by Marcia Woolf
“We were only together for about four or five minutes. You’re lucky I remembered the tartan skirt.”
“Never mind. Let me see if...”
“Wait! She was: a pair of earrings. When she turned away from me I saw them. Very blue opals, with a decorative edge, like seed pearls.”
Dawn frowned.
“Right.”
“What do you mean, right? Is that significant or not?”
“Could be.”
“Dawn, don’t be—”
The traffic warden knocked on the windscreen and brandished his book at us. Dawn lowered the drivers’ side window and leaned out. He was about to give her the spiel when she flicked open her ID and waved it at him. He gave me a look that suggested he thought I’d been picked up for something. Hopefully he wasn’t thinking soliciting.
“Sorry, mate,” said Dawn, in her best now fuck off voice, “won’t be much longer.”
He righted himself and re-crossed the road, pen poised.
“Okay,” she said, “I’d better go and pick up Geraldine before she takes the bus. Don’t say anything about this: not to Ollie, not to anyone, right? Let me see if I can get a definite ID on your mystery woman before we decide what to do next.”
“I’m flying to Chicago tomorrow, don’t forget.”
“Probably the best place for you.”
I opened the door and climbed out, checking the street both ways for the grey Merc, but there was no sign of it. I leaned in.
“Dawn? Can I trust you?”
She looked at me with the same pitying look she’d used earlier, but this time the max strength version.
“What do you think?”
I shut the door and she pulled away, giving me a wave as she went. The traffic warden was still doing his thing on the other side of the road, and watched her leave from behind the van he was ticketing. As I walked over to him he backed away slightly, like he expected to get hit. He seemed relieved when I spoke.
“I don’t suppose you’ve noticed a grey Mercedes parked around here recently? Maybe in the next street along? Sometimes with two guys sitting in it?”
He rubbed his nose.
“It’s my first day,” he said.
“What? Your first day working round here?”
“No, my first day as a warden.”
I had to smile. He smiled back.
“Well,” I said, “how are you enjoying it so far?”
15th July, nine months later
Day Three - Transcript
Mr Ivan Shorter, QC (Defending Counsel for Lars Henning Nilsson)
Mr Shorter:
DCI Sullivan, could you please tell the Court who was present with you at the meeting of your team on Thursday 20th November?
DCI Sullivan:
Dame Sally Dannatt, DI Dawn Sayler, DC Ashok Kumar and DC Tony Hendy.
Mr Shorter:
DC Tony Hendy being involved in surveillance operations with DC Kumar?
DCI Sullivan:
Correct.
Mr Shorter:
And what was the substance of that meeting?
DCI Sullivan:
We discussed developments on the case.
Mr Shorter:
And it was at this meeting, was it not, that DC Kumar first identified Charlotte Garrity?
DCI Sullivan:
No. I mean, he didn’t know who she was at that time.
Mr Shorter:
He said he had discovered that her name was Charlotte Bronski. Is that correct?
DCI Sullivan:
Yes.
Mr Shorter:
And what else did DC Kumar say about Miss Bronski?
DCI Sullivan:
He reported that he and DC Hendy had observed Miss Bronski coming in and out of the CBIB building at regular working hours. He had obtained her name from discreet questioning at the coffee shop on the ground floor of the building and had ascertained that she was working at the bank.
Mr Shorter:
And did he say that he was making enquiries as to whether she was a temporary staff member from a recruitment agency?
DCI Sullivan:
Yes.
Mr Shorter:
And is it not the case that DC Kumar presented evidence of Miss Bronski’s presence at the bank by way of these photographs taken during his periods of surveillance, and that Miss Bronski’s face is clearly visible in those photographs (which I present here to the jury as Exhibits 117b and 117c)?
[copy photographs shown to DCI Sullivan in the dock]
DCI Sullivan:
Yes.
Mr Shorter:
You must have been surprised, DCI Sullivan, were you not, when these photographs were presented to you on 20th November?
DCI Sullivan:
[no reply]
Mr Shorter:
You did recognise the woman in the photographs, did you not, DCI Sullivan? And yet you failed to identify her to DC Kumar, or to anyone else at that meeting on 20th November, nor to any other senior officer in your department. Are you able to recognise her now, from these images?
DCI Sullivan:
Yes. Charlotte Garrity.
Mr Shorter:
Charlotte Garrity! Indeed. The very same Charlotte Garrity with whom you were at that time involved in what may best be described as an intimate relationship of a romantic nature, is that not the case?
DCI Sullivan:
Yes.
[laughter in the court room: His Honour Judge Simler calls for order]
Mr Shorter:
Members of the jury, you have already been acquainted with the details of Miss Charlotte Garrity’s previous convictions, and I do not wish to humiliate DCI Sullivan with further questions on the nature of his involvement with her at this stage. However, I would draw your attention to the fact that DCI Sullivan’s partner, DI Sayler, who was also involved in Miss Garrity’s previous arrest and subsequent conviction and who, as we have heard, was also present at the meeting on 20th November, also failed in any way to identify Miss Garrity in these same photographs. We shall, of course, be calling DI Sayler to the witness stand in due course.
