by Guy Ware
I’m not likely to forget him.
14
IF IT WASN’T Likker trying to take money out of Likker’s bank account on Monday – and I was certain that it wasn’t: I had seen the man’s body rouged and waxed and laid out in the padded box before the box slid through the velvet curtains and the organ doodled portentously – then who exactly was it? And why?
Well, why was obvious enough – follow the money. What I really meant was: why was someone trying to access Eddie’s bank account now, when Eddie had been dead a month? Why did the bank not mention this to Proctorow? And apparently there was no money, anyway. Insufficient funds, Gerald had said, but surely the account should have been frozen? Knowing Eddie, his financial affairs would have been in excellent shape. Everything would have been prepared: it is extremely unlikely that the bank would not have been informed of his death. Yet, according to Gerald, the bank simply said there was no money in the account: which certainly does not sound like Eddie, either. Could the bank have been aware of the fraud? Or attempted fraud? Or whatever it was? Could they have been trying to cover something up? I thought about the interview room, about the poster on the wall, about the man I met with the pale skin and the acne, Meersow. Why had he been so keen to let me know about the second witness, the woman? He hadn’t told Proctorow about her.
I called Bernie, asked him to come back up to my office. He wasn’t keen, but I told him I needed to pick his brains. When he arrived, Karen let him walk right in without bothering to check, or even knock. He looked worse than ever; his face was pale and sweaty, the edges of his eyes were red. He looked at the carpet.
I told him to sit down and I asked him if the name Rada Kalenkova meant anything to him.
He looked up, his eyes met mine, and I got to see a faint light die right there in front of me. He looked away again. I remembered, then, and said, “I spoke to Moody. Don’t worry.”
“Don’t worry?”
“She says Proctorow’s an idiot.”
Bernie had his elbows on his knees. He curled forward and puts his head in his hands. He mumbled something I couldn’t hear.
“Moody says he’s just winding you up. Showing off. She says if we’d killed two people it would have been all over the news.”
Bernie didn’t move. I could see the scalp through the hair on the top of his head.
“Bernie?”
He sat up. When he spoke, he looked past me, out of the window, perhaps, but his eyes were unfocussed. His voice was flat. “If we robbed a bank and accidentally shot a woman, and one of us saved her life with a balaclava tourniquet, wouldn’t that be all over the news, too?”
He had a point. It seemed that I had not been paying sufficient attention. I said, “Moody didn’t shoot anyone.” I was almost certain I believed it.
“If you say so.”
I nodded, acknowledging his sarcasm. “There’s something else going on at that bank. Something that’s nothing to do with us. The manager showed me into the interview room I must have fired into. There were stains on the floor and fresh paint on the wall. But . . .”
“Whoa. Whoa!” Bernie sat up straight. “You went back to the bank? You must be out of your mind.”
I said, “At least you and Moody agree about that.”
“You stupid, stupid bastard. Sir.”
He said ‘sir’ the same way Moody had.
“According to the information they passed to your erstwhile colleagues, the man who wouldn’t get down on the floor was Eddie Likker.”
“But . . .”
“Quite.”
Bernie shook his head. “Mind you,” he said, “it’s the sort of thing Likker would do.”
“If he weren’t dead?”
“Obviously.” Bernie paused. “You’re sure?”
I nodded. “I saw him with my own eyes.”
“So . . . ?”
“The bank manager either doesn’t know Eddie’s dead – which I don’t believe – or he was lying. I just don’t know why. But he was very keen to tell me about the woman who followed the man who wasn’t Eddie.”
“That was Rada Kalenkova?”
So Bernie had been listening after all. “You know her?”
“I probably came across her dad. Pyotr Kalenkov. Aka Peter Caller; aka Pete the Pontiff. Because he could persuade you he was the Pope, if he had the mind. A conman who married well, by all accounts. And a mate of Likker’s.”
That took me by surprise.
“Eddie’s?”
Bernie laughed, relaxing now. “I know. Shocking, isn’t it? For an accountant your friend Mr Likker associated with a pretty low class of person. As well as with the high and mighty, of course . . .”
“So there could be a connection?”
“Who knows? Kalenkov’s been dead for years. His son found the body in the woods behind their house. That’s how I know the name. It was my case until the Chief called me in and told me it was suicide.”
“But it wasn’t?”
Bernie gave me that look again. “The coroner said it was.”
“So it was?”
“If you say so. Me, I’ve never come across another middle-aged man who got pissed and tranq’ed and slit his wrists successfully; certainly not a right-handed man who slit his right wrist first . . .”
I found myself looking at my wrists, imagining a knife. I wasn’t sure I wouldn’t start with the right wrist. Once you’d cut the left it wouldn’t be much use. But what did I know? I wasn’t a coroner; I wasn’t even a detective. Debits by the window; credits by the door.
Bernie said, “When the Chief told me, guess who was in the room?”
After a moment, it came to me. “Eddie?”
Bernie says, “You’d make a detective yet.”
