‘I know that you can watch yourself suffering and rationalise it. I don’t think Bill can do that. And that makes it harder.’
‘It’s in his own hands,’ she said helplessly. ‘It always was.’ Atherton said nothing. You’re worried about him. What’s he done?’
Atherton sat forward, clasping his hands between his knees. ‘He was always an independent sort of worker. But our new boss likes everything done by the book. Now Bill’s gone off trying to hunt down a man our boss thinks is the bee’s knees. I think he’s going to get himself into trouble.’
‘What do you want me to do about it?’
‘He’s been in trouble before, of course, but I’m not sure this time if he’ll be able to cope. I’m not sure, now, if he’ll even want to.’
‘What do you want me to do about it?’
‘Nothing. I don’t know. It’s not for me to say—’
‘You think I ought to take him back, tell him that he doesn’t have to leave home, that I’ll just be his mistress – is that it?’ He didn’t answer, looking at the carpet angrily. ‘But that wouldn’t work either. That wouldn’t make him happy.’
‘At least you’d be giving him the choice,’ he flashed. ‘What choice does he have this way? You’re blackmailing him!’
He stood up and walked over to the fireplace, and kicked the bottom of the surround, though he managed to pull his kick at the last moment and damaged neither his toecap nor the wood.
‘There’s no right answer,’ she said.
‘I know,’ he muttered, his back turned to her. ‘That’s what makes me angry – not being able to do anything about any of it.’ She didn’t say anything. ‘Well, I suppose I’d better get back,’ he said. ‘I just slipped out for a moment, just to see how you were.’
‘Thanks,’ she said. Her voice sounded so peculiar that he turned to look at her at the same moment as she stood up, and seeing her expression he moved towards her and took her in his arms. She held on to him tightly. A woman he’d never seen before had once held onto him like that, when he had broken the news to her that her husband had been killed in a car accident. There was no sex in it, or even affection. He might have been anyone.
‘I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see how it comes out,’ he said kindly. She wasn’t crying, just holding on to him, her arms round his waist, her face pressed against his chest. He held her quietly, and after a while bent and laid his lips against the top of her head.
The Crown and Sceptre, Melina Road, was a Fuller’s pub, thank heaven. Atherton was already there when Slider arrived, seated at a corner table facing the door, with two pints in front of him.
‘Thanks,’ Slider said.
‘For the pint or my presence?’ Atherton asked tautly.
‘Both,’ Slider said, taking the top two inches down.
‘I’m putting my neck on the block for you,’ Atherton grumbled. ‘I hope you’re at least going to tell me what it’s all about.’
‘I am now. I’m sorry for the way it’s happened, but I don’t see what else I could have done.’
‘I can give you a list, if you’ve got an hour or two to spare.’
‘Sorry,’ Slider said again. ‘First tell me what’s been happening back at the shop.’
‘We’ve broken the news to the Hung Fat crew that Michael Lam is dead. That went down extremely well. One of the sons asked on behalf of the father who the murderer was, and Mr Barrington authorised us to say that it was Ronnie Slaughter, who has since removed himself from the stage.’
‘Barrington’s still going down that road, is he?’
‘It’s a pleasant lane through a smiling and sunlit countryside,’ Atherton said. ‘I don’t think old Hung Fat was a hundred percent convinced, though. He said a large number of things in Chinese to his son, of which his son only translated about a quarter.’
‘Talking of translating—’
‘Yes, I spoke to Slim Kim. He’s pretty sure he can find out about Chou Xiang Xu. He’s got a friend in the business whose daughter Sun-Hi works at the embassy, and if this bloke came over officially it can’t be top secret or anything. He spoke to Sun-Hi this morning and she agreed to make enquiries.’
‘Right. What about Mrs Stevens?’
‘She gave it six on a scale of ten. Too far away to be sure, but it could be. And she took to the silver hair idea without too much trouble.’
‘Suggestible, isn’t she.’
‘She was never going to be a star witness,’ Atherton concurred.
‘Any news from America?’
