08 - Murmuring the Judges

by Quintin Jardine

  To master it, he took a deep breath, before looking at the glass panel once more, and before pressing the entry button.

  Two men stepped into the shop. The first, his powerful build apparent even in his loosely cut, colourful Versace jacket, was a big man, but smaller than his companion. He stood at least six feet three and seemed to fill the room with his black-clad presence. Both newcomers had broad, brutal faces, and both seemed to exude menace. Ignoring the other customer, who sat with his back to them at his table, they moved towards their waiting host.

  ‘Good to see you again, Mr Malenko.’ Rarity greeted the Russian like a cousin, back from a long journey.

  ‘Good to see my dollars again,’ the man growled in return, in a harsh, hoarse voice.

  ‘Not at all,’ said the manager, inanely.

  ‘Whatever. Let’s do business.’ Malenko beckoned to his companion who stepped forward and laid a big, soft nylon bag on the counter. ‘There’s four million dollars. You want your lady come count it, as usual?’

  Rarity nodded, vigorously. ‘I’ll just go and get her.’

  He turned and stepped through the door behind him.

  As soon as he had left, the two men began to converse. They spoke in low voices, in Russian, but from their attitude anyone listening would have known that they were doing no more than passing the time.

  They snapped back to attention, though, when the door behind the counter opened once more. A burly, moustached figure stepped into the room with another tall man behind him, and stepped around the counter.

  ‘Mr Malenko, I am Detective Superintendent Dan Pringle, Central Division CID, and this is Detective Sergeant Steele. We have a warrant for your arrest in relation to alleged offences in Germany. I must ask you and your associate to . . .’

  The Russian moved with remarkable speed for such a big man. He kicked Pringle hard on the shin, then butted him as he reacted to the pain. ‘I don’t think so,’ he snarled, as the Superintendent slumped to the floor.

  The gun appeared in the giant’s hand as if from nowhere, pointing at the centre of the detective sergeant’s chest. Somehow, the silencer made the ugly weapon look even more menacing. The minder looked at Malenko, who said something in Russian, and nodded.

  The only Russian word which Bob Skinner knew was ‘Niet’. Instinctively he barked it out, as he rose from his table, abandoning the amethyst jewellery, and hurled himself at the two gangsters.

  The pistol swung away from the ashen-faced Steele and round towards him, but the detective was quicker than the bulky gunman. He seized his right wrist in his left hand and swung it up, towards the ceiling, at the same time slamming all his weight into him and bearing him backwards towards the wall. Thrown off balance the Russian was unable to gather his strength, or do anything to ward off Skinner’s attack.

  He was wide open as the heel of the DCC’s right hand flashed upwards, to hit the tip of his nose, breaking it, and driving bone and gristle upwards. He screamed as strong fingers gouged his eyes, blinding him. He sobbed as a knee smashed into his crotch, crushing his testicles and sending waves of pain, indescribable in any language, shooting through his body.

  Skinner was aware of the sound of scuffling behind him as he tore the pistol from the collapsing mountain’s loosened grip, but all his attention was on the gunman. His face was contorted in a snarl as he whipped the barrel and silencer of the gun across his face: three blows, backhand, forehand, backhand once more.

  ‘You were going to shoot him, were you, you bastard,’ he hissed. The man was on the floor, crumpled against the wall, as the detective laid the weapon against the side of his head and pulled the trigger. He squealed in terror at the suppressed noise of the shot in his ear, and at the crushing sound of the bullet burying itself in the panelled wall behind him.

  Slipping the pistol butt-first into his pocket, Skinner pulled him up with his left hand and punched him, once, very hard, with his right fist, in the middle of the forehead. The Russian’s eyes glazed as he sagged, unconscious.

  In the moment that the DCC stood and turned, Malenko, with his back to him, managed to break free of the young Sergeant Steele’s judo hold, and hit him with a head-butt, in the same way that he had incapacitated Pringle. He had barely straightened up before the cold metal of the silencer ground into the back of his head, just above the hairline.

  ‘I hope your English is really good, friend, and you understand what I’m going to tell you,’ said Skinner. ‘If you make one move, I’m going to blow your fucking brains all over that wall.’ The Russian froze.

