by Adam Creed
Dan closes and opens his eyes again.
Jadus removes the gun and wipes it against the shoulder of Dan’s jacket to remove the spittle on the barrel. ‘You meet me here, day after tomorrow, four o’clock, then you can have your book back.’
What Dan will receive is an extremely competent forgery of the book, down to the feint and the watermark and the serial numbers. Drafts aren’t used so much these days and this book is the next but one in line. The plan is, no one will notice until the original drafts are presented for payment, which they will be. They’ll all land the same day and that night, at close of business, the books won’t balance.
Dan will have to make up his own story, but he’s senior enough to survive. He’ll have to come up with some whipping boy.
Soon, Jadus will deliver the banker’s drafts – so many licences to print money, provided you get them precisely right. But he feels low, feels all the hope for a different life making its way to the ground beneath, sticking between his toes like sharp sand. He leaves it behind with each step as he goes.
Out on City Road, he smokes a joint and by the time he gets to Shoreditch for the drop, he feels less bad. He is dulled, but the ghost is there. He felt this way after what he did to the postmaster, but can’t see himself doing any more time. He can’t go back in there and pretend, every minute of each day, that he can fly his bird like a true soldier. Truth is, Jadus doesn’t feel like a soldier any more. Outside the back of Cutz, he finishes the joint. He knocks on the door and when they open it, he can smell the oil of Dax Wax. It’s a whiff of the Caribbean, a blast from when his dad took him to have his hair cut, to when he used to walk back to his mother feeling brand-new, his Short and Neat making him feel a million dollars.
*
Staffe watches Jadus disappear through the gate that leads to the back door of the barber’s shop.
As soon as he had seen the restraint to Jadus’s low-slung, backward-sloping gait; as soon as he saw the jeans a little high, he had suspected something was awry.
Earlier, he had watched Jadus light up his spliff and he had waited to see what else emerged from the underground car park. An expensively suited man transpired, every vestige of colour gone from his face and holding a bloodied handkerchief to his ear. He knows that he has to get to the bottom of whatever Jadus plans to do with that poor man in the expensive suit.
Staffe contemplates whether to go into Cutz, or wait. And he plots the sequence of actions that will enable him to discover who the suited man is. He will start with Finbar Hare. Or will he? He doesn’t want to pull the plug on Jadus if there might be something innocent, by way of explanation.
His phone goes and he steps away from the gate, walking round the corner. A gaggle of City boys suck on cigs outside The Nelson between the strippers’ acts. He can remember when The Nelson was for locals, when the old boys played doms and the young boys played pool while the girls took their clothes off standing on a little round table by the ladies. Who can say which is the better world?
‘Pulford?’ he says into his phone.
‘Given’s on the move, sir.’
‘Shit. Already?’
‘We let him go, like you said.’
‘Oh, God.’
‘You said to, sir.’
Staffe wonders if he is too sure about Crawford; about where Tommy might go. ‘It’s OK. Does he have the little girl with him?’
‘Yes. They’re packed for an overnight stay by the look of things. Should be easy enough to keep track of – he’s in the Merc.’
‘You got the photograph of her?’
‘I’ve emailed it in. They’re doing it now.’
Staffe is outside the front of Cutz. Jadus has his feet up in a barber’s chair and looks at himself in the mirror with more than the usual weight.
He wants to intervene, to stop this playing out, but the call is from afar and it cannot wait.
Thirty-Two
The two women unclasp from their hug. It had lingered, had involved Lesley whispering assurances that everything will be just fine, that they will have to adapt. It may not be exactly what they had planned, but an impression will be made upon the world, for the better.
For her part, Zoe Bright says nothing.
The baby kicks and she reaches out for Lesley Crawford’s hand, places it on her bump. The baby kicks again and the women look at each other in dead earnest. This joyous thing makes neither woman smile, and Zoe’s recent convictions are reconfirmed afresh. All that matters is this baby. She has to bring it to the world safe.
‘You said that the police are onto Given,’ says Zoe.