‘The woman you spoke to at Chang’s firm called this morning just after you’d left. I don’t know how you sweet-talked her into it, but she managed to get hold of the concierge at his apartment, who confirmed that Chang said he was going straight off on vacation after his trip to England, and that he hadn’t come back in between. She sounded worried, and asked if she ought to tell anyone, like the police or her boss. I said she shouldn’t, but whether that will stick or not I don’t know. If it doesn’t—’ He let the inference hang. Oh, and one little nugget you’ll particularly enjoy – we’ve tracked down the car Mrs Acropolis saw parked by the alley, and it was nothing to do with our case.’
‘How lovely!’
‘As you say. It was a dark red Capri belonging to the mate of a man called Leroy Parkes who lives in the flat below hers. The mate had called on him on his way home from a party, and Parkes didn’t want to say anything because his mate hasn’t got insurance or tax. Mackay got it out of him, and it all checks out And that,’ Atherton said, putting down his glass and looking seriously at Slider, ‘leaves you, my dear old guv’nor, and the question of your future career, if any, in the Metropolitan Police Force. There are those in high places who wonder not a little what you’ve been doing for the past two days.’
‘I’ve got a problem,’ Slider said.
‘Tell me about it!’
‘No, seriously. I think I know what happened now. What I don’t know is whether Barrington is involved. If he is, I can’t go to him with what I know.’
‘Well, I see that,’ Atherton allowed doubtfully.
‘And if he isn’t involved, he’s going to tell me I haven’t got any evidence – which I haven’t, not good enough for the CPS. And there’s information I need that I can’t get without his help.’ He brooded a moment.
‘Two brains are better than one,’ Atherton suggested.
So Slider recounted the interview with Peter Ling.
‘A microchip?’ Atherton said. ‘It’s possible.’
‘It’s more than possible,’ Slider said. ‘Look – Cate has a string of computer shops. He has government and quasi-government contacts. He has the run of the NATO base. He must have known how important and valuable a prototype microchip could be.’
‘You think he stole one?’
‘I think Lee Chang stole one. He had the knowledge and the contacts; he’d worked in microelectronics, and he was based in Silicon Valley where all the big firms are. How he and Cate got to know each other I don’t know, but Ling said Cate went every year to the Computech Convention in California, which is an enormous trade and science fair—’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘You’ve heard of it?’
‘Not everyone is computer ignorant, you know,’ Atherton smiled.
‘Oh. Well, I imagine Chang met Cate there – perhaps on several occasions.’
‘Maybe it was a holiday romance,’ Atherton said. ‘He seems to have liked small, slim orientals.’
‘Perhaps. Anyway, one day Chang told him about this chip and how valuable it would be if it fell into the wrong hands, and Cate then offered to do all the planning and disposing if Chang would do the initial stealing.’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Let me go on. Cate knew from having been a copper how a plan can fall through because of one little thing going wrong. So his idea was to have double and triple lines of defence. To begin with, the chip couldn’t be smuggled out of the St
ates by Chang, who had to be squeaky clean to get in and out of the NATO base. I think that’s why Peter Leman went to San Francisco. He had no connection with anyone, and no-one was watching him or checking up on him. A microchip’s a pretty small thing and easily hidden if no-one’s looking for it.’
‘So why did Chang need to come to England at all? And in any case, how could he possibly arrange his attachment to the NATO base just for his own convenience?’ Atherton got his question in at last.
‘Oh, he didn’t, of course. I think it was the fact that he was coming to England that made the whole plan possible. As to why he was needed – someone who understood the thing had to do the sales talk. No-one’s going to fork out billions of dollars without a bit of convincing that the goods are worth it. I think Chang was probably thrown in for the price, to set the thing up for the purchasers – and as a kind of hostage.’
‘You think he went to China?’
‘He had to disappear very thoroughly. Sooner or later he would be connected with the missing chip, and then the whole of the western world wouldn’t be big enough to hide him in. Inside communist China he could make a new life for himself, safe from Uncle Sam’s revenge.’
‘So what had Michael Lam got to do with it? What was all that malarky in the chip shop?’
