by Adam Baron
‘So, you set it up from the start? Before you met him? You went out with him to sell the story?’
‘And I got nearly forty grand for it. It was a lot because there were two of them.’
‘And that’s what Alison did? To Jack Draper?’
‘That’s right. She knew all along. It goes on all the time and footballers are too dim to realize. But I have to say that I was surprised that Alison was doing it. She was a bit too straight, and I can’t imagine what her mother would have said. But McKenna got her to do it. Somehow he managed to persuade her.’
I hadn’t been taking any notes but I reached for a pen.
‘McKenna?’
‘Yeah, McKenna. I saw her talking to him at the ground one day. That’s how I knew it was him.’
‘Jack Draper’s agent. Jeff McKenna?’
‘Right,’ she said. ‘You know about him, then?’
‘Not really. Tell me.’
‘I will if you give me a chance. He’s the guy I sat up all night hiding from in South Mimms fucking service boring station,’ Cheryl said. ‘The twat I reckon killed her.’
Cheryl lit another cigarette. She had her hands under control this time. I waited until she’d taken another deep drag and set it down on the saucer I’d pushed towards her.
‘It wasn’t Draper, then?’
She pulled a face. ‘Why would he kill Alison?’
I shrugged. ‘He was mad at her, for going to the press?’
‘I’d be dead three times over.’
‘He just lost it, he went crazy when he realized what she’d done to him…’
‘Have you met Draper?’
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Well then. Did he look the type who’d suddenly go crazy? I’ve never met someone so in control of himself.’
‘If he’s getting what he wants,’ I said.
Cheryl gave me a look that said I was welcome to think it was Draper, she wasn’t going to argue. I sat back in my chair. The sun found my window and sent a javelin of light through the haze of smoke, into Cheryl’s eyes. They looked like wasps whose nest was on fire.
‘Tell me how McKenna’s involved? Why kill her? Why would he go after you?’
Cheryl nodded. I knew what she was going to say. ‘The two players I was shagging. They were both represented by McKenna.’
‘And he set them up?’
‘Very clever. It was his idea. I didn’t really know any players then. He got in touch with me, after I’d met him at a party. He told me he’d introduce me to a player. Well not introduce, exactly, he couldn’t do that. He just told me where the players would be, and which one to go for. Jeff had been getting him pissed all night in this club but he left when I showed up. Just been packed in by his TV presenter bird had Mr Bigshot little-dick defender. I sat next to him and after a while he bought me a drink.’
‘And you started seeing him?’
‘Yeah. And Jeff set up the deal with the papers.’
‘With one of his own clients?’
‘TWo actually. I met the other one a week later. Jeff thought it’d be a bigger story.’
‘And he took a cut?’
‘TWenty per cent from me. Probably took a slice from the People as well.’
‘And you think he did this with Alison? Set Jack up with him?’
I thought about what Louise Draper had told me. McKenna, not inviting her to parties. It sounded like Jack and Jeff McKenna had been close. If anyone would have known about Jack’s marital difficulties it would have been him. Maybe McKenna thought he was vulnerable.
‘I know he did. As far as I knew, I was the only one Jeff had done it with. Then Alison asked me. She said she was seeing someone though she wouldn’t say who, but that Jeff had set it up. She wanted to know if she was getting enough money.’
‘Was she?’
‘I didn’t think so. I told her to ask for more.’
‘And that’s why he killed her?’
‘No! She probably tried to blackmail him – she’d tell Draper if he didn’t pay her, something like that. Or maybe she wasn’t blackmailing him, she just thought it was wrong. I reckon she said she was going to tell Jack because she was in love with him. That’s the kind of girl Alison was; fall in love with the worst man two times over. A married footballer. Either way, Jeff would have been finished as a football agent if his clients had found out what he was doing to them.’
‘So he killed her?’
‘And obviously everyone thinks it was Jack. And I’m the only one who knows what he was up to.’
‘So you’re scared?’
‘I’m shitting myself. He’s a wanker, Jeff is. I was seeing him as well as the footballers, so I know. They were just stupid but he was vicious. He hurt me. He’d have cut me if I hadn’t been seeing other blokes. When Alison was killed I thought it was him right off.’
