"But if we fight and win-"
"Percentages, Sam. Gerrard was doubtful of winning even before this Brooks thing. That's why he's wheeling and dealing. That's why he's in with the judge-"
"You mean the judge is part of this too?"
"Not officially - not part of the deal. But I'll tell you something, Sam. It will be a long and expensive trial if we fight, and if we lose the judge will take that into account. Not only will you be guilty of murder but you'll also be guilty of wasting public time and money. He'll throw the book at you for that."
"A judge would want an innocent man to plead guilty?"
"Innocent - guilty - forget it, will you? Who gives a shit? The courts are overcrowded. They've got a backlog of cases a mile long. All they want is the case over and done with. Sam, we're dealing with practical men."
"You mean Gerrard will get a decision now from the judge and then-"
"Not a decision. That would make the judge part of the deal. But an indication. Then you'll have to decide what to do. But my guess is you'll get a suspended sentence if you opt for manslaughter."
"I have to decide? But I'm not a lawyer."
"It's your trial, Sam. You instruct us." He took another hurried look at his watch. "Look, I must get upstairs. I'll be back as soon as I can - but Sam - you be ready with your instructions next time round - okay?"
And with that he was gone. It was a hell of a decision. Part of me wanted to fight all the way - try to prove my innocence once and for all - clear my name and salvage my reputation. But squaring that with keeping Kay out of it was becoming more and more difficult. And the prospect of freedom made me giddy. If I could get out now - there was still a chance of saving Apex and of getting it back from the receiver.
Perhaps I thought of other things - other people, Kay, Edgar, friends like Jack and Maria - I think I did, but I'm not sure now. I had precious little time to think of anything, because Collins was back within fifteen minutes - wanting my answer. With a heavy heart I agreed to plead manslaughter. He looked pleased, patted my back and left me to wait in my cell.
You go up into court from the cells. A narrow passage leads to a small flight of stairs which ascend to the dock. One policeman walks in front, while another treads on your heels. The courtroom looked spick and span after the greasy dirtiness of the cells. I saw Gerrard in his wig and gown, laughing and joking with a man I took to be Gladwyn-Hughes. Lewis Collins was sprawled back in his chair, swapping stories with his articled clerks. Junior counsel were chatting happily together. They all looked so relaxed, so satisfied. Colleagues, not adversaries. A deal had been struck. Their professional reputations had been protected. Gladwyn-Hughes would chalk up another result. Gerrard would claim to have saved a client from life imprisonment. Both would have won in a way. There was only one loser. And he was sitting in my chair.
There was a movement, a scraping of chairs and clearing of throats as the judge arrived. Everyone stood up - and five minutes later my trial was under way.
It only lasted an hour. Gladwyn-Hughes had his say, and thirty minutes later Gerrard was on his feet, putting forward the mitigating circumstances. The stories they told bore little relationship to the truth - but then how could they? Anyway, as Collins so aptly put it - "who gives a shit?" As long as it's over and done with and they all got their fees. Like court jesters telling two different tales to entertain their master - and at the end of the day their master was more taken with Gladwyn-Hughes's fairytale than the one told by Gerrard. As soon as the judge summed up I knew Collins had been over-optimistic. I knew I would be sent to prison. So I was prepared for the sentence when it came. Six years, the time already spent in Aylesbury to count as part of the term. The policemen motioned me to turn and go back downstairs to the cells, and just as I did so I looked up, to see Kay watching me from the public gallery.
I stopped dead in my tracks. The policeman behind me bumped into my back. Kay was in the front row, almost, close enough to touch. I said her name aloud without realising it. She looked tanned and well, dressed in black, kid gloves holding a black handbag on her lap. She sat quite motionless, but her eyes were wet with tears.
"Kay!" I shouted.
The policeman behind pushed and I stumbled down the top two steps. I craned my neck, resisting the hands on my shoulders. I wanted to go back for a last look, a final word, ask how she was and where she had been. I was fighting the policeman now - he was shoving and I was struggling to stay on the stairs. I could see Kay's face, framed in the opening above me.
