Foul Play

by Tom Palmer

  Danny knew he would be safe if he got to Holt first. He could tell him the story, then go to the press conference with him. And he knew he had to move fast too. It had to be this morning. Before Sir Richard had a chance to make another move. Or before whoever had phoned him that morning found him.

  Danny recognized Holt at the bus stop. Young. Slim. Dark hair swept back. And in a suit.

  Danny walked over the road, a break in the traffic appearing just when he needed it.

  Holt asked no questions as Danny told him his story. He just nodded. And looked concerned. Danny had expected him to take notes. But he didn’t.

  When Danny had finished talking, Holt said nothing.

  ‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ Danny said, suddenly feeling vulnerable.

  What had made him trust this man? Maybe he was on Sir Richard’s books too. Maybe all the media were. And it was just a big conspiracy to sell newspapers as well as football shirts.

  ‘It’s my job to listen,’ Holt said. ‘Then to find out if what people say is true. I want to believe you. But I need more.’

  ‘That’s why I wanted to come to the press conference with you. We can confront Sir Richard. He’s destroying the club.’

  ‘But you can’t just go and throw accusations around like that.’

  ‘What? Why?’ Danny’s plan was in pieces.

  ‘I can’t go into a press conference in front of the world’s TV cameras without a shred of proof and say, “Gawthorpe has kidnapped his own player. He’s an evil villain. Oh and, by the way, Sam Roberts is in the basement. Follow me.” ’ Anton Holt ran his hand through his hair. ‘Also, there’s my job. My boss is best mates with Gawthorpe. If this doesn’t work out, they’ll never let me in the stadium again – so how can I report on the team then?’

  Danny shrugged.

  ‘Can you give me any proof?’ Holt said. ‘If not, I have to look into it. It could take me a couple of days.’

  Danny frowned. He wanted it solved now.

  ‘Danny, I’m not letting you down. I want to believe you. But I need more time.’

  Danny racked his brain. It occurred to him that maybe he had made it all up. The kidnap. The shooting. Sir Richard. The burglars. And Charlotte. Maybe he’d imagined it all. It seemed so absurd. You sometimes heard about people who had imagined a whole life and had come back to earth with a bump.

  What proof was there? Danny had no photos. No recordings. There was nothing on the ground floor of the stand, where the press conference would be. Everything had happened in the basement and in Sir Richard’s office. And he wouldn’t get access to them.

  Then it came to him. Sir Richard’s car. And the gate he’d crashed into.

  ‘His car,’ Danny said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Sir Richard’s car. He drove it at me, but it crashed into the gate. Last night. Remember, I told you? I can show you.’

  ‘That would do it,’ Holt said. ‘Come on.’

  But Danny stopped Holt.

  ‘Can we walk slowly?’ Danny said. ‘Just walk past the scene. I’ll lead you. And don’t react if you see anything. Just keep walking, so we don’t stand out. Then straight into the press conference.’

  Holt nodded.

  Danny smiled, but his heart was thumping. It all depended on this. Everything. They had to think every move through.

  They walked to the club gates. Danny just ahead of Holt.

  There was no sign of Sir Richard’s car. But they kept walking. There was no glass or smashed plastic you’d see after a car accident. Danny began to feel shaky. They were twenty metres away from the gated entrance to the main stand. The gate Sir Richard had driven into. This was Danny’s last chance.

  He caught Holt’s eye. Holt was nodding. Danny didn’t know what it meant until Holt gestured with his eyes to the wall next to the gate. There were marks. Streaks. Several bricks had been shaved away, exposing lighter coloured brick. And there were streaks of red too. Sir Richard’s Mercedes was red.

  Danny watched Holt pull his mobile phone out to snap a photo of the damage.

  They reached the door to the main entrance. A huddle of journalists were going through.

  ‘Say nothing,’ Holt said.

  Danny nodded.

  All the journalists were signing in. Danny panicked. Did he have to sign in? If he did, his hands would shake so much, he’d drop the pen. He never signed in for anything before. And now there was a queue of journalists behind him.

