by Ellis, Tim
He drifted back to the others.
‘I don’t know what your mum’s playing at, but she’s not answering her phone.’
‘Maybe it’s broke, or it needs re-charging, or she’s flushed it down the toilet, or an alien abducted it...’
‘Where do you get this rubbish from?’
‘It’s not rubbish. All of those things can happen to a mobile phone.’
‘A head full of rubbish.’
‘Have you tried the home number?’
‘Do I look stupid?’
‘You don’t want me to answer that, do you?’
‘Why? What would you say?’
‘I’d take the Fifth.’
‘You watch far too much American rubbish. Didn’t Dr Suresh say anything about...?’
‘Oh I forgot to tell you, he said you had to disconnect my television.’
‘All of it?’
‘Yes.’
‘He doesn’t trust you, does he?’
‘It’s not that, he’s just being cautious.’
‘Cautious, my backside. He knows you’ve been sabotaging his therapy, and has threatened you with ex-communication unless you disconnect your television.’
‘What food did mum pack for us?’ she asked changing the subject.
He didn’t get a chance to answer because the five past eight train terminating at Ealing Broadway arrived.
‘Do you need a key to get down there?’ Catherine asked the Chief once they had made themselves comfortable in a nearly empty compartment..
She pulled a normal-looking key out of her pocket. ‘You mean like this one?’
‘I expected it to be big and rusty, and well... older-looking,’ Richards said.
Abby Kirby smiled enigmatically and said, ‘Wait and see.’
It was five to nine when they arrived at Holborn. Once they’d exited the station, they walked the short distance to Lincoln House. The Chief used a key to enter and lock the main door. She disabled the security alarm, and then keyed in a series of numbers.
‘It’s a special code that re-activates the alarm in five minutes once we’ve left the main reception area,’ she explained in response to curious looks from the others.
Opposite the main door was a central column with an elevator. To the right was a small reception desk with a locked office behind it. On the left of the elevator was a door in a wall.
Eager to see the P2 Lodge, Richards opened the door to find a cleaner’s cupboard, and then expressed her disappointment. ‘Oh!’
‘Any ideas?’ the Chief asked.
Nobody said anything.
She leaned into the cupboard. They heard a click, and the whole wall shifted. The left side moved backwards, and the right side moved forwards. She pushed a hand in the gap that had materialised between the right-hand side of the wall and the central column and pulled it towards her. A secret room was revealed with a brick archway and a set of steps that led down into the darkness.
‘Shall we?’ the Chief said.
Each of them stepped into the secret room. The Chief pressed a button, and the wall closed behind them.
A light activated.
She walked through the archway and began to descend into the blackness.
Chapter Twenty-One
It was Friday. It was five-thirty in the afternoon when they set off. It was the 23rd December. It was the last but one shopping day before Christmas. It was still snowing. Everybody in Essex was trying to get from A to B. There was a whole shopping list of reasons why it took them three and a half hours to reach the Woodford Green Service Station, which closed at eight o’clock at night – it wasn’t a 24-hour service station.
‘The gods are against us, Lola,’ Kowalski said.
‘Lola got spells, but they be in her desk drawer at the station, and more at home.’
He phoned the Duty Sergeant’s number.
‘Sergeant Holt.’
‘Kathryn, how are you?’
‘Do they do a night shift in the MIT?’
‘Let me tell you a story.’
‘It’s not going to be a long one, is it? The Chippendales are here showing a group of us what they’re made of.’
‘Admit it, they’re just a substitute for me?’
‘Yes, but there are seven of them and only one of you. They’re all younger. None of them has had a heart attack. As far as I know, none of them is married with four starving children waiting at home for their Christmas presents, and, of course, my husband doesn’t mind me drooling over the Chippendales, but I think he’d object if it was you.’
‘You know how to make a guy feel special, Kathryn.’
‘So, go on then? I can spare... Have you finished yet?’
He told her about the journey, that the service station was closed, and how he needed the emergency number.
She obliged.
‘May everything you desire for Christmas get stuffed in your stockings, Kathryn.’
‘Never going to happen, Kowalski. My slob of a husband will still be snoring next to me when I wake up on Christmas Day. Now, if you were going to climb down my chimney...’
‘Have you even got a chimney?’
‘That’s the end of that then. Have a good one, and say hello to your wife and kids.’
‘And you, Kathryn.’
The call ended.
‘You should have been an inter-rational playboy, Ko-wall-ski.’
‘I think you’re getting to know me a bit better, Lola.’
He phoned the number Kathryn had given him.
‘Vince Markwick.’
‘Mr Markwick, this is Detective Inspector Kowalski from Hoddesdon Police Station, badge number 957654. Do you have CCTV at the garage?’
‘Yes?’
‘And were you on duty this afternoon?’
‘I was there. There were two of us. I’m the manager.’
‘A Range Rover filled up this afternoon. I need to look at the CCTV. I also need to know if the person paid by credit card.’
‘You’re joking?’
‘Do I sound like a comedian, Mr Markwick?’
