The Ring of Death

by Sally Spencer

  There was no reassuringly competent voice.

  There wasn’t even a static crackle to offer him a little hope that there might be one eventually.

  ‘You bastard!’ he shouted at the radio. ‘You bloody useless bastard!’

  But so what if he was on his own, he asked himself, calming down a little.

  Did that really matter?

  It was now ten thirty-seven and Forsyth couldn’t possibly be going too far at this time of night.

  It did not take long for him to realize how wrong that supposition had been. Forsyth was not heading for the centre of the town – as a man in search of a late-night drink, or a late-night prostitute, might have been. Instead he was driving towards the ring road.

  It was a quarter to eleven by the time the Rover 2000 and its tail reached the A677.

  The road was still busy at that hour. Carloads of middle-aged drinkers were returning from expeditions to isolated country pubs. Married couples were heading home, after spending the evening with one of their families. Heavy-goods lorries were setting out on overnight runs, and an ambulance – having completed a mad dash to the hospital – tootled sedately along on the journey back to its base.

  Crane slid his Vauxhall Victor into the space between a Mini and a blue builder’s van. He was perhaps a hundred yards behind Forsyth’s Rover, and as long as the traffic remained as thick as it was now, he was reasonably sure he could stay undetected.

  ‘But what happens if the bloody traffic starts to thin out?’ he worried, as the A677 joined the A59 at Whalley. ‘And, even worse, what happens if Forsyth decides to turn off the main road and go down a minor one instead?’

  If Forsyth did do that, there’d be no choice but to follow him, the detective constable decided.

  But it wouldn’t be easy – without the protective covering of other vehicles – to remain unnoticed. In fact, on the scale of suspicious behaviour, driving along a country lane – late at night, and in an area you probably weren’t familiar with – ranked quite highly.

  What was it the boss had said?

  Something like, ‘Forsyth’s not that kind of spy. He’s never been one of the pieces on the chessboard of espionage. He’s the bastard who moves the pieces around. He wouldn’t spot a KGB agent if he had his rank tattooed on his forehead – and I doubt he’ll spot a fresh-faced young detective constable, either.’

  Yes, that sounded all very well – in theory.

  But how good a spy did Forsyth have to be in order to spot the fact that a car was following him up a road to the arse-end of nowhere?

  Crane tried the radio again – pressing down on the button so hard that his thumb hurt – but the sodding machine was still refusing to cooperate.

  As they were approaching the boundary of Clitheroe, Forsyth indicated that he was intending to turn off the main road, just as Crane had feared he might.

  He had no option but to increase the distance between them, Crane decided, as he flickered the intention to turn himself. That meant, of course, that he was running the risk of losing his quarry – but at least it was dark now, and Forsyth’s lights would provide some help in keeping track of him.

  The road Forsyth had chosen to take was indeed a country lane – quite a narrow one, with high hedgerows either side, and drainage ditches running along its edges. Crane didn’t know where it went, though from its general direction he supposed it must be leading towards the moors.

  But why the hell would Forsyth want to go anywhere near the moors at that time of night?

  Well, there was only way to find out.

  Forsyth was driving slowly – almost as if he wished to make the detective constable’s job easier for him – and there was a real danger they would soon be bumper to bumper.

  Crane slowed down to a halt. He reached into the Victor’s glove compartment and took out a map.

  As he studied it, he began to count, ‘One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . .’

  By the time he had reached ‘thirty’, he had both familiarized himself with the map and given Forsyth time to get well ahead of him. He could no longer see the Rover’s back lights, but he was not unduly worried by that. All it meant was the car had turned a bend. On this road, the man couldn’t lose him by making an unexpected turn – because, as the map clearly showed, there was nothing for him to turn into.

  It was growing dark outside, and Edward Dunston – who had been nervously gazing through his lounge window for over two hours – fretted about what that might mean in terms of his own survival.

