to hear these things said, that’s all,’ said Skin. ‘That way, we don’t have any misunderstandings. So that when Pike tells his dwarf, Kevin, to arrange us with our balls in a vice, I can say with a clear conscience that it was the Nurse who came up with the idea.’

  That stopped Dan’s hand on the way to his pint. Skin grinned.

  ‘Do I look like the type who’s going to grass you up?’ he said, babyface all innocent, only the spider web tattoo giving it away.

  A long hard look from Dan, brain doing double time.

  ‘Have you been thinking the same thing all the fucking time?’

  ‘What I’ve been thinking, Nurse, is that we’ve done a lot of dirty work for minimum wage,’ said Skin. ‘Doing the illegals, then the cabbie and his mate, taking an injury and then still doing our shift at the warehouse is what I call heavy overtime. I don’t mind doing a bit of extra as long as it’s appreciated. I don’t know about you but I don’t feel appreciated, not in my pocket, and not in here, neither.’ He tapped himself in the chest, drank some more lager.

  ‘So I’ve been making my own enquiries, since we thought about the people clearing up loose ends becoming loose ends themselves.’

  Dan grunted a laugh. He’d underestimated Skin, as a lot of people probably did. ‘And you’ve found out who Pike’s doing this for?’

  ‘What I do know,’ said Skin, shaking his head, ‘is that the only one he’s had any contact with is the English bloke, and I heard the Irish fucker call him Reecey. The American guy who calls himself Jordan and does all the talking to the girl, he’s running the group and, as far as I can make out, he hired in Reecey to organise the kidnap.’

  ‘What about the other American we haven’t seen on our shift?’

  ‘He’s Jordan’s mate. They work together. I haven’t heard his name.’

  ‘And “the Irish fucker”, the security guy?’

  ‘He’s with Reecey.’

  ‘And who’s behind them?’

  ‘Does there have to be anyone?’

  ‘Jordan goes outside to make phone calls after his sessions with the girl as if he’s updating someone.’

  ‘You heard any of that?’

  ‘Nothing,’ said Dan. ‘Do you know if Pike’s been paid?’

  ‘A hundred K,’ said Skin. ‘So far.’

  ‘Does that sound like a lot of money to you?’

  ‘It does when you think that the only outside supplier was the cabbie. The rest of us, doing all the shit work, are on the payroll.’

  ‘It’s Pike’s warehouse,’ said Dan.

  ‘Which is always empty,’ said Skin.

  ‘And I doubt that refrigeration unit they’re in has been turned on this century,’ said Dan.

  ‘Get us another couple of pints in,’ said Skin, slapping a tenner down on the table.

  They sat in front of their refills. More crisps. Skin was nodding.

  ‘What?’ said Dan.

  ‘I’m thinking it through, beginning to end,’ said Skin. ‘The easiest bit is going to be taking the girl in the first place.’

  ‘I only went into the refrigeration unit at the beginning to stick the cannula in her arm. What’s the scene in there?’

  ‘There’s only two of them and Jordan’s occupied with talking to the girl most of the time,’ said Skin. ‘All I’d have to do is distract Reecey and I don’t think that’ll be too much of a problem.’

  ‘How does Reecey know Pike?’

  ‘I dunno,’ said Skin. ‘But if you had muscle behind you, would you come to Pike for it? Why not do the job yourself?’

  ‘Local knowledge. Access to the cabbie. Warehouse facilities.’

  ‘And us, the security detail,’ said Skin, chuckling. ‘Tell me about the Indian billionaire.’

  ‘After the movies, he turned himself into an industrialist. You name it, he does it. Steel, construction, cars, energy. A conservative estimate of his personal wealth, according to Forbes magazine’s India Rich List, puts him at number eighteen with four and a half billion dollars.’

  ‘Fuck me. How much does number one have?’

  ‘Around thirty billion.’

  ‘He got any daughters worth kidnapping?’

  ‘In India.’

  ‘So what do you reckon is in it for us?’

  ‘If you’ve got four thousand five hundred million dollars, you shouldn’t begrudge a million for a couple of lads from Stepney, should you?’

