An Incidental Death

by Alex Howard

  For a second, Hanlon thought that she was dead, then she noticed a slight movement of the crimson fabric. Huss was still breathing.

  ‘Shit,’ said Hanlon. Ignoring Schneider, she ran over to where Huss was lying and pulled the sheet back. She grabbed a towel and pressed it to Huss’s side, trying to make a pressure bandage to stop the bleeding.

  ‘Get up off your ass, you piece of shit, and hold this bandage,’ barked Hanlon.

  Schneider did so while Hanlon dialled emergency services on the landline, then the hotel reception to get a medical team down.

  58

  Kellner found the handle and yanked open the back door. A rush of cold air billowed in. He stumbled outside coughing and choking and Adams, aware the rifle was gone, followed him. She had seen what Hanlon had done to Frank Muller, she didn’t want a similar fate. She had noticed the look in her eyes when she had learned Huss was dead. She knew exactly what would happen to her if she fell into Hanlon’s hands. No mercy.

  Outside the back door, Kellner and Adams looked at each other. Adams stared at him with contempt. He was so useless, she thought.

  ‘Mein Gott, what are we going to do?’ wailed Kellner.

  Adams was already moving.

  ‘The van,’ she commanded.

  Kellner panted after her. He was overweight and hadn’t run anywhere since he’d been at school. His feet slipped on the wet grass. Hanlon would be phoning the police. Disgrace, prison, ridicule, ruin, all of these lent him speed. He wanted to get back home to Germany as soon as possible, see his lawyer. Get his side of the story in first. His brain slipped into gear. None of this was his fault. He was just easily led, too nice for his own good.

  Schneider, it was all Schneider.

  He was frightened of Adams too, but more frightened she would leave him behind. Drive off without him. It’s just the sort of thing she would do. He gasped with the physical effort, he had a terrible stitch, and put a spurt on but she overtook him as they reached the van, heading for the driver’s door.

  Still sobbing with the unaccustomed exertion, he flung open the rear doors of the van.

  The Presa was angry and still in pain. It was also furious at being cooped up in this van and the smell of blood from the two inaccessible bodies was infuriating. It had been shut in the van now for a long time and it was enraged. Anger made it violent. Never a rational dog, its small mind was full of the need to sink its teeth into something and tear and tear and tear... Then suddenly the doors of its prison were thrown wide.

  It seized its opportunity. It sprang into action.

  Adams, in the driver’s seat of the van, felt the vehicle rock as the dog sprang forward. She heard a tearing, high-pitched scream from Kellner as sixty-five kilos of muscle and teeth slammed into him. She risked a quick look back and almost wished she hadn’t. Kellner was down on the ground with the dog standing over him, its jaws clamped on the man’s calf.

  The Presa shook its head vigorously, tearing at Kellner’s flesh. He howled and screamed in pain, the leg of his trousers darkening in colour, his fat arms beating ineffectually at the Presa. His struggles and blood excited the dog even more and its powerful jaws suddenly left its leg and then, cobra quick, fastened on to his arm.

  Adams put the van into first and drove away. Kellner’s glasses lay smashed by his side, his eyes bulged with agony. He screamed continually now and the dog’s eyes stared at his naked throat with interest. It let go of Kellner’s arm and transferred its grip to his soft, yielding windpipe.

  After a while Kellner ceased to move and the Presa dragged him into the shadows by the shed where he could finish what he was doing uninterrupted.

  That was where the police found them later.

  59

  It was the hotel doctor and assistant with plasma who beat the ambulance by three or four minutes. As they got a line into Huss’s vein, her eyes opened and alighted on Hanlon. A small smile flickered across her lips and then her eyes closed.

  The Diplomatic Protection sergeant and two of his men clattered down the stairs. Hanlon recognized him from Claridge’s. She pointed at Schneider, sitting sullen and defeated on the floor.

  ‘Nick him,’ she said.

  Schneider’s wrists were cuffed. ‘Charge?’ said the sergeant.

  ‘Attempted murder of two police officers,’ said Hanlon, curtly. That’d do for now. ‘Oh, by the way, you’d better follow me with a medical team,’ she said, remembering Muller.

  Another protection officer, firearms she assumed from the badges on his uniform, appeared. They had found Florian Kellner, or what was left of him.