‘I’ve only just got home. It’s fucking murder out there.’
‘Sorry. I could always break the door down and help myself... With your permission, of course?’
‘I don’t think so – fuck’s sake. It’ll take me at least an hour to get back there.’
‘If it’s any consolation Mr Markwick, you’ll be helping me to catch a serial killer.’
‘It’s not.’
The call ended.
‘I’m hungry,’ Kowalski said.
He drove the short distance into the village and found a kebab takeaway.
‘You gonna kill yourself, Ko-wall-ski.’
‘A man’s gotta eat, what a man’s gotta eat.’
‘No he don’t! Lola gonna talk to your wife. We got to sort this eating business out. You can’t go stuffing bad food in your mouth everyday. You ain’t gonna be lasting long if’n you do that. And Lola ain’t sitting here watching you kill yo’self, especially when you meant to be teaching Lola to be a de-tek-tive. I gotta save you to save myself. I don’t want to be sent back to devil’s spawn neverways.’
***
‘You were right, Sir,’ Sir Victor Bradshaw said into his mobile. He was in the Korean Restaurant across the road from Lincoln House having a cocktail. ‘Four of them have just entered. Our Tyler – Abby, the reporter Catherine Cox, and I assume Parish and Richards.’
Sir Victor Bradshaw was one of three senior executive board members of the London Stock Exchange and his salary was in excess of £10 million per annum. He also sat on a number of other company boards as a non-executive director for which he was paid the measly annual stipend of £250,000 to cover his non-existent expenses. He was happily married with two young children. He took winter holidays in St Moritz, and summer holidays in Bermuda. He was also the Senior Warden of the P2 Masonic Lodge – The Worshipful Grandmaster’s second-in-command. If all went well, then he would
be the next Worshipful Grandmaster.
‘You know what to do?’
‘Of course, Sir, have a lovely Christmas with your family.’
The line went dead.
He made another phone call.
‘Yeah?’
‘Coady?’
‘Is that who you rang?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then who do you think is answering my fucking phone?’
Under normal circumstances he would have avoided Boyd Coady like the proverbial plague, but necessity is the mother of invention, so they say. He needed someone to kill Abby Kirby and the others. He certainly wasn’t about to do it himself. The Worshipful Grandmaster had guessed Abby would betray them. Years as a Judge had made him a good judge of character. He’d known that when it came to choosing between good and evil, Abby would choose the former. As a consequence, she needed to die, and so did her conspirators.
When Lord Elias had discussed the situation with him he’d jumped into a black taxi and said to the driver, ‘Have you got the knowledge?’
‘You don’t “get” the knowledge, Sir, you “do” the knowledge, and all black cabbies have done the knowledge.’
‘I stand corrected. What’s the worst pub in London?’
‘That’s a question and a half, if you don’t mind me sayin’, Sir. The worst for what? The worst for food? The worst for service? The worst for...?’
‘Let me narrow the question down for you. I’m looking to hire a couple of unsavoury characters for a particular...’
‘Ah, you want the Blind Beggar on Whitechapel Road. It ain’t changed much since Ronnie Kray shot George Cornell in the face for havin’ the “diabolic liberty” to drink in one of his haunts. A couple of days later, Ronnie popped into the pub and asked for a “luger and lime”. Ha, you don’t get ‘em like that anymore.’
So they’d travelled across London to the Blind Beggar in Whitechapel. He’d found out that the cabbie’s name was Robert Shaw.
‘No relation...’ Shaw said. ‘Although I would have liked his fame and money.’
He guessed he was talking about the film actor. The idea of walking into the worst criminal pub in London without some form of safety net scared him to death, so he had the cabbie wait for him. When he’d been younger, he’d had the idea he might join the Territorial Army as an officer, but then he’d discovered that they sent TA officers to the Gulf War, the Iraqi War, and Afghanistan. He’d decided that he wasn’t cut out to be a hero, so had joined a squash club instead.
The meter was already something extortionate like £200, so a couple more minutes waiting outside the Blind Beggar for him wasn’t going to break the bank. He’d be able to write it off as expenses anyway.
When he stepped inside the pub, he knew immediately how the Christians had felt when they’d been pushed at spear point into the Coliseum to face the lions. He ordered half a lager and lime, while he waited for his heart rate to decrease. The regulars had looked at him as if a leper had walked into the bar. He expected Ronnie Kray to miraculously appear and shoot him in the face at any moment.
Eventually, he was ignored. He glanced around surreptitiously until he saw one man in his twenties with a crew cut, a two-inch scar on the left side of his face, and a neck like a bulldog’s.
Bradshaw approached the table. There were two other men sitting there with scarface.
‘Is that smell you, Lumby?’
Jack Lumb raised an eyebrow. ‘Ain’t fuckin’ me, Coady.’
‘Excuse me,’ Bradshaw said.
‘What you think, Lumby? Should we kill him now, or take him round the back and kick the living shit out of him?’
Lumby put on a posh accent. ‘In my considered opinion, I think you should kill him now if you’re concerned about the smell, old man.’
