On Eden Street

by Peter Grainger

  ‘It’s one of those jobs, I think, that you have to have done. You can’t really explain it to anyone who hasn’t. Like being a soldier, too.’

  Wortley said, ‘You didn’t fancy the Army?’

  There had been a moment in the university careers library, when Waters had looked at an advertisement for graduate recruitment. He could even recall some of the details – three days of assessment, and if you got in, forty-four weeks at Sandhurst. The subject of your degree doesn’t matter to us, only your ability to lead others…

  ‘No. But the man who trained me in the police, as a detective, he was ex-Army.’

  ‘Yeah? Where’d he serve?’

  Always the first question soldiers ask.

  ‘I don’t know many details, he didn’t talk about it much. But I know he was in Northern Ireland for a long time.’

  Wortley nodded, as if he didn’t need any more detail than that. But there was a restlessness about him again – he was getting ready to leave.

  Waters said, ‘And I can tell you exactly what he’d say to you now.’

  Wortley didn’t respond straight away, but in the end, he wanted to know – what would a fellow soldier say to him in a situation like this? He nodded, and Waters said, ‘He would have said, you know what you should do now, don’t you, son?’

  Silence again, but not surprise. Wortley had thought about it himself. It was impossible to judge what his motivations might be, but he had considered the alternative to running and hiding. Waters edged his way forward.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about why you followed me tonight, instead of driving off. An hour and a half at least you’ve been here, and you could have been a hundred miles away by now. You’d found out it was the police watching you, which was the main thing you needed to know, but you’re still here. Why?’

  Wortley was waiting for something more.

  Waters continued, ‘Perhaps it was just curiosity, but you took a chance coming here, didn’t you? Subconsciously, maybe you wanted to tell someone.’

  ‘What? You’re going to psycho-analyse me? I never went in for any of that bullshit when we came back from Helmand, so…’

  When you’ve taken a wrong turn, turn back, try another way.

  Waters said, ‘What you did for those women saved them a lot of suffering. Six people I’ll bet leading better lives today thanks to you. Anyone you talk to is going take that into account. Remember I mentioned finding out about that on Monday? The police in Norwich told us they’ve been looking for you for months because you’re an important witness. You could help a lot of other women – you said there are houses where it’s still going on. You might even help us to find who murdered Neville Murfitt.’

  Wortley’s face closed again, and he seemed to be the man who had confronted Waters in the hallway once more. But was there something before that, when Murfitt’s murderer was mentioned? And Wortley was still here and still, apparently, listening.

  Waters continued, ‘The people who came after you, and who might do so again, are organised crime. As my old boss would have said, serious villains, Michael. And the people who will eventually catch them are serious coppers. Talk to them. You can stop looking over your shoulder, and you can do a lot of good. I’m not going to say they won’t charge you with something, but I honestly doubt it. When it’s over, if you need it, they’ll help you to move on.’

  ‘Are you talking witness protection?’

  Waters was treading a fine line. He didn’t want to make promises others might break, and he didn’t want to lie.

  ‘I can’t say what they’ll offer you. But if you come in, I’ll ask the right questions on your behalf, and I’ll keep asking them. Don’t underestimate the value of a witness who’s been on the inside. You’re not stupid. You can cut yourself a deal and bring this to an end, Michael.’

  Wortley stood up slowly and said, ‘Thanks for tea.’

  Waters followed suit, and they looked at each other.

  Wortley said, ‘If you try to arrest me now, I’m going to resist. Don’t do it, mate.’

  You really do not get many friendly warnings like that one, in this job.

  Waters said, ‘I won’t. The last time I got into a fight with a squaddie, it didn’t end well for me.’

  He touched his nose, and Wortley said, ‘I was going to take your phone, but… So, as soon as I’m out of here, you can call it in. Like I said, once I’m out of the town you won’t find me.’

  Wortley took a couple of backward steps before he turned towards the door, still wary that Waters might try to detain him.