  ‘Search him, Dan,’ the DCC ordered Pringle, as the Superintendent clambered off the floor, his face covered in blood.

  He nodded. ‘In a minute, sir.’ With great deliberation, he hit Malenko as hard as he could, a tremendous blow to the pit of the stomach. The air hissed out of the gangster’s lungs in a loud groan, as he doubled over.

  ‘I never saw that, Dan,’ said Skinner.

  ‘Naw,’ Pringle retorted. ‘And I never saw what you did to that other fucker either!’

  He took a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and secured Malenko’s arms behind his back, then frisked him, roughly, while Skinner helped the young sergeant to his feet. ‘You okay, Stevie?’

  ‘I’ll live, sir.’ As he spoke, the image of the gun pointing at his heart rushed back into his mind, and he went chalk-white once more, save for the livid red mark on his cheekbone where the Russian’s forehead had connected.

  ‘Yes, son, you will. With a commendation on your record, at that. If you hadn’t restrained him, I’d have had trouble handling Malenko as well as that monster there.’

  Steele looked at the heap on the floor. ‘Ex-monster, I’d say, Boss.’ The giant was still out cold.

  ‘Malenko’s unarmed, sir,’ Pringle called out.

  ‘Thank Christ for that. As soon as I get back to Fettes, I’ll be on to Her Majesty’s Customs. Some bugger’s going to have to explain to me how a Russian can bring a firearm through any port in this country. If I had thought for one minute that they’d have been armed . . .’

  Pringle shook his head. ‘It never occurred to me either, sir.’

  He turned to Malenko. ‘Where did you arrive in Britain?’ he asked. The Russian shook his head and spat on the floor at the Superintendent’s feet. The burly man, still bleeding from a cut above his right eye, balled his fists, but Skinner spun the prisoner around and unbuttoned his jacket. He reached into a pocket and found a passport.

  He flicked his way through the pages, until he found what he was looking for. ‘Paris,’ he muttered to Pringle. ‘This was stamped in Paris yesterday. Let me take a guess, Ivan. You flew to Charles de Gaulle, then caught the Eurostar to London.’

  The gangster glowered at him.

  ‘What did you do with the gun?’ he asked. ‘Wrapped in tin-foil was it, to beat the X-ray machine, and hidden in a container in your man’s suitcase?’ He shrugged his shoulders, and smiled. ‘Yes, I guess that was probably how you did it. It’s academic now. The fact is, you probably did us a favour. If he hadn’t been carrying, and you two had come along quietly, I’d have had nothing on him. I’d have had to let him go.

  ‘That’s not a problem now. He’ll go before a Scottish judge, charged with attempted murder. Christ, he’ll probably get longer than you.’

  He turned to Sergeant Steele. ‘Stevie, get on the radio and tell the uniformed team to come and pick these people up.’ As he spoke, there was a moan from the man on the floor. Skinner looked down to see him beginning to stir, beginning to push himself to his feet.

  Quite casually, the detective kicked him on the side of the head. ‘Just stay quiet now,’ he said, conversationally. The minder’s eyes rolled as he slumped against the wall once more.

  36

  ‘You never told me you were going to pick up Malenko,’ said Andy Martin.

  Skinner smiled across the table in the senior officers’ dining room. ‘I had an hour free, so I thought I’d go along and le
nd a hand.’

  ‘You might have told Pringle, though. He said to me that he had trouble keeping his face straight when he came out of the back shop to arrest the Russians and saw you sitting there, looking for all the world like a punter in for a present for the wife.’

  ‘I was. Sarah’s got a birthday coming up soon.’

  The Head of CID frowned. ‘From what Pringle told me, it was just as well you were there. Who’d have thought that a Russian would have been armed in this country?’

  ‘We should have thought of that, mate,’ Skinner growled quietly. ‘You and I should have, as line commanders. We put two officers’ lives in danger. Firearms Act or not, the world’s changing, Andy; every bugger seems to be going armed these days. We won’t make a policy announcement, but from now on, whenever we go on an operation like this morning, we’re going to have armed men on the team.’

  He paused as a waitress stepped up behind him to clear his soup bowl. ‘As I promised Pringle,’ he continued after she had gone, ‘I’ve been on to the Customs people, at the top level. There are cages being rattled in London, and in France even as we speak. It’s fucking ridiculous that two Russian hoodlums got through our security with four million dollars and a firearm.’

