Low Profile

by Nick Oldham

  But going by this picture, maybe there had been some truth in what Flynn had claimed. Henry snorted derisively at that thought. He and Flynn rarely saw eye to eye and, as Henry had once said to Flynn, ‘Call me a cynic, but I don’t fucking believe you.’ It hadn’t helped matters that Flynn was looked upon with some fondness by Alison, which made Henry think, grrr …

  And yet, that aside, here was an up-to-date photo of Hoyle. Henry’s eyes hadn’t deceived him. Jerry Tope confirmed it.

  Henry lay down his pen and stared vacantly into space, then scooped up his desk phone and dialled an internal number to the one and only Jerry Tope – who was actually only sitting in an office just on the other side of the MIR. If Henry had stood up and gone to his office door, he could have seen Jerry’s door.

  ‘Intel Cell, Jerry Tope.’

  ‘It’s me.’

  A hesitancy, then, ‘Hello, boss.’

  ‘So when did you last speak to Steve Flynn?’ Henry asked cheekily.

  If Tope had had a mouthful of anything, he would have spluttered it out. ‘I … I haven’t, boss.’

  Henry chuckled. ‘Whatever. Look, Jack Hoyle … do some digging, get everything you can about him, please. Same applies for Steve Flynn. Dig out their old personal files and everything you can about that missing money.’

  ‘Why Flynn?’

  ‘Because I say so. I’m a detective superintendent, or didn’t you know that?’ Henry blasted him, but only jokingly. It was rare for Henry ever to pull rank, but occasionally he had some fun with it. Otherwise what was the point?

  But Tope did not see the joke. ‘You know Flynn’s not involved.’

  ‘I don’t know anything of the sort. The guy is a thoroughly bad egg.’

  ‘OK, I’ll see what I can do. Incidentally …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Can you send the cleaner round to stick a broom up my arse? Might as well do her job, too.’

  ‘I can think of something much more painful to stick up there.’ Henry smiled. From the office window he could just see the top of Blackpool Tower. He hung up.

  ‘You know you can’t prove anything,’ Flynn said with a confidence he didn’t really feel.

  ‘It isn’t what I can prove,’ Romero said, ‘it is what I can convince a criminal court to believe.’

  ‘Fuck you,’ Flynn snarled.

  The two men were now standing on the threshold of Flynn’s cell. It still stank and the toilet had not been unblocked.

  ‘What exactly do you want?’ Flynn said.

  ‘To clear up a brutal murder, a double murder in fact. This is a peaceful law abiding island and you seem to attract violence to it. You should be in prison, Señor Flynn.’

  ‘You know I didn’t do it.’

  ‘Then tell me who did.’

  ‘If I knew, I would. Maybe you need to do some digging into Mr Costain’s background. There might be some answers there.’

  ‘I will, but until then …’

  ‘I’m under arrest?’

  ‘Very much so.’ Romero gestured into the cell.

  Flynn walked in, then stopped suddenly and spun around. ‘Time for my phone call, please. And if you are seriously going to do a background check on Costain, you might want to speak to a detective I know in England, in Lancashire.’

  ‘Who might that be?’

  ‘Christie, Henry Christie … he’s a detective superintendent. He’ll know about Costain, and then maybe you’ll be able to apply some fundamental investigative thinking to all this instead of just grabbing the first fall guy you see – me!’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Find out how a man lived and you’ll find out why he’s died.’

  ‘That sounds like something your grandmother might say,’ Romero said scathingly and slammed the cell door shut.

  Flynn’s nose was only inches from it. He stood there for a moment, then turned and walked over to the bed muttering, ‘At least I wouldn’t have to teach her how to suck eggs.’

  THIRTEEN

  The debrief for the murder team that evening was upbeat and Henry gave and felt a sense of positivity. One of the main things was that a Porsche 911 had been found abandoned in Poulton-le-Fylde, up someone’s driveway, and a Nissan Note had been stolen from nearby, but both reports had come in late. First, the Porsche in the driveway of a big, detached house was only discovered when the house owner and his wife returned from a short break to find it impossible to get their Mercedes up the drive. Second, the Nissan had only been reported stolen by the owner, a nurse on a night shift at Blackpool Victoria Hospital, when she actually stepped out of her house to go to work that evening.

