Bryant & May - The Burning Man

by Christopher Fowler

  ‘I’d bet my string vest on it.’

  ‘How did he do it? Tell the directors, I mean? Because everyone says they didn’t meet or speak to each other.’

  ‘I don’t have the details yet, but I know someone who might be able to provide us with an answer.’

  ‘If your contact knows something we don’t, I imagine the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau will already have got to him.’

  ‘Not this gentleman,’ said Bryant as their taxi drew up. ‘He’s mentally unstable and living in a secure care home. I think you and I should go and visit him.’

  25

  FIREPOWER

  The Manderfield Healthcare Centre was an anonymous new-build on East Finchley High Road, but one detail differentiated it from other apartment blocks in the area: if you looked carefully, you could see slender steel bars behind each of the windows.

  ‘He’s quite harmless,’ Bryant said as they waited to be buzzed in at the discreet side entrance. ‘He trained as a psychologist but then switched careers, and ended up managing one of the local banks that went down in the Barings collapse. He didn’t handle it very well.’

  ‘Why?’ asked May, shaking the rain out of his coat. ‘What did he do?’

  ‘He burned his branch down. Knotted invoices all over the counters like kindling, doused them in petrol he’d siphoned from his car and set the whole lot on fire. It turned out he had a history of arson. It rather put paid to his hopes of promotion.’

  The home had made great efforts to disguise its true identity, but the lingering odour of municipal cabbage gave it away. A nurse led them to the day room in a manner that suggested she might be showing them where they were to live from now on.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got a lighter on you?’ asked Henry Steppe, reaching out a hand in greeting but unable to conceal the excited grasp of his curled fingers. Skeletal and stooped, with the overhanging posture of a man too aware of his own awkward height, he looked to be in his early fifties but illness had aged him. His tartan dressing gown had singed patches around the sleeves, and there was an absurdly large bandage over the top of his head, like a child’s drawing of a hospital patient. He was lured to an armchair by the wary nurse, who then stood at a discreet distance until she could be sure that no one was going to attack anyone else.

  ‘I’m afraid not, Henry,’ replied Bryant.

  ‘But you’re a pipe-smoker. Not even a throwaway?’

  ‘You know I can’t do that. You’re looking … What happened to you?’

  ‘Nothing, why?’ Steppe seemed puzzled by the question.

  ‘Oh, it’s just …’ Bryant pointed tentatively to Steppe’s head.

  ‘Oh, this. I don’t like Morecambe and Wise.’

  ‘Er, not quite with you there, old sausage.’

  ‘I had a bit of a fight with the common-room television.’

  ‘He put his head inside it while it was on,’ piped up the nurse very loudly, as if speaking to an incredibly stupid child. ‘We’re getting a nice new flat-screen now, aren’t we? I’ll leave you to talk to your chums, Henry, is that all right?’

  ‘I don’t like Morecambe and Wise!’ he told the nurse.

  ‘Try to keep him nice and calm,’ said the nurse, reproachfully pursing her lips at Steppe before scuttling off.

  ‘Thank suffering Christ she’s gone,’ said Steppe, glancing back to make sure the coast was clear. ‘You have to let them think you’re a moron, otherwise they never leave you alone. I was trying to take the inverter board out of the TV and electrocuted myself. I have to carry out my own laptop repairs, so I nick bits from wherever I can. I assume this is concerning Findersbury?’

  ‘How did you know that?’ asked May.

  ‘I picked up some intel from your building. You really need to have a word with Raymond Land about his passwords. He used to use Leanne for everything, but lately he’s switched to Crippen. It’s a bit sad when you can only come up with the name of a cat that’s not even yours.’

  ‘He’s getting divorced,’ said Bryant. ‘We had a rather unpleasant chat with Dexter Cornell this afternoon. Do you think he’s guilty of insider trading?’

