‘You’re going to think I’m crazy.’ Raif shook his head in disbelief. ‘He said his old man was the American consul in London. He couldn’t get anyone to believe him. He said they’d fallen out and the old man wouldn’t speak to him or give him any more money.’
She pointed a finger at him. ‘You, don’t go anywhere.’ She grabbed a phone and called John May’s extension. ‘John, it looks like we have a lead on the boy they found in our basement.’
* * *
—
Longbright stood just beyond the doorway of Raymond Land’s office.
‘Don’t hover at the threshold,’ called Land irritably. ‘You’re not Dracula waiting to be invited in.’
The two Daves had assured him they would find a door that fitted properly and fix it in place. So far they had come up with a pair of hinged brackets and an indentation chiselled into the frame for a strike-plate, but no actual door. Now that his divorce was through, Land’s New Year resolution had been to become technically adept on handheld devices so that he could register to start online dating, but filling in the profile had utterly defeated him. Lately he had been feeling increasingly useless. He couldn’t even get his office door fixed.
‘What do you need me for?’ he snapped.
‘Last month our workmen discovered the body of a twenty-two-year-old man called Jericho Flint in our basement, yes?’ Longbright slipped a sheet of paper on to Land’s eerily tidy desk. ‘His head had been bashed in and he was wrapped in a tablecloth. The body went to Giles Kershaw over at the St Pancras Mortuary, but was taken away from him before he could conduct a preliminary examination.’
‘I’ve been meaning to ask you about that,’ said Land unconvincingly. ‘Where did it go?’
‘He was identified as the son of Howard Flint, the US consul in London, the one who recently left office.’
‘They all leave office,’ replied Land. ‘They have to be gone before the next inauguration day. What do you mean, already identified?’
‘Apparently two men turned up at the mortuary flashing US Secret Service accreditation and took the corpse away with them.’
‘How did they know he was there, for heaven’s sake?’
‘I always assume the Americans know everything. It’s safer that way.’
‘Wait, this is the consul who told the press he was sick of being served lamb and was looking forward to having hamburgers again?’
‘I don’t think he enjoyed his time in the job. You probably want to know how the body was identified.’
The thought had not occurred to Land but he nodded gratefully.
‘He had some sensitive documents inside his jacket. Mr Flint was on hand to identify his son. The lad had joined him here in London after completing a gap year. Apparently Flint Senior and Junior weren’t on speaking terms. The father had cut off the boy’s trust fund.’ Longbright handed Land a hard copy of a press clipping. ‘I had to pull this from a tabloid. Information on the family is hard to come by.’
Land skimmed the page. ‘Why’s that?’
‘There’s some kind of press embargo on their personal lives, so the only articles out there are bits of society gossip. Reading between the lines you get a bit more of a picture. The father is a hawkish Republican; the son was an artistic counterculturalist. Jericho was interviewed by the paper nine months ago. At that time he was living in Hackney, smoking dope, selling paintings to earn a living. He’d settled in London because it was one of his father’s conditions for being granted any sort of an income. Flint Senior wanted the boy where he could keep an eye on him. They argued and the money tap was finally switched off. That much seems common knowledge.’
Land handed back the article. ‘Tell me about the part that isn’t.’
‘It looks like Jericho Flint was in financial trouble. He lost his flat and borrowed from everyone, so he probably made a few enemies. I spoke to a mate of his who was pretty sure that something bad had happened to him.’
‘Why does he think that?’
‘If Flint had been so short of cash he would have sold his van, even though the engine needed to be repaired. Instead he vanished overnight, leaving the vehicle behind. It’s only a fifteen-minute walk from Tufnell Park to our building, so how did he end up in the basement?’
‘It’s not our job to answer that anymore,’ said Land wearily. ‘I’m sure the US Embassy has plenty of granite-faced agents looking into it right now.’
‘Then I guess you haven’t seen this,’ said Longbright, passing him a letter. ‘The Home Office is handing us the responsibility.’
Land was horrified. ‘They can’t just do that—can they?’
‘His body was found on our premises, Raymond. As you can see, they feel it’s incumbent upon us to lead an investigation and avoid souring our so-called “special relationship.” We’re waiting for their coroner’s report.’
Land’s eyes widened. ‘You’ve spoken to them?’
‘I just had them on the phone.’
He slapped the desk purposefully. ‘Then get Bryant and May in here.’
‘They’re tied up with another case.’
‘This is more important. I don’t want the Americans saying we can’t handle it.’ Land’s hand went to his lips. ‘No, wait. If I bring Bryant in he’ll start involving witches and shamans. We’ll become a laughingstock.’ There crept upon his face the anxiety of an Englishman stricken with indecision. It was a look you could see every day in Pret A Manger when middle managers struggled to choose sandwich fillings.
‘Then don’t officially involve him,’ said Longbright. ‘It would be better if the embassy didn’t see their names on the investigation team. Let them think Jack and I are handling it.’
‘Do you think you’re up to it, Janice?’
Longbright shot back a look that could have cracked a window.
‘All right, I’ll keep their names out of the official report. See what you can do.’
