Joint Enterprise (The Romney and Marsh Files Book 3)

by Oliver Tidy

  Sammy’s face said that he did. ‘Killed in the hospital, I heard, Mr Romney. What is the world coming to? When I was a boy people went to hospital to get better. These days it seems you’re lucky to come out alive all these super-bugs and psychopaths running around the wards unchecked.’ Sammy knew that Romney was after anything he knew of the man. ‘He’d come in here from time to time.’

  ‘You knew him then?’

  ‘Not really. Not to talk to. But I knew who he was. You couldn’t not know who he was if you’ve lived in Dover all your life.’

  Romney frowned. ‘What don’t I know about Edy Vitriol, Sammy?’ And there was a wariness in the DI’s tone.

  Sammy sat back in the plastic chair and it creaked in protest. ‘When did you arrive in Dover, Mr Romney?’

  ‘Nineteen-eighty-nine. Too long ago.’

  ‘That explains it then.’

  ‘Explains what?’

  ‘How come you don’t know Edy Vitriol. You haven’t been here long enough, Mr Romney. You must remember the Herald of Joint Enterprise?’

  ‘Blimey, yes,’ said Romney.

  ‘No,’ said Marsh.

  Sammy seemed pleased that Marsh had given him an opportunity to show off something of his knowledge of local history. ‘The Herald of Joint Enterprise was a cross-channel car-ferry that operated between Dover and France,’ said Sammy. ‘It was one of those roll-on-roll-off types. In nineteen-eighty-seven it capsized off Zebrugge on the Belgian coast. Nearly two hundred people lost their lives that night.’ Marsh looked suitably astounded. ‘The bow doors weren’t closed before it put to sea and she flooded, lost stability and rolled over before she was five minutes out of the port. Guess whose job it was to shut them?’

  ‘Edy Vitriol’s?’ said Marsh.

  Sammy nodded sagely. ‘He was asleep in his cabin. On a break. Some people said he was drunk, but that was never proved.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Marsh. ‘What happened to him?’

  ‘He walked away from court. The judge directed the jury to acquit him, the company and several others who were tried in connection with the disaster on some technicality.’

  ‘And he stayed here, in Dover?’ said Marsh, incredulous.

  ‘Yeah, he did. Lot of people found that strange at the time. If it had been me, I’d have moved to the other side of the world and taken a new identity. He suffered for it a few times that I know of. He had a few hidings. Some more serious than others, but yeah, he stayed.’

  *

  When they left Tiffany’s, Romney was still kicking himself for not knowing about Vitriol’s past.

  ‘You don’t think it’s got anything to do with his death do you, sir?’ said Marsh. ‘That was twenty-five years ago. If someone had it in for him, they’d have probably done something about it before now wouldn’t they?’

  ‘Probably, but until we find out different we are going to have to consider it a possibility. There must still be a lot of people out there who harboured a grudge and will be happy that he’s dead. Still, I don’t think we have to get pro-active about it yet. Just bear it in mind.’

  Romney’s phone started ringing. He answered it as they walked, listened and said with rising anger, ‘Do I have to speak to her? Tell her that her sources are responsible for a crime and that if she doesn’t give them up to us then she could find herself facing charges of obstruction. What? No, I’ll hold.’ He put his hand over the mouthpiece and said to Marsh, ‘Grimes’ reporter is not being cooperative.’ Then he was listening again. ‘Threaten her with arrest. Try and be convincing.’ And again to Marsh, ‘What is wrong with some people? Why can’t there be more citizens like Sammy? People who understand what right and wrong is and have a conscience that leads them to cooperating with the law instead of impeding it? What makes me sick about them is their hypocrisy. As soon as they’re on the wrong end of some thieving little scrote’s attentions they expect us to come running and dry their tears. Who’s next on your list of tarts?’

