In Her Blood

by Annie Hauxwell

  Berlin sat on the edge of her armchair, trying to find the balance between saying too much, and not enough.

  ‘Got a cold?’ Marks asked.

  She realised she was sniffing.

  ‘It’s that time of year,’ she said.

  ‘You should try Lemsip,’ said Marks, solicitous. ‘I swear by it.’

  Maybe it is a cold, she thought. But somehow I don’t think Lemsip will quite crack it. She brought out a soggy tissue and blew her nose.

  ‘I’ve seen your report in the old file,’ she said. ‘I wondered if there was anything else, Senior? The sort of thing that an experienced copper like yourself might notice, but wouldn’t put on paper because it was based on instinct, not on facts.’

  Flattery will get you everywhere.

  ‘Call me Harvey,’ he said, and dunked his biscuit. ‘I was in the job twenty-five years. Didn’t get beyond Senior. Didn’t want to. I was content to work my shifts and go home. Unlike some.’

  He wasn’t going to be rushed through this. He sat back in his chair, his gaze drifting to the sympathy cards. Berlin raised an eyebrow, interested, encouraging him.

  ‘Is this something to do with that girl who turned up in the Limehouse Basin?’ he asked.

  He was still a canny copper, thought Berlin. ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘The lock down there, at the Basin, was one of Doyle’s stomping grounds. Quite literally. Frank Doyle, that was – the patriarch, if you like. He’s probably dead.’

  This was what Berlin had come for, the history that was written between the lines. Marks was on a roll now.

  ‘I knew the family pretty well, although Frank’s wife had left him before my time. Frank lived with his son, who for some reason was only ever known as Doyle. He was always Doyle and his father was always Frank Doyle, as if his son was just a piece that had been snapped off him.’

  He sipped his tea and glanced again at the sympathy cards.

  ‘Nancy lived there too, of course, Doyle’s wife – common law, that is – and their little girl. Or rather, they lived with Frank. The flat was council then and I think Doyle’s mum was the original tenant.’ He sighed and shook his head, rueful. ‘I knew Nancy the best. Nance. She was a very nice woman, but she had her flaws. Issues, I suppose they would call them these days.’

  ‘She was on the game,’ said Berlin.

  Marks nodded. ‘She wasn’t out every night. But she made a bob or two around the Haymarket at the weekends, bank holidays, that sort of thing. She was very careful with her money, didn’t drink or splash it around. She told me once she was putting a bit by, a nest egg like, so that one day she and Doyle could get their own place, somewhere with a bit of garden for Georgina to play in.’

  He stopped suddenly, perhaps aware that he was turning into one of those geezers that bang on about the old days. ‘You’re not interested in all this trivia,’ he said quickly.

  ‘No, I am. This is very important background. Please go on, Harvey.’

  She reached for another chocolate bourbon to demonstrate her commitment. ‘May I?’

  ‘Help yourself,’ he said. ‘I always had trouble believing that Nancy would run off and leave her kid behind. On the other hand, who knows what drives people? Doyle seemed okay, he kept a low profile, although none of them ever had any visible means of support. You never know what goes on behind closed doors.’

  ‘Do you think he was living off immoral earnings?’ asked Berlin.

  Marks shook his head. ‘I doubt it. He was a weak character, always in Frank’s shadow, but he didn’t strike me as that type.’

  ‘What was Frank like?’ she asked.

  ‘Now he was a violent man, very free with his fists.’

  ‘Did you ever receive any complaints about Doyle, from his clients?’

  ‘Clients?’

  ‘People who’d borrowed from him. The loan-sharking business.’

  Marks looked confused. ‘It doesn’t ring a bell. I’m sure I would have heard if he’d been standing over anyone, that sort of thing. I would have been first in line for a loan.’ The joke was half-hearted. ‘No. He definitely wasn’t into loan sharking in those days. Neither was Frank. He was just a run-of-the-mill villain. Thieving mostly. They must have got into the lending lark a bit later, after my time. I was moved to another station not long after Nancy disappeared. I heard Frank had moved out to Chigwell. Turned into a bit of a recluse, by all accounts.’

  Berlin noticed Marks’s tea had gone cold.

