The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime 9
Page 63
The Finn squeaked.
“And you,” Peroni added, glaring at the hulk in the red satin boxer shorts, “remember. Tell the truth. One word. Fisting.”
They all stared at him in awed silence. Peroni eyed a minion from Milan. The man had his notepad in his hand. He hadn’t written a word.
“I’ll repeat the licence plate once more,” he said. “After that …” He touched Vieri on the shoulder again. “The inspector gets cross.”
They all scribbled it down that time. Peroni looked at Vieri and asked, “Anything else?”
The man’s hair didn’t look as perfect as it had that morning. He was lost for words.
“I’m off shift in thirty minutes,” Peroni added, glancing at his watch. “Take off the fact I never got a lunch break, in truth I’m done now.” He eyed Prinzivalli. “Beer? The usual place?”
The uniform man stripped off his uniform jacket, turned it so the lining was on the outside, and said, “The usual place.”
“Come … with … me …” Vieri ordered, gripping Peroni by the arm.
9
They walked round the corner, back towards the Campo, and Peroni filled him in on the details along the way.
To the man’s credit, Vieri listened, furious as he was.
When the explanation was done, Vieri shook his head and said, “I could have your job.”
“No, no.” They stopped by the place Peroni had bought his porchetta panino that morning. “I’ve done much worse than this and I never got kicked out then. Besides I’ve only got a few years left. What’s the point?”
He looked Vieri in the face.
“Anyway what are you going to say? Fire this man because he tracked down a couple of double murderers on evidence I wouldn’t even walk upstairs to look at? Not when he pleaded with me? I was too busy on my Blackberry, see. Too tied up watching CCTV and waiting for the mobile phone records to land in my inbox.” He scratched his head. “Is that how you get on the up escalator in Milan? If so, let me offer some advice. Don’t try it here. Won’t work.”
Vieri stiffened.
“We would have found all this,” he insisted. “When forensic reported, when we got round to the detail …”
Peroni felt a little red light rise at the back of his head.
“You didn’t need the detail. Two dead men, odd socks, same pairs. How many questions does that raise? How many possibilities? They didn’t get up that way. All you have to do is work out how they got naked. Then ask yourself why whoever dressed them didn’t spot the socks were wrong. Really. That’s it.”
The man from Milan was silent, a little down in the mouth.
“You use your eyes,” Peroni added. “Watch what people do with theirs. You know the only person who’s looked me straight in the face all day? That poor Roma kid’s father. He didn’t have anything to hide. He wasn’t choking on some stupid obsession with systems and procedures and idiotic theoretical …”
“OK, OK,” Vieri interrupted. “Point taken.”
“And yes,” Peroni added. “You would have got there in the end. But this case maybe hangs on our golden boy Sven getting scared enough to cough it all up and put Eva beside him in the dock. Get his confession and before long she’ll realize she can’t wriggle out of it. You won’t have to prove a damned thing. You could have spent months trying to do that, and I’d bet a politician’s pension somewhere along the way Sven would have gone missing, by himself maybe or courtesy of some other hulk Eva was keeping sweet between the sheets.”
Vieri nodded. He seemed to agree.
“It’s Toni, isn’t it?” Peroni asked. “I’m Gianni.”
Vieri glanced behind him to make sure no one was watching. Then he took Peroni’s hand.
“The trouble is, Toni, all that northern crap doesn’t really cut it here. Not sure it does anywhere frankly. Walk around staring at your Blackberry and your computers all day and you’re as blind as that stupid Finn, to a few things, maybe ones that matter. At least he’s got the excuse he was born that way.”
“The paperwork …” Vieri began.
“… is your problem. This is your case. You get the credit. Tell them you sent me out to see Dinicu’s father on a hunch. It all fell into place from there. You’ve got someone itching to confess to two murders and cut a sentencing deal. No one’s going to ask a lot of questions.”
The inspector nodded.
“And if none of this had worked out? All your hunches came up empty?”
Peroni grinned.
“Then you’d never have been any the wiser. Here.”
He gave him the minion’s notepad, the phone with the recorded exchange in Finnish between Eva Spallone and Sven, and the keys to the unmarked police Fiat.
“I stole the notebook from your guy. A translator might find something useful on the phone. And me and Prinzivalli … it may be more than one beer. You get someone to deal with the car.”
“Fine,” Vieri said and started to turn on his heels.
“Hey,” Peroni called. The man stopped and looked at him. “You should come for a pizza with me and my friends. Falcone, Costa, Teresa. Well …” He shrugged. “She’s more than a friend. You’ll like them.”
Inspector Vieri laughed. It made him look human.
“Oh,” Peroni added.
He reached into his pocket, took out a nougat, held out it for the man from Milan.
“Welcome to Rome.”
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
* * *
MEET ME AT THE CREMATORIUM by Peter James © 2010. First appeared in The Sounds of Crime, an audio anthology edited by Maxim Jakubowski.
WRONG ’EM BOYO by Nick Quantrill © 2010. First appeared in BYKERBOOKS.
WHERE ARE ALL THE NAUGHTY PEOPLE? by Reginald Hill © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
A BULLET FOR BAUSER by Jay Stringer © 2010. First appeared in Crime Factory.
