by Tom Bale
She sketched out the basics of a long, complex operation to monitor the activities of a man suspected of smuggling gold coins to finance terrorism.
‘In the course of our surveillance, it became apparent that the man was also a violent and prolific paedophile. There was evidence that he’d been abusing children for more than twenty years, but our lords and masters ruled that this couldn’t be allowed to jeopardise the enquiry. I was assured that these crimes would be investigated in due course, but only when they’d gathered every crumb of information on the gold smuggling.’ She snorted. ‘Priorities, eh?’
‘What did you do?’
‘Took matters into my own hands. I made certain that he was never able to contemplate sex with anyone, ever again.’
Harry nodded, as neutrally as he could. ‘And did you get caught?’
‘I thought I’d engineered a little window in the surveillance, but it turned out I was wrong. One of my diligent colleagues spotted me, and felt obliged to “do the right thing”.’ There was heavy irony in her voice.
‘I’m surprised I don’t remember this being in the news. The media would have gone crazy.’
‘They never got the chance. Officially, I was a mentally unstable citizen who’d attacked a man after a drunken argument about money. The victim went along with that, of course, and so did his lawyers. All the evidence of his paedophilia was quietly spirited away, and I spent the next four-and-a-half years at Her Majesty’s Pleasure.’
Harry let her take a break from what was obviously a difficult subject to discuss. They’d passed through several villages and were now on the A142, heading south to join the A14. The sky overhead was growing darker, a few spots of rain appearing on the windscreen. Miserable weather. He thought of Alice, stuck in a house with people she didn’t like. What had she said? They make me uncomfortable.
‘Tell me about Greg,’ he said. ‘I can’t understand why he risked so much, digging into the affairs of a man like Laird. Keri says he went on with his enquiries while you were in prison.’
‘That’s right.’
‘But why, when you two had split up?’
‘Because he was a good man. Genuinely a good man.’
‘Okay.’ Harry waited. And couldn’t help but laugh at her failure to elaborate. ‘Please, Ruth. I only want to know what he was trying to find.’
She shook her head. Struggling with frustration, Harry aimed what he knew was a low blow.
‘Keri suggested there might have been a relationship once.’
‘What?’
‘Between you and Laird.’
‘Did she?’ Ruth sounded intrigued, rather than offended. ‘I always thought there was an element of competition in her attitude towards me. Part of the reason she seduced Greg.’
‘Hold on.’ Harry was confused, not least because she seemed to be admitting to the relationship. ‘Competition for what?’
‘She was Laird’s favourite for a time. She probably didn’t admit that, did she? As with most guys in his position, Laird liked to sample the merchandise. In Keri’s case it became quite serious – until Laird lost interest. That was why Greg worked so hard to befriend her. He thought she’d know more than the other girls.’
‘He thought? Don’t you mean you thought?’ Harry, annoyed by Ruth’s attitude to Keri, was in no mood to go easy on her. ‘Because Greg was doing all this for you, wasn’t he? A favour that cost him his life. So there must have been a very good reason.’
‘There was,’ Ruth conceded. ‘Laird took something from me.’
‘Okay.’ Now we’re getting somewhere, he thought. ‘I know I keep pressing, but given what’s at stake here – the danger my family are in – I have to understand what’s motivating you.’
‘My son,’ Ruth said brusquely. ‘That’s what motivates me, all right? Nathan Laird took my son from me.’
Fifty-Nine
Alice didn’t lose consciousness – or at least she didn’t think so – but there was a moment of overload, when the fear and panic and adrenalin obscured her ability to process the world around her.
And then she came back to find she had rolled over, somehow, and was lying in the soft depression in the earth, staring up at a canopy of golden leaves, the rain dripping hard on her face. Her arms were still enfolded around the carrier: they ached from the effort of taking her weight, protecting Evie from being crushed as she fell. But had she succeeded?
She held her breath until Evie made a sound; a shuddering gasp. Tiny feet prodded her in the stomach. What are we doing, Mummy? Get up!
Then Michael’s face loomed above her, still disgustingly handsome despite the sheen of rain and sweat on his forehead. He wore a wide-eyed expression of horror.
‘Alice, oh thank God! You’re alive!’
As he reached out, her whole body convulsed. She pushed his hand away but he leaned in, grabbed her arm and squeezed it tight.
‘Don’t fight, Alice. You’re safe, Evie’s safe, I promise. Just relax …’
‘Leave me alone!’ She went on struggling but it was hopeless, lying on her back, with Michael angled over her. So she froze instead, the way an animal will freeze in the face of a predator it cannot defeat.
Michael gazed at her, and for a moment there seemed to be a real hunger in his eyes. Then he released her arm and rested back on his knees. His chin dropped to his chest as he took several huge breaths.
‘Thank God. We were so worried, Alice. So worried that Renshaw had done something terrible.’
Michael hadn’t given any thought to what he would say when he caught her. He rarely bothered to plan out his encounters with women. Better to keep it loose, rely on his ability to read the character and the moment.
He’d done that now, quite brilliantly. In an instant, he had it all there in his head. He was ready for any question, and his manner conveyed precisely the right degree of relief and concern for her welfare.
