Games with the Dead

by James Nally

  Maybe her reference to ‘Mutt and Jeff’ had been an ingenious, multi-layered clue that referred not only to the place where she’d been held against her will, but also to the motive and character of her abductors. If Zoe’s cryptic crossword skills are up to scratch, then I’m about to find out.

  I turn off the M23 at junction 8 in search of MJ Bridges scrapyard in Pease Pottage, trusty old silver breeze block perched on the passenger seat.

  I would never have diverted home to retrieve this characterless hunk of concrete had it not featured so prominently in Julie’s chilling visit to me. Sure enough, thanks to Zoe, we now know the block itself and the paint covering it are rare and specialist. So specialist, I hope, that they’ll lead me to Julie Draper’s killer.

  I drive through the scrapyard entrance, past multi-coloured towers of crushed cars to a squat prefab office in a distant corner. I pull up and take a deep breath. Scrapyards are traditionally hostile places for police. Dealers tend to neither ask nor care where metal comes from, knowing that, once crushed, it all looks alike and fetches the same price. I don’t even have a warrant, so decide to play it low-key.

  I walk into the prefab, cradling my silver breeze block with a carefree air, as if it were a perfectly normal commodity to bring into any office environment. A middle-aged woman with lustrous dyed blonde hair and a tanned, wizened face looks up from a dirty great ledger. She’s a ringer for Led Zep’s Jimmy Page, though less feminine. Her saggy eyes drop slowly from mine to the block, darkening.

  ‘Paint that yourself, did you?’ she says in a faltering West Country accent.

  ‘Can I speak with Mr Bridges please?’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘I’m just wondering if he might have more of these blocks.’

  ‘He deals in metal, dear,’ she says slowly and loudly, enunciating each word as if addressing a deaf halfwit. ‘You wanna go to a concrete place for more of those.’

  ‘I’m told he has more here. I’m willing to pay top dollar.’

  She frowns, then smirks in disbelief. I can see she’s thinking: This’ll give the old bastard a laugh. She gets up and walks over to a CB radio.

  ‘Gareth, can you hear me?’ she says.

  ‘Aye,’ says Gareth, in an even thicker West Country lilt.

  ‘Got a man here wants to show you his special block.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘He’s painted it and everything.’

  ‘What are you on about?’

  ‘He wants to buy concrete blocks off ya.’

  ‘Tell him I don’t sells blocks. I buys metal,’ he says, sounding like Wurzel Gummidge on crystal meth.

  ‘Oh, I never thought of that. Just get over here so I can get him out of my hair will ya?’

  Now the excruciating wait. She pretends to get on with her work as I act like I have a burning interest in crushed cars.

  ‘You’re not a copper are you?’ she says.

  I laugh: ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Thought not.’

  I hear Gareth’s stomp long before I see him. He’s enormous, with a face like a half-mashed turnip.

  ‘What’s all this about?’ he groans.

  I hold up the block to my chest. ‘Have you ever seen one of these before?’

  ‘Not painted. Who are you and why do you wanna know?’

  ‘Can we step outside?’

  He turns and I follow.

  ‘I’m a police officer, Gareth, but I’m not interested in you or anything you’re doing here.’

  He stops and turns, sizing me up before squinting at my badge.

  ‘I’ve got nothing to hide,’ he declares. ‘Follow me.’

  He stomps towards another corner of his plot. I have to trot to keep up.

  ‘It’s so quiet,’ I say.

  ‘You wait,’ he laughs.

  He stops, finally, at a run-down old brick shed.

  Poorly stacked inside, about forty concrete blocks. Although not painted, each has three flutes and is identical in design to the one that’s now sucked all feeling out of my arms.

  ‘I bought this place in 1981,’ he says. ‘I’ve never used this shed or them blocks. What use would I have for ’em? They’ve just been sat there.’

  My heart’s galloping, sensing a breakthrough. ‘Are there any other buildings on this property?’

  ‘No. Just the prefab. Can I ask what’s this about?’

  I take a walk around the shed. It sits inside a flimsy wire fence. On the other side is a dirt track. A sudden rumble startles me. I look around just as a massive plane screams overhead, no more than 100 feet above us.

