by Graham Brack
‘Let’s hope we don’t find any more bodies, lad. Now, two things we need to do with that car. First, we need to get the forensic team over there to give it a thorough going over, and while they’re doing that you can check out the CCTV at the entrance to see when he got there.’
‘I thought I was supposed to be in charge of this part of the enquiry, sir?’
‘Oops. Quite right, so you are. So what are you going to do, Navrátil?’
‘I thought I’d get the forensic team over there to give it a thorough going over, and while they’re doing that I can check out the CCTV at the entrance to see when he got there, sir.’
‘Excellent idea, lad. With initiative like that you’ll be high up in the police force in no time.’
Valentin had an aversion to entering Slonský’s place of work, this being the result of an unlooked-for visit under the previous regime. Slonský had tried to convince him that the chances that he would once more be thrown down a flight of concrete steps and kicked in the ribs a few times were extremely small, no matter how aggravating he was, but Valentin preferred not to take the chance. They had therefore agreed to meet for a mid-morning snifter at a nearby bar. To Slonský’s surprise Valentin asked for a coffee, which shamed Slonský into doing likewise, despite the fact that 11 o’clock is very nearly lunchtime and a lunchtime sausage can be very dry without a little something of a hoppy nature to help it on its way.
‘What have you got there?’ asked Slonský.
Valentin handed over a folder containing a number of photocopies.
‘Everything I could find about the bank siege. Some good stuff in there, even though I didn’t write it. And the editor liked the idea of profiling senior police officers. He thought it wouldn’t do us any harm to earn a few merit points from the forces of law and order. Got any more names?’
‘I thought perhaps Major Klinger?’
‘You said human.’
‘He is. More or less. And just think — he’s almost singlehandedly defending the value of people’s savings against the evils of fraud and corruption. Besides, you’re a creative writer. Write something creative about him.’
‘You mean lie.’
‘No, just write something creative. Something that makes him sound cuddly, like your favourite uncle.’
‘You overstate my powers. But since Urban is the real prize here, I’ll give it a go. Who else?’
‘I thought maybe the head of PR?’
‘Fine. Name?’
‘I’ve no idea. You’ll have to look it up.’
‘Okay. I can do that. A fifth one would be good, then we can run one a day from Monday to Friday for a week.’
‘Malý.’
‘Malý?’
‘Yes, Malý. He’s a police dog.’
Valentin put his pad down so that he could use both hands to make a point.
‘Slonský, I can’t interview a dog.’
‘He’s a very clever dog.’
‘No doubt. But I’m not printing a quote that goes “Woof woof, woof woof woof!”’
‘People love dogs. It’ll be very popular.’
‘That’s as may be. But I can’t profile a dog.’
‘Not Malý then. We have around eight hundred others.’
‘Not a dog.’
‘How about the Head of Cynology?’
‘Cynology? What’s that?’
‘Dog training. Interview him about all the wonderful things dogs do.’
Valentin sighed. ‘Okay. What’s his name?’
‘I’ve no idea. You’ll have to look it up.’
When Slonský returned to the office he was intercepted by Mucha.
‘Navrátil says when you get back could you please meet him in the Situation Control Room?’
‘The what?’
‘The Situation Control Room. The room where we control situations.’
‘I didn’t know we had one of those. We can’t be using it very much.’
‘The room two floors up with a television on the wall.’
‘Oh, that! Is that what we call it these days?’
‘Why, what do you call it?’
‘The room where we watch big football matches together.’
Slonský laboriously climbed two flights of stairs and pushed open the door of the room. Navrátil was sitting on the table using a remote control to manage a video recording that he was watching on the big screen.
‘Have you borrowed a movie, lad?’
‘CCTV of the car park. I wanted you to watch it with me to see if you draw the same conclusions that I did.’
‘This, I imagine, is the moment when Daniel Nágl’s car arrives at the car park.’
‘That’s right. But the first thing to notice is the date and time.’
‘Sunday 16th September, 14:34. So if she planned to run off on Friday, why didn’t she get on with it?’ Slonský asked.
‘I think I’ve got an answer to that. That’s the black Golf now, coming off Wilsonová into the slip road for the car park. Let me freeze it as it gets to the barrier.’
‘Right. What am I looking at?’
‘We can’t really see the driver too well because the sun visor is down. But note they’ve only got one hand on the steering wheel.’
‘The left hand.’
‘Then they have to take the ticket from the machine on their left, so they wind down the window and use the left hand.’
‘Okay.’
‘So they now have no hands on the wheel.’
‘Agreed.’
‘Drive through, then we switch to this camera at the far end. There are quite a few spaces on Sunday afternoon but the driver chooses a place well away from other parked cars. The Golf comes to a stop, and the driver gets out, picks a bag out of the back seat, again using only the left hand, and locks the car.’
‘It looks awkward, doesn’t it? Something wrong with their right arm?’
‘I think so. And we might get a reason for that when they walk into the station…’
‘It’s a woman! That must be Mrs Broukalová.’
‘Wearing dark glasses but that looks to me like a swelling on her cheek. I think she probably has a black eye she’s hiding, and she has to hold the door with her left hand, cumbersome as that is. I think Nágl has beaten her.’