‘But you didn’t say anything, to the police?’
‘I wasn’t going to get involved. They’d go and talk to Jeff and he’d know I’d grassed him. He’s not the sort of person you grass. I didn’t want to go anywhere near the Old Bill. I’d just as soon have stayed right out of it.’
‘Until now. Why come to me? Has he threatened you?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘He’s not that stupid.’ Cheryl suddenly looked very, very scared indeed. ‘But he knows what I know. I thought he’d forgotten about me, hadn’t heard a word from him. I began to relax. But he came round, yesterday afternoon. He just showed up at my house, ‘bout five o’clock. He never did that, he always called. I’d nipped out for some fags and it was fucking lucky I had.’ She drew on her cigarette, letting the smoke find its own way out of her mouth as she went on. ‘I was coming back when I saw him outside my flat. He had a bag in his hand. He was looking in my windows. I hid behind a van. He rang the bell again and then just sat in his car, watching. I was crapping myself. My car was parked down the street and I got in it. I drove off but he saw me and I had to fucking steam away. I lost him, thank God. That’s when I remembered you.’
‘And you’ve been driving all night?’
‘I couldn’t think of anyone he didn’t know. All I could think of was how vicious he was. I sat in a shithole of a pub until closing. Nearly let some twat take me home just so I’d be safe somewhere. But he was foul. I just drove and drove and found myself on the M25. I kept thinking he was still after me. My car is a bit distinctive. When I was sure he wasn’t I stopped in an all-night place. Didn’t have enough cash for a room. I called you and then hit the coffee.’ She pulled on her cigarette again, the angry orange a match for her eyes. She looked at the stub between her fingers.
‘Whoever said these things are bad for you?’ Cheryl said.
Chapter Twenty
I passed CHERYL 1 on the way to the Mazda. It was a canary-yellow Escort with a lot of extra plastic and a stuffed animal suckered to the inside window like a laboratory animal being suffocated. Cheryl was still upstairs. She was terrified of going anywhere in her car and I’d told her she could catch up on some sleep on my sofabed, if she liked.
‘Is it comfortable?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It’s comfortable.’
‘Are there any sheets for it?’
‘There are but they aren’t clean. I wouldn’t bother with them.’
Cheryl told me that she’d probably slept on worse, and I believed her.
There were no police outside my flat when I got there and I was surprised. I’d gone there to tell them about McKenna. I hadn’t promised Cheryl I wouldn’t. There was no point putting off speaking to them, especially now that I had McKenna’s name to give them. I wondered why they weren’t there – they’d sounded pretty keen to speak to me. It wasn’t long before I knew the answer.
I pulled off down towards Russell Square. I’d decided not to call Draper. I wanted some background on McKenna but Draper hadn’t been too stable yesterday, I didn’t know how he’d react. He might have jumped in a car and got to McKenna before I did. It was to McKenn
a’s office that I was going, but I didn’t call him either. I wanted to surprise him by just showing up. I was pumped up to be doing something, impatient to get across town.
Tapping my feet at a light I thought about what Cheryl had said, about Alison. She’d been surprised at what her friend had done and I was too. I’d begun to build a picture of the girl whose body I’d found and what she’d done just didn’t fit it. I told myself I was being sentimental. Just because the girl had got herself killed, it didn’t mean she wasn’t capable of some pretty shabby behaviour beforehand. I thought about what all the players had told me – she was such a nice girl – and shrugged it off as well. They’d probably reacted the same way I had. Dead people aren’t saints. They’re just unlucky.
I took the back way, driving through Bloomsbury, joining the Euston Road at Great Portland Street. After twenty-five minutes I was pulling through the forecourt of Marylebone Station towards Lisson Grove. I’d made good time. I turned off Lisson Grove onto Broadley Street, still trying to work out just exactly how to play it. Pretend to be a potential client? An Albanian refugee with a wicked left foot and a dodgy marriage? No. What about a potential story – I’d seen secret FA files which revealed that the Wembley plans were being scrapped and the new National Stadium was actually going to be built in Stockholm. I was putting this idea to one side when I ran into traffic.
