A Kind Of Wild Justice

by Hilary Bonner

  Bill Phillips, predictably enough, did not. ‘Ange, Ange,’ he called plaintively. ‘Are you all right, darling?’ Then, getting only silence in response, ‘Of course I’ll give him what he wants, darling. I’ll do anything to get you home. Anything.’

  The muffled voice came on the line again: ‘At midnight tonight you will put £50,000 in used ten-pound notes into a rucksack and leave it at the foot of a pine tree in Fernworthy Forest. I want your son to do it. On his own. No filth. Nobody else. You want to see your son again, don’t you? Mess with me and he’ll go missing too. Tell him to take the road around the reservoir. It comes to a dead end. Park there and walk approximately 150 yards due west into the forest. Ordnance survey map OL 28, reference 8390.6574. The tree will be marked with a red cross. The kid will be nearby. You’ll find her.’

  ‘I haven’t got the cash, I can’t get it till tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Tell the filth to keep their snotty noses out. I know they’re with you and I know their tricks. Tonight – or your precious Angela dies. Oh, and it won’t be a pretty death …’

  The caller hung up. So did Bill Phillips. His complexion seemed to be growing greyer by the minute.

  His wife looked at him questioningly.

  He shook his head numbly. ‘So much about wanting to take control away from him,’ he said. ‘It’s got to be tonight and I don’t want any interference. I want it the way he’s said. I’m not taking chances with my children’s lives.’

  Parsons and Fielding exchanged glances. ‘Can you raise the money that quickly, Mr Phillips?’ asked Fielding.

  The other man smiled weakly. ‘One call to my bank manager,’ he said. ‘And I won’t have to explain why.’

  Fielding glanced around the big farmhouse kitchen. It reeked of affluent well-being. The house must have a minimum of eight bedrooms, he thought. He glanced out of the window over Dartmoor, taking in the five tors that gave the farm its name. He had learned that the Phillipses were mixed farmers, big on beef, some dairy, and several thousand sheep on their higher ground and moorland. Their more lush land, on which they raised their beef including one of the country’s finest herds of pedigree Devon cattle, was to the rear of the farmhouse stretching back towards and beyond Okehampton. Fielding also knew the size of the farm, approaching 2000 acres, pretty big anywhere and huge in the West Country. He felt a bit silly having even asked the question that he did.

  Parsons stepped in brusquely. ‘You’d better do it in that case, Mr Phillips,’ he said. ‘And then we’ll discuss the next step.’

  Phillips turned away and picked up the phone again.

  Fielding spoke in the DCI’s ear. ‘A word, boss,’ he said.

  Silently the older man turned on his heel and walked out of the room. Fielding followed him. ‘Boss, we can’t let Rob Phillips make the drop. Let me go in his place.’

  Parsons looked thoughtful. ‘I’m not sure, Matey obviously knows this family. Or all about them anyway. We don’t know how well he might know Rob Phillips, do we? It’s not at all unlikely that he’s local, don’t forget. At the very least he’s done his homework. Almost certainly he knows what Rob looks like. That’s the problem.’

  ‘I’m about the same height and build. It’ll be pitch-black out there. I’ll keep my head down. The bastard’ll never know the difference.’

  Parsons considered for a moment. Then he nodded abruptly.

  Rob Phillips, however, who had already been notified by his father of the kidnapper’s instructions, needed a little more convincing. ‘We mustn’t take any chances,’ he said, echoing his father’s earlier remark. ‘I don’t want anyone standing in for me. I want to go get my sister. It’s my fault she was taken in the first place.’

  Fielding wondered if the young man was waiting for somebody to say that it wasn’t his fault. But nobody did.

  Parsons did have something to say, though. ‘Mr Phillips, at the very least your sister is in very grave danger. I cannot allow you to put yourself in danger too.’

  ‘What do you mean, you can’t allow …’ Rob was bristling, quick to find a target for the anger inside him, which was really directed at himself.

  His father interrupted. ‘No, boy, the inspector’s right. Your mother and I can’t risk losing you too. Let the sergeant take the money. He knows what he’s doing.’

  Fielding just hoped Bill Phillips was right.

