The Boardman Files

by Gus Ross

  With a momentary pause that seemed just long enough to let the fear set in, a second chamber discharged; this time sending a bullet straight between the eyes of its victim. Pete White crumpled to the bare concrete floor, the reflex tightening of his index finger sending one solitary shot high up into the roof space. Save for disturbing a handful of pigeons, there was not a soul to witness the executions, not a soul that was except the executioner. He quickly dismantled the long range rifle and placed the pieces neatly into a dark cloth bag which he slung across his shoulder.

  Targets three and four had now been dispatched.

  Like taking candy from a baby.

  He would always welcome such a straightforward gig, not like the other two, they had been a real challenge. He was satisfied with his work and this was one scene that he could happily leave just as it was; two ‘connected’ thugs whose boss had just come to an untimely end, all the hallmarks of the usual turf wars again

  He walked the short distance across waste-land to where he had parked his vehicle and opened the boot, raising the carpeted section to reveal the compartment that normally houses the tool kit and wheel changing accessories. He carefully placed the bag containing his rifle into the space and dropped the carpeted section back into place.

  It was the stupidest of things really; one of those unforeseeable twists of fate that sometimes seem to just conspire against you and without which perhaps everything would have turned out differently. Almost as if the great card player in the sky had decided that you held too many aces and he was going to level the playing field by throwing in a joker.

  And there it was, as the silent assassin drove away from the scene of his latest successful endeavour, PC Plod and his merry men sat at the side of the road leading out towards the dual carriageway, having set up one of those temporary exhaust emission checks that you see twice in a lifetime if you are unlucky. One of those annoyingly, unnecessary things that are designed to really piss off the average motorist, but thankfully only pull over a small random selection of the vehicles that pass their way.

  Only this time the random vehicle they were flagging down had a lot more going on than just an old, inefficient exhaust. It would only be a matter of moments before it was identified as stolen and the driver had no intention of letting that happen.

  He slowed momentarily, as if about to comply with the officer who was ushering him into the cordoned off area, and then gunned the engine. The vehicle’s front end twitched as the tyres squealed in protest, desperately grasping for grip on the damp tarmacadam and for a split second it seemed that he was not moving at all. Then the car shot forward, almost taking out the officer who was standing in the road still ludicrously waving his arm, intent on pulling this particular vehicle in for testing.

  His partner who was behind the wheel of the police BMW, which was situated behind the emissions test van, heard what was happening before he saw it. He reacted instinctively, pressing the start button, throwing her into gear, and hitting the blues and twos almost at the same time. The officer with the waving arms had now sprinted to the passenger side of the BMW and jumped into the already moving vehicle.

  The stolen car, an old MK IV Golf GTI (if only everything in life was as reliable), had a head start on the police vehicle, which had also managed to temporarily wedge one of the traffic cones, cordoning off the testing area, under its offside front wheel; it speed down the road towards a large roundabout that sat beneath the flyover section of the dual carriageway ahead.

  It was a busy road at the best of times, feeding two on and off ramps and also a main route into the west end of the city, and today was no different. Three cars sat patiently giving way to the traffic from the right, awaiting their turn to enter the roundabout, but this was no time to play nicely; the driver of the GTI swerved out onto the other side of the road directly into the path of the oncoming traffic that had just exited the roundabout. It was all about nerve now; lose it and there would be tears, keep it and you might just come up smelling of roses.

  The road was just about wide enough to squeeze two vehicles on either side, but that was without taking into account the residents parking and also the Reginald Molehusband (that great sixties public information film icon), driving, that passed as acceptable for anyone of that era.

  The driver of the first oncoming vehicle was not quite that old, but swerved violently to avoid impact with the Golf and duly smashed into the side of one of the parked cars with a reassuring crunch of metal. The second slammed the brakes but could not avoid the slewed vehicle in front and caught the offside rear end, pushing it outwards and into the path of the GTI, whose driver immediately swerved back in to avoid a head on impact and then immediately back out again to avoid the line of cars still waiting patiently to enter the roundabout. But the man at the wheel of the third oncoming vehicle, who had been paying no attention at all, would have definitely identified with Reggie Molehusband, and who was more interested in finding his Val Doonican CD than watching the road, duly ploughed headlong into the Golf, with a sickening crunch of metal and crash of glass.

  The impact speed, which would have been close to 60 mph, was enough to throw the third car across into the opposite lane of well behaved motorists and send the Golf spinning, until it came to rest, drivers side wedged firmly against a parked 4x4.

  The driver of the Golf could not have gotten out even if he had been in a fit state to. As it was, his head slumped forward, blood oozing from a deep gash to the side. He would not recover consciousness, and eventually, when the police had discovered the contents in the boot of his car, he would be linked to the murder of two of Osram’s boys, not a mile from the scene of his fatal crash.

  When it came to identifying who he was, there would be no record whatsoever.

  The man was a ghost.

  Mac Howison was breathing a little easier as he watched the latest Sky News report on the oversized flat screen that hung in his office. Normally the sound would be muted and his attention would only occasionally be diverted to the endless scroll of ‘Headlines’ that ran across the bottom of the screen, most of which were of little interest to him, but this time he had the sound up.

