Hidden Power

by Judith Cutler

  He snorted. ‘What planet are you on, Kate? It’s only secret stuff people would want to read. If you told them it was ordinary office waste they wouldn’t bother!’

  She wrung her hands. ‘But they said I’d come back so quick they couldn’t have—and it’s true, Mr Vernon, they hadn’t moved from their desks.’ Let him think it anyway. ‘In any case, they said the only thing that would have interested them would have been if it was news about their pay rises.’

  ‘Tch! Well, you were right to tell me, I suppose. But don’t do it again, for God’s sake, Kate. I mean, we’re part of a big operation here. Confidential information in the wrong hands could cost the organisation millions.’

  Kate stared, open-mouthed, open-eyed.

  ‘Oh, in share values, things like that,’ he said, offhand.

  ‘You mean there was stuff in your bin that was that important? My God!’ She covered her mouth, peering at him with frightened eyes.

  ‘Well, not this morning, perhaps,’ he admitted. ‘But it only goes to show, Kate.’

  ‘I’m really, really sorry.’ She might have been on the point of tears.

  ‘Well, it wasn’t the best of days for you yesterday, not by the sound of it. So I’m not surprised your stomach let you down. Let’s just forget all about it. So long as it doesn’t happen again. Tell you what!’ His voice changed to boyish enthusiasm. ‘I’ve just seen this mini-shredder in this catalogue. So cheap it could come out of petty cash. Now, what if I ordered one for this office?’

  Well, it could mean one of three things. His PA might shred stuff, she herself might shred it, or, being a man, Vernon might want to play with his new toy himself. Kate smiled. ‘It’d certainly add ten minutes to my cleaning time each day,’ she said, beaming.

  Rod. She’d had enough to chew on to push her worries about him to the back of her mind. But now they flooded back. Earnshaw should have been in touch with him by now, surely. But she mustn’t allow herself to phone and check. Not yet. If you chased after good news it would change to bad—that was what Cassie would say. So she made herself stroll down to the site shop. Milk; bread. She or Earnshaw could always use those. With luck she might run into punters. Or would it be better luck to speak to whoever ran the place? The shop was tucked away in a prefabricated building towards the less appealing end of the site. It’d almost certainly be on Sophisticasun’s hit list.

  But the door opened with a cheerful two-tone electronic beep on to what looked at first glance like an old-fashioned village store. There was no post office counter, however, and a closer inspection showed the shelves were far from full—just a token front row of tins or packets, with nothing behind. The vegetables were compost heap material. Not surprisingly she was the only customer. She picked up milk and sugar and a packet of cheese. She might even buy a Kate Potterish magazine. Yes, she’d always liked Bella, turning immediately to the recipes and then the stories. OK, it was the previous week’s, but she wasn’t buying it for the latest news from the Middle East, was she?

  The middle-aged man behind the counter smiled at her wanly, and responded to her cheery greeting with a thread of a voice. Flu or his normal state? He looked as if some weeks ago someone had rubbed him out and not bothered to colour him in again. She felt over-large, over-bright. Lowering her voice to match his, she produced a much shyer smile, and handed over her booty. He told her the total. She mustn’t let her eyes widen. She’d have paid less than half that at Tesco. But she handed over a folded flyer without comment. Then she ventured, as if embarrassed, ‘I suppose you don’t do staff discount, do you?’

  ‘Work here, do you?’

  ‘A cleaner.’

  ‘Ah, well you’ll be agency, like. I’m afraid it’s only full-time staff who get discount,’ he whispered. She shrugged. ‘No offence, I hope.’

  She let him count her change into her palm. Feeling that Kate Potter might well allow herself to be miffed (all that hard-earned money wasted, for goodness’ sake!) she cast a disparaging look about the place. ‘Not much of a turnover here.’

  He shook his head sadly. ‘People mainly bring their own. But we’re due for an upgrade as part of the refurbishment scheme.’

  ‘So is this shop yours or theirs?’

  ‘Oh, I’m just the manager. I’m really looking forward to the new establishment. It won’t be the same as this of course.’ He sounded regretful.

  ‘What’ll be different?’

