Widows

by Lynda La Plante

  “Let’s do the whole thing now,” she called back them, and whistled to Wolf, who was rolling in a dead seagull.

  They spent another hour running through the plan before calling it a day. While Dolly packed up the picnic hamper, Bella and Linda carried the chainsaw and rucksacks back up to the boot of her Merc. Shirley emptied the sand from the pillowcases and watched Dolly from the corner of her eye. Dolly’s lips were pursed tight and she seemed still to be seething at her own inability to keep up with the rest of them. Shirley had tried a big, consoling smile, but her split lip opened up again and anyway, Dolly had just ignored her. She was a tough old bird. Her own weakness in the face of Tony Fisher’s assault was playing on Shirley’s mind. I was pathetic, she thought angrily. But I won’t be anymore . . .

  The final rehearsal run had been the slickest yet and well under time. Dolly’s decision to reorder the roles, with her now driving the blocking van up front, Bella back on the chainsaw and Linda driving the transit van behind, turned out to be absolutely the right thing to do and played to everyone’s strengths. They’d finished the day on a high, tired, filthy, achy, but invigorated. For the first time it seemed real, very real. As Shirley cleared the beach of their debris, she picked up one of the driftwood shotguns and smiled. Checking Dolly’s back was turned, she held the “gun” in position one last time before throwing it into the dunes.

  Dolly hadn’t cared about the decision she’d had to make about driving the lead van, but she did mind failing in front of her girls. They looked to her for guidance, for stability and for leadership and she had to maintain that role; there was no way they could think she was weak in any way.

  Linda and Bella were almost at the bottom of the steps by the time Shirley and Dolly were packed up and ready to go. As Dolly looked at her three girls, she spotted the not-so-subtle sideways glance that Linda gave the others. While they no longer seemed to doubt that they could do this, by the way they looked at her, Dolly could see that it was her they doubted now.

  She picked up the sledgehammer. “I never practiced my bit, did I?” she said cheerfully. Standing a couple of feet from the Morris, legs apart, hands firmly gripping the handle, Dolly swung the hammer. The veins stood out on her neck and she let rip; not exactly a scream, but a weird guttural roar right from her belly. She let the hammer go and it flew through the air before smashing through the Morris’s windscreen, shattering it into a thousand pieces. Beads of glass flew backward, sprinkling over the back seats. For a second or two, the inside of the car looked like a snow-globe and it was almost beautiful to watch.

  As the sledgehammer landed on the back seat, the three women gasped in shock.

  “Oh, my God!” Linda spoke for all of them. “It’s like the first time you hear your mum say ‘fuck’!”

  Dolly looked at them with an impish grin. “I know my strengths. And I know yours,” she said. She turned serious. “We’ve got this, girls. We’ve bloody well got this.” And then she said something that brought a lump to even Linda’s throat:

  “I won’t let you down.”

  Now, Dolly saw no doubt in their eyes at all; only respect. They knew she could lead and she knew they’d follow.

  By Harry’s third run, it was clear that he was holding them up. He simply wasn’t fast enough and, no matter how many times he tried, he wasn’t getting any faster.

  No one said a single word as Harry thought through his options. His face was tight with anger and his jaw muscles twitched erratically. His anger was directed at himself, they could all see that, so they respectfully gave him the time and space he needed. Eventually, Harry handed his rucksack to Jimmy.

  “Lemme see you run, kid,” he said.

  As the sweat trickled down Harry’s bright-red face, Jimmy completed the run in a spectacularly fast time. In Harry’s younger days that run would have been a piece of cake, but he was smart enough to know where his team’s strengths lay—and his wasn’t running; not anymore.

  “Back to your start positions,” Harry ordered. “I’m gonna time the whole thing.”

  As he watched Terry, Joe and Jimmy walk back toward the follow van, Harry was hurting, inside and out. He’d always led from the front and to have to relinquish that position was heart-breaking.

  Joe and Terry clambered into the back of the follow van while Jimmy lagged behind. He was tapping his watch.

  “What’s the problem?” Harry asked.

