The Price Of Darkness

by Hurley, Graham

  Barrie himself, to the surprise of many, had remained totally unflustered in the eye of this storm, addressing one issue after another, calling for clarification over this point or that, seeking all the time to identify worthwhile investigative pathways forward as the sheer volume of incoming information threatened to overwhelm them.

  The key task in these early hours, he kept reminding everybody, was concentration. They had to keep an open mind. They had to sift. They had to assess. And soon, once the focus became a little sharper, they had to eliminate. His one concession to Operation Polygon’s quickening drumbeat was an hourly break for a roll-up and a trip to the open window beside his desk, leaving others to sort out yet another round of coffees.

  Past midnight, he called a halt. Only Faraday remained in his office. As the evening lengthened he’d compiled a list of developments. House-to-house checks by a small army of uniforms and D/Cs along the motorbike’s presumed escape route had so far failed to raise anything of real significance. South of Goldsmith Avenue lay a warren of terraced streets, dozens of intersections, an endless choice of turns for a man in a hurry. Aggregate all those streets and you were looking at literally thousands of front doors.

  Many of these people had been out at work or at the back of the house, and all of them were only too used to the howl of a passing motorbike. One pensioner at the northern end of Haslemere Road thought she might have spotted something through her net curtains. Another woman, much younger, reported seeing a blue motorbike with a pillion passenger making a left turn into Grayshott Road. She’d been on foot, wheeling her nipper back from the nursery, and it was only all the stuff on telly that had prompted her to make a call.

  The bike, she said, had been going slowly. She’d had to stop on the kerb to let it make the turn. There’d been nothing at all to raise her suspicions. Asked for a description, she’d said the person on the pillion was much smaller than the driver. Also, she thought she remembered something distinctive on the forks that held the front wheel, a sticker or something, black and yellow. And, yes, there’d been a holdall strapped on the back pannier rack.

  The mention of Grayshott Road had at least been a lead. From here, the bike could have motored the half-mile or so to the Eastney Road. Directly north lay one of the major routes out of the city. At five fifteen, the Eastern Road was choked with rush-hour traffic and Barrie had ordered an appeal through the media for homebound drivers who might have spotted a blue Kawasaki. That appeal had produced nothing of any real value and neither - so far - had a trawl through the afternoon’s CCTV tapes.

  Within fifteen minutes of the shooting, traffic cars had been stationed alongside all three roads off the island, with others at the ferry terminals. That left a tiny chink in Pompey’s wall but these roads were covered by cameras, and although there’d been dozens of motorbikes amongst the traffic, none of the CCTV sightings had precisely matched the target.

  Other cameras monitored key roads and junctions across the city and Barrie had a team of four D/Cs combing through hours of pictures, while others sat beside the control room staff, monitoring live feeds as the evening went on.

  Then, at dusk, had come a call from a woman who worked at The Orchards, a new psychiatric unit beside St James’ Hospital. She, like everyone else, had been watching the coverage on television. Late in the afternoon, she said, she’d been looking out of the window and had seen a motorbike coming down the road that led to the unit. Beyond the turn into the car park lay the back gate to the hospital itself. The main gates were always padlocked but the side gate was open for staff on foot. Unusually, the bike had squeezed through the gate and then disappeared. At the time, she’d thought nothing of it. Only now, remembering the two leather-clad figures on the bike, did she start to wonder.

  St James’ Hospital was barely a mile from the scene of the hit. At Barrie’s prompting, Faraday had sent a couple of D/Cs to interview the woman and dispatched a dozen uniforms to the hospital with instructions to comb the grounds. They’d been hard at it for three hours now but by midnight there was still no trace of the blue Kawasaki. The conclusion, comfortable or otherwise, was only too clear.

  The bike had been dumped somewhere else within the city, enabling the riders to make their escape at a time of their choosing. Shedding their leathers, they could have left by car, by public transport, even by ferry or hovercraft. They could be in London by now, or on the Isle of Wight, or even abroad. In the seven hours since the shooting, hundreds of flights had departed from Heathrow, Gatwick, Southampton and Bournemouth. The guys on the Kawasaki could be literally anywhere.