Now, DCI Sullivan, to move onto the rest of this meeting, can you please explain to the court what steps the investigation under your command was taking at this time, to ascertain my client’s alleged involvement in financial irregularity?
DCI Sullivan:
I instructed DCs Hendy and Kumar to continue with the surveillance at the bank. We were aware that there was another meeting between Mr Henning Nilsson and the Australian TV company arranged for the end of the month to discuss the syndication contract, so there was some pressure on us in terms of timing. DI Sayler and I were working on trying to trace more of the contestants. David Finchcock from the FCA was focusing on going over all the financial statements we had obtained from contestants, to see if we could relate the fluctuations to any of Mr Henning Nilsson’s private equity deals.
Mr Shorter:
And DC Dillon? DC Dillon had been absent for several days at this point, without making any contact either with you, the senior office in the case, or with anyone else on the team. Were you not concerned at this lack of communication from an officer who was, by your own earlier admission, in a vulnerable position?
DCI Sullivan:
I instructed DC Hendy to go to DC Dillon’s home and make enquiries. I was aware that, if there was any wrongdoing and DC Dillon had been identified or followed, a police presence at the flat could make things worse. DC Dillon lived in a shared flat.
Mr Shorter:
So you were protecting the investigation?
DCI Sullivan:
I was protecting DC Dillon. But, obviously, if Dillon had been under suspicion from anyone at the bank it would have jeopardised the investigation, yes. As you know, undercover officers sometimes have to go quiet in order to maintain credibility.
Mr Shorter:
And you believed that DC Dillon had “gone quiet”, as you put it?
DCI Sulli
van:
Yes. If I’d thought for even a second that anything had happened—
Mr Shorter:
You would have acted?
DCI Sullivan:
[no reply: DCI Sullivan appears distressed]
His Honour Judge Simler:
DCI Sullivan, are you able to continue?
[DCI Sullivan nods]
Mr Shorter:
During this period of the investigation, what was Dame Sally Dannatt’s involvement?
DCI Sullivan:
She didn’t have any active involvement: she was simply to keep a watching brief and report back to HMRC and to the Department of International Trade, as interested parties.
Mr Shorter:
So, to be clear, Dame Sally was not at any time, so far as you were aware, involved personally in investigating the case or in commissioning any other party to investigate it?
DCI Sullivan:
No.
Mr Shorter:
And what was your understanding of Dame Sally’s view of the progress of the case?
Miss Chung:
Objection, M’Lord. Mr Shorter is asking the witness to speculate.
His Honour Judge Simler:
Upheld. Kindly rephrase the question, Mr Shorter.
Mr Shorter:
I am obliged, M’Lord. DCI Sullivan, did Dame Sally, during the course of the meeting, express to you her views on the progress of the case or on its likely outcome?
DCI Sullivan:
Yes. Just after the meeting closed, we were standing in the corridor outside the meeting room – that is, Dame Sally was standing with me and DI Sayler – and she said something along the lines of: ‘You do realise that CBIB finances a significant number of trade deals between British companies and those in Switzerland? It could be very embarrassing for the Government if a Department-nominated financial intermediary were to be involved in any kind of large-scale fraud.’
Mr Shorter:
That sounds very precise, DCI Sullivan. You clearly have a good memory for dialogue, if not for faces.
[laughter from the public gallery]
And did you respond to Dame Sally’s statement?
DCI Sullivan:
I said we’d got no firm evidence of anything fraudulent taking place. I expressed the view that perhaps Mr Henning Nilsson had just taken his eye off the ball to focus on his own deals.
Mr Shorter:
But you didn’t believe that?
DCI Sullivan:
I was sceptical.
Chapter Ten
Thursday 20th November
Catch Me If You Can
I rang Dirk from the departure lounge to let him know what time the flight was due into O’Hare. He sounded relieved that I was on my way.
“Cookie, we’ve been going through all the funeral arrangements. Everything’s fine: your mother left some instructions.”
“I’ll bet she did.”
“Cookie, I’m just in Father Hennessy’s office now.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’ve disturbed you.”
“No, not at all. In fact, Father Hennessey was wondering if you – or Jack – had any suggestions for a reading?”
I pictured Dirk pressing the phone hard to his ear so that Father Hennessy didn’t catch anything untoward being uttered, and fished around in the Catholic back-catalogue collecting dust in the furthest archive of my brain.
“I can’t speak for Jack. He’s not one for church. I know, how about Psalm 79? Verses one to four should do it.”
“I’m just writing that down. Thank you, Cookie.”
“That’s my flight being called. I’ll have to go. See you later.”
I hung up before Dirk, a post-operative Lutheran, had managed to slip his note across the green leather top of Hennessy’s monumental oak desk. It was a pity: I’d have liked to have heard his reaction. Dirk will kill me, I thought, smiling to myself as I joined the queue for boarding.
