by Jeff Gulvin
Sarah gripped the phone and gesticulated across the desk to Berry. ‘I’ll put you through,’ she said. ‘Just hold on.’ Berry lifted a thumb and she nodded to him. Putting the call on hold, she swivelled in her seat and looked through the glass at Vanner. The phone rang on his desk and he pressed the reply button.
‘Vanner.’ He looked at Sarah through the glass. She stood up and came to the door with the others.
‘Vanner,’ he repeated.
‘You have me on a squack box.’ The voice sounded distant and crackly.
‘Yes.’
Others listening then?’
‘Who are you?’
‘You know.’
‘No I don’t.’ Vanner leaned forward and picked up the receiver, the voice intimate suddenly in his ear.
‘That’s better—just you and me now.’
‘Yes.’ Vanner sat back again. ‘What do you want?’
‘To gloat.’
‘What about?’
‘You know.’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Ha bloody ha.’
Vanner frowned. He knew this voice. He had heard this voice before.
‘You won’t catch me. You won’t ever catch me. I’m the people. What they want. They won’t let you catch me.’
The phone clicked dead and slowly Vanner replaced the receiver. He looked up into the faces of his colleagues. Nicholls rewound the tape and they all listened to it again. Then he rewound it a second time and they listened once more. McCague appeared in the doorway and they listened all over again.
‘Our man?’ It was Berry who broke the silence.
Vanner looked over fisted knuckles at him. ‘No.’
McCague lifted an eyebrow. ‘You’re very sure.’
Vanner glanced at him. ‘I know the voice.’
‘Who is it?’
‘I mean I’ve heard it.’ He lifted his hands. ‘I recognise it.’
‘You might be wrong.’
Vanner shook his head. ‘I’m not.’
DC Bell clattered down the stairs and into the Incident Room. ‘We’ve traced it.’
‘Where?’ McCague demanded.
Bell’s face wilted a little. ‘Telephone box in Walthamstow.’
‘Terrific’ Nicholls sat down in the seat across from Vanner.
‘Send a unit anyway, Stephen,’ McCague said. ‘Get them to take a look. We might at least get some prints.’
Vanner looked up at him. ‘From a public payphone? You’ll be lucky.’
McCague nodded to Bell. ‘Well, with the plethora of leads that we’ve got, maybe luck’s what we need.’
When the others had gone McCague closed the door and leaned on it. He looked thoughtfully at Vanner. ‘You seem very sure.’
‘I am.’
‘You could be wrong though?’
‘No.’
A belted silence between them. McCague said: ‘That doesn’t make it not our man in itself though.’
Vanner raised his eyebrows. ‘Not in itself. But I think it’s very unlikely.’
‘So what are you telling me?’
Vanner shrugged. ‘Nothing. Just that I recognise the voice.’
Jo Hawkins threw small pieces of gristle to Fatboy, his Alsatian Cross. He delighted in the attentive eye and measured snap of the jaws. Beyond the dog the TV flickered, volume low; daytime chat show, a mass of confused colour against the drab, fractured wall of the flat. The dog rose as no more food was forthcoming and began to sniff at the dirty plate which had housed last night’s Chinese takeaway. Hawkins chewed gum and smoothed a palm up and down his naked, tattooed forearm. The television disgusted him, all those pretty people with their silly white smiles and perfect makeup. The chairs irritated him—their depth, their comfort. Paid all that money to sit and gabble like a bunch of women in a bus queue.
Getting up, he switched the set off and stood a moment with his fists balled up in the pockets of his jogging pants. The dog half-crouched in expectation below him. Hawkins hoisted his twin metal dumbbells and pumped his arms for a few minutes. The muscles stretched taut and then lifted, hard against the skin; a vein bulged in his neck and he sucked breath through clenched and bitter teeth. The dog gave a little yelp and hopped away from him.
Laying aside the weights, Hawkins scooped up last night’s dinner debris and cursed himself for not doing it sooner. No woman would put up with it, he told himself. Then he quietly laughed and told himself that no woman was likely to ever be there anyway so what the hell did it matter. But it did matter, and his sudden lack of discipline dampened his mood still further, so he scrubbed away at the dishes as if his life depended on it. ‘Spit and polish,’ he breathed. ‘Spit and bloody polish.’