  That left the bike itself. Alongside the house-to-house calls and revisits, Barrie had ordered a detailed street-by-street check on every garage, lock-up and patch of waste ground within a steadily expanding radius south of Goldsmith Avenue. The task was enormous but for once he could call on almost limitless manpower, and on the basis of progress reports from the Major Incident Room, he expected the south-east quadrant of the city to have been thoroughly checked within twenty-four hours. If nothing turned up, then he’d extend the search north and west, covering the whole of the island on which the city was built, but in truth he thought that unlikely. Already he sensed that these people had done their homework. There were simply too many CCTV cameras to risk any kind of breakout.

  A professional hit. Almost certainly. Every fresh scrap of evidence - or lack of it - suggested a carefully planned operation. The choice of time and place for the killing, the city in its usual state of rush-hour gridlock. The decision to use a motorbike, with near-perfect concealment inside a helmet and full leathers. Even the choice of weapon. According to the Scenes of Crime Co-ordinator, no spent cases had been recovered from the road. That meant the use of a revolver, rather than an automatic handgun, leaving only the bullets themselves, deformed lead slugs, to offer any kind of forensic lead. A couple had been dug out of the Vauxhall’s upholstery. Of the other two, one had been removed from the minister’s chest cavity after penetrating his shoulder, while the other was still lodged at the back of his skull, awaiting a second operation at the hands of the neurosurgeons in Southampton.

  ‘How is he?’ Barrie had almost forgotten about the victim.

  ‘Still critical, sir.’

  ‘And if he survives?’

  ‘No one’s saying. But an injury like that, full face, you’d expect impairment of function at the very least.’

  Impairment of function was a horrible phrase and Faraday had only used it because someone else had, and because he was tired. The truth of the matter, he thought grimly, was far more graphic. This man had taken a bullet in the brain. If he was unlucky enough to survive, there’d be precious little function left.

  ‘Poor bastard,’ he said softly.

  Barrie didn’t appear to have heard him. He wanted Faraday’s thoughts on the intelligence picture. Brian Imber and Tracy Barber had spent the evening almost permanently on the phone, chasing their various contacts. Neither Special Branch nor the Serious and Organised Crime Agency could come up with any obvious candidates who might have wanted to kill the Under Secretary of State for Defence Procurement but the intelligence services were taking a very different view.

  MI5 were currently conducting dozens of surveillance operations on various groups of fundamentalist militants. A top secret report endorsed at the highest level in Thames House was ready for dispatch to Downing Street. The report, it seemed, carried a disturbing analysis of changing patterns in the terrorist threat and warned that UK-based fundamentalists appeared to be in the process of developing sophisticated cell structures very similar to the Provos’ at the height of the Troubles. Sooner or later one of these cells would mount an operation, and on the phone to Brian Imber a senior analyst had concluded that this was probably it.

  The minister’s visit had been flagged in various specialist defence magazines. The rush-hour certainty of near-gridlock in the city’s traffic offered a perfect opportunity for a hit. The minister himself was unlikely t
o travel with armed protection. Four bullets at point-blank range would make headlines around the world.

  Faraday, pressed for an opinion, thought the MI5 view had some merit. The key weapon in the terrorist war was surprise. It was in the interests of these people to keep changing their MO. The lesson of 7/7, after all, was pretty plain. The intelligence services had known nothing about the London bombers, yet four of them had managed to kill fifty-three people.

  ‘So you think Five might be right?’

  ‘I think their analysis holds water. Until now, as far as I know, they’ve gone for suicide bombings. This is something different but that in itself may be significant. The best terrorist hits come out of nowhere.’

  ‘Of course they do, Joe. But they’re not giving us names, are they?’

  ‘No, sir, not yet, but this is huge. Five will have the politicians all over them. The pressure will be enormous. And we should be aware of that too.’