  “The bodies of two men, whom Police have identified as known associates of suspected crime boss Stanley ‘The Knife’ Osram, who himself was identified as the victim of a serious road accident just a few days earlier, have been discovered in a disused industrial unit in the East side of London. At this stage it is believed that both victims died from single shots to the head and that Police are understood to be following lines of enquiry linking this to a suspected turf war that has been escalating in the East side of the city over the last few weeks. We cross to our London correspondent Jonathan Hughes for the latest update...”

  Howison returned the sound to mute and went back to his desk.

  Watt moved across the empty incident room towards the whiteboard, which was stuffed with the usual pictures, post-its, and random looking scribblings linking everything together, or at least trying to. In the middle of the board was a picture of Stanley Osram and below that, one of the R.T.A. they had recovered his body from. Watt was amazed that there had been anything to recover.

  On the left hand side there was a picture of DC Buckfield and a couple of the car park where he had been murdered. He stared hard at those for almost a full minute, as if trying to almost ingrain the images on the back of his retina for future reference. There were some comments regarding phone calls between the two men on a yellow post-it, but he was pleased to see nothing that mentioned the files he had discussed with Bright.

  “Admiring the board Sarge?” DI Bright’s arrival in the room had gone unnoticed and Watt turned to meet him.

  “Hadn’t seen the car park photo’s until now. Shit business this.”

  “Thanks for those files by the way. Very interesting. Managed to crack them open eventually and I’m sorry to say it, but I think you were right about Buckfield.”

  “As I said, this is a shit bus
iness.”

  Bright nodded almost imperceptibly, he did not like it one bit when they found a dirty copper, especially a dead one, but all the evidence was pointing in Buckfield’s direction. “Did you hear the news regarding two of Osram’s boys?” Watt shook his head, so he continued. “Two of them found shot through the head this afternoon down at the old East Dockland Industrial estate. Seems whatever is going on just got a little bit messier. My boys are down there now.”

  “Really. Sounds like maybe someone might be muscling in on Osram’s patch.” Watt wasn’t sure he really believed his own words, they sounded right but they just didn’t feel right, and DI Bright did not respond.

  “So what have you got for me this time Sergeant? Some more files on Osram?”

  “No, but what I do have is very interesting. We had a dead body recovered from the Churn a few days back. Had a report of some men in a dark van seen apparently disposing of it into the river which Buckfield followed up, but we didn’t find anything at the time. Then a few days later the body shows up, only now the autopsy confirms he died from a single shot to the head before being tossed in the Churn.”

  “Hmm, just like Osram’s boys,” interjected Bright, but Watt continued.

  “That’s not the good part Sir. Turns out this guy worked for an Organisation called C.E.R.N. You heard of them?”

  “Yes, I have actually. Seen some stuff before on Horizon, or something like that. They have that particle accelerator thingy. What’s it called? The Hydron something or other?”

  “The Large Hadron Collider,” corrected Watt.

  “Yeah, that’s it. So your body worked for those guys. I’m still not sure I get where this is going Sergeant.”

  “Two things Sir. Firstly I called C.E.R.N and spoke to a Stephan Meyer. It seems that Lucian Hendrick, the guy we pulled from the river, was supposed to be in London to pick up some kind of information for Meyer, except he never reported back, and therefore, presumably was killed before he had the chance. Meyer was not too forthcoming about the whole thing, downright cagey I’d say, and I can see a visit being necessary to speak to him in more detail, but it’s the second thing that really set the alarm bells ringing.”

  “Ok, go on. This is all getting rather interesting.”

  “I got the ballistics report back on the bullet they pulled from Hendrick’s skull. Seems that the weapon used to murder our man from C.E.R.N. was also used in a murder committed last year. Only it was one of those investigations that Buckfield had on his files, one of the ones that didn’t go anywhere, but not one of the ‘Access Restricted’ ones I gave to you earlier.

  “Now that is interesting. I think we need to have a little sit down and try and piece this one together Sarge. Let’s get a brew from the canteen first. I reckon we could be in for a long day.”

  “Have to admit I can’t get it out of my head. That’s why I wanted to speak with you Sir. The file in question did not mention Osram but I kept thinking what if it was one of his boys, or someone related to him and Buckfield had covered it up. And if this guy from C.E.R.N. was killed by the same gun, and then Osram gets killed and Buckfield, well then it really starts to get interesting, don’t you think? And now you say two of Osram’s crew have been taken out today. There is something going on and it feels big, I’m just not sure what it is yet.”

  “Let’s get some tea first, eh. I always think a bit clearer once I’ve had a brew.”

  Bright already knew that this had all the hallmarks of something that might soon be taken out of his hands; he had spent years looking into Osram and had come up against too many closed doors for it all to be down to DC Buckfield.

  Whoever had been protecting Osram sat quite a bit further up the food chain and sooner or later he knew he would come up against the same obstacles as before.

