by Mark Timlin
‘Think the paper’ll be interested?’
‘I should say so. Just one thing though: I’m going to need corroborating evidence.’
I took the exercise book out of the bag and gave it to him. ‘In there,’ I said, ‘are the present whereabouts of everyone involved – those that are still alive, that is. Plus everything I knew up until last night. Jacqueline Harvey knows I’m seeing you, and has agreed to talk to you about what happened. And I think there’s something else. The piece of paper they talked about – if I just knew what it was and where it is. But I’ll find out. Now, be careful, Chas. She and I are the only ones you can talk to. The others are dangerous. Except for Jackie’s dad. He’s just fucked up. If Collier and Millar learn what’s going on, they might do to you what they did to me. Or worse. That’s why I started investigating. I’m scared they’ll come back one night and finish the job.’
I didn’t mention what Collier had said about Dawn and Tracey. I didn’t like to think too much about that.
‘I always wondered what all that was about,’ said Chas.
‘Now you know. And do you want to know what the funniest part of it is? If any of it’s funny at all.’
‘What?’ he said.
‘If Collier hadn’t phoned me the night Sailor topped himself, none of this would be happening. I’d blanked him. I wasn’t going to lift a finger to help him clear his name. If Collier had just thrown that letter away, I would probably never have known that Sailor was dead at all.’
‘That’s the way it goes.’
‘Isn’t it just?’
Chas sat and stared into space, but I knew exactly how his mind was working.
‘So was it worth lunch?’ I asked.
‘I’ll say.’
‘Told you,’ I said.
‘Jee-sus,’ said Chas. ‘An Assistant Commissioner of the Met: a child abuser and a murderer. This is too much.’
‘Isn’t it?’
‘You were right,’ he said. ‘This will get me the job I want.’
‘Enjoy it,’ I said as drily as I could.
‘How much?’ asked Chas.
‘How much, what?’ I said.
‘How much do you want for the story?’
‘Fuck off, Chas,’ I said. ‘I’m not interested in money.’
‘You’re the only one who isn’t then.’
‘Christ. You belong in fucking Wapping,’ I said. ‘With all the rest of the cheque-book journalists.’
‘How about Jacqueline Harvey? Would she be interested?’
‘Fuck knows, I don’t,’ I said.
He took a Vodafone from his inside pocket and switched it on. ‘Sorry,’ he said. He punched in a number, then said, ‘Bob. Chas. Listen, I’m tied up here. Can you cover for me this afternoon?’
He paused. ‘Nothing much. Just an interview with that bloke who found those bodies buried on his allotment. You’ll do it? Great. I owe you one. Yeah, and I need some time off.’ Another pause. ‘Course it’s important. Would I ask if it weren’t? I can? You’re terrific. I’ll be in day after tomorrow. See ya.’
He killed the phone then punched in another number. ‘Give me Tom Slade,’ he said, when it was answered. Then, after a moment’s pause, ‘Tom. Chas Singleton. Listen, I’ve got a story here you’ll kill for.’
He paused.
‘It’s a biggun’. I don’t want to talk about it on the phone. It could be dangerous for several people, including me. Can I come in tomorrow before lunch and see you?’
Another pause.
‘Great. See you.’ He switched off the phone again and put it back in his pocket.
He winked at me, and called for more liqueurs. ‘Great stuff, Nick,’ he said. ‘I think we’ve got a goer here.’
29
I called Jacqueline Harvey the same afternoon.
‘He went for it,’ I said, referring to Chas. ‘Mind you, he’s got to convince the hard-nosed editor of a national Sunday tabloid yet. But I think he’ll do it. If he can’t, no one can.’
‘I hope so,’ she replied. ‘In fact, I’m counting on it.’
Me too, I thought, but didn’t say so.
‘When and if he does,’ I said, ‘he’s going to need to have a long talk to you. I mean a really long talk, with everything going down on tape. Now, I know you told me, but he’s not me. Is it still all right with you?’