Alice stared at him, still wary but wanting so much to believe: he could see it in her eyes. Her genuine emotions were as near to the surface as his own fake ones.
‘He went back to the house.’
Michael nodded. ‘We didn’t realise at first. The garage door wasn’t locked, so he sneaked in that way.’
He paused, partly because he required a few more seconds to assemble the next part of his explanation. He bought that time by offering his hand, though he was careful not to touch her.
‘Let me help you up. Are you sure you’re not hurt?’
She ignored the question, but the baby had recovered from the shock of the fall and started bawling again. Although Michael wasn’t too worried about anyone coming along in this weather, he didn’t want to push his luck. They could do without the noise.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘By the time we realised he was in the house, he’d gathered up his things and was ready to leave. The bastard’s run out on you, I’m afraid.’
By now she’d relaxed a little, and seemed willing to hear him out. A drop of rain hit her in the eye and she wiped it away, then gingerly took his hand and struggled to her feet. She looked disorientated, confused, but not afraid.
That was good, he thought. That was essential, in fact.
Alice didn’t know what to think. The impulse to flee had been so instinctive: could she have got it wrong? It was Renshaw who’d used the word ‘predator’, but Michael was a family man, with a wife and four children. Young children.
‘The money,’ she murmured. Michael didn’t hear her, because of Evie crying. She lifted the carrier enough to be able to kiss and stroke the baby’s head, gradually soothing her. ‘What about the money?’
‘What money?’
‘In euros. A lot of money. Renshaw left it with me.’
Michael frowned, turned and examined the short distance she’d travelled before she fell.
‘No … I dropped it, earlier.’ She felt foolish now, realising how wild and eccentric she must appear.
He shrugged. ‘It’s probably counterfeit
. Otherwise he’d hardly have left it here with you.’ He pushed a hand through his hair, a foppish gesture that sent a spray of rain over his shoulder. ‘I’m so sorry, Alice. It wasn’t till he drove out of the garage that we realised you weren’t with him. Then, like I say, we started to fear the worst …’
He tailed off, because Nerys was hurrying towards them, lugging the carrier bag in both hands. Her face was flushed and glistening with rain. Something about the way the headscarf concealed her hair, while emphasising her features, made Alice think of a fairytale witch.
‘They’re both safe!’ Michael cried. ‘It turns out Renshaw didn’t hurt them. Isn’t that a relief?’
Nerys made a noise that might have signalled agreement. She looked decidedly vexed.
Michael said, ‘I was telling Alice about Renshaw doing a runner. Is that the money?’ He indicated the bag. ‘It’s almost certainly fake. That or he’s got so much he didn’t need this any more.’
Nerys nodded vaguely, as if reluctant to express an opinion. She studied Alice for a moment, and produced a thin smile. ‘What a bunch of drowned rats we are.’ After handing the bag to Michael, she touched the carrier. ‘I had visions of this little mite coming to harm, all because of that ghastly man.’
‘I thought he was your friend?’ Alice said.
‘More a colleague. I can’t say I knew him that well, to be honest.’ Nerys turned and began to walk away, giving Alice little choice but to follow. ‘I stepped in to help him, because that’s my nature. I don’t turn people away.’
‘Heart of gold,’ Michael said, in a way that implied it was a burden he’d had to bear. ‘But people take advantage.’
Nerys was in rueful agreement. ‘They do. Abandoning you out here, it was wicked of him. He didn’t care one bit if you both ended up with pneumonia.’
Michael, yet again, was amazed by how swiftly his mother had adapted to the cover story he had laid down for them. He let her take command, following with the bag while she escorted mother and baby along the path.
They walked as quickly as the conditions would allow, the leaves mushy beneath their feet. The rain made a tremendous noise as it hit the leaves, but they didn’t appreciate the protection offered by the wood until they emerged into the field. Here the rain was slanting down like strings of glass beads.
‘Couple of minutes and we’ll be back in the warm,’ Nerys shouted.
Michael didn’t hear Alice’s response but he was watching her face. At first she seemed distressed. Then he saw a visible effort to set her fears aside. It wasn’t surrender, as such – but surrender was what it amounted to.
She was theirs.
Alice clung to a vague hope of encountering someone else on the way back, someone who could serve as a witness, at least, even though she kept assuring herself that there was nothing to be afraid of. Their account of Renshaw’s departure was perfectly plausible – so long as you accepted that the money was something he could readily abandon.
She wished that she’d taken a closer look at the banknotes. But would she have been able to distinguish a forgery? She knew nothing about large euro notes.
Perhaps Michael sensed what she was brooding about, for as they came to the end of the footpath he nudged his elbow against her arm and said, ‘You and Evie are okay, so who cares about Renshaw, eh? You can get cleaned up, then I’ll drive you to the station for the train at twenty past two.’
She nodded, muttered her thanks. Perhaps that was for the best: get to the station, at least, then speak to Harry again. But the immediate priority was to make sure Evie was warm and dry – and for that Alice knew she had to endure another hour or so in their company.
The lane was deserted, and it took only a minute to reach the house. Alice wondered vaguely why they hadn’t gone in through the back garden.
