Spider Trap bak-9

by Barry Maitiland

  ‘A . . . a couple of weeks, perhaps.’

  ‘Have you visited his offices?’

  Another image of Hadden-Vane came into Kathy’s mind as she was listening to this, of the MP leaving the concert, and leaning in to give his little bow to Kerrie, Grant’s office manager, and the

  woman’s oddly vivacious response.

  ‘Yes, once or twice.’

  ‘In connection with what?’

  ‘I think you should ask him, sir.’

  ‘I’m asking you, and let me remind you that if you attempt to mislead the committee you will be in contempt of the House.’

  ‘He felt I might be interested in some information he had been collecting, on crime in his constituency.’

  ‘What kind of crime?’

  ‘Drugs, violent crimes,Yardie gangs.’

  ‘And also the business activities of the Roach family, am I right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did he ask for access to police information?’

  Tom hesitated, then said,‘Yes.’

  ‘And you obliged.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But you gave him the material you stole from Ms A’s house?’

  ‘That was the first time.’

  ‘With the knowledge of your superiors?’

  ‘No.’

  Hadden-Vane gave a sigh of satisfaction, took a drink from the glass of water in front of him, sat back and mopped his brow with the blue handkerchief.‘Thank you.’

  Now the others came in like a vengeful chorus.Was it commonplace for Special Branch officers to carry out investigations without the knowledge of their superiors? How many other innocent citizens’ homes had he broken into? How many other documents had he forged? Tom answered in a stoic monotone, until finally they had exhausted the possibilities and seemed satisfied, at which point Margaret Hart declared a recess.

  At Queen Anne’s Gate the watchers sat back in stunned silence. Someone muttered ‘Bastards’, as if to put on record the general outrage at what had been done to Tom, but it was said without much conviction, for they all felt contaminated by what Tom had apparently done, and failed to do.

  ‘What got into him?’ someone asked, and then Bren, shaking his head, said,‘And how did that smug bastard get all that stuff in just two days?’

  He turned to Brock.‘It was the Roaches, yes? They must have fed it to him.’

  Brock nodded.

  ‘But why did they want to crucify Tom?’

  ‘It’s not Tom they’re after, Bren. They’re not finished yet.’ Brock checked his watch and got stiffly to his feet.‘I’d better make some calls.’

  ‘Madam Chair,’ Michael Grant said, sounding bereft of any real hope, ‘I ask that we suspend this matter for a few days. My colleague’s revelations this morning, if they’re true, have been as disturbing to me as to the rest of the committee, and I need time to frame a response to his questions.’

  ‘By all means,’ Hadden-Vane responded, with a shark’s smile. ‘After you’ve heard all of my questions.We know the “What” and the “How”. But we still have to consider the “Why”.’

  Grant tried to object, but it was clear that the committee was against him.

  ‘I’m sorry,Michael,’Hart ruled.‘Nigel is right.We need to get all the issues out on the table.’

  ‘Thank you. You see, the real mystery is why a Member of Parliament, aided by a rogue police officer, would go to such lengths to malign a family of successful and respectable British businessmen. Now it is true that this family came from humble beginnings and that some of its members were involved in their youth in minor misdemeanours. They paid their debts, learned their lessons and devoted their talents to legitimate enterprises, but perhaps there are still members of the Metropolitan Police Service who resent that success and would like to settle old scores.’

  A warning to Brock? Kathy wondered.

  ‘Perhaps Inspector Reeves thought that he could score career points in some quarters by his actions, who knows? But why would the Member for Lambeth North encourage such a thing? Indeed, why does he maintain a research office at taxpayers’ expense that seems largely devoted to trying to find links between the Roach family businesses and the Yardies and drug dealers in his constituency?

  ‘Mr Grant has never hidden the intensely personal nature of his campaigns against drugs and crime, and I think we’re entitled to ask if there is perhaps some private reason for his attacks on the Roach family. After all, he knew them as a young immigrant in South London, living in the same area where they ran several small businesses. I asked myself if perhaps that was where the roots of this animosity lay, and so I took it upon myself to speak to one or two people who might be able to shed light on our dilemma. I wish to call one of them as my final witness. I believe the committee will find his testimony both credible and illuminating. His name is Father Terry Maguire.’

