The Jackdaw

by Luke Delaney

  ‘Did you know Goldsboro?’ he asked the screen. ‘Is that it? You knew him and he knew you – from the past. Were you afraid that somehow he’d recognize you – even through your mask and distorted voice – that he knew you so well some small thing would make him recognize you. The way you moved perhaps? Or am I just clutching at straws?’ Sean needed someone else to see what he was seeing, to tell him he wasn’t imagining it, that it was indeed something important – or that it meant nothing.

  He stood and walked the very short distance to Donnelly’s office next door and leaned inside, making Donnelly break off from the conversation he was having with Zukov and look up.

  ‘Can I borrow you a minute?’ Sean asked.

  ‘Problem?’ Donnelly replied in his usual way.

  ‘I just need you to take a look at something.’

  ‘Sure,’ Donnelly answered, heaving his thick body from the small chair.

  ‘You found Jason Howard yet?’ Sean quickly asked Zukov.

  ‘He’s on the PNC as wanted,’ Zukov explained, ‘and I’ve circulated his photograph to all Borough Intelligence Units in the Met, but still nothing. He’s done a Lord Lucan on us.’

  ‘Find him,’ Sean demanded and headed back to his own office. Donnelly fired Zukov a quick look of irritation before following Sean next door and sitting on the opposite side of the desk.

  ‘So, what is it you want me to look at?’ he asked as he landed in his seat.

  Sean spun his laptop through ninety degrees to an angle at which they could both see the screen.

  ‘This,’ he answered and pressed the play icon that started the Your View video of Jeremy Goldsboro once again.

  ‘Goldsboro’s video,’ Donnelly said, sounding unimpressed. ‘So what of it?’

  ‘Just watch,’ Sean told him, allowing the footage to play while they silently watched. After thirty seconds or so Donnelly cracked.

  ‘What am I supposed to be looking for?’ he asked.

  ‘Keep watching,’ Sean told him and let the video play for several more minutes before hitting the pause button. ‘What’s the most striking difference between this video and the others?’

  ‘I haven’t studied the others that closely,’ Donnelly admitted. ‘That’s being done at the lab for me – breaking it down frame by frame.’

  ‘You don’t need to study them closely,’ Sean argued. ‘You just need to watch and to see.’

  ‘OK,’ Donnelly played along. ‘It’s … it’s not as violent?’

  ‘No,’ Sean dismissed his observation. ‘Something else.’

  ‘Looks like the same place,’ Donnelly tried. ‘The same chair and placement of the bags over the windows and the suspect’s wearing the same clothing and …’

  ‘And?’ Sean pushed him.

  ‘And the victim remains hooded and gagged throughout,’ Donnelly finally gave him the answer he was waiting for. ‘The other victims had their hoods removed and were allowed to talk – to plead their case, so to speak.’

  ‘Do you think publicly humiliating them is important to him?’

  ‘I … suppose so,’ Donnelly agreed unconvincingly. ‘I mean possibly – or perhaps it’s just about making his point.’

  ‘Which is?’ Sean asked.

  ‘Which is the bankers screwed up and yet it seems to be the likes of you and me that are paying for it.’

  ‘And you still believe that?’ Sean asked; he was using Donnelly as a sounding board for his own doubts and suspicions.

  ‘Why not?’ Donnelly answered with a question. ‘There’s a lot of anger out there towards the sort of people he’s been taking. Why wouldn’t someone who’s a little unhinged decide to turn himself into a latter-day avenging angel? We’ll find him soon enough and he’ll be another two-time loser looking to make a name for himself. You’ll see.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Sean answered, blinking rapidly as he tried to keep pace with his own thoughts, ‘but this different treatment of Goldsboro … it just makes me feel …’

  ‘Makes you feel what?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘Makes me feel there’s a link between him and Goldsboro – something personal between them.’

  ‘Then what about the other victims?’ Donnelly questioned his theory. ‘Do they have a personal link to the suspect too?’

  ‘Possibly,’ Sean admitted.

  ‘But if they are all linked to the suspect,’ Donnelly explained, ‘then the chances are they’d be linked to each other somehow, agreed?’

  ‘Yes,’ Sean played along. ‘That’s what I’d expect.’