The drains were backing up and the streets ran with slews of cold brown water. The traffic was stationary and it stayed that way for at least ten minutes, even though some of the people behind me did their best to get it all going again by leaning on their horns. I was close enough to the place so I parked up. I pulled the door handle and looked out, the water running high up over the kerb and onto the pavement.
‘Probably a burst water main,’ I said to no one, as I stepped over the dirty river. I locked the car and stuck five twenties in the meter standing up out of the murky water.
When I got round the corner onto Salisbury Street I saw what the real reason for the hold-up was. Three police cars were blocking the road ahead. A van with its lights flashing was pulling up from the other end of the street to add to the problem. I shrugged. I glanced up at the street name. I was on a row of attractive Georgian houses, white stucco giving way to red-brick. I set myself. I counted down the numbers and saw that I was only three or four buildings away from McKenna’s office. I started walking towards it.
‘What the fuck are you doing here?’
She’d been stepping out of the building when she’d seen me. It was another fine Georgian property, but this one converted into offices. It had a black smoked-glass frontage instead of the railings and heavy painted door of its neighbours. It was number one three four. McKenna’s building. I was only a few feet away from it.
‘Well?’
She was wearing the same maroon jacket over a plain white blouse. She’d stopped on the steps of the building when she’d seen me and when I heard her voice I stopped too. We looked at each other, from twenty yards away. It was a complete shock, to both of us. Like running into your ex at a party. Weird. Neither of us moved. Then DI Coombes marched out onto the street towards me until she was standing a foot away, her hands high up on her hips.
I smiled. ‘Hello.’
Coombes stuck her chin out towards me. She was a few notches less than pleased. ‘The elusive Mr Rucker. Private detective, as I have now discovered since we met. Back at eleven, that little cunt said. Think I enjoy sitting outside your flat? Once again – what the hell are you doing here?’
I didn’t know what to say. I was on my back foot but I made every attempt not to show it.
‘Well?’
‘Oh. DS Coombes. I was going to call you.’
‘Were you? How thoughtful. What about?’
‘McKenna. Jeff McKenna. Jack Draper’s agent.’
‘What about him?’
‘I was coming just to see him.’
‘Evidently. Why?’
‘Why? Listen,’ I said.
‘I can hear you.’
‘I’m working for Draper’s wife. Louise. She wants me to find her husband.’
‘Are you now?’ Coombes pursed what should have been her lips and frowned at me, her eyes pinching. Her freckles looked like spats of spilled latte. ‘Trying to find him, are we? Find him like you did the other night? Hmm?’ I let her go on. ‘We got you on CCTV, following him through Bethnal Green. Also, two people said they saw someone looks like you chatting away to Draper in the bar that just happens to be right outside your house. Something you want to tell me, is there? Well? Working for his wife? Not him?’
I shook my head. ‘He tried to hire me, okay? He’d been getting harassed.’
‘His wife told us. And?’
‘We got in a fight. I said no, he’d have to do without me. Then I changed my mind and chased round all night to find him.’
‘So you must have seen him going into her apartment.’
‘Must I?’
‘The two noddies who stopped you did and they weren’t even looking for him.’
‘Policemen are observant, aren’t they?’
‘Oh yes. So, Draper tried to hire you and you didn’t mention this? You didn’t think to tell us this?’
‘I would have,’ I said. ‘I was confused, okay? I just wanted to see what went on. If you put Draper in the square without me, what’s the harm? I figured you would. I was going to call you after speaking to McKenna.’
‘Were you? What do you want to see McKenna about?’
Wasn’t it obvious? ‘I’m working for Draper’s wife. I’m trying to find him, so naturally I want to speak to the man’s agent.’
‘That all?’
I looked at her, then shook my head. ‘No. It isn’t.’
‘No?’
‘Listen,’ I said. ‘Draper didn’t do it. I’m convinced of that.’ I looked away from her, to the back-up she had. She must have had the same idea. ‘I think McKenna might be involved.’
‘What makes you think that?’
‘I just found out. It was McKenna who set Draper up, with the press. He took Alison to the Sun. He got Alison to start seeing Draper so he could sell the story.’
She was surprised but took it in quickly.
‘How do you know that?’