  Would the man who had rung him up with the rescue plan see the onset of darkness as an opportunity to put that plan into action, he wondered desperately.

  Or would the men who the would-be rescuer said were watching the house choose that moment to swoop down on him?

  ‘I wish you’d tell me what’s worrying you, Edward,’ said Mary Dunston, from the other side of the room.

  She sounded very calm – eerily calm – at that moment, but he knew it wouldn’t last. In the hours which had passed since the phone call, her mood had swung from the hysterical to the numb, and then back again.

  She had begged him to allow her to call the doctor, or the police – or anybody. He had refused each time. He was putting his faith in the man who had called him – because he didn’t see he had any choice.

  ‘We are married, you know,’ Mary said. ‘And a problem shared is a problem halved.’

  ‘For God’s sake, can’t you just shut up, you stupid bitch!’ Dunston said angrily.

  Mary started to sob softly to herself.

  He wanted to turn round and comfort her, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to do it. The only suffering he could handle at that moment was his own, he told himself – and he was not even making a particularly good job of that.

  How had he allowed this to happen, he wondered.

  Whatever had possessed him to put himself in a position in which, after over twenty years of happy – if unexciting – marriage, he could find it so easy to be brutal to his wife?

  It wasn’t his fault, he argued.

  What he’d done would have passed without comment a hundred years earlier.

  Jesus, a hundred years earlier, he’d have been rubbing shoulders with lords and clergymen while he did it!

  But perhaps he wouldn’t have found it so enticing back then. Perhaps it was the very illegality of the act – and the frisson of danger which accompanied it – which had so attracted him in the first place.

  ‘Whatever it is you’ve done, Edward, tell me about it,’ Mary said, in a choked voice. ‘Tell me about it, and we’ll face it together.’

  He felt himself weaken. He would tell her about it, even though he could already picture the look of total disgust which would come to her face as he described what had gone on – even though he knew that when he had finished telling her, she would despise him. He would come clean whatever the cost, and maybe, that way, he could find a little redemption.

  The phone rang, and he grabbed at it.

  ‘Yes?’ he gasped into the receiver.

  ‘Have you got the money and the jewellery together?’ asked a calm voice at the other end of the line.

  ‘Yes . . . yes, I have.’

  ‘How much is it worth?’

  ‘I don’t know. How could I know? I’m an accountant, for God’s sake, not a jeweller.’

  ‘You’ll get nowhere with that attitude,’ the other man said sternly.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Dunston grovelled. ‘I didn’t mean to . . . I only wanted to . . .’

  ‘You must know how much you paid for the jewellery in the first place,’ the caller said. ‘Take an educated guess at what it’s worth now.’

  Dunston gazed wildly up at the ceiling, as if he expected to find the answer written there.

  ‘It’s probably worth a thousand pounds,’ he said finally. ‘Maybe even a little more.’

  The man on the other end of the line fell silent.

  ‘Are you still there?’
Dunston asked, as he felt the tears start to run down his cheeks.

  ‘I’m still here. A thousand pounds, you say? Or maybe even a little more?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Another pause, then the man said, ‘I suppose if that’s all there is, it will have to do. Now listen carefully. There’s an unpaved lane running along the back of your house—’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘I know you know. Don’t interrupt again!’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Dunston sobbed, and then, realizing that that could be interpreted as an interruption, said, ‘I’m sorry,’ a second time.

  ‘Be on the lane in two minutes from now,’ the caller said. ‘If you’re not there when I arrive, I won’t wait for you.’

  The line went dead.

  Dunston picked up his suitcase, and headed towards the back door. Then, seeing his wife huddled in her armchair, he paused for a moment.

  ‘I love you, Mary,’ he said. ‘I honestly do. And I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Will you . . . will you be coming back?’ his wife asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘I hope so.’

  He went through the kitchen, and into the back garden. It had gone completely dark now, but there was a moon, and he could see the path to the back gate quite clearly.