  ‘But there isn’t a link,’ Donnelly ambushed him. ‘We’ve already checked and none of the victims know each other. They all work for different companies. Sorry. No links.’

  ‘Work.’ Sean seized on one of Donnelly’s words. ‘Maybe that’s the link.’

  ‘But like I just said,’ Donnelly reminded him, ‘they don’t work together.’

  ‘Not in the same company,’ Sean argued, ‘but maybe, some time in the past their paths crossed – too fleetingly for them to remember, but something that brought them into contact with either Goldsboro or the man who took them.’

  ‘Like what?’ Donnelly asked, his arms spread wide.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sean admitted before slumping back in his chair and then immediately sitting bolt upright. ‘You said the victims don’t work for the same company now, but what about in the past?’

  ‘I couldn’t tell you,’ Donnelly told him. ‘Sally’s been looking after victim research.’ Sean sprang to his feet and paced to his doorway from where he shouted across the office.

  ‘Sally,’ he called out and waited for her to look in his direction. ‘My office please.’ He moved back inside. ‘Do we have Goldsboro’s medical evidence yet?’ he asked Donnelly while they waited for Sally’s imminent arrival.

  ‘You mean the statement from the A&E doctor who treated him?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Sean confirmed.

  ‘No,’ Donnelly admitted.

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ Sean complained. ‘Why the hell not?’

  ‘It’s an A&E doctor,’ Donnelly reminded him. ‘Getting a statement out of them is like trying to get blood out of a stone. What’s the urgency anyway? Goldsboro had his little finger clipped off. That’s not going to change, no matter how quickly we get the statement. What’s bothering you, guv’nor? What’s the sudden urgency for the medical evidence? It’s not going to take us any further.’

  Sally strolled into the office before Sean could answer. He quickly turned his attention to her. ‘Dave says you’ve been looking into the victims’ backgrounds – in particular their employment?’

  ‘Well,’ Sally answered guardedly, ‘I’ve been overseeing it, if that’s what you mean. I haven’t exactly been doing it myself.’

  ‘Whatever,’ Sean told her, uninterested in the details of whose task it was. ‘And what have we found?’

  Sally looked at Donnelly for support before answering, confusion etched on her face. ‘That they all work in the City,’ she shrugged, ‘for banks and financial institutions.’

  ‘I know that,’ he snapped a little. ‘What I mean is, have any of them worked together in the same company? I’m looking for a connection between them.’

  ‘They all worked for different companies,’ Sally explained. ‘There is no connection and Goldsboro hasn’t worked for anyone for five or six years. There is no connection between the victims. What’s this all about anyway?’

  ‘He didn’t take the hood or gag off Goldsboro,’ Donnelly tried to explain.

  ‘So?’ Sally asked.

  ‘So the guv’nor thinks that means he must somehow know him.’

  ‘I don’t get it,’ Sally admitted.

  ‘It’s just an idea,’ Sean answered, beginning to feel a little self-conscious.

  ‘Well I hate to shoot it down,’ Sally apologized, ‘but we even asked the victims if they knew each other, and they didn’t. Georgina Vaughan and David Barrowgate had apparently heard of Paul Elkins, he was
a very senior and well-known figure in the City, but they don’t know him.’

  ‘And Goldsboro,’ Sean asked, ‘did any of them know Goldsboro or he them?’

  ‘No,’ Sally explained. ‘He retired too long ago for them to probably even remember him.’

  ‘Young blood, eh?’ Donnelly offered. ‘No time for the old guard.’

  ‘But did he know Paul Elkins?’ Sean persisted, refusing to let go of the feeling in his gut that at least some of the victims were connected to each other and The Jackdaw to them.

  ‘We asked him,’ Sally deflated him, ‘but he doesn’t know him.’

  Sean slumped in his chair, drumming his fingers in thought and frustration on his desk. What was he missing? What was he missing? His eyes narrowed as he leaned forward. ‘How far did you go back,’ he asked Sally, ‘how far did you go back into their employment history?’

  ‘We didn’t,’ Sally admitted. ‘There was no need. They’ve all been with their current companies for several years, except for Goldsboro who’s retired. We just checked their current jobs.’

  ‘No,’ Sean almost shouted, getting to his feet. ‘We need to go back further – back through their previous jobs and even further if we have to – at least back to when Goldsboro was still working.’