  ‘That’s the way you see it,’ said Skin, stuffing crisps in his face, the greed making him ravenous. ‘I think we should go for a mill each. Fuck Pike.’

  ‘He’ll come after us.’

  ‘Not with anybody I’m scared of,’ said Skin. ‘He’s not tooled up. Doesn’t have that kind of business.’

  ‘What about Kevin?’

  ‘That fucking dwarf?!’

  ‘What about Jordan’s mate and the Irish bastard? You think they’ll take kindly to you offing their comrades in arms?’

  Skin shrugged, smiled.

  ‘And what about Mister Big, who’s hired Jordan and Reecey to kidnap the girl?’ said Dan. ‘He doesn’t strike me as someone who’s used up his last savings to pull off this stunt.’

  ‘You getting cold feet now, Nurse?’ said Skin, screwing his finger into Dan’s gut. ‘Gone all lily-livered on me, have you?’

  ‘All right,’ said Dan, batting Skin’s finger away. ‘Let’s get practical. Where do we keep the girl once we’ve taken her?’

  ‘Well, we don’t make it easy for Pike and co.,’ said Skin. ‘We don’t keep her at my mum’s. We’ve got to find somewhere he won’t look, which is where you come in. Pike knows me back to front. What does he know about you? Fuck all. He wouldn’t know where to start. Different background, you see. Posh.’

  ‘I’m from Swindon,’ said Dan. ‘Since when did that get posh?’

  ‘And that’s why you’re important,’ said Skin. ‘Pike’s never been further west than Wandsworth. He doesn’t know the first thing about you.’

  ‘He knows I’m a nurse.’

  ‘I’ll take care of Jordan and his mate,’ said Skin, ignoring him. ‘You’ll look after the girl. We’ve got the transport. Now all we need is a place. Are you in?’

  Dan hesitated and then picked up his beer.

  ‘Are you in?’ he said, chinking glasses.

  It took Roger Clayton more than three hours to drive from Lower Parel down to Nariman Point for his next meeting, which was in the Sea Lounge of the remodelled Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel. He was taken to a window booth, with a view towards the Gateway of India and the Ferry Terminal, where Divesh Mehta was sitting. Mehta was a Gujarati, who worked for the Research and Analysis Wing, India’s equivalent of MI6. Clayton preferred this relationship with Mehta, who had been educated and trained in the UK, because they had a valuable information exchange, meaning no friction on his credit card.

  The only problem with Mehta was that he made Clayton feel like a slob. Immaculately dressed in a bespoke suit, with a starched white shirt that, unlike Clayton’s, would never crease or come untucked, and with his Vincent’s Club
tie (he’d been a cricket blue) neatly knotted, he looked and spoke like Englishmen used to when they wore the shorts that lost the empire. He also drank tea. The words ‘skinny latte with an extra shot’ had never passed Mehta’s lips. Clayton felt his own off-the-peg jacket clinging to all the wrong places. His top button was undone, tie loosened against the atrocious humidity outside. His specs (with clip-on shades) swung over his chest on a chord, while the belt of his trousers dug into his gut. They shook hands. Clayton sat back and let the Taj’s aircon deflate him back to normal size.

  ‘Tea?’ said Mehta, in a perfect imitation of a waitress in a south London greasy spoon.

  They laughed. Clayton nodded, feeling the dinner plates of sweat under his arms cooling horribly, while a waiter put a menu into his hands.

  ‘They’ve done a good job,’ said Clayton, looking around him, flipping his specs on to read the menu. ‘I haven’t eaten here since before the 2008 attacks.’

  ‘I don’t think this bit was hit as badly as some of the other parts of the hotel,’ said Mehta. ‘Anyway, you asked to see me. Did I detect some urgency?’

  ‘It’s about our film star friend, Frank D’Cruz,’ said Clayton. ‘Did you know he’s gone to London?’

  ‘He’s not high on my list of priorities at the moment,’ said Mehta. ‘What’s the story?’

  ‘Your friends in the IB think it’s to do with something even more horrible brewing in the Indian Premier League.’