‘Michael Lam was Chang’s passport out of Britain. Cate recruited Lam and got him to do some little carrying jobs for him to get him acclimatised and test his trustworthiness. It was Lam who set up the trip to Hong Kong on his father-in-law’s behalf, remember. On the night itself, his instructions were to set off for the airport and check in early, and then come back to meet Cate at the fish bar to collect a little package to be taken to Hong Kong on Cate’s behalf.’
‘Why couldn’t he have the goods in advance? Why did he have to come back?’
‘You mean what reason was he given? Probably that the goods wouldn’t be available until later. Cate couldn’t bring them to the airport – they mustn’t be seen in public together. The chip shop was a nice private place to meet, where Cate would have a perfect right to be if spotted. And anyone who might recognise Lam wouldn’t think anything of seeing him hanging around that alley, even at night.’
‘All right,’ Atherton said. ‘Then what?’
‘Lam has to get back to Heathrow to catch his plane, so the meeting at the chip shop can’t be too late. But the shop is open until eleven – although Cate knows Ronnie has shut up early on occasion. So Peter Leman is sent along to lure the poor dope out for a drink, making sure he gets out before half past ten, and that they’re seen together in some public place – of which more later. As Ronnie and Leman go out of the front door, Cate and Chang come in at the back—’
‘How?’
‘Cate has a key to the back door. And Leman unbolts it while Ronnie’s attention is elsewhere.’
‘But Ronnie swore it was bolted when he came in the next day,’ Atherton objected.
‘Yes, I know, and that bothered me for a time. But you see I couldn’t think why Cate would make such a point of not having a front door key, except to prove he couldn’t have got in, and only Ronnie could have done the murder. If you remember Ronnie’s reactions to the mention of Cate’s name – I think Cate must have warned him on several occasions of the dire consequences if he ever left the back door unbolted. Ronnie, according to Peter Ling, adored Cate, and would do anything rather than let him down. He was also afraid of him. Now I think when we asked him if the door was bolted, he was too scared to say no, in case it got back to Mr Cate that he’d been and gone and forgotten. And I think Cate was banking on that.’
‘He may simply not have remembered whether it was or not, and assumed it was. He wasn’t very bright,’ Atherton said. ‘But look, if he had remembered and/or sworn that it was unbolted, where was Cate then?’
‘Cate had an alibi – his security guard is ready to swear he didn’t go out that night. And the lock on the back door is only a Yale – it could be slipped by anyone. Why should anyone think Cate was involved at all?’
‘Hmm. All right, go on.’
‘Where was I? Oh yes, Cate and Chang wait in the chip shop until Lam arrives back from the airport. They let him in, and kill him. Chang takes Lam’s identity, passport and the microchip, and heads off for the airport in Lam’s car to catch Lam’s flight. Of course at the other end the genuine contact waiting for Lam doesn’t see him, because he isn’t there. Lam disappears, and so does Chang. Two for the price of one.’
‘Meanwhile,’ Atherton said, ‘you’re telling me that Cate did the cutting up?’
‘Who better? He knew the place and the apparatus, and he’d spent his formative years cutting up fish in his father’s shop. If Slaughter could do it, so could Cate. Then he concealed the body in the rubbish sacks, all except the bits which might give a hint to the corpse’s identity. He washed everything down, and wiped the knives clean, and left everything as Slaughter would expect to find it. The plan, I think,’ Slider added slowly, ‘was for the body not to be discovered at all, and there was a good chance of it. The dustmen would have thrown those sacks into their truck without examining them, and they would be offloaded onto a corporation dump, where they’re moved around by mechanical grab. No-one is very interested in getting into close quarters with the stuff. And there are all sorts of scavenging animals that live at the dump – gulls, rats, crows, probably even foxes—’
‘I get the picture,’ Atherton interrupted hastily.
‘If any part of the body was discovered at the dump, it would be hell’s own job to discover where it had come from. But there was a second line of defence: if it was discovered before it left the chip shop premises, we, the investigators, would pretty soon discover that it could only have been Ronnie who committed the crime.’
