14 - Stay of Execution bs-14

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘That would be appreciated. We may wind up sending this investigation back to you for completion. Whatever happens, be sure of one thing: we want to catch the bastards who did this every bit as much as you do.’

  He hung up and looked at McIlhenney, and at Dan Pringle, who was seated beside him. ‘Apart from what you just heard me promise, have either of you any bright ideas for lines of inquiry?’

  ‘Eye-witnesses, sir,’ the inspector replied. ‘Somewhere between Paula Viareggio’s place and the Malmaison, Mawhinney was abducted. As you said, he was a big guy, so there must have been some sort of a struggle. We could issue a public appeal for anyone who saw anything like that to come forward.’

  ‘Tomorrow, if we have to.’

  ‘Why wait?’

  ‘Because most of the replies we get will be mistaken or time-wasters; yet they’ll all have to be followed up. In a week when our resources are stretched by the papal visit, that’s a last resort. Before we go there, we’ve a card up our sleeve. I think if you ask our friend McGuire, you might find he’s been making his presence felt on his new patch. Anyone who was on the street at that time on a Sunday was probably going home from the pub, so that’s the best place to start looking for assistance.’

  ‘They’re not very forthcoming in that part of town,’ said Pringle gloomily.

  ‘They will be, with an angry McGuire leaning on them.’ The DCC looked at McIlhenney. ‘Go to it, Neil. Dan, you stay for a minute longer, I want a word with you about something else.’

  The big inspector nodded and left the room. ‘About these Belgians,’ Skinner continued. ‘I had a talk with Malou this morning.’

  ‘Did it get you very far?’ The head of CID’s tone said it all.

  ‘It did, funnily enough, only I’m not sure of the direction I’m headed. And I need to be; these guys are here to play for the Pope, yet someone’s bumped two of them off.’

  ‘Couldn’t we just send them home?’

  ‘It’s not that easy; they’re our responsibility now. They’re safe under our protection, and they’ll be safe at Murrayfield. If there are others on somebody’s hit list, we can hardly send them back into danger. We need to solve this, not pass the buck. Besides, they’re not our guests, Dan. They’re here at the personal invitation of His Holiness; if anyone sends them packing it’ll be him. And he won’t, because the wee colonel’s an old friend of his.’

  Pringle was astonished. ‘How did they meet?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t bloody know; Malou wouldn’t say. He wouldn’t have told me about it at all, if I hadn’t picked up on a reference he made to him. He used a name that only a few people know. Dan, I want you to pull all the information on this investigation together, in fact on both of them, ours on Lebeau and the Humberside police’s on Hanno. I want to see all the interviews that you and the boys have done with the Belgians, and all the witness statements that the Hull people have taken; everything, post-mortem reports on both men, the lot. While you’re doing that, I’ll be trying to find some answers.’

  Pringle nodded and left. As soon as the door closed, the DCC picked up the phone and called a cell-phone number. ‘Yes?’ a female voice answered.

  ‘Aileen, it’s Bob Skinner. Can you speak?’

  ‘Yes, I’m alone, but how did you get this number?’

  ‘I’ll tell you when I see you. For now just call it a small demonstration of power. I’m sorry, but would it be a mighty inconvenience if we postponed our dinner this evening for, say, twenty-four hours? Something very important has come up.’

  ‘If it’s that important, sure. I’ll call the club and tell them to move the arrangement back a day. Can you tell me what this thing is?’

  The DCC chuckled. ‘Not on this line. It’s only slightly more secure than calling you through your office line.’

  He put down one phone and picked up another, then dialled a scrambled Whitehall number that was lodged in his memory; the receiver at the other end rang once and was picked up. ‘Hello, mate,’ said a familiar voice, ‘what fookin’ crisis has befallen you today?’

  ‘I’ll say this about you, Major Arrow. You’re nothing if not to the point.’

  ‘And you, Deputy Chief Constable Skinner, always like a preamble. So how’s the wife, how’s the kids?’

  ‘All in fine form, thanks. I won’t ask about your home life; if I found out about it, you’d probably have to kill me.’