  ‘I won’t do that.’

  Wortley faced him again.

  ‘Won’t do what?’

  ‘Call it in as soon as you’re gone. Nobody will know you’ve been here tonight. I’ll give you my word on that, if you’ll give me yours.’

  There was a frown on Wortley’s face as he said, ‘Give you my word on what?’

  ‘That you’ll drive somewhere quiet. Park up and think over what I’ve said. I can see why you’re not just going to hand yourself over – I wouldn’t. But I would think hard about what I said to you. Think about your life if you don’t resolve this now, and think about the good you can do if you bring all of this to an end.’

  Waters had no idea where this had come from – it hadn’t been a part of any plan. If Wortley had agreed to go with him, there would have been a phone call to Freeman and a sleepless night in Central; now there would be a sleepless night here wondering whether a bad day had just got considerably worse.

  Wortley said, ‘Are you serious?’

  Waters nodded but didn’t answer, and eventually Wortley said, ‘I reckon I’d call it in, if I were you…’

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The office was busy and, as far as Waters could tell, in one way or another everyone was engaged in the search for Michael Wortley. For the fourteenth time, he went over the events of yesterday evening but each time he did so, they seemed to take on an air of increasing unreality. As soon as Wortley had gone down the flight of stairs, Waters had left his flat and made his way quickly up to the top floor, camera in hand, his longest lens attached. The landing looked down over the rear of the block and the car park – he hadn’t noticed a vehicle following him into it last night but if Wortley had parked there, he should see him driving out, and he might, just might, get a shot of the number plate.

  What he saw was the man walking across the car park and going out through the entrance, where he became a silhouette against the reflections of the streetlights on the shining, wet surface of the road, a film noir image all too appropriate under the circumstances. Wortley turned right; he’d driven on past the entrance when he saw Waters go in, and had parked in the street. Twenty seconds later, a dark-coloured van drove by, heading back towards the city centre. With so brief a glimpse, it was impossible to guess the make of the vehicle, let alone see the plate. Waters had returned to his flat and read the message on his phone – I’m in town if you wanted to meet for a late drink. It was from Serena, trying to cheer him up after a bad day.

  He looked at her now. She was re-checking everything to do with the mobile number Wortley had given to the ADS office, using all her contacts and all her experience to see if Wortley had left any trace, a single footprint in the vast sands of the digital desert. John Murray was poring over data from the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority, and had already chased up the passport office. There was an increasing suspicion among the team that Wortley might have left the country.

  “Guilty” doesn’t really cover how Waters was feeling at this point. What had possessed him to give his word like that? To a man who had been part of a criminal enterprise supplying Class A drugs on the streets of Norwich? In the cold light of this Friday morning, it appeared absurd, but what could he do about it now? He pictured the scene as he went to see DCI Freeman and explained that he’d had a visit from Michael Wortley last night. They’d had a nice long chat and agreed – but even that wasn’t true – t
hat Michael would go away and have a think about whether he wanted to come in and talk to them about what he’d been getting up to over the past few months…

  This would all go down a storm, wouldn’t it? Freeman would call DI Greene into her office and say, Chris, just go through it once more, because I need a witness to your stupidity before I send you home. Your time in this squad is now at an end. Now go and explain it all to Detective Chief Superintendent Allen.

  Which was all very well and suitably stomach-churning, but none of them was there, were they? If Wortley had turned up at Freeman’s house, how would she have dealt with it? She couldn’t have woman-handled a character like Wortley into the back of her car and delivered him to the custody suite of Central either, could she? True, her powers of persuasion were considerable – after all, she’d persuaded Waters to leave a perfectly sensible job in another part of the building to join this set-up – but he couldn’t imagine Wortley falling for it, not the way he was last night. All true, the voice said, but whichever way you look at it, even if you had called her immediately Wortley left, you’d still be the detective sergeant who frightened him off on Tuesday and let him walk out of your own flat on Thursday. There was no way around that. And that’s why you decided to gamble your entire career on the good sense of a Class A delivery driver.