When the kitchen was spotless he picked up the dog’s lead and went back through to the living room. He paused at the shelf above the TV where he stared out at himself from a photograph in gleaming Number l’s. He caressed the folded maroon beret that lay very precisely next to it, and then went out to the hall. He fastened the lead onto the dog, collected his Girocheque from where it lay on the table and stepped out of his front door.
His flat overlooked the bleak, square concourse with the half-hearted washing lines and the vague, council-inspired attempts at a children’s playground. Everywhere you looked, graffitied obscenities daubed the walls like brightly-coloured faeces. Hawkins clutched at the dog’s lead and hated himself for living in the same petty squalor that had so disgusted him in Londonderry. The steps to the ground floor smelled of piss and other people’s sex. He held his breath and scowled all the way to the street.
Later in the pub, the stink of stale lager and lunchtime sweat in the air, he sipped his second pint. Two pints at lunchtime was bad news, the evening okay but not lunch-time. Standards slipping: just because it was paid for with a Giro was no reason to let his standards slip. He bit against the glass as he drank. He would work out later and maybe he could break a few heads if there were joyriders in the park when he took the dog out.
The door opened and the summer heat of London blew in for a second. Hawkins looked up and saw Billy Mason cutting a slovenly path across the floor towards him. Pathetic bastard. Still, he’d take his money for a few pints and then wind him up with some stories about the old days.
That night, Vanner had sat in the darkness of his office. Violence. Blood rushing in his temples and Daniels’ head flicking back again and again. He rubbed his eyes and then glanced down at the four ‘Letters to the Editor’, spread before him in their plastic sleeves. His right-angled lamp illuminated the typed print and words leapt up at him from the page. ‘All my pretty ones? Did you say all?’ Where did they come from? What did they mean?
The phone rang.
‘Vanner.’
Silence.
‘This is Chief Inspector Vanner.’
‘Vanner.’ The voice jarred in him, recollection but no recollection. Memories. Where?
‘What d’you want?’
‘You.’
‘Come and get me then.’
‘When I’m ready.’
‘You’re not who you say you are.’
A pause. The sound of breathing in his ear.
‘Are you listening to me? I know you’re not who you say you are.’
‘You know nothing.’ The phone clicked and the dialling tone drilled in his ear.
Morrison clicked his tongue in irritation. Across the desk, Garrod lifted his hands. ‘McCague is making noises. He’s calling your bluff or trying to. Daniels dropped the charge, remember.’
‘Yes, but we can’t just let it go. Allow Vanner back on the job.’
‘The public would like us to.’
‘Today.’ Morrison sat forward. ‘What about tomorrow? Vanner’s a DCI for Christ’s sake. Can you imagine the tabloids in a few weeks? We’ll have to discipline him internally if nothing else.’
‘Dismiss him?’
‘It ought to be, Sir.’
‘That’s up to the Commander.’
> Morrison sat back.
‘There’ll be a hearing,’ Garrod said. ‘I can promise you that. But don’t bank on him being dismissed, Andrew.’
Morrison smiled. ‘This is not a vendetta, Sir. I have serious professional doubts about Vanner. I always have had. That Ireland business.’
‘It’s rumour.’
‘But where does rumour start?’
‘Andrew, the man was accepted into the Force. He rose from DC to DCI very quickly. As a policeman, up until now, his record is impeccable.’
‘With respect, Sir …’ Morrison compressed his lips. ‘Things don’t add up.’ He held up his hands. ‘I admit I have no evidence, but for one thing—on the nights of the killings Vanner was off duty.’
‘Every one?’
‘All four.’
‘So what. Four nights in as many years.’
Morrison sat back. ‘Yes, I know. But that’s just the start.’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘Well, Vanner was in Scotland when the Lothian killing took place. He was in London when Highbury happened. On leave, of all things. I don’t know more than that really. I’m working on hunches.’