‘In which assumption Ronnie unwittingly helped us by pretending the place was his,’ Atherton said. ‘He wasn’t very bright, was he, our Ronnie?’
‘Just bright enough for us to suppose he might think of wiping his prints off the knives and then put fresh ones on in the morning,’ Slider said ruefully. ‘I knew there was something wrong about the fingerprint situation, but I couldn’t—’
‘Put your finger on it? But talking of fingers, what about the one in the chips? Sheer bad luck, do you think?’
‘A bit of that, and a bit of serves-’im-right. I think Cate put the hand through the chip-cutter out of a nasty little-boy’s desire to see what would happen. Maybe he’d been fascinated by the thought all his childhood, and now was his chance to find out. But one finger went astray. Whether he didn’t notice, or whether he noticed and searched but had to leave before he could find it I don’t know. I suspect the latter. He wouldn’t have been too worried. If it did turn up, the second line of defence came on line. It was supposed to be Slaughter who did it, and as soon as we started investigating Slaughter, we’d find out about Leman.’
‘Yes, Leman of the two addresses,’ Atherton mused. ‘He courted Slaughter, went out with him, went home with him, and quarrelled with him. Perfect motive for a murder.’
‘He looked just enough superficially like Lam for the pathologist to accept the identification. He had no background, so no-one would miss him and ask awkward questions. But on the other hand, he had gone out of his way to establish his disappearance, should anyone come asking. I think Leman was supposed to lie low until Cate saw which way our investigation went. Then, if he wasn’t needed for the role of corpse, he could have resumed his identity.’
‘And if he was to be the corpse, he’d have had to disappear permanently.’
‘Yes. Well, everything seemed to be going quite well for the conspirators, until all of a sudden we released Slaughter. If we had doubts about him, they had to be resolved. So Slaughter committed suicide, leaving that very poignant note, and the case was nicely wound up. All Barrington had to do was to sign on the dotted line and accept the bouquet. Unfortunately for Cate, Leman wouldn’t stay dead. He wasn’t quite as faithful and dependent
as Cate had imagined: he had an unlicensed girlfriend, of whom he was rather too fond, and an irrepressible desire to talk.’
‘So Leman had to be rubbed out, before he could do more damage?’
‘Yes,’ said Slider. ‘And if you look at the timing, it happened immediately after Barrington insisted on telling Cate that Leman wasn’t dead after all.’
‘Ah,’ said Atherton. ‘That’s why you wonder whether Barrington’s involved or not?’
‘Not only that. He’s been telling me to keep off Cate’s back right from the beginning – ending up with forbidding me to investigate the man at all. Look at it from Cate’s point of view – it would be extremely useful to have a Barrington on your team. Or perhaps in your power.’
Atherton shook his head. ‘I don’t know. As much dangerous as useful, I’d have thought’
‘You think so? But if I had been prevented from asking questions about Cate, we’d have had nothing to go on at all.’
‘Except his slip about Ronnie’s literacy,’ said Atherton.
‘Yes. Ronnie concealed that well from his hero.’
‘And you really think Cate popped into the house and wrote another note, just to convince you the first one was genuine?’
‘No, I’m sure he didn’t. Barrington might have recognised his writing, even if he disguised it.’
‘Then—?’
‘I think the security guard wrote both of them. I think it was the security guard who killed Slaughter – Cate was rather too well known in that house to slip in and out without the chance of someone recognising him. And he and Cate are each other’s alibis, if such things could be supposed to be needed.’
‘Yes,’ said Atherton. ‘I see. And I suppose the security guard killed Leman, too.’
Slider thought of the other Peter, blond, smouldering, devoted, jealous. He thought of the round, red bruise in Leman’s palm and the torn and swollen lobe of Davey’s right ear. He thought of the skull earring in Davey’s left ear, and Leman’s missing fingers – easier to chop them all off in one swift movement to retrieve the ring, than mess around taking just the one. And none of it, none of it would matter if they could not get the evidence against Cate. It was no use knowing things in your gut – you had to prove them.
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