  Holt looked back at him again. He must have sensed Danny’s fears.

  ‘It’s OK. I’ve got it sorted. Trust me.’

  Danny waited, completely in Holt’s hands.

  Holt went to sign in.

  ‘Who’s the boy?’ a woman in a suit asked Holt.

  ‘Work-experience kid. School placement. That OK? They wanted him to see something real.’

  She let them pass.

  They climbed up a staircase and entered the inside of the stand in the middle. Danny looked down to his right to the small staircase he’d run down before, then left to the lifts he’d escaped from six hours ago. He felt a chill of fear. The sickness he’d felt last night when he’d thought he wasn’t going to get out. He looked around for Sir Richard or Andy. There was no sign of them. He looked for security cameras and saw two.

  Holt stopped outside the press-conference room door.

  ‘One call,’ Holt said, holding his hand up.

  Danny waited in silence, watching the journalists file into the press-conference room. Some in jeans and T-shirts, some in suits. Men and women. Old and young. And at the end of the room, the table with several microphones and a backcloth advertising the club sponsor, Sir Richard’s scrap company.

  ‘Rebecca? It’s Anton. Listen. Can you get someone to check car-repair garages for a red Merc? Front and side crash damage. There’s not many red Mercs in the city.’ Holt paused to listen. ‘Sir Richard? I couldn’t possibly comment.’ Holt smiled broadly as he closed his phone.

  ‘Right, Danny. We listen to what they have to say. See if any of the other journos have anything interesting to ask. Then I stand up. I tell your story. Get that copper over there to join us. And you lead us to the bunker. Yeah?’

  Danny felt an explosion of nerves. Him leading dozens of people to the bunker. It sounded unreal. But this was his moment. He tried to imagine he was a real detective about to reveal all. But that didn’t help. It just made him feel even more nervous.

  ‘Yeah,’ Danny said, his voice wobbling.

  ‘Let’s go in, then.’

  Danny followed Holt into the press conference. He didn’t see Sir Richard watching him from a doorway to the left. Nor the look of surprise on Sir Richard’s face.

  The Challenge

  The press-conference room was full again. There were at least fifty journalists. Three cameras at the back, lights reflecting off their lenses. Two on tripods. One on a woman’s shoulder.

  When Danny saw Sir Richard enter the press conference he almost retched. He saw him from behind. His silver hair. His black jacket. A green folder tucked under his arm.

  Holt put his hand on Danny’s back. ‘Are you OK, Danny?’

  Danny felt weak and hot. ‘Not really. But I can cope. It’s just seeing him.’

  The sight of the man who had said he might kill him – in the very building where he’d said it – was almost too much for Danny. He remembered his years of dreaming about being a private detective. He’d never imagined feeling like this. He resolved that when this was over he’d go back to a quiet life. Trying out for the school football team. Asking Charlotte out. Those were the kinds of risks he wanted to face. After this.

  Danny watched Sir Richard sit down next to the senior policewoman. Just the two of them this time. Danny had thought he’d feel fear seeing him again, but his overwhelming feeling was hatred. Towards this man and what he was doing.

  He couldn’t imagine what they were going to say when he spoke out. Would his investigations have any effect o
n them at all?

  ‘Good morning, everybody,’ the policewoman said, sitting down and waiting for Sir Richard to sit down. As the noise of the journalists subsided, she played with her hair at the back. Smoothing it. ‘Thank you for coming. Especially on a Sunday. I am pleased to say that we have some encouraging news.’

  Encouraging news? Danny wondered what was going on. What could have changed? Part of him was fascinated to see how Sir Richard was going to get out of the situation he was in. What could he possibly say or do?

  Danny looked around the room. There was a silence. An expectation. Then, looking back at the table where the policewoman was pausing, Danny saw Sir Richard staring right at him. A cold hard stare. Danny felt Holt’s arm go round him and noticed Holt stare back at Sir Richard, who looked away.