‘It’s not very much.’ Garrod cocked his head to one side.
‘I know. I know. But just think about it for a moment, Sir. Operation Watchman has been going on for almost four years. Four killings. Executions. The work of a professional. A soldier or ex-soldier or a policeman.’ He paused. ‘Vanner is all of those things.’
Garrod shook his head. ‘If it was anyone else but you, Andrew …’
‘And now this assault,’ Morrison said. Openly beating up that boy Daniels.’
Garrod looked at him then. ‘Those two things don’t add up. You could argue they rule Vanner out.’
‘You mean precision to passion? A burst of angry violence?’
Garrod nodded.
‘All killers get caught, Sir. Or most of them do. Serial killers do eventually. They make a mistake. Maybe this is the mistake.’
Garrod sighed, then he got up from his desk. ‘I ought to tell you to let this drop. There’s no evidence. McCague has made it clear he’s unhappy with you down at Loughborough Street.’ He broke off.
‘I’ve been right before, Sir.’ Morrison held his eye. ‘I’ve known this man for five years. Believe me, I know what I’m doing.’
Garrod scraped the fingers of his hand against his palm. He looked back at Morrison’s clear, green eyes and wished he could just dismiss this. But Morrison was good, had always been good, scrupulously efficient. If something itched he knew he had to let him scratch it.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘But on your own time, you understand. If McCague gets stroppy it’s nothing to do with CIB.’
Vanner’s mobile telephone rang. He was shaving, white foaming lather dripping from his chin like a beard. He knew he would regret charging the battery and switching the thing on and he wondered why he had done it. When he picked it up, however, he knew why he had done it. Sarah’s voice, soft and womanly in his ear.
‘Aden.’
‘Hello.’
‘Don’t go anywhere. I’m coming up to see you.’
‘Where are you?’
‘London. I’m leaving at four.’
Vanner felt his spirits lift: though he tried to quell the feeling it ignored him and they lifted anyway. ‘Drive carefully,’ he said.
His heart was moving against his chest as he walked back to the bathroom and took up the razor once more. Carefully now, with deliberation, he gathered the gel in his palm and mixed it to a thick white cream which he reapplied to his chin. He paused, looked at himself, the darkness in his eyes, as if the emotions of him in the mirror did not reflect his own.
The relationship had begun in Hammersmith, five years previously, before he had gone up to join Morrison in Lothian. He had been working for D11 out of Old Street (an inspector in those days). He was called to preempt a raid on a building society in Hammersmith. He remembered it vividly; the information was half-baked and things had got out of hand. The thieves had stolen a car and they had to chase them halfway across London.
Vanner was in the front passenger seat as the Range Rover roared into the Industrial Estate. Ahead of them two Sierras, lights flashing, were already chasing the suspect vehicle as it bounced across a huge, concrete footing where once a warehouse had stood. Vanner stared ahead of them, watching the stolen Capri as it raced across the rough ground with gravel hissing from its wheels. The two Sierras weaved a path behind it, forcing it this way and that. The driver with Vanner hurtled the Range Rover across the back of the Sierras, to cut off the exit to the warren of residential back roads that bordered the estate to the south.
Suddenly the Capri turned right and disappeared out of sight.
‘Got them.’ Vanner slapped the map that was spread on his knees. ‘Dead end.’
As if in distant acknowledgement, tyres suddenly howled. They slowed at the corner and saw the Sierras swerve to a standstill. The driver flattened the Range Rover to a stop, side on behind the Sierras. Vanner hit the ground running, pistol drawn, as the two suspects ran from their car towards the gaping entrance of a deserted factory. Both of them were masked, one of them waving a sawn-off shotgun. Vanner sprinted after them. Two uniformed officers from Hammersmith sprang from the Sierras, one of them a woman who Vanner nearly bowled over in his haste.
He got to the door of the factory and the two officers came up behind him. Vanner glanced at them: the PC, young, twenty-one or so, red-faced. The woman older, short dark hair and a crisp clarity in her eyes.
