‘He had no records, no background history,’ Longbright pointed out.
‘That’s not an uncommon thing in London,’ said Bryant, ‘but I still thought it might hold the key. Bensaud accidentally left his real name in the stage-door log of the Rainbow Theatre, Finsbury Park. Maggie Armitage spotted it. Of course, the silly woman forgot to tell me for ages. I knew we wouldn’t get the truth merely by asking him. It was when I was looking at Géricault’s painting The Raft of the Medusa that I realized he might be a refugee. After all, we had an actual Medusa in the case – Freddie Cooper’s company. Medusa transports engines, and that gave me links to the others.’
Bryant picked up his penknife again and began carefully removing black paint from the scorched wooden panel on the table. ‘Did you know, in rural Spain and Turkey it’s not unheard of for neighbours to gamble away the adjoining rooms in their houses? When they have nothing left to put on the table they use their property rights. The Cossack Club is a proper old-fashioned gambling den where people will gamble anything, despite what its manager told Janice. So those were the pieces; all that remained was to put them in the right order. Anyone?’ He peered around the room as if expecting to see raised hands.
‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ Land exploded. ‘Just for once can you drop your Miss Marple routine and give us the bottom line?’
Bryant would not be rushed. ‘Marion North’s daughter Cassie was an enigma. She didn’t really get on with her mother but still hired her to work in the company. She had an affair with Bensaud but stayed long after it ended, and didn’t walk out when she discovered he’d got Lynsey Dalladay pregnant. She was at the centre of everything but kept such a low profile that we never suspected her for a minute.’
‘What, you’re saying that Cassie North killed her rival and her own mother?’ asked May. ‘That doesn’t seem right.’
‘No, that’s what I thought,’ Bryant agreed. ‘As soon as I stopped thinking of this as the work of a clever manipulator and imagined someone trying to make the best of a series of disastrous accidents, I arrived at the only possible answer.’ He paused for dramatic effect. ‘Freddie Cooper. It had to be him.’
‘But you just saved his life,’ said Land.
‘I haven’t finished.’ Bryant silenced him with a hard stare. ‘It’s a matter of looking at Cooper differently. He’s feral and instinctive, a self-preservationist haphazardly covering up consequences. This time, all of the pieces fit except one. He had the most to lose if Life Options went down. But I thought he might kill for the simplest reason of all – in order to survive.’
While Bryant let that sink in, he walked to the front of the room and drew an odd pattern on the whiteboard. ‘Medusa delivers engines, trucks and boats. It’s also involved in the smuggling of parts and people. Four years ago one of its vessels sank, drowning a hundred and eighty desperate refugees. One of the survivors was Ali Bensaud. I deciphered Gilyov’s tattoo as a gorgon because it fitted, but I was wrong. If we draw in the missing sections we get something else – not snakes but tendrils. Not the Gorgon but a jellyfish. Not a Medusa but a méduse.’
Having filled in the image, he returned to the section of painted wooden hull and picked a scab of paint from it. Underneath the silver ‘A’ in ‘Medusa’ was an ‘E’.
‘Cooper’s French-registered boat, the Jellyfish – La Méduse – was taking refugees from the coast of Libya, and its owner cared less about its human cargo than its contraband. It was never traced because he changed the company name. Dimitri Gilyov had the tattoo because he was the captain of La Méduse. By this time ship owners were regularly being prosecuted, and when Gilyov tracked the owner down in London he tried to blackmail him. Cooper punished Gilyov by cutting off his hand – the proof he bore on his tattooed skin – and throwing it in the river. The current did the rest. Gilyov harboured the grudge and drunkenly came at Cooper one night in the boatyard. He was knocked out and drowned in the shed’s water trough. Cooper put the body in his car and drove it to the bridge.
‘By now Cooper was making more money than he could handle and needed someone to help him launder it, so he looked around for a dupe and chose Lynsey Dalladay. He got her a job in a gambling club and had his players pass her their “winnings”. She wasn’t a call girl, she was a mule. There was a problem, though. Money couldn’t stay in Dalladay’s account without someone noticing.