  As Marsh fished in her bag for the piece of paper containing the women’s contact details Grimes came back on the line. Again Romney listened but this time his body language indicated something more encouraging. ‘She called you what? Tell her that you can arrest her for that.’ He listened. ‘Well that’s something, at least. You can’t leave her to call them and warn them we’re coming. You’ll have to take her in.’ More listening. ‘Has she? Well, tough shit. She’ll have to reschedule. Tell her welcome to the real world. In fact don’t bother, I’ll do it. I’ll see you back at the station in fifteen minutes. And, Grimes, don’t let her make any phone calls.’

  ‘Change of plan?’ said Marsh.

  ‘Change of plan.’ He was smiling mischievously. ‘Back to the station. You can drop me off there and take either Grimes or Spicer with you to go and speak to the others on your list. I’m going to rescue Hugo’s precious films.’

  Marsh subdued her inclination to pout and sigh. Romney didn’t seem in the right frame of mind for that. He rarely did for any show of dissent. She envied him his power to pick and choose his input; to flit from investigation to investigation as his mood, the hint of some excitement and the promise of success suited him.

  On the way back to the car, Romney’s step developed a hint of a spring. He was going to recover the missing film. He was going to be the arresting officer. He was going to have the future of Hugo Crawford’s little project in his hands and he was going to enjoy it. On top of that, he was in the mood to deal with violent activists, release some pent up frustration and crack a few heads.

  *

  The first thing Romney did on his return was to speak to his opposite number in uniform. Falkner’s words of warning were never far from his procedural planning these days. If he was going to tackle a cell of hardened activists, he needed an overwhelming force of appropriately kitted out officers and a strategy of attack.

  After communicating the situation and his wishes to the officer in question, he left him to his organisations and the mustering of whatever bodies he had available and moved down to the basement and the interview rooms where Grimes was waiting with Claire Wright.

  As soon he entered the dingy little room in which she was waiting the journalist said, ‘Are you Detective Inspector Romney?’

  ‘That’s right. And you must be Ms Wright, so introductions over. You know why you’re here?’

  ‘Am I under arrest? Are you charging me with something?’ she looked more anxious than angry.

  Romney ignored her concerns and search for understanding of her position. He was in an intimidatory frame of mind and pandering to her questions and allaying her fears would only likely prove counter-productive. ‘Ms Wright, let me make something very clear for you.’ She was sitting and he had come to lean against and over the table – the only thing that now separated them – threatening to invade her personal space further. The table let out a little shriek of friction as it jolted an inch on the hard floor under his weight. She instinctively eased herself back as if fearing violence. ‘We believe you have information relating to serious crimes: theft and a nasty assault. I want that information and I want it now. Upstairs a small force of police officers is equipping themselves and waiting for names and an address. If you disappoint me with your ridiculous and warped view of confidentiality, I can promise you I will not be pleased.’ Romney had taken in her good clothes, expensive haircut and tasteful accessories. Apparently, Claire Wright liked what money and credit could buy her. Romney took a shot in the dim light of his assessment. ‘Do you know how an arrest and successful conviction can affect a person’s credit rating, Ms Wright?’

  She looked somewhat flustered, which was good, but she was not to be so easily cowed into revealing what she knew. ‘I am a professional journalist, Inspector Romney,’ she said a little pompously. ‘My sources and the way that I treat them are of paramount importance to my future credibility in my job.’ Romney waited and glowered. ‘I’m not entirely sure that you have the right to insist in such an aggress
ively hostile way for such information from me.’

  ‘Then you need a reality check, Ms Wright. And it’s going to be my pleasure to provide it for you. This is the real world and you are coming down to meet it with a great big bump. I’m going to give you one minute to consider your options, your future – and while you are considering your future you should also think about how your bosses are going to react to the news that Dover police are no longer going to be a cooperative partner in the community with them and how, when they find out who is responsible for that, they might then view your position. On top of that you need to think about your more immediate future and how failure to assist us voluntarily with our enquiries is going to impact on it. I don’t make idle threats, Ms Wright. I make cast-iron promises. And