  ‘Oh, the stock. We’ll be dealing in videos—and DVDs, of course. And applying for a wines and spirits licence. And there’ll be a hair and beauty salon, too—but I shall have nothing to do with those.’

  ‘When will all this be happening?’

  His laugh sounded offended. ‘Proper Little Miss Nosey, aren’t you?’

  She let her mouth droop. ‘Sorry. It’s just nice to talk to someone else here. I mean, Mr Vernon’s very nice, very nice indeed, but he’s my boss, and you can’t have a natter with your boss, can you?’

  ‘Hmm.’ Was he mollified?

  ‘And the girls in the office are a bit—well, I suppose they’re very busy.’

  He looked at his watch. ‘As a matter of fact, I’m just expecting a delivery. So if that’s all?’

  He handed her her purchases in a carrier bag made of the thinnest polythene she’d ever seen. Would it get to the bike before splitting? Not trusting it, she carried it like a favourite cat, pressing it to her chest and supporting it underneath. She’d just stowed the contents in her panniers when she heard the rumble of a heavy vehicle. Expecting it to be the shop delivery, she barely glanced up. Bread? Potatoes? No. Office Gardens. Hell. All that work on Vernon’s plants and they were to be replaced. Or was it foliage for the conference room? In which case, why all that business about her buying flowers for Mrs Vernon’s vases? And why, instead of heading for the admin block, was the van heading for the furthest corner of the grounds?

  Abandoning the bike again, she followed, walking as if she were entitled to be there. There weren’t any punters to stop her, but there, where the road dropped down to some greenhouses that had seen better days, were Gary Vernon, clutching a clipboard, and the shop manager. She pulled back behind a lollypop-shaped evergreen. Though he was walking purposefully he seemed to be stopping every twenty or thirty yards to look around him. There was no more cover between her and the glasshouses. Should she risk following him with some specious excuse? Or was discretion the better part of valour, given that her carelessness had already irritated him, and her questioning annoyed the shop manager? On the whole, she thought a tactical withdrawal the best move. Waiting till they were engrossed in conversation and apparently checking items on Vernon’s board, she slipped as quietly as she could back to her bike. At least she had the number of the van and the name on the side. No, she wouldn’t have access to the police computer herself, but her colleagues would. They’d even have a homely Yellow Pages to see if Office Gardens was a bona-fide firm. Yes, she’d done her bit, hadn’t she?

  It was almost twelve before Kate could pull into the nearest lay-by and check for phone messages. Nothing. Earnshaw? She’d risk phoning her. And got an immediate invitation to leave a message. Hell. No point in hanging around worrying, not when she could be getting closer to Earnshaw’s cottage and worrying there.

  Except that that was where Craig would be working. All day. She could have done without seeing him It would be nice, colleague to colleague, to tell him that she’d been softening up Vernon on his behalf, but he’d see it as a sign of weakness on her part, no doubt about that.

  A phone box provided a solution. Pulling over, she dialled and jammed money in as fast as her fumbling fingers could manage. Earnshaw’s answerphone.

  OK. What about Earnshaw’s official police number? It was safe enough to use that from a call box.

  Earnshaw picked up the receiver first ring.

  ‘It’s Kate—’ She got one sentence before Earnshaw cut the connection: ‘Get yourself into the Cathedral coffee shop—now.’
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br />   Chapter 17

  Scenarios shuffled and collapsed in Kate’s imagination as if she were shaking a kaleidoscope. Not pretty patterns, either, any of them. Mustn’t look at them. Any of them.

  The bloody Honda was no more use than a pushbike, not up hills—if only she’d got a firm time from Knowles for its upgrade. But if—what if—? Perhaps she wouldn’t be staying If there was anything wrong with Rod she’d throw the whole job—

  No! There mustn’t be anything wrong with Rod. But a man who’d just used the L word wouldn’t stay silent like this without good reason. A stakeout—no, Rod was too senior an officer to be involved at that level. Illness. That was what she feared most, after a mate’s death last year. But Rod looked after his heart a healthy diet, lots of exercise. Stress: that was the downside. Stress came with the rank. Especially with pressure from all directions to find, the callous killers of a harmless old man. Most of all from inside yourself, if you were as conscientious as Rod. And pressure caused not just heart attacks but strokes. What if he’d had a stroke? Paralysis. Losing his speech. Incontinence. How would he cope with that? How would she cope, working and coming home to look after him? But he was young enough to recover. Look at that writer—full-time literary editor of one of the quality.. Sundays. He was OK. But what about the Frenchman, who’d only been able to communicate with one eyelid? Oh, God—not that, not for Rod he’d rather be dead. Anyone would.