  ‘Overnight Sir Richard received a communication from the I.K.G.P.,’ the policewoman went on. ‘They are offering to negotiate and Sir Richard has accepted. We hope in the next twenty-four hours to have good news. But until then I must ask those of you who are engaged in undercover work – you know who you are – to desist. This is a sensitive period. Any journalists who take their enquiries any further, thus jeopardizing our negotiations, will be met with the full force of the law.’

  Fifty hands went up. A barrage of questions. But the policewoman went on, raising her voice. ‘I have heard that one of the newspapers has put up a reward of one million pounds for information leading to Roberts’ rescue. I want this knocked on the head right now. This investigation is at a delicate stage. Anyone trying to solve this crime on their own will only make things worse. They could be putting Roberts’ life in danger. I’d like to ask the newspaper to take back its offer.’

  The hands shot up again, as if they hadn’t heard the policewoman’s last words.

  ‘Sir Richard? Will Roberts be back in time to train with the England squad?’

  ‘Sir Richard? Are you going to pay the ransom?’

  ‘Sir Richard? How much is it now?’

  ‘I have asked Sir Richard not to answer any questions until the matter is resolved,’ the policewoman said.

  ‘Can I make a statement, rather than ask a question?’

  Danny stared at Holt. He had spoken sooner than Danny had imagined he would.

  This was it.

  Danny felt his mouth go dry. He wanted to breathe deeply, but his breaths were short and shallow.

  ‘Yes,’ the policewoman said. ‘So long as it doesn’t jeopardize the recovery of Sam Roberts. If it does, then my previous statement stands.’

  ‘Anton Holt, Evening Post,’ Holt said. ‘One of my sources has given me information to suggest that Sam Roberts is, in fact, here at City Stadium.’

  Conversations muttered throughout the room. Questions. Laughter.

  ‘That’s absurd,’ Sir Richard said. ‘I…’

  The policewoman put her hand over Sir Richard’s microphone. ‘No more,’ she mouthed to him, then turned to Holt. ‘Explain,’ she said, over the noise that had increased.

  Danny could sense Sir Richard’s eyes boring into him. But he didn’t look up. He just stared at his hands as his fingers intertwined with each other. Like the night before, he felt he wasn’t inside his body, like he wasn’t here at all.

  Holt stood up. And Danny noticed a quiet in the room again. But a different quiet. Nobody was moving. Or speaking. Everyone was looking at Holt. Waiting. As if they had all held their breath.

  ‘I have information that Sam Roberts is being held in a basement apartment directly beneath the main stand, accessible via the electrics room.’ Holt was talking quickly. And Danny realized that he must be nervous too. ‘My sources tell me that there is one man guarding him. That man is armed. That man has fired a gun. I have seen physical evidence that backs up this story. My source described to me an incident with a car outside last…’

  People had stopped listening to Holt. The room was on its feet.

  Holt stopped talking.

  ‘Wait. Stop,’ Sir Richard said, as most of the journalists headed for the door. He was pale and sweating, his eyes bearing down on Danny.

  ‘Please…’ the policewoman said.

  But it was too late. The room was emptying. Dozens of men and women charging out of the door, towards the staircase Danny had walked down two days before.

  Danny stayed close behind Holt, catching Sir Richard’s eye again. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought Sir Richard was trying to mouth words to him, but he couldn’t make them out.

  Fifty people were piling down the steps to the basement. To Danny it was familiar, like leaving the football after a good win. There was an electricity in the air. An excitement.

  As he made his way down to the basement corridor, Danny saw a forest of TV cameras and microphones. Some of the TV cameras were pointing at Holt, as Danny went along in his wake. Other journalists were waiting at the door to the electrics room. They made a space for Holt and Danny to come through.

  ‘Let’s see your mystery bunker, then, Holt,’ one pink-faced and overweight journalist said, sneering.

  ‘Danny?’

  Danny looked at Holt.

  Holt gestured at the door.

  Danny went to open it. It was stiff again.

  ‘Locked?’ the sneering journalist said.

  Then the door gave and Danny opened it. He let Holt and half a dozen other journalists into the electrics room.

  The first thing Danny noticed was the moisture. There was condensation on some of the pipes that ran up the wall. The room had been dry before. Very dry.