  ‘But I’ll tell you one thing,’ he said, leaning forward to make his point. ‘Doyle didn’t move a muscle without Frank’s say-so. Anything illegal, Frank would be at the bottom of it.’

  Marks regretfully saw her out.

  ‘Sure you won’t stay a bit longer? I could whip you up an omelette. You look like you could do with a good feed.’ He smiled. She had eaten the whole plate of chocolate bourbons.

  Berlin was almost tempted to stay, but she was going to be late for her appointment if she didn’t get going. It was one she couldn’t afford to miss.

  She also knew that sooner or later Marks would ask her what her rank was and where she worked. Then it would get awkward. She didn’t want to lie to him. It had never been awkward for Coulthard, who would dissemble and mislead punters and police alike by always referring to himself and other members of the team as ‘Inspector’. She’d even seen him sign into a casino on a covert operation as Inspector Coulthard. Lying wanker.

  ‘Another time, Harvey,’ she said and shook his hand.

  She was halfway down the path when he called to her.

  ‘Catherine!’

  She rarely heard her first name. As she turned around she half expected to see her father standing there. She shuddered.

  ‘Yes?’ she said.

  ‘Don’t forget the Lemsip.’

  39

  FERNLEY-PRICE HAD BEEN astonished the police had found him at his club. He didn’t know the old bill were that efficient. He knew he had acted like a guilty man, but who wouldn’t, confronted by two detectives? Everyone has something to hide.

  He’d had a few drinks to steady his nerves after they’d gone, and kept ringing Doyle, but as per, the bastard wasn’t answering his calls.

  He had stayed in his room all day, drinking and weeping in a welter of fear and despair. He dreaded the night, and when it came his childish terrors had returned. He had made a hell of a noise, members complained and there was a tussle with the porter. The last thing he remembered was being sick and blubbing in the porter’s lap.

  Today would be a different story. He had to find Doyle, although really this was the last thing he wanted to do. The man was a monster. But it was either that or walk away penniless. Time was running out and he had to salvage something from this nightmare.

  He would scour London until he tracked Doyle down.

  The traffic was gridlocked. The cab had crawled half a mile in fifteen minutes. He tapped on the glass partition and urged the cab driver on.

  ‘Can’t you find a way through this mess?’

  The driver glanced at him in the rear-view. ‘What do you want me to do, mate? Fly?’

  Fernley-Price slumped in his seat. Jesus Christ, what was the country coming to? There was no respect any more. Once upon a time people like this bloody cab driver had put on a suit and tie to keep an appointment with people like him. The City had been important, revered even. Deference was expected, and forthcoming. Now they asked you before you got in if you had the cash for the fare.

  Something had gone terribly wrong.

  *

  Doyle felt he might have taken his eye off the ball a bit lately. Returns were slipping; he was going too easy on the customers. He had such a lot on his mind.

  Fernley-Price wouldn’t take the hint when Doyle didn’t answer his calls or respond to his increasingly hysterical messages; he just kept on ringing. No manners. But when Doyle got a text from the publican at The Silent Woman saying the wanker had been in there looking for him,
he decided he couldn’t afford to have him running around town. He caved in and rang.

  Fernley-Price had sounded half-pissed. He’d demanded to see him immediately ‘on a matter of the utmost importance’. The geezer was in a cab roaming all over the bloody East End on the hunt for him. He must be unhappy with his cut, thought Doyle. Wouldn’t meet at The Silent Woman either, wanted to get together on neutral ground.

  Doyle swore. He’d never get a parking space near Liverpool Street Station. It was inside the ring of bleeding steel and the Congestion Charge Zone. They had built the original station on the site of the old asylum, the Royal Bethlem Hospital, and it certainly carried on the Bedlam tradition.

  He didn’t want the lads dropping him off there either, in case they caught sight of Fernley-Price. It would be a disaster if it got back to Frank. Fuck it, he would walk: it wasn’t that far from home. It would do him good to stretch his legs.