  ‘He wouldn’t run away from that,’ said Mehta. ‘That’s his meat and drink. And anybody who’s been anywhere near the hysteria generated by that game couldn’t possibly imagine that it’s being run by a council of virgins. So why has he run?’

  ‘We know why he’s run, or rather left,’ said Clayton. ‘But we don’t know who’s behind it.’

  Mehta leaned forward, picked up his cup and saucer, and Clayton knew he had his undivided attention. This wasn’t the run-of-the-mill information update they usually had.

  ‘As you know, we are particularly concerned with intelligence about our next-door neighbours and since he took over the steelworks, D’Cruz has been travelling regularly to Pakistan,’ said Mehta. ‘He’s desperate for export contracts.’

  ‘Did he travel alone?’

  ‘Alone, and with his daughter until the end of last year.’

  ‘Do you know the quality of the people they were dealing with?’

  ‘They were both seen meeting socially at the Sheraton Karachi, with a Pakistani military officer called Lieutenant General Abdel Iqbal.’

  ‘I don’t suppose he’s got anything to do with Inter-Services Intelligence agency, by any chance?’

  ‘Yes, he’s a serving member, we’ve been able to confirm that, but we’re still researching his connections which, given the thinness of our operational support, is not going as quickly as I’d like,’ said Mehta. ‘Those connections may be one of the reasons why D’Cruz’s contracts were signed so rapidly, the licences granted, the product transported, released and paid for so smoothly.’

  ‘But do you suspect that Iqbal is part of “an old boy network”, so to speak?’

  ‘He’s part of it,’ said Mehta. ‘We know he’s an old friend of Amir Jat’s, for instance.’

  ‘Who’s he?’

  ‘You’ll need a full report on him. He’s a monster of connections and affiliations from the CIA to al Qaeda. You’ll put me off my tea if you make me talk about him.’

  ‘I wouldn’t countenance it,’ said Clayton.

  ‘All we’re waiting for now,’ said Mehta, ‘is that last piece of the jigsaw that shows Iqbal’s got the terrorist links we suspect he has.’

  11

  10.45 A.M., MONDAY 12TH MARCH 2012

  Isabel Marks’ house, Kensington, London W8

  Boxer filed his situation report by email and sat back in the room upstairs where he’d put the recording equipment. He wasn’t looking forward to the call he had to make. To his mother. The ‘drunken hag’, as she was so sweetly known by Mercy.

  ‘Hi, Esme, it’s me,’ he said. She’d insisted on him using her Christian name since he was twelve.

  ‘Charlie? What do you want?’ she said, in that cracked radio voice of hers from too much smoking. She knew he didn’t call unless he wanted something.

  At least she wasn’t drinking yet. He heard the cigarette being lit up, a reflex action from her days as a producer.

  ‘Mercy and I have both got jobs on,’ he said. ‘Would it be all right for Amy to come and stay with you . . . please.’

  ‘Nobody else’ll take her?’

  ‘There’s been a problem,’ said Boxer. ‘I think she’d benefit from some time with you. You’re the only person she gets on with in our family.’

  He told her about Amy’s Tenerife jaunt. He could hear Esme chuckling to herself.

  ‘The girl’s got nerve,’ she said.

  ‘She has,’ said Boxer, ‘but it’s not how parents normally like it to be shown.’

  ‘Then you should have been around for her more, Charlie,’ said Esme, in that calculated way of hers, guaranteeing maximum irritation because it was so ruthlessly true.

  ‘Well, you know how it is, Esme, from when I was a kid,’ said Boxer; couldn’t help himself.

  ‘You turned out all right, and you made sure there wasn’t a whole lot I had to do with it,’ said Esme. ‘And I’m sure Amy’ll turn out fine, too. It might not be the way you want her to turn out, but she’ll get to where she wants to be in the end . . . no thanks to you, or Mercy.’

  ‘Can I tell her to go straight up to your place after school?’ asked Boxer, not rising to it.

  ‘Sure,’ she said, and her phone rattled back down into its cradle.