  Margaret Hart looked puzzled. Kathy remembered seeing her talking to Father Maguire at the concert and thought she must be wondering, as Kathy herself was, why Hadden-Vane would want to call such an excellent character witness for his opponent.

  ‘Do you have any objection, Mr Grant?’ Hart asked.

  Grant looked equally mystified. He shrugged and said no.

  The priest was led into the room and shown to the witness seat. He looked somewhat overwhelmed by the setting, and beamed with relief at seeing the familiar faces of Margaret Hart and especially Michael Grant. As with each of the witnesses, the Chair thanked him for attending and explained the circumstances.

  ‘Oh, I’m very happy to speak on Michael’s behalf,’ Father Maguire said, ‘although I’m sure he doesn’t need any help from me. His works speak for themselves.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Hadden-Vale said, with ominous emphasis. ‘You’ve known Mr Grant a long time, haven’t you, Father?’

  He prompted the priest to talk about Grant’s youth and early career, which the old man did with such enthusiasm and at such length that the committee members began to become embarrassed and restless. When Hadden-Vane mentioned the Roach family, however,the priest’s flow faltered.He said he knew of no particular reason for animosity between the young Grant and the Roaches,in fact didn’t think they’d had much contact.

  ‘What about the local criminal types, Father, the so-called Yardies-did Michael have dealings with them?’

  ‘No, no. He concentrated on his studies, kept his head down, an exemplary student.’

  ‘So where does it come from, this single-minded crusade of his against those he imagines to be criminals in his community? Some might call it almost an obsession, rather like the excessive zeal of the reformed sinner.Yet you say he didn’t get into trouble himself in those days?’

  ‘Certainly not. His commitment comes from his experiences in Jamaica before he came to London. Those were terrible days, and he saw at first-hand what damage drugs and violence could do to poor folk.’

  ‘Ah yes, in Jamaica.You’ve had a lot of experience with young people coming here from Jamaica, haven’t you?’

  ‘I’ve tried to help, mainly through support for the work of a colleague of mine, Father Guzowski, and his mission in Kingston. He helped many young people in trouble to leave and start a new life elsewhere.’

  ‘What sort of trouble was Michael in, Father?’

  ‘I didn’t mean . . . I meant young people who were capable of bettering themselves,’ he said, sounding flustered. ‘Doing something with their lives-’

  Hadden-Vane narrowed his eyes at the priest. ‘Come, come, Father Maguire. It’s a very serious matter to mislead a Parliamentary committee.’

  The old man’s face turned deep red against the frame of white hair.‘I’ve no intention of misleading anyone,sir,’he protested.

  ‘Good.’ The MP beamed at him and suddenly reached for his pocket and produced the blue handkerchief with an exaggerated flourish. Father Maguire watched, bemused, as he mopped his face.

  ‘Father Guzowski used to tell you about the background of th
e men he was sending you, didn’t he? Their families, their circumstances, things like that.’

  ‘Ye-es, sometimes,’ the old man nodded cautiously.

  ‘What did he tell you about Michael Grant?’

  ‘Madam Chair,’ Grant interrupted.‘I object to this. I’ve made no secret of my background. This is offensive and irrelevant.’

  ‘Yes, what is the point of this?’ Hart agreed.

  ‘It will only take a moment, if Father Maguire remembers his promise not to mislead us. Michael Grant arrived in this country with another man, Father, didn’t he?’

  ‘That’s true. Joseph Kidd.’

  ‘That’s what he called himself, but you knew that wasn’t his real name.’

  ‘I’m not sure-’

  ‘Father Guzowski told you his real name, didn’t he? What was it?’

  ‘I . . . I don’t remember.’

  ‘What about Michael Grant’s real name?’

  ‘I don’t know . . .’

  The priest’s answer was almost drowned by a hubbub of voices and a shout of anger from Michael Grant.