"Kay!" I shouted again.
Tears streamed down her cheeks and she fumbled into her handbag for her handkerchief. A man reached over to pat her shoulder. He stood behind her, resting both hands on her shoulders. I couldn't see his face - I was looking at Kay anyway. Then the policeman kicked my legs from under me and I fell down the rest of the stairs - and Kay had gone forever.
Collins arrived in my cell minutes later. Listening to him made me sick - anyone would have thought we had won. "Sam, another judge and it would have been a suspended sentence. I swear it! But six years is a nothing. Six means three with remission - and that's before we go to work. We'll appeal Sam, definitely appeal. Not against the verdict but certainly against the sentence. We'll cut it mark my words."
"Kay is upstairs. I saw her. Will you fix it for her to come down here? Just for a minute - can you fix that for me?"
He went away to try but Kay had left the court - or at least Collins was unable to find her. And when he came back he wanted to talk business. "Sam, what's happening about your affairs in general? Someone has got to look after them. What are you doing-"
"Do I have to decide now - like this - here?"
"Sam. Be practical. Someone has to act for you. They'll need power of attorney. Think about it - bills to pay, expenses at Ashley Grange, this fight with the receiver. It was a full-time job for you, let alone anyone else. We must protect your interests, that's all while we sort this mess out."
I thought about Jack. He would look after things for me. But the comment about it being a full-time job stopped me suggesting him. He had his own responsibilities. So I gave Collins the job and signed bits of paper there and then in the cell. Then a policeman arrived to take me to prison. I was handcuffed and led out to a Black Maria. We climbed into the back and it was driven away.
We went to the Old Bailey first. When we stopped, Davis climbed in. I was unhooked from the copper who was told to wait outside - then Davis gave me a real-mouthful. "Six years," he said bitterly, "should have been sixty. I'm still after you, Harris. I've got the Fraud Squad in at Apex, working alongside the receiver. They'll find something. And when they do you'll be back here on fraud charges." He jerked a thumb at the Old Bailey. Then he got out and I was taken to Brixton Prison.
Kaufman stood up when I finished. He crossed to the windows. For a moment I expected him to draw the drapes for another film show. But instead he merely stood there, hitching up his trousers and staring out across the terrace. "Well, well, well," he growled to himself. "What do you know? What do you know?"
"It all fits," Richardson said, "pieces of a jigsaw."
"And how," Kaufman said without turning round. Then he jerked his head in my direction. "That poor schmuck never knew what hit him."
I walked to the sideboard and poured myself a scotch. It was a relief to have finished, even though it left me feeling scratchy and on edge. I was still at a loss to understand what my life had to do with them - this house and being kidnapped. I took a long pull on the whisky, then said, "Davis is bent. You say you're the law. Why don't you-"
"Sam," Kaufman interrupted from the window, "Davis is a nothing. If it's any consolation, the Fraud Squad business nailed him. He went too far. Sure the Fraud Squad investigated Apex, but there was nothing there and Davis kept badgering and that got reported. So people took a quiet look at him."
"And?"
"Fifty thousand in three undeclared bank accounts - one in a false name. Davis earned a
bundle making your life a misery-"
"He's still at it. He's still on the force. He's-"
"He's like Southampton, Hull - other bits and pieces in the Pipeline. We know them. Our men are onto them. You met Evans - he's our man. You'll get your revenge on Davis, but putting him away won't break the Pipeline. When we move we want the whole works - the Pipeline and the top man."
I refilled my glass. The news about Davis was comforting but it was still a long way from an explanation. I said, "And this top man - he's the one I'm supposed to know?"
"Oh, you know him all right," Kaufman said, returning to the table. "Like I told you, he's a friend of yours. That's why Corrao's orders were to take Apex without hurting you."
"So you say."
