by Philip Kerr
‘Yes, I’m sorry for your loss. Again.’
I nodded back at her. ‘You know, it’s been a while since Matt Drennan hanged himself. But the police still haven’t released the body so his poor family can bury him. Why is that, please?’
‘I don’t really know. I’m no longer on that case. At least not that particular case.’
‘Case? I didn’t realise it was a case. What’s taking so long?’
‘These things can take a little time. Besides, the circumstances of Mr Drennan’s death have obliged us to reopen a previous inquiry.’
‘What exactly does that mean?’
She looked around. ‘Look, perhaps this isn’t the right place to tell you about it.’
‘We can go to my office if you like.’
‘I think that might be better.’
We got up from the table and went along to my office in silence. She walked with her bag slung over one shoulder and her arms folded in front of her chest, the way women do when they’re not entirely comfortable about something. I closed the door behind us, drew out a chair for her and then sat down. I was close enough to smell her perfume – not that I could tell what it was, merely that I liked it. In spite of who and what she was, I liked her, too.
‘So. What did you want to tell me, Miss Considine?’
‘I’m sorry to land it on you like this,’ she said. ‘Really, I am. Especially now. But you’ll hear about it soon enough. Tomorrow, probably, when we make it official.’ She paused for a moment and then said: ‘We’re reopening the police inquiry into the rape of Helen Fehmiu.’
I was silent as, for a moment, it was 23 December 2004 and I was back in the dock at St Albans Crown Court, about to be sentenced to eight years in prison for rape. I closed my eyes wearily, half expecting that Louise Considine was going to tell me that I was under arrest again. I lowered my head onto the desk in front of me and let out a groan.
‘Not again.’
‘I’m afraid so.’
‘Christ, why?’
To my surprise she laid her hand on my shoulder and left it there.
‘Look, Mr Manson, you’re not a suspect so there’s no need for you to worry. No need at all. I promise you, you’re in the clear. If anything, this is good news for you. You have my word on it.’
I sat up again. ‘That’s easy for you to say.’
‘It really is good news, you know. It will completely remove any lingering suspicion that in spite of your acquittal you might have had something to do with it.’
‘I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘Why now? It’s been almost ten years. And how does Matt Drennan’s death have any bearing on what happened to Helen Fehmiu?’
‘Well, you see we found a suicide note in Mr Drennan’s pocket. In the note he talked about you. In fact, his suicide seems to have had quite a bit to do with you, Mr Manson.’
‘I find that hard to believe.’
‘Rather than me try to explain what I mean, the quickest thing would be if I were to let you read it. The note. I have a PDF of it here.’
She picked up her handbag, took out an iPad and then showed me an image of a handwritten note. I didn’t recognise the childlike handwriting but the signature at the bottom with a smiley face inside the capital ‘D’ of Drennan was familiar, although on a suicide note it struck me as rather strange. Then again, it was quite typical of the man: I imagined him writing the note, then signing it with the smiley face out of sheer habit, as if he’d been signing an autograph for a fan in a pub or outside a football ground. Drenno was never too busy to sign an autograph for whoever asked him. It was one of the reasons why so many people loved the man.
Dear all,
I’ve come to the end of my rope, if you’ll excuse the cliché. My time in football being over now, there doesn’t seem to be anything worth living for. My life at the bottom of a glass isn’t any kind of substitute for how things used to be when I was a player. I figure it’s better to check out before I really fuck up big time. Tiff, I love you, I love you. I am so, so sorry. For everything. But I want to say an especially big sorry to my pal Scott Manson. Feeling guilty at having let you down so badly for all these years. I kept my mouth shut when I should have said something long ago. It was me that put Mackie up to stealing your new car, back in 2004. Just a joke. I knew how much you loved it. But I didn’t know Mackie would nick it and then do what he did. It was him that raped that lassie. I couldn’t say then because I couldn’t grass him up. See, he did time for me years back, in Scotland, when I fucked up the first time. I tried to get him to hand himself in but he just wouldn’t do it. Every time I used to see you in the nick it used to cut me to pieces. I made Mackie join the army to serve his country by way of atonement. He’s dead now so it doesn’t matter, I suppose. Wanted to tell you the other night but didn’t have the guts to look you in the eye, Scott.