‘I’ll need to talk to Mr Bryant about how the body was found.’
Land sighed. ‘This is how it always starts. First we ask his opinion, then a couple of days later the Unit is overrun with members of the maniac community. I don’t want him reporting to the Yanks that Flint was ritually sacrificed by druids. That weird illness he had made him worse than he was before.’
‘Mr Bryant was suffering the aftereffects of having been poisoned,’ Longbright reminded her boss. ‘He’s back to normal now.’
‘He was never normal,’ said Land forlornly. ‘He is the thorn in my paw, the stone in my shoe, the fly in my ointment. You think Her Majesty’s Government causes trouble for us? Wait until you see what the Americans can do. They won’t appreciate some superannuated Harry Potter interfering with international policy. You have to keep him as far away from them as possible, do you understand?’
‘I just thought you should be kept in the picture. I didn’t think you’d seen the letter.’
Longbright took her leave, although not before Land noticed that she had failed to agree to his terms.
* * *
—
One of the Daves stuck his head around the door of the detectives’ office.
‘Bugger off,’ Bryant warned. ‘We can’t have you two electrifying things while we’re trying to work.’
‘Sorry to bother you,’ said Dave One. ‘It’s just that me and my colleague were talking about that lad whose body we found in the basement. We heard you’ve been asked to investigate the case.’
‘How do you get your information so fast?’ asked May impatiently. ‘Is there some kind of underground network we should be aware of?’
‘They did find him,’ Bryant reminded his partner. ‘You’d better come in.’
Dave One stepped across the threshold and scratched at his scrubby beard. ‘The basement door was locked when we went down there. We were t
he first to open it. But there’s another way in from the building next door.’
‘You mean Flint could have come in from the other side?’
‘It’s just that you wouldn’t hide a body down there, because of the difficulty getting it down the stairs, right?’ Dave One looked at his boots, embarrassed. ‘I know it sounds daft—’
‘No, it doesn’t at all,’ said Bryant, enthused. ‘You think he was killed down there. It means he could have met someone in the Ladykillers Café or the bar, and there was an altercation.’
‘We thought you should talk to the owners.’
‘You can’t, Arthur,’ warned May. ‘We can’t be seen to be working on the case.’
‘What, you think the Yanks have got spies out watching the building? Surely they won’t stop me going for a cuppa and a cake.’ Bryant rose to his feet. ‘Come on, I’ve had my eye on their Victoria sponge for a while.’
* * *
—
Jack Renfield was careful not to smile too much. He had been racking his brain trying to think of a way to win back Longbright, and now the opportunity had presented itself. As he had been teamed with her once more, he would be able to show her how thoughtful and supportive he could be. It had been quite a learning curve for the former desk sergeant from being the confused butt of everyone’s jokes to reinstatement as a trusted member of the PCU. He tried not to appear too doglike when gazing at her.
‘There’s not much to go on.’ Longbright turned the pages on her notepad. ‘We know Howard Flint was estranged from his son. The CIA brief says that he knew the boy was still living in London but wished to have no further contact with him. Jericho Flint was last seen on the evening of August the tenth. It means that whoever stashed him in our basement did so right under our noses.’
‘Either he was killed here, or he was brought in already dead,’ said Renfield. ‘I know we’re lax on security but there’s no way someone could have carried a corpse through this building. The electronic entry system was installed at the main door as soon as we arrived.’
‘But the Daves say there’s another way in,’ Longbright said.
He caught her eye just as she had the same thought. ‘Let’s see for ourselves.’
Number 231 Caledonian Road occupied the end-of-terrace position on a sliver of land that had formerly hosted (in reverse order) a public house, temperance rooms, a chapel, a brothel, a boarding house and a private residence. When the Hoop & Grapes lost its licence and closed down, the property remained derelict for several years before being converted into offices that were purchased by the Home Office to house the Specialist Operations Directorate. The PCU jumped the queue because it urgently needed to be rehoused, Arthur Bryant having managed to burn down their old Unit at Mornington Crescent.
The basement was much older than the late-Victorian edifice that had been constructed over it. A painted wooden door at the rear of the ground floor led to the basement staircase.
‘Dan reckons the lower floor was laid after 1824. Something about the mass manufacture of concrete. It was built over a tributary of the River Fleet and used to store beer barrels.’ Longbright stopped before a riveted iron door edged with yellow-and-black striped tape. ‘The Daves were meant to put some lights in but didn’t get around to it.’
‘Here, let me.’ Renfield squeezed past her. Gripping the handle in a meaty fist, he dragged the door open.
‘The US Embassy brought in members of their own team to stay with Flint’s body. They spent an afternoon at the Unit, but didn’t allow anyone else downstairs.’ She turned on her cage light and held it high. ‘After they removed the remains, they taped up the door with specific instructions that no one should enter the basement. Obviously they forgot to tell the Daves.’
‘This part looks a lot older than the building above,’ said Renfield.
Longbright’s light fell on the eight-foot-long stone box that had contained the consul’s son. ‘The lid is a single piece of Portland stone.’ She pointed to the great slab that leaned against the container. ‘It took two of them to push it off.’