Psalm 79, King James Version
O god, the heathen are come into thine inheritance; thy holy temple have they defiled; they have laid Jerusalem on heaps.
The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth.
Their blood have they shed like water round about Jerusalem; and there was none to bury them.
We are become a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and derision to them that are round about us.
We reached cruising altitude and the fasten-seatbelt sign pinged off. I had been pleased to see it was a quiet day in business class. The woman in the seat opposite was already fast asleep. I could hear the tap-tap of laptop keys two rows behind, and that was pretty much it. I accepted a pre-lunch drink and read for a while. There was nothing to see out of the window except thick grey-white cloud. Nine hours of this and I would be fit to kill someone. Fortunately, the book I’d picked up at Heathrow wasn’t bad. Not the sort of thing Jack would approve of, so I took the opportunity while I could. He likes fact. I’ve always preferred fiction.
After lunch (beef Wellington, followed by raspberry syllabub) I tried to carry on reading but I was lulled by the background drone of the engines and the constant keystrokes of the guy behind. When I woke, thirsty, stiff-necked, over an hour later, he was still typing away. I went past him on my way to the washroom and again, slowly, on my way back. Grey-haired, about forty, he was sitting hunched forward over the keyboard, wearing headphones. I stopped in the aisle and he looked up. I smiled. He seemed puzzled for a moment, then tugged off his headset. I could hear the insistent tzz-bm, tzz-bm of some kind of jazz-funk emanating from it.
“Hi.”
He sat with fingers poised over the keys, like I really had interrupted him mid-thought. I smiled again, hopefully in a reassuring way. He looked worried.
“I’m sorry. Is my typing disturbing you?”
“No, not at all. You seem very busy though. Important presentation?”
He stared at the text on the screen, and then back at me.
“Presentation? Oh, no. I see. No.”
“Really none of my business. I’ll let you get on with it.”
I started to move away.
“Wait. I mean, I’m sorry. That was rude of me.”
He snapped the laptop shut and gestured to me to join him.
“James Lyon.”
I shook his outstretched hand, its long pale fingers closing firmly around mine.
“Cookie Garrity. Pleased to meet you, James.”
When Mr Lyon smiled, his perfect white teeth glinted at me in the light of the overhead strip, and I could make out a faint crescent of contacts against the pale grey of his eyes. I suspect the steward had been watching from behind the screen: he manifested unexpectedly by my side and asked if we would like a drink. I know what they do on these trips: they take bets; on who’s a drunk, who might leave a tip for the cabin crew, which one is smuggling drugs. Someone had been betting on me. Lyon flashed his pearly whites again.
“Shall we have some champagne?”
I wasn’t quite certain what to make of his suggestion.
“Don’t you think that’s rather a cliché?”
Lyon laughed. The steward looked offended.
“I’d rather have a cup of coffee, please.”
“Two coffees, then.”
The steward nodded and left us, patting at the chair backs on his way to the galley, in case any of them had been marginally misaligned by their imaginary passengers.
“So, Mr James Lyon, what’s with all the tapping?”
“If you must know, I’m finishing a book.”
“Oh. A novel?”
He gave a wry smile. I suppose it had been the obvious question.
“Sadly not. It’s—”
“Let me guess. A self-help guide.”
This time he laughed so loud I head the sleeping woman passenger begin to stir.
“No!”
“A text book of some kind? An instructio
n manual?”
He chuckled.
“You seem to think I’m the sort of person who goes round telling everyone else what to do. I don’t know where you get that idea. We’ve only just met.”
I looked at him carefully. He was one cool customer, that’s for sure.
“Well, go on then. Surprise me.”
The steward arrived with our coffees and made a show of serving them.
“I can’t really tell you. Let’s just say I’m helping a famous person to write his autobiography.”
“You’re a ghost writer?”
“It’s not a term I like.”
“So, who is the famous guy? An actor?”
The steward’s ears were twitching, but he couldn’t stretch his little ceremony out any longer and retreated off down the aisle as slowly as decorum would permit.
Lyon told me the ‘celebrity’ was a sportsman, but that was as much as he would say. To be honest, I wasn’t that interested in some semi-literate pro-footballer who had to get hired help to do his homework, but nine hours is a long time to spend in a flying tin with only an over-attentive steward and a comatose woman for company. I carried on chatting and flirting with Mr Lyon for quite a while. Eventually, I made a transparent excuse and returned to my seat, and James Lyon carried on with his ghost-writing, tap-tapping his way energetically into the landing procedure, when he was obliged to turn off all electrical devices and return his tray to the upright position. He was good. Whoever had hired him must have spent a lot of money. The way he’d gently, almost imperceptibly, drawn out what he wanted to know. All those casual questions, slipped easily into an anecdote or two. So now he knew: where I was going, where I was staying, who I was meeting. He knew how long I was staying in Chicago and when I was due to fly back. Except, like I said, I prefer fiction to fact. It would be interesting to know what Mr James Lyon would say when he arrived at the check-in desk of the Peninsula Hotel and found I wasn’t there.