Lesley Crawford looks out of the window, follows the flight of the heron across the marsh. ‘He’ll look after himself. We must do the same.’
‘I was shown a newspaper.’
‘I’m sorry you were kept like this. It had to appear this way. It had to convince – for your sake. It gave you a way out.’
‘Gave me a way out?’
‘What did the paper say?’
Zoe considers what Lesley Crawford might have meant when she said it gave her a way out. Have her plans changed? ‘They mentioned Emily Bagshot, and Vernon’s bill, too. It seems that the public are with us.’
‘It’s democracy. The only kind that’s left.’ Lesley Crawford sits on the edge of the threadbare sofa that Zoe had pushed under the window. The sun is slanting in, low, shaved by the Welsh hills. She rests the pads of her fingertips lightly upon her knees, together. ‘There’s no such thing in Parliament. Those thieves and liars will do only what lines their pockets or plumes their power. So you have to offer them power. Sometimes, the outcome can be democracy.’
‘But will the MPs vote for the bill?’
‘They’ll vote for what the electorate want. And that’s in hand.’
‘Have the plans changed?’
‘We have to adapt. It’s the way of things.’
‘It can’t be good that Given is cut adrift. You know what he’s capable of.’
The heron swoops low. It moves fast but its wings are slow. ‘He came to us by chance. Chance was never going to be sufficient. Our interests fused, but nothing is for ever.’
‘He’ll kill us.’
Lesley Crawford looks quite demure as she turns to face Zoe, saying, with utter calm. ‘No, my love. It was me who let the cat out. He’ll kill me. If he can.’
*
Staffe closes down the image on his phone. The artist’s impression of Baby Bagshot, as Absolom insists on calling her, is in pen and ink and pictures the infant by a five-bar gate with an idyllic cottage behind. Appearing from the right, the lower arm and hand of a parent – probably her father – rests on her shoulder. The wrist is wrapped in an oversized watch. The likeness, obscured here and there and duly vetted by the solicitors at the News, will send Tommy Given berserk. Staffe can only pray that he and they can cope with the consequences.
Jombaugh has issued alerts to all airports and the ferry terminals, but Staffe reckons they will draw blank. His money is on Tommy having made a trip north – to either Nottingham or the Wirral. Either way, he’ll be in a hurry to catch up with Lesley Crawford for having made contact with Nick Absolom and the News. Right now, Staffe is unsure quite who is prey.
He raps the door. It is dusk and he has been told that Vernon Short was not in the Commons today and nor did he visit his club. Perhaps he is busy mulling the final words of his resurrected bill. Not so much resurrected as a nulling of its withdrawal. It comes before the House the day after tomorrow.
When Vernon opens the door, it is plain to see that the statute book is far from the forefront of his mind, for Vernon is not his dapper self. His hair is ruffled and his eyes are heavy. His shirt is three buttons undone and the collar is frayed, the sleeves rolled up and his moleskin trousers are bagged at the knee. He looks as if he might have been gardening, except, when he says, ‘Oh, you,’ a pall of booze hums forth. He turns his back and pads into his home, along the Minton floor and into the k
itchen.
They sit at the table and Vernon pushes a bottle of Glenlivet in Staffe’s direction, then a tumbler. Staffe pours himself a modest one, not wanting it, but neither wanting Vernon to feel as if he has to drink on his own.
‘Your bill is finally upon us.’
‘Like a bloated body in the Thames.’
‘I thought you’d be pleased, though I have to say I’m surprised. How does the Home Secretary feel about it?’
‘After all these years in politics, nothing surprises me any more.’ He forces a smile and lights up a Rothmans. ‘Time was, we did what was best. Parliament was trusted to govern.’
‘And your pro quo? Is that secure?’
‘You take what you can, but really, the forces are irresistible. You can’t impose your will on the people any more. There was a time when we believed in something; something different from the other side and you wouldn’t give a toss if somebody disagreed with you. In fact, it was a good thing. That was the point of it all. It lit the fire in the belly.’
‘In your father’s time.’
‘There was an acceptance that we knew best. It’s why we were in the club and the man in the street was in the street. Now, it’s a kowtow to the press. Today’s dish is my bill. That’s all it is.’