  40

  BY THE TIME Doyle found the right café at the station he was nearly frozen to death. He’d put on his sheepskin driving coat, which might have kept the sheep warm but was seriously inadequate in these arctic conditions. He wasn’t happy. He spotted Fernley-Price at a corner table and raised his hand in greeting. The numpty pretended he didn’t know him. What, did he think they were in some bloody James Bond film?

  Doyle plonked himself down and picked up the menu. ‘What’s up with you, mate? You look like you’ve lost a pound and found a penny.’

  Fernley-Price glared at him. ‘I’ve lost a bloody sight more than that, I can tell you.’

  Doyle could smell the liquor on his breath across the table. ‘Yeah, but none of it was yours, was it?’

  Fernley-Price flushed.

  Doyle looked at him steadily. The prat didn’t like that; didn’t like being reminded that he had taken a lot of people’s savings down with him. He dropped the menu on the table and when the waitress came over he didn’t look at her.

  ‘Cup of tea and an Eccles cake, love,’ he said. The waitress slunk off.

  ‘I want my investment back,’ Fernley-Price said.

  ‘Beg yours?’ said Doyle.

  ‘I want my cash.’

  Doyle leant back in his seat and folded his hands in his lap. He could see Fernley-Price was coming apart. He was sweating, despite the weather.

  ‘Steady on, mate. What’s brought this on?’

  Fernley-Price’s voice broke as he leant across the table. ‘Look, I’ve had a visit from the law,’ he said.

  ‘You better tell me all about it,’ said Doyle.

  ‘One of my clients died in unusual circumstances.’

  ‘Why did they come to you?’ asked Doyle.

  ‘He phoned me,’ said Fernley-Price.

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘A number of times, okay. The day he died,’ said Fernley-Price. He ran his fingers through his hair, which Doyle noticed was matted.

  ‘So? What’s that got to do with me?’ asked Doyle.

  ‘I got the Agency off your back, didn’t I? It was business as usual for you, right? But it’s all getting a little too close for comfort. I’ve done a risk analysis and this is a good moment for me to exercise my options.’

  Doyle was getting seriously pissed off. He’d walked miles, at least three, in the freezing cold, to sit in this shithole and listen to a load of crap from this twat. Outwardly he remained calm. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  Fernley-Price was trembling like a girl. Doyle was a pretty good judge of character and he knew when someone was close to the edge. He’d pushed them there often enough. This bloke wasn’t just scared, he was bleeding terrified. Of what?

  Fernley-Price struggled to keep the hysteria out of his voice. ‘When you told me about the surveillance operation I pulled some strings at the Agency and got the bloody investigation closed down.’

  The waitress put the Eccles cake and a cup of warm liquid that was supposed to be tea in front of Doyle. ‘Thank you,’ he said, but didn’t move. Just sat there staring at Fernley-Price.

  ‘What? For God’s sake why are you looking at me like that?’ said Fernley-Price.

  ‘The op was cancelled, courtesy of my contact in the Agency,’ said Doyle.

  ‘No. It was my man, Nestor. Ludovic Nestor.’

  Doyle remembered how frantic Fernley-Price had been when he’d told him about the two blokes in the car outside his flat. He couldn’t believe he had taken it into his head to interfere. Bloody amateurs.

  ‘But I told you it was sorted,’ said Doyle, through gritted teeth.

  ‘Well, I’m used to managing my own risk. I don’t outsource it,’ snapped Fernley-Price.

  Doyle reined in his temper. ‘So what are you telling me? What’s the connection here? This Nestor was one of your clients and worked at the Agency, is that it? Is that how you managed it?’ he asked in the most reasonable tone he could muster.

  ‘He didn’t just work there. He was the boss,’ said Fernley-Price, and snorted.

  The snort spoke volumes to Doyle. It said, as if I would have had anything to do with the lower echelons.

  It seemed to go very quiet in the café. Something in the pit of Doyle’s stomach felt like lead. He tried to recall the chain of events. After he’d spotted the two pillocks in the car outside the flats, his contact had confirmed there was an operation on him. But all he could say at that point was that the informant was a woman going under the alias Juliet Bravo. The bloke owed him five grand. Doyle had told him to get the op shut down and he’d write it off.

  As an added incentive he’d implied that if he went down, this bloke was going with him. The geezer was cocky and gave the impression he could do pretty much what he liked at the Agency.

