He smiled, gladder than he knew that she’d come home at last. A small toast, he told himself. A glass or two of something decent in celebration. He found a bottle of Rioja in a cupboard downstairs. He uncorked it and poured himself a glass. Then he took it through to the kitchen, gazing at the stove, wondering whether to get something ready for when she woke. Would she be hungry? Did he have anything fresh he could knock into the kind of alfresco meal they’d always enjoyed together?
He decided that could wait. For the time being he’d just settle down and enjoy the wine. He sank into the chair at the end of the table. Then his eyes strayed to the laptop and he began to read. He was looking at Gabrielle’s in-box. She must have been reading the email on the screen. It was in French. It had arrived a couple of hours ago.
Ma petite, it went. Je suis si heureux de savoir que tout va bien pour toi. Tes photos de la petite Leila sont extraordinaires. Je suis très fier de toi et de tes efforts. Tu as toujours été courageuse, toujours tenace, mais maintenant plus que jamais. Ca me fait énormement plaisir de te donner un peu d’argent. Ca a été merveilleux de te revoir après toutes ces années. Reviens à Paris une fois de plus. Et reste plus longtemps. Je t’embrasse. Philippe.
Faraday, still nursing his glass of wine, read it again. This was somebody who knew Gabrielle very well. His name was Philippe. He’d seen photos of Leila that Gabrielle must have sent him and he wanted her to know how proud of her he was. It had been great to see her after all these years, and it had been an absolute pleasure to give her a little money. She must come to Paris again. And this time she must stay longer.
Faraday looked up, trying to focus on the clock above the stove. ‘A little money’ was clearly an understatement. This was the man who had made Leila’s transfer to the UK possible. This was the guy who’d given her £87,000. Only days ago, over the meal in the pub, Gabrielle had told him the money had come from a rich Arab she’d met through a friend at the university in Orleans. Not some old flame from Paris. She’d been lying to him. And now Philippe couldn’t wait for her return.
For a while he did nothing. He could hear the tick of the clock and the sigh of the wind in the trees beside the harbour. Then came the distant cry of a solitary curlew, way out in the darkness, haunting, almost spectral. Gabrielle’s bag was on the floor in the corner of the kitchen. Everything that mattered to her was inside it. If this sudden glimpse into her private life wasn’t to tip him back into a kind of madness, then he knew he had to find out more.
The wallet she used for money and credit cards and scribbled notes on scraps of paper was at the bottom of the bag. He began to go through it, item by item, methodical, driven, fearful of what he might find. In some respects, he thought, this is a crime scene. You steal into someone’s secrets. And then you steal out again.
The card was tucked behind her blood donor details. Philippe Stern. A Paris address in the 8th arrondissement. Maybe a shop of some kind. Objets d’art et tapisseries. Faraday carefully noted down the details, then slipped the wallet back into her bag. The clock on the wall told him it was quarter to eight. He emptied his glass, re-corked the bottle and replaced it in the cupboard.
Then he got to his feet, checked to make sure he’d left no trace of his visit and left. An hour later he was on the top deck of the Isle of Wight car ferry, hanging over the rail in the windy darkness, thinking about the curlew again.
Mackenzie didn’t get back to Portsmouth until gone nine. He got off the train at the harbour station and walked the half-mile to Blake House. Winter let him in on the second buzz. He was watching Nature’s Great Events.
Mackenzie stood in front of the set. A meet with yet another journalist had put an extra spring in his step. She was Irish, he said. And she just loved the way he was taking a chainsaw to the British constitution.
‘Was that her phrase or yours, Baz?’
‘Hers, mush.’
‘What does it mean?’
‘Fuck knows. She was a good drinker though. Jameson. No ice. Leo fancied the arse off her. In fact he’s probably still at it.’
Baz wanted to know about Lou Sadler.
‘You met her?’
‘Yeah.’
‘So why didn’t you phone me? Afterwards?’
‘I didn’t think it was necessary.’