‘I told you I wasn’t made of glass. I’ll be fine.’
‘No second thoughts?’
‘None.’
‘Good.’
‘But I’d like you to be there when I do it. It’s not going to be easy, not after all this time, and I need someone on my side.’
‘You will have. Myself and Chas both. I’ll be staying in close touch.’
‘You’re very thorough, Mr Detective.’
‘I could have been more thorough at the start of all this,’ I said. But I didn’t want to go into all that again.
‘Listen,’ I said. ‘Whatever happens, we’ve got to keep this close to our chests. I don’t want Collier and his mates catching on to what we’re doing. They play dirty, believe me; I’ve had more than enough experience of that. And there’s more of them than there are of us. And they’ve got the might of the Metropolitan Police behind them. So don’t tell anyone, and I mean anyone, what we’re up to.’
‘I understand. I haven’t got anyone to tell anyway. And don’t forget I’ve had experience of them too. Probably more than you.’
It was debatable, but I let it go.
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t thinking.’
‘That’s all right.’
‘We’d better meet soon, and discuss strategy. When are you free?’
‘I’m not exactly overburdened with social engagements at the moment; I can probably fit you in when you want.’
I was beginning to get to like Jacqueline Harvey.
‘Let me call you soon,’ I said. ‘I’ll wait to hear from Chas first. When I hear something positive, we’ll get together, OK?’
‘Sounds good.’
‘I’ll buy you a drink after work one evening,’ I said.
‘I don’t –’
‘Don’t say you don’t drink,’ I interrupted. ‘I know better.’
‘Can we keep it our secret?’ she asked.
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘My lips are sealed.’
And that was how we left it.
The next afternoon, Chas called me up at home. ‘It’s a good ’un,’ he said. ‘The news editor lapped it up. He’s talking front page. But only if we can come up with some hard evidence. What you’ve given us so far is great. But he’s scared of the libel lawyers. He’d be taking a big chance printing anything on what we’ve got right now.’
‘Fair enough,’ I said. ‘I’ve spoken to Jacqueline Harvey. She’s agreed to tell you everything. But she’s a bit nervous. She wants me there when you do the interview. Is that OK with you?’
‘The more the merrier,’ said Chas. ‘But I’ve got to do some ferreting of my own first. It’s Thursday today. I’m going to have a dig around. Speak to some people I know. I’ll talk to you if I come up with anything. All right?’
‘You’re the boss,’ I said. ‘But remember what I said, Chas. When you’re out ferreting, just be careful. These boys play for keeps.’
‘So do I,’ he replied. ‘Talk to you soon.’
I phoned Jacqueline at work and told her what Chas had said.
‘That’s good,’ she said.
I agreed with her, and promised to let her know when I’d heard more from my pet reporter.
I felt a whole lot better after Chas’s call and my brief chat with Jacqueline, both mentally and physically. At long last I thought that I was finally going to lay the ghost of Sailor Grant, and a whole load more besides.
The l
ess ghosts there are in your life, the better it is, I figured.
But some ghosts just won’t lie down.
Chas called me on Saturday afternoon.
‘Christ,’ he said. ‘What kind of police force runs this town?’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked.
‘I’ve seen a few contacts. Called in some favours. Been told a lot of stories. It seems that your mates Collier and Millar are well known.’
‘Yeah?’ I wasn’t so sure I wanted to hear.
‘Yeah. Seems like they’ve had carte blanche to do exactly as they please for the last decade or so. They’ve settled down in Peckham running a two-man private police force that can get away with pretty much what it wants.’
‘Like?’
‘Like copping backhanders from local businesses. Taking care that whores don’t get nicked, for a nice lump of their profits. Protecting drug dealers from prosecution. Likewise for a nice cut. You name it, those two boys have got a finger in it. Literally in the case of some of the brasses. Apparently, if there’s ever any complaints, someone with a lot of clout comes to their rescue like the Lone Ranger.’
