The Aden Vanner Novels

by Jeff Gulvin

  His wife followed him into the kitchen and laid the paper on the table. She poured herself some tea and settled down to read. In the hall the boys lifted coats from the pegs. Kinane picked up his briefcase and as he clasped the handle it slipped under the damp of his palm. He frowned, then looked up at his wife and smiled.

  ‘See you later then.’

  She took his arm and kissed him. ‘Try not to be too late tonight. There’s a Governors’ meeting at school.’

  ‘Six thirty.’

  ‘Okay.’

  He went through to the hall and slipped his jacket over his shoulders.

  Pamela Richards showed the phone records to Weir. He had a copy of the Express on the desk in front of him, Jessica Turner’s face lifting from the front page.

  ‘Beaulieu,’ Pam said. ‘She called a number in Beaulieu. Either that or her husband did.’

  She tapped the page. ‘Three times. Once just before Christmas, again three weeks ago and the Monday before the weekend she was murdered.’

  Weir picked up the sheet of paper and studied it. ‘Ask Sid to get hold of the husband,’ he said. ‘See if he recognises the number.’

  Ryan was in the outer office, standing by Davies’ desk. A cigarette burned in the ashtray. Fat-Bob was reading an action sheet, his face very red this morning, tie undone and his weight spreading out from the chair. Ryan picked up the burning cigarette and tapped off an inch of ash. He handed it to Davies. ‘Smoke,’ he said. ‘That way you’ll get there quicker.’

  ‘Fuck off, Slippery’

  Ryan grinned and patted him on the shoulder. ‘Just my little joke, Fats. Just my little joke.’

  Pamela gave him the phone records and told him what Weir had said. Ryan scanned the page and then laid it flat in front of him. He picked up the phone and dialled Alec Turner’s number. The phone rang three times and then the answermachine clicked on. Ryan left a message and then put down the phone.

  Weir came out of his office and beckoned to him. Ryan got up and went over. Weir was leaning with his fists on the desk. He looked up and motioned for Ryan to close the door.

  ‘Guv’nor?’

  ‘Phonecall just now, Sid. The Gun Room at Lambeth.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ Ryan moved closer to the desk. ‘What did they say?’

  ‘The cartridges are from a Russian weapon. Tokarev. 7.62mm.’ He picked up a sheet of facsimile paper and passed it to him. ‘This is from Jane’s manual. I got Lambeth to fax it across.’

  Ryan took the sheet of paper and sat down: — The TT-33 Tokarev is now obsolete in the Warsaw Pact countries. Production ceased in 1954 in its native country, although there is reason to believe it continued for longer than that in Yugoslavia and China. There are therefore many of these pistols to be met in the world and it is no longer safe to say their use is confined to the Soviet and former Soviet States. It was derived from the Browning design in the 1920s at the Tula Arsenal by Feodor Tokarev and he simplified parts of the design and modified others, but the basis was the model 1911 Colt.

  Ryan laid the paper down on the desk.

  ‘It’s rare, Slippery,’ Weir said.

  ‘Never heard of it, Guv.’

  ‘Lambeth have.’ Weir pursed his lips. ‘They’re sending it over to NIFSL.’

  ‘NIFSL?’

  ‘Northern Ireland Forensic Science Lab.’

  Ryan felt the hairs lift on his arm. ‘What’re you telling me, Guv’nor?’

  Weir sat back and drew audible breath through his nose. ‘I don’t know, Sid. But the only people who use Tokarevs in this country are the Provisional IRA.’

  Ryan met Vanner for a drink in the Irish pub in Wembley. He ordered two pints of Caffreys and watched them settle. Vanner came in, damp on his clothes from the misted rain on the street. Ryan rolled licorice-papered cigarettes on the bar. Vanner sat down on the stool next to him and Ryan passed him a roll-up.

  ‘Skint already, Slips?’

  ‘Wife and three brats, Guv’nor. Unlike some.’ Ryan lit his cigarette and held the match for Vanner. ‘How’s Ellie?’

  ‘She’s fine.’

  ‘In love are you?’

  Vanner ignored him and sipped the froth off his pint. ‘So how’s things with Weir?’

  Ryan lifted his shoulders. ‘He’s got me minding for him.’

  Vanner smiled. ‘You’re a good skipper, Slips. You might be a gobby git but you’re not bad at your job.’