‘Why not?’
‘She’s talking silly money.’
‘How much?’
‘Two hundred and fifty grand. She says that’s all she can manage.’
‘She’s got it then. She must have.’
‘The toot? Of course she has. God knows what she’s done with it by now. Sold it on, I imagine.’
‘Yeah? Who to?’
‘Haven’t a clue, Baz.’ Winter smothered a yawn. ‘She’ll be well connected, that woman. Big client base. Loads of the right kind of punters. London? Southampton? Bournemouth? Poole? I wouldn’t know where to start.’
Mackenzie nodded. To Winter’s surprise he hadn’t tossed his toys out of the pram.
‘What about Johnny?’ he asked.
‘They nailed him. Definitely.’
‘Who’s “they”?’
‘She’s got a friend, a big guy half her age, Max. Turns out Max is the brother of the tom Holman had been shagging. Our Johnny was way out of line. Plus he was sitting on all that toot.’
‘My toot.’
‘Yes, Baz. Your toot.’
‘So they killed him? Is that what you’re saying?’
‘Yeah. Must have done a nice job too. Class woman. Very canny.’
Mackenzie was having a think. Winter asked him to move. A line of grizzly bears was stationed at the top of a waterfall, scooping up salmon after leaping salmon.
‘You’re right, mush,’ Mackenzie said at last. ‘Two hundred and fifty K’s a joke. So what do we do?’
‘We let her sweat. Give it a day or two, she’ll come back, I know she will. But there’s no way we’re going to get anywhere near a million.’
‘We have to.’
‘It won’t happen, Baz. I’m telling you now.’
‘How much then?’
‘Maybe five hundred grand? It depends what’s happening down the line. She may not have done the deal yet. She’s been busy the last couple of days, tucked up with my ex-colleagues.’
‘She told you about that?’
‘Yeah. She’s done pretty well so far. They’ve bailed her and lover boy, all the usual bollocks, so they definitely haven’t given up.’
‘But you think she’s home safe?’
‘Yeah. Unless we grass her up with Holman’s gear. In which case she’s probably fucked. It’s odds on that stuff has her DNA on it. Or maybe Max’s.’
‘And mine?’
‘Yes, Baz.’
Mackenzie nodded, his eyes turning to the screen. The biggest grizzly had just nabbed another salmon. Mackenzie was looking thoughtful.
‘She understands we’re serious?’ he said at last.
‘Oh yeah. She understands that.’
‘Excellent, mush.’ Mackenzie stepped towards the door. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’
Chapter Thirty-Four
THURSDAY, 19 FEBRUARY 2009. 08.02
Faraday launched what he called the second phase of Operation Gosling at the morning squad meet in Ryde. Thanks to some determined lobbying by Parsons, Willard had OK’d the return of the D/Cs who’d been stood down the previous day. It now fell to Faraday to get them re-motivated.
It was obvious to everyone in the room that something had happened to him overnight. He was paler than ever, the bones of his face starting to show, and his voice had dropped to a near-whisper. Twice, people at the back of the room had to ask him to speak up and both times he seemed to have difficulty understanding the request. Suttle, standing near him, began to wonder whether there was a graceful way of taking over.
It wasn’t necessary. Faraday kept his remarks to the minimum. Oobik and Sadler, he reminded everyone, had been released yesterday morning on police bail. Oobik h
ad surrendered his passport and both of them were obliged to report weekly to Newport police station. As far as the interviews were concerned, they’d both been pressed hard, but Gosling still lacked the evidence to make the decisive breakthrough. In his view both remained prime suspects for the murder of Johnny Holman and for associated narcotics offences, but the difficulty lay in proving it. The kind of information that would have justified an application to the magistrates for a warrant of further detention simply wasn’t available within the specified time limits. Hence their release.