  Fortunately, with regard to the Porsche, the comms operator receiving the report had been well briefed about the double murder and linked the Porsche to it so that, as well as the murder team being informed, a local bobby and a CSI were dispatched to the scene. Then, when the Nissan was reported stolen from a street nearby, the same operator did the sums – one car abandoned, another stolen – and sent the same bobby to report it and bear the possibility of a link in mind.

  Good work, for which Henry had gone into comms at Blackpool and thanked the operator.

  The details of the Nissan were duly circulated and a note attached saying that if it turned up anywhere, burned out or otherwise, a CSI had to be sent to it immediately.

  The Porsche – as Henry had recalled seeing when he had gone to Percy’s house – was on hire from a well-known car hire company in Manchester and a detective was going to visit their office next day.

  A lot of work had been done at the crime scene, and details of Percy’s business dealings and money transfers were now being scrutinized officially; the e-fit image of the killer was widely circulated and Henry reported to the squad he expected to hear something back from the FBI soon regarding the American accent angle – hopefully. The full results of the post mortems were revealed and a video of the actual examinations was made available.

  So Henry was feeling reasonably sanguine about it. The juggernaut was moving in the right direction and everyone was hanging on to its sides.

  He dismissed the team after taking questions and they all dispersed, ready to have a pint or get off home, whichever floated their boats.

  As Henry watched them go, his mind actually returned to boats.

  He went back into his office and reached for the desk phone, which rang just before he picked it up.

  ‘Hi, Henry.’ It was Donaldson.

  ‘Hey, Yank, I was just about to call you.’

  ‘Got in first … been doing some rootin’ for y’all,’ Donaldson said, exaggerating his twang for Henry’s benefit. ‘And you ain’t gonna like it.’

  ‘Try me, I’m a big boy.’

  ‘From what you told me and from the e-fit, this guy fits the description and MO of a hood operating for a low level mobster in Miami. To put it plain, he’s an executioner.’

  Despite being a big boy, Henry suddenly went cold and fearful. ‘Name?’ he asked.

  ‘Hawke, with an “e”. Jason Hawke. Hawke by name, hawk by nature. He looks like your e-fit and our intelligence has it that he “suits up” for his jobs and uses a revolver as opposed to a semi-automatic pistol. Thirty-eight calibre. Soft points.’

  ‘Suits up?’ Henry said.

  ‘Paper suit, forensically aware, been arrested several times and he’s very savvy so he has always walked.’

  ‘Sounds like him,’ Henry said dully.

  ‘Boston born, mob background in the Big Apple, evolved from a gofer into an enforcer and then a hired killer. Served time as a teenager for putting two rounds into a guy’s head, but pleaded and was out in two years. Guy he shot was a scumbag, anyway.’

  ‘So that makes it OK?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Donaldson laughed. ‘In fact Hawke’s name has popped up in connection with lots of gang-related hits. Was arraigned for one, but a witness got queasy, then dead. Seems the only way to make anything stick with this guy is to catch him in the
act – which is what you did. But what the hell is he doing whacking some two-bit, legitimate jeweller in the north of England?’ Donaldson finished.

  ‘That is the question I would have asked myself.’ There was a pause while both men mulled over this conundrum, then Henry said, ‘How far away from Miami is Key West?’

  ‘One hundred and sixty miles, give or take,’ Donaldson said knowledgeably. His last posting as an FBI field agent had been in Miami, so he knew his way around Florida.

  ‘It’s down at the far end of the Florida Keys, isn’t it?’

  ‘Next stop, Cuban cigars,’ Donaldson said. ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ve got a photo of our dead couple on a fishing boat in Key West. They were there a couple of weeks ago … thing is there’s a guy in the background of one of the shots that I recognize.’

  ‘That you recognize?’

  ‘Yeah, ex-cop, disappeared with a big wodge of drug dealer’s money … Jack Hoyle … I think you know the story.’