‘Girl McKenna used in the past, scared shitless she’ll be next after Alison. She came to my office an hour ago. So maybe Alison threatened McKenna that she’d tell Draper what he’d been doing. Make sense? McKenna was stitching up other clients too.’
Coombes looked back towards the building she’d come out of, tried it, then nodded like she was tasting a good Côte Rôte. She let herself look a little impressed.
‘And you think McKenna killed her?’
‘Maybe, all I know is—’
‘Well, we’d better go inside and ask him then, hadn’t we? He’s at his desk.’
‘Right,’ I said, a little surprised. ‘Right.’
Coombes turned immediately and I followed her. Seeing Coombes was a shock but she seemed to accept what I’d told her. I followed her past two policemen guarding the door and into a small foyer. She headed for the stairs.
‘So, you had the same idea?’ I said.
‘Sorry?’
‘That McKenna was involved.’
Coombes didn’t seem to hear me. When she got to the top of the stairs Coombes turned left and stopped outside the open door to an office.
‘Mr McKenna,’ Coombes said, through the door. I could hear activity inside. ‘A Mr Rucker would like to ask you a few questions. Is that okay? Yes? Step inside, Mr Rucker, this way.’
I walked past Coombes and into the room, where there were five men in total plus McKenna, at his desk.
‘Go on, then,’ Coombes said, from behind me. ‘Ask Mr McKenna if he killed Alison Everly. Well, Mr Rucker? Go on. Ask him.’
I didn’t say anything. I could have asked my question and McKenna wouldn’t have denied it. He wouldn’t have said anything. The
knife in his neck looked to have gone straight through to the desk top. It was standing there, straight and firm. McKenna’s head was resting on a huge pillow of deep crimson that had run across the surface, snaking down one of the table legs to the floor.
‘Go on,’ Coombes said again, behind me. ‘Don’t be shy. Ask him.’
Part Three
Chapter Twenty-One
Noticing people. Spotting people who are acting differently. Spotting people trying too hard to act the same as everyone else. Seeing the preoccupations sitting just behind the eyes of someone when they’re doing something ostensibly normal, when they’re talking to you, smiling the big smile. It’s not difficult, really, or at least it shouldn’t be. Observation: you just have to make it your business, and then when it is your business try not to forget that. Then, after a while, not a lot will get past you.
When you’re a policeman it’s your job to do this. But there is, however, a problem. Most of the time you are identified as such, and normal circumstances no longer apply. I recently finished reading one of those popular science books that mentioned Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle and the idea is the same. You cannot accurately measure a system because by measuring it you are interfering. If you tell people you’re Old Bill, quite simply they behave differently. If you don’t tell them, they often know anyway or their suspicions put them on their guard. People look like they’re lying when in reality they’re just nervous. People innocent of the crime in question can seem guilty because they’ve actually done something else, something as mundane as failed to pay their TV licence. And then there are the people who are guilty, but since they either know or suspect you of being on the force, and the knowledge of their crime makes them prepared, they take care to appear innocent as a spring lamb with a good lawyer. As a policeman you have to accept this. Reading the somewhat baffling take on the universe(s) I’d recently finished I got the impression that Heisenberg, one hell of a physicist, would have made a pretty good copper too.
But no longer being a policeman I don’t have to worry about what people think of me. I don’t often interrogate people. I no longer make people feel uncomfortable simply because of the fact of what I do, or represent, and I occasionally have to remind myself how liberated this makes me feel. It isn’t often that people mistake me for Bill, so I usually have the liberty of not disturbing the system, of being able to fit in, of being able to observe without changing the status of what I see. It means that I can never get a warrant to search a house, or perform the scientific tests most modern detection now relies on, but it does give me the advantage of being able to watch, to let the truth simply reveal itself like the petals of a spring flower. Noticing the water droplets on the entrance bell of Alison Everly’s apartment building is an example of that. It didn’t get past me. It amazes me then, when I think of it, how I didn’t see any of the rest of it coming. None of it. How I didn’t fully realize until it was almost too late, when there was a silver bullet spinning across my living room towards my head. Now that it’s over it still amazes me but I realize why. It’s all about observation: you have to make it your business and then when it is your business try never, even for a minute, to forget that.
