"Jess!" said Eva. But the girl ignored her, and in the end, Eva let her go. There were more pressing matters. Jess stomped past the windows of the office into the windy afternoon.
"What's up with her?" said Dan.
"You know what's up with her, and you can fix it later."
Dan said nothing, but his face spoke his guilt. He'd been found out.
"Come on. I said we'd be twenty minutes. You can drive."
When Eva most needed to be in control, when the Halliwell fraud needed Jess's careful eyes, and now with a high profile case landing in their lap, Eva felt anything but in control. And having Dan by her side, his new edginess...didn't bode well. Right when she wanted to be the captain of the ship, Dan had gone and broken the bloody tiller. Now she'd have to fix it, and get in control again. As she got into Dan's old black Jag Eva's stomach span, reminding her of the moment on the summit of a roller-coaster when your stomach floats in the air. The moment before you plunge into a vertical fall.
Three
They arrived at the busy car park next to the black-grey tower block of the Civic Centre, where the rules of the town were made and taxes collected. The big ornate clock on the front of the building chimed four o’clock as they got out of the car. High above the Union Jack flapped hard in the wind. Dan’s car, but it definitely wasn’t the finest Dan had ever driven. They bought an hour’s parking, walked into the building, and a minute later found the canteen. For a place where people exercised some kind of power, the surroundings were not impressive. It looked like any work canteen, with cheap blond wood tables and uncomfortable chairs. Yet this was where the officers and Councillors of the town’s local government ate sandwiches and jacket potatoes while discussing their latest petty plots. By now the place was empty except for two middle aged suits and a dumpy woman who was busy eating a hill of sandwiches. In the far corner- in the far right - was a table of eight men in dark suits, their faces as serious as their body language. Their demeanour was quiet, angry and defensive. Dan noticed almost every man had either a shaven head or a buzz-cut except for a smaller man in their midst sporting a short back and sides with a side parting. The men were all middle-aged. Receding hairlines might have been the excuse for so many buzz cuts. Eva noticed them too. She fixed a business like smile, and with feminine confidence walked into a nest of masculine self-opinion. Yes, the man with the hair was Councillor Peter Serge. He was the smallest one - a narrow faced man with big dark eyes and a scar on his cheek, the one with the side parting. He looked at Eva as she approached, said something quickly to the others and they looked around at her. A few of them were smirking. Sexism. It just never grew tired or hackneyed. Not at all.
“Will Burton asked me to come and meet with you,” said Eva. Forthright. Taking the lead. She watched Peter Serge for his response. It came exactly as she expected.
“No, I called you. I spoke to Will.” Serge turned his narrow pouting face to Dan. “Is your name Bradley?”
Dan nodded. Serge started up again. “I asked you to come here. Will Burton is indisposed at the moment. He shouldn’t even be making calls. He’s in hospital with his family.”
“Either way, we’re here,” said Eva.
“Before we start. Which of you is paying us?” asked Dan. The question irked Eva straight away. It wasn’t the way Eva would have gone about it. But she knew Dan was setting the tone just as Serge had done. They weren’t going to be cosy with these people. Injured son or not, this arrangement was going to mean business with people they wouldn’t like.
“Don’t worry UKFirst is good for your fee.”
Eva shrugged. The men didn’t invite her to sit, but Eva knew good psychology. She walked forward to the table, keeping her strident manner, took an empty seat and sat down, pushing herself close amongst the men. The men hesitated then submitted, and moved apart to make room. The huddle was broken. Eva had won. Dan followed suit and sat down opposite Eva.
She remembered Peter Serge’s unusual face from the local newspaper. Serge was one of the newest Councillors in the Borough, one of the rainbow coalition of parties which had taken power at the last election. UKFirst had its first local Councillor in Peter Serge. But getting a Councillor was nothing compared to the prospect of getting an MP at Westminster. Serge had local influence, but Will Burton would put UKFirst on the national stage. Maybe even the European stage.