  ‘Take that as a compliment shall I.’

  Vanner took a long draught from his pint and looked around the bar. Apart from two old Irishmen playing dominoes they were the only ones drinking. ‘What’s happening with Ealing then?’

  ‘Shooting.’

  ‘I know that. How’re you getting on?’

  ‘Not very well.’ Ryan checked to see who was behind him and then told Vanner what was happening. When he mentioned the gun Vanner frowned.

  ‘That’s a terrorist weapon, Slips.’

  Ryan nodded. ‘Lambeth Gun Room’ve sent the cartridges over to Ulster. They want to find out if the weapon’s been used over there.’

  ‘That’d make sense.’ Vanner dragged on his cigarette. ‘What does Morrison make of it all?’

  ‘Same as the rest of us. Blank.’

  ‘I saw the picture in the papers. You hoping someone’ll come forward?’

  Ryan nodded. ‘She was playing over the side, Guv. Husband thought she was home all weekend but she wasn’t. We need to know where she was.’

  He pushed himself back from the bar. ‘What you working on?’

  ‘Crack team. Harlesden.’

  ‘Jimmy’s deal?’

  Vanner nodded.

  ‘Stepper-Nap.’

  Vanner frowned at him. ‘You know him?’

  Ryan shook his head. ‘Jimmy told me about him last year. British Black posse right?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I looked at the file but couldn’t do anything with it then. It was bitty. Still an AIU deal really.’

  ‘It’s not now. They’re about the biggest team in London. Jimmy’s built up something of a dossier. He’s got a connection in Jamaica and the DLO is feeding him information. We’ve got most of the team eyeballed, nicked a couple of runners, but we don’t have a wash house.’

  ‘Nobody talking?’

  ‘There’s one snout. They think they own him but we do. He’s useful. They smurf cash through Western Union.’

  ‘Nobody putting the finger on anybody?’

  Vanner shook his head. ‘We’ve got one possible. Ex-player doing time in Winchester. Got stitched up by one of the generals. He was over the wall for a while and ran with them. Got nicked by a PC writing out a stop slip. We’re seeing him tomorrow. He reckons he can finger the doctor.’

  Ryan made a face. ‘Good luck, Guv. The black teams are always the hardest to crack. You’re lucky if you get this much information.’ He made a gesture with forefinger and thumb.

  They bought more beer and Ryan rolled fresh cigarettes. ‘How’s your old man? I heard he had a heart attack.’

  Vanner stared at himself for a moment in the mirror behind the bar. ‘Mild one,’ he said. ‘He’s recovering at home. I was there the other weekend. Took Ellie with me.’

  ‘That’d be a first. You taking a woman home.’

  Vanner nodded. ‘She’s a good girl, Slips.’

  ‘Don’t get hung up on her, Guv. She’s young. The young ones always stiff you.’

  They sat in silence for a moment then Ryan looked at his watch. ‘I suppose I’d better get home. Haven’t seen the missus for ages.’

  ‘Weir keeping you late is he.’

  ‘Murder Squad, Guv. You know how it is.’ He finished his beer and pushed himself off the stool. ‘Say hello to Ellie for me.’

  In the morning Vanner drove with Jimmy Crack to Winchester to interview the informant. They left Campbell Row at eight thirty and headed out to the M25. Vanner drove, rain falling diagonally against the windscreen.

  ‘Checked out the
address for Pretty Boy, Guv’nor,’ Jimmy was saying.

  ‘Anywhere we can set up a plot?’

  ‘I don’t know. Difficult. There’s two more addresses in that area flagged to me. It isn’t going to be easy.’

  ‘We can’t get him tailed every day’

  ‘We need a drop, Guv. Somebody coming in.’

  ‘Maybe your man today can help us.’

  Jimmy lifted one eyebrow. ‘Maybe.’

  They got to the M25 and headed south for the M3. Vanner thought about his father. He had phoned last night and spoken to Anne. He was better but still bed-ridden. He asked for his son a lot. He thought about going up again at the weekend. Ellie was working and perhaps it would give them a chance to talk. A lorry pulled out right in front of them, hissing spray to confuse the wipers. Vanner flicked them to double speed and eased back on the throttle.

  ‘You ever thought about trying to talk to Stepper’s wife, Jim?’