  It might not be illness at all What if he’d interrupted a burglar Not in the course of duty. Someone breaking into his own home. A simple break-in. Or a revenge attack. Making enemies of violent men came with the territory too.

  For God’s sake, Kate: get grip. He’s doing what you’ve been doing—working. He’s good at his job. He keeps fit. He’s simply too busy to phone. And he’ll be wary about contacting you at all anyway.

  The traffic slowed to about five miles an hour. Now what? Swearing like a trooper, no, like Earnshaw, she realised they’d caught up with a huge hay-wagon’: It was loaded so high it was brushing the trees that overhung the road, leaving a trail of leaves and twigs and, of course, hay. Or was it straw? Whatever it was, it was part of an unsafe load, and if she could have caught up with the driver she’d have had him at the nearest weighbridge before he could say harvest. Fat chance of catching anything except cold on this bloody bike.

  She’d have known if anything had happened to him. Anything really bad. Surely she’d have known. She’d known the instant Robin died. There’d been no need for the superintendent in charge of the failed raid to trail into her A and E cubicle and try to break the news through the masses of painkiller they were flooding into her. No need. But then, she’d known Robin for such a long time: they’d been friends, the closest of friends, long before they’d become lovers. She’d even known when Graham had been involved in a motorway pile-up. So, no: nothing could have happened to Rod. OK, she was stupidly near to screaming with worry and fear. But it was worry and fear for someone still alive. She’d have gone on oath.

  The outskirts of Exeter: this was where the Honda would shine. She nipped sharply in and out of the near-stationary traffic. So she’d always deplored it when bikes had done it to her. Tough. Close season for good manners. Kate’s at least.

  There were usually parking spaces in the multi-storey on the river side of the ring road. OK, it wasn’t the nearest car park to the Cathedral, but Craig had insisted that this was the best option—after all, it was easy enough to leg it over the pedestrian bridge, across one road and then into the Close. She’d just have to trust Craig’s judgement.

  The Cathedral greeted her abruptly: far from being a haven of peace, it was crawling with hard-hatted men setting up a stage and sound system. She had to weave and dodge—were all the natives of Exeter old or infirm?—down to the refectory. And there was Earnshaw, stolid, impregnable, wading through a slice of what looked like carrot cake.

  ‘Get yourself a coffee and come and sit down.’ It wasn’t just the tone of voice that said she’d reveal nothing until Kate had carried out orders; her whole body insisted. But Kate was shaking so much by the time she’d brought her tray over to the communal table Earnshaw had commandeered, that she had to go back for paper serviettes to mop the milk she’d slopped.

  ‘Craig’s put in an official complaint against you. That’s just for starters.’

  Kate sat straighter. ‘Just at the moment I don’t give a flying fuck about Craig. The only things I’m worrying about are passing on information I picked up this morning and Rod—’

  ‘You girls and love. You’ve got a bloody job to do. You and your bloody private life—’

  ‘What’s the news of Rod?’

  ‘I don’t—I really don’t—know what you’re making such a sodding song and dance about.’

  ‘Is he all right?’

  ‘As far as I know.’

  ‘So why didn’t he answer my calls?’

  ‘Because he’d got something more important to do, you stupid bitch One of your mates was so badly beaten up they thought they’d lose him So Rod—who sounds a decent officer, with his priorities right, unlike some I could mention—spends the night at the hospital with the man’s family. And in hospitals, you may recall, you can’t use mobile phones. Does that suit your ladyship? Because I’m telling you, Power, any more of your amateur dramatics and you’re off my team. And probably off this man Rod’s visiting list, too, if he’s got any sense. All these hysterics. For God’s sake!’

