‘Not many,’ Hope said. ‘Most West Africans head to London and stay there. I know a couple of Nigerian nurses in Bradfield, and a family who came as asylum seekers and have been given leave to remain.’
‘How many members do you have altogether then?’
‘About a hundred, though that includes the children, and most of them must be here today, as you see. The place is packed. But there are more members from the other side of Africa – Somalis, Eritreans, and a few Zimbabweans, of course. A lot of them are asylum seekers who’ve been shunted up here into empty properties, and some don’t have good English, or any English. We arrange free classes for them if they want to learn. They can’t afford to go to college classes if they’re not working.’ She shrugged. ‘And they’re not allowed to work, of course. One of the more stupid rules you impose.’
‘So talking to the adults will be quite difficult, then?’ Thackeray broke in suddenly. ‘We may need translators?’
‘Some of them will have difficulty understanding English, yes,’ Hope said. She glanced at her watch. ‘But we have a lot of informal translators. Very often the children have learnt some English at school and help their parents. When we serve the food in about fifteen minutes, I’ll make an announcement to tell them all who you are and what you want. You can show them the picture of this poor girl. And then anyone who has anything to tell you can do so. Does that make sense?’
‘Perfect sense,’ Mower said. ‘Thanks.’ He hesitated, knowing that Hope would not like his next question, but that he had no choice but to ask it.
‘Do you have any contact with illegal immigrants?’ he asked. ‘We have to consider the possibility that she’s not being identified because that’s what she is and her friends or family are to frightened to come forward.’
‘I don’t know anyone here illegally myself, but I wouldn’t bank on there not being any in Bradfield,’ Hope said slowly. ‘And I doubt very much that anyone here would tell you about illegals if they knew. That would almost certainly be pushing it a step too far.’
Mower glanced down again at the artist’s impression of the dead girl and then at Thackeray.
‘Someone somewhere has lost a daughter,’ the DCI said fiercely to Hope. ‘And quite a young daughter, at that. Our chances of finding her killer are very slim if we don’t even know who she is or what she was doing in Bradfield.’
‘I know all that,’ Hope Kuti said, glancing away from Thackeray’s angry eyes. ‘But you know as well as I do that there’s an underworld out there, an underworld of desperate people with no money and no hope who’ll work for next to nothing because the alternative is to starve. You can’t blame people for doing the best they can to survive and avoid being sent back to whatever particular hell they’ve escaped from. And believe me, there are some hells in Africa. I sometimes think God has turned his back on that continent.’
‘Let’s do your appeal, then,’ Mower said, recognising the impasse. He would not argue with her analysis but he knew many people who would. ‘You never know. It might come up with something.’
But when he and Thackeray walked back to the car half an hour later they had to accept that they had drawn a blank again. With the music turned off and food being hungrily wolfed down, the crowd of Africans had listened politely enough to what Mower had to say, and various bits of informal translation appeared to have explained his message to everyone there as they had passed the artist’s impression of the dead girl amongst themselves, but most shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders and although both Mower and Thackeray watched closely, there did not appear to be any hint of recognition from anyone in the crowd. As the groups of young men and families switched their attention back to their Sunday lunch, a multi-ethnic buffet with several dishes Mower did not even recognise, Hope Kuti made her way back towards them with a plateful of food in her hand.
‘Who’s that?’ Mower said to her when he had guided her out of earshot of any of the other party-goers. He nodded at a solidly built man, broad-faced and very dark, in whose eyes he had detected just the faintest flicker of some emotion as he had stood at the front of the crowd listening to the appeal for information. As their eyes met for the second time, the man cleared his plate of its last mouthful of food and made his way purposefully towards the door, shouldering slighter people out of his way.
‘Emanuel,’ Hope said. ‘I can’t remember his other name. I could look it up for you. I’ve never spoken to him. He doesn’t often turn up.’
‘Is he Nigerian?’
‘Yes, I think he is.’
Mower watched as the tall, broad figure in a brightly patterned orange shirt stretching against his belly, pushed through the swing doors, but made no comment.