  Adam Arrow laughed. ‘We don’t use that word these days, mate. “De-incentivise” is in fashion now, but it wouldn’t come to that with you: a simple lobotomy would be enough. As it happens, I don’t have a home life at the moment, so you’re safe on all fronts.’

  ‘Glad to hear it. To get to the point, Adam, you’re my doorway into the murky world of defence intelligence, and I need your help again. I’ve got a double murder investigation under way here . . .’

  ‘It doesn’t involve soldiers, does it?’ asked Arrow, sharply.

  ‘Not ours, and certainly not on the active list any more. The victims are Belgian, and they’re in their sixties. The only connection that I know of is that they were all in the army together, with the band of the First Guides Regiment. I need to ask some questions there, and I need a contact.’

  ‘It won’t be that easy, Bob,’ Arrow warned. ‘You’ll need to go there.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘Even then . . . a foreign policeman, not even one of your rank, can’t just walk in and talk to these guys.’

  ‘I guessed that too.’

  His friend sighed. ‘So you want me to go with you.’

  ‘You guessed it in three. Can you?’

  ‘It’s important?’

  ‘We’re got a major event in Edinburgh on Friday. There’s a public rally in the rugby stadium, at which Pope John the Twenty-fifth will meet his people. The Prime Minister will be sat next to him. These dead Belgians were supposed to be playing for him. Their band still is.’

  ‘It’s important,’ Arrow exclaimed. ‘Right, the people we’ll need to see are in the security division of the Belgian General Intelligence and Security Service. They can get access to everything without any questions being asked, so it’ll be much quicker than going through their personnel section. The head of that division’s a contact of mine; I see him regularly at NATO meetings. How soon can you get to Brussels?’

  ‘There’s a flight from Edinburgh this afternoon; there’s a seat held on it for me. I can be there this evening.’

  ‘I’ll meet you at the British Airways desk in Brussels airport. Half six?’

  ‘Make it six forty-five. See you there.’

  63

  ‘Does it really mean anything, Stevie?’ asked Detective Superintendent Chambers. ‘This thing the boy found? It’s only a few letters grouped together after all.’

  ‘It could do, Mary. If Ivor was on to her, and she found out, it’s possible she did away with him, or that she and her husband did. I’m assuming they’re acting in concert.’

  ‘Why should they run now, with Whetstone set up to take the blame?’

  ‘Maybe they always intended to run, but maybe they couldn’t just then, not until the money had hit its final destination.’

  ‘That’s plausible, I’ll grant you. But as proof of anything, what does this all mean?’

  ‘Next to bugger all, I admit, as I told Murphy.’

  Chambers smiled grimly. ‘Not next to it, Stevie,’ she said. ‘It means precisely bugger all. It doesn’t tell us anything for sure and it doesn’t lead us any closer to them either. If it makes the Whetstones feel better, that’s good, but that’s all it’ll do.’

  ‘I know, Mary,’ Steele conceded. ‘The lad was so pleased with himself, though.’

  ‘And I hope he stays that way, but what are you planning to do next? I appreciate you keeping me involved, but this is your inquiry, remember; I’m still feeling my way into this job, so I don’t plan on muscling in.’

  ‘I’m going to dig into Aurelia’s past,’ he to
ld her. ‘I’ve requested her file, formally and in writing, from the SFB human-resources manager; she’s consulting the data controller, just to stay on the right side of the Data Protection Act, but I don’t anticipate problems. I want to see if it gives us any pointers to where she and her husband might have headed.’

  ‘What about his file?’

  ‘I’ve made the same request to Heriot-Watt University. They’re more used to police requests for information. With a bit of luck I’ll have both files by the end of the day. If I have to I’ll take them home with me and look through them tonight.’

  ‘They’ll be well protected, then.’

  Steele gave her a curious look. ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘Maggie had a quiet word with me while you were out. I don’t know whether it was woman to woman, or senior officer to senior officer, but she told me about her . . . How do I put it? Relocation. I’ve never seen her look so happy; I’m very pleased for you both, and I really do hope it works out.’