  Steppe pulled his armchair closer. ‘The CoL’s Fraud Squad won’t release interdepartmental information without Home Office sign-offs, and the encryption’s too tough for me to crack from here, but I’d swear Cornell tipped off his fellow directors. He knew about the collapse of the Chinese deal because apart from the lawyers, who are effectively operating sub judice, he was the sole negotiator of the contract.’ Steppe shifted to the edge of his seat, lowering his voice further. ‘As far as I can tell, the bad news somehow transmitted itself to three other company directors in a six-hour time period when they were all in the same building. The story is that the three were in a board meeting on the top floor from ten until four without a break. Nobody left the room, the phones were switched off and nobody came in.’

  ‘What, they didn’t even go to the bathroom?’ asked May.

  ‘There’s a loo and a small kitchen directly adjoining the meeting room.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Interior renovation plans lodged with the City of London Department of Works,’ answered Steppe, as if it was obvious. ‘They’re all available online: hopeless security. I fear for this country. There’s not an MP who gives a damn about technology. Anyway, a cold lunch had already been laid out before they arrived. While this was happening, Cornell was downstairs in a roomful of managers. The NFIB will be looking for surveillance footage of the missing hours, but you can bet that AntiCap will be searching for the same footage.’

  ‘Anticap?’ asked May.

  ‘They started as a tech-based splinter cell from Anonymous UK; basically a bunch of hacktivists trying to expose illegal banking practices by breaking open encrypted emails. They’ve had some small successes in the past, but the Cornell case could be their big one. Hang on.’ They all sat back and drank tea while two nurses walked past. Steppe beckoned them forward again. ‘I have some documentation in my room but the print’s too small for me to read. I don’t suppose you could get me a magnifying glass?’

  ‘Nice try, Henry,’ said Bryant. ‘I assume the meeting room was swept for bugs.’

  ‘According to AntiCap’s website, the bureau took the entire place apart and found nothing. The whole building came up clean. But the question of Cornell’s guilt doesn’t impact on your investigation, surely?’

  ‘We don’t know,’ admitted May. ‘We’re at a loss to find motives. How much do you know about the investigation?’

  ‘A lot more than the journalists at Hard News,’ said Steppe. ‘They got their information from me. Don’t worry, I made sure it was misleading.’

  ‘The fact that all three of our victims are associated with the bank makes it too much of a coincidence that they should die within days of each other,’ said Bryant, ‘but we only have circumstantial links. I keep thinking Cornell might be able to supply a solid connection between them.’

  ‘It’s a logical assumption,’ Steppe agreed. ‘I find it intriguing that the deaths all have an element of fire in them.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Bryant, ‘I thought you’d like that.’

  ‘He’s sending a message – nothing very subtle, just that he wants to burn it all down.’

  ‘Burn what down?’ asked May.

  ‘All of it! The system. The City. Everything that’s failed.’

  ‘Wouldn’t someone with this much rage stand out from the crowd?’ May wondered. ‘Could he function normally? Wouldn’t he be easy to spot? Or would he be able to hide his feelings and carry on going to work without anyone becoming suspicious?’

  ‘I don’t see how he could be lucid and able to operate within the community. It shouldn’t take an expert to recognize the signs.’ Steppe leaned forward and rubbed his hands, smiling unctuously. ‘If you could just see your way to springing me out of here—’

  ‘—you’d burn down the first bank you set eyes on,’ said Brya
nt. ‘I’d rather have you working on the inside, thanks.’

  ‘Well, if you have any further questions, I’m happy to lend a hand.’

  ‘Actually, I do have one.’ Bryant reknotted his scarf. ‘Why is he obsessed with fire?’

  ‘Simple, Mr Bryant,’ said Steppe, rising to see them out. ‘Barring the usual eschatological arguments for playing with matches, he likes it for the same reason we all like it. Fire destroys and cleanses. But it also renews. There’s only one thing more powerful than a good fire, and that’s the man who starts it.’

  ‘Are we all finished now?’ warbled the nurse, appearing from her alcove. ‘The dinner bell has sounded. Do you want to say goodbye to your lovely friends?’

  ‘Bye-bye, lovely friends,’ said Steppe, sounding simpleminded.

  ‘Why does Steppe let them think that he’s crazy?’ asked May as they walked away.

  ‘He likes it there,’ Bryant replied. ‘It’s a stress-free environment, and the State pays for his room and meals. And it’s better that he’s locked away.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because he still wants to burn everything down.’