“We’re hiring you because this is a sensitive situation, and we’re not sure the police are best placed to deal with this fairly.”
“Why? Because they don’t like Nazis?” said Dan. Eva rolled her eyes and the big men around Serge looked at him. Dan wore a ‘what, me?’ smile on his face.
“Au contraire, Mr Bradley. The police are full of people who like using truncheons and Tasers on our black, yellow and brown friends. The police are very right wing. But the management - the officers - are very media conscious and are therefore at the whim of the press and government. And it’s those fools who’ve taken against us, so we can’t ever truly know if Will Burton’s family will be properly protected. And that’s not on. Some groups would gladly see Will Burton smashed to pieces just so as UKFirst don’t get what’s coming – what’s rightfully ours.”
“Nothing’s rightfully yours. Especially not until an election win in a democracy.” said Dan.
“The polls say otherwise, Mr Bradley. By the way, I should correct your misapprehension. We are not a right-wing party. We are pro-British centrists. We love this country - we love and respect British rights and traditions. But don’t confuse us with those BNP idiots. That would be a heinous insult. We are safely on the middle ground, Mr Bradley. We’ve got opinions just like yours.”
“You’re full of it. You’ll come out of the closet when you win.”
“See, even you say we’re going to win it. But only if our main man is protected and his family are safe. We can’t let soft policing or some violent bloody anarchist throw us of course. Now let’s leave the politics alone for a little while, shall we. We have to handle those arguments all day long. This is important. This is about Will Burton’s son.”
Dan opened his mouth again, but Eva cut across him. “Absolutely. We are here to work. So, what happened, as far as you know?”
“Will got home on a lunch break from campaigning, then we were going to head out again canvassing door to door in Southchurch. His son Jerry was home. So was Dawn, his wife. Jerry was in another part of the house. Will was eating a sandwich in his office, then says he heard a funny noise but thought nothing of it, so he carried on eating his lunch and made some calls. He called me, just a chat about the canvassing route and the aggro we could face from the lefties down there. We had a laugh and finished the call. Five minutes after that he went to take his plate back to the kitchen and found his son sprawled on the hallway floor with the front door wide open. Jerry was unconscious and bleeding from a wound on his forehead. He thought the boy was dead at first.”
“Does Mr Burton know what caused the injury? Any obvious weapon?”
“Well, it wasn’t a knife, was it? On the top of his head, just where his forehead and hairline meet. He had to have been hit with something heavy.”
Eva nodded- it was a reasonable assessment. “Can I speak to Mr Burton?”
“Sure. But we wanted to meet you first… To see if you were any good.”
Eva looked away from Peter Serge’s dark and devious eyes. They were unpleasant and sexual. Not at all alluring, just full of innuendo. The man was revolting.
“Who do you think did it, Mr Serge?”
Serge looked around. “I don’t know.” He made a theatrical sweep of his hand. “Anyone of a thousand people. Half the country loves us, and half the country despise us because they think we are the BNP. People hate the BNP with a passion. And I get that, but by association, the loony left hate us too. But the association is in their imagination. The attacker could be anyone of them - a rogue from out of town, one of those hard core hippies who sit outside banks in tents. Or
it could have been a totally irrational and unprovoked attack by a nutter. There are enough nutters in this bloody town to have a thousand suspects.”
Serge looked at Eva, waiting for her response. Serge’s men soon joined in the staring game.
Eva took her time. This was her test. “Irrational and unprovoked? That’s highly unlikely. Your man Will Burton faces a by-election with national implications next week. He’s doing TV and press conferences every day right now. You’ve never had a profile like this before, have you? The chances of this being a random attack are incredibly slim, Mr Serge. No. I would bet the attack can only be motivated by the election. It could be even be an effort to derail the campaign. Equally it could be a reverse hate crime, as in hate the haters. People think you are evil - that your party is evil. Some people, given half the chance would rather see you hurt than elected. It’s a fact, Mr Serge. You know that. But attacking a young man in broad daylight? That takes a special kind of vindictive determination, and as you are right to say, this could be a mental health issue.”