‘Behind me,’ Vanner commanded. His driver and two other armed officers spread themselves along the outer wall of the factory. Vanner held his pistol firmly, short sleeves of his shirt flapping against his arms in the breeze that blew from the river.
Ducking inside, he scanned the vastness of the floor. It was naked save the odd ruined piece of machinery and tattered cabling, that dangled from the roof joists like the broken web of a spider. The two men were running for the far end, shouting at each other. Vanner went after them.
Halfway across the floor one of them paused to get his breath, leaning against a chewed hunk of metal.
‘Stop!’ Vanner shouted. ‘Armed Police.’
The man whirled, leather jacket, black ski mask, sawn-off shotgun.
Vanner stopped, raised his pistol. The man was fifty yards from him.
‘Armed Police. Put—the—gun—down.’
For a second the man looked at his fleeing partner, still bolting towards the closed door at the far end of the building. Vanner moved forward, gun extended now like part of his arm. Two hands. He could feel the moisture move on his brow. Soldier: the smell of explosives; men running down rain-soaked Irish streets.
‘Put—the—gun—down.’
The man lifted the shotgun. Vanner was naked, no cover; the factory gathered above him vast and empty and laughing. Instinctively he dropped to one knee. The shotgun boomed, the sound reverberating around the building like the echo of a blast in a quarry. Vanner saw the gun kick in the man’s hands. He returned fire. The man cried out and fell backwards.
Vanner was up, moving forward again; body coiled, crabbing his way across the distance between them. The man moaned, lying face forward, prostrate. Still he held the gun. Vanner was aware of others behind him. Up ahead, the man with the bag had forced the back door with two armed officers chasing him.
Vanner moved closer to his victim, still clutching at the shotgun.
‘Drop it.’ Vanner snarled the words at him. His own gun was stiff in front of him, both arms locked at the elbow.
Ten paces from him now, the man squirmed; with his free hand he had ripped off his mask and his face was twisted with pain. Still he held the gun, right-handed, arm extended in the dust. Vanner paced around him, eyes on the weapon, his own gun cocked for a second shot. Then he stepped on his wrist. The man cried out, tried to move. Vanner stepped harder. Then he bent and placing the
muzzle of his pistol against the back of the suspect’s head, he wrenched the shotgun from his grasp. He heard footsteps in front of him. Looking up, he stared into the face of the WPC.
Sarah Kennett. He wiped the last vestige of shaving foam from his chin and rubbed some aftershave into the chafed and reddened skin. Their eyes had met; him sweating, chest still heaving, memories of Ulster and shouting and the smell of burning bodies in his eyes. Her, face white between the black of her uniform and the black of her hair. He had stared at her; black skirt, breasts that seemed to thrust at him through the thin cotton of her shirt. He had ducked his head, withdrawn his eyes, momentarily disgusted by the proximity of lust and violence. Get an ambulance, he had instructed her.
He waited for her as the afternoon dwindled and the sea began to single out his small headland. Rain laced the wind, almost cold enough for snow. Outside he shivered as he gathered enough wood for the hearth. With early whiskey in a glass, he built up the mass of the fire.
They had started seeing one another. Her face had haunted his mind, the unswerving intensity of her gaze as he had holstered his gun and issued instructions to his men. Outside the warehouse, she waited by her car and smiled at him as he walked back to the Range Rover. It was almost as if she demanded that he speak to her. He did not, at least not immediately. But the inquiry was ongoing and it was not long before he saw her again.
Sitting over the fire he watched the flames as they scoured the chimney, licking up the walls in snake’s tongues of black and gold and red. The wood snapped and hissed where the sea spray, carried on the wind, had coated its bark with salt.
He sipped whiskey and thought about Sarah driving up to see him. The second time in a week. McCague sent her before. Had he chosen her or had she volunteered? She wanted to see him; he could sense it in her voice, in her eyes when she looked at him. And the last time she had been here … His breath dipped in his throat. The fire seemed to beckon his gaze, casting out its shadows; with the day gone it was the only light in the room. He became aware of the stiff, buckled sensation in his chest as thoughts of how it had all started up again drifted to him through the darkness.