‘It’s nothing more than I expected,’ I said. ‘I hope you’ve kept your head down.’
‘Sure I have. I’m not silly, am I?’
‘I hope not, Chas, for your sake,’ I said.
‘Trust me. I’m going to get some rest now. I’ve been up since Thursday night. I’ll talk to you Monday, OK?’
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘Just take it easy. Remember what I said.’
‘I will,’ he replied and hung up.
I got straight on to Jacqueline. Apparently she’d just come back from Sainsbury’s with the weekend shopping. I told her what Chas had told me.
‘Is that good?’ she asked.
‘Not bad,’ I said. ‘Not bad at all. It pretty well confirms what I thought was happening. It makes our case stronger, which is good.’
‘It is, isn’t it?’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ I agreed. ‘I’ll talk to you again when I’ve spoken to Chas on Monday. Take care.’
We said our farewells and I put down the phone.
On Sunday evening, Dawn came round by herself. I was getting to rely on her more and more as that year trundled towards its close. She was different with me when we were on our own than she was when anyone else was around. I felt sorry for Tracey. No, not sorry, but sad. I could see a chapter in both their lives ending. I think it would have happened whether I’d come along or not. I’d just been the catalyst. It was obvious that Dawn wanted to get back to the straight life.
Christ knows why. What had the straight life ever done for her?
Anyway, she came round. She bought a Chinese takeout: chop suey and chow mein, with a side order of ribs and a portion of fried rice.
I supplied the soy sauce.
We sat and ate the food out of the tin foil containers it came in, with the plastic chopsticks the restaurant supplied, and fought over the last rib.
We talked about what Chas had told me, and what had happened on the Lion the night I’d been beaten up, which was pretty depressing, and she talked some more about the babies she wanted to have. I didn’t want to disillusion her, but the thought of changing nappies again didn’t exactly fill me with the joys of spring.
We ended up in bed together, just like in the storybooks. A paperback novel, where everything always works out in the end.
Not tonight, Josephine.
The bell to my flat rang at about two a.m. I came awake straight away, looking up into the darkness, with only the sound of Dawn’s breathing disturbing the silence of the room, and I wondered if I’d imagined the noise. Then it rang again, ragged and urgent in the quiet of the night.
I got out of bed, pulled on T-shirt and jeans and went barefoot down the stairs. I didn’t want to open the door, but I did. Chas was leaning against the porch wall outside. His face was a bloody mask, and as I pulled the door towards me he collapsed into my arms. He was such a dead weight that I almost dropped him. As it was he slid halfway down my body before I caught him securely, and he left a trail of blood down the cotton of my shirt, like a long red tyre track.
I held him up and it wasn’t just his face that was a mess. He’d been given a right going over by the looks of it, and I would have put money then and there on who’d given it to him.
I sat him down in the hall with his back to the wall, and ran upstairs to call an ambulance. Dawn was coming to and I told her what had happened, but all she seemed to take in was the stains on my shirt.
The ambulance arrived twenty minutes later. Not bad. Poor Chas was mumbling and moaning and thrashing around on the floor by then, and a couple of times I had to hold him down as he tried to get to his feet. I asked him what had happened, but I might as well have been talking to myself. Perhaps I was.
I went with him to King’s. At the rate I was going, pretty soon I’d have a life membership to casualty. A gold card.
The staff there wanted to know what had happened. I didn’t enlighten them. When they took Chas away for X-rays, I stood outside in the chill night air and smoked a couple of cigarettes I’d bummed off the charge nurse.
Eventually a doctor came out to find me.
‘Your friend took a pretty bad beating,’ he said. ‘Have you informed the police?’
That was a hoot. If Chas hadn’t taken the hammering from a couple of the thin blue line that is all that stands between us and anarchy, I was a monkey’s uncle. And I didn’t have any brothers or sisters. Not any more.
‘No,’ I replied. ‘I don’t know what happened. He just turned up on my doorstep like that.’
