The Chinaman

by Stephen Leather

  Inside the box were two batteries, a black plastic alarm clock with a digital display, a small aluminium tube, a tangle of different coloured wires and five pounds of pale-brown Semtex explosive in which was embedded a detonator. As the roadsweeper unclipped his shovel and carefully swept up a cigarette packet and a pile of dust, the clock began ticking off the seconds. The man was in no hurry. The clock was set for five minutes, but even when the time was up the bomb would not explode. The clock merely completed the circuit for the second switch, a mercury tilt-switch which acted as a motion sensor. The design prevented the device going off accidentally. It was one of The Bombmaker’s favourite bombs, and one of the simplest. There were no booby traps because it was a small bomb and if it was discovered the bomb disposal experts would dump it into an armoured chest and take it away rather than try to deal with it on the spot.

  The streetsweeper left the mews just as the five minutes were up. He left his cart a quarter of a mile away, along with the hat, the donkey jacket and the gloves. Fisher had planned everything down to the last detail. O’Reilly kept on walking until he saw a black cab. He hailed it and took it to Victoria Station where he waited for half an hour before catching another cab back to Wapping.

  The front door of the mews cottage in Chelsea opened at the same time as the cab turned into Wapping High Street.

  Erica’s hair still looked as if she had just got out of bed, but this time her lipstick had gone and as Jephcott kissed her he smelt her sex rather than her perfume. Her classy clothes had gone, too, and in their place she wore a white silk dressing-gown. Something else that he’d bought for her.

  ‘Tomorrow?’ she breathed, her body tight against his.

  ‘No, my love, I’m afraid not,’ Jephcott replied. ‘I’ll call you.’ Over her shoulder he looked at his watch. Plenty of time. He kissed her again and then pulled himself away. She closed the door behind him with a final goodbye, and he adjusted his tie as he went to the car. He unlocked the door to the Rover and got in. He looked at himself in the driving mirror and smoothed down his hair before using the breath-freshener again. The Rover started first time and as he edged it forward the bomb went off, blasting through the wheel-arch and taking off both of his legs in a burst of fire and exploding metal.

  Detective Chief Inspector Richard Bromley was filling his briar pipe from a weathered leather pouch when the phone on his desk rang.

  ‘It’s the front desk, sir. He’s here again.’

  Bromley groaned. ‘Tell him I’m busy.’

  ‘I’ve done that, sir. He says he’ll wait.’

  ‘Tell him I’ll call him when there’s any news.’

  ‘I’ve done that, sir.’

  Bromley groaned again. He’d had the same conversation more than a dozen times over the past three weeks but he always hoped that it would end differently, that Nguyen Ngoc Minh would just give up and go home. It had started with phone calls to the general enquiry office, but somewhere along the line somebody had told him that Bromley was handling the case. Nguyen began telephoning him twice a day, once at nine o’clock prompt and again at five o’clock, asking for Detective Chief Inspector Bromley, always polite and deferential. When he first spoke to Nguyen, Bromley felt sorry for him and when he asked how the investigation was going he did his best to sound optimistic. That was his mistake, he realised, he should never have raised the man’s hopes. Nguyen explained what had happened to his wife and daughter, quietly and seemingly without emotion, and he told Bromley that the men responsible must be caught. Bromley had agreed and said that they were doing everything they could. Nguyen had thanked him and asked that Bromley call him when the men had been caught. He’d said ‘apprehended’ but had pronounced each syllable separately as if reading the word for the first time. Five seconds after replacing the receiver, the inspector had forgotten all about the man with the strange name and the awkward English. Until the next day when he rang again. He was just as polite, always calling him ‘Detective Chief Inspector Bromley’ and never raising his voice. He simply repeated the questions once more. Was there any news? Did they know who had set off the bomb? Were the police about to catch the men? When? He listened to Bromley’s replies, which were less optimistic this time, told him how important it was that the men were found, thanked him, and rang off. He rang again the following day. And the day after. Bromley stopped taking his calls and forgot about him.