“If I weren’t being sacked?”
“You want me to find her?”
“Could you?”
There was that look again. He said, “Of course I can. I work in HR.”
An hour later Bernie and I approached a terraced house in a late nineteenth-century suburb. There were trees and wide pavements and speed humps in the road. There were wooden shutters in the big bay windows. Ms Kalenkova must have been comfortable enough for a conman’s daughter. The door was answered by a man in an apron; his hands were covered in flour. Bernie said we were with the police – it was the same mis-truth I had used myself – and could we come in? The man in the apron looked uncertain, and didn’t step aside. Bernie said we were looking for Rada Kalenkova and it was obvious from his reaction that the man knew the name. Bernie said not to worry, she wasn’t in any trouble. She just had some information that we needed. The man said Rada wasn’t at home.
“And you are?”
“Gary Kalenkov.” He held up his hands to show he couldn’t shake because they were covered in flour; he looked as if he were surrendering.
I said, “Her brother?”
“Her husband. I took her name.”
Bernie tried not to laugh. I wondered whether it was just sexism or the fact that the woman’s name was fake anyway that had amused him. He said, “Can you tell us where your wife is, Mr Kalenkov?”
“It’s the middle of the afternoon. She’s at work.”
“And what does she do?”
“She’s a loss adjuster. Why do you want to talk to her?”
“Ah . . . One of her clients has died . . . We need a little background information, that’s all.”
I was admiring Bernie’s quick-wittedness until I thought: if we were interested in her because of her client, why would we ask what she does? And why wouldn’t we have rung her office? But the young man was laughing now. Bernie stopped and the silence demanded an explanation. Kalenkov wiped his hands on his apron and said, “Her clients are all dead, officer. That’s what she does.”
“No. No way.”
&
nbsp; “Bernie . . .”
“There is no fucking way I’m going back to that bank. And neither are you.”
It was four-thirty. We were on the broad pavement outside Rada Kalenkova’s house. It was still hot and we had retreated to the shade of a plane tree. Fat black ants with wings crawled around our shoes. I could see sweat moistening Bernie’s beard; above the hairline his cheeks had lost their pallor. I took this as a good sign.
I said, “If we’re quick we can get there before it closes.”
Gary Kalenkov had clammed up after his joke about his wife’s dead clients. He claimed not to know the name of the company his wife worked for, or where its offices were. He told us he had to go and collect his son from school. It was only when we made it clear that we were quite prepared to keep him there as long as it took, that he gave us Rada’s mobile number. As soon as he left, I called it: I told her voicemail that I was “with the police”, that I understood she had witnessed a bank robbery on Monday morning, and that I would very much like to talk to her. I said my name was Pitt.
Bernie asked why Pitt, and I said that was the name of my predecessor, the name I’d used at the bank. Then I thought about the deputy manager again, Meersow, and the way he’d winked at me. I said we had to go back and talk to him again, and Bernie said we shouldn’t.
At the bank I asked the cheerful-looking blonde woman if we could speak to Mr Meersow. After a moment’s hesitation and confusion, she showed us into an interview room. It was not the room I’d been in before, the one with the fresh paint and the poster, the one I accidentally fired into. Meersow’s thin frame entered the room sideways as if he was checking behind the door for a surprise attacker. I invited him to sit down as if this were not in fact his bank, but mine. I introduced Bernie as Detective Inspector Jenks. It was not untrue; as Karen had been so keen to remind him, Bernie retains his rank despite his transfer to HR. But it was not exactly true, either. I watched Meersow as I said it, and I felt rather than saw Bernie wince. Meersow may have noticed it too, because he seemed to relax a little. He nodded towards Bernie and then turned back to me. He said, “Forgive me, Mr Pitt, but I cannot recall your rank.” Which was because I had not given one, as I am sure he was aware. I am not a policeman, but as a department head I did in fact have an equivalent rank. I doubted that telling Meersow I was an Assistant Chief Constable would help – no real Assistant Chief Constable would be seen dead at a crime scene without cameras present.
Bernie rescued me. “Mr Meersow, the information you passed to my colleague indicated that the account from which the witness attempted to withdraw money was that of one Edward Likker.”
Meersow stroked his moustache, but said nothing.
“But the witness could not have been Edward Likker.”
Meersow nodded again. “Indeed.”
So the bank knew their customer was dead. I said, “Why was the account still open?”
“Because Mr Likker left specific instructions that it was to remain open until we received further notification from his solicitor.”
“Why?”
“He did not share his intentions with the bank, Mr Pitt.”
Bernie said, “So why was the account empty?”
Meersow turned his colourless eyes to Bernie. “Because, Detective Inspector, all of the funds had been withdrawn on Friday of last week.”
“By?”
“Matthew Rodkin, I would imagine.”
We waited.
“Mr Likker’s solicitor. Mr Likker had given him power of attorney.”
I said, “How much was in the account?”
“Four hundred and fifty thousand pounds. Plus interest.”