‘Dalladay introduced Cooper to Ali Bensaud and Cassie North, and Cooper seized the investment opportunity they offered him. London is the dirty-money capital of the West. It arrives from Russian and Chinese sources and gets dumped into property and companies before it can be traced.
‘Everything should have gone smoothly – but something unexpected happened. Ali Bensaud fell in love with Lynsey Dalladay. He even gave her his precious neck-chain, to remind her to be strong. Dalladay announced she was pregnant by Bensaud and told Cooper she was donating his laundered cash to Life Options. She loved Ali and she would do anything for him.’
Land looked as if he was having trouble keeping up. It had been a while since his most senior detective had made this much sense.
‘Cooper insisted on meeting Dalladay at Tower Beach,’ Bryant explained. ‘She had to climb the gate to get inside, but it was the kind of challenge she liked. He was waiting under the pier in the decommissioned MPU boat he used, and chained her with the neck-chain Ali had given her. Then he headed upriver, leaving her to drown. Hence, one set of footprints leading to the tideline.’
‘But he still couldn’t get his hands on the money,’ said May.
‘That’s right. So he asked Marion North to help him. But by now Marion knew he was the owner of La Méduse.’
‘How did she find out?’
‘One of his invoices read “Méduse” instead of “Medusa”. Before Cooper could rectify the mistake she showed it to Bensaud. He must have been devastated. Cooper heard that a man called Bill Crooms was asking around in the Finsbury Park cafés where Libyans and Syrians gathered. Like Bensaud, he’d arrived in the UK under a new name. He heard rumours that Cooper owned refugee boats and had amputated Gilyov’s hand. When Gilyov vanished, Crooms searched for evidence.’
‘Cooper must have felt that everything was closing in on him,’ said May.
‘And that made him panic,’ Bryant replied. ‘Police and press were sniffing around and gabby Marion North was likely to talk. Cooper moved in as soon as you left her, and strangled her with your scarf. Maisner, the skipper of the Penny Black, didn’t see you, he saw Cooper.’
The truth dawned on May. ‘So Cooper directed blame on to Bensaud—’
‘—by encouraging you to investigate the centre. He didn’t care about losing his investment. He painted out the evidence by changing the names of the remaining boats which were in for repairs. But he missed the vessel that was being used for the Thames pageant.’
‘The contusions,’ Longbright reminded him.
‘Dan thought the wounds were similar but Dalladay didn’t get dragged along in the tide like North. She wasn’t hit by a starling. Cooper hit her with an old-fashioned boathook. A curved metal spike almost identical to the bridge starling that the bodies of North and Curtis ran up against.’
‘Do we have any proof for all of this?’ asked Land.
‘We have Cooper’s confession,’ Bryant replied, ‘although his lawyer won’t be pleased that I took it while he was still under the effects of medication.’
‘And you’re telling me you got all of this from a bloody painting?’ said Land, still unable to fully comprehend the details.
‘Actually it was John who gave me the idea,’ said Bryant. ‘He suggested I should look at paintings.’
‘So you were working as a team behind my back.’ Land thought about showing annoyance but decided to be magnanimous. ‘I suppose I should never have tried to stop you.’
‘I’m just sorry all this has probably come too late to save the unit,’ said Bryant.
Land looked suddenly sheepish. ‘Actu
ally, I may have found a way of temporarily protecting us from closure.’
‘You?’ It was Bryant’s turn to be surprised. ‘How?’
‘Hello, everybody,’ said Barbara Biddle, leaning in the doorway and smiling conspiratorially at Land.
‘I don’t care who you are or where you’re from,’ said Supervisor Elena Drosio, checking the call board above their heads, ‘all I want is results. You were top of your team last week. Now you’re three places behind. I thought you wanted to be a winner.’