  ‘Jack Hoyle, Steve Flynn – that story?’ Donaldson did know of it, had even met Flynn a few times.

  ‘That’s the one. Hoyle’s in the background of one of the shots … fortnight later, they’re dead … maybe at the hands of a mob killer from Miami.’ Henry’s ring piece nipped sharply together as he said these words, his physical concession to his excitement – a twitching arsehole.

  ‘You got the name of the boat?’ Donaldson said.

  ‘Uh … it’s on another photo … just hang fire.’ Lottie’s camera was still on his desk (and Henry mentally castigated himself for not booking it in with the exhibits officer). He switched it on and found the photo of Silverfin, from the port of Key West. He told Donaldson.

  ‘Hold on while I search for it,’ Donaldson said.

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘An Intel search on the FBI system … we have a database of boats on it … bit like a mini-Google.’

  Henry could hear computer keys being tapped whilst Donaldson hummed.

  ‘Whoa!’ Donaldson uttered.

  Henry’s bottom did another tightener.

  ‘Just to backtrack, I said that Hawke is a mob hit man … well, what I didn’t tell you was that the mobster he works for in Miami is called Giancarlo Fioretti: small operator, big ideas. I came across him a few times when I worked there.’ Donaldson exhaled quite loudly into his phone. ‘And he owns a sportfishing boat in Key West called—’

  ‘Silverfin,’ Henry ventured.

  ‘Which means your vics were recently on a boat belonging to a crime boss in Florida.’

  Henry’s arse then slammed so tightly shut he felt it would need to be prised apart with a jemmy.

  Henry’s breathing was unsteady, his heart hammering, his throat dry, as he impatiently watched the monitor of his desktop PC, which was logged into his work email account. Then, with a magic Henry the Luddite still did not understand, an untitled email appeared from Donaldson, with various attachments.

  Henry moved his forefinger, about to press and select and open it, when his mobile phone rang. With an irritated shake of the head he answered it.

  He hurtled through the corridors out into the secure car park, where he leapt into the Audi and set off, annoyed by the slowness of the rising security barrier.

  ‘C’mon, you …’

  It rose and he accelerated through. Minutes later he was abandoning the car in the ambulance only parking area outside the entrance to the A&E department at Blackpool Victoria Hospital, a place where, he thought, he’d spent far too much of his police service.

  He trotted quickly into the emergency treatment area just beyond reception and literally grabbed a passing nurse, one he half-recognized. He pulled out his warrant card and said, ‘Archie Astley-Barnes – just been admitted from his home address in Out Rawcliffe … seriously assaulted.’

  Henry drove the Audi cautiously over the rutted track leading up to Archie Astley-Barnes’s farmhouse in Out Rawcliffe. He stopped on the edge of the yard at the front of the building. Drawn up and abandoned at various untidy angles were three police cars (one a CSI van, one a local patrol and the other DCI Peter Woodcock’s Vauxhall Insignia).

  Henry paused in the driver’s seat, looking at the farmhouse, all lights blazing, the front door wide open, security lights on.

  The expression on his face was one of grim anger as he wondered what sort of person could have beaten a frail old man within a hair’s breadth of his life … and maybe, if Archie didn’t regain consciousness and the life support machine that was keeping him going was switched off, to death.

  The only good point about it was that Archie, despite his frailty and mental state, might well have given his attacker more than he had bargained for.

  Henry climbed out and shivered, his mind still full of the image of the old man in the A&E unit, a crash team working furiously to keep him alive and then stabilize him.

  Woodcock emerged from the front door, already dressed in his forensic suit. He came over to Henry, his expression very much matching Henry’s.

  ‘Boss,’ he greeted Henry.

  ‘Pete … what have we got?’

  ‘The guy who lives in the next farm along the track was driving past about an hour and a half ago, saw Archie’s lights on, front door open, which was odd, apparently. Usually all the doors are closed up, shutters down, just the hint of a light. So he stops and checks. Finds Archie in the living room, badly beaten up but still breathing, with his shotgun in his hands … blood everywhere, but not all Archie’s. Neighbour called the ambulance and police and the paramedics ferried him to BVH.’