  It took about half an hour to drive from Blackstone to Fernworthy Forest, mostly along dark deserted roads skirting the moor. Apart from Fielding himself, alone in Rob Phillips’s Land Rover, there did not seem to be a soul about. There are few roads over Dartmoor and the heart of the moor remains remote and inaccessible, but the last couple of miles or so, from Chagford to the reservoir, cut right across the stretch of rugged moorland known as Chagford Common. At one point, as the Land Rover reached the brow of a hill, a pony loomed abruptly in its headlights and Fielding had to swerve violently to avoid it. As he swung the wheel, his nerves jangled far more than they would normally do.

  The thing about surveillance was that it was so much easier in urban areas. People are the best camouflage. Want to lose yourself, go to a city. Policemen and villains both knew that.

  The number one priority was to retrieve Angela Phillips safely – if that were even still possible, Fielding thought wryly. There were plenty of police officers waiting nearby for the call everyone hoped Fielding would be able to make, the call to say that he had Angela Phillips safe. But no attempt had been made to plant police officers at the delivery point. There was something about the kidnapper’s approach, the use of precise map readings, which tagged him as a military man. Indeed, kidnappers often were. They were the kind who enjoyed plotting complex operations. Parsons had reckoned that close surveillance would not be possible. ‘Not without Matey sussing it out pretty damned quickly,’ he had said. And he hadn’t been prepared to take that risk. So Fielding was pretty much on his own. His mouth felt dry, the palms of his hands were clammy.

  On the car seat next to him was a freshly purchased Millet’s rucksack containing £50,000 in used tenners. As instructed. It also contained a signalling device, concealed in the padding in the bottom. It might be discovered at once. Or Angela’s kidnapper might just empty the cash into another container or straight into a vehicle. On the other hand it might just give out a signal for long enough for the police to close in on him. After Angela Phillips was freed, of course. Nothing was to happen until then. That was the priority.

  It was all a matter of survival, really. And not just the survival of Angela Phillips, but also that of the senior police officers on the case. Fielding knew the way Parsons’s mind worked. He was unlikely to catch much criticism, if any at all, over loss of the Phillipses’ £50,000 as long as Angela was safely recovered. Indeed, he would be a hero again. So would Fielding himself, he considered with some satisfaction. As Todd Mallett had worked out long ago, he liked being a hero. But if Angela were lost, he and Parsons, already involved in an unorthodox operation, would both be deeply in the mire, whether or not the money was ever recovered. In fact, probably particularly if it were – if it looked as though any priority had been given to anything other than the safety of the missing girl.

  He was also about to wander into a forest at the dead of night in the presence of an undoubtedly dangerous man who could well be a raving lunatic. Fielding licked his dry lips. He drove as instructed to the parking area at the end of the road, which ran round about half the circumference of Fernworthy reservoir. When he switched off the engine the silence was deafening. Fielding didn’t think he had ever really appreciated that expression before. He switched off the Land Rover’s lights too and was instantly swallowed up in pitch-blackness. Nowhere, but nowhere, is darker than a forest at dead of night, he thought.

  A map-reading expert had pinpointed the appropriate reference for him. Fielding hoped his own skills were up to it. It should take only a few minutes to walk to the tree, but at night, making your way through a forest was
far from simple, he could easily get lost and he would have to be careful not to trip over the undergrowth. He decided to try to find the appropriate tree straight away and then just wait.

  With the help of a powerful torch, its beam cutting reassuringly through the darkness, Fielding, taking care to keep the light directed away from his face at all times, picked his way gingerly through brambles and nettles, weaving around the tree trunks. He found the tall conifer marked with the red cross more easily than he expected. It stood alone in a small clearing. He checked his watch. He was tempted to put the rucksack alongside it there and then, but decided against. The instructions were to make the drop at midnight. He would do it by the book. He switched off his torch, leaned against a nearby tree trunk and wondered if he were being watched. Almost certainly he was. He pulled the peak of his black baseball cap a little further down over his forehead. He was dying for a cigarette, but he didn’t dare light up. As Parsons had pointed out, they had no idea how well the kidnapper knew Rob Phillips, whether personally or just by sight. Either way, it was far too great a risk to allow the flame from his lighter to illuminate his face.