All three of them laughed.
‘You could kill me now,’ Bradshaw said once the laughter had died down, ‘but then you’d miss out on the chance to earn some money.’
Coady’s face changed to serious, and his lip curled up. ‘What makes you think I’m interested in your fuckin’ money?’
‘If you’re not, I’ll find someone who is.’
‘Piss off, Ollie,’ he said to the third man.
Ollie went and stood at the bar.
‘Sit,’ Coady said to him. He stuck out a massive hairy hand. ‘Wallet.’
‘Are you going to rob me?’
‘Just give me your fuckin’ wallet, or I’ll get Lumby to take you outside and kill you. I’m getting fuckin’ bored already.’
He handed over his wallet.
‘So, let’s see who we’ve got here. Sir Victor Bradshaw... slummin’ it, eh?’ Coady rifled through Bradshaw’s wallet. Helped himself to the £250 cash inside, made a mental note of where he worked and where he lived, and made jokes about the picture of his wife Olivia. ‘Always wanted to fuck one of these stuckup bitches up the arse.’ He looked at his friend. ‘We could both do her at the same time, eh Lumby – She looks like she’d enjoy that. Okay, say what you’ve got in mind. But before you do, let me warn you that if what you’re tellin’ me isn’t on the up and up, then the first chance I get I’ll be round your house to kill your wife and kids. Are we clear on that?’
Bradshaw had no doubt Coady would do exactly that. ‘We’re clear.’
‘Good. What’s the job, and more importantly – how much?’
Bradshaw explained what he needed. Coady said he and Lumby would do the job and supply the hardware. They settled on £5,000 a body, and if there was more than five people Coady had the choice to call for reinforcements. They shook on it. Bradshaw knew he’d been taken advantage of, but he didn’t mind as long as the job got done.
Now, he said to Coady, ‘Are you ready?’
‘Been ready for a fuckin’ week, Vic. Where?’
‘Lincoln House, High Holborn. I’m in the Korean Restaurant opposite. I’ll meet you outside.’
‘About an hour.’
‘Okay.’ He ordered the spicy tofu stew and another cocktail, and settled down to wait.
***
The stairs only went down a short distance to a sealed room with another elevator.
‘I thought we’d have to walk down those old steps for ages,’ Richards said.
Abby nodded. ‘We used to, but walking down wasn’t really the problem. It was the climbing up again. The older members refused to do it after a time, so we had this lift put in.’ She used a key to open the lift door.
The four of them stepped inside. There were only two buttons – one had an up arrow, and the other a down arrow. Abby pressed the button with the down arrow on it, and the elevator began to descend.
‘What happens if the lift breaks down?’ Catherine said. ‘There’s no emergency button.’
‘You die. Who would you call if there were an emergency button? That’s why there are built-in safeguards.’ She didn’t elaborate.
Once the lift reached the bottom the doors opened. Everyone stepped out, but Abby wedged a piece of wood between the doors. ‘We don’t want to be surprised, do we?’
‘I thought you said we’d be on our own,’ Parish said.
‘Being a member of P2 has taught me that you can never be too careful.’
‘Is that the only way down here?’ Catherine asked.
‘There is another way. At the back of the hall is a locked gate. Only members have a key to it.
‘Where does it go?’ Richards said.
Abby half smiled. ‘The tunnels. You don’t want to ever go into the tunnels.’
‘Why?’
‘Let’s just say that people who go into the tunnels are never seen alive again.’
Richards’ brow creased. ‘Oh! Well, I don’t think we’ll be going into the tunnels then.’
They were in a type of lobby. On either side were two small rooms. Spread out before them lay the Banqueting Hall.
‘God! It’s massive,’ Richards said.
Catherine took a deep intake of breath. ‘It’
s like a warehouse.’
And it was. It measured forty feet from floor to ceiling. It was a hundred feet square. In the centre was a square of tables, which would have seated at least two hundred. Around the edges was shelving, and it reminded Parish of a Library. The spines of the shelves pointed towards the centre of the room, and they all looked full.
‘Any ideas where we should start?’ Parish said.
Abby shrugged. ‘Not a clue. Members are not permitted to look at the records unless they have a specific reason for doing so, and then they’re required to make a written request to the Senior Warden.’
Catherine stepped into the hall first. ‘The sooner we get started, the sooner we get out of here. Don’t P2 believe in computers?’
‘Too insecure,’ Abby said following Catherine into the hall. ‘I may as well help you. Parish and Richards know what they’re looking for.’
Richards looked at him. ‘Do you?’
‘I know we’re looking for anything related to my birth, but what it looks like – not the faintest idea.’
‘We could be here forever. There’s just... so much of it.’
‘Isn’t there a catalogue, or a guide, or something which says where everything is, Chief?’
‘Never seen one.’
‘You go and start rummaging through the shelves. I’ll have a look in those two offices, and see if I can find anything that will point us in the right direction.’
Richards moved into the hall and decided to begin in the near right-hand corner, which was on the opposite side to Catherine and the Chief.