‘Would you like some lunch?’ Hope asked. Mower was tempted for a moment but he could see the frozen expression in his boss’s eyes and knew that this was not the moment, if there ever was one, to persuade Thackeray to try Africa’s varied cuisine.
‘Thanks, but no thanks,’ he had said with a faint grin in Thackeray’s direction. ‘My boss wants to get back. Some other time, maybe. And if you hear anything, you’ll get in touch?’ He gave Hope his card.
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Of course I will.’
‘I reckon if she was African someone there would have recognised her, guv,’ Mower said as he drove back towards police HQ.
‘So she’s an illegal, or she’s not African at all,’ Thackeray said.
‘If she was West Indian and local, someone would have identified her by now,’ Mower said. ‘We’ll have the picture on TV tomorrow, local and national, so maybe that’ll come up trumps.’
‘Why did you ask about the man who left? What was his name? Emanuel?’
‘I just thought he looked a bit anxious when someone passed him the picture, that’s all. But maybe he doesn’t like the police for some other reason.’
‘Didn’t want his papers looked at, maybe,’ Thackeray said.
‘Or maybe he’s importing bush-meat. Some of those dishes on the table didn’t look like chicken or beef to me.’
‘Bush-meat?’
‘I don’t think you want to know, guv,’ Mower said.
‘I want to know,’ Thackeray insisted grimly.
‘Chimpanzee, all sorts of wild animals, smuggled in. There’s a flourishing trade in London apparently,’ Mower said, grinning at Thackeray’s appalled expression.
‘Dear God,’ the DCI said.
Mower swerved suddenly as they passed a pub where a group of youths in Bradfield United colours suddenly spilt into the road, with silly smiles on their faces.
‘Still celebrating, I see,’ Mower said. Thackeray gave a half-smile.
‘Laura actually went to the match,’ he said, still sounding faintly astonished at the idea. ‘Seems to have enjoyed it.’
‘I’d have been rooting for Chelsea,’ Mower said. ‘They were just up the road when I was a kid. Not that I could often afford to go, even then, and now you have to take out a mortgage to get a season ticket.’
‘We’ve been invited to a club celebration at West Royd this evening, but I don’t think I’ll bother.’
‘Oh, you should go,’ Mower said, wishing he could just tell his boss to lighten up for once. But he knew that would be taking a liberty too far. ‘You could combine business with pleasure and ask their Nigerian star whether he knows our victim.’ Mower was joking but to his surprise Thackeray seemed to take him seriously.
‘Okigbo? I might just do that,’ he said.
The bar and reception area at the West Royd club was heaving at six o’clock that evening when Thackeray and Laura arrived for the celebration party. Laura was wearing a short low-cut black dress, which she knew did her a lot of favours, and had brushed her hair into a froth of copper curls under Thackeray’s watchful, and she hoped lustful, gaze.
‘Who are you trying to impress?’ he asked, as she picked up a wrap and inspected his dark suit and the silk tie she had bought him the previous Christmas with
equal attention.
‘Just you,’ she said, brushing his cheek with a kiss. ‘Come on, cheer up. I think we both deserve an evening out.’
Thackeray had driven slowly up the hill out of town to the country club where the car park was already almost full. He wished that he was as confident as Laura that they would enjoy the evening, but he had his doubts. Football was not his game, parties were not his scene, but he knew that if he did not make an effort Laura was quite prepared to go on her own, and of the two options, he had decided that was the worse.
As soon as they had left their coats, Laura was hailed by Tony Holloway, snaking through the crush towards them with a glass in his hand and a glazed look in his eyes that indicated that it was by no means the first drink of the day.
‘Laura,’ he said, giving her an unexpected kiss on both cheeks that she was too slow to evade. ‘Our lovely Laura,’ he went on, and Laura could feel Thackeray bristling beside her. ‘You know,’ the sports editor ploughed on, addressing himself to Thackeray now. ‘You know, your lovely Laura has suddenly become a football expert? Amazing, isn’t it? I’d no idea she understood the off-side rule, had you?’