  He was standing quite still when he heard the crack of a twig nearby. His eyes were adjusted as well as possible to the darkness now and through the gloom he could just make out an approaching figure. Early, he thought. What should he do now? Should he have made the drop already after all? He was confused. The figure was coming closer. He hadn’t expected the bastard to show himself like this. He passed Fielding within about three or four yards. He was wearing some kind of military-style camouflage jacket – but then, so did almost everybody nowadays, it seemed. The policeman could not see his face. He could see the shape of a gun clearly enough, though: a .22 rifle, by the look of it, fitted with some kind of night sight and a silencer.

  The man moved almost soundlessly towards the tree with the red cross on it. Casually he propped his gun against the trunk. Then he undid his flies and had a pee.

  Fielding could barely believe his eyes. What was going on? He tried desperately not to move a muscle. But something alerted the other man’s attention. He could feel eyes boring into him across the clearing, peering through the darkness. Suddenly the man picked up his gun and took off at a run.

  Instinctively Fielding called out, ‘Hey, wait.’

  The man kept running. Fielding was bewildered. He did not know what to do or think. He glanced at his watch. It was still only ten to twelve. Should he follow? He’d never catch the bastard anyway. The man obviously knew these woods. He’d taken off at a pace. Even with the help of his torch, if Fielding tried to chase him he would be sure to fall over or at the very least run into something.

  For a few seconds he could make no sense at all of what he had seen. Then gradually his jumbled thoughts cleared. It only made no sense if the man who had run away was the kidnapper. But what if he wasn’t the kidnapper at all? Of course! The most likely scenario was that sonny was a poacher out hunting, his appearance at the drop spot just a ridiculous coincidence. Poachers didn’t like bright lights or big bangs drawing attention to their presence – hence the rifle with a night sight and silencer. Fernworthy’s three square miles or so of dense forest land would be home to more than one herd of deer, Fielding reckoned. While Dartmoor hosted nothing like the herds of big red deer which roamed Exmoor, there were other breeds in its woodland areas, as there were throughout the West Country, come to that. And although the managed forest of Fernworthy was open to the public, unauthorised shooting was strictly forbidden. That had to be it: a poacher. But Fielding had no idea where that left him – or Angela Phillips, come to that.

  He decided that the best he could do was to continue as if nothing had happened. It couldn’t do any harm, surely. On the dot of midnight he strode across to the tree and dropped the rucksack at its base in a rather theatrical manner. Then he walked back to his original vantage point and waited. He waited and waited, heart thumping in his chest, for what felt like an endless period of time. Now and then he glanced at the luminous hands of his watch. Nobody came to pick up the cash and, if Angela Phillips was nearby, he could neither see nor hear any sign of her. After forty-five minutes he could stand it no longer. He had to try to find out what was going on. He turned and began to make his way back to the Land Rover.

  When he got there he switched on the police radio, which had been hastily installed in the vehicle earlier that evening. Straight away a call came through from Parsons. ‘It’s off. Matey’s called the farm already. Says there were armed police in the woods with rifles. Bill Phillips assured him there weren’t. I even talked to him myself. He’d already made it clear he knew I was here. He’s been watching our every move, no doubt about it.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Fielding. ‘There was a man with a rifle. Night sights and silencer, too. I think he was a poacher. Matey must have seen him as well. I don’t damn well believe it.’

  He heard Parsons draw in a deep breath. ‘Right, then, go get the money and come on back,’ instructed the DCI abruptly and only someone as close to him as Fielding would have detected the strain in his voice.

  At 8 a.m. the next day, after another sleepless night of recriminations and distress at Five Tors Farm, the kidnapper made a further phone call: ‘You’ve got a second chance. Same place, same time. But I’m fining you. The price has gone up to £70,000. This will be the last chance. Any hint of police presence this time and the girl dies.’

  Fielding, mightily relieved, could see hope flickering over the faces of Angela’s family. They too, he suspected, had begun to believe that Angela was probably already dead. Last night must have been unbearable for them. It had been bad enough for him.

  ‘But you have to let me go this time, Inspector,’ said Rob Phillips. ‘Maybe he saw the sergeant’s face. We can’t take the risk.’

  Parsons dodged the issue. ‘Are you absolutely sure there is nobody you know who you think could be doing this?’ the DCI asked for the umpteenth time.