  He grinned, unexpectedly. ‘That’s one advantage of Jimmy’s office. Even as a DCC you only get a certain level of attention from these characters in London, but when you’re announced as acting Chief Constable Skinner, and you come on the line breathing fire, that’s a different matter altogether.’

  ‘Excuse me, gentlemen. Two ham salads, was it?’

  ‘Yes thanks, Maisie,’ said Skinner. The rosy-cheeked bustling woman set large, well-filled plates before them and withdrew with a smile.

  ‘How did Dan get on at his press conference?’ he continued.

  ‘Fine,’ Martin replied. ‘I didn’t stay all the way through, but he and Royston were well in control when I left. The hacks lapped up the Russian story all right, especially when Dan threw in the bit about the gun.’

  ‘He didn’t mention me, did he?’

  ‘No. He said that Malenko’s bodyguard . . . He’s called Fydor Ostrakov, incidentally . . . had been disarmed by police officers, that one shot had been fired, but that no one had been injured.’

  Skinner almost choked on a piece of ham. ‘What? Pringle sat there with stitches in his eyebrow and said that no one had been hurt?’

  ‘That’s right,’ the Head of CID confirmed, laughing. ‘The woman from Scot FM asked him about it, of course. Big Dan just puts a hand up to his embroidery, touches it and says, “That? Oh that’s nothing at all, my dear.” There’ll be “Hero Cop Tackles Russian Hit Man” headlines all over tomorrow’s papers.’

  ‘Good. People need to be reminded that our job can be dangerous as well as difficult. Plus, in the middle of the most concentrated crime wave that we’ve ever experienced, we needed a good arrest. It gives me something to throw at Councillor Bloody Topham this afternoon too.’

  ‘You don’t like that woman, do you?’

  ‘Don’t trust, Andy. I don’t trust her. She’s got no backbone, and she doesn’t have an opinion to call her own either. Jimmy gets on fine with her, because he can manipulate her. I haven’t the patience for that crap.’

  Martin finished his salad and leaned back from the table. ‘Coffee?’

  ‘No, I’ll have some with the Lady Chair.’ Skinner glanced up at the clock on the wall. ‘I’d better get across, in fact, she’s due in five minutes.’ He stood up. ‘Listen, can you get hold of Mackie and McGuire? I want a briefing on the judges at close of play today. It doesn’t need to be here. I’ll go wherever is easiest for them, but I want a progress report.’

  The Head of CID nodded. ‘I’ll tell Gerry where and when.’

  Skinner turned and left the dining room. To his instant annoyance, he found Councillor Marcia Topham pacing the corridor outside. ‘Ah, there you are,’ said the Chair of the Police Board. ‘I’ve been waiting for ten minutes, and no sign of either you or that secretary chap. I thought you’d forgotten about me.’

  ‘How could I, Councillor?’ he replied with a forced smile. ‘But you are a bit early.’ As he spoke, Gerry Crossley appeared at the end of the corridor, returning from lunch. Skinner showed the woman into the Chief’s office through the side entrance, signalling behind her back for coffee to be brought in.

  Inside, he directed her to one of the comfortable armchairs and sat down facing her. ‘I’ll come straight to the point, Mr Skinner,’ she burst out. ‘I’m not happy.’

  Instantly the DCC felt his temper beginning to strain at the leash, but he kept his smile in place. ‘I’m sorry to hear that, Councillor,’ he replied. ‘A domestic problem?’

  ‘No, it is not,’ she snapped. ‘I’m having to put up with a lot of comments from constituents, friends, and just ordinary people in the street, about these terrible robberies. When are we going to see an arrest, Mr Skinner? It’s just not good enough.’

  ‘I quite agree with you. It’s not good enough that you should be subjected to such harassment. I’d be quite happy if you were to refer every one of these people to my office. I’ll be happy to listen to their worries.’

  He paused. ‘But let me ask you? What do you say to these concerned constituents?’

  ‘I agree with them, of course. Armed men holding up banks and the police apparently doing nothing about it. It’s not right.’

  Skinner held up his right hand, bunched into a fist. ‘D’you see that, Councillor?’