  He was supposed to be working on a list of public transport locations which could be visited to obtain CCTV footage, when he knew perfectly well that Wortley had a van. He did his best to look convincing but felt a complete fraud. If he’d put his foot down and kept going, Wortley could be in Wales or Scotland or France. When he’d found the footage Greene wanted, was he, Waters, prepared to sit though hours of it, pretending to look for the man who had, he knew, not been within a mile of the railway station? For the sake of not looking a complete fool? No. But with every passing minute, officers he liked and respected were already wasting valuable time, and he was getting in deeper and deeper.

  Was there anyone he could tell, anyone who could give him advice? In the office, only John Murray. Murray would tell him to speak to Freeman, he knew that. It was the weekend tomorrow. There was someone else, of course, but… But you have to move on, you have to reach the point where you’re taking responsibility, not advice. There was a chance, ever-diminishing but still a chance, that Michael Wortley would get in touch, wasn’t there? At some point today, that chance would effectively reduce to zero, and then Waters would have to choose – keep silent forever or own up. Of course, Wortley might never be found, in which case, what Waters had done would never be discovered. It would remain his own guilty little secret. Keeping silent had that going for it, but it wasn’t enough.

  He looked at his watch. 09.43. He might be able to stand another couple of hours but if Wortley hadn’t made contact by midday, this farce had to end. He meant the wait for Wortley, of course, but knew, in the moment he made that decision, it might also apply to his career in the police force.

  At 11.55, Waters opened his desk drawer and transferred a few personal items to his shoulder bag. There was a silver Parker Pen set, still in the original blue box, which Smith had given him when he, Waters, had finally got the message about making thorough notes. A Wenger Swiss Army knife, a present from his father when he was sixteen, which had travelled everywhere with him since, even though it had rarely been opened. Odds and ends, silly things, including a business card from Gloria Butterfield, QC. He remembered the moment vividly – Smith, of course, had been present – when she said ‘Keep this, young man. I have defended more than one policeman who got into bother for doing what he believed was the right thing…’

  Too much irony there, just at the moment. He decided he would simply leave the room. There would be moments for explanations and goodbyes later, assuming any of them were still inclined to give him the opportunity. DI Greene was watching but without interest; it was slightly unusual for Waters to be taking his shoulder bag with him at this time of day but suspicion had not been aroused. They were all too busy having their time wasted to notice him leaving.

  He closed the door, paused and took a breath. Freeman’s office was on the same floor but around one corner; along this corridor and to the left. If he walked slowly, it might take him another twenty seconds to reach it. She would look up from whatever she was doing – laptop, mobile, a case file – and wave him in towards a seat, signalling she’d be with him in a moment. He would not sit down. He would wait, on his feet, and she would notice this, and end what she was doing. And then, almost certainly, she would end what he was doing.

  Her door was open. He made sure Freeman had seen him, and then stepped inside, closing it behind him. She had been reading something on her laptop screen, and went back to it, finishing a sentence or a paragraph, one hand ready to close it and speak to him. Waters had the words prepared – he’d been rehearsing them for an hour – and then there was a knock on the door behind him. Freeman looked up and indicated he should open it and see who was there. He did so, and found Priti Hussain.

  Cara Freeman said, ‘Come in, Priti. You’re not interrupting – we haven’t got started on whatever it is Chris needs. What can I do for you?’

  Priti said, ‘I’m sorry, ma’am, but it was Detective Sergeant Waters I was trying to get hold of. I saw him come into your office just now but he didn’t see me.’

  This had to be true – Waters couldn’t remember anything about the walk to Freeman’s office now. If the businessman with the ponytail had wandered by, Waters wouldn’t have spotted him.