‘Well, take my word for it,’ said the doctor who scowled at the cigarette I was holding, ‘he didn’t get those injuries by walking into a door.’
‘Can I see him?’ I asked.
‘Out of the question. He’s under sedation. He might even need surgery.’
‘Tomorrow?’ I asked.
‘You can always try,’ said the doctor, and he turned on his heel and left me alone.
I went back home by cab.
On the way, I decided to go out and get some form of protection for myself.
30
When I opened the flat door, Dawn was sitting on a stool at the breakfast bar, drinking coffee and inhaling a Silk Cut. She got up, dropped the cigarette into her coffee mug, where it died with a hiss, and came over and gave me a hug. Boy, did I need one.
‘What happened?’ she asked.
I let her know what I thought had happened. That Chas had stuck his beak into Collier and the rest’s business just a bit too far, and they’d snapped it off.
‘Will he be all right?’
I told her that I was none the wiser. The way I said it set her off. ‘Oh God. He’s not going to die is he?’
I took her in my arms and tried to comfort her. ‘Relax,’ I said. ‘He’ll be OK.’
As we stood together, taking some comfort in the warmth from each other’s bodies, the phone rang. ‘That’s the fourth time,’ said Dawn. ‘When I answer it there’s no one there. I thought it was you from a dodgy call box.’
I picked up the receiver, and said hello.
‘You and your fucking mates never learn do they?’ It was Collier.
‘You cunt,’ I said.
‘Flattery will get you nowhere,’ he replied. ‘I told you, didn’t I? But you wouldn’t listen. Fancy sending some bastard from the press around to do your dirty work.’
‘You’re fucked,’ I said. ‘It’s just a matter of time.’
‘Fucked for what?’
‘For covering up for Byrne. I know what he did to Carol Harvey. And I know what you and Millar and Grisham did to cover it up.’
It was the first time I’d told Collier what I knew, but it didn’t seem to worry him at all.
He’d had too many years of being a law unto himself, and he took it in his stride. But I realised I’d probably signed my death warrant by telling him. ‘Prove it,’ he said coolly.
That was the problem: proof. But I knew that Collier had something hidden away somewhere. And it was my job to find it.
‘I will,’ I said.
‘Don’t hold your breath. It was all too long ago.’
‘There’s no time limit on murder.’
‘I’m shaking in my shoes.’
‘You will be.’
‘Save it. Pull out now before someone gets seriously hurt.’ He put down the phone.
‘Who was that?’ said Dawn.
‘Collier.’
‘He never gives up, does he?’
‘He will. I’m going to have that bastard. I know he’s got something that implicates Byrne. I’ve just got to find it.’
‘Where?’
‘His place. That’s where I’ll start. But right now I want you out of here. Somewhere safe. Not home. And get Tracey on the blower. I want her out of there too, as fast as she can go. Have you got someplace to go?’
‘I don’t want to leave you,’ she said.
‘I know you don’t, but you’ve got to. It’s too dangerous for you to be about. I’ve got enough things to think about without worrying about you.’
‘We could go to Tracey’s mum’s.’
‘Where’s that?’
‘Milton Keynes. They moved her up there when they knocked down the old buildings in Bermondsey, where she used to live.’
‘Terrific,’ I said. ‘Who’d ever think of looking for you there? Go on, phone Tracey up. I want you out of here now.’
‘Nick, it’s not six yet.’
‘The best time. Tell her to get packed. Nip round and pick her up, and don’t let anyone follow you.’
She began to protest, but I cut her off, and she did as she was told.
Dawn didn’t say much when she got through, but I heard the urgency in her voice, and I hoped Tracey did too.
When she put down the phone, she said, ‘I’m meeting her on the corner of our street in twenty minutes. She’s packing us a bag each. She’ll suss out if anyone’s watching. She’s an expert, is our Trace. Used to do a bit of hoisting. She’s got eyes in the back of her head.’