  ‘Of course.’ Barrie frowned. He was as exhausted as Faraday. ‘So we keep an open mind? Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘I’m afraid so, sir. You wouldn’t have it any other way.’

  And he wouldn’t. Faraday was sure about it. He made a start on tidying his desk, then gave up. One o’clock in the morning was far too late to worry about rogue paperwork. He reached for his briefcase, turned out the light, and stepped into the corridor. There was the trill of a telephone and a murmur of conversation from a nearby office. At the other end of the corridor, through the open door into the incident room, he could see the Outside Enquiries D/S locked in conversation with one of the civilian indexers. Passing the Intelligence Cell, he paused. The lights were still on. He gave the door a gentle push, then peered round it. Jimmy Suttle was bent over a file on his desk, pen in hand. A pad at his elbow was covered in figures.

  It took him a moment or two to realise he had company.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Bit late, isn’t it?’ Faraday nodded at the desk. ‘What’s keeping you?’

  ‘Mallinder’s bank details, sir.’ Suttle stifled a yawn. ‘I’ve only just got round to them.’

  Thirteen

  TUESDAY, 12 SEPTEMBER 2006. 09.34

  Winter sped north along the Meon Valley. The moment the cabbie had picked him up at Blake House, he’d insisted on a change of station on the radio. Virgin FM was fine for brain-dead thirty-somethings trying to kid themselves they were still young but on a day like today you very definitely needed Five Live.

  Already, by the time they got to Fareham, he’d listened to Portsmouth South’s venerable MP expressing his city’s shock and grief at yesterday’s events. Now, in a neat twist, someone had come up with the notion of talking to the football club’s new owner, an ex-Israeli Army sniper of Russian extraction who presumably knew a thing or two about the application of extreme violence.

  As it happened, the interview proved to be a non-starter, not least because Alexandre Gaydamak was unavailable, but Winter sat back, his briefcase on his knees, deeply satisfied that Pompey - both the city and the club - had finally earned its place in the sun. Not only had Goldsmith Avenue featured on TV screens worldwide but the Blues had just found themselves at the very top of the Premiership. Not one result, but two.

  The Five Live presenter was taking phone-ins on the wider implications of the Pompey hit.

  Winter stationed his face in the rear-view mirror, catching the cabbie’s attention. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Dunno, mate, but the way this bloody government’s carrying on, I say fair play to the geezer.’

  ‘There were two of them.’

  ‘Geezers then. Who cares? Bloody politicians, two a penny. Tell you something, though.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It might make someone sort the fucking traffic out. Takes you forever to get anywhere down Pompey. Complete disgrace. Carry on the way we are, and this job won’t be worth tuppence.’

  Winter grinned, then leaned forward to listen to an item of breaking news. He didn’t catch the details but he was sure it was in connection with the shooting.

  ‘They’ve found that motorbike.’ The cabbie was laughing. ‘You’ll never guess where.’

  The breakthrough sent a ripple down the corridor at Major Crimes. Glen Thatcher, the Outside Enquiry D/S in the Incident Room, had lifted the phone to Faraday the moment he’d taken the call from the D/C on site.

  ‘Blue Kawasaki, sir. Nine hundred cc. Black and yellow chequers on the front forks. We’ve got it down as nicked four days ago. Has to be the one. Has to be.’

  ‘Where was it?’

  ‘In some kind of derelict building - it’s not clear from the report. Seems someone’s poured paint stripper all over it.’

  ‘But where?’

  ‘St James’, sir. In the hospital grounds. Turns out that woman from The Orchards was right.’

  Faraday stared at the window. In the welter of enquiries last night, he’d almost forgotten about the call from the woman who’d spotted the two figures on the motorbike. St James’ was the city’s psychiatric hospital, a substantial Victorian pile with extensive grounds. Many of the wards had been closed after the shift to community care but it still housed a sizeable group of long-stay patients. Oddly enough, it lay within half a mile of the Bargemaster’s House. Faraday passed it daily en route to work.

  He bent to the phone again. First things first.

  ‘Have you talked to Scenes of Crime, Glen?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I passed the word on. They’re going to blitz it.’