  Freeman told her to go ahead, and Priti said, ‘I called you from reception but they said you’d just gone out of the incident room, sir. I came straight up because I thought it might be important. I know I shouldn’t have, but I’ve noticed his name up on the whiteboards, and I’ve heard you all talking about him. So, when he…’

  Freeman looked at Waters as if he might be able to explain what this was about. Waters shrugged, looked back at Priti and said, ‘Who? Is it a phone call?’

  ‘No, sir, he’s down there. He asked for you by name, and they’ve put him in one of the side rooms. He said his name was Wortley. I’m sure it’s the same man you’ve all been…’

  When Priti had gone, not realising that her sharp eyes and quick wits had ensured she wouldn’t be working in routine admin for much longer, Freeman said, ‘Get down there. Smile, shake his hand, offer him lunch, do anything you have to do, but get him into the building properly, behind the security door. I’ll see Tom, and make sure Interview One is free. Go!’

  And so there had been a moment when Waters could have said quietly to Michael Wortley, I kept my word – nobody knows you came to see me last night. So, if you could just… But it didn’t happen. He took Freeman’s warning seriously and said not a word that might have alarmed or worried the man, as they walked through Central and took the stairs up to the squad’s suite of rooms. Interview One was empty and they went inside but Waters had already guessed this would not be straightforward. Wouldn’t Regional be on their way to collect him the moment they heard Wortley was in the building?

  But he thanked him for deciding to do the right thing, and Wortley would never know how much sincerity lay behind those simple words. Waters wasn’t out of the woods by any means but he’d managed to escape the quicksand. Moments later, Freeman arrived with Greene close behind, the daybook in his left hand a pencil in his right. Freeman introduced herself and Greene, and then shook Wortley’s hand as she met his surprised look – from the outset she didn’t want him to feel like a suspect, Waters concluded. She said, ‘Detective Inspector Greene needs to complete a couple of formalities, Mr Wortley, and then he’ll leave the three of us to talk. Can we get you anything? Coffee? Tea?’

  Waters thought, yes, tea with no sugar, but Wortley declined the offer. He seemed somewhat taken aback by the warmth of the welcome so far. Greene asked his questions, which would have been amusing if they hadn’t been so ironic; do you have an address, Mr Wortley? A telephone number? Have
you left a vehicle in the station car park? Wortley’s answers were short and to the point, and the detective inspector wrote down the responses word for word. When he left, Waters would have bet his most expensive lens that Greene only went as far as the room next door, where the recording equipment would already be running.

  Freeman said first, ‘I’m not going to insult your intelligence, Michael, by pretending we’re not surprised to see you. Obviously, you know we’ve been looking for you, and, equally obviously, we know you’ve gone to some trouble to make sure we didn’t find you. I’m talking about the events of Tuesday night this week. What I need to clear up first is whether you understand why we’ve been trying to speak to you for the past couple of weeks. To put it more simply – what do you think this is all about?’

  Exactly as Smith would have played it – you do not reveal your hand first, you invite the person on the other side of the table to reveal theirs. But the ground in front of Waters had opened up again because Wortley was surely about to say, it’s all right, he told me all about it last night, and then DCI Freeman would smile a chilly smile, and say, would you excuse us a moment, Mr Wortley? A word outside, Detective Sergeant…

  Michael Wortley said, ‘It depends what you mean by “this”. On Tuesday I didn’t know much, but I knew someone had been asking questions. I couldn’t be sure who it was, so I made myself scarce. I hadn’t done anything wrong but I wanted some time to think.’

  Freeman considered his answer before she said, ‘You couldn’t be sure who had been asking questions? You knew it was the police, didn’t you? You knew it was us?’

  ‘No. I knew someone had been at ADS and waved some ID around. Anyone can do that, get some fake identification, can’t they?’

  He looked at Freeman and then at Waters, and it was so subtle Freeman didn’t see it, but he was acknowledging the story Waters had told him about Neville Murfitt and his own Army ID card.