He put an arm round Laura’s shoulder and glanced around the room, swaying slightly.
‘Jenna invited you, did she? Wonderful lady, Jenna Heywood, but not long for this job. You wait. The old guard’ll have her out, one way or another. You’ll see.’
‘You sound as if you’ve been celebrating since the final whistle,’ Laura said tartly. ‘Have you written your report for tomorrow? I reckon Ted will want it on the front page.’
‘All taken care of, sweetie, all wrapped up and ready to go, the front page splash, of course,’ Tony said blithely. ‘Ted’s here somewhere, by the way.’ He glanced across the room in the direction of a group of heavy men with dark suits and flushed faces amongst whom Laura could see their editor chomping on a cigar and waving a whiskey glass in the air, evidently haranguing his listeners in a way that was all too familiar to his staff.
‘I didn’t know he was a footie fan,’ Laura said.
‘Oh, it’s not that game with Ted, is it, darling? It’s another sort of game entirely.’ And with that Holloway wove off into the crowd again with what she guessed he hoped was an enigmatic smile. Laura turned back to Thackeray with a shrug.
‘Sorry about that. You know, I think my foray into sport may be strictly a one-off,’ she said. ‘It’s not the game, it’s the company you have to keep. But let’s make the most of it while we’re here, shall we? The drinks seem to be over there.’
After a couple of glasses of champagne, Laura’s party turned into a dizzy whirl of introductions and brief conversations as alcohol-fuelled young men in designer gear, almost invariably accompanied by fiercely tanned young women, tottering on high heels and wearing very little, grouped and regrouped around her. She lost sight of Thackeray after a short time and suddenly found herself face to face with Paolo Minelli, who looked rather too enthusiastically pleased to see her. His girlfriend Angelica did not seem to be in sight.
‘Ciao, Laura, cara,’ he said, pronouncing her name as Dante would have done and kissing her on both cheeks. ‘You look ravishing tonight.’
‘Paolo,’ Laura said, dodging what appeared to be an attempt at an even closer embrace. ‘You must be delighted by the result yesterday.’
‘I am delighted, Jenna is delighted, OK is delighted.’ For a second his face clouded as he seemed to catch the eye of someone in the crowd behind him. ‘I just hope we can keep OK for the rest of the season,’ he said quietly, although there was little chance of being overheard amongst the frantic chatter and laughter all around them.
‘He wouldn’t go so soon, would he?’ Laura asked, surprised. ‘I thought he’d only just arrived.’
‘He was Sam Heywood’s last purchase,’ Minelli said. ‘No one rated him very highly so he came cheap and his contract is short. But there’s always pressure at clubs like this to sell the best players on. There’s never enough money.’ Suddenly his crumpled face took on an expression of tragic intensity. ‘If you’re talking to Jenna, tell her how crucial you think OK is to the team. She likes you. She’ll listen to you.’
‘Surely she wouldn’t sell him,’ Laura said.
‘There are people who would,’ Minelli said. ‘And he’s ambitious. What young man with his talent isn’t? I’m doing my best to keep him happy here, but you never know what others will offer. We pay him as much as we can afford, I helped him get a good car, a top-of-the-range Beamer, he has a nice flat, girls, whatever he wants. But I know that look in his agent’s eye. I see the pound signs there.’
Minelli took another pull at his drink and then smiled suddenly.
‘But I shouldn’t bore you with my troubles. And that’s all off the record, by the way. I almost forgot that a beautiful woman like you earns her living as a reporter.’ He put his arm around her waist and she could feel his hot hand move very close to her breast and she pulled away abruptly.
‘I must find my partner,’ she said, although she could see no sign of Thackeray in the milling and increasingly raucous crowd. But with a feeling of relief she did see Jenna Haywood moving towards her with a welcoming smile on her face. Minelli spotted her too, and with an ingratiating nod headed immediately in the opposite direction.
‘Hi,’ Jenna said. ‘I’m glad you could come. The egregious Paolo wasn’t bothering you, was he? Don’t give him any encouragement is my advice.’
