To Hell in a Handcart

by Richard Littlejohn

  ‘WHAT?’ Mickey froze.

  ‘Murder? You sure?’ the sergeant checked.

  ‘This is going to be done by the numbers. We’ve got an unarmed victim. A shooter who admits it.’

  ‘I haven’t admitted anything,’ said Mickey, backtracking.

  ‘That’s not what it sounded like to me back at the house. What was it you said, “I’m not denying it”?’

  ‘I wasn’t denying it was my gun. I haven’t admitted murder. I told you, self-defence. Reasonable force.’

  ‘I assume he’s been read his rights?’ asked the sergeant.

  ‘I cautioned him back at the house,’ Marsden confirmed.

  ‘Well then, Mickey. If you want my advice. I’d keep your mouth shut.’

  Mickey clammed up.

  ‘Sarge, I’m only going on the facts as they stand right now. I need time for further investigations. We don’t even know who the victim is, yet. I’m having him fingerprinted at the hospital. Once we’ve got those, we can run him through the computer. Meantime, I’d like Mr French here detained on suspicion of murder.’

  ‘Do you want to call anyone, Mickey?’ asked the sergeant.

  ‘Not right now, Ted. Thanks.’

  ‘OK. Empty your pockets.’

  Mickey took his wallet from his rear pocket. The sergeant examined the contents. Thirty-four pounds in cash, assorted credit cards, Spider’s membership card.

  ‘You’re not still drinking in that dive?’ he asked Mickey.

  ‘Not since this afternoon,’ Mickey said.

  Three photos. Andi, Terry, Katie.

  ‘Your eldest has blossomed, Mickey.’

  ‘Fifteen, now.’

  ‘Pretty girl. And your boy. He’s a big lad. Like his old man.’

  ‘Yeah. Look, Ted, can’t I keep them?’

  ‘You know the score, Mickey.’

  ‘Fair enough, Ted.’

  Mickey was shown into a cell.

  Marsden followed him in.

  ‘Look, I know you’re an old mate of my dad’s,’ said the young DI. ‘But you know what the Job’s like today. Climate of fucking terror. This investigation has to be spotless. But I will get to the truth, wherever that leads.’

  Mickey smiled at him. ‘I wouldn’t want it any other way. Just do your job.’

  Marsden stopped as he left the cell.

  ‘I will promise you this, though. I’ll keep you informed.’

  ‘I appreciate that.’

  The sergeant appeared at the door.

  ‘Cup of tea, Mickey?’

  ‘No thanks, Ted. I’ve just put one down.’

  Forty-two

  Ricky Sparke’s alarm woke him at 6.30 am. He yawned, stretched, scratched his balls and swung his legs out of bed. He shaved, showered, washed down his daily dose of Milk Thistle with a can of V-8, dressed and headed downstairs.

  No Mickey.

  That wasn’t like him.

  Ricky knew he was pissed last night but he distinctly remembered Mickey telling him he’d swing by the radio station, retrieve the motor from the underground car park and collect him usual time.

  Ricky gave it five minutes.

  No sign.

  He called Mickey’s cellphone.

  ‘The posaphone you are calling has not responded. It may respond if you try again,‘ said the automatic message.

  Ricky tried again.

  ‘The posaphone you are calling may be switched off. Please try later.‘

  Maybe Mickey had slept in. He’d had a skinful last night, too.

  Ricky dialled Mickey’s home number.

  A standard BT answering message kicked in.

  After the tone, Ricky spoke. ‘Hey, French. If you’re there get your arse out of bed and pick up the phone.’

  Nothing. Ricky heard the tape run out. He switched off the phone.

  Mickey would turn up later. No doubt with a sore head.

  Still, he hadn’t ever failed to show before.

  Ricky walked to the main drag and hailed a black cab, slipping on his Ray-Bans and hoping he wouldn’t be recognized. The provisional wing of the LTDA still had a fatwah out on him.

  Ten minutes later he arrived at Rocktalk 99FM.

  ‘Morning, Harry,’ he greeted the security guard. ‘Any sign of Mickey yet this morning?’

  ‘Morning, Ricky. No. I was just wondering about him myself.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’

  ‘Yeah. His motor’s still in the car park. Been there all night.’