  Jimmy glanced at him. ‘I thought about it yeah. Bumped into her at Tesco’s once. I thought about telling her the whole bit there and then. You know, fronting her. Hi, I’m PC McKay. Did you know your old man’s an international drug dealer?’

  Vanner grinned.

  ‘It’s worked before, Guv. Sometimes with the Jamaicans—they marry British blacks to get citizenship over here. Then they take off with baby mothers or just treat them bad. I’ve had one or two shop the old man for going over the side.’

  ‘Not this one though.’

  ‘No. She likes the money too much.’

  They drove on in silence, heater blowing warm air into the car. Vanner opened the window a crack and lit a cigarette. ‘Who can we have a go at, Jim?’

  ‘To spoil you mean?’

  Vanner nodded.

  ‘Immigration want to spin Carmel’s place. I told you about Plug. He’s working with a DC out of Willesden. Elsdon. Knife-in-the-back man. The smiling fucking assassin. Stick you between the shoulders if he thought it’d help his career.’

  ‘Which one’s Carmel again?’

  ‘Radcliffe Road, Harlesden. She looks after the illegals I told you about. Part of the Daddy’s politics, keeping the Tottenham Yardies off his patch. She’s clean right now but I won’t fend them off forever.’

  ‘Does Carver know about the posse?’

  Jimmy nodded. ‘Seen my flag, Guv. But Elsdon thinks he can make a name for himself.’

  ‘If he so much as steps on this plot I’ll cut his legs from under him.’

  ‘Stepper-Nap’s canny, Guv. He’ll know we’re watching Carmel. He plays it very fine, just enough to keep things sweet in Tottenham.’

  ‘Hell of a diplomat isn’t he.’

  ‘He’s very smart. Much smarter than Pretty Boy figures he is. That one’ll get himself burned.’

  At Winchester Prison they parked and went up to the police interview room where they waited for the informant to be brought down.

  ‘He was over the wall for a year, Guv’nor. PC with a stop slip picked him up again. The Crime Group let me know. He gave them an address which was flagged to me so I had a chat with him in the scrubs before he was transferred here. Name’s Dion Rafter. Word is he’s wanted in Jamaica for a shooting. He’s terrified of going back. Reckons the police out there will kill him.’

  ‘If they’re anything like the ones I know — they will.’ They waited for five minutes before the warder knocked on the door and brought Rafter in. He was tall and slim, scars over one eye which looked to Vanner as though they had been made by a bottle. His hair was cropped short, criss-crossed with razor patterns. Jimmy gave him two packets of cigarettes and he sat down, loose limbed, watching Vanner carefully. ‘This is DI Vanner, Dion. I’m working with him.’ Vanner nodded to him and Dion lifted one finger. He unwrapped one of the packets and Vanner offered his lighter.

  ‘So how you doing in here?’ Jimmy asked him.

  Rafter half-smiled. ‘Rather be out there.’

  ‘You were weren’t you,’ Vanner said, ‘for a while.’

  ‘Not long enough, man. Was just getting amongst my women and you bastards nicked me.’

  Vanner grinned at him. ‘That’s the game, Dion. Sometimes you win, sometimes we do.’

  Rafter pulled on his cigarette.

  ‘What you got for us, man?’ Jimmy leaned his arms on the table.

  ‘Couple o’ things.’

  ‘On the phone you said something about the doctor.’ Rafter slowly nodded. ‘They got one of those, man. Need to get the stuff out you know. He sticks stuff up their asses to make them shit it all. Don’t want to get caught with exploding bags in your butt.’

  ‘Where?’ Vanner looked him in the eye.

  ‘You got money for my woman, man?’

  Jimmy nodded. ‘All squared away, Dion. If what you give us is good.’

  ‘You know where to put the cash?’

  ‘You told me.’

  ‘The doctor, Dion.’ Vanner took one of the cigarettes from the pack and lit it.

  Rafter told them that the doctor the posse used had a surgery on Willesden Lane. He was an Indian man, in Stepper-Nap’s pocket, they had been using him for two years on and off. He was tame and he was cheap. His surgery was a converted house in a street close to the Hindu Temple.

  ‘Religious is he?’ Vanner said.

  ‘Oh yeah, man. Real religious.’

  ‘What’s the name of the street?’

  Rafter blew out his cheeks. ‘Can’t tell you. I just know where it is is all.’