  Once on the lane, he stood peering into the blackness. And then he saw the headlights – two shining, bright yellow eyes – moving slowly towards him.

  As the vehicle got closer, he could see that it was a six-hundredweight van.

  ‘A van?’ he thought. ‘That’s not much of a getaway car.’

  And suddenly, he was quite proud of feeling so calm – of being able to make a joke, even if it was only a weak one.

  The van came to a halt beside him, and the driver reached across to open the passenger door.

  ‘Get in,’ he said.

  Dunston manoeuvred his suitcase over the passenger seat into the back of the vehicle, and then climbed in.

  The van pulled off again.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Dunston asked.

  ‘You’ll know when we get there,’ the driver replied.

  ‘Look, I’m paying for this, so I have a right to know now where we’re going,’ Dunston said, feeling more in control of himself now than he had since he’d seen the police press conference on the television.

  ‘Where I’m taking you, all your worries will soon be over,’ the driver said.

  They had turned off the lane, and were on a paved road with street lights. For the first time, Dunston got a real look at his rescuer’s face.

  ‘I know you from somewhere,’ he said.

  ‘Do you?’ the driver replied, his voice devoid of interest.

  ‘Yes, I do.’

  But where had he seen the man before?

  Had they met on a professional basis, perhaps?

  Was he one of the company’s less important clients, whose account had been handled by one of the junior members of the firm?

  Did he work for some other company, that Dunston’s had audited?

  Had they met in a pub, or at some sort of social gathering?

  Or was the link even more tenuous than that?

  And suddenly he had it.

  ‘I know who you are,’ he said triumphantly. ‘You’re . . .’

  ‘That’s right,’ the driver agreed. ‘I am.’

  It was as the Vauxhall Victor turned a bend in the narrow lane that Jack Crane saw the patrol car a hundred yards ahead of him. It was parked at an angle – its bonnet pointing towards the drainage ditch on one side of the lane, its boot pointing in the direction of the ditch on the other side – and the flashing light on its roof was sending out demented orange rays in all directions.

  It was a roadblock! Crane thought.

  It couldn’t be anything else.

  But why would anybody set up a roadblock on this deserted country lane, at this time of night?

  As he slowed his vehicle down, his mind ran through a series of rapid calculations. He was two or three minutes behind Forsyth’s vehicle, he estimated – which was just about acceptable in terms of not losing him on a road where there very few turnings. But by the time the patrol car had performed the manoeuvre which would be necessary for him to get past it, he would have lost another two or three minutes. And that would make his task much more difficult.

  A new – and very disturbing – thought came to his mind.

  The patrol car must already have been there when Forsyth passed this way, but it had done nothing to stop him. So why was it blocking the lane now?

  He brought the Victor to a halt a few feet from the police car, and wound down the window with one hand, while reaching for his warrant card with the other.

  One of the uniforms, holding a torch, ambled over to him as if he had all the time in the world.

  When he drew level with the car, he shone the torch directly into Crane’s eyes and said, ‘Good evening, sir.’

  Squinting, Crane held out his warrant card.

  ‘I’m following the car that just went through here – the Rover 2000 – and what I need you to do is to get your unit out of the way as quickly as possible,’ he said urgently.

  ‘Have you been drinking, sir?’ the uniformed officer asked.

  ‘Didn’t you hear what I just said?’ Crane demanded. ‘I’m on a job. I need you to get out of the way.’

  The second patrol car officer had joined them. ‘There’s no need to be abusive, sir,’ he said.

  ‘I’m not being abusive,’ Crane protested. ‘For God’s sake, will you listen to me? I’m on a job!’

  ‘And there’s no need to shout at us, either, sir,’ the first officer said.

  Crane took a deep breath.

  ‘Look, if you don’t let me through soon, I’ll lose the man I’m tailing,’ he said, as calmly as he could.

  ‘Would you mind stepping out of the car, please, sir?’ the first officer asked.