  She peered at it. ‘It looks swollen to me.’

  ‘Quite right. I injured it this morning, tackling a very large man holding a silenced pistol. If I hadn’t been there, or even if I’d been a second or two slower, a young officer would be dead right now.’

  As he spoke, his tone became harder. ‘I saw you at a funeral yesterday; that of a young police officer. Annie Brown gave her life in the service of the public, lady. Stevie Steele almost did today.

  ‘In the office which you hold, people like them are entitled to expect unswerving public support from you. In the office which I hold, I bloody well demand it. Unless you’re prepared to relinquish the Chair to someone worthier, I suggest that you try to learn a bit about the realities and the difficulties of police work.

  ‘For example, not all criminals wear flat caps, have low foreheads, and carry sacks labelled “swag” over their shoulders. Some . . . the successful ones . . . are highly intelligent people who go about their work in a highly professional way. These robberies have been planned better than any I’ve ever encountered, and have been implemented with matching efficiency. It is not easy to catch people like that . . . yet if you look at the record of this force, you’ll find that almost invariably, we do.

  ‘The Chair of the Police Board should know all that. I suggest that you go away and read up the facts and figures, so that you can do your job properly by supporting my officers, not attacking them.’

  He stood up, abruptly, his anger written all over his face. ‘Now, as you will appreciate, with the number of live investigations which we have running, I’m busy, so this meeting is at an end.’

  Councillor Topham looked up at him, red-faced. ‘But Sir James always gives me half an hour,’ she protested.

  ‘In that case,’ said Skinner, ‘maybe you should postpone your next visit until Jimmy gets back from holiday. I think that we both have higher priorities than vacuous chat, don’t you?’

  She rose, at last, with ill grace. As the side door closed on her, Gerry Crossley appeared at the other end of the room, carrying a tray. The Acting Chief grinned at him. ‘Sorry, but the lady’s just gone. Have the other cup yourself and brief me on these hearings.’

  The secretary nodded and left the room to fetch his papers. When he returned, he sat in the armchair which Councillor Topham had just vacated.

  ‘Let me see, sir,’ he began, leafing through the folder. ‘In both these cases, the officers concerned have declined formal hearings into
the complaints. They’ve opted to come straight to the Chief Constable for disposal.

  ‘PC Green . . . he’s the first before you . . . has taken the position that since the circumstances which led to the Divisional Commander’s complaint against him were domestic rather than professional, and since no criminal charges have been laid, there’s no case to answer.’

  Skinner nodded. ‘I can follow that line of reasoning. Will he be represented this afternoon?’

  ‘Yes. He’s exercised his right to have his local Police Federation rep. sit in on the meeting.’

  ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘Sergeant Ewan Cameron, from Bathgate.’

  ‘I know who you mean. He was a DC on my Drugs Squad years ago. What’s he like as a Fed. guy?’

  Crossley thought for a moment. ‘Conscientious but cautious, I’d say, sir. He does his job properly: by that I mean he stands up for the people he represents, but that he always manages not to upset Sir James.’

  Skinner laughed. ‘That sounds like Ewan all right. It sums up the reason why I recommended him for promotion to uniformed sergeant. Sometimes in CID work you have to put your arse on the line. Cameron was conscientious all right, but he’d never do that.’

  He took a sip of his coffee and picked up a low-fat chocolate digestive. ‘What about Sergeant Neville?’

  ‘She simply denies the allegation. There’s a statement from PC Keenan, the boy she’s alleged to have assaulted, describing the incident. Then there’s a note from the Divisional Commander, which says that he can’t judge the facts, but that she’s a bloody good officer, and that the probationer has not impressed him in his attitude to the job. Finally, there’s her own statement which says simply that she bumped into Keenan in the cupboard. She says that they just happened to be in there at the same time.’

  ‘Will she have a Fed. rep. with her?’

  Gerry Crossley frowned, momentarily. ‘No. Sergeant Geary, from Dalkeith, is her area rep., but when I spoke to her to arrange this hearing, she refused point-blank to have him present. She said she was going to come alone.’ The secretary paused, and coughed. ‘I told her that in the circumstances, sir, I thought that would be completely inappropriate, so I insisted that she bring another personal representative.’