  ‘Gatwick’s right over there. We get ’em every ten minutes now,’ says Gareth.

  ‘Where does this track come from and lead to?’

  Gareth raises a beefy arm. ‘That way goes to the road you came here on, which eventually takes you back to the M23. This way is just an access road to some fields.’

  ‘Who owns the land?’

  ‘It used to be Lord Irvine’s. He died about, ooh, four years ago. It’s now been bought up by some company who, I’m told, are hoping to make a killing if Gatwick airport expands.’

  ‘Have you seen anything unusual along here in recent weeks or months?’

  He shakes his head. ‘Only time we had trouble here were a good few summers ago. Poor old Irvine had lost his marbles by then. Silly bugger agreed to let these bloody ravers down here. Wrecked the place, they did. Left rubbish and shit everywhere. Where are you going?’

  I’ve climbed out through a gap in the wire fence.

  ‘I’m going to take a walk to the end of this track, just to see what’s up there.’

  ‘I’ll join you,’ says Gareth.

  ‘There’s no need,’ I say, but he’s already through.

  Christ, I think, he could waste me right here and crush me in the boot of one of his knackered cars. Who’d ever know? Yet my gut trusts him completely.

  Just 100 yards along the track sits a dilapidated old shed. I go off-road in search of a way in, only to find a pair of large wooden doors chained shut.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ says Gareth.

  ‘The place where a woman was held, before she was murdered.’

  ‘Bloody hell. I’ve got something that’ll bust that chain,’ he says, marching back to his yard. I watch him slip through another busted section of fence. Beside the Gareth-sized hole, an old battered metal sign reads ‘MJ Bridges & Co. Scrap Merchants’.

  Moments later, he returns with a crowbar and sets to work. As the chain snaps off, the doors swing inwards slowly, ominously.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ I say to Gareth. ‘I think we’ve just found it.’

  Chapter 47

  Pease Pottage, West Sussex

  Friday, July 1, 1994; 18.00

  I make sure Fintan gets here first. I owe him this scoop. But that’s not why I call him before anyone else.

  Fifteen days ago, we found Julie Draper’s body a few miles down the road at Pyecombe cemetery. My boss, Commander Crossley, responded by sacking me and barring Fintan’s newspaper from any further press briefings. Although banished, we’ve just made the single biggest breakthrough in his floundering investigation.

  ‘I can’t wait to see his flustered old chops,’ cackles Fintan, a man ceaselessly motivated by personal grudges. ‘I’ve got to hand it to you, Donal. That bloody fish thing … how did you even think of that?’

  ‘You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.’

  ‘How did Julie know where she was? Presumably she was kept blindfolded?’

  ‘She would’ve heard the crusher in the scrapyard and the planes landing at Gatwick. Maybe she knew the place from before? Or she saw one of the signs when he drove her here. There’s an old one dumped literally opposite the shed.’

  ‘The sad thing is, that might be why he had to kill her, once he got his money. So, how’s undercover school?’ he says.

  Never get caught in a lie …

  ‘Put it this way, I�
��m gathering lots of hilarious anecdotes about why it isn’t for me,’ I smile.

  ‘Where’ve you been? I haven’t seen you since Tuesday.’

  ‘I got sent to Stoke. Then spent a night in Manchester.’

  ‘Anywhere nice?’

  ‘Pretty basic. Minimalist, I’d call it.’

  ‘Never got on with that place. It doesn’t seem to have a centre.’

  ‘A city with strange ways, for sure.’

  ‘Croissant’ Crossley steams around the corner, pursued by a couple of senior officers from the Home Office forensic team.

  ‘Ah Commander,’ chirps Fintan.

  Crossley stops so suddenly that his underlings almost crash into the back of him.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ he snaps.

  ‘Like you said a couple of weeks back, we’re a latter-day Burke and O’Hare.’

  He eyes us with wary contempt. Fintan’s relishing every second so I sit back and let him get on with burning the Croissant.

  ‘Now this is a very open spot, wouldn’t you say, Commander? Nigh on impossible to secure. I mean, journos and snappers and film crews could get in from all angles.’