  ‘Sorry, sir,’ he said. ‘You’re going to need to come and look at this.’

  The sergeant looked around the bloodstained room, the stretcher containing Huss being carried up the stairs, the German MP with the badly beaten-up face. There was a severed wrist with hand attached in a bowl on one of the worktops. Idly, the sergeant wondered who that had belonged to. He stared at the woman in front of him. He had heard rumours about her that he had refused to believe as being too far-fetched. Well, he thought, time to re-evaluate.

  If anything, they had wildly underestimated her.

  She was looking at him belligerently. He said, conversationally, ‘Well, DCI Hanlon, you certainly know how to throw a party.’

  60

  Two days later Hanlon visited Huss at the Radcliffe Hospital. She reversed her Audi neatly into a bay in the car park and sat for a while behind the wheel.

  She was glad that Huss had survived, not least because the following week was Mark Whiteside’s surgery. The survival of Huss seemed like the best omen she could have for the operation.

  She was not remotely religious but she found herself at times like this praying for a successful outcome for Whiteside’s operation. She desperately wanted him back. Being with Serg had reminded her of the depth of feeling that she was capable of, but had refused to allow herself ever since Whiteside had been shot. It was like a part of her was in a coma too. In a deep freeze.

  She shook her head briskly. When, when, not if, Mark Whiteside recovered, then she would allow herself to live again.

  Briskly, she got out of her car, slammed the door behind her and strode across the hospital car park.

  *

  Huss was sitting up in bed attached to two IV lines, propped up on pillows and her hands outstretched, like she’d been crucified.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ asked Hanlon.

  ‘Oh, fine,’ said Huss. ‘Thank you for—’

  ‘Don’t mention it,’ said Hanlon curtly. She didn’t want to be thanked and Huss knew that she wouldn’t want to be, that it would embarrass her.

  ‘Thank the Lord Enver didn’t see me like that,’ said Huss.

  ‘Indeed.’ Hanlon had seen Enver just after Huss had been taken away to hospital. Enver had been back on his duties in the main kitchen as junior sous. None of the kitchen staff had any idea of the drama that was unfolding just a couple of hundred metres away and of them, only Enver was all that interested.

  The food was the primary concern. The kitchen was all that mattered. Their whole world. Nobody knew who Schneider was, or cared.

  Now the police had left and everything was back to normality.

  Enver was due to officially leave the Rosemount that day at noon, on the excuse he had been recalled back to the agency.

  ‘I have made the cover of Bild, though,’ said Huss with amusement. She showed Hanlon the German tabloid with a photo of her on a stretcher, paramedics on each side. Huss’s blouse was open and she was showing a lot of cleavage. It was really the main focus of the image. There was a smaller photo of Schneider being pushed into a police car, looking grim.

  ‘What does it say?’

  ‘Die Schöne und das Biest. Beauty and the Beast.’ It carried the byline Jurgen Flur. Huss continued, ‘I’ve been in the Oxford Mail but never a red top. Especially a German one.’ She raised her honey-coloured eyebrows. ‘Excitement.’

  Hanlon
smiled, Huss put the paper down.

  Huss decided to change the subject. ‘So it was all a big con.’

  ‘In a way, but slightly odder than you think.’ Hanlon told Huss about her trip to Germany, her visit to the dwarf prostitute.

  ‘Schneider had threesomes with Lottie and Gunther Hart at Oskar’s. Almost certainly Hübler joined in. He may even have met Hübler there. Perhaps Bild will run an exposé. That’s why he got Adams to kill Hart, because Hart had threatened to expose him. Hart knew nothing about money-laundering for the Russian mafia. People will put up with a lot from a right-wing politician, but they don’t expect kinky sex. Especially gay, three-way kinky sex. He’d have been a laughing stock. You can’t be a successful hard-right politician if people are laughing at you.’

  ‘It’s strange,’ said Huss. ‘He confessed everything to me, but not the gay sex. Killing people, Mafia connections, he was fine with that, the money laundering, but not the sex. It’s not like I could have told anyone, isn’t it odd?’