“Care in the community. Just one of the failed social policies we plan to address, Miss Roberts. Once we are in power.”
Eva ignored him. “An attack as brutal as this suggests a warped mind. This was a brutal and violent attack in a busy part of the day. It suggests someone who has lost control. I’d say this person has probably attacked people before.”
“So, will they try it again?”
“It’s hard to say. If they have a plan then you have just a five day window for that. After that, time for any political attack will be finished. This time next week, for a day, maybe a week, Will Burton will be famous, but soon after that Mr Burton will be just another MP, joining 350 others. As soon as people realise your party will fade into the Westminster political pack, the risk against Mr Burton’s family will diminish very quickly. Whoever did this will be thinking about your man for a little while, but it will soon blow over.”
Serge looked at Dan Bradley. “You don’t rate our chances then, Miss Roberts?”
“Oh, I think you can win. I just hope you don’t, is all.”
Serge sucked on his teeth, turned and looked at Dan Bradley.
“So you let her do all the talking, do you?”
Dan smiled. “When she’s talking sense, why not?”
“I don’t ask anyone’s permission, Mr Serge. I never have and I never will,” said Eva.
Serge looked at her, then back at Dan once more. Dan shrugged. “Eva’s right. If this was just politics they would have egged him, maybe even attacked him on camera. But attacking the man’s son? On his doorstep? No way. This one is a nutcase. Or he’s close to home.”
“He?”
“He. She. It. Whatever, and if they’re nuts or have a vendetta they’re likely to strike again,” said Dan.
A few of the middle-aged skinheads were looking at Dan closely. Eva knew they were wondering about the rough texture of pink scars on his cheeks and chin. She wanted to change their focus.
“So did I pass the test, Mr Serge?”
“With flying colours, Miss Roberts.”
Eva shook the man’s hand but felt Dan’s burning disapproval. She was dancing with the devil. That was what Dan would say. She looked at Dan and felt the accusation coming from his eyes, coming from him in waves. Surely, Dan knew how it was. This was business. Sometimes sacrifices had to be made if you wanted to earn a living. Besides this wasn’t about UKFirst’s politics. This was about a son who had been brutally attacked in his own home. She told herself the words again over and over. But after shaking Peter Serge’s hand, Eva felt it needed washing. The dark-eyed man made her skin crawl… and all the while Eva kept an even smile and held his stare.
When they were back in the Jag Dan didn’t complain. He didn’t say a word. He kept driving. Eva wasn’t in the mood to be judged again. She’d been judging herself already. Though Dan hadn’t said a word, her inner voice was saying Dan was right. She was a sell-out. She was as bad as Peter Serge by virtue of agreeing to work for the man. Eva wanted to be rid of the guilt and unease but there was no way she could jettison a case she had needed so much. So she would do the job well by ignoring Dan, by steering clear of Jess’s emotional games, by focussing on the young man Jerry Burton who she knew did not deserve to be a victim.
But Eva was wrong. She didn’t truly know what Dan was thinking. Dan was busy repelling something attacking him from the edges of his thinking. They weren’t thoughts. They were feelings. Anxiety was creeping in fast and low from the edges of his mind. Something about Peter Serge was terrible and familiar. And it wasn’t because of his photograph in the newspapers. Dan didn’t understand it at all…
Or maybe, he was blocking, and he just didn’t want to understand. Not yet. Not ever.