  ‘Go on then, Holt,’ the pink-faced journalist said.

  ‘Is this it?’ Holt said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can you lift it?’

  ‘Yes,’ Danny said. He felt his hands shaking as he lifted the trapdoor. Heavy in his hands.

  But, as he lifted it away, Danny knew something was wrong. The smell. The air. Everything.

  Holt helped Danny lift the trapdoor away, to lean it against a wall. Then turned to see six journalists peering down a hole. With more behind them.

  ‘It’s just an old cellar. Looks like it’s flooded too.’

  ‘What?’

  One of the journalists had pulled a small torch from his top pocket. He was shining into the hole. Danny and Holt moved to the edge. Six faces looking up at theirs as they looked down.

  Water. Brown water. It had to be three metres deep.

  The entire apartment had been flooded.

  ‘It’s down there,’ said Danny. ‘I was there. Roberts too. And a man with a gun.’

  ‘Is this your source?’ the sneering journalist said to Holt.

  ‘One of them,’ Holt said. But his voice was quiet and flat, not like Danny had ever heard it. It reminded him of his dad’s voice. Disappointment, not anger.

  Then Holt glanced at Danny. His eyes were full of questions.

  ‘They’ve flooded it,’ Danny said. ‘I swear it.’

  The policewoman had made it through the scrum of journalists.

  ‘Right. What have we got?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Holt said. ‘Nothing. I’m sorry for wasting your time.’

  ‘Wasting my time? You’re from the Evening Post, yes?’

  ‘Yes,’ Holt said.

  ‘I know your boss. Giles Forshaw. I’ll be calling him.’

  ‘Yes,’ Holt said.

  Holt gestured to Danny to go with his eyes. Danny shook his head.

  ‘Go,’ Holt mouthed.

  Danny gave him a look, trying to say sorry. Holt looked gutted.

  So Danny left the electrics room, ignoring the questions the other journalists threw at him. Moving through the cameras and microphones, past the journalists making calls into their mobile phones, laughing at Anton Holt’s expense.

  There was no sign of Sir Richard or Andy.

  Danny pushed through the fire doors, walking this time, not running. He didn’t care if an alarm went off.

  It didn’t anyway.

  He had thou
ght he’d be worried leaving the stadium, even scared. But all he could think of was Holt’s face. That defeated look. And the things the policewoman and other journalists had been saying to him. Danny wondered if he’d destroyed Holt’s career. He felt sick.

  As he passed through the stadium gates, Danny looked up to the main stand, and the huge plate glass windows that allowed fans to look out across the city.

  Standing in the window was Sir Richard, looking into the middle distance, talking animatedly into his mobile phone.

  We Meet Again

  Danny moved quickly, crossing the main road in front of a small white van that slowed down and waved him across. He waved back, waiting on the white line for three cars coming the other way to go past, then went across to the front of the chip shop and up a side street.

  He needed space to think. But not near the football stadium. It wasn’t safe. Nor at home, where he’d just get question after question.

  Danny walked briskly. He’d find a back street. Somewhere he could collect his thoughts. He remembered the park at the back of the electrical store, where he’d been watching the burglars. A playground and a line of benches looking out over the city. No one would find him there. Sir Richard. Andy. Anton Holt. His dad. He would have time to think. Time to work out how to find a way out of the mess he’d got himself into.

  He reached the park and sat with his back to the road. In front of him was the city, with the stadium in the foreground and a forest on a rising hill in the background. Vast green spaces. People in the distance, walking dogs, jogging, playing with children. A view he’d have relished a few days ago. But now he was so buried in his thoughts he barely registered it.

  The sun was warm. The bench dry. Clouds scudding across the sky.

  So what was he supposed to do now? Go to the police? Go on the run? Or just go home?

  He wondered if it was wise to go to the police – after what had happened at the stadium. They were probably more keen to speak to him than he was to them. What was it called? Wasting police time? What was the punishment for that?

  Even worse, Danny couldn’t get the look on Anton Holt’s face out of his mind.