The job now, said Faraday, was to take a longer, harder, more considered look at Gosling. A lot of this work would be intel-based: trying to establish the exact pattern of person-to-person contacts that webbed the events of last week. Nailing this stuff down, drawing up a timeline, making it lawyer-proof would take a great deal of effort and patience, but before they confronted Sadler and Oobik again, it had to be done.
The most promising line of enquiry, he said, related to the disposal of the body. In that respect a company called Freezee would be investigated, and on the basis of information already acquired that work would start at once. Some detectives would be making calls around the island. A small task force, backed by a Scenes of Crime team, would be heading for west London. Still further north there were enquiries to be made in the Lake District.
He looked around, squinting in the fierce throw of morning sunlight through the window, and Suttle realised how old he looked, and how suddenly lost.
‘Coffee, boss?’ he said, taking him by the arm.
To Winter’s immense satisfaction, Sadler belled him mid-morning. There was no way she wanted to have a conversation on the phone. She was working her arse off trying to sort out a couple of business problems and suggested he come over to the island. She’d be free around one. She had a new proposal in mind. She might even buy him lunch.
Winter, far too canny to take any of this at face value, got in touch with Mackenzie. Under the circumstances, meeting Sadler alone was a risk he wasn’t prepared to take. They were already talking serious amounts of money, and he’d no desire to be taken hostage as part of ongoing negotiations. In his view, he told Bazza, these were people who’d already killed once. The stakes were high and getting higher. So what did Bazza suggest?
‘Leave it to me, mush. Ring me again when you’re ready to leave. You want company? I’ll sort something out.’
Billy Angel was waiting in the hovercraft terminal when Winter arrived. He was wearing a suit with a crested blue tie and there was a new-looking leather briefcase on the seat beside him. A white raincoat was folded over his lap. He didn’t bother to get up.
‘How come you guys get so much time off?’
‘Time off what?’
‘The job. Temeraire, isn’t it? That’s what Mackenzie told me.’
‘I binned that a while ago. I’m part time now. Holiday relief, like.’ He had a nasal Brummie accent which somehow matched the pale face and the dead eyes. He didn’t smile much.
A queue was forming at the door. Winter bought a ticket and rejoined Angel as the passengers shuffled out into the breezy sunshine. Curls of seaweed blew across the big ramp that led down to the sea. The hovercraft was less than half full. Winter squeezed himself into a window seat. Angel joined him.
A roar from the gas turbine lifted the hovercraft as it pirouetted sideways down the ramp. The pilot kicked it straight and there was a tiny jolt as it settled on the water and began to accelerate away. Winter was aware of Angel beside him. He had an almost animal presence, something you could probably sense in a darkened room, and Winter watched while he stooped for his briefcase, knowing that he didn’t like this man at all. The bitten nails. The small stubby fingers. The diver’s watch. The way he was always moving, shifting his weight, looking round. Winter was wondering whether Mackenzie had any more little errands in store for him when Angel pulled a newspaper out of the briefcase and passed it across.
‘Page 6,’ he muttered.
Winter had forgotten about yesterday’s Daily Telegraph. He opened the paper and flicked through it. The main story on page 6 was headlined would-be mayor reclaims the streets, beneath it a photo that chilled him to the marrow. Colin Leyman was sitting in his hospital bed, the huge face frozen in a rictus grin. Beside him, mugging for the camera, was Bazza Mackenzie.
‘I took that shot,’ Winter muttered. ‘That was me.’
His eyes skated through the text that followed. Pompey’s favourite son had decided to draw a line in the sand. Violence, he said, was disfiguring the city he loved. Pompey folk, both old and young, were frightened to go out at night. The police were too busy form-filling to do anything about it. And so the time had come for people to stand up and be counted. Why? Because even in your own home you could no longer be safe from attack. There followed an account of an un-provoked assault on Colin Leyman. The fact that he was unprepared to even talk about the incident was, to Mackenzie, proof that things were falling apart. Someone comes knocking at your door. You let them in. Next thing you know, they’ve broken your jaw. Not once but twice. What kind of society puts up with stuff like this? What kind of city surrenders itself to the law of the jungle?