  ‘He said he’d stop off and collect it before picking me up.’

  ‘Maybe the trains were fucked up again.’

  ‘Yeah, maybe,’ said Ricky.

  That might explain it. The trains were always fucked up. Strikes, suicides, leaves on the line, wrong kind of snow. Wrong kind of twats running them, more like.

  Still, he would have expected Mickey to ring.

  ‘Any messages?’ he asked his production assistant.

  ‘Usual bunch of nutters,’ she said.

  ‘Any word from Mickey?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Ricky poured himself a coffee and scoured the papers in preparation for that morning’s show.

  ‘Usual parcel of bollocks,’ he said. ‘What the fuck am I going to say to get them going today?’

  ‘Petrol prices?’ suggested his producer.

  ‘Been there.’

  ‘Speed cameras.’

  ‘Done that.’

  ‘Asylum-seekers.’

  ‘You’re not serious. We did that yesterday. What is this, Groundhog Day?’

  ‘Sorry, Rick.’

  ‘Isn’t anything happening anywhere in the world?’ asked Ricky.

  His producer shrugged.

  Just before nine o’clock, Ricky took up his position in the studio.

  As the theme music began to roll, his producer rushed in with the latest headlines.

  ‘Sorry, Ricky. This is just off the wires.’

  Ricky didn’t have time to rehearse his reading of the news. The theme music faded and the red ON AIR light indicated that his mike was live.

  ‘Good morning everyone. You‘re listening to Rocktalk 99FM. I’m Ricky Sparke. And these are the latest headlines.

  ‘Reports are coming in of a shooting overnight. Police have confirmed that a burglar has been shot dead …

  ‘GOOD!’

  Ricky interjected with genuine delight. Commenting on the news as he was actually reading it out had become Ricky’s trademark. The listeners loved it.

  ‘As I was saying, a burglar has been shot dead in the village of Heffer’s Bottom.’

  Heffer’s Bottom. That’s where Mickey lived.

  Ricky composed himself.

  ‘A man is helping police with their inquiries. We’ll bring you the latest details just as soon as we get them. More news later. Your calls next. First, here’s the Buzzcocks.’

  ‘Ricky, what happened to the rest of the headlines?’ his producer yelled in his ear. ‘What about the weather forecast?’

  ‘In a minute,’ Ricky said. He switched on his mobile phone and dialled Mickey’s number again. Nothing.

  It was him. It had to be him.

  ‘RICK-EEE!’ his producer screamed. ‘The record’s finished.’

  ‘I’m sorry, ladies and gentlemen. I’ve just been trying to get some more information on that shooting in Heffer’s Bottom. That’s really the only story which interests me this morning.

  ‘I had a look at the rest of the headlines while you were listening to the Buzzcocks and, quite frankly, I wouldn’t blow my nose with them.

  ‘Incidentally, if you want to know what the weather’s like, I suggest you look out of the window.

  ‘Let’s go to the phones. Pete, in Wisbech.’

  ‘All right, Ricky?’

  ‘Sweet as a nut, Pete. What can we do for you?’

  ‘It’s about that burglar being shot.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘I think it’s bloody brilliant, if you�
�ll pardon my language.’

  ‘We’re all grown-ups, Pete. I’ve heard worse. Just make sure I don’t hear any worse on the air, OK?’

  ‘Sorry, Ricky. Like I was saying, I’ve been burgled six times in the past two years. The police have done nothing. These burglars are vermin. If I’d have had a gun and I’d caught someone in my house, I’d have blown his head off.’

  ‘Thanks, Pete. You’re not with Amnesty International, by any chance?’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Never mind, Pete. Keep those calls coming in. Here’s the Kinks.’

  ‘Listen,’ Ricky said to his producer on the talkback. ‘I want everything, repeat everything on this burglary. Got it?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Ricky’s excitement at this fantastic breaking story was tempered by his concern for his mate. Last time they’d spoken, Mickey said he was cleaning his guns. What with the no-show, it had to be Mickey.