  But he was going to shake the tree as hard as he could in the meantime, and see just what sort of monkey might fall out.

  Chapter 15: Chess.

  Sternie had clearly been up for quite a while and had the look of someone who had spent most of it doing what must have been a fairly rigorous exercise regime; his face was ruddy and there were still beads of sweat sitting patiently on his forehead, as if, having negotiated their way through his thick mop of hair, they were now teasing each other about who should go first. He was sitting at a long wooden breakfast table in what was quite a modern looking kitchen, slurping at his tea.

  “Sleep well?”

  “Not bad considering. You?”

  Surprisingly I had managed a good night’s rest, but my old crazy head was off and running again when I finally came to. “Pretty good. There’s a lot to take in.”

  “Yeah well I suppose there is no point hiding the family silver from you now, seeing as the old man gave you a fair idea of what’s going on.” Sternie seemed different somehow, almost as if a weight had been lifted from his broad shoulders.

  “I reckon you could still enlighten me on one or two things don’t you?” I raised my eyebrows in an expectant, questioning way, but I was still pretty certain anything he might tell me would be a long way short of full disclosure.

  “Fire away and we’ll see where we get to.”

  I was beginning to warm to the new Sternie, but had no intention of wading in all guns blazing and watch him clam up on me. “Ok, why don’t we start with the two goons that tried to put my lights out back at my place? Or what was my place,” I said, quickly correcting myself to reflect the sad demise of my own little stake in the property market.

  “Ruskies. Most likely looking for your wife, or what she stole. You just walked into the wrong place at the wrong time, although of course, fortunately for you, I was not far behind.”

  I had to laugh at the one, “Not far behind! I don’t recall anyone else in the room when I was doing my James Bond / Bruce Willis cameo and taking out the bad guys.”

  “I’ll give you that one,” said Sternie, between more annoying slurps of tea.

  “So tell me, what did she steal?” I tried my damnedest to make the question sound as if I wasn’t desperate for the answer, but it didn’t work.

  “Next question, I’m afraid.”

  “Ok, so what about your crazy sidekick; old shark eyes. What side was he bating for?” That one had been puzzling me for some time; in all good spy films I had seen there were usually just two sides; the good guys and the bad guys, but I was struggling to keep up with the plot of this one.

  “Now that is the right question. I’ve been working on that one for some time now; infiltrated that little lot about ten months or so ago and have been trying to figure out who was calling the shots ever since. Shark eyes, now that I like; he was a right bastard that one. You definitely got lucky having me on your side that time.”

  I was keen not to let Sternie stray from the point, deliberate or otherwise, so I interjected, “And....?”

  “Yes, well we are still trying to get to the top of that tree. We have a pretty good idea who is pulling the strings, if you like, but you’ll understand that we can’t go throwing wild aspersions around until we have something concrete to go on.”

  In fairness, Sternie knew that they were still some way off from unmasking the grand puppeteer, but he was not about to share that with me.

  “So you don’t know, or you won’t tell me, which is it?”

  “Let’s say the latter for now. But I have a hunch it will all become a bit clearer in the days to come. We are heading for the end game.”

  I wasn’t sure I liked the sound of that. Sure I was keen as mustard to get this all over and done with, but there was something in the way that Sternie had said it that made me realise that nothing would go back to normal.

  Sternie was a real pro, the real deal, if I had been half as sharp as I thought I was, I would have seen where this was all heading. I reckon I would still have missed it though, even if Elton on steroids had asked me to roll over so that he could spread the butter up and down the other side.

  “So what was that you
were saying about a body being thrown in a river?” This time it was Sternie who asked the question with feigned indifference, which was entirely unnecessary; I was more than happy to share my little piece of intel’, after all I was in the spy game now and of course I had just been nicely buttered up.

  “A few days back, Monday. Was on my way to work, just coming over the Churn on the B4696 when I saw two guys throwing what looked like a body into the river. Like a good little citizen I reported it to plod, and the next thing I know I’m being treated like a suspect.”

  Sternie was off and running now, before I had even had the chance to pour myself a cup of tea he had pretty much gotten chapter and verse of the whole sorry debacle out of me.

  What I failed to register was just how interested he had been; I was too absorbed in downloading every little detail, nook, and cranny of what had happened. They say a good confession purges the soul, although I was in no way religious, so had no idea how a proper confession really made you feel, but my download did seem to help. I wanted to tell him everything and so I did. It wasn’t until a good while later that I realised that our little exchange had been a tad one sided and that maybe this whole pally chat thing had been just a bit too contrived.

  I was back in my room, not really sure what it was I was supposed to do, or be doing, when my mobile rang.

  “Dave. Is that you? Dave, can you hear me?”

  I could hear her alright, I just couldn’t speak. I had no idea what to say, and then I did.

  “Yeah, it’s me, but who the hell are you?” It was my wife’s turn to go quiet for a second.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I think you know what I mean. Five years! Five years together and you fail to tell me you’re a Russian spy. A bloody Russian spy for fuck’s sake!” I was shouting at the phone now, shouting at her, shouting at the whole bloody mess.