  ‘Boss,’ Sally warned him. ‘That would take hundreds of man hours. We’re trying to run a murder investigation while also handling a murder trial. We don’t have the people to do that.’

  ‘Then I’ll do it myself,’ Sean told them, the disappointment thick in his voice as he started pulling his coat on.

  ‘Where do you think you’re going, boss?’ Sally asked him, her concern matching his anger.

  ‘To speak to Jeremy Goldsboro,’ he insisted. ‘Maybe he can give me the answers I need, since it seems nobody here can.’

  Donnelly sprang to his feet. ‘Want some company?’

  ‘No,’ Sean answered too quickly.

  ‘Why don’t you just call him?’ Sally tried to stop him.

  ‘No,’ Sean explained. ‘I need to see him. I need to pump him for information. I can’t do that down a phone.’

  ‘You don’t even know where he is,’ Sally argued.

  ‘I’ll find him,’ Sean snapped, fixing Sally with a look she couldn’t remember him ever using on her before. The sound of the phone ringing broke the atmosphere. Sean hesitated, not sure if he would even answer it until curiosity got the better of him and he snatched it up. ‘DI Corrigan.’

  ‘Sean,’ DS Aden O’Brien answered. ‘How you been keeping? Haven’t seen you since that little job we pulled in Liverpool.’

  ‘Long time ago now, Aden.’ Sean avoided reminiscing. ‘You got something for me?’

  ‘That shotgun DS Donnelly wanted me to take a look at,’ O’Brien began. ‘Very interesting.’

  ‘I’m listening,’ Sean assured him.

  ‘Not your usual sawn-off,’ O’Brien told him. ‘Hope they haven’t been robbing banks with it – gun’s probably worth more than any haul would be.’

  ‘What are you saying?’ Sean asked.

  ‘I’m telling you that shotgun’s a rare and valuable item. More specifically, it’s a David McKay Brown, over/under double-barrelled round-action shotgun with a twenty-nine-inch barrel and some very beautiful Celtic engravings. Any decent villain who got his hands on this would sell it, not saw the bloody barrels off it, so either whoever has it doesn’t know what he has, or he doesn’t care.’

  ‘Or it’s his own,’ Sean said quietly.

  ‘What’s that?’ O’Brien asked.

  ‘Nothing ,’ Sean lied. ‘Thanks, Aden.’

  ‘One more thing,’ O’Brien said before Sean could hang up. ‘I checked the register of stolen firearms. A gun like this should show up pretty quickly.’

  ‘But?’ Sean encouraged him.

  ‘I got a big fat no trace.’

  ‘Meaning no one’s reported one as being stolen,’ Sean surmised.

  ‘Correct,’ O’Brien confirmed. ‘Listen. There’s probably only a couple of hundred of these guns in the UK. Shouldn’t take you too long to find out who’s missing one.’

  ‘Long enough,’ Sean replied. ‘Thanks, Aden.’

  ‘No problem. Sorry I couldn’t pin it down a bit more for you.’

  ‘Trust me, Sean told him. ‘You’ve given me plenty.’ He hung up slowly as another brick in the wall The Jackdaw had built seemingly crumbled.

  ‘Everything all right?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘The shotgun our boy’s been using,’ Sean explained, ‘it’s valuable and reasonably rare, but not reported as stolen.’

  ‘Then the owner doesn’t know it’s missing yet,’ Donnelly offered the logical explanation.

  ‘I don’t see how,’ Sean argued.

  ‘Overseas maybe.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Sean told him. ‘I think it’s not reported stolen because it’s not stolen. I think it’s his gun, whoever he is. He’s not a criminal, or at least he wasn’t, and neither does he associate with them, so he can’t use his criminal contacts to get a gun and he can’t just walk into his local boozer and quietly ask around. So he uses his own shotgun. But this isn’t the sort of gun a farmer or gamekeeper would own, this is a rich man’s plaything.’

  ‘Maybe the rich man owner’s dead,’ Donnelly suggested. ‘Our boy’s first victim, hiding somewhere in a shallow grave. Can’t report the shooter missing if you’re dead and no one knows.’

  ‘It’s his gun,’ Sean insisted. ‘I’m telling you, it’s his own gun, and he’s no working-class hero. He’s right under all our noses, only we can’t see him.’