‘Whoever brought him down here must have known about the box,’ said Renfield. ‘You don’t just stumble on something like this. How come nobody came down to the basement when we first moved in?’
‘Raymond told us it belonged to the building next door. I checked the lease, and it turns out he was wrong—as usual.’
‘If Flint was already dead there had to be at least two others with him, putting him in the casket while we were working upstairs.’ He pressed his hand against the box and felt the damp, cold stone on his skin. ‘What’s it doing here anyway? How could anyone have known about it?’
Longbright led the way over to the door in the partition. She leaned close to the wood. ‘I can hear something moving about on the other side.’
Renfield placed his ear against the door as well. ‘Maybe it’s rats.’
The door suddenly opened outwards and Bryant stepped in. ‘The café has a cocktail bar downstairs,’ he explained as May followed him in. ‘They have a very good selection of gins. It appears several of these basements were once connected. If this is the way they brought him in, they’d still have had to pass through a busy bar.’
‘Why would anyone go to so much trouble?’ Renfield asked. ‘What do you gain by hiding a body down here?’
Longbright shone her torch at the empty sarcophagus. ‘Who’s going to look for it in a cop shop?’ she replied.
* * *
—
‘How would you like to not smell of cabbages anymore?’ Longbright asked brightly.
Meera Mangeshkar regarded her with suspicion.
‘I’m talking about taking you off bin duty.’
Meera scrunched her lips. She might have been trying to imagine elephants in outer space. ‘Me and Colin always get the bin searches. There’s no one else to do them.’
‘Perhaps I could persuade Raymond to outsource the dirtiest jobs. You’ve both been doing them for long enough.’
Mangeshkar’s mistrustful eyes narrowed still further. ‘What’s the catch?’
‘No catch. Jack and I could do with your help. The consul’s son hung out with a young crowd. They won’t open up to us, but they might to you.’
‘You’re a police officer. You can get them in here and scare the shit out of them.’
‘That isn’t how we do things, Meera, you know that.’
‘You’re saying we should go undercover?’
‘Jericho Flint was sleeping in a camper van on Market Road. There’s a healthy counterculture scene around there. There’s also a big recording studio complex nearby that has a twenty-four-hour café used by sound engineers and musicians. I’ve sent you and Colin some profile notes. Find out who Flint’s friends were. His father wants to know what his son had been up to.’
‘Why? It says here he hadn’t seen him for a year. Why didn’t they speak? What’s missing from the notes?’
‘That’s what I’m going to find out,’ Longbright replied. ‘Jack and I have an appointment with the US consul tonight.’
‘They’re moving the embassy from Grosvenor Square to Nine Elms,’ said Meera. ‘The new one looks like a fortress with swords on the top and a moat.’
‘I imagine that’s pretty much what it is. Apparently they didn’t think much of the security in this place. We’re meeting Mr Flint tonight in a “soft secure” building in Mayfair, but I can’t get you in. Only two of us are getting clearance for entry. If we’re given any further information I’ll feed it through, but you can start right now by going to the Vinyl Café. Try not to look like coppers.’
‘What do you mean?’ Meera seemed aggrieved.
‘The boots.’
‘I don’t know what else to wear.’
‘Look around you. Try dressing like a normal girl for once.’
‘There are so many things wrong with that sentence I don’t know where to begin. I’ve seen the old photos of you in your low-cut gold lamé gown down the strip club, dressed like Marilyn Monroe.’
‘Diana Dors, actually.’
Meera shrugged. ‘I don’t know who that is, presumably someone old. I’ll go undercover but I’m not wearing a dress over black leggings or doing anything weird with my hair.’
Longbright considered her. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you out of uniform. You don’t have the fashion gene, do you?’
‘No, I have the climbing-in-and-out-of-bins gene, thanks to being stuck on rubbish duty for ages. You’re the glamorous one, but I agree you’re pushing it age-wise so I’ll give it a go.’ She looked down at her ribbed navy PCU sweater. ‘Colin will be all right, he always fits in.’
‘You two seem to be getting on pretty well these days.’
‘I’m waiting for him to underestimate me. That’ll be fun.’
‘You know he’s in love with you, right?’
Meera rolled her eyes. ‘I’m not thick. He just needs to slow down a bit.’
Janice laid a hand on her arm. ‘Don’t hurt him, Meera. He’s not as strong as you.’
‘Yeah, well. Ta for the advice. Not sure you’re the one to be giving it.’
‘Because of me and Jack?’
‘Yeah. On, off, nobody knows where you stand.’
‘It comes with the job.’ Janice gathered her notes and pulled a pencil out of her hair with some difficulty.
‘You mean the job comes first. Like Superman not marrying Lois Lane.’
‘They got married.’
‘Only in one timeline. Then ended up single in another.’
‘Then I guess that’ll be like me and Jack.’ She waved Meera away. ‘What is this with the personal stuff? Nobody around here ever discusses their personal life.’
‘That’s because most of us don’t have one,’ Meera pointed out.
‘Go on, get out of here, before I change my mind.’
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