‘Well, somebody certainly has.’
‘And she parked well away from other cars because she doesn’t have a driving licence. So far as I know, she can’t drive, but it’s an automatic and if she takes it carefully and only has to work the wheel and the pedals, it’s not impossible that this woman who allegedly can’t drive could use a car to get away.’
‘And if she’s using the car, he can’t, so he will have problems following. So why only drive to the station?’
‘She doesn’t want to push her luck. She certainly doesn’t want to get out onto the motorway. But driving in from Komořany is not too terrible. It’s about eleven kilometres, and it doesn’t matter if it takes her thirty minutes. He can’t follow. She just drives up Modřanská then she either crosses to the left bank and comes back across the river via Jiráskův bridge, which is the shortest route, or she keeps going and makes a right turn onto Podolská. It’s a little longer but for a novice driver it’s more straightforward.’
‘Good work, lad. Are there any images that show her face?’
‘I haven’t found one, sir. That’s what I’ve been doing.’
‘Have the forensic boys removed the Golf?’
‘They’ve examined it on site, but the Car Park operators want to know who is going to pay the twelve thousand crowns due for the parking? I told them to speak to you, sir.’
Slonský was doggedly ploughing his way through the photocopies that Valentin had found, and decided that he now had enough to go and see Major Rajka. A telephone call ascertained that Rajka was free so Slonský gathered the papers back into the folder and made his way to the plush corridor that housed senior officers.
Rajka’s office was not
in that corridor. This was his choice. He thought being housed with senior officers might tend to give the impression to people that they could influence his enquiries, not to mention sneak in and tamper with the evidence, so to get to Rajka’s team you had to go along the corridor, down a flight of stairs at the end and along to the farthest point of the wing. There was a security door where you had to wait for someone to let you in, but if Rajka’s secretary was in her office it was left open.
Rajka was sitting at his desk when Slonský entered, but sprang to his feet with alacrity and offered his hand. Slonský was very impressed that Rajka was able to stand without the use of his arms, his desk or emitting a low grunt of effort.
‘You intrigue me. Sit down. Green tea?’
Slonský peered into Rajka’s mug. ‘What is it? Cabbage?’
‘Actual tea. It’s just green. Full of antioxidants.’
‘Are you full of oxidants, then?’
‘We all are,’ smiled Rajka.
On the basis that if drinking this stuff contributed in any way to the impressive musculature underlying Rajka’s shirt, Slonský would be a fool to miss out, he accepted a cup and tried hard to look as if he was enjoying it.
‘I assume that folder is the reason for your visit.’
‘It might be. When we were discussing Colonel Dostál you didn’t tell me that he had been the subject of an Office of Internal Inspectio enquiry.’
‘That’s because I didn’t know.’
Rajka turned to his computer and tapped a succession of keys with the practised ease of a concert pianist. ‘There’s nothing about it in our index,’ he frowned.
‘Captain Lukas remembers being told it was happening. But more to the point, this folder consists of press cuttings relating to the bank siege that made his name, and one of them mentions that OII will be investigating a complaint of unnecessary violence by the police attending the siege.’
Rajka walked to the door to summon his secretary.
‘Do you have a date there, Slonský?’
‘Eight years ago. The siege was in June 1999.’
Rajka instructed his secretary to go to the evidence store and look for anything relating to an inquiry into a man called Dostál in the latter part of 1999.
‘We’ll see if we can get to the bottom of this. Summarise what’s in here for me.’
‘It was Friday, 18th June. A team of three bank robbers targeted a bank in the old town. They walked inside like normal customers, and two of them joined the queues for the tellers. The third one pretended to be reading some leaflets. Suddenly the two men produced guns and the third one slipped through a door into the area behind the counter. It’s possible that they waited until someone came out so they could get in without having to force the lock.
‘They ordered the staff to fill their holdalls with cash and the one who was inside made sure they did it. He told them to leave the small stuff, just fill it with large denomination banknotes, and get a move on. It seems likely that he knew there was a silent alarm button but they didn’t know where so they planned to be only a minute or two and to leave before the police arrived. Which they did, or at least one of them did.’
Rajka raised a quizzical eyebrow at the suggestion that only one had tried to leave, but said nothing.
‘The problem was that Prague City Police are not much good at preventing bank robberies but they’re red hot on illegal parking in the old town, so the getaway driver had been moved on by a couple of City cops. He planned to go around the block and come back, but by then the alarm had been raised and they’d heard on the radio what was happening, so when robber number one pokes his head out he sees two police running towards him with their guns drawn. So he retreats inside and slams and bolts the door.’
‘And I assume the next step was to open negotiations with the robbers while all the time filling the district with troops?’
‘Pretty much. Dostál and his squad were able to get into the building using extending ladders provided by the fire service. The robbers had barricaded the ground floor but could not cover the whole building. What happened next is anybody’s guess. There was a lot of sound and fury, and the two men in the main customer area were shot by Dostál’s men. The third one tried to hide in the back office but was pointed out by staff. After a bit more drama he too was dead and Dostál and his men were the heroes of the day. Dostál was promoted to major and everyone was happy. Except, presumably, the robbers, but you can’t have everything.’