‘And your place in the Cabinet?’
He shrugs.
‘Your father would be proud.’
‘My father.’ Vernon pours himself another and stubs out the cigarette, just two drags into it. ‘I don’t smoke. I keep them in the house for visitors. Remember?’ He looks at Staffe, trying to weigh him up. ‘I’m older than you, but not that much. When people called on our parents, you’d offer them cigarettes and a gin and they’d ruffle your hair. It was a different time. But you didn’t come to humour me, Inspector. What do you have?’
Staffe thinks about what Declan Hartson had said about Vernon not having the balls. He thinks how none of what Vernon has done this last month fits. He tries to find a not unpleasant way of saying this, but he can’t. He does his best. ‘You don’t really care about the bill, do you, Vernon? I mean, you don’t care about twenty or twenty-four or twenty-eight weeks any more than you care about the war or Eldercare or nailing benefit frauds, and if you did, you’d keep it under a bushel.’
Vernon lights another cigarette. ‘Go on.’
‘I’d like you to tell me exactly why you put yourself behind the bill in the first place.’
‘I’m not going to do that.’
‘You gave Lesley Crawford what she had to hold against the Home Secretary, didn’t you?’
‘I would never do that. And anyway, you said she gave it to me.’
‘You arranged for the details of Cathy Killick’s abortion to fall into her hands because you had no choice. She got a bag with that in it and we got it the wrong way round. And you got behind the bill because you had no choice.’
‘I was going to water the lawn. The sun is down. It’s the best time.’ Vernon finishes his drink and stands up, takes an almighty drag from his cigarette and holds it in.
‘What does she have on you, Vernon? What was in the bag that she gave to you?’
‘Nobody has anything on me.’
‘Lesley Crawford has a hold on you and I need to know. This has to stop. She has to stop and you know it.’
‘What do I know?’
‘It’s out of control and Lesley Crawford is going to do something. She doesn’t care about you or about Kerry Degg or Zoe Bright, or Tommy Given any more.’
Vernon blinks, twice. His Adam’s apple rises and falls and he reaches for the whisky, pours himself another and tries to inhale his cigarette without removing it from his lips, but this makes him splutter. He punches his chest, twice.
‘You know about the threats that Cathy Killick received?’
He shrugs; has the decency to look ashamed. ‘The strangest things can suit a cause – especially in my game, Inspector. Sometimes, you have to look a little deeper.’
‘Crawford will say it’s you who spilled the beans on Killick and her abortion all those years ago. She’ll ruin you, but if you tell me what she knows about you, I can manage the information. If I have to dig around, everybody’s going to know. I will ask whoever it takes, whatever it takes. But I don’t want to do that. Honestly, I don’t.’
‘I swear on everything that is dear to me that Lesley Crawford has not one iota of information against me.’ He looks Staffe in the eye. His eyes are milky. ‘Not a jot.’
And Staffe believes him. He says, ‘I believe you.’
‘Thank you. I’m going into my garden. You can show yourself out.’
Staffe watches him go, fiddling with the concertina security grille that keeps the unwanted from trespassing. He opens the door to his garden. ‘Who, then?’ says Staffe.
‘What?’ Vernon looks back at him, as if he has gone for his wallet and come up blank.
‘Who does she have the dirt on?’
‘I said I’m going to water my lawn.’
‘And your father’s lawn before you.’
Vernon turns his back, walks into his garden with his head down, looking older, much older, than his years.
*
‘You were on duty the day Kerry Degg went to City Royal for her final consultation. The records from that consultation have conveniently vaporised. And you refuse to provide an adequate explanation for the powdered milk.’
‘I told you, a friend came to stay. She left it and I threw it out.’
‘Give me her name.’
Eve looks stronger, now. Her resolve seems stiff and her breathing and speech are even. She has refused a solicitor, saying innocent people don’t need solicitors.
Staffe says, ‘It was convenient, us becoming friends. A coincidence. I don’t believe in coincidences.’
‘You seduced me.’