  ‘I’ve already explained . . .’

  ‘If you refuse to obey my instructions, you’ll leave me no alternative but to remove you forcibly.’

  ‘This can’t be happening,’ Crane thought, as he got out of the car. ‘It simply can’t be happening.’

  The first officer shone his torch on to the lane. ‘What I’d like you to do now, sir, is to walk in a straight line,’ he said. ‘Do it slowly, placing the toe of one shoe against the heel of the one in front, and then . . .’

  ‘I know how it works!’ Crane told him. ‘I was on motor patrol myself for six months.’

  ‘Then you shouldn’t have any difficulty following our instructions, should you, sir?’

  Forsyth would be at least five minutes ahead by now, Crane thought.

  ‘When my boss tells your boss about this, you’ll get a real rocket for it, you know,’ he said.

  ‘That’s as maybe,’ the first constable said. ‘But we can’t be concerned about that for the moment. We’re just doing our job, and what’s required of you is to cooperate with us.’

  There was no point in arguing – not with the patrol car parked across the lane. Crane walked the line, as he’d been instructed.

  ‘What do you think?’ asked the first constable.

  ‘He’s definitely under the influence,’ replied the second.

  ‘You’ve got to be joking,’ Crane said. ‘I promise you, I haven’t touched a drop for over eight hours.’

  ‘That’s what they all say, sir,’ the first constable told him.

  It was only now that Crane noticed the badge which was painted on the side of the patrol car.

  ‘You’re not Lancashire police at all!’ he said. ‘You’re from the West Yorkshire Constabulary!’

  ‘That’s right, we are,’ the first constable agreed.

  ‘So you’re way outside your own patch!’

  ‘That would be quite true, under normal circumstances,’ the first constable said. ‘But these circumstances aren’t normal at all. We’ve been drafted in for the night. And we’ve got
the paperwork to prove it.’

  ‘Then I’d like to see that paperwork for myself,’ Crane said.

  ‘DC Crane would like to see the paperwork,’ the second constable said to first.

  ‘How did you know my name?’ Crane asked.

  ‘It’s on your warrant card,’ the second constable said.

  ‘I know it is,’ Crane agreed. ‘But you weren’t here when I showed it to your mate!’

  ‘Do you want to see the paperwork, or not?’ the first constable asked.

  ‘Yes, I want to see the paperwork,’ Crane said heavily.

  The first constable went back to the patrol car, and returned with a document on a clipboard.

  ‘Could you shine your torch on this, Tommy, so that DC Crane can get a proper look at it?’ he asked the second constable.

  ‘I’d be more than glad to,’ the second constable replied.

  Crane quickly scanned the document. It was written in the usual bureaucratic gobbledegook, but it seemed genuine enough, and the signature at the bottom – George Baxter, Chief Constable – was the clincher.

  ‘Satisfied?’ the first constable asked.

  No, he wasn’t, Crane thought. But he was resigned.

  ‘My colleague will drive your vehicle to our station, and you will accompany me in the patrol car,’ the first constable said. ‘Now if you wouldn’t mind putting your hands behind your back . . .’

  ‘You’re never going to handcuff me, are you?’ Crane asked incredulously.

  ‘Drunks can suddenly turn violent, and when there’s only one officer in the vehicle with them, it’s deemed safest to have them handcuffed,’ the first constable said. ‘It’s normal procedure in a case like this.’

  ‘I’m not drunk, and you both bloody know it,’ Crane said angrily.

  ‘What’s the point in making this any harder than it has to be?’ the first constable asked.

  No point at all, Crane thought, putting his hands behind his back and feeling the metal bracelets click into place.

  NINETEEN

  It was the early-morning light, filtering in through the small, barred window of his cell, which probably woke Jack Crane up.

  His first thought, as he turned over on an unfamiliar mattress, was that he hadn’t been asleep at all. And yet, if he hadn’t been, where had the hours gone?