Anyway, that’s it for now. Cheerio. See you in God’s dressing room.
Matt Drennan
‘I’ve managed to get hold of a photograph of Sergeant MacDonald,’ she said, ‘and if you’ll forgive me I think it’s fair to say that he looks not unlike you. He was part Nigerian. It might account for why Mrs Fehmiu was prepared to identify you as the rapist.’
I nodded slowly.
‘You’re nodding like it seems to make sense,’ she said.
‘It certainly explains one or two things that have always puzzled me about what happened back then,’ I said.
‘Such as?’
I told her how my car had disappeared from outside Karen’s house in St Albans, and then reappeared again; and how Drenno had visited me regularly in prison.
‘He obviously felt guilty,’ she said.
‘I suppose so. And now I come to think of it, Mackie had a conviction for car theft. Drenno used to say he’d nicked cars, too, when he was a kid in Glasgow, only he never got caught.’ I sighed. ‘The fucking idiot. Drenno was always playing stupid practical jokes like that. Every day. And I mean every day. Sometimes it seemed to me that he wanted to make people laugh more than he wanted to play football. Once some bloke’s wife bought him one of those fat Mont Blanc Meisterstück pens as a birthday present and Drenno filled it with his own piss. Stupid. Juvenile. But at the time very funny.’
‘So he must have known that you were having an affair with this woman, Karen, and where your car would be. Did you tell him?’
‘God, no. But for all his stupid larks he was actually quite clever, so he must have worked it out. And now I seem to remember that one day he tailed me in his car from the Arsenal training ground at Shenley. I was sure it was him and then I wasn’t, if you know what I mean. But it must have been him, I think. I should have known there were no lengths Drenno wouldn’t go to for the sake of a practical joke.’ I nodded. ‘Wait, I remember now. My car keys. He came to the garage with me when I bought the car. He said he was thinking of buying one the same. Maybe he did, for all I know. Anyway, he must have rung up the salesman, pretending to be me, told him I’d lost my key and asked him to order me a spare from Germany. That’s the only way they could have done it. If he gave that bastard Mackie a key.’
Louise Considine nodded. ‘I know Helen Fehmiu is dead and it won’t help her, but rape is a serious crime and we’re reopening the inquiry because we have to, although it seems pretty cut and dried. I may have to interview you formally, so that you can tell me the full story again. I hope you’ll understand. And I give you my word that when I do, the press won’t know about it.’
‘Thank you.’
She touched my hand. ‘I’m sorry I had to mention it at all. But you had to know the truth about what happened. I think you know that, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’m just sorry it’s going to change your perception of Matt Drennan.’
I shook my head. ‘It won’t, you know. I honestly can’t find it within me to condemn him. After all, he’s paid a dreadful price. He’s dead. That’s much, much worse than anything that happened to me.’
28
Sometimes, modern buildings function in ugly, hidden ways never quite conceived by the men and women who design them. They have their own inbuilt wastelands – leftover spaces which go unseen by the public and which often end up having minor, unplanned, alternative uses. The place at Silvertown Dock where Zarco’s body had been found was such a space – a forgotten area that existed in the bird-shit gap separating one independent structure from another – a no-man’s-land space between the seating bowl and the outer steel frame. In an attempt to hide this particular space – or perhaps to protect it from illicit use – a crude, triangular gunmetal grey door with a weather-tough Abus padlock had been installed; and stepping through it now I found myself in a similarly triangular concrete spot that was dominated by a long, sloping, polished steel column that reached up through the uppermost branches of the distinctively jagged support structure and into the afternoon sky.