‘It didn’t feel like that.’
Eve smiles, knowingly. She runs her tongue across her top lip. ‘It looks as if you were abusing your position of authority. Was I always in your frame? Did you fuck me for information, Will?’
‘You know I didn’t.’
‘I know I had nothing to do with the events that preceded the birth of Grace Degg.’
‘You sound different.’
‘Different from what?’
‘If you tell me everything, you could leave here.’
‘Even if I am guilty?’
‘You say you are not. And I believe you.’
‘Then release me.’
‘This isn’t about you, Eve. Or me. It’s about Grace and Kerry and Sean. And it’s about Grace’s twin sister, or brother.’
‘How can you be sure of that?’
‘And it’s about Emily Bagshot.’
‘I saw something about that.’
‘She visited City Royal two and a half years ago and three days later her boyfriend reported her missing. The baby’s birth was never registered.’
‘There was another?’
‘And you saw her. You were on duty the day Emily Bagshot went to City Royal to say she wanted to end her pregnancy. And you told Lesley Crawford.’
Eve’s mouth is open but she says nothing. Her face turns pale and she doesn’t blink. ‘Not me,’ she says.
‘Do you know Tommy Given?’
She shakes her head, slowly and slightly, as if she fears her head might topple.
‘You’re in it deep, Eve.’ He stands up, pauses by the door and watches her nod. ‘And I didn’t seduce you. It suited you, to be with me, didn’t it?’
Eve looks Staffe in the eye. As he leaves her, he thinks that perhaps she has something to be ashamed of.
Outside, Staffe tells Jombaugh to keep her in the interview room and to allow no food or drink in. If she calls, he is to ignore it. The walls are thick and nobody is next door.
He goes up to the incident room and sits down alongside Josie. He pulls out the bottom drawer of her desk and rests his feet on it, leans back, blows out his cheeks.
&nb
sp; ‘Not going so well?’ says Josie.
‘She’s digging her heels in.’
‘It must be weird for you, having to interview her.’
‘Do we have any of Bridget Lamb’s photos?’
‘I’ve got her wedding photograph, from the Kingston Advertiser.’
‘Perfect.’
‘I’ll talk to Nurse Delahunty again, if you want.’ Josie pulls the image of Bridget Lamb from a file. The bride beams into camera on the happiest day of her life, the arm of her husband around her shoulder and him looking as if he might have done too well for himself.
‘Let her stew,’ he says, taking the photograph from Josie. ‘Do you have the rosters from City Royal there?’
Josie flicks through a different file and hands him a sheet.
He says, ‘This is for the day Kerry disappeared. What about the earlier one, from when Emily Bagshot went in?’
Josie flicks again and hands him another sheet.
Staffe looks at one and then the other, then back again.
‘You want copies?’
‘No.’ He hands the papers back and picks up his car keys.
‘Where are you going?’
‘To find out who killed Sean Degg.’
*
Staffe parks his Peugeot 406 outside the off-licence on the New North Road. He flicks the key fob, but it has died and the doors don’t lock. He should get a new car, but this one suits. Locked or not, nobody is going to steal it. And it’s not a car which a police inspector would drive.
From here, he can see the payphone that Sean Degg used the night he died. From there, he called a person who used the very same mobile phone just moments later to call the Lambs’ landline. It occurs to Staffe that the telephone in Bridget’s home might be the very one that Malcolm Lamb would have used when they were at school together. Every now and again, Staffe’s dad would come back from the Angel and say he had seen Malcolm Lamb – Malcolm’s dad, that is. He would ask Will why he was not friends with Malcolm and when Will shrugged, he patted his son on the shoulder and said, ‘His father drinks halves of shandy. Shandy!’ He would say it in the manner of a confidence.
Staffe takes out the photograph of Malcolm’s bride and breathes in through his nose and mouth at the same time, turning to the off-licence and going in. He waits for the manageress, Maisie Dixon, to finish serving a child a pack of ten Mayfair. He knows it is Maisie Dixon because he phoned ahead. Maisie was on the night Sean Degg came in.