‘You don’t have to worry,’ he replied. ‘I’ll make it up before the end of my shift.’
‘See that you do,’ said Elena. She looked at him and softened. ‘Look at the people around you. They’re from all over the world and they all want to make something of themselves. But you’re smarter than any of your workmates. I’m sure you could get whatever you want if you put your mind to it.’
Bowing his head in deference, he took his place at the desk once more, donned his black plastic headset and checked the dazzling blue screen in front of him. ‘Good morning,’ he said, picking up his pen, ‘am I talking to the lady of the house? My name is Ali Bensaud and I have a special offer for you today that I think you’ll be very interested in . . .’
As he reeled his caller in, he shaded the drawing he had made of Lynsey’s face, to remind him of who he had loved and lost.
In the great windowless grey hall of the call centre, 197 other employees set out to be kings of the city.
50
BRYANT & MAY
‘I don’t think I’ll be going near the Thames for a while,’ said Bryant.
‘Nor will any of the others,’ May agreed. ‘They’ve all got colds. I thought you deserved a treat after saving me like that, even if you did leave it until the last minute.’ The detectives were perched on stools in the atrium bar of the Shard. Bryant was unable to obtain a pint of nice cloudy bitter and, at a loss for what to order, had settled on an Acapulco Sunset. It arrived with a sparkler, a curly straw and a red umbrella, and couldn’t have looked more 1980s if it had been wearing legwarmers.
‘It’s funny to think that the Thames was so essential to Victorians. From up here it seems utterly insignificant.’ Bryant traced a forefinger on the angled glass wall. Below him was spread an alien city, a vast plain of winking lights. ‘You can hardly make out any landmarks at this height at all. Perhaps that’s the appeal of buildings like this.’
‘What do you mean?’ May asked, turning his glass.
‘Anonymity. We could be looking down on Shanghai or Bangkok. Urban sprawl as far as the eye can see, and from up here it’s the same as anywhere else. London and New York are roughly the same size, approaching eight and a half million people. Guangzhou is five times as big. But from far above all cities are the same.’
‘Then you have to get down into the streets again and start rediscovering what makes the place unique,’ said May. ‘You can’t let London beat you.’
‘It beat Ali Bensaud,’ said Bryant, extracting the kiwi and raspberry kebab from his drink. ‘He came here with an ambitious dream and the city poisoned it. London took his girl and his money and it corrupted him. And the river – it’s not sacred or dangerous any more, it’s forgotten. I’m finding it harder and harder to stay in love with London, John. It’s failing those who come here looking for a better life.’
‘Not all of them,’ said May, trying to offer his partner some hope. ‘We don’t know where Ali is now. He’s had a taste of success. I don’t think he’ll give up easily. Hey, come on, no more depressing thoughts. You should be celebrating. You got your mojo back.’ May raised his glass.
‘Perhaps,’ said Bryant, disdainfully removing a baby tomato from his concoction of tequila, pineapple, rum and almond liqueur. ‘But I do feel different now. Something inside me has changed. I’ve seen glimpses of something else. I’m not sure what exactly but there are – images.’
‘What of?’
‘I don’t know. A ghost city, an alternative version of London I imagine and long for rather than the place I live in. I was warned there would be after-effects.’
‘Then there’s only one thing you can do,’ said May. ‘Learn to enjoy them. Time is short but it hasn’t run out yet. I’m going on a date – yes, at my age, have your laugh. After decades of worrying about everyone else I’m going to finally start enjoying myself.’
‘You’re right, of course,’ said Bryant, setting aside his glass. ‘That’s exactly what I should start doing. Embrace the changes, and if any more phantoms appear I’ll sit down for a pint with them and ask them about the London they know.’
‘So you remember who you are now,’ said May as the waiter dropped a terrifying bill on their table and beetled away. ‘The last time we finished a case together you weren’t so sure.’
‘Yes, I think I’m getting the hang of it again,’ said Bryant. ‘You have no idea how nice it is to be able to remember where you live.’