  “Nothing.” Jimmy didn’t want to look stupid or cause trouble. “It’s just my watch. Overwound it, I expect.”

  Harry took his gold Rolex off and handed it to Jimmy. “Here,” he said. “Have this. I’ll be buying myself the latest model when this is all over.” He climbed into the driver’s seat of the bread truck.

  As Jimmy took up his new position in the driver’s seat of the follow van, he admired Harry’s gold Rolex with its diamond-encrusted face. It was the most beautiful watch he’d ever seen. He vowed never to take it off.

  Chapter 19

  Fuller’s weekend had been spent at the Yard, showing Boxer Davis’s landlady, Fat Fran, hundreds and hundreds of mug shots. She said she’d do her best to help him, but Fuller wondered if she was just stringing him along for the free food and all the hot and cold drinks she kept asking for. Sometimes she’d point at a face and say, “I think, but I’m not sure, but it could be him . . . let me have another cup of tea and some biscuits while I think about it.” Fuller would then run a computer check on the individual she’d selected, only to discover they were serving time in prison, or that they were dead. But Fuller had to keep going with her because she was their only lead now. Each time she mentioned a lag by name, it got his hopes up, but most of them turned out to be ex-lovers and one even turned out to be her husband. Bloody hell, Fuller thought to himself sourly, she’s had a lot of fellas for a woman of her size and odor. As for the man who attacked her, Fran finally admitted that she simply couldn’t remember what he looked like.

  Andrews had spent the morning with forensics. He’d asked them to check out a stolen vehicle found abandoned in a side street off Shaftesbury Avenue. The car had blood on the undercarriage, which came from the same blood group as Boxer’s. There was damage to both the rear and front bumpers, and a headlight was broken: similar glass had been found in the alleyway where Boxer was discovered. It hadn’t taken the forensic team long to confirm that the fibers snagged on the broken headlight matched the suit that Boxer had been wearing, and they were also able to match the glass left at the scene with the stolen car. A positive result, but it lead nowhere: the car had no suspect fingerprints in it, and the leather glove marks suggested Boxer’s killer had a criminal record and didn’t want to be caught. It was yet another dead end.

  Fuller hammered each key down as he made his methodical notes, wishing it was Resnick’s head. There had been a big jewelry raid in Mayfair the night before and the whole station was buzzing about it. By rights, Fuller should have been assigned to it, but he was stuck on the Rawlins case. So, instead of tracking down proper criminals—ones who were actually alive—he’d spent his time waiting on Fat Fran and getting nothing in return. He was sick and tired of being Resnick’s whipping boy—and the other CID officers was pissing him off, too. They knew how much Fuller hated Resnick, and kept joking about how inseparable the two of them were, and how Fuller was putting on weight and starting to smell like an ashtray as he slowly morphed into his boss. Smarting with resentment, Fuller finished typing and angrily yanked his report from the typewriter, tearing it down the middle in his haste. He looked up at the ceiling, calmed himself and started again.

  When Andrews came in, he too was angry. The chief had hauled him over the coals for requesting forensic priority on the stolen car used in the hit and run on Boxer Davis over the Mayfair job. Andrews had had to stand there like a wet lettuce while he took the bollocking that should have been given to Resnick. Now he paced up and down the room, watching Fuller hit the typewriter keys with such force it was moving across the desk.


  “’Ere Fuller, how’s your mate Resnick?” Detective Sergeant Hawkes popped his head round the door with a big grin on his face.

  “Fuck off,” said Fuller.

  “With pleasure,” said Hawkes. “I’m off the case, and so’s Richmond, and we’re on the Mayfair job. No more wasting time doing surveillance on the Rawlins woman for us.”

  “How come you got moved and I didn’t?” Fuller was seething.

  “I think the DCI’s keeping all rejects in the one team so as not to infect the rest of the station,” Hawkes mocked.

  Fuller was livid. He thought of asking the chief if he could get on the Mayfair job, but then he figured the chief would have already asked if he’d wanted him. God, what if Resnick’s incompetence really was rubbing off on him? He glared at Hawkes.

