by Bill Kitson
‘Spoilsport. Ah well, I’m no’ that worried. With everyone being short o’ money, there’s bound tae be others willing tae nick stuff, just tae make ends meet. And judging by the reports I read, they were fairly amateurish. Anyway, what can I dae fer ye? Lost the keys tae the cells?’
‘No, although it is about keys that I came to see you. These, to be precise.’ She produced the key ring and laid it on the counter. ‘I need to find out what they fit.’
Johnson pointed to the two bronze keys. ‘I can tell ye what they are, or what they appear tae be.’ He explained his idea.
Clara nodded agreement. ‘Yes, that was what we thought. It’s the steel one that we don’t know about.’
He picked up the key and peered at it for several moments. ‘Aye, I think I can tell ye what that fits. Bear wi’ me a sec.’
He disappeared into the workshop and returned a few minutes later. ‘Unit number twenty-one, Helmsdale Industrial Estate,’ he told her as he dropped the key ring back in her hand.
Clara stared at him, as awestruck as a child who has seen her first magic trick. ‘How on earth do you know that?’
Johnson smiled, enjoying the moment. ‘Because I fitted the lock tae that door. In fact I fitted the locks tae all those units. When the industrial estate changed hands a couple o’ years ago, the new owners wanted better security fer their tenants. Plus master keys for themsen in case any o’ the tenants defaulted, an’ because they have a habit o’ losing ’em, or needing extras.’ He shook his head sadly. ‘Ye’ve no idea how careless people are wi’ keys. I’ve had tae provide three replacements already. That type o’ key is a bit special, which was how I knew it was frae the industrial estate. All I had tae dae then was compare it wi’ the numbers on the master copies in the workshop tae know which o’ the units it fit.’
‘Jimmy, I may have told you this before, but you’re a genius. Thanks a lot.’
The male receptionist on the caravan park smiled at the man approaching the desk. ‘Can I help you?’
‘We’re touring the area and don’t have a booking. Is that a problem?’
‘No problem at all. We’ve often got room for a few more vans,’ he reassured him as he glanced through the window at the motorhome. He passed him the booking form. ‘Would you fill that in, please? How many people are there in your party? We have to ask; health and safety, you understand.’
‘Just three of us.’
‘I’m afraid we have to take payment in advance, a credit card will be fine.’
‘That’s OK, it will be cash.’
He climbed back into the driving seat of the motorhome. ‘Stand number thirty-four, courtesy of the youth on reception.’
As they drove slowly up the tarmac road, looking for the stand they had been allocated, he asked, ‘What do we do now?’
‘Do as before. Keep watching and behave normally.’
In the back the Shakila was silent. She had trusted strangers once before, and the result had been dreadful. Now, she was with these people who had found her on the beach and were keeping her prisoner; but where else could she go? They had kept her safe, so far. They had supplied her with warm clothing and she supposed in a way they had been kind, even if they are drug runners. They had got her to tell them of the shooting on the boat and assured her she would be taken care of, but what reliance could she place on their promise, given the way they earned their living? Were they lying to her? If they were going to kill her they could have already done so. Might they not simply hand her over to those people she was most anxious to avoid, the gunman, or to the authorities, who would send her back to the place she had gone through so much to escape from?
Chapter twenty-two
Next morning, Lisa was alone in the CID suite.
Clara arrived. ‘Any messages?’ she asked, as she hung her jacket on a chair.
‘Only one. God wants you to ring her; said it was urgent.’
‘It usually is,’ Clara remarked as she picked up the phone.
‘I was right about the Drugs Intelligence Unit,’ O’Donnell told her. ‘They’re very interested in the caravan park and are going to get someone to check it out when they can, and if they send word they will need us to be ready to go in. But more importantly, they’ve just got some intelligence about the other drug suppliers; how they bring them in to the country and where they’re based. At present they can’t confirm any of this, so they need our team to investigate on their behalf – and our own, I hasten to add. I think we need to act speedily on this, so liaise with Jack Binns and traffic to help monitor the location. Have you got pen and paper?’