  Three days after the last call he was told that there was someone waiting for him at reception. It wasn’t unusual for people to arrive at New Scotland Yard with information that might be useful for the Anti-Terrorist Branch, but he was surprised that the man had asked for him by name because most of his informers wouldn’t have wanted to have been seen within a mile of the building. It was Nguyen. Bromley told the man on reception to send the old man away, but he had simply sat down on one of the hard grey sofas and waited. He’d waited until the main offices had closed and then he’d left, only to return the following day. He’d maintained his vigil for more than a week, never making a fuss or doing anything that would justify ejecting him from the premises. He just waited. Bromley had been impressed by the man’s stubbornness, but he was also hugely irritated by it. Several times he’d had to walk through reception while he was there and he’d glanced at the slightly built Oriental sitting with his hands in his lap, head lowered like a monk at prayer. Once he’d looked up as Bromley passed and he’d bitten down hard on the stem of his pipe and quickly averted his eyes, but too late to keep the guilt from his face. The old man had called out his name but Bromley didn’t look back as he headed for the sanctuary of the lift.

  Bromley tamped down the tobacco with his thumb. It wasn’t that he was afraid of talking to Nguyen, it was just that there was nothing to tell him. There had been six bombs in all, a total of thirty-two people dead, and the IRA had claimed responsibility for each explosion and assassination. The bombs had been of different types, though Semtex was always used. They were pretty sure it was the work of one IRA active service unit and that they were based in London for most of the time, but other than that, nothing. They were no closer now than they were when the bombing campaign had started ten weeks earlier. Bromley had told Nguyen that during one of the first telephone calls. Maybe what the old man needed was counselling, or a psychiatrist. Bromley held the phone between his shoulder and his ear while he lit the pipe and puffed it until the tobacco glowed. The pipe, and the tobacco, had been a birthday present from Chris, his fifteen-year-old son, paid for from the money he’d saved working on his paper round.

  ‘She was only sixteen,’ Nguyen had said of his daughter. Bromley wondered how he would feel if Chris had been killed. His stomach went cold at the thought of it and he heard himself tell the man on the desk that he’d come down and speak to Nguyen.

  ‘You’ll come down, sir?’ repeated the man, not believing what he’d heard. Bromley hung up without replying.

  Nguyen was standing by the reception desk and he stepped forward to meet Bromley as the lift doors opened.

  ‘Detective Chief Inspector Bromley, it is good of you to see me,’ he said slowly and bowed his head. No mention of the countless times that the policeman had refused to even acknowledge his existence. Bromley felt a rush of guilt. He asked the man behind the desk if there was an interview room free and he was told there was. Bromley took Nguyen through a pair of double white doors and along a corridor to a small square room containing a table and two orange plastic seats. He motioned Nguyen to the seat nearest the door but the old man waited until Bromley was seated before he sat down. Bromley drew on his pipe and studied him through a cloud of smoke.

  Nguyen was smiling earnestly like an eager-to-please servant. His clothes were clean but scruffy, as if they’d been slept in, and his hair was lank and uncombed. The hands clasped on the table were wrinkled but the nails were neatly clipped. After twenty years as a policeman Bromley had acquired the knack of summing people up at a glance but he had no idea where to start with Nguyen. Maybe
it was because he was Oriental. Certain points were obvious. Nguyen was not a rich man, but he had the look of a man who was used to hard work and responsibility. There was suffering too, but you didn’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to work that out, Bromley knew. His English was reasonably good, though he had to make an effort to choose his words carefully, and there was something vaguely American about his accent. He seemed honest and straightforward and he looked Bromley in the eye as he waited for him to speak.

  Bromley took the stem of the pipe from his mouth and ran his left hand through his short-cropped beard. ‘Mr Nguyen, you must realise that we are doing everything we can to find the people who killed your wife and daughter. Everything that can be done, is being done, you must believe me when I tell you that. There is no point in you coming here every day. If there is something to tell you, we will telephone you or we will write to you. Do you understand?’

