by James, Henry
‘But that avenue of inquiry is currently closed to us.’ Kenton thumbed downwards: Sparks had incarcerated Oldham below and was personally interrogating the man.
‘Yes, for now, but I suspect not for long. I imagine it’s only a matter of minutes before Lane gets hold of Merrydown. But if we rule Oldham out, where do we find our man?’
‘Maybe a stalker; she’s very pretty? Maybe someone she met at the nightclub on Saturday night?’
‘Maybe. Maybe. Everything is maybe. What news on Mersea?’
‘A blank, I’m afraid.’
‘You what?’ Lowry said, surprised. ‘Did you tell those clots the reason we need to see this man, ask them for the name of the driver who hit Cowley’s corpse?’
‘I said that it was now murder, but didn’t say why. They had no record of who he was.’
Lowry rubbed his temples. ‘But Jennings was there when we turned up.’
‘I know; he didn’t log the call.’
‘What exactly did Jennings say?’
‘He said Queen Street Uniform might have details.’
‘And do they?’
‘No.’
‘Did Jennings know what type of motor it was?’
‘No. He said it was too dark. He’s a pretty low-watt bulb.’
‘What?’ Lowry said, amazed, and then it all fell into place. He had it. ‘Bollocks. Nobody’s that fucking stupid.’ He picked up his donkey jacket. ‘Come on – quick.’
‘Where are we going?’ Kenton said.
‘Records. For Jennings’ home address.’ Lowry span round. ‘By way of the cells and a final word with Mr Nugent, and then to Mersea for one last trip.’
‘Last trip. That I’d like to believe – I’m sick of the place. Why? You’re on to something?’
‘Maybe.’ Lowry smiled faintly. He knew that, if he was right, they didn’t have much time.
-58-
5.35 p.m., Thursday, basement cells, Queen Street
‘Now then, Ted, what if I told you that the person you saw through Derek Stone’s window was the last person you’d expect to be skulking around a low-rent flat in New Town?’
Nugent looked up sullenly from the bunk. He’d been downstairs for nearly four hours – long enough for a musty bodily odour to fill the tiny cell. Kenton had no idea where this line of questioning was heading, and stood back, leaning against the cell bars. Lowry nodded to dismiss the duty PC and sat down on the bunk next to Nugent. He pulled out a pack of Player’s Navy Cut.
‘Don’t know what you mean – barely know the geezer.’
‘All right, let me be more precise. I’m suggesting you saw someone who could influence your parole in a dubious situation.’
This remark grabbed his attention. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Nugent repeated, his tone stiffening.
‘Okay, let me spell it out for you. And you – you try and think clearly before you answer, because time is running out. Your parole is screwed, anyway, but let’s see if you can limit the damage. Listening?’
‘I am.’ The man’s composure had changed. He was no longer the cocky little handyman caught out. Here was a man with his freedom on the line.
‘When you were up your ladder on Artillery Street, you saw another face you recognized, one more troubling than a druggy no-hoper like Stone . . . the face of a man usually in uniform. A policeman.’
Nugent turned to face Lowry, then shot Kenton a look.
‘I don’t know who to trust,’ Nugent said quietly.
‘Trust me,’ Lowry said.
‘Ha! Right.’ Nugent shook his head.
‘It’s you we’re talking to, not Jamie – you’re safe. I give you my word.’
A man with few alternatives, Nugent sighed. ‘Most of what I’ve said is true, like. Minding the window-cleaning round and that. I never wanted to get mixed up in all this. Imagine, first job I do and there in front of me is Stone waving a shooter around, shouting at that Mersea copper and Jamie Philpott.’
Lowry thought of the smeared window again. He could envisage the scene. ‘Carry on.’
Nugent hesitated. He needed reassurance.
‘I promise you’re safe.’ Lowry shucked him another cigarette, taking one himself.
‘PC Patrick Jennings is yer man,’ said Nugent in a voice barely above a whisper. ‘He planned the post-office job and was after the drugs drop.’
‘How?’ Kenton crouched down.
‘Jamie and Derek Stone had heard from a soldier pal of Stone’s. Jamie is Jennings’ cousin.’