  ‘We don’t know for sure this is the place yet.’

  ‘That won’t stop the media circus descending, as you know only too well, Commander. One phone call and I could turn this into Zulu Dawn. And think about it, that’d be a real lose-lose for you. Because the Julie Draper case has slipped off the news agenda. This would put it right back on top, and you firmly in the spotlight. Do you really want that heat, Commander?’

  Crossley can’t hide his alarm. He’d never make a decent poker player.

  ‘The alternative is we keep it nice and tight. You confirm to me and me only that this is or isn’t the place Julie Draper was held. By the time I publish Sunday, you’ll be done and dusted here, and gone. Nice and tidy.’

  Crossley shuffles foot-to-foot, takes a quick glance at the heavens.

  ‘Okay, you’ve got a deal,’ he says, turning to walk off.

  ‘Hang on a second, Commander,’ says Fintan brightly.

  Crossley stops and slouches, but refuses to turn around.

  ‘Tell me, Commander, you wouldn’t want it coming out that an officer you fired ended up solving your crime, alone and single-handedly, two weeks later?’

  Crossley slouches some more.

  ‘If you reinstate him as of, ooh, now, then I can make sure the Kidnap Squad gets the credit for this.’

  He nods.

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ I say. ‘I’ve got another job now.’

  Crossley doesn’t need a better excuse to flee.

  Fintan turns to me in horror. ‘My God, you’ve got the gig, haven’t you?’

  ‘You know I can’t say. But I’m now living somewhere else.’

  ‘You can’t take it, Donal. I’m serious. Get back on this squad instead. You could get a medal for this find here.’

  I shrug.

  Fintan takes a step closer. ‘I’ve been checking out those guys in Windsor. They’re complete psychos. If they get so much as a whiff that you’re not who you say you are, they’ll kill you without even thinking about it.’

  ‘I appreciate your concern, Fint, I really do. But I’ve got some powerful people around me.’

  So powerful, in fact, that they were able to get me slung into Strangeways.

  ‘Jesus, Da will be beside himself,’ he says.

  ‘What? Why did you tell him? For Christ’s sake …’

  ‘He’s already lost his wife this year …’

  ‘Spare me, Fintan. The old emotional blackmail used to work when it was about Mam. He doesn’t give a shit.’

  ‘You don’t know how wrong you are, Donal. Seriously, this’ll floor him.’

  ‘Don’t tell him then. Say I flunked the course. You’re not supposed to tell anyone anyway.’

  Fintan blinks for the first time in what feels like minutes.

  ‘I bet your new bosses haven’t told you who’s behind these thugs in Windsor?’

  ‘They tell me what I need to know.’

  ‘Well let me tell you what you need to know, Donal. Some years back, the main man in this Windsor outfit, Pat Regan, spent a few years in Swaleside prison in Kent, where he got very cosy with a lifer. The consensus is that this criminal is now bankrolling Regan and his henchmen. And he is none other than public enemy and villain number one, Mickey Sheeran.’

  I check he’s not pulling my leg.

  ‘That’s right. The gangster, cop killer and grass handled by our mutual friend Croissant Crossley. I can’t believe they didn’t tell you this. Ever get the feeling you’re being set up?’

  Chapter 48

  Arsenal, North London

  Saturday, July 2, 1994; 10.00

  It doesn’t take much to keep me up all night. Fintan’s grim tidings about the people I’m about to engage with worked a treat. Sleep? I barely blinked.

  My plunge into a fatalistic fug culminated in an early morning call to Zoe. Shiraz just wanted her to know that I still loved her and Matt. Of course, Shiraz couldn’t leave it there. He then had to make the vainglorious proclamation that I’d chosen to risk my life to prove my love for her.

  ‘There really is no need for that, Donal,’ she said.

  Shiraz then asked her if Chris had proposed yet.

  ‘Proposed what?’ she yawned.

  ‘What do you think?’ snapped Shiraz. At least I’d spoiled his surprise.

  I wake on the couch to a pounding head and a pinging phone. Connections want a meet. Pick you up 11am, Bernie.