Winter read no further. Billy Angel must have been through this piece a thousand times, and even now he couldn’t resist another look. Winter folded the paper and gave it back. He felt dirty beside this man. He felt a surge of overwhelming disgust.
‘All your own work, eh, Billy?’
Angel grunted something he didn’t catch. Then he told Winter that Mackenzie must have a pair of bollocks the size of melons.
‘Why?’
‘Why? Is that a serious question?’
‘I’m afraid it is.’
‘You don’t get it?’ He nodded down at the paper. ‘To have me take the guy out and then pull a stunt like that?’
‘You think that’s clever?’
‘I think it’s hysterical.’
‘Yeah? So what else turns you on?’
They took a taxi from Ryde to Cowes, barely talking. Sadler had given Winter directions to a restaurant near the waterfront. She said she was coming alone and added that she knew the people who owned it. They’d have a discreet table slightly apart from the main dining area. The food, she’d said, was great.
Winter had already told Angel that he wanted him posted outside for the duration of the meal. To his intense disappointment it was still sunny. A couple of hours in the rain, thought Winter, would have served the bastard right.
Lou Sadler was already in the restaurant when Winter arrived. He made sure she knew he had company, then settled himself at the table. Despite the low ceiling, the place was bright. They offered a decent selection of bottled lagers, and the smells from the kitchen were decidedly promising.
‘So who is he?’ Sadler was still watching the squat figure of Billy Angel. The net curtains gave him a slightly portly look as he shifted from foot to foot, like a figure from a child’s cartoon.
‘Mate of Mackenzie’s,’ Winter explained. ‘Total animal.’
‘Don’t you trust me?’
‘Not one bit.’ He flashed her a matey grin and reached for the menu. ‘Is this lot still on you?’
They both went for the leg of lamb en croute. Sadler, to Winter’s delight, was surprisingly good company. She told him a number of stories about her least favourite clients, some of whom Winter knew. One of them, a successful accountant with a Portsea-born wife and a tribe of kids, liked nothing better than a chapter of Christopher Robin and a sound thrashing. Another, an ex-Wren officer who’d made it to the upper reaches of IBM, always ordered at least two girls in her hunt for the ultimate orgasm.
When Winter was still in the Job, tales like these had often brightened chatter in the canteen, and now he found himself digging up one or two war stories of his own. How he’d led a raid on an Old Portsmouth brothel, only to fall into the arms of a student who turned tricks to pay her way through a PhD on some obscure French poet. How he�
��d specialised in kippering a long line of informants, only to get totally kippered himself by this very same tom.
‘She was wonderful,’ he said. ‘Smashing girl. Totally off her fucking head.’
He laughed at the memory, picking at the remains of his lamb. Sadler, her glass of Sauvignon still untouched, wanted to talk business.
‘Fine.’ Winter reached for his napkin, wiped his mouth. ‘How much?’
‘Three hundred and fifty K.’
‘Why so soon?’
‘Because we need to get this thing sorted.’
‘You need to get this thing sorted.’
‘Too right.’ She held his gaze. ‘So what do you say?’
Winter took his time. He sensed this was close to the limit of what Lou Sadler would probably pay, but he sensed something else as well. He no longer had the remotest interest in screwing any deal for the likes of Bazza Mackenzie. Sitting on the hovercraft, reading the latest instalment of his grotesque assault on the foothills of the mayorship, he’d had enough. He was in bad company. He no longer had the taste or the time for people like the guy in the road outside. Billy Angel was vermin. Bazza Mackenzie was off his head. People like that belonged in someone else’s life. All he wanted now was a safe way out.
‘That’s fine,’ he said. ‘So how do we do this?’
Sadler didn’t bother to hide her surprise.
‘You can agree? Just like that?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You don’t have to take it back to the boss?’
‘No. All I need are the details. Are we talking cash?’
‘I’m afraid so.’
Borrowed Light Page 38