  ‘Thanks, Mary,’ he said, ‘that means a lot to us. I hope everyone takes it as well.’

  ‘They will, don’t you worry. Does Mario know yet?’

  ‘I think he’s guessed that we were seeing each other, but not that Maggie’s moving in. She wants to tell him herself, but face to face, first opportunity she gets. She’s going to leave it for a couple of days, though. Apparently he’s pretty broken up about the American guy.’

  ‘He’ll be steamed up now, after the outcome of the autopsy.’

  ‘Why? What’s up?’

  ‘The DCC’s wife found fresh tap-water in the lungs. She proved that he was drowned somewhere else then chucked in the dock. She’s a sharp operator, that one; there’s a few pathologists would have missed it. Dan Pringle called to tell me, as a courtesy, so I didn’t hear about it first on the telly. There’s a press conference this afternoon.’

  ‘Is Mario taking it?’

  ‘No, Mario isn’t in charge. McIlhenney’s running this one, and Alan Royston’s handling the media himself.’

  ‘Why big Neil?’

  ‘Because Special Branch does organised crime, and that’s where the investigation’s focused.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’

  ‘That’s more or less what I said, but when you think about it, who else would pick a New York copper off the street, and drown him in the bath?’

  ‘There aren’t many other candidates, I’ll admit,’ said Steele, just as the door opened behind him and DS George Regan’s head appeared.

  ‘Excuse me, ma’am,’ he said to Chambers, then looked at Steele. ‘Got a minute, Stevie?’

  ‘If it’s important, yes. What is it?’

  ‘That car, the one you told us to trace?’

  ‘Yup. Mitsubishi Pajero, number SQ02ZZL, registered to Jose-Maria Alsina.’

  ‘We’ve found it.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘In the long-stay car park at Edinburgh airport.’

  ‘Outstanding. Any idea how long it had been there?’

  ‘Can’t give you that, sir, I’m afraid. You know how crowded that place is.’

  ‘Anything from the airlines?’ asked Chambers.

  ‘We’re working on that, ma’am.’

  ‘No, you’re not, George,’ the superintendent replied amiably. ‘You’re standing in my doorway, waiting for someone to pat you on the head. Consider that done; now please go back and help Tarvil. We need to know which flight those two caught, and whether they had an ultimate destination beyond that.’

  64

  If Bob Skinner had ever been asked to nominate, as a frequent flyer, his least favourite European airport, Brussels would have come a close second to Heathrow. For all its turn-of-the-century improvements, he still found it annoying, claustrophobic and difficult to get around. Professionally he felt that its lay-out must make it a nightmare to police.

  His flight from Edinburgh had been late, after an air-traffic-control departure delay had thrown it off schedule, so it was just past seven o’clock as he approached the British Airways information desk.

  Adam Arrow was nowhere to be seen.

  He walked up to the counter, where a richly dressed black woman was querying something on a flight ticket, then turned and looked around. Suddenly he felt something being pressed into the small of his back, something small and round.

  ‘Turn around very slowly,’ a voice growled.

  Skinner began to do as he had been told, moving to his left. Then suddenly, he pivoted on his right foot, dropping his bag as he did so, knocking an arm aside and grabbing it by the wrist.

  ‘Careful, Bob,’ said Adam Arrow, ‘or you’ll break my fookin’ banana.’

  The Scot laughed out loud and released him. ‘You daft wee bugger,’ he exclaimed. ‘How did I do anyway?’

  ‘Not too bad,’ Arrow answered, as he slipped the fruit back into his blazer pocket, ‘but at best you’d have had a big flesh wound; at worst you’d have been minus your left kidney. Come on, let’s get out of here, there’s a couple of coppers over there giving us funny looks. I should have known better than to pull a stunt like that in an airport these days.’

  Adam Arrow was a short man, with massive shoulders and a slim waist that gave him the overall appearance of a spinning top. His hair seemed to be cut shorter every time that Skinner saw him; the DCC suspected this was because there was less of it to cut. The two men had known each other for years . . . professionally at least, since Arrow only ever discussed business . . . and an absolute trust had developed between them.