  The old man nodded twice, and his smile widened. Several of his back teeth were missing, and one of his canines was badly chipped. ‘I understand, Detective Chief Inspector Bromley,’ he said slowly.

  Bromley continued with the speech he’d rehearsed in his mind while travelling down in the lift. ‘The men are members of the IRA, we think they are living in London, probably moving from place to place, perhaps living in bedsitters or cheap boarding houses. They will be using false names and they will be experts at blending into the background. What I am trying to say to you, Mr Nguyen, is that it will be very difficult to find them. Do you understand?’

  Nguyen nodded again.

  ‘In fact, it might well be that we never find them. That is a possibility that you must come to terms with. Sometimes the IRA will mount a bombing campaign and then the political climate changes and the bombing stops. If that were to happen, we might never catch the men. But at least the killing will stop. Do you understand?’

  Nguyen nodded. ‘No,’ he said quietly. ‘That cannot be so.’

  ‘It is so,’ said Bromley.

  ‘It is not something I can accept, Detective Chief Inspector Bromley,’ the old man said, still smiling as if he was afraid to offend the policeman. ‘You must catch these men.’

  ‘If it is possible, we will, Mr Nguyen. That I can promise. But if it is impossible . . .’ He shrugged and put his pipe back into his mouth.

  ‘These men in London. They are doing this because they are told to, yes?’

  ‘We believe they are members of the IRA, yes.’

  ‘But this IRA is not a secret organisation. You know who is in it, you know where they are.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Bromley doubtfully, not sure where the man was heading.

  ‘Then why cannot you arrest someone else who you know is in the IRA and make them tell you who is doing the killing?’

  Bromley smiled ruefully, knowing that there were a good many men in the Royal Ulster Constabulary and even his own squad who would be more than happy to do just that, to pick them up off the streets and take them to an underground cell and attach electrodes to their private parts and squeeze every bit of information out of them. And there were others who’d welcome a shoot-to-kill policy, official or unofficial, so that they could blow them away without bothering about the niceties of evidence and procedure and witnesses.

  ‘That is not how we do things in this country,’ said Bromley.

  ‘What I do not understand is why the Government allows this IRA to be,’ said Nguyen.

  ‘To be what?’ said Bromley, frowning.

  ‘To exist, to be,’ Nguyen said. ‘Why does the Government not arrest everybody who is in the IRA. Lock them up. Then there will be no more killing. And perhaps then you find who murdered my family.’

  Bromley held his hands up in surrender. ‘Life is not so simple, Mr Nguyen. It is a question of politics, not policing. You should speak to your MP.’

  ‘MP?’ said Nguyen, his brow creased.

  ‘Member of Parliament,’ explained the policeman. ‘Perhaps he can help you.’

  Bromley got to his feet. ‘Mr Nguyen, there is nothing else I can tell you, I am afraid. I don’t want to offend you, but you must not keep coming here. I am very sorry about what happened to your family, but your coming here is not helping. It makes it more difficult for us. Do you understand?’

  Nguyen pushed back his chair slowly and stood in front of Bromley, still smiling. ‘I understand, Detective Chief Inspector Bromley. And I thank you for talking to me.’ He held out his hand and Bromley shook it. The small, wrinkled hand was surprisingly strong, as if there were steel rods under the old skin. Nguyen turned and walked out, leaving Bromley alone with his pipe.

  Tempers were flaring on the football pitch. It wasn’t that there was anything at stake other than the game itself, it was just that the army team hated to lose and they were two goals down with less than ten minutes to go before half-time. Their opponents, the local police team, had the edge when it came to skill and finesse but the army boys had the aggression. The referee looked at his watch and missed the sharp elbow jab in the ribs that sent the police sweeper sprawling but he heard the cop swear and he blew hard on his whistle. The crowd jeered as the referee fumbled in the pocket of his shorts for his notebook.