  ‘You knew they entered the country under false names, didn’t you?’ Hadden-Vale insisted, raising his voice above the din.

  ‘They had to!’ Father Maguire protested, and the noise was suddenly stilled. Even Michael Grant, half-risen out of his seat, was struck silent.‘They were in mortal danger.’

  ‘From whom?’

  ‘The police. The Jamaican police wanted them dead.’

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because . . .’ The old man looked at Michael with a stricken face,then back at Hadden-Vane.‘Because . . .’His voice faded and he seemed on the point of passing out.

  ‘Because they’d murdered a police officer!’ Hadden-Vane roared, and the priest bowed forward, his face in his hands.

  Michael Grant was on his feet. He shouted something incoherent at his tormentor across the table and began to struggle towards him, knocking his chair over and pushing aside his neighbour, who got in his way. His face was transformed by anger, mouth open in a furious snarl, his movements wild and violent. All around him people began to move in confusion, some to block him and others to get out of his way.The Clerk and a door attendant joined in,and Grant became locked in a tight scrum in the middle of the room. Beyond him, well out of range, Hadden-Vane was backed against the oak panelling,a look of elation on his face,dabbing at his mouth with his blue handkerchief.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  From the window of the living room on the first floor Brock could see yellow and purple crocus tips pushing up through the last remaining crust of old snow against the fence of the garden below. If he listened carefully, he could hear the murmur of traffic on the high street, and the occasional muffled jangle of the bell on the front door of the antiques shop through the floor. He sat at the window, holding a mug of coffee, suspended.

  Unlike Tom Reeves, whose suspension would become, after due process, an absolute rupture, his own, he’d been assured, was a temporary state designed to satisfy the ruffled sensibilities of the brass. All the same, it felt like being shouldered out of the way, out of the stream of life. Suicides were suspended, as were punch bags, victims in comas, and people holding their breath in fright. He wondered if that was how Suzanne’s daughter had felt before she stretched herself out above the cliffs.

  While he’d been waiting for the coffee to brew, he’d come across the pile of newspapers, tactfully stacked away beneath the kitchen table for disposal. It looked as if she’d bought every one, their headlines a study in sanctimonious outrage . . .

  ‘Extraordinary scenes in Parliament’

  ‘MP was a YARDIE GUNMAN.’

  ‘PM condemns renegade MP’

  ‘Tragedy of Boy from the Dungle’

  Her voice on the phone had been tentative. She hadn’t realised that he was involved, until Ginny had mentioned it, and was shocked when he told her he was suspended.What was he doing?

  What he was doing was reading the papers and wondering at the speed with which they, as opposed to the police, had been able to uncover so much information in so little time.Here was a picture of a hovel beside a rubbish tip,where Michael Grant had grown up, and there an old lady,his grandmother,whose surname,Forrest,was the one that should have been on his passport. Here was Father Guzowski surrounded by small children, and there the sainted priest again, eyes closed, in a casket after his murder.

  What he was also doing was imagining the research effort that must have gone into it, and the irony that, all the time Michael Grant had been beavering away gathering information on Spider Roach, Roach must have been doing exactly the same thing on Grant,saving up the juicy revelations,one by one,until the moment came to launch his devastating attack.

  ‘Well,’Suzanne had suggested tentatively,‘if you’d like a break, a drive down to the country . . .’

  He’d accepted readily,too readily he now thought.Maybe she’d intended it as a hypothetical option for some time in the future, instead of which he’d got straight in the car and motored down.

  ‘We’re here!’ Suzanne’s voice came from the foot of the stairs, accompanied by a chatter of children’s voices, home from school.

  Miranda rushed in first, with the unselfconscious assumption that she would be found adorable, which she duly was. Brock knelt to give her a hug, then straightened as her older brother came in, holding out his hand stiffly,right shoulder tilted higher than the left as if expecting to have his arm twisted. Brock shook the hand, then gave him a hug too. He’d brought some presents, a Meccano set for Stewart, who had a practical bent, and a puppet theatre for Miranda, who was already something of a performance artist. They accepted them enthusiastically, but Brock thought he also sensed a wariness, as if perhaps they associated gifts with adult guilt, with being abandoned and returned to.