Llewellyn cleared his throat. "Two men run the Pipeline possibly three, but certainly two. Serracino is one, of course. He organises the procurement of heroin throughout the Middle East. The distribution end is run by a man known as the Ferryman, and we think a third man liaises between him and Serracino."
"And the Ferryman is the man I'm supposed to know?"
"That's why we had to use you," Kaufman stabbed a finger in my direction, "you're the best chance we've ever had of penetrating the Pipeline. Tell him, Enrico, tell him about the man we had in Sicily."
Bonello raised his sad eyes to mine. "Two years ago," he said, "Fiore Serracino was seen back in Palermo. That's what put us onto it - the fact that the Pipeline might be controlled from Sicily. He vanished within a few hours of being sighted but our informant was a reliable man so we followed it up. The number of undercover men in the area was extended. We watched and waited. For months - nothing, for a year - nothing. Then one of our agents succeeded in confirming that part - if not all - of the Pipeline was organised from Sicily. He worked alone and took terrible risks, constantly in danger as he probed deeper. Then one day he overheard a name. How and where we never found out, but that the name was important was confirmed by events, because he was discovered and chased. He got as far as his hotel room in Palermo - got as far as reaching me on the telephone. Then they shot the lock off the door and murdered him - cut him to ribbons with their bullets. But not before he screamed a name down the line to me, Mr Harris, and we believe it was the name of the Ferryman."
Kaufman swung back to me. "We started digging after that. Tried to find out all we could about this man. On the face of it he was a respectable English businessman. Then we discovered his connection with you. Bear in mind that some months before we had learned Corrao's instructions - take Apex without hurting Winner Harris. So now we had another link. We watched this man, week in and week out. Nothing. So eventually we committed a little burglary at a house in Chelsea. His house. Still nothing except for that photograph," Kaufman pointed at the large brown envelope, "so we ask ourselves - what's a man like that doing with a photograph like this?"
Warning bells rang in the back of my head. Very faintly. But I stifled my alarm - after all there are thousands of houses in Chelsea. A connection, a connection like that, was ridiculous.
Kaufman pointed a finger at me. "Then we get your story. Your fight to save Apex. You fought your guts out, but you were always a step behind. Ever ask why? Because someone close to you was giving out inside information, that's why. And who was closer than anyone in Apex? Who was the man-"
"You're wrong!" I snapped, "Absolutely - completely - up the bloody creek wrong. It can't possibly be true."
"Yeah? You were framed and you know it. That half-arsed lawyer of yours didn't help - but who really bitched you? Come on, Sam, wake up! He knew you wouldn't contradict the story he gave the police. He knew it! And once you got suckered into that there was no way you could get out clean-" "Rubbish! He was protecting Kay."
"He was putting you away - that's what he was doing! Can't you see that you poor schmuck? You fought too hard. Maybe originally he wanted to give you a break for his daughter's sake, but when you left him no choice-"
"He was thinking of Kay - that's all - he had no other reason-" "Like hell! With that photo in his safe? What sort of father is that for Chrissake? You think it was there for the family album or something?"
"You can't possibly be right-"
"I'm right, buddy boy. Some poor bastard agent screaming his last breath down a phone ain't telling lies. One name he got out one lousy name - and that name was Hardman. That's the man running the Pipeline. That's the Ferryman. That's the man who ruined you! Your precious father-in-law."
"I don't believe-"
"You don't want to believe. But you've got twelve hours to wise up because tomorrow you're going down the Pipeline. And the Ferryman is there waiting for you. He's already made contact-"
"Contact?"
"We got a girl answering your telephone at Rex Place. Edgar Hardman has called three times in the last two hours. Maybe he neglected you during the past couple of years, but by the sound of him he's damned keen on seeing you now."
Chapter Seven
They drugged me when they took me from the big house. Oh, not the way they did before - there was no struggle this time, no mock heroics from me. After a meal they put something in my drink - at least I think they did because I was wide awake one moment and struggling to keep my eyes open the next. Kaufman was saying something, then his voice sounded far away and he was going out of focus. The next I knew was waking at Rex Place - bathed in sweat, with nightmares prancing over my bed.