  He took a deep breath, tried to call Amy; still not answering. He sent her a text about the arrangement with Esme, went back downstairs.

  Isabel was in the kitchen, staring into a cup of cold coffee. He wanted to focus her mind on the next phone call, develop a strategy that would give her a foothold on the sheer cliff of their opponent’s psychological advantage.

  ‘You look sick,’ she said, raising her eyes from the muddy cup.

  ‘I just called my mother. That’s the effect,’ said Boxer. ‘We should talk about the next call.’

  ‘Tell me about Amy,’ said Isabel, ignoring him.

  Boxer looked at his watch; Mercy was due any moment. They’d have the strategy session later.

  ‘Why is she so unhappy?’ asked Isabel.

  ‘The reason most kids get unhappy – absent parents,’ said Boxer, still wincing after his mother’s rapier thrusts. ‘Mercy and I have tricky jobs, which means we can’t always be around. When I was working at my old company, I was out of the country for a minimum of two hundred days a year. That’s why I resigned, but . . . I think it might have been too late.’

  ‘And when did you notice things going wrong with her?’

  ‘She was always a restless kid. Always reaching beyond herself, wanting to be older,’ said Boxer. ‘We went on holiday to Spain when she was fifteen and she developed a twenty-two-year-old boyfriend. I thought we’d never get her away from there. We’re pretty sure she’s been having sex since then. Maybe it was because we weren’t able to give her a proper family life, but she wasn’t that crazy about being a child. Always wanted to be more adult. Mercy wanted the opposite, tried to hold her back all the time. It was the start of real tension between them.’

  ‘Was she a sociable kid?’

  ‘Sure. Always been a popular girl. Always had friends and lots of people who wanted to be her friend but . . . she’s never retained them.’

  ‘You haven’t said anything that scares me yet. So what is it?’

  ‘Apart from the usual stuff, like pathological lying and instant aggression, which is mainly directed towards Mercy, I think, for me, it’s her detachment,’ said Boxer.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I saw her once with a group of kids who were talking animatedly about the latest band, whi
ch in this case was The Killers. There was a concert coming up and they were all wild about it. But I could tell Amy wasn’t interested. Later, I asked her why and she said of the band: “They’re floaters”.’

  ‘Floaters?’

  ‘A complicated word in Amy-speak. It means dead in the water, but also floating on the surface. It’s music that doesn’t get inside.’

  ‘But that’s good, Charlie. That’s insightful.’

  ‘It is, but it’s disturbing too, because I see her loneliness. She’s an odd mixture of boundless curiosity, suppressed by endless tedium. She’s like the excited kid in the front row of a party with a magician, but her enthusiasm wanes as she sees how every trick is done. And there’s nothing more disappointing than seeing how banal magic is.’

  ‘What’s your deepest worry? I mean . . . she doesn’t sound suicidal?’

  ‘No, I don’t think she’s that,’ said Boxer. ‘I’m more worried that she’s like me.’

  ‘And what’s that?’

  The doorbell rang.

  ‘That’ll be Mercy,’ said Boxer, relieved. ‘I’m going to have a quick talk with her outside before I introduce you.’

  ‘About us?’

  ‘That would not be advisable.’

  Boxer went to the front door, put on a coat, took a key.

  Mercy was wearing a sober, dark suit and a roll-neck sweater under a black wool coat, leather gloves over her long, slim hands. No jewellery. She kept her hair cut close to her head, which accentuated her sculpted face – high cheekbones, long jawline, a fine nose that hinted at some sub-Saharan ancestry. Her eyes were narrowed against the cold and her mouth pursed – shrewd and professional. She was not alone. Standing five metres away was a young man, in his early thirties. Cropped thick black hair with that Mediterranean whorl that could polish floors, dark heavy eyebrows, deep-set brown eyes, long nose, over-pronounced mouth and, despite a morning shave, a shadow already visible. Under his black raincoat he wore a dark suit and tie, with lace-up shoes. Boxer was surprised he didn’t have a blue light revolving on his head, seeing as his whole demeanour screamed ‘cop’.