The chief constable gave her the details and chuckled at Clara’s gasp of surprise. ‘Pretty much my reaction when I heard it,’ she agreed, ‘but totally logical, when you think about.’
‘You’re dead right, ma’am. We’ll get on it straightaway, but I think we’re going to need some help. Viv’s giving evidence in court today, so there’s only Lisa and me.’
‘No he isn’t. He’s on his way to Helmsdale now along with Jackie Fleming. The defendant in the case changed his plea to guilty, which freed Viv up. I happened to see him when he popped in here, and handed him over to Jackie. There are also four armed officers en route.’
‘Brilliant. Thanks, ma’am. I also have to thank you for your idea about taking the key to Jimmy Johnson. He recognized it immediately. Coincidentally, it belongs to a unit on the same industrial estate as the address you’ve just given me. Jimmy fitted all of them, which helped. I was going to take a look around there today, but it will have to wait until we’ve dealt with this other job.’
Clara thought it was a strange coincidence that the site they had been directed to was only two streets away from the unit to which Patrick Newsome held a key.
The building, in the middle of a row of identical ones, was typical of many. Alongside the frosted glass door to one side of the unit, which usually led to a small office was a larger, roller-shutter door delivery entrance. Both of these were closed, there was no light on inside, no cars parked outside, no sign of life at all.
‘They deserve to go to gaol, if only for their lousy puns,’ Fleming commented.
Clara read the sign and laughed. ‘Yes, they are pretty bad.’
The board, which had been fixed above the glass door, read, SOLE TRADERS, Fresh Fish Delivered Weekly From Our Plaice To Yours.
‘Hmm, then it’s appropriate that we’re raiding them, because we suspect something fishy’s going on,’ Pearce commented.
‘I wonder if customers have to pay C.O.D. for their fish?’ Lisa joined in.
Fleming groaned. ‘Don’t you start! We’ve enough bother with Viv.’
Lisa turned to Fleming and asked, ‘In that case, can you create a new rank for Viv? Defective Punstable perhaps?’
They were seated in Clara’s car on the main road next to the side street where the unit was located. ‘Hang on, one of the vans is coming,’ she interrupted.
‘Saved by the bell. I don’t think I could have stood many more bad puns,’ Fleming muttered, as Pearce radioed to the members of the ARU team in an unmarked Volvo estate car a few yards behind them. Pearce knew the innocent-looking vehicle contained a slide-out drawer below the parcel shelf that held a variety of weapons.
‘Do we approach him outside, or wait until he’s opened up?’ Lisa asked.
‘Let him get inside. Once he’s on the premises, we’ll be able to conduct a search and keep out of sight if any others turn up.’
The van driver was in a good mood. The business was flourishing. He and his boss hadn’t expected the level of demand for their products as he and the others toured the villages. The lack of a fishmonger in the local towns and a natural dislike of supermarket produce was the reason for their success. He confidently expected them to be able to shift almost all the catch they had bought at the port by the weekend and the free lobsters would make a healthy profit.
That, of course, was without taking the other stuff into acco
unt. The small parcels he and his colleagues regularly collected along with the fish had them paid handsomely by their employer.
He parked the fish van in front of the delivery door, opened the office, stepped inside and operated the mechanism that controlled the roller-shutter. He turned to head back to his van, his intention to reverse into the building, when he became aware that he was being watched. His hand hovered close to the shutter button; then froze. His mood changed instantly. Two men were standing in the doorway, both pointing guns at him. For a moment, he thought that this was a hijack such as he had been warned against. One of the men shouted, ‘Armed police. Stand still; put your hands where I can see them.’
Most of the speech was superfluous, for by then he had seen the flak jackets they were wearing which bore the logo ‘police’, and knew he wasn’t about to be shot in cold blood. The realization didn’t comfort him one little bit.