‘Jennings is bent?’ Kenton hissed, barely containing his naïve surprise.
‘And the rest. Jamie had been bragging how he and Pond had had safe conduct, like, from your mob, for years with the weed . . . The temptation was too much.’ Nugent nodded. ‘Especially when ’e ’eard it was coming in through his patch, Mersea. They thought they could muscle in there.’
‘What did they want exactly, Jennings and Philpott? Drugs? Money?’ Lowry asked.
‘Not the drugs; they ain’t set up for distributing a hundred kilos of speed. It was the money. The post-office cash was to buy Stone a way in, cash down, like, but it also gave him the power over the others. And although Jamie remained on the outside, he was still in Jennings’ pocket. The only problem was they weren’t sure exactly when the stuff was arriving.’
‘Go on.’
‘Jennings leaned on Stone to find out when the gear was coming in, but his pal wouldn’t say . . . so Jamie, who turns out to be a bit of a headcase when wired, squeezed him, but all he managed to get out of him was New Year’s. But when that wasn’t enough, Jennings sent Jamie round to Del’s flat to confront Freddie Cowley, and they fell out, good and proper.’
Now Kenton could see the picture. ‘Fell out? It was a little more than that.’
‘I dunno what happened exactly. Jennings overstepped it, thought he could slice a wedge for providing safe conduct across the island, or some crap like that, I dunno . . . I only know what happened next. They knew when it was coming in – roughly – but not where or who with, or where it was going. And with Cowley out of the way, they weren’t going to find out any time soon. But they knew it had to come off the island.’
‘Ingenious,’ Lowry said. ‘Who else, other than a copper, could check everyone’s comings and goings from the island? Even better, close the road, and, while they’re at it, dispose of a body under everyone’s nose.’
‘I don’t know nothin’ about that. Promise me I’m in the clear? I ’aven’t hurt anyone.’
‘You have my word,’ Lowry said. ‘We’ll have you out of here just as soon as we tidy up some loose ends. When was the last time you spoke to either Jennings or Philpott?’
‘Jennings, when I called him to get you off my back. Fat lot of good that did. And Jamie gave me the finger as he left, just now.’
‘As he left?’ Lowry said.
‘About an hour ago – I assumed you’d moved him.’ He looked from one of them to the other. ‘You don’t think I’d be dumb enough to gabble away with him in the next cell, do you?’
‘Of course not.’ Lowry feigned a smile. He thought Jamie must be upstairs with a solicitor. ‘We’ve got to run. Now, Jennings – any idea where he lives?’
‘End terrace on that row of fishermen’s cottages behind the yacht club – off Coast Road – right past the harbour, looking across the Blackwater.’
Lowry beckoned to the duty PC. ‘One more thing: does the name Oldham ring any bells?’
‘Oldham? Who’s he? A druggy?’
5.45 p.m., Sparks’s Office, Queen Street HQ
Sparks was listening hard to the woman on the other end of the line. He locked on to the blonde WPC opposite him. He’d forgotten her name.
‘Let him go,’ the voice said.
Sparks didn’t answer.
‘Hello? Sparks, are you there?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘You have no evidence. Has it not occurred to you that you’re being played with? Som
eone wants you to believe the army’s behind the whole thing.’
‘But there are traces out on the ranges. Oldham had—’
‘I’m well aware of that!’ The nasal rasp stopped him in his tracks. ‘Let him go. Philpott’s fingerprints were found at the house, which is more than can be said of Oldham’s. You can’t place him anywhere other than at the ranges, where the drugs happened to be; place him somewhere he shouldn’t have been and then I’ll listen. In the meantime, charge Jamie Philpott. You’ve nothing to lose.’
Sparks just couldn’t credit Philpott as the ringleader, knowing him as he did. But if that’s what she wanted, so be it. They had him banged up downstairs for the armed robbery, anyway.
‘You cannot imagine the shitstorm it would cause if the captain was wrongly charged. How is he?’
Who gives a toss? thought Sparks, but instead he replied, ‘Stoic, ma’am.’
‘Well, let him go immediately.’
Sparks looked again at the WPC opposite.