  Vanner glanced at Jimmy. ‘You got an A-Z?’

  Jimmy shook his head.

  ‘Listen, man. You don’t need no map. The street right after the temple. It’s all houses down there. There ain’t but one doctor.’

  Outside rain had stopped falling, but wind had risen from the southwest and it howled through the trees on the kerbside. Vanner cupped his hand to his lighter and smoke was whipped away from him.

  ‘What d’you reckon?’

  Jimmy shrugged. ‘He’s been good in the past, Guv. He gave us the last drop exactly.’

  Vanner took his mobile phone from his pocket and phoned Campbell Row. Sammy McCleod answered.

  ‘What you doing, Sam?’

  ‘Setting up an undercover buy.’

  ‘Do me a favour will you?’ Vanner told him what Rafter had given them and Sammy agreed to take a drive and try to locate the address.

  They were halfway up the M3 when Vanner’s mobile rang.

  Jimmy was driving, Vanner sat next to him, catlike in the passenger seat.

  ‘Vanner.’

  ‘Sammy, Guv.’

  ‘Find it?’

  ‘Yes. Doctor Jamani.’

  Ryan phoned the Beaulieu number. He had spoken to Alec Turner who did not recognise it so they surmised his wife had made the phonecalls. He got an answerphone, a Mrs Holt so he left a message and hung up. He was at the coffee machine when Fat-Bob came into the corridor and told him the woman was on the phone. Ryan slopped frothy coffee over his fingers, cursed and went back to his desk.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Ryan,’ he said as he picked up the phone.

  ‘Alison Holt, Sergeant. You telephoned me. I take it it’s about Jessica Turner.’

  Ryan was still for a moment. ‘You saw the picture in the papers then.’

  ‘I did. I was going to phone you but you got to me first.’

  Ryan nodded to himself. ‘Did you know her well?’

  ‘No. I only met her once. She rented a holiday cottage from me in the New Forest.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘The weekend she was murdered. She had it from the Friday night till Sunday. It was the third time she rented it. Once last summer, once in December and the other weekend.’

  ‘She booked it in her name?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Nobody else’s?’

  ‘No. Why?’

  ‘Just wondering.’

  ‘She always paid by cheque. A week or so in advance.’

  ‘Are you in
for the rest of the day, Mrs Holt?’

  ‘I am, yes.’

  ‘I’d like to come and talk to you. I’d like to see the cottage as well if that’s all right.’

  ‘Fine.’ She gave him her address and hung up.

  Weir parked outside the huge Georgian house that overlooked the estuary and switched off the engine. Seagulls swooped over the marshland, chasing one another, their cries mournful, keening on the wind. The tide was on the turn, mud-coloured ripples bustling against the lean grass of the banks. Ryan got out of the car, buttoned his jacket and re-fastened the top button of his shirt. He could smell salt in the air. On a little jetty fixed into the mud a wooden dingy bobbed with the incoming tide.

  Alison Holt must have seen or heard them as they crunched up the gravel sweep of the drive. A well-trimmed lawn bordered by dahlia beds butted up to the gravel and ran in a slope to the six-foot wooden fence. She was waiting in the porch as they approached.

  Weir made the introductions and she led them into a high-ceilinged drawing room where a half-height inglenook fireplace lifted over freshly crackling logs. Ryan went over to the fire and rubbed his palms together.

  ‘Beautiful house,’ he said. ‘Beautiful village.’

  ‘We like it. Peaceful.’

  Weir took off his coat and she took it from him and laid it over a chair. She motioned to a wide settee with tie-fixed arms and they sat down. She perched on the edge of a Queen Anne chair and clasped both hands on her knees.

  Weir looked at her, about fifty, grey hair curled at the front and fastened with a long pin at the back. Her clothes were Harvey Nichols, blue Guernsey sweater over jodphurs and Chelsea riding boots.

  ‘Is your husband in?’ Weir asked her.

  She shook her head. ‘He’s working.’

  ‘What does he do?’

  ‘He’s a yacht broker. We have an office in Lymington.’

  Weir sat back and put his hands in his trouser pockets. ‘Thank you for seeing us, Mrs Holt.’

  She hugged herself then as if she was suddenly cold. Ryan watched her face. ‘Difficult for you.’

  ‘I didn’t know her well, but it’s strange to think that after she left my cottage she was shot to death in her home.’