‘And where do you live?’ asked May.
Bryant pointed to the chromatic matrix of lights that lay in every direction beyond the angled glass. ‘Out there,’ he said.
Janice Longbright closed down her computer, folded up her make-up box, turned off her desk lamp and hunted for her coat. Now that the case had been closed and the unit’s demise had been deferred she felt strangely empty inside. It was late. Looking around her eerily tidy office, she wondered what to do next.
‘How come you’re always the last one to leave?’ asked the square-set silhouette in the doorway.
Longbright squinted. ‘Jack?’
Sergeant Jack Renfield stepped into the room. She hadn’t seen him since he broke up with her on the towpath of the Regent’s Canal.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked.
‘I heard about Fraternity moving on,’ he said casually. ‘A shame that. He’s a decent guy, just like his brother was.’
‘We’ll still see him. He’s going to be working with Giles.’
Renfield looked around the room. ‘That means there’s a vacancy here.’
‘Not for long,’ said Longbright. ‘John has someone in mind: a German forensics specialist. She’s supposed to be very good. Brilliant, in fact.’
‘Oh. I guess that ship sailed without me.’
‘I thought you hated it here,’ she said, folding her arms.
‘I didn’t say that. I said I couldn’t stay here after what had happened between us.’
‘You asked me to marry you for the wrong reason, remember? Because you thought you’d lost me.’
‘Yeah, I thought about that,’ said Renfield. ‘I shouldn’t have asked you to give up the job. That was selfish. Sometimes I forget it’s a vocation.’
‘So – why are you here?’
‘Oh—’ He didn’t know what to do with his hands, so he stuck them in his pockets. ‘Your internal investigations officer asked me to collect some files and shred them. It sounds like she’s not going to present her case against the unit.’
‘And?’ Longbright was waiting.
‘And I’ve got them stacked in boxes in the hall, all ready to go. I told you, I’m not like Bryant and May, Janice. I’m not like the rest of you. But I do miss it. The Met’s boring compared to here. The PCU isn’t like a regular unit. It’s more like—’ He struggled to think of an appropriate simile. ‘Like working in a condemned funfair.’
‘Well, you gave it up.’
‘I gave you up.’ He bit his lip. He was never the most articulate of officers, and hated talking about his feelings. ‘It made me realize. If someone makes you happier when you’re with them than when you’re alone, you shouldn’t let them go.’
‘And what the hell makes you think that person would ever take you back?’
Renfield screwed up one eye. ‘Er . . . I was counting on a sudden endorphin rush.’
‘Jack, did you just make a joke?’
‘I think so, yes.’
She laughed. ‘Blimey, there may be hope for you
yet.’
He looked up at her sheepishly. ‘Then what should I do?’
‘Apply for the job.’ She smiled. ‘We’ll see how it goes.’
Fraternity DuCaine sat under a dripping plane tree beside the canal and watched the rain creating sound waves on the water. Beside him, in a plastic bag, were the few personal items he needed to keep from his days at the PCU. He couldn’t bring himself to tell Raymond Land the real reason for wanting to leave the unit. It was true that he had a great job lined up, but every day when he entered the office a wave of sickness swept over him.
His brother had been killed while working for the unit. At first Fraternity thought he could handle it, but everyone around him had known and loved his brother, and the awkward pauses that followed every mention of Liberty’s name were more than he could bear.
It hurt him to go because he liked them all, even Raymond Land. They tried so hard and often failed but still they stayed, underappreciated and underpaid, like employees in a company manufacturing children’s toys that had long since fallen from favour. He couldn’t understand what kept them at their posts until he realized that they had no other option. Like many public sector officials they were institutionalized beyond the point where change was possible, and that was what made them happy.
He smiled to himself and rose from the damp grass. I did it for you, Liberty, he said to himself. Now it’s time to move on.
‘Is there a bone running through this?’ asked Colin, sawing away at the orange brick on his plate.
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