My bed? That was a laugh. Nothing was mine any more. My whole life had been taken over by Llewellyn and Kaufman, with their crazy ideas about Edgar Hardman. It was madness. I raised myself off the pillow and reached for my cigarettes, then lay back and thought about the big house, remembering the endless questions, trying to make sense of it all. I shuddered. It was like a bad dream which needed daylight to drive it away. The clock next to me showed nine o'clock. Sunshine lay in strips across the carpet. Sounds of the rush hour traffic floated in from Park Lane just round the corner.
I showered and dried myself - then heard the noise downstairs from the kitchen. Wrapped in a dressing gown I crept down the stairs. It was Jack, breaking eggs into a frying pan. He was whistling something half under his breath and concentrating so hard on the stove that he missed seeing me slide along the bench at the kitchen table. "Are you the last?" I asked, "or are there more surprises later?"
Not that I was really surprised. Something in the back of my mind said Jack was involved. He had to be. How else could they have bugged the place? How else could Lucia have been ready and waiting? Jack must have known - and so must Maria.
He was embarrassed at first, tensed up, nervous about my reaction - and bloody right, he got no sympathy from me. At least not to start with. But then I heard his side of it.
Maria told him about her background before they were married. Jack thought she was exaggerating at first, but then Enrico Bonello called to see him. Bonello confirmed everything. Not only that but Bonello filed a report with the Met. Police. "Ever since then' Jack said, "we've had police protection. Nothing obvious, but they've kept an eye on Maria all right. They always thought Fiore might find out where she was and come looking for her - or send some of his friends."
Suddenly the penny dropped. Now I knew why Jack always seemed to know just that little bit more about the police. All those years and he had never said a word about it to me. It hurt a bit, that he and Maria had never told me - we had been such good friends that for them to keep a secret like that was like not trusting me. But it was a selfish reaction and a moment later I regretted it. I tried to imagine living with the strain of something like that, forever wondering if the stranger at the bar had been sent by Fiore Serracino. It was a hell of a thought, even when Jack admitted that they had not been troubled.
"I never expected trouble," he said, "Not really. After all, we planned to stay in London. Italy seemed a long way off, a different world. On the other hand Enrico persuaded me to take some precautions. Like accept a degree of police protection and live life away fr
om the bright lights, things like that."
Another penny dropped. Suddenly I knew why he had pulled out of The Point of View. In fact he admitted it. "You were getting all the international set there," he said with an apologetic smile, "London one week, Rome or Milan the next. Word might have got back. A chance remark, a good description, someone brighter than average putting two and two together. It never seemed worth the risk."
Listening gave me a bad conscience. I called him all sorts of things when he pulled out of the club. I had been really sore. Of course I got over it, but I called him a few names at the time - said he was ungrateful, his business judgement was up the creek, things like that. Now it was like knowing him for most of my life, yet never really knowing him at all.
He read my mind because he said, "It worked out fine, of course. Maria and I had fun with The Dog's Home and I made a bundle on the antiques."
I knew he was letting me off the hook but there was no point in pursuing it so I pressed him to go on with his explanation. "Enrico came to see us about six months ago," he said. "We thought it was a social visit at first - but then he took us to meet Kaufman. Lucia was there too. It was the first time I'd met her. She and Maria never lost touch, letters and birthday cards and so on, but none of them posted - Enrico always delivers them when he's in London. We never even knew Lucia's address. She's even been to London before, but never to see us - Enrico forbade it. Enrico is the most cautious man I know."
That shook me even more, knowing Jack had been involved for months.
Jack said, "Kaufman needed my co-operation so he had to tell me what he was up to. About Serracino being involved, and old man Hardman running this end of it."
Ian St James Compendium - Volume 1 Page 58