  ‘Come on,’ said May, taking his arm. ‘I’ll drop you home.’

  ‘You’re not going to come and tuck me in; I’m not tired yet,’ said Bryant petulantly. ‘You know I do my best thinking at night.’

  ‘Maybe so, but I’ve got a dinner date with Blaize Carter,’ said May. ‘I’m thinking that perhaps it’s time to start a little fire of my own.’

  They met in La Veneziana, a catastrophic Italian restaurant in King’s Cross whose walls were covered with reproductions of Renaissance art that looked as if they had been painted by an angry clown, but it stayed open long after everywhere else had shut and the spaghetti portions were gargantuan, so police officers ate there to stock up on carbohydrates.

  ‘Tell me about fire,’ said May, pouring out the remains of the Chianti. ‘What happens if you get caught in one?’

  ‘Well, I’m sure you know the basics,’ said Senior Fire Officer Blaize Carter. ‘It’s usually the toxic gases that prove lethal. Carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, hydrogen cyanide. Hot smoke and flames singe your hair and burn your airways, so you can’t breathe. Burning inflicts intense pain because it stimulates the nociceptors, the pain nerves in the skin. And you get a rapid inflammatory response, which boosts sensitivity to pain in the injured tissues and surrounding areas. Something like forty per cent of all victims of fatal home fires are knocked out by fumes before they can even wake up.’ She took a sip from her glass. ‘So, don’t get burned.’

  She had changed out of her regulation navy sweater and untied her hair, and although looking like a civilian still didn’t make her think like one there was something different in her voice now, a warmer, more playful tone.

  ‘What drew you to it as a career?’ May asked.

  She shook her head. ‘I didn’t intend to join the fire service. I hated the idea of working in an office, and was always fairly outdoorsy and athletic. Then when I started training and learned more about the field, it sort of took hold. It’s not all going to fires. I visit schools and community centres, talk to people in their own homes. The poorer the neighbourhood, the greater the risk, even now. You should see some of the sweatshops we go to in the East End. How about you?’

  ‘I suppose I could never have been anything else,’ said May. ‘I met Arthur on my very first day on the job. He instructed me to decode a message made out of butterflies.’

  ‘What did it say?

  ‘“We’re out of tea.” He said, “You look fairly sturdy. We could do with someone like you.” And that was it. We’ve remained teamed up ever since.’

  ‘So I heard. Your exploits are fairly legendary among your fans.’

  ‘Really? I was beginning to doubt we had any.’

  ‘You worry about him, don’t you?’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘I could see you keeping a watchful eye out.’ She gave a rueful smile. ‘The PCU’s a pretty tight unit from what I hear. We’re the same. I was called out at two thirty the other morning to get an obese driver out of his car. He’d stalled it just off City Road and had become wedged behind the wheel, so he rang us. He was drunk, of course, and not for the first time by the sound of it, so we cut him free just to teach him a lesson. Virtually sawed the vehicle in half. He wasn’t very happy about it. People never understand when you tell them you enjoy being on the streets.’

  ‘That’s why we never take promotion,’ said May. ‘We have seniority but stay hands-on. There aren’t many jobs where you can do that.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad I’m finally working with you,’ said Blaize, raising her glass. ‘That spaghetti vongole was like eating elastic bands covered in grit.’

  ‘I know, it’s amazing, isn’t it?’ May laughed.

  ‘We have a balti house near the station where everything tastes of disinfectant. The lads love it.’ She sighed. ‘Just once I’d like to go to one of those restaurants you see in the magazines. Somewhere that isn’t popular just because it’s open after midnight.’

  ‘I’ll take you to one,’ May promised. ‘When we close the case.’

  Blaize smiled. ‘You have confidence.’

  ‘Trust me, that’s all I have,’ he said.

  26

  INSIDER

  Bryant was exhausted. His arms and legs started aching an hour before dawn on Thursday morning, the dull grinding pain travelling from deep inside his joints and radiating out to his skin, remaining until he was finally able to dispel his sense of ill-being with a mug of teak-coloured tea and a marmalade-smeared scone.