  ‘Very.’ Hanlon’s mind flashed back to the transparently pale Huss and the huge amount of blood that had come out of her, the doctor who had saved her practically hysterical with relief that she was still alive. By all accounts it was Kellner’s lust, wanting a still-living Huss to slake his desires on, that had kept her alive. A slightly deeper thrust into her body, another half-millimetre, and she would have been dead.

  ‘And Christiane Hübler was going to go public?’ asked Huss.

  Hanlon nodded. ‘She had photos, recordings, Lottie made them for her. That’s why she seemed to have that odd hold over Schneider. She also guessed he’d arranged to have Hart killed by Adams, her and the lovely Dr Kellner. She got Lottie to send her the cream of the crop to her phone in England. That’s when Schneider decided she had to die. She was like an unexploded bomb about to go off. One text to Bild, one attachment, end of Schneider.’ She sat down in the chair for visitors. ‘It had to be done quickly but, of course, he had Georgie available.’

  ‘But why kill her in England?’

  ‘Lottie gave me the date that she sent Hübler the photos of the three of them, Lottie, Hart and Schneider, having sex. Including Hart and Schneider coupling. It was the afternoon of when she was murdered. I don’t know what she wanted, marriage maybe? Money? It scarcely mattered. She was untrustworthy. My guess is that she threatened him with the photos and he felt he had to act. He was one phone call away from ruin. Remember, he had Georgie – who better to entrust that to? She’s by far the most competent of the lot of them.’

  ‘So that’s why he had her killed at the hotel?’

  Hanlon nodded. ‘Adams coerced Arzu into texting Hübler to meet him for sex in the kitchen. They’d had sex before when he showed her around the lodge. She killed Arzu, the hand was removed either by her or Kellner so his thumb would activate the lock on the kitchen door, and when Christiane turned up, she, or maybe her and Spencer, killed her. The lock gave the time of death, more or less, and the Germans all had an alibi, all present at that video conference.’ She pushed her hand through her thick, wiry dark hair. ‘It was very well planned. We all thought that Arzu was part of Al-Akhdaar and that he was the killer, just as Adams planned.’

  ‘And Marcus Hinds managed to stumble on the truth?’

  Hanlon shook her head. ‘He invented a truth by mistake. He thought it was just a good story and that nobody would be able to prove otherwise. Even in his wildest dreams he could never have imagined that Adams had any links with Schneider.’

  She got out of the chair and moved restlessly around Huss’s room.

  ‘He invented a non-existent connection between Eleuthera and Al-Akhdaar. Just to sell a story, just to make money. How was he to know that Georgie Adams was involved in money laundering and murder? How was he to know she had invented Al-Akhdaar as a strawman to pin a murder on? So when he said that he had proof, which of course he didn’t, that Eleuthera were involved with Al-Akhdaar, she believed him. She thought he was on to her, and that meant he had to die and that his evidence, like that hard drive that Elsa had, had to be destroyed. We all kind of believed him, he fooled everyone.’

  ‘So it all boiled down to sex and money,’ said Huss.

  Hanlon nodded. ‘Islamic terrorism was never there, just paid-for sex and dirty money. Arzu, Elsa, Hinds, Hart, Hübler, and the others, all dead just to feed Schneider’s ego and Georgie Adams’s desire for God knows what.’

  ‘I wonder where Adams is now?’ said Huss.

  ‘God alone knows, but I’m sure she’ll turn up again. She’s probably at some anarchist camp somewhere. She’s got great IT skills, seemingly, she’s ex-Anonymous. I’m sure she’s busy creating a new identity for herself. We’ll doubtless hear from her at some time in the future. Spencer is on the run too.’

  ‘And what about you?’ asked Huss.

  ‘I’m handing my notice in,’ said Hanlon. ‘Mark’s got his op coming soon, he’ll need me.’ She sighed. ‘I wasn’t there for him before, I can at least be there for him now.’

  61

  It was his last day at the Rosemount. Enver finished plating the last of the breakfasts for a table of three – kedgeree, an omelette and eggs Benedict on a warm brioche – and yawned.

  ‘Service,’ he called. ‘Table twelve, Bryony, off you go.’

  ‘Thank you, Chef,’ said Bryony. She hoped he’d be staying, all the waitresses did, he was so nice, so calm, and, my God, those muscles!