  ‘Get on to the local nick and find out the name of the man they’re holding,’ he told his producer. ‘Second thoughts, don’t bother. Ring the local boozer, the Keep & Bear Arms. It’ll be in the book. I think the landlord’s called Sid.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Just do as you’re fucking told. OK? And when you get him, tell him to make like he’s never met me. Right?’

  Terry and Julie had crossed the river and Raymond Douglas Davies was in paradise.

  ‘I never get tired of that song. One of our greatest living Englishmen. Ray Davies, the Kinks, “Waterloo Sunset”.’

  ‘Line one, Ricky,’ his producer prompted him.

  ‘More now on that shooting. On the line now is the landlord of the local pub in Heffer’s Bottom, Sid, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s right, Ricky. It’s Sid Allen, here.’

  ‘You hear everything, Sid. What can you tell us about this shooting?’

  ‘Early hours this morning it happened. It seems one of our locals, Mickey French, was disturbed by an intruder. I don’t know too many details but I saw them take Mickey away in a police car. And they loaded a body into an ambulance. One copper told me he was dead. They thought he was a burglar. Wouldn’t surprise me, we get a lot of that here, ever since the pikeys …’

  ‘Members of the travelling community, you mean?’

  ‘Oh, yeah, right. Anyway, we’ve had all kinds of burglaries and things going missing.’

  ‘Don’t let’s jump to any conclusions, Sid. What’s going on right now?’

  ‘Well, Ricky, there’s Old Bill, sorry, policemen, crawling all over the place. I believe Mickey. Mr French, that is, was taken to Angel Hill nick.’

  ‘Thanks, Sid. Well, there we have it. More on that story later in the programme. After we’ve heard from Counting Crows.’

  ‘I had no idea,’ Ricky’s producer said on the talkback. ‘You OK? I thought you handled that well. In the circumstances.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Did you know it was Mickey?’

  ‘I had a hunch, soon as I heard it was Heffer’s Bottom.’

  ‘You OK to carry on?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Counting Crows, Omaha, somewhere in Middle America. Meanwhile, somewhere in Middle England a burglar has been shot dead. I’ve got to be fairly careful about what I say, because of the law, sub judice and stuff like that. It’s early days yet. We still don’t know all the facts of this case.

  ‘We’ll find out more about what happened as the show, the day, the days, the weeks, maybe, go on. And, I can promise you this, you ‘ll hear it first on Rocktalk 99FM. This is Warren Zevon. “Send Lawyers, Guns and Money”. Sounds just what Mickey French needs right now.’

  In his office down the corridor, Charlie Lawrence, programme director, punched the air.

  Forty-three

  Acting Detective Chief Inspector Colin Marsden was at his desk early. He’d slept briefly and fitfully.

  At thirty-five, his dark hair was already greying at the temples and thinning. He looked older. Years of snatched meals in police canteens had played havoc with his digestion and his waistline.

  His marriage, to a young nurse called Denise he’d met while on duty, had gone west a few years ago. As Princess Di once remarked, there were always three of them in the marriage.

  Colin, Denise and the Job.

  He had never wanted anything other than to be a police officer, like his father, grandfather and two of his uncles before him. His younger brother, Billy, had also followed in the family footsteps and was now a DS with the drugs squad.

  Colin remembered his dad talking about Mickey. Good copper. Brave. Dependable.

  Now he had Mickey French downstairs in the cells on a charge of murder. And he still didn’t know who the victim was.

  The fingerprints and preliminary post mortem report would be with him in a couple of hours.

  Marsden buttoned his shirt collar, fixed his tie, put on his chain store jacket and beckoned his sergeant to accompany him to interview the prisoner.

  Strangely, for a man facing a murder charge, Mickey French had slept soundly.

  It wasn’t the first night he’d spent in the cells. When he was a rookie cop at Tyburn Row on the night-shift, he’d often get his head down for a couple of hours.

  His own reaction surprised him. He was concerned about Andi and the kids but convinced himself he’d be out in a few hours, once the facts had been sorted. Marsden seemed a decent sort. Straight-up.

  There was an inner calm about Mickey. It was as if the shooting had been an act of catharsis, evacuating the pent-up stresses of the recent past – the ambush, the Goblin’s incident, the burglary.