  ‘You don’t want an update then? Jesus, I—the loo.’ This time her stomach upset was for real. And the queue was full of old ladies gossiping and ‘after-you-ing’ and taking forever once they’d reached a cubicle. And the lavatory pan Kate eventually knelt before hadn’t flushed properly. She vomited till there was nothing left but bile. So this was what they meant by sick with worry.

  At last she was able to tidy herself up. She might as well take off the cleaner’s overall: she could roll it up and stuff it in her bag. And even if she were off the case, she’d better retrieve from her bra the documents she’d filched.

  If only Earnshaw hadn’t seen them as a peace offering. ‘Humph. So you did do some work this morning.’ She stowed them grudgingly in her bag.

  She mustn’t rise to the bait. ‘Now, when I told Vernon I’d left stuff unshredded while I threw up—yes, same problem at work—he nearly shat himself. If certain information got into the wrong hands, he said, it could cost the organisation millions. He’s talking about getting his own personal shredder: you never know, he may even let me use it.’ Earnshaw nodded an approximation of approval. ‘Vernon was so sorry for my wan face this morning he promised to try to get me on the Saturday roster. He showed me round a couple of the apartments: before and after refurbishment.’

  ‘Any surveillance cameras?’

  ‘In the older one. I didn’t see the bedroom in the posh one.’

  ‘Maybe you will. OK?’

  ‘At one point, I said that whoever was supposed to be maintaining the grounds was doing a pretty crap job and even Craig would be better. Vernon said he didn’t want any domestics on his patch, which interested me.’

  ‘Don’t see why it should: the residents wouldn’t like to see you and Craig yelling blue murder at each other.’

  ‘Ah. But, as I told him, they wouldn’t because we’d be working at different times. No, Ma’am, what interested me was the word he used. “Domestics.” It’s a bit of our lingo, surely?’ Earnshaw fixed her with a hard stare. ‘OK. I’ll get it checked out. Not that the computers have suggested a police background—and I can assure your ladyship we have been doing our homework too.’

  Again Kate kept her cool. ‘And he may want me to baby-sit a bit more often. Now he knows Craig’s walked out on me. And there’s something that may be interesting about office plants.’

  ‘That’s what one of those memos was about.’

  ‘Right. Anyway, this morning I popped into the shop and then saw this delivery…’

  She gave
a full account, ending with the van’s details. If she expected half a brownie point, she didn’t get one.

  ‘You’re setting up contacts like this and you think of walking out on the job? You’re off your head, girl. Women like me have had to bust our flaming guts to get where we are. You swan in here, all lady muck, tell us you’re not happy because lover-boy back home didn’t phone: I didn’t fight and crawl my way up through the ranks for the likes of you!’

  ‘The other thing,’ Kate continued, as if Earnshaw hadn’t spoken, ‘is that there’s a flaw in your and Knowles’s domestic arrangements. Why doesn’t your husband of all these years live with you? A bit hypocritical of you two to be telling Craig and me to sort ourselves out if you two have split up, isn’t it?’

  ‘Fuck. But surely—’

  ‘Vernon gives the impression he really likes me—he’s genuinely worried when he thinks Craig may be violent towards me. He’s worried I may be hard up. He doesn’t live far from you, and I’d say he’s the sort of man who might want to come and talk to you about what should be done.’

  ‘Sounds a decent man. What a pity he’s a criminal dealing with drugs and laundering terrorists’ money. At least, the people he works for. I’d suspect him as well—the drugs side.’

  Kate dug in her bag. ‘I also got this number—someone might want to check. A car out on Berry Head. It stuck out like a sore thumb. You know, the sort of classy, tarted-up Audi that drug dealers use?’ But perhaps Exeter dealers were more discreet than Brummie ones. She added, ‘Tinted windows, alloys, more sound than’s decent? That sort of car. The same time as the Vernons were taking their kids to fly their kites.’

  ‘No one would be that stupid.’ All the same Earnshaw wrote down the number.

  ‘Or careless. Or arrogant. That’s what I thought. Then I started to wonder… After all, the people in Brum—yes, it’s a West Midlands reg—have to get their stuff from somewhere. As I said, a small boat could use Cockwood. It’d be nice to get some surveillance cameras of our own set up there. And I’m sure our colleagues are keeping an eye on suspicious activities on Dartmoor—perhaps that could be stepped up.’