Having secured their prisoner and examined the contents of the van, the team concealed themselves in the warehouse. Their prisoner’s vehicle was still parked outside, which should cause the other drivers to approach the unit in safety.
As they waited, Clara inspected the office and found only fish related invoices and paperwork, nothing to indicate who the gang leader was. In the warehouse she spotted a bank of large chest freezers, each labelled with the name of one of the drivers. A simple system adding credibility to the set-up should anyone in authority visit the premises.
Within the next two hours, the team had arrested all four drivers. Inspection of the vans revealed a compartment in the passenger footwell of each fish van, inside which a couple of small parcels had been secreted. These were removed for testing. The prisoners were ferried to the police station whilst Mironova, Andrews, and Pearce loaded the fish from the vans into the freezers. ‘No point finding out that the packets contain flour and then facing a claim for damages because the fish has gone off,’ Fleming told them.
As soon as they reached the station, one of the men requested that he be allowed to contact his solicitor for himself and the others. Their legal representative, following the call, immediately rang the mobile phone number that was permanently on his desk jotter, to inform Tony Hartley of the arrest of his men.
Hartley’s instructions were clear. ‘Activate the reserve fund and make sure they know the terms and conditions before the police start interviewing them.’
Sergeant Binns, who by now was beginning to think his job description had been changed to include the duties of a hotel receptionist, was thankful that all the other prisoners had been transferred to Netherdale to await their appearance at a preliminary hearing.
When the solicitor reached the station, he requested to speak to each of his clients alone prior to their interrogation. During which time, he passed on the message from Tony Hartley. Although they were only marginally cheered by the news that their families were to be cared for during their inevitable incarceration, they had no hesitation complying with the accompanying instruction. Thus, when they were questioned about the presence of the drugs in their vehicles, their suppliers, clients, and where they got the money to pay for the illicit produce, none of them said a word. The price of their silence could be calculated almost to the penny, but then Tony Hartley and his boss, the major, were careful planners.
The interviews and the accompanying paperwork took so long that there was no chance for the team to revisit the industrial estate that day. ‘We’ll have to look at Newsome’s unit tomorrow,’ Clara told them.
Mironova parked in front of her flat and got out of the car. Before turning to go inside, she glanced across the road. Her heart lurched and she felt an almost physical pain as she saw David’s mother and father climb out of their car and begin crossing the road towards her. The inference that something terrible had happened was obvious; immediate and unbearable. She bit back a cry of anguish, but her look of distress was sufficient to cause David’s mother to break into a run. She clasped Clara in a tight embrace. ‘It’s all right, it’s all right,’ she repeated again and again. ‘David’s OK. He’s safe. He’s been wounded, but he’s safe.’
‘He took a nasty wound in the shoulder,’ David’s father added as he joined them. ‘I spoke to the medics, they’re usually pretty cautious types, and they assured me he’ll be fine, given time. We thought it better to come and tell you in person. Not the sort of thing you want to hear over the phone.’
‘Come on, Clara, relax,’ Mrs Sutton told her. ‘They’ll be flying him home as soon as he is fit enough to travel.’
‘Is he ... did you speak to him.’
‘Very briefly, after they’d operated. He was pretty doped up as you can imagine, but he insisted we let you know as soon as we could. He said you’d already be worried, because he hadn’t been able to phone.’
‘I was. And you’re certain it’s nothing worse? No nasty complications?’
‘Absolutely certain. He even made a joke, sent you a message. Something about it being the perfect excuse for him to get out of decorating – whatever that means.’
Clara laughed, albeit a little shakily. ‘He’s been threatening to redecorate the flat for ages, but something always seems to get in the way. I’m sorry I folded up like that, but I naturally thought, when I saw you.... Look, where are my manners. You must come inside. Let me get you a drink or something.’