  As ever, my trusty old hangover – that straightjacket of apathy – keeps all emotions in check. I’ve approached every significant moment of my adult life in this state, or worse. Then I wonder why it never ends well …

  I climb into Bernie’s muscular Range Rover. ‘Nice,’ I say. ‘Who are we meeting?’

  ‘Pat Regan’s older brother Ron.’

  ‘Ron Regan? You’re kidding me?’

  ‘Yeah, so get it out of your system now, he’s very touchy about it. Don’t call him Ronnie whatever happens.’

  ‘Or Nancy eh? Where are we meeting?’

  ‘Heston Services.’

  ‘Christ, it all happens at the services.’

  ‘Well it’s public enough for no one to try anything stupid, and anonymous enough for us not to get noticed. What we’re proposing to Ron today is 10,000 tablets at £2.50 a pop. Here’s the sexy bit.’

  He takes a device off the dashboard that looks like a hand-held computer game and passes it over.

  ‘That’s called a GPS or Global Positioning System. The military have been using it for years and they’re just starting to appear in hire cars. See that dot there? That’s us. A satellite up there has literally put us on the map. Mental eh?’

  ‘And the plan for this is?’

  ‘Gary, your handler, would’ve explained to you that the most dangerous moment in any drugs deal is the handover, right? We’re always trying to think of ways to make sure the money and the drugs aren’t on the same plot, because that’s when someone gets the pound signs spinning in their eyes and pulls a gun.

  ‘The beauty of this is we can drop a package of 10,000 Es from a small plane in rural Berkshire or Surrey and they won’t find out where until you give them the co-ordinates.

  ‘Meanwhile, you’re somewhere else with a mutually agreed and trusted money man – namely me. You pass them the co-ordinates. Once they confirm the gear is up to scratch, they instruct the money man – me – to hand over the dough to you.’

  ‘It’s all a bit Tom Clancy, isn’t it, Bernie? Couldn’t we just leave the drugs somewhere for them? Like in a hotel room or a lock-up?’

  ‘That’d be too easy for a police sting. They’re paranoid after this Molly business that they’re being set up. Using the GPS, they’ll believe we’re dropping 10,000 Es somewhere random, at the last moment, because who’d leave 10,000 Es lying in a field for more than a c
ouple of hours? There’s no way this could be a police sting because the logistics are too last minute. And they love all this hi-tech gubbins. At least the money man behind them does.’

  ‘Who is?’ I ask, hoping Fintan had made up the Sheeran connection to spook me.

  ‘Mickey Sheeran, apparently. Now he’s made his millions, he’s become something of a Misadventure Capitalist. He funds criminal schemes that excite him. A few years back, he pours fortunes into this hole-in-the-wall bank scam where they created thousands of fake cards. It failed, just, but had it succeeded, it would’ve brought down the entire banking system. So he’ll love this.’

  ‘Why don’t the cops try to turn Pat Regan against Sheeran?’

  ‘No one goes against Sheeran. It’d be suicide. You need to just stick to the straightforward mission here; nail the guys who imported the E that killed Molly Parker-Rae and you’re out.’

  ‘What about you, Bernie? What’s your mission?’

  ‘Let’s just say it’s longer term. Though I’m beginning to wonder if I’ve got the stomach for it any more. I’d forgotten how these fucking so-called villains are always frittering time away on shit matters, like trying to persuade someone to drop charges. That’s why most of them are skint. They’ve got to bounce around their patch all day like feudal lords, dishing out instant justice and being kings and all that rubbish, instead of just earning money.

  ‘And then you’ve got the possessive gang members who always want to be best buds with the main man and get threatened by anyone who might supplant them. Take this lot in Windsor, Shaun Shaw and Craig Walsh are like star-struck teen girls with a major crush on Pat Regan. You feel like you’ve regressed to aged fourteen.

  ‘You’ll see it yourself this week. We’re gonna have to hang out with them and get our hands dirty so they know we’re onside.’

  ‘What would be your top-line piece of advice, Bernie?’

  ‘I’ve got two: don’t ever back down, and don’t ever look or act shocked about anything.’