  ‘You look terrible,’ said Alma Sorrowbridge, a woman he still referred to as his landlady even though she no longer owned the property he rented. After hard times had befallen them both, they had ended up sharing a council flat in Bloomsbury, where she allowed Bryant to continue treating her as a combined housemaid, laundress, cook, cleaner and paid companion because she believed that the Lord was working through her to save his soul, although as the years passed she had come to the realization that there was little chance of Bryant’s soul or indeed any other part of him being saved unless it was in a jar of formaldehyde at the Hunterian Museum, where his remains would serve as a grim warning to others.

  ‘Most kind of you to say so,’ said Bryant, sitting back down on the end of his bed. ‘I’m thrilled to have my bathroom mirror’s evidence corroborated. And there was me thinking the reflection was faulty.’

  ‘You’re not sleeping again, are you?’ Alma tidied away his breakfast tray.

  ‘No, I’m not, as it happens. My brain seems to have a mind of its own. Where’s my tweed overcoat?’

  ‘At the dry cleaner’s. It was in a disgusting state. What was it doing in the freezer?’

  ‘It’s an old forensic trick. Putting your clothes in a sub-zero environment kills all the germs.’

  ‘Wouldn’t it be easier to wash them?’

  ‘I was saving you the work. What am I supposed to wear today?’

  ‘It’s going to be mild out, so you shouldn’t need such a thick coat. It would do you good to get some air to your skin.’

  ‘That’s London air.’ Bryant pointed out of the window. ‘Have you seen what it does to statues? I’m not exposing myself to that. I’ll wear my grandfather’s First World War greatcoat today, thank you.’

  ‘People think you’re strange, you know that?’ said Alma, pausing in the doorway of his bedroom.

  ‘I don’t care what people think, and haven’t done so since the old king died.’

  ‘I mean the other people in this building.’

  Bryant grimaced. ‘I hope you’re not referring to the man next door, the one in the sleeveless top who walks like he’s carrying the back end of a piano.’

  ‘I went in to meet his wife,’ Alma said. ‘She’s very nice.’

  ‘I saw around their front door the other day,’ sniffed Bryant. ‘A flat-screen telly the size o
f Rembrandt’s Night Watch and not a single book in sight. What on earth do they find to talk about?’

  ‘They’re mystified by your comings and goings.’

  ‘I’m not entirely happy with their balcony full of washing, bicycles and pizza boxes. I don’t suppose they like having a copper next door. I guess he’s having to unload his stolen phones somewhere else.’

  ‘He’s an honest man, Mr Bryant. He drives a boring machine.’

  ‘Well, he should change his job.’

  ‘No, boring underground tunnels. He works for Crossrail. He’s got kids.’ Alma gave a little nod of approval to that.

  ‘Yes, I know. I’ve never seen such ugly children. One of them looks like a lizard eating a potato.’

  ‘Did it ever occur to you that you might find the good in others if you got to know them properly? You’re a misanthropist.’

  Bryant was outraged. ‘I am not, I just don’t like people! They’re messy and inconsistent and incompetent and never say what they mean, and when you’ve finally figured out what makes them tick they die on you.’

  ‘Well, I don’t understand it,’ said Alma. ‘You side with those protestors but you can’t possibly know how they feel.’

  ‘I understand perfectly how they feel.’ Bryant’s face took on a higher colour. ‘They feel cheated. In my lifetime this country has been transformed from a benign dictatorship to a third-rate democracy, and I ask you, which is less empowering? To be tricked into thinking that you have freedom is worse than being told what to do. When I was young, dissenters were treated with more respect. Now they’re even ostracized by their own peer groups. We’re raising the retirement age to seventy but at work you’re a has-been at forty – what are these people supposed to do? That’s why the bank protest groups don’t solely consist of kids without careers; there are just as many adults among them who’ve found themselves thrown on the scrapheap of industry.’

  Bryant shivered at the thought. He unwrapped his scarf from the teapot and tied it in a double knot around his scrawny neck. In his grandfather’s greatcoat he looked like an old soldier who had been hit by a shrinking ray.