Nerys opened the front door and stepped inside, kicking off her boots in a well-practised motion. She urged Alice to follow and not worry if she got mud on the carpet. Alice’s shoes were filthy, her jogging pants soaked and splattered with mud. Hopefully by now her own clothes had been washed and dried.
It was only when Michael shut the front door that her senses picked up on some anomaly. She couldn’t say what it was, but it provoked a shudder of unease. Nerys was using the headscarf to wipe her face, while Michael still faced the door. A surreptitious click told her he was locking them in.
Alice sniffed, and knew at once which sense had alerted her to danger. She’d had enough medical training to identify the smell of blood. For a second her mind seemed to shut down, and when she came back Nerys was saying: ‘… run you a nice hot bath,’ and Michael was promising tea and toast and warm towels, and neither of them was able to stop her when Alice broke away and ran towards the kitchen.
The door was half open. A body lay in a pool of blood on the floor beside the table, but the head – Renshaw’s head, it must be – was no longer recognisable as human.
She took it all in: the blood splatters on the kitchen cabinets, on the bin and the fridge, a lump of white hair attached to a fragment of his scalp, lying on its own just a couple of feet from the doorway.
She turned, not at all sure that her legs would obey the command to run. In any case, Michael and Nerys stood shoulder to shoulder, blocking her path. Michael wore a regretful smile, while his mother’s face was a picture of hard, calculating hostility.
And Nerys was holding a weapon, a short-bladed paring knife.
Alice took a step backwards, putting her on the threshold of the kitchen. Nerys tutted.
‘Back door’s locked and bolted. You won’t get out that way.’
‘And we’re not going to hurt you,’ Michael said. ‘Are we, Mum?’
‘Not if she does as she’s told.’
Alice fought to stay calm. She managed to nod. ‘All right.’
‘Good.’ A tight smile from Nerys. ‘Now give me the baby.’
Sixty
Laird had taken her son. In terms of what might have been motivating Ruth, this went way off the scale. Having pressured her so much for answers, Harry now felt reluctant – even ashamed – about questioning her further.
His silence prompted a bitter laugh. ‘What’s up, Harry? You wanted to know. I told you.’
‘I’m staggered. I don’t know what to say.’
‘Well, how about if you take over driving for a while, and I’ll do my best to explain?’
She pulled up on the verge, a mile or so from the A14. It was still only raining lightly but there was a lot more to come, judging by the skies to the west. Harry got out of the car and automatically checked his phone. Nothing more from Alice.
Once Harry had rejoined the traffic, Ruth described how she had first heard of Laird in 1998. He’d grown up in a well-to-do part of Surrey, but had been banished from the family home when in his late teens: the classic underachiever who fell in with the wrong crowd. By his mid-twenties he’d served a couple of short prison sentences: one for fraud, one for aggravated assault. Then he joined a Far Right group that had a lucrative sideline importing drugs – mostly hallucinogenics and other so-called ‘club drugs’.
‘I was asked to help infiltrate the gang, by posing as the girlfriend of another undercover officer. At that time there were very few female officers with the training and experience for this sort of work.’ She snorted. ‘Not to mention the appetite for it.’
‘But you did – have the experience, I mean?’
‘I’d been seconded to the Met for several undercover roles in the past and discovered that I had a flair for acting.’
Lying, Harry thought, just as Ruth seemed to read his mind.
‘Or lying, you might prefer to call it. Amounts to the same thing.’
After a couple of months the male officer had been forced to withdraw from the operation because of personal issues. Ruth opted to stay in place and her handlers agreed, since by now she had formed a bond with Nathan Laird.
‘He was far and away the most intelligent member of the
group. Charismatic, ambitious, and extremely good-looking. He made it clear that he was attracted to me, so I decided to make use of that.’
‘You slept with him?’ He frowned. ‘Hold on – is that even allowed, when you’re undercover? I remember a big outcry a few years back—’
‘There’s a valid argument about the betrayal of trust, I suppose, especially if the people you’re deceiving are essentially innocent of any crime. That wasn’t the case with Laird.’ She seemed irritated that he had raised the point. ‘It’s a fine line. Until you’ve been in that situation, you’ve really got no right to judge.’
‘I can express an opinion—’
‘I didn’t mean you, specifically. Anyway, this was purely my own decision. It was never officially sanctioned. And boy, did I pay for it, in the end.’
She turned her head away from him, staring out of the window.
‘To this day I don’t know how I got pregnant. I suspect Nathan sabotaged my contraceptives. He’s the most perceptive man I’ve ever met. His intuition could be terrifying, it was so sharp.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I think he knew from the start that I was undercover. But he played along, had his fun with me. Never gave me a hint of anything incriminating. And then, the final insult: he got me knocked up.’
Harry, once again, was subdued by the sheer weight of the tragedy she was describing.
‘Did you … I mean, weren’t you tempted to … ?’
‘Have an abortion? Yeah. I thought about it. My dad was raised a Catholic, a pretty half-hearted one by the time I came along, so religion wasn’t much of a factor. And yet … I couldn’t destroy an innocent life. I was young, healthy, I had a good salary. Keeping it seemed the right decision.’