  They had met after Arrow had moved from undercover SAS work in Northern Ireland and other hotspots into a role in Ministry of Defence security that did not appear in any published documents and was defined only in vague terms to outsiders, even to those as close to him as Skinner. This was fine by the DCC; all he needed to know was that Arrow reported to very few people and that when something secret and serious needed doing, he was the man who could make it happen.

  ‘Where are we going?’ the Scot asked.

  ‘There’s a car waiting for us outside.’

  Skinner picked up his bag, and the two men walked through the terminal building’s arrivals exit. Less than twenty yards away, a black Citroën waited; its driver was in military uniform and stood beside it. He nodded briefly to Arrow and opened the back door.

  ‘So now,’ the Scot asked, ‘where are we going?’

  ‘We’re booked into the Royal Windsor Hotel, on rue Duquesnoy. It’s just about the best hotel in Brussels.’

  ‘That’s a bit extreme, isn’t it?’

  ‘Don’t worry about it. They’re looking after us, just as we look after them when they come to London. We don’t piss about with two-star accommodation, mate: no fookin’ security. The man we’ve come to see is meeting us there for dinner at eight thirty. One thing about your Belgian . . . he does like ’is food.’

  65

  ‘You’re no feart, are ye?’ said Malky Gladsmuir.

  ‘Of you?’ laughed Mario McGuire, amiably. ‘There’s a very small list of people and things that scare me, pal, and you’re definitely not on it. I thought I’d convinced you of that. I don’t like those big spiders you find in the bath sometimes, and my granny can still get to me, but not you, son, not you.’

  ‘Maybe no’, but meeting me here might not have been the smartest thing to do, if I’d brought a whole team wi’ me.’

  ‘I suggested this place, remember, when you asked for somewhere quiet. Anyway, give me credit, man. I watched you arrive from across the street. Only you and him came in here. If anyone else tries to join us, they’ll find obstacles put in their way. It’s you that’s in bother, Malky, not me . . . if it turns out your man here’s going to waste my time.’

  The detective and the pub manager were in a half-built house on a site not far from Salamander Street, where investment by developers was turning acres of redundant warehousing into a residential district. There was a third person there too, a weedy man of medium height,
in a woollen hat, a well-worn leather jacket and dark trousers.

  ‘This is Spoons,’ said Gladsmuir, ‘the bloke I wanted you to meet. He’s got something you might like to hear.’

  The man looked at the superintendent with cunning eyes. ‘Is it going tae be worth my while, like?’

  McGuire glared at his escort. ‘Is he serious?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s no’ like that, Spoons,’ the publican barked at him. ‘I told you. Now talk.’

  The man shifted from one foot to the other. ‘Aye, okay.’ He looked down at the detective’s feet, as he readied himself to tell his story. ‘Malky said ye wis asking about Sunday night. Ah mibbe saw somethin’.’

  ‘What time?’

  ‘After ten.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Doon the shore. Ah’d come oot the Pheasant . . . Ah kent whit the time was ’cos the Spanish fitba’ had finished on the telly, like . . . and Ah wis just comin’ tae the bridge ower the watter, when Ah saw this on the ither side. There wis a man . . .’

  ‘Describe him.’

  ‘Quite a big bloke. No’ as big as you, but quite big. He wis wearin’ this donkey-jacket thing. That’s a’ Ah kin remember; it was dark, ken. Onyway, he’s walking doon the shore, towards Commercial Street, when this motor pulls up alongside him; naw, a few yards in front of him. Jist as he got to it the passenger’s door in the front opened, and the fella stopped.’

  ‘How many people did you see get out?’

  Spoons shook his head. ‘Nane. There was naebody got out. The boy on the pavement just stood, as if he was starin’ at it.’

  ‘Could you hear anything?’

  ‘Naw, Ah wis still only hauf-wey across the bridge; Ah wisnae near enough.’

  ‘So what happened next?’

  ‘The back door opened like, and the boy got in.’