  “Resnick know about this?” Fuller asked.

  “No idea. I’ve not seen him and I don’t care. It’s the DCI’s decision,” Hawkes said cheerfully, shutting the door and leaving Fuller to stew in his own juices.

  Five minutes later, Alice walked in. She was about to be transferred to Criminal Records and was relieved in a way: the stress levels would be much lower.

  “You’re moving back to your office today,” she reminded Fuller and Andrews. “The decorators have done a lovely job. It’s all nice and fresh with brand-new equipment.” Her voice was a cross between a kindly mum and a strict headmistress.

  Fuller had already had most of his desk and files packed and moved. Andrews had slipped out to the canteen before he could be commandeered into moving any office equipment.

  “DCI Resnick in yet?” Fuller asked Alice, as he carefully pulled his report from the typewriter and picked up the last bits of paperwork from his desk.

  “No, and I’m furious that he hasn’t done a thing about clearing his office! I gave him boxes to put things in but he’s not even managed that.” Although she was a group secretary for the CID senior officers, Resnick behaved as if she worked for him, and him alone.

  “Alice,” Fuller said kindly. “What did you expect?”

  Alice looked sharply at Fuller. She hated the lack of respect for Resnick, although she knew exactly what Fuller meant. Resnick was bone idle when it came to practical things; he knew that if he left something for long enough, Alice would do it for him. She’d once caught him laughing about it with one of his colleagues. “Why have a dog and bark yourself?” he’d said, which had hurt her deeply, although she knew he didn’t really mean it. Resnick was lazy because she liked looking after him, not the other way round. She still defended him. “Well, he’s very busy, Detective Sergeant Fuller. He has no time for menial tasks.”

  Fuller smiled at Alice as he left with his last box of property. “He’s lucky to have you, Alice. And I’m sorry that I can’t say the same for you.”

  “Do you know when you might expect him?” Alice shouted after Fuller.

  “Don’t know! Don’t care!” Fuller shouted back.

  Alice went along the empty corridor and stood outside the cracked, Sellotape-covered door to Resnick’s office. She rattled the handle. It was, as usual, locked. The silence was shattered as the swing doors at the end of the hall banged open and Resnick appeared. As he passed the new office, he bellowed for Fuller and Andrews, and was about to bellow for Alice when he saw her waiting for him.

  “Morning, flower,” he said, unlocking his office door and bursting into one of his coughing fits.

  Resnick’s office was as shambolic as ever; he’d made no effort even to begin boxing things up. He flung his dog-eared, chewed briefcase onto his desk and picked up the phone.

  “It’s been cut off, sir,” said Alice patiently. “The decorators are starting in here today and you’re supposed to have moved upstairs into the new annex office.”

  Resnick banged the phone down. “Why didn’t you tell me?!”

  Alice had in fact told him five times, but she didn’t say so.

  He handed his office keys to her. “Don’t let anything out of your sight,” he said, earnestly looking her straight in the eyes. He trusted her as he trusted no one else.

  “Of course,” she replied equally gravely. And he was gone.

  Alice stood amid the horrible mess that was Resnick’s professional life. If it had been anyone else’s office, she’d have delegated it to the typing pool. But not Resnick’s. He’d given her the keys to his sanctuary and she wasn’t going to let a single scrap of paper out of her sight. She sighed heavily. Why do I always let you do this to me? she thought. Resnick barged in and out of her life every day like a tornado, and every night she’d pick up whatever he left in his wake. He never listened to a thing she said, unless it was an answer to one of his questions, and she couldn’t recall how many times on leaving the office, he’d shouted: “Give my regards to your dad! Slip him a hot toddy—that’ll cure anything.” Even though she’d told him a thousand times that her father was dead.

  But Alice knew exactly why she ran round after Resnick, and why she would do anything for him. She’d loved him for fifteen years.

  Chapter 20

  Linda sat in her arcade booth, biting her nails. The throbbing music had given her a headache. She was thinking about the meeting they’d all had at the arches lock-up after the beach rehearsal. And she didn’t like how it had turned out.