I closed the steel door behind me, sat down on my haunches and looked up and around, trying to picture the dreadful fate that had befallen Zarco. As Jane Byrne had observed, with no windows in sight there was nowhere he could have fallen from – unless he’d jumped off the very top of the building – and it was just the kind of secluded, fag-end place where a savage beating could have been handed out to Zarco without any fear of disturbance. It seemed a lonely, awful place for a convivial man like him to have ended his life. I had hoped in some vague way to connect the scene of the crime with the texts on Zarco’s ‘something else’ phone. Could this be the ‘123’ where Paolo Gentile was supposed to have brought fifty grand in cash?
The key to the door had a plastic tag on the end which read ‘SD Outer Ground 28/1’, which was a long way from ‘123’. And since there was no roof, it was hard to imagine that Gentile would have left fifty grand exposed to the elements, even if the money had been inside one of those ‘overboard’ waterproof hold alls that yachtsmen use. Suppose someone from building maintenance had come in here and found it? There were a few brushes and brooms stacked in the corner which seemed to suggest that might have been a possibility. The keys to the door’s padlock – two of them – had been easily located; they were still in the dock caretaker’s key-safe. Had there ever been three keys? No one was quite sure, but other such padlocks had been supplied with three.
If I’d hoped to have some great detective moment and somehow ‘see’ the crime in my mind’s eye, it didn’t happen. Right then the only insight I had was that I was entirely unsuited to any of the tasks my new employer had given me. I felt cold and more than a little bewildered, especially after Louise Considine’s unwelcome news. Things were moving much too quickly for me right now. It was all I could do to remember where I had parked my car. Which was when I remembered that Maurice had done it for me.
I stood up and went outside again, locking the door carefully behind me. I was halfway back to my office when I saw Simon Page striding towards me with a face like a calamity was about to befall us.
‘Disaster,’ he said. ‘Bloody disaster.’
‘What is?’
‘That stupid fucking German poof has only gone home, that’s what’s fucking happened.’
‘You mean Christoph Bündchen? For Christ’s sake, Simon, keep your voice down. If one of these coppers hears you using words like that they’ll nick you for whatever it is they nick you for now when you call someone a poof. Hate crime or something.’
‘I’m sorry, boss, but I’m at my wit’s end trying to find him, that’s all.’
‘Look, what’s the problem? The police said they could go home after they’d been interviewed.’
‘Maybe the police did, boss, but UKAD certainly didn’t; he was one of the four players drawn at random to give a urine test.’
‘Oh fuck, I’d forgotten all about them.’
‘That’s right. After his interview with the police this morning it seems that Chris buggered off in a taxi back to Hangman’s Wood, like everyone else when their interview was over. I told him before he left the room with that WPC to come straight back, but the daft bastard must have forgotten. At least I hope he just forgot. Anyway, the drug testers are about to go home. Unless we can find him in the next fifteen minutes he’ll be in breach of the strict liability rule on dope tests and charged with failure or refusal to take the test.’
‘You’ve tried his mobile? And Hangman’s Wood?’
‘I’ve tried his mobile, his landline. I’ve rung Hangman’s Wood. I’ve done everything but send a fucking carrier pigeon to his mum and dad in Germany, so unless he’s remembered and is already on his way back here to take the test, he’s buggered and so are we without a fucking striker. Because you mark my words that’s exactly what’s going to happen if that stupid Kraut doesn’t take that fucking test. They’ll slap a ban on him for sure.’
‘We’ve still got a striker. I had a conversation with Ayrton Taylor an hour or so ago and took him off the transfer list.’
‘Thank fuck for that.’
‘But you’re right, this is serious. Look, I’ll come and speak to the doping people now.’
‘Don’t get your hopes up, boss. These people can be right bastards when they’ve a mind.’
We went down to the doping control station near the dressing room; all the big clubs have them now. It’s just a suite of antiseptic-looking rooms, including a lavatory, some chairs, a table covered in a black cloth, a sink, a box of sample collection bottles, a chiller cabinet containing plenty of bottled water – sometimes you have to drink a lot of water before you can pee – and, on that particular afternoon, an air of crisis. On the wall was a poster that read:
Cannabis →
← Success
Make your choice. It’s your career.