  Stewart had homework to do before teatime, and while he got on with that Brock helped Miranda erect her theatre from the kit in the box.Later they ate together and talked about inconsequential things, TV shows and movies they’d seen, what they were going to do that weekend.Brock had the impression they were all being care-ful.When the children went to bed he stood to leave, but Suzanne said they hadn’t had a chance to talk,and he agreed to stay for coffee.

  They sat in armchairs on opposite sides of the fireplace and Brock remarked that the kids were looking happy. Suzanne spread her hand and rocked it like a bird caught in turbulence.

  ‘You’ve been having problems?’ he asked.

  She sighed, then said, ‘Look, if you insist on driving back tonight you won’t be able to have a drink, and then I won’t be able to have one, but I need one if we’re going to talk about things-it’s the Aussies’ fault, they got me drinking more than I used to.’

  ‘What do you suggest?’

  ‘Well, there’s a spare bed.’

  He nodded. ‘Suits me. I don’t have a job to go to in the morning.’

  ‘Right!’ She got to her feet and fetched a bottle of wine and a corkscrew, which she handed to him while she went for glasses.

  On the way back she carefully shut the living-room door and when she spoke she kept her voice low.

  ‘Cheers,’ she said.‘No, they’re doing pretty well, considering. Do you know, when they ran out of money Stewart started knocking on neighbours’ doors, offering to wash their cars. In the snow. Nobody thought to ask what was going on. And I was 12,000 miles away. It’s amazing Amber survived on the headland in that cold.’

  ‘How’s she doing now?’

  ‘It’s a terrible thing to say, but the stronger she gets the more trouble she becomes. She gets fretful, then abusive, then aggressive. What I’m most worried about is when she’s completely recovered physically and starts demanding the children back.’

  ‘Can she do that?’

  ‘I’m getting advice.’

  He refilled her glass, unable to express the sadness he felt for her.‘Would it help,do you think,if I came with you to see her in hospital?�
��

  She looked surprised, then smiled.‘I don’t know . . . Not now. Maybe later? Anyway, tell me about your disaster.’

  So he did, and at the end of it she said, ‘Poor you. And you still don’t really know what happened to those two teenagers or the three men on the waste ground.You must be furious.’

  ‘Am I? I don’t know.When you peel away the hurt pride and the frustration, maybe I feel relieved. Coming on Roach again was like scratching at an old wound.Who needs it?’

  ‘I’ll drink to that.’

  ‘The only thing is that I did have a theory about those men, and now I’ll never know.’

  ‘To do with the old files you were going through?’

  ‘Yes. What I couldn’t understand was how they’d been disposed of-three shallow trenches in open ground. It seemed unnecessarily exposed and risky, when the Roaches had a safe and

  discreet way of getting rid of their victims.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘They had their own funeral business. I knew that because I remembered we mounted a surveillance operation against it to try to find out what they were up to. But when I went back through the files I discovered that that came later.What happened was that one of the supergrasses we had at that time, a North London gang boss, started telling us about this perfect set-up south of the river, that gangs all over the city were paying big money to make unwanted corpses disappear.We traced it to Cockpit Lane.The business was in the name of Cyrus Despinides, whose daughter Adonia was married to Spider Roach’s son Ivor. But this didn’t come out until late in the summer of 1981, at least four months after the three men on the railway land were buried.So the question was,if Ivor and his brothers killed those men, why didn’t they use the family business to dispose of them, the same way everyone else did?’

  ‘Hm, all right, why didn’t they?’

  ‘Perhaps they didn’t want Cyrus to know what they’d done. Could the three Jamaicans have been friends of his or doing business with him? So I started investigating his background. We had quite a lot about him on old files, but nothing about any dealings with Jamaicans. In fact, from what I could gather, his attitudes were extremely racist. Then I had another thought. Perhaps it was his daughter Adonia, not Cyrus, who wasn’t to know what the Roach boys had done.