  ‘What about the hospital management?’

  ‘The lads on site are talking to them now.’

  Faraday nodded. The scene would need to be isolated. Then would come the interviews, dozens of them. The Outside Enquiry teams would need to quiz anyone in a position to see the long drive that threaded past The Orchards into the hospital grounds from Locksway Road. Many of these potential witnesses would presumably be inpatients and Faraday permitted himself a grim smile, imagining certain D/Cs on the squad trying to tease any sense from some of the St James’ veterans. The guys on the Kawasaki had known exactly what they were about. Clever.

  Glen Thatcher was still on the phone.

  ‘Is there anything apart from the bike?’ Faraday asked him. ‘Leathers? Gloves? Helmets?’

  ‘Not that anyone’s told me, sir.’

  ‘Fine. I’ll pass this on to Mr Barrie. He’s up at headquarters this morning.’

  A bubbling pot of freshly made coffee was waiting for Winter by the time the cab dropped him at Esme’s place. The smell greeted him as she opened the front door and she warmed the welcome still further by giving him a smile. There were toys all over the polished beechwood floor and Winter picked his way between an abandoned sit-on tractor and a yellow mini-slide as he followed her into the huge kitchen. She was wearing an apron and a pair of rubber gloves. The woman from the village who did the cleaning was down with flu.

  Esme was as hooked by events in Pompey as Winter himself. She gestured up at a small portable TV wedged between a line of recipe books and a row of glass storage jars.

  ‘Amazing, isn’t it?’

  She stripped off the gloves and poured the coffee while Winter helped himself to a stool to watch the TV. A junior government minister in the studio was acknowledging the need for enhanced security. Until now armed protection had been allocated on a strictly needs-must basis. After yesterday all that would change. He sounded, if anything, relieved.

  ‘Has my dad talked to you this morning? Only he seems to have made a few calls last night and one of them was to a buddy of his in Dubai. This guy spent some time in Los Angeles. He’s got part-shares in a couple of marinas and Dad wondered whether he’d come across this woman you both met.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He says not. Dad thought it was odd, that’s all.’

  ‘Los Angeles is a big place.’ Winter helped himself to another biscuit. ‘There must be loads of people in her game.’

  ‘Sure
. He just wanted me to pass it on. He also asked me to draw up some kind of contract.’ Her eyes strayed to the television. ‘So what’s your take on this lady?’

  ‘She’s a looker.’

  ‘So I gather.’

  ‘And she certainly talks the talk.’

  ‘That’s exactly what Dad said.’ She shook her head. ‘My poor bloody mother. Sometimes I wonder why she bothers. A decent lawyer and she could walk away with millions. She’s still got it too. She could have any guy she wanted.’

  ‘Maybe she loves him.’

  ‘Yeah, I think you’re right. You know what my mum once said to me? Before they were even married?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘She said she’d been mad for him ever since the day they first met.’

  ‘So why didn’t she marry him earlier?’

  ‘Because that’s not the way you play it with Dad. He knows exactly what he wants and he’ll be all over you to get it so the trick is to hold off. I’ve done it myself. It works a treat. He’s like a kid. The last word you should ever use is “yes”.’

  Winter grinned. The change in Esme’s attitude was startling. She was treating him like one of the family. She seemed to trust him.

  ‘Here. Have a look at this.’ She passed across a stapled sheaf of A4 paper. ‘It’s just a draft. We can add or subtract as needs be. See what you think.’

  Winter glanced through the contract. He was no lawyer but he supposed it made sense. At the end of the document, in the clause dealing with the fee payable for Katherine Brodie’s exclusive services, there was a space left blank.

  ‘How far is he prepared to go? Has he mentioned a figure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Seven thousand a month.’

  ‘A month? That’s a fortune. Or at least for him it is.’

  ‘Exactly. Dad doesn’t make offers like that, not without due cause.’ She glanced across at Winter again. ‘That’s why I thought we ought to ask a few questions first, find out a little more about this woman.’