  No problem, he had told Doyle. I can sort it. He personally would guarantee that Doyle was protected.

  Now here was Fernley-Price telling him that this Nestor was the boss, not the wally in Doyle’s pocket. So if Doyle’s bloke was just another shitkicker, what did he do to stop the investigation?

  Doyle felt dizzy. He was overcome by a terrible feeling that his contact might have gone the time-honoured route and got the investigation shut down by getting rid of the informant. He swallowed hard and made sure his tone was the right side of reassuring.

  ‘Let’s just take this down the road,’ he said to Fernley-Price. ‘There’s a nice little pub down there, just beyond the bridge.’

  Doyle knew better than to smash someone’s teeth in before you’d got all the information you wanted. He stood up and started to walk out, then turned back, picked up his Eccles cake and put it in his pocket.

  ‘Get the bill, will you?’ he said.

  Fernley-Price was surprised at how fast a man of Doyle’s proportions could walk. He followed with reluctance as Doyle took a sharp right off Liverpool Street into a narrow lane that ran between a building site and an office block. It was not the sort of place he would have ventured alone.

  ‘I thought we were going to a pub just past the bridge,’ Fernley-Price said, nervous.

  ‘Shortcut,’ said Doyle amiably.

  Doyle slowed to a stroll halfway down the lane and they walked side by side. There was only just enough room. No one was coming the other way. A couple of junkies crouching in a doorway looking to mug someone appeared to think better of it when they saw Doyle, and took off.

  ‘So what happened when the police came around?’ asked Doyle.

  ‘They told me that Nestor had drowned.’

  ‘They looked you up just because he was a customer?’

  ‘We were at school together, then went on to the same university, although he was a few years older than me. We socialised on occasion. Anyway, they said it looked like suicide and they were talking to everyone he knew about his state of mind. He’d made some calls to me from his mobile the same day he …’

  Doyle’s pace slowed another notch and he nodded sympathetically. ‘It must have been a shock.’

  ‘It was terrible. Terrible. I don’t
know how they found me so fast.’

  Doyle realised Fernley-Price was more shocked by the visit from the law than by the death of his old school chum. He came to a complete halt and put his hand on Fernley-Price’s arm. Fernley-Price flinched.

  ‘And it was this Nestor who you had persuaded to get off my case?’

  Fernley-Price nodded.

  ‘How?’

  ‘Everything he had was tied up with my firm.’ He broke off and tried to tug his arm away from Doyle, who tightened his friendly grip. ‘See here, Doyle, I’ve got to get going, appointments et cetera. Let’s just agree to dissolve our partnership. Settle up. No hard feelings.’

  ‘None whatsoever,’ said Doyle, with an expression of concern.

  Fernley-Price gabbled. ‘I really appreciate it, old man. My life’s in the crapper at the moment. I need to move on. You know how it is, exposure. One can only manage it with cash.’

  Doyle glanced up and down the deserted lane. He knew all about exposure.

  The next moment Fernley-Price gasped as Doyle’s knee connected with his groin. He doubled over as Doyle delivered a swift uppercut, smashing his rings into the soft place under the chin. Doyle felt the lower jaw crack nicely.

  ‘Fuck!’ Doyle exclaimed, and flexed his fingers. He should have taken his rings off.

  Fernley-Price was on the ground, throwing up. He didn’t seem to be able to open his mouth properly and the vomit was backing up.

  ‘Mate,’ said Doyle. ‘That money has gone out to the market. Your bit of capital’s tied up. Be patient. Pull out now and there will be significant penalties. You understand this principle, don’t you?’

  Fernley-Price gurgled.

  ‘Good. This is not a gentlemen’s agreement.’

  His knuckles still stung, so he delivered a few swift kicks to the kidneys and stomped on Fernley-Price’s head.

  Fernley-Price’s screams died in his throat. Doyle heard, with satisfaction, the gentle chink of teeth tumbling onto cobblestones.

  ‘No hard feelings,’ he said as he walked away. He took the Eccles cake out of his pocket and bit into it savagely. Could he have set up his own flesh and blood without knowing it? Good Christ, what had he done?