‘Thanks,’ Laura said. ‘I’m certainly not going to do that. How’s it going? Has yesterday’s result made you a few more friends?’
‘Well, among the fans, maybe,’ Jenna said, with a wry smile. ‘Though they’re only as reliable as last Saturday’s result.’ She glanced around the room and fixed her gaze on the same group of middle-aged men to whom Ted Grant had been talking earlier.
‘I think Les Hardcastle’s still conniving to get me out,’ she said. ‘It’s not really results that interest him. He’s much more interested in selling United’s ground and – he says – moving out of the town centre. The plan is to buy a bigger tranche of land and build a new stadium with some sort of lucrative leisure complex attached. It’s not a bad idea, as it goes, but I reckon some of the directors wouldn’t be too upset if they didn’t have to bother with a stadium at all. I can’t prove that, of course, but football at this level is not a very cost-effective business. Everyone knows that. The shareholders would prefer a few other fish to fry. But for God’s sake, don’t say I said that.’
‘My father’s still got some shares, apparently,’ Laura said. ‘And he reckons someone’s trying to buy them up.’
Jenna looked at Laura in silence for a moment.
‘That doesn’t surprise me,’ she said. ‘You know I reckon all this stuff about not liking a woman running the club is a load of cobblers. The real reason they want to get rid of me is because I’m determined to keep the club alive for the fans. That’s what gets up their noses.’
‘You wouldn’t be thinking of selling OK Okigbo then?’ Laura asked. ‘Paolo Minelli seems to think you might.’
‘Do I look that stupid?’ Jenna said. ‘Managers at this level are always the same: they can’t decide whether they want to keep a brilliant player or sell him on and buy two or three cheaper ones. And I’m convinced some of them still line their own pockets during these transactions. Of course OK’ll go in the end. He’s bound to. He’ll want to move up to a bigger club and we’ll benefit from buying cheap and selling at a profit. Someone will make us an offer we can’t refuse. But I hope it won’t be soon. Anyway, I’ve got the majority of the shares safely locked up in my name, so they’re going to have a fight on their hands if they try any dirty tricks.’
‘Keep me in touch,’ Laura said lightly.
Jenna looked at her with a more serious expression than Laura had expected.
‘I will,’ she said. ‘I don’t trust your sports editor colleague. I reckon he’s in the pocket of Les Hardcastle and his
mates. And I’m not at all sure where your editor stands. This is a small town and he wields a lot of power.’
‘Ted Grant will stand wherever he reckons will do him a bit of good,’ Laura said candidly. ‘But he will listen if there’s a good story going. In the end he’s a newspaperman first and won’t let an exclusive pass him by. So let me know if you have trouble with Tony Holloway and there’s anything you think’s worth printing.’
Laura felt a hand on her arm and spun round, thinking Minelli had returned and ready to take him on, only to find Thackeray behind her, still holding the glass of tonic water with which he had started the evening. She introduced him briefly to Jenna, who nodded and half-turned away.
‘Good to meet you, but I have to circulate,’ she said. ‘Keep the troops motivated, and all that.’
Laura glanced at Thackeray, who seemed restless and unaccountably annoyed.
‘Is your back hurting?’ she asked quietly. But he shook his head.
‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘I just wondered who that dark-haired chap was who was pawing you.’
‘That’s the coach, Paolo Minelli,’ she said. ‘I can deal with him. He’s got a girlfriend here somewhere who’ll keep him in line anyway.’
‘How long do you want to stay?’ Thackeray asked.
Laura shook her head.
‘Let’s have something to eat and then we can go,’ she said, suddenly dispirited. ‘You go and look at the food. I just want to say hello to Les Hardcastle. He’s a friend of my father’s.’
She slipped away through the crowd but Thackeray did not take her advice. Instead he spotted the Nigerian striker Okigbo, less tall and more rounded than he expected the star player to be. He was on the other side of the room with another older, heavier black man beside him, whom he recognised as the man who had left the African Social Club that morning. The press of party-goers moved out of the way as he shouldered his way across the crowded room and he interrupted the two men’s conversation with a curt introduction.
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