Bernie whistled through his teeth. All cops watch watch too much TV. He said, “Do you have an address for this Rodkin?”
Meersow smiled, thin lips curling back over surprisingly large front teeth. “Rodkin died at the weekend. Apparently he slit his own throat with a breadknife. Do you not read the papers? I understand your . . . colleagues . . . do not consider the circumstances to be suspicious.”
I didn’t like the way he said ‘colleagues’. I said, “You didn’t mention any of this to DS Proctorow?”
“He didn’t ask.”
Bernie said, “This four-fifty. Did Rodkin take a banker’s draft?”
Meersow interlaced his long fingers and rested his chin upon them.
“The money was withdrawn in cash, Detective Inspector. I arranged the withdrawal myself. We don’t usually carry that much currency, you know.”
And there it was again, that twitch, the faintest muscular spasm just below his right eye that could have been a wink.
Outside on the pavement Bernie whistled again and said, “You want to check out Rodkin’s place?”
“I think we’d better.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
I waited for him to make a call, to find out where we had to go.
“Bill?”
“What?”
“You know we picked the wrong day to knock this place off.”
“Four hundred and fifty thousand pounds?”
“And change.”
“It’s just the chips, Bernie.”
Bernie pulled out his mobile and made a couple of calls. A few minutes later, we were heading back to the suburbs. We’d pick up Moody on the way.
15
WHEN HE LEAVES the café D tells me not under any circumstances whatsoever to go to Rodkin’s place or anywhere near it, or in the same postcode, even, and I won’t. But despite there being nowhere that I actually have to go, and the fact that the two places other than Rodkin’s flat I might choose to go – viz work and home – are both at least temporarily off-limits for different, albeit related, reasons, I can’t just sit here, in the café, all day. I have no book, no phone, or at least I have only a dead phone, a phone I’ve killed, and no work, on account of not actually being supposed to be working, I have nothing to do at all, so I cannot stay here, in the café, without experiencing considerable boredom, which I am not good at, and without attracting, after a while, the attention of the staff who might reasonably expect me to buy something to justify occupying a table no one else will use while I am here. They will not say anything, at first – they know me here, or at least they recognise me; I’ve been here before with D, and with Gary, who engages the owner in detailed conversations regarding the provenance of her coffee beans, the treatment of the soil and the employment practices on the various estates, which conversations the owner seems more than happy to engage in, although, after a while, I notice that she finds other tasks increasingly absorbing and distracting and eventually urgent. Now I think of it, I’ve been here with Matthew, too, and even Alex; it is the café we sometimes come to on a Sunday when Gary has not actually for whatever reason baked croissants or brioche or Danish, in view of all which, the staff will probably hold back for a while, in recognition of our previous acquaintance, and the regularity of my custom, and of the fact that it is not, now, in the early afternoon, the busiest time of day. But eventually one of them – the short woman, perhaps, with the pig-tails and the metal spike through her eyebrow and two more spikes through her lower lip and the Doctor Marten boots; Lauren, I think, or Laura, or Lara, I’ve never actually used her name, or been introduced, but I’ve overheard her talking with the owner – Lara will stroll past my table and ask – politely, not hassling me or anything, but letting me know all the same that she’s noticed how long I’ve been sitting here, not buying coffee, or cake or a herbal infusion – whether there is anything she can get me? And once, maybe twice, I could say I’m fine, thanks, and smile, and she would have to go away because, after all, it is a café and people sit in cafes and she wouldn’t be able to make a fuss or say what she and her colleague – Ray? Rory? – would actually be thinking because it wouldn’t be polite and might cause a scene they wouldn’t want. A
s time drags on, though, and teatime approaches and the café begins to fill up again, it will be harder, if not impossible, for me to say I’m fine and not buy anything, which is the problem. Because the fact is that when I went to the bank on Monday it was to pay in the cheque Gary’s mother sent for Matthew’s birthday and also to withdraw cash from my own account, which I was waiting to do when the gunmen – actually two gunmen and one gunwoman – entered the bank and began to shout and wave their guns about and tell us all to get down on the floor, which I did, as a result of which I never actually got around to withdrawing any cash or depositing the cheque and now, sitting in the café where I have already ordered and drunk a cappuccino and D has left without paying for his hot chocolate w/marshmallows and sandwich, or panini, or whatever, I realise that I have no money. Not exactly no money – nobody has no money; or almost nobody – but in this case what I have is £7.36 and I’m not sure that will even cover what D and I already owe, let alone allow me to order anything more, and the longer I sit here, not ordering, not responding to Lara’s obvious invitations to order something, the more embarrassing it will be both in general and in the specific circumstances that £7.36 proves insufficient to meet my existing obligations. Which, it turns out, it is, but it’s close enough for Rory, or Ray, who happens to be nearest to the till when I finally get up to leave, to make a bit of a joke about and tell me I can give him the rest the next time I’m in. Which, if I had known he was likely or able to do I might have been tempted to order another coffee after all, but now of course it is too late.