  They had all been on a high after the successful practice runs, but the meeting had turned sour. It had started when Bella had asked Dolly where she was going to stash the money after the raid.

  “I’m not telling you.” Dolly had replied, quite matter of fact. “What you don’t know, you can’t tell. It’s as simple as that. It’ll be safe. That’s all you need to be sure of.”

  “Don’t you trust us?” Linda had said, instantly defensive.

  “If you don’t like it, Linda, you know where the door is.”

  The three of them had stood in disgruntled silence as Dolly had handed them another checklist. After the raid, each girl was to travel to Heathrow airport separately for flights to Rio. Exact times and dates would be confirmed once Dolly had met the security contact, but for now they each had instructions on how to travel to the airport and how to behave during their journey. Lastly, Dolly gave them each an envelope full of money to pay for their hotel bills.

  Shirley’s face was beaming. She was both excited and frightened by what was happening. “Where you going before Rio, Dolly?”

  “Nowhere,” Dolly had said curtly. “I got to find the right time to stash the money and then settle my Wolf into kennels. If we all disappear at the same time, people might ask questions. I’ll be bringing out a considerable amount of cash for us to stay in Rio. Enough for at least two months. The longer we’re away the safer it’ll be for all of us.”

  Linda opened her mouth to ask Dolly the question that was on everyone’s mind, but Bella interrupted. She didn’t want this to escalate into a slanging match. “And the bulk of the cash . . . only you’ll know where that’s stashed?” she asked politely.

  Dolly had seen that the girls needed reassurance that she knew what she was doing, and why. “We work the way Harry did. None of his team ever knew where the money was stashed and he never ripped any of them off. They trusted him with their . . .” Dolly had looked down at the ground, not wanting to meet Linda or Shirley’s eyes and regretting her choice of words. “They trusted him,” she amended. “They were good men, but Harry knew they’d be tempted to go out and start blowing the money right away. That attracts attention from others . . . especially the Old Bill.” She paused. “Now look, I ain’t gonna pull a fast one and disappear with the money.”

  “What if something happens to you? What if you get caught or hit by a bus?” Bella was still worried.

  Linda, who was bursting to know everything, had chipped in. “We’d be stranded in Rio with nothing, that’s what. We need to know it all, Dolly.”

  Dolly had been hurt more than angry: hurt because they still didn’t trust her. She turned on all three of them.


  “Right now,” she said through clenched teeth, holding her index finger and thumb an inch apart, “right now, I’m that close to calling it off and walking out of here. You can pay back every penny I’ve given you. You’re all standing there holding more cash than you’ve ever seen in one place. How dare you question me! And if you think you can pull the job off on your own, then go ahead. Go ahead without me and see how far you get! I’m sick of being questioned. You make a choice right now, all of you. You want to pack it in? You want to do it on your own? Tell me now! Tell me right now!”

  Although Shirley had said nothing to anger Dolly, she hung her head guiltily—she’d thought enough bad things about Dolly. Linda was less bothered by Dolly’s ranting, but she knew that without the ledgers and the security contact, that there was no way they could do the job on their own.

  In the end, Bella had been the sensible mediator. “We don’t need to know where the money’s being stashed, Dolly. We trust you. We have to.”

  Dolly shrugged. It was a backhanded compliment from Bella, but it would do for now. Picking up Wolf, she left before she said something she might regret.

  As the door closed behind her, Bella had turned to Linda and Shirley. “I didn’t lose a husband like you two did in her precious Harry’s raid, but you need to know this . . . if she tries anything on, I’ll kill her. My life’s on the line here because I believe what she’s promising. I ain’t never had this much to lose before. And if anyone takes it from me, they’ll be sorry. Very sorry.”

  Shirley had looked shocked; she knew Bella wasn’t kidding. Linda had chewed her last nail down to the quick, making it bleed. Like Bella, she still couldn’t bring herself to trust Dolly completely. They’d have flown halfway round the world, and Dolly would be the only one who had access to all the money from the robbery. And they wouldn’t even know how much they’d got away with!