WHOLE LIFE by Liza Cody © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
A FAIR DEAL by L. C. Tyler © 2010. First appeared in the Sunday Express.
DEATH IN THE TIME MACHINE by Barbara Nadel © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
SHOOTING FISH by Adrian Magson © 2010. First appeared in Plots with Guns.
THE MINISTRY OF WHISKY by Val McDermid © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
THE ART OF NEGOTIATION by Chris Ewan © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
JUNGLE BOOGIE by Kate Horsley © 2010. First appeared in Pulp Ink, edited by Nigel Bird & Chris Rhatigan.
ROTTERDAM by Nicholas Royle © 2010. First appeared in Black Wings, edited by S. T. Joshi.
SMALL PRINT by Ian Ayris © 2010. First appeared in A Twist of Noir.
EAST OF SUEZ, WEST OF CHARING CROSS ROAD by John Lawton © 2010. First appeared in Agents of Treachery, edited by Otto Pensler.
SISTERHOOD by Nigel Bird © 2010. First appeared in A Twist of Noir.
RULES OF ENGAGEMENT by Zoe Sharp © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
LOVELY REQUIEM, MR MOZART by Robert Barnard © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
BEASTLY PLEASURES by Ann Cleeves © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
THE WALLS by Mark Billingham © 2010. First appeared in The Sounds of Crime, an audio anthology edited by Maxim Jakubowski.
MOON LANDING by Paul Johnston © 2012. First appearance in print.
PARSON PENNYWICK IN ARCADIA by Amy Myers © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
THE LONG DROP by Tony Black © 2010. First appeared in Out of the Gutter.
TERATOMA by Keith McCarthy © 2012. First appearance in print.
CLUTTER by Martin Edwards © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
COLT by Ken Bruen © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
OPEN AND SHUT CASE by Marilyn Todd ©
2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
QUEEN OF THE HILL by Stuart Neville © 2010. First appeared in Requiems for the Departed, edited by Gerard Brennan and Mike Stone.
GHOSTED by Peter Lovesey © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
TEXAS IN THE FALL by R. J. Ellory © 2010. First appeared in France in a Sonatine Editions sampler.
THE FEATHER by Kate Ellis © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
THE DECEIVERS by Christopher Fowler © 2010. First appeared in The Sounds of Crime, an audio anthology edited by Maxim Jakubowski.
LOVE AND DEATH by Michael Z. Lewin © 2010. First appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine.
BLOOD ISLAND by Barry Maitland © 2010. First appeared in the Newcastle Herald & the Canberra Times.
FEST FATALE by Alison Bruce © 2010. First appeared as a chapbook.
THE GIFT by Phil Lovesey © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
THE SKIN WE’RE IN by Matt Hilton © 2010. First appeared in More Tonto Short Stories.
LITTLE RUSSIA by Andrew Taylor © 2010. First appeared in Original Sins, edited by Martin Edwards.
LITTLE OLD LADIES by Simon Brett © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
IN PURSUIT OF THE INEDIBLE by Brian McGilloway © 2010. First appeared in a Radio 4 reading.
MOPPING UP by Col Bury © 2010. First appeared in Even More Tonto Short Stories.
AUL YELLAH BELLY by Gerard Brennan © 2010. First appeared in Crime Factory.
A TOUR OF THE TOWER by Christine Poulson © 2010. First appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
DEAD MEN’S SOCKS by David Hewson © 2010. First appeared as an e-read Amazon book.
About the Author
Maxim Jakubowski is a London-based novelist and editor. He was born in the UK and educated in France. Following a career in book publishing, he opened the world-famous Murder One bookshop in London in 1988. He compiles two acclaimed annual series for the Mammoth list: Best New Erotica and Best British Crime. He is a winner of the Anthony and the Karel Awards, a frequent TV and radio broadcaster, crime columnist for the Guardian newspaper and Literary Director of London’s Crime Scene Festival. His latest thriller is I Was Waiting for You.
Recent Mammoth titles
The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 21
The Mammoth Book of Great British Humour
The Mammoth Book of Drug Barons
The Mammoth Book of Scottish Romance
The Mammoth Book of Women’s Erotic Fantasies
The Mammoth Book of Fun Brain Training
The Mammoth Book of Hard Bastards
The Mammoth Book of Dracula
The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica 10
The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime 8
The Mammoth Book of Tattoo Art
The Mammoth Book of Bob Dylan
The Mammoth Book of Mixed Martial Arts
The Mammoth Book of Codeword Puzzles
The Mammoth Book of Hot Romance
The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 24
The Mammoth Book of Gorgeous Guys
The Mammoth Book of Really Silly Jokes
The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 22
The Mammoth Book of Undercover Cops
The Mammoth Book of Weird News
The Mammoth Book of Lost Symbols
The Mammoth Book of Conspiracies
The Mammoth Book of Antarctic Journeys
The Mammoth Book of Muhammad Ali
Copyright
Constable & Robinson Ltd
55–56 Russell Square
London WC1B 4HP
www.constablerobinson.com
First published in the UK by Robinson, an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd, 2012
Copyright © Maxim Jakubowski, 2012 (unless otherwise stated)
The right of Maxim Jakubowski to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library
ISBN : 978–1–78033–095–2