  ‘Neighbour saw nothing?’

  ‘Not a thing.’

  Henry winced, his shoulder suddenly hurting. ‘What do you think?’

  Woodcock shrugged. ‘Burglary gone wrong, maybe. Archie surprised someone who attacked him but managed to get to his shotgun, and looks like he blasted the intruder … the shotgun’s been fired and there’s blood flecks around the door and frame. He could be just winged, could be an arse shot … there’s a blood trail across here.’ Woodcock indicated an area of the front yard that had been marked out by tape. ‘Could be minor or major … whatever, I reckon this could be linked to Percy’s death, that’s my guess.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just a feeling.’

  ‘Anything stolen that we know of?’

  ‘Hard to say … there’s a tray full of diamonds in the bureau that seems untouched.’

  Woodcock’s view that it was linked to Percy’s death didn’t quite seem to fit with this scenario to Henry, but he could have been wrong. It had been known.

  ‘How are the rats?’

  ‘Looking hungry and nasty.’

  Henry sighed, rotated his jaw, then said, ‘So we have a wounded burglar on the loose?’

  ‘Looking that way. I’ve got two dog men en route, going to start searching the fields nearby. Already alerted A&E at BVH and Lancaster Royal, although he could have had a car to get away in. The way the trail of blood ends suddenly suggests that.’

  ‘How many offenders?’

  Woodcock shrugged.

  Henry considered all this, sifting and filing it, putting it into logical order and thinking the very worst – that this could become another murder and he could well be standing on the edge of another murder scene, which might – or might not – be connected to what he was already investigating. His gut feeling was that this was a completely different sort of thing and, as Woodcock had suggested, could be a burglary that had gone wrong. ‘I want the circus out for this, Pete. There’s every chance that Archie could die and I don’t want to get caught showing my arse, so let’s do this right from here.’

  It was an old mantra, but one drilled into Henry’s brain: You don’t get a second chance at a crime scene.

  He raised his eyebrows at Woodcock. ‘You’re the man on this, OK?’

  Other than getting an overview of the potential murder scene by being walked through it by Woodcock and a CSI, the only thing Henry
actually did was to oversee the seizure of Archie’s tray of diamonds for safe keeping. He had them photographed as a whole, then individually – not that Henry could tell one rock from another – and had them bagged and sealed, then conveyed by two uniformed cops to the safe in the major incident suite, where they would then become the responsibility of the exhibits officer. Although he didn’t really want them in police possession he knew it would be foolhardy to leave them vulnerable at the scene where, with the greatest respect to all concerned, light fingers could be attracted to shiny things.

  With Woodcock, Henry counted a hundred and sixty-two diamonds, all cut and finished. Henry could not even begin to imagine their retail value. A thousand pounds each, maybe … he didn’t have a clue, but knew that when they were fitted into a ring or necklace, they could easily sell for five grand each.

  Either way, the sums were astronomical.

  ‘What are you going to do with them?’ Woodcock asked.

  ‘Keep them safe and see how Archie fares. Let’s just hope he recovers and, if he doesn’t, that he’s made a will. We need to find his solicitor and hand them over as soon as possible … if we can’t do that, I’ll get them put into a safe deposit box … I’ll work on it. Whatever, I don’t like the thought of them being with us for longer than necessary.’

  On a cage perched on the bureau top, one of Archie’s rats surveyed them, its eyes as black as anthracite.

  Henry gave it a wink. ‘RSPCA for you, mate.’

  The scene was secured at midnight. The police dogs had not found anything of interest in the surrounding fields, which tended to firm up the belief that the offender had escaped in a car. Henry left a fully briefed uniform cop outside the farmhouse in a vehicle and made the decision to resume in the morning.

  He then phoned BVH and after much arguing – because he wasn’t an actual relative of Archie’s and therefore no information concerning his condition could be released – was eventually put through to the consultant who was treating Archie. She had no problems in talking to Henry and informed him that Archie was very, very poorly, not expected to survive the night.