  All that troubled him was the identity of the man he had shot. He had assumed it was one of the pikeys. But from what he could gather as he was being put into the police car, that wasn’t the case. The chief pikey, whatever his name was, had shaken his head.

  Marsden collected Mickey from the cells and walked him to the interview room. He introduced his sergeant and inserted two blank tapes in the cassette recorder. He reminded Mickey he was still under caution.

  Mickey had waived his right to legal advice. He would speak for himself.

  Painstakingly, Mickey took him through the incident.

  He had been sitting in his living room, in his own home, cleaning his guns, which he was legally entitled to possess, when he had been disturbed by an intruder. Fearing for his life, he loaded the gun and fired in self-defence, as he had been trained to do by the Metropolitan Police.

  ‘Who was he, anyway?’ Mickey asked.

  ‘We still don’t know,’ Marsden said. ‘Once I’ve got the prints I’ll run them through the system. If he’s got form, we’ll soon find out.’

  ‘It’s a million he’s got form.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Marsden.

  ‘Not one of the pikeys, then?’

  ‘What made you think it would be?’

  ‘We’ve got history. Check your records.’

  ‘Enlighten me.’

  Mickey ran him through the background, starting with the attempted robbery of his golf clubs right up to the assault on his home.

  ‘They topped the cat?’ said Marsden incredulously.

  NEX TIM ITS YOU COZZER.

  ‘So you see how I was in fear of my life?’

  Marsden cracked his knuckles and stretched.

  ‘Hmmm. My problem is that whoever the victim is here, he is not one of the men you believed had made threats against you.’

  ‘Victim? I’m the fucking victim here.’

  ‘Technically speaking, no, you’re not. You see the difficulty,’ said Marsden.

  ‘Crystal,’ said Mickey. ‘Look, I’m not trying to be difficult.’

  ‘This is a very difficult situation.’

  ‘Tell me about it. I still maintain that whoever the intruder is, correction, was, I only used reasonable force under the law.’

  ‘We haven’t found a weapon,’ said Marsden.

  ‘I was entitled to assume he was
armed, given the background,’ said Mickey.

  ‘You’re not entitled to assume anything, you should know that,’ said Marsden.

  ‘I was trained to assume the worst.’

  ‘Just talk me through your day again,’ said Marsden. ‘Then we’ll knock it on the head until I’ve managed to ID the victim and had some more scenes-of-crimes reports.’

  ‘What’s that got to do with the prix de poisson?’

  ‘Humour me. I need to build up a picture of your frame of mind at the time of the shooting.’

  Mickey smiled. He could see where this was leading. It would boil down to intent when push came to shove.

  ‘Let’s get one thing straight. When I sat down to clean my guns, I had no intention of using them. The Glock was unloaded when I heard the intruder. I reacted instinctively. Standard police procedure.’

  ‘You’re not a police officer any more.’

  ‘It’s like riding a bike. I acted automatically.’

  ‘You made no attempt to establish whether the intruder was armed.’

  ‘No time. It was dark. I was under attack. Threats had been made against my life. I defended myself.’

  Marsden got up, walked round the room and sat down again.

  ‘There was an empty bottle of Jameson’s,’ he said.

  ‘What’s your point?’

  ‘Had you drunk the whole bottle?’

  ‘Half, maybe,’ said Mickey.

  ‘You’re a driver now, right?’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘There was no car at the house.’

  ‘I left it in town.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I had a couple of drinks at lunchtime.’

  ‘How many is a couple?’

  ‘Nothing heavy.’

  ‘Be more specific,’ Marsden entreated him.

  ‘Four or five large ones, drop of wine.’

  ‘Drop of wine? How much is a drop?’

  ‘Couple.’

  ‘Couple of what, glasses?’

  ‘Bottles.’

  ‘I’m impressed.’

  ‘Years of training,’ said Mickey.

  ‘Yeah, my dad told me. These days drinking on duty is a non-runner,’ said Marsden.

  ‘Always was,’ said Mickey. ‘Never enforced, though.’

  ‘Now it’s a hanging offence. They don’t even like you drinking off duty. It’s even been mooted that they’re going to conduct random breath tests when officers start their shifts.’