Four
The next morning it was clear that the long hot summer was waning. The morning light in the office was weak. So far no one had thought to put on the light. Worse, the office was the kind of silent that comes from an atmosphere of disagreement. It was tense, and Eva didn’t like it, and having to fix the team dynamic all the time was grating on her. So she pretended there was no problem when the problems were plain to all concerned. Eva was well used to planning and brainstorming cases by herself. In the old days she used to use the laptop or the iPad, but with Jess and Dan on the team those tools seemed a little anti-social, and she needed their input and validation to make sure she was on the right track. Eva made a fuss of dragging the flipchart stand across the floor to get some attention. She stood the board by the coffee pot and snatched up a marker pen. Jess looked up at Eva with a quizzical and derisory smile. The girl was not one for brown-nosing her boss, or being in the least deferential when in a bad mood. And no matter how little Eva liked sycophants, she could have done with far less attitude from her protégé today. Eva’s conscience was already playing a little mood music about the fact she was working for people many thought of as Neo-Nazis. Including Eva herself.
“Look. I know you think the flipchart is for show. But this isn’t for anyone’s special benefit. I just want both the input from both of you on this and this is a way to get it. After all, what’s the point of having a team if we all work like lone-rangers?”
“You tell me,” muttered Jess. Eva rolled her eyes and sighed. Jess looked away. Enough was enough. It was time to put the house in order.
“Less of the attitude, Jess, or you’ll be on Halliwell’s spreadsheets until home time.”
“Eva, what exactly is the flipchart for?” said Dan.
“Brainstorming the Burton case.”
Eva wrote Will Burton in the centre of the sheet and circled the name. She drew an offshoot bubble with Peter Serge in it, along with another circle mentioning his consorts at the Civic Centre canteen. Other names included Dawn Burton and Jerry Burton, the injured son.
“How bad is the boy? Do we know?” asked Dan.
“Will Burton said the son is unconscious and heavily medicated. He’s in a medically induced coma, but they think he would come out of it if they stopped the meds. They had significant concern about concussion, and believed there could be some swelling of the brain. They planned to keep him under sedation and monitored for a few days before they take him off the meds. The blood loss was substantial and they had to do a transfusion to compensate. Blood loss from the scalp can be very heavy.”
“So, is he going to live?” said Jess.
“Yes. But they have to be cautious. There is a chance of brain damage, slight but present,” said Eva.
“Okay. So how long until election day?” said Jess.
“The polls open four days from now. Which means Jerry should still be in hospital by then, just about to be discharged if all goes well.”
“Hmmmm. Knowing Will Burton it’s hard to guess what he would rather happen. Get his son free from hospital or keep him safely locked up so he can kiss clean white babies on Election Day?”
“Dan, he may be a right-winger, but the man is st
ill a father. He will want his son well. The man will be worried to leave his bedside, especially seeing as most of his local UKFirst comrades seem to suspect a political extremist behind the attack.”
“If it was an extremist, he’d be no less extreme than UKFirst. Those guys are fanatics. You realised that, right?”
“I didn’t magically realise anything, Dan. Most of those guys had cropped hair. And some of them were sexist, yes. But the same goes for most middle-aged men who work at Civic Centre. As for their creed and politics, I don’t do surmising.”
“You don’t have to surmise. That’s the beauty of the internet, Eva. I’ve been doing my homework on UKFirst, Eva, and I don’t like them anymore than I did yesterday.”
“Surprise, surprise,” said Jess.
“These people said they represent a moderate middle-ground party. But half of the names around that table yesterday were former members of the British National Party.”
“And that’s a fact? That’s not your spider sense tingling?” said Jess.
“Hey, sweetie. I’ll take the smart Alec stuff from Eva, but not you. This is from research. Have you heard of it?”
“I had. But you? You’re kidding.”
Eva ignored their argument and pressed on.
“What about the rest of them who weren’t in the BNP?”
“Which half a table of Nazis isn’t enough for you?”
“I’m interested, Dan. Look, I’m writing it down and everything.” Eva scribbled another circle, and wrote ‘ex-BNP associates’ in it.
“The rest are ex-Conservatives. True blues from the furthest right end of the party.”
“So they’re not all out and out head-cases. Which means the BNP guys may be reformed characters.”
“Eva, come on. These are not former dope smokers here. These guys are close to psychotic.”
Divide and Rule Page 2