  There were two groups of supporters, one on each side of the pitch. The police supporters, mainly loyal girlfriends and bored wives, stood with their backs to Woolwich Common, facing Stadium Road. The army supporters, mostly soldiers with nothing else to do on a Saturday morning, were ranged along the other side. O’Reilly was standing with the police wives as he studied the referee through the lens of his Pentax. The man’s cheeks were flushed red as he spluttered at the policeman who was waving his arms and protesting his innocence. He moved the lens to the left and the Queen Elizabeth Military Hospital came into focus and then he saw the road sign. Shrapnel Close. He smiled at the irony of it.

  The referee blew his whistle to restart the game as O’Reilly walked slowly along the sideline, stopping every now and again to take photographs. Over his shoulder was a black camera bag. Close to the corner flag was a stack of sports bags and towels and two polythene bags full of quartered oranges. The crowd roared as a big, beefy, army striker sent the ball ripping into the net, and as his team-mates rushed to congratulate him O’Reilly dropped his camera bag down among the sports bags. He walked back to the line and took more photographs before checking his watch. Three minutes to go. A red Renault drove down Repository Road and into Stadium Road and came to a halt at the junction with Shrapnel Close. O’Reilly knew that he’d attract attention to himself if he walked behind the goalmouth while the game was on, so he stayed where he was until the referee’s whistle blasted out and brought the first half to a close. The players ran across the pitch to where the bags were as O’Reilly walked over to the car. McCormick opened the passenger door for him and he got in. They both looked over at the foot-ballers, clustered around the now-opened polythene bags and helping themselves to pieces of orange.

  ‘Now?’ said McCormick, licking his lips nervously.

  ‘No, Fisher said we wait until we’re on Shooters Hill Road,’ replied O’Reilly.

  ‘Let’s go then.’ McCormick put the car in gear and drove to the main junction and indicated before he turned. He pulled the car to the side some fifty yards down the road. O’Reilly nodded and opened the glove compartment and took out a small walkie-talkie. It was an Icom IC2 transceiver, a hand-held model. There was another in the camera bag, though it had been modified. The Bombmaker had attached a relay switch to the loudspeaker circuit which was connected to a second circuit, containing a 1.5 volt battery and a gunpowder detonator. The detonator was embedded in twenty-five pounds of Semtex explosive, around which was wrapped a cluster of three-inch nails. There was no timing device because the bomb would be detonated at a safe distance by the transceiver in O’Reilly’s hand. And there were no booby traps because they weren’t sure when he’d be able to put the bag down.

  O’Reilly saw the avaricious look in McCormick’s eye, the pleading of
a dog begging for a bone. He handed it over. McCormick handled it reverently like a holy icon.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

  ‘Go for it,’ said O’Reilly.

  McCormick switched the control switch to ‘send’ and held the transceiver to his mouth. ‘Bang,’ he said, and they saw the flash of light followed quickly by the thud of the explosion and felt the tremor through the car seats.

  ‘Come on, let’s go,’ said O’Reilly.

  They were driving along the A102 heading for the Blackwall Tunnel by the time the first white-coated doctor reached the blood-soaked pitch.

  Sir John Brownlow was getting irritable, so Ellen brewed him a fresh cup of coffee and placed it on the desk in front of him. He smiled his thanks and she could read his discomfort in his eyes. Ellen Howard had been the MP’s personal assistant for almost three years and she’d reached the stage where she could pretty much judge what he was thinking by the look on his face. Today he was wearing his professional, caring mask but she could tell that he was far from happy. He hated the regular constituency surgeries where the punters queued up to present him with their problems and to ask him to put their lives in order. The ones at the local party office weren’t so bad because they were mainly an opportunity of pressing the flesh with the party faithful, it was when he had to go out and about that he suffered. Ellen knew what the problem was, though she would never dare tell the MP to his face. It was that Sir John simply did not care about the man in the street, and he sympathised even less with their trials and tribulations. But he was all too well aware of how narrow his majority had been at the last election, and he had resigned himself to the fact that being seen helping his constituents with their problems was a vote-catcher. Holding the surgery in a local citizens advice centre eased some of the pain as it meant he could usually pass them on to someone else. Teflon Time, he called it. The trick was to make sure that nothing stuck and that the punters went away thinking that their MP had done his best and was worth supporting.