Seated under the poster were two men wearing shirts and ties and blue blazers and faces as long as two streaks of dope-free piss. They got to their feet as we came through the door.
‘Scott Manson,’ I said. ‘Acting club manager.’
‘Hello,’ said a man holding a clipboard. He showed me a plastic identity card on a red ribbon around his neck and then shook my hand. ‘My name is Trevor Hastings and I’m the doping control officer with UK Anti-Doping. And this is the Football Association Supervising Officer.’
‘Pleased to meet you, gentlemen.’
‘Is Christoph Bündchen available to take the test?’ he asked politely.
‘I’m afraid there has been a misunderstanding,’ I said. ‘You’ll be aware that João Zarco was murdered here yesterday afternoon, and that the police are here now. They’ve been interviewing the players and playing staff, and it’s beginning to look as if Mr Bündchen – who is German and doesn’t speak the best English – has confused the meeting he was supposed to have with you, to give a urine sample, with the meeting he had with police officers earlier on today. As far as we can determine he’s gone home. We’ve called him and left messages instructing him to return here as soon as possible. But so far without success.’
The DCO looked at his watch. ‘I understand what you’re saying, Mr Manson, but I have to inform you that the player was informed he would be subject to a drugs test today, and he has already signed a consent form; so unless the player presents himself for a test within the next ten minutes, he will be in breach of Part 1, Section 5A of the FA’s anti-doping regulations, and the penalties set out in Regulation 46 will apply to this violation.’
Simon opened a copy of the FA’s procedural guidelines that was lying on the station table and started to look for the relevant section.
‘I understand that,’ I said. ‘But it seems to me that some people might think it a little unreasonable not to cut someone a bit of slack under these extraordinary circumstances. It’s been a while since I read the regulations but I do think you ought to reconsider your position here.’
‘I’m afraid a breach is a breach. It’s for an FA disciplinary commission to decide on whether or not that breach is justified. At a formal hearing.’
‘I se
e.’
‘Fucking hell,’ said Simon, who always got more Yorkshire when he was angry and upset. ‘Have you seen the penalties in Regulation 46, boss? It’s a minimum one-year suspension for a first violation. One bloody year. Christ, that could end the German lad’s career. And all because of a silly misunderstanding. Listen here, Mr Hastings, you’ve got to be joking.’
‘I don’t think Mr Hastings is joking, Simon. He’s just doing his job, aren’t you, Mr Hastings?’
‘Yes, I am. I’m glad you see it that way, Mr Manson.’
‘And I think we all recognise the gravity of what might happen here.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Those regulations are there to uphold and preserve the ethics of sport, and to safeguard the physical health and mental integrity of players. Isn’t that right, Mr Hastings?’
‘That’s correct.’
I gestured towards the regulations in Simon’s hand. ‘May I?’
Simon sighed a sigh that sounded like there was a large dog in the room and passed them to me.
‘Aye, maybe so. All of that times ten with a cherry on top. But it’s still bloody unfair to the lad. And I say that as someone who’s hated the Krauts all his life.’
‘Why don’t you go and get us all some tea?’ I said to the big Yorkshireman.
‘Aye, perhaps I will.’
‘Sorry about that, Mr Hastings,’ I said, after Simon had gone. ‘He’s feeling a bit emotional right now. We all are.’
‘That’s quite understandable.’
‘I’m glad you said that.’
‘How long have we got before we’re in breach?’ I asked the DCO.
‘Seven minutes,’ he said.
I found the relevant section of the guidelines and considered it very carefully; I knew that Christoph’s whole career depended on what I said next.
‘“The failure or refusal by a Player without compelling justification to submit to drug testing after notification is prohibited,”’ I said, reading out the guidelines. ‘“The expression ‘compelling justification’ shall embrace, and shall only embrace, circumstances where it would be wholly unreasonable to expect a Player to submit to drug testing in the circumstances pertaining at the time, bearing in mind the limited commitment that this entails.”’