Slonský sipped his green tea and made an involuntary face.
‘It’s an acquired taste,’ Rajka explained.
‘Evidently, and I haven’t acquired it. Anyway, there it would have rested except that one of the members of the public in the bank at the time must have been feeling very public-spirited and brave, because she wrote to the newspaper saying that she didn’t think they should be making heroes of Dostál’s men given that at least one of the robbers was unarmed and had surrendered when he was shot. The newspaper knew better than to print the letter, but they forwarded a copy to OII and kept the original. Some days later OII demanded the original, so we wouldn’t know the letter existed except that the newspaper made another copy.’
‘And was there an inquiry?’
‘The demand says that the letter is needed as part of the evidence for the inquiry and so that they could contact the sender. I called her just before I came here. She says that nobody ever interviewed her. And the newspaper editor of the time wrote a memo in which he said that he asked after a while — to be precise, on Monday 11th October — whether the inquiry had reached any conclusions and was told that all involved had been exonerated and that the witness had been mistaken.’
Rajka’s secretary returned with a small document box which she handed to her boss.
‘This is all there is, by the looks of it,’ said Rajka. He spread out the documents, paying particular attention to some photographs taken at the scene.
‘That’s odd,’ said Slonský.
‘What is?’
‘This is plainly a still from a videotape, but I’d have expected the videotape itself to be retained as evidence.’
‘So would I. And do you notice anything about these three photos of dead robbers with their guns beside them?’
‘You mean apart from the fact that two of the guns look suspiciously identical and that no serial numbers are quoted?’
‘No, that’ll do. I smell a rat. It’s just possible that the robbers obtained two identical guns in identical condition, but otherwise I’d suspect that a gun was moved after being photographed by one body to place it near the third, particularly since someone alleges that the third robber was unarmed. Are you busy?’
‘I’m trying to solve an abduction and murder, but I’ve given Navrátil his head. He won’t miss me for an hour or two.’
‘Excellent. Let’s go and see if anyone who was there in 1999 is still working at that bank, and then we might drop by the woman’s house and take a proper statement. The enquiry into Colonel Dostál’s behaviour has just been reopened.’
Rajka drove a vehicle that was definitely not police issue. Sleek, white and very foreign, it contained a number of enhancements that suggested to Slonský that the extras may have cost as much as the car. He was particularly impressed by the voice activated entertainment system, not that he wanted to use it. It was just that he had never come across anything before that did what you wanted as soon as you mentioned it. Except, now he thought about it, Navrátil.
Rajka’s car had at least six gears but not, it seemed, a brake. Either that, or Rajka was trying to avoid wearing it out with overuse.
‘Don’t you get a police issue car?’ asked Slonský.
‘I could,’ said Rajka, ‘but it’s important that people don’t immediately recognise the car as a police vehicle.’
Well, they’d never suspect this was one, thought Slonský. The chances are the Chief of the whole Czech police force doesn’t drive one of these.
; ‘But you’ve got a siren and lights,’ Slonský pointed out.
‘Yes, but concealed lights, not stuck on the roof like a normal police car. If I want to drive down the highway I can do so without attracting attention to myself.’
That struck Slonský as inherently unlikely. It reminded him of a prostitute he had once known who used to claim that she was “blending in” when she entered expensive hotels wearing an ocelot coat and no underwear.
Rajka turned right without any obvious signal and parked in exactly the same place as the getaway driver had eight years ago.
‘Aren’t you worried about being ticketed?’ asked Slonský.
‘No, because I’d tear it up and in any event there’s a sticker in the front window that tells those who need to know that it’s an unmarked police car.’
I never knew that, thought Slonský, who wondered what the point of doing that was, since it seemed to defeat the object of an unmarked police car if you then marked it in some way.
Rajka presented his credentials at the counter and asked to speak to the senior manager on duty.
‘He has someone with him,’ replied the assistant tentatively.
‘I’m sure he has. He’ll be a busy man. So am I. I can give him five minutes to wrap things up.’
Slonský turned over in his mind whether there was any semantic difference between the Rajka approach — “I can give him five minutes” — and his own — “Five minutes, then I kick the door in” — and decided they were broadly equivalent.
The assistant rushed away to consult the manager and soon returned to invite them to wait in the corridor outside the office.
‘He’ll only be a minute or two,’ she explained.
Slonský and Rajka sat on the indicated chairs.
‘Do you bank here?’ asked Slonský.
‘No,’ said Rajka. ‘I don’t go to banks that have a history of being robbed. What about you?’
‘No, I use the one nearest the office. Banks don’t fall over themselves to get my business.’
The manager emerged, ushering a woman in front of him who was still trying to put her coat on as he shook her hand.
‘Thank you so much. We must talk again soon,’ he said, before turning to Rajka and Slonský and inviting them to enter and take a seat. He was one of those people who readily displays his anxieties, as evidenced by his sweaty hands and his rictus smile. ‘Is there a problem, gentlemen?’