  ‘Is there a problem?’ he asked. She was suddenly aware that she’d been ogling him through the pass instead of doing her job. Such a nice face! Was it too soon to invite him out for a drink? Something told her he’d be shy. Well, she could cope with that. She was well aware of how attractive she was. She expertly took the plates in her long, elegant fingers and, smiling bashfully at Enver, swept out of the kitchen into the dining room.

  Enver, oblivious of Bryony and unaware of her interest in him, checked his phone – no message from Huss. Twelve o’clock and he’d be out of here for good.

  He wondered vaguely what had got into Bryony. She was behaving very oddly.

  He looked at the prep list on the wall:

  Harissa sauce, gin and tonic jellies, langues du chat, turned potatoes (DESIREE NOT KING EDWARDS!!!!!!)... it went on and on.

  He ran his finger down the list, fifty-one items.

  No longer his problem. He started work on the harissa.

  ‘Hi, Enver, can I see you in my office...’

  It was Harry Jones, the sous.

  He followed him into the office.

  ‘Czerwinski’s told me the agency want you back and they’re sending me a replacement,’ said Jones, leaning forward in his chair and taking a mouthful of coffee.

  ‘Yes, Chef, I’ll be sorry to leave,’ said Enver, waving an apologetic hand, ‘but you know the decision’s not mine. I go where I’m sent.’

  ‘Oh, sure,’ said Harry, ‘but, well, I’m very impressed with your work, Enver, you’re a sodding good chef and I was wondering if you’d like to come and work for me full time. The salary will be good, and we’re going places, Enver, this could be your big chance...’

  Enver sighed and leaned over Harry’s desk...

  And in London, in a rented room in Kilburn under another name, Georgie Adams had dyed her hair a mousy blonde and coloured her eyebrows to match. With her new glasses she didn’t look much like her old self at all.

  She had plenty of money and plenty of confidence in her ability to build a new life. But first something for Hanlon to remember her by. Hübler had told Schneider the story of Hanlon and the man she loved and Schneider had told Adams.

  Such touching loyalty, she thought. It really should be rewarded.

  Not many London hospitals have ITUs dealing with long-stay head injury patients and it hadn’t taken Adams that long to locate Whiteside. Neither did it take long to find the name of the company that had the cleaning contract for the hospital.

  Cleaners are always needed and Adams, w
ith her forged CV and backstory, a history of learning difficulties, was hired immediately. It didn’t take her very long either, using a brute force algorithm, to hack into the cleaning company’s systems. Access to company rotas had her transferred to the company cleaning team allocated to the hospital.

  It wasn’t hard at all.

  *

  Enver’s feet scrunched in the car park as he hefted his bag into the back of his old Volvo and slammed the tailgate down.

  He looked at the Gothic pile of the Rosemount and the enormous extractor vent like a ship’s funnel that rose out of the roof of the kitchen.

  I’m waiting for you, whispered the Rosemount kitchen, speaking for all kitchens worldwide. You can run, but not forever.

  He felt his phone vibrate and took it out. He opened the message and the image attachment. It was Kelly Reeves, naked from the waist up, the date written in felt tip across her heavy breasts, each bearing a produce and day sticker, ‘left’ and ‘right’ in the appropriate place.

  The message ran, Dated and labelled, Chef! Just as you like it!! ;) Call me if you get lonely! xxx Kells.

  He shook his head as he clambered into the car and started to laugh.

  *

  Mark Whiteside shared a room with a man called Paul Bentley. There was a nurses’ station just inside the ward’s double doors, a ward with half a dozen beds, two single rooms and the double one Whiteside was in.

  The room was cleaned every day at eleven a.m. Nobody notices cleaners. They’re an anonymous part of the furniture. Adams carefully wheeled her cleaning trolley in and methodically locked the brakes as she’d been shown. The room was bright and airy with a view over the rooftops in the direction of the Seven Sisters Road.

  The two men lay in their respective beds, various tubes attached to them and monitors for their vital signs displaying red electronic digits. Each man had a whiteboard on the wall near their heads for spur-of-the-moment notes from the nursing staff. Bentley’s board said, Does not like salmon. As Bentley was perpetually unconscious Adams wondered momentarily what it could mean. He was hardly in a position to complain.