  ‘But the Celtic markings on the gun,’ Donnelly argued. ‘Surely he’d know we’d identify it?’

  ‘Then he has a plan for that too,’ Sean insisted. ‘He has a plan for everything, remember.’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Donnelly shook his head. ‘We should concentrate on looking for someone who’s lost everything – someone with a vendetta against these City types.’

  ‘No,’ Sean told him. ‘It’s personal. It always was.’ He quickly finished filling his coat pockets with everything he thought he might need and headed for the door.

  ‘You sure you don’t want me to come?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘No,’ Sean told him. ‘I’ll call you if I need you.’ He swept past Donnelly into the main office and was gone, leaving Donnelly sitting open-mouthed in his office.

  ‘Once in a while,’ Donnelly complained to Sally, ‘I wish he’d tell me what the fuck’s going on in that mind of his.’

  ‘Would you really want to know?’ Sally asked.

  ‘No,’ Donnelly shook his head. ‘D’you want me to go with him – even if he doesn’t want me to?’

  ‘No,’ Sally replied. ‘He’s best left on his own – sometimes.’

  ‘You sure?’ Donnelly checked. ‘This thing about Goldsboro and the hood – I wonder if this is one high-profile investigation too far.’

  ‘If he thinks he’s on to something we should trust him,’ Sally rounded on him. ‘Don’t you?’ Donnelly just shrugged. ‘Let him work it through,’ Sally ordered. ‘Just give him time to work it through.’

  As Sean reached the exit to the main office he almost bumped into Anna coming the other way. Instinctively he grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her around to avoid a painful collision – moving as if they were dancing.

  ‘Sean,’ she panted, flustered. ‘I was hoping to see you.’

  ‘Not now, Anna,’ he apologized. ‘I need to be somewhere else.’

  ‘It’s important. I’ve already waited too long to tell you.’ Her eyes told him she was serious.

  ‘OK,’ he relented. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Not here,’ she told him. ‘We need to speak in private.’

  ‘Walk me to my car,’ he instructed her. ‘We can speak on the way. If we’re moving we won’t be overheard.’ She nodded her agreement and followed him out of the door and along the corridor heading to the lifts. ‘So what’
s so important it can’t wait?’

  ‘Christ,’ Anna tried to begin, drawing in a deep breath. ‘This is not going to be easy for me to say.’

  Sean smiled nervously as they strode along the thin corridor. ‘This already doesn’t sound good.’

  ‘It’s about Assistant Commissioner Addis,’ she explained.

  ‘Addis,’ Sean said dismissively as he pushed open the doors that led to the small foyer and the lifts. ‘What’s Addis got to do with anything?’

  Anna checked all around them to make sure they were alone as Sean impatiently stabbed at the lift button. Still he didn’t sense her anxiety as his mind wandered ahead to Jeremy Goldsboro and what he was going to ask him. No doubt Goldsboro would think he was as mad as everyone else did once he started questioning him about why his captor hadn’t removed the hood.

  ‘It was Addis who made sure I was attached to the Thomas Keller investigation,’ she reminded him.

  ‘So?’ Sean shrugged as the empty lift arrived, the doors parted and they stepped inside alone.

  ‘And it was Addis again who arranged for me to be attached to this investigation,’ Anna continued.

  ‘I know,’ Sean told her, sounding increasingly irritated. ‘Listen, if you’ve got something to tell me then just say it.’ The doors of the lift slid shut as they began their juddering descent.

  ‘My job was and is to profile the offenders for you – to help you find them.’

  ‘I know what you’re here for,’ Sean sighed.

  ‘Only, that’s not entirely true,’ she explained. ‘I’m not here to profile the offenders for you, Sean, I’m here to profile you for Addis.’ Sean’s eyes grew large and wild, before narrowing to thin slits – his pupils turning to little more than black pinpricks. Anna reached out to touch his arm, but he pulled it away. ‘I’m so sorry. It was before I met you. Before I got to know you. If I’d known then what I know now I would never have agreed to it.’

  ‘What was in it for you?’ he managed to ask through thin white lips.

  ‘It sounded an interesting case study,’ she answered, knowing only honesty could save her now. ‘A detective who could seemingly see things that others could not – see evidence that others had missed. One who could profile the people he hunted better than any psychiatrist or psychologist I’ve ever known.’