‘No, not a chance,’ David’s father said. ‘We’re taking you out to dinner. That was something I had to promise we’d do. He said you’d probably be working far too hard and living off pizzas and whisky. I can’t fault the whisky, but I detest pizzas. Like chewing cardboard.’
Clara managed a smile. ‘He’s wrong; it’s quiches, not pizzas. This is ever so kind of you. Will you at least come in whilst I get changed?’
‘Of course, Dear,’ Mrs Sutton coughed delicately. ‘And if you want time to have a shower....’
‘Oh! Of course, I’d quite forgotten. We arrested some men today who deliver fish. We’d to transfer their stock from the vans to the freezers. I must stink like Billingsgate Fish Market.’
‘It is a little noticeable,’ Mrs Sutton agreed. ‘We’ll come in and wait for you.’
‘I think we must hold a press conference,’ O’Donnell told Fleming. ‘We’re being hounded by the media over the lack of progress, especially regarding the unsolved murders. Added to which the media must have got wind that we’ve made several arrests, and there’s nothing worse than news reporters who are short of facts. They tend to make up their own. At least if we announce the results we do have, they’ll know we’re not sitting back, twiddling our thumbs.’
‘I was on my way to see you. I’ve had a call about the drugs that were found in Lee Machin’s motorhome and the home of the dealer Clara’s been referring to as Greasy Palms. It’s confirmed that only one batch was contaminated; so technically we’ve got our murderer of the addicts. I suppose we should be thankful that Greasy Palms had only just started distribution, and only a small amount at that, so there isn’t much on the streets. Whether either of them will say anything more, remains to be seen. At least at the press conference we can be more positive. Do you want to set it up now, or wait until Clara and the team have had a look at the other unit on the industrial estate?’
‘When are they going there?’
‘It was scheduled for today, but then Clara rang in and requested the day off, and in the circumstances, it would have been churlish to refuse.’
O’Donnell raised an enquiring eyebrow.
‘You’ve met her fiancé – Major Sutton? Well I’m afraid he’s been injured, fortunately not too seriously, and his family have arrived.’
‘In that case we’ll have to go ahead with the media conference in advance of any other activity. I can’t hold off any longer. It would also be right to let Clara conduct the search on the other unit, so that can wait until she’s back. We owe her that for the magnificent work she’s put in whilst Nash has been away.’
‘I still don’t understan
d why you refused point blank to even allow me to contact him. Knowing Mike, I feel sure he would have returned, if only for a few days.’
‘Which is exactly the reason that I didn’t allow it. There are times when it’s necessary to take the broader view, particularly in my job, and I’ve already told you, Mike needs a rest.’
Chapter twenty-three
The media conference was difficult, but at least the chief constable and Fleming were able to identify certain areas of success. O’Donnell began by giving a full account of the tragic deaths of the addicts found at the derelict house. ‘The cause was adulterated heroin,’ she told the assembled reporters. ‘Sadly, with the chemical used to contaminate the drug, we believe this was a deliberate act. Although at this stage we can only speculate as to the motive, we believe it may possibly have been a particularly malicious part of a turf war between two competing drug gangs. I am pleased to say we have since recovered quantities of the drug which have been similarly adulterated, and although it is too early to say that we have removed the threat completely, we are confident that there can be very little left out on the street.’
She continued by elaborating on the quantities of heroin the police had seized; an announcement that caused even some of the more experienced journalists to raise their eyebrows. ‘I am also pleased to say that we have also arrested several members of the two factions involved in bringing drugs into our region, and we hope in time to stop the supply route they have been using.’ O’Donnell then let Fleming take up the story of the arrests in detail.
A reporter from the Gazette positioned at the back of the room called out, ‘Where’s Inspector Nash? Why isn’t he on this case?’
O’Donnell stared directly at him. ‘Inspector Nash is on compassionate leave.’
Realizing the connection between his paper’s former staff member and Nash, the reporter squirmed and looked at his feet.