  The younger man shook his head. ‘I can’t believe it’s anyone the family knows, I really can’t.’

  Ultimately it was agreed that Rob should make the second drop and secretly Fielding was glad not to have been given the task again. He couldn’t quite stifle the nagging doubt that he might somehow have been responsible for the failure of the first exchange, although he did not really see how that could have been so.

  However, Parsons had a plan to keep control. ‘We tried to play it straight,’ he told Fielding. ‘You can’t legislate for something like your damned poacher and that was probably our mistake. This time we take no chances. We get the armed-response boys in. Make ’em look like soldiers on exercise. There’s enough of ’em up at Okehampton camp.’

  ‘He’ll know, he’ll not fall for it,’ intervened Todd Mallett. ‘He’s been spooked once by a man with a gun in the wood.’

  ‘If we get ’em in position quickly enough he shouldn’t even see ’em.’

  The Phillips family, of course, were not told of the new plan. But at 10.30 p.m., half an hour or so before Rob Phillips was due to leave the farm to follow in Mike Fielding’s footsteps of the night before, the kidnapper called again. ‘Change of plan,’ he said. ‘Make the drop at Hay Tor. Leave the rucksack at the top of the tor itself. The very top.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Fielding. ‘He’s giving us the run-round. And Hay Tor, too – no cover for him, or the girl, come to that.’

  ‘Or, indeed, us,’ commented the DCI. Hay Tor was Dartmoor’s highest point, bleak, exposed and at the other side of the moor from Blackstone.

  ‘Maybe that’s the point. I just don’t know. I wonder what he’s up to …’

  He and Fielding were conferring in the main hallway of the farmhouse, out of hearing of the distraught family gathered, as usual, in the kitchen.

  ‘I’m going to call off the armed-response boys from Fernworthy and see if they’ve got any bright ideas on how they can give some sort of cover at Hay Tor without being seen,’ Parsons said quietly
.

  Fielding listened uneasily as his boss got on the radio and began to issue fresh instructions. He had no sensible alternative suggestion, but was this really such a good move? he wondered. Within minutes it became clear that it wasn’t.

  Just as Rob was about to leave for the new assignation point, the kidnapper called once more. Bill Phillips answered the phone.

  ‘Tell the pigs I didn’t see the gun boys go into the forest, but I sure as hell saw ’em come out. Oh, and tell ’em – when your daughter dies I won’t have killed her. That’ll be down to them.’

  He hung up at once, leaving a stunned Bill Phillips looking at a buzzing receiver. He turned to Fielding and Parsons. ‘What on earth do you think you’re doing,’ he shouted at them. ‘He’s right. The bastard’s right. If my daughter dies it will be down to you lot. All I ever wanted to do was to give him the money and get my girl back. But you couldn’t settle for that, could you, not any of you.’

  DCI Parsons looked him coolly in the eye, still the manager, still the chief executive. If he was as shaken by the turn of events as Fielding, he certainly didn’t show it. ‘Mr Phillips, I had to take responsibility for your son’s safety as well as your daughter’s. I’m afraid the kidnapper double-bluffed us on this one. We couldn’t have guessed that.’

  ‘Then you should have left well alone,’ stormed Phillips. ‘Let me do it my way. He’s been scared off, now, and if we’ve lost him then we’ve lost Angela too. God knows what he’ll do to her.’

  If he hasn’t done it already, thought Fielding. Aloud he said, with a confidence he did not feel, ‘Try not to worry, Mr Phillips. He’ll be in touch again very soon, I’m sure of it. He wants your money not your daughter.’

  The kidnapper did not call again. Not that night. Not the next morning. Kidnaps were such a rare crime in the UK that there were few precedents. Those that did exist encouraged little optimism among the police team. And in the case of Angela Phillips some of the most important lessons learned in the past did not fully apply. The débâcle surrounding the abduction and murder of Lesley Whittle by the infamous Black Panther taught the importance of taking the press into police confidence and insuring a media clamp-down over kidnaps for as long as there was a chance of safely retrieving the victim. Parsons and his team had not had the luxury of choosing that option, because following the discovery of Angela’s shoe, they had promptly announced her missing and called for public help. Fielding suspected they would all be criticised for that sooner or later, but it was easy to be wise after the event.