‘Tell Lowry to charge Philpott with murder,’ he said blankly. She didn’t respond. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Uniform took Philpott away, sir, at Sergeant Bradley’s request.’
5.50 p.m., Colchester Road
Lowry floored the Saab out of Colchester. He didn’t have time to wait for back-up. West Mersea had requested Philpott for questioning the minute Kenton had left the island: the Dodger had put the call in. The desk sergeant hadn’t thought to check with CID and, in a very slim window of time, Jennings had convinced the old fool that Jamie was the driver who had hit the body on the Strood, and thus facilitated his escape.
‘And the irony is it was Philpott that laid Freddie in the road.’
‘Got to say you’ve lost me, guv.’
‘Think about it. Jennings remembers turning a Land Rover back that night, but can’t give you the name of the man who ran over the body. When you went back this afternoon, you caught him out. He wasn’t expecting that. The man who “hit” the body was Philpott, but he didn’t run him over, just unloaded it once they’d spotted their men.’
‘How could they be sure they had the right men?’
‘Two men in a Land Rover in the middle of the night, covered in mud? Felix said the police advised them where to spend the night – at the Dog and Pheasant – so they knew where to find them in the morning, and followed them into Colchester for the drop.’
‘But Philpott, a murderer?’
‘Drugged out his mind, anything is possible. We’ll find out . . . Explains why Stone went to the house unarmed. He knew his murderer.’
‘And Patricia Vane in Oldham’s houseboat?’
‘Jennings would have seen Oldham coming and going and have figured it out as the ideal place to hold her to keep an eye on her. At the same time, it would implicate the good captain, as Jennings would know the military connection with the ranges.’
‘What, and have us barking up the wrong tree, as the chief’s been doing?’
‘Yes, it would appear so. Jennings. Jennings is the mastermind.’ Lowry dipped his beam as he followed the road round to the right towards West Mersea. ‘Clever lad, all along; playing the lackey PC.’
‘I still don’t get it – you’ve given Nugent your word that you’ll help him out, after he tried to run you down. Why trust him and not Philpott, who, until lately – let’s be honest, guv – was practically on the payroll?’
‘His behaviour.’
‘What, the swearing and cursing? I can see there’s an honesty—’
Lowry interrupted. ‘Ted Nugent is the epitome of a man in jeopardy, and I don’t just mean because he’s been nicked – he didn’t know which way to turn or where to find safety. When we spoke with Nugent the first time, wild horses wouldn’t have dragged him from the island, remember? Yet the second time, when I nabbed him up the ladder, he knew the situation had shifted up a gear – he was in trouble with us, and that meant with Jennings, eventually, who was the bigger danger. That’s why he was practically begging to come to Queen Street; that energetic episode with his XR3 – as if he’d get away? And then telling us about the cash in the glove box. Compare him to Jamie with his eyes gone crazy – who’d you trust? It’s not always straight forward.’
‘Straight forward,’ Kenton muttered as they passed through the small town centre, its ancient church reaching up into the night, and descended into the harbour.
‘Jesus, it’s dark down here. Worse with the snow,’ Lowry said as huge flurries swirled down, covering all in their path. ‘I can’t see the name of the road, but I’m sure that’s the lane – at the end there next to the yacht club, through the arch. Too narrow for a car.’
By a large white building with large black windows on the upper floor, the road slipped away into the dark.
‘Right, we’ll park up here.’ Lowry edged up to a chain-link boundary, on the other side of which large white hulls loomed, quiet and majestic, the lanyards clinking invisibly above them.
‘I used to be afraid of the dark,’ Kenton said across the car roof, which was already white.
‘Really? Not now, I hope.’ Lowry’s breath caught in the weak orange gloaming surrounding the solitary street light.
‘Of course not.’
‘Good. It’ll be pretty black down there. And be aware, to the left, the path falls away to water, like the edge of a pier. Now, keep quiet.’ They each carried a torch but would hold out on using them unless absolutely necessary. A second later, a gull screech pierced the dark from amidst the boats, confirming Lowry’s warning of the sea’s proximity.
As the street narrowed, the rapidly disappearing tarmac gave way to cobbles. The street light didn’t reach beyond the stone archway, so having passed through they found themselves in total darkness. Lowry had stopped – or Kenton could no longer hear his footsteps, lost in the snow perhaps. Instead, he heard water lapping below and to the right of him. Kenton found that this affected his balance. The closeness of the sound compelled him to reach out blindly for a secure surface. He could barely move his feet; an atavistic fear, something akin to vertigo, had him rooted to the spot.
‘Guv? Guv!’ he whispered urgently into the void.
‘What?’ Lowry’s voice, soft and barely audible, came back through the dark. ‘Don’t panic; your eyes will adjust. Listen.’
He stood still and listened as hard as he could. Footsteps.
‘Who’s that?’
No reply.
Then voices, urgent, cracking the silence ahead. Gradually, Kenton’s spatial awareness came back as his vision adjusted. A weak moon flickered on the water.
‘I should have let you drown that night,’ came a voice out of nowhere, a second before he felt a truncheon smash across his jaw.
*
By keeping close to the cottages, Lowry, by dint of a sliver of moonlight, had caught sight of the silhouette lunging out at his younger colleague. As Kenton went down, Lowry swiftly leapt in and rabbit-punched his assailant across the neck. Jennings’ pasty face spun round and met with a left hook, which sent him flying into the water and the truncheon rattling on the cobbles.
Kenton lay groaning at his feet. Further off, an outboard motor sputtered into life. Lowry flicked on his torch and shot it down the jetty path; thickening snowflakes caught in the beam. At the very end, there was movement.
‘Keep him in the water – it’ll cool him down,’ he said to his prone colleague, and ran down towards the boat. Snow caught in his eyes as he went, but he could just make out a dinghy casting off. He broke into a sprint and launched himself off the jetty and into the boat, landing squarely on the figure who was steering the outboard motor. The two men went crashing to the wooden hull, the decked pilot bucking violently. Lowry pressed down against taut muscle and sinew underneath the man’s overcoat – this was no weakling like the stringy policeman. Philpott thrashed hard again, this time dislodging Lowry, who was thrown back and cracked his head against the gunwale. The boat circled out of control as Philpott
tried to pin Lowry by the neck; he was searching for something within his coat – a knife perhaps. Lowry struggled but couldn’t escape his surprisingly vice-like grip. Reaching blindly to his side, he grasped what felt like a fuel can. He fumbled to tilt the metal container and grab the handle, then swung it up with all his might, clouting the seething, bristly face above him and sending the lighter Philpott sideways. He shot up, abruptly buckling as the boat keeled inwards, then swiftly righting himself as he caught a glimpse of a blade. Philpott was still on the floor, so Lowry tossed the fuel can at his head and trod forcefully on his groin, causing him to bellow with pain. Crouching to steady himself, Lowry was suddenly blinded by torch beams. ‘The cavalry,’ he muttered to the four or so uniforms who had appeared on the jetty. After a sharp kick to the whining man’s ribs, Lowry took control of the outboard and brought the dingy to dock.
7.15 p.m., Queen Street HQ
Oldham had been released.
Jennings and Philpott now swallowed all the attention. The latter was raving in the furthest interview room, his voice echoing down the corridor. Lowry pulled the door shut and took a last look through the glass at Jennings. The man caught his eye. Wrapped in a blanket, his pale face was indignant and said, ‘I’m as good as you.’ And Lowry thought, Yes, you probably were; it was a shame his intelligence had not found a better outlet. Jennings had hidden all this time working under the Dodger, and Lowry wondered what drove a man like him to crime. Surely it was more than frustrated ambition? He couldn’t help but think that, if Jennings had had a more capable number two, he would have inflicted some major long-term damage and gone undetected for some time, above and beyond the blood of the last week. He could have got away with killing Freddie Cowley, too, probably, if it weren’t for Philpott’s insanity on Sunday night at Greenstead.
Lowry blew his nose; he felt the onset of a cold. He had business to attend to home, but Jacqui had just started a rota of nights; it would be the briefest of interludes – make sure Matt didn’t go to bed too late – with no time for a proper conversation. And he needed time to think how to approach the situation. But if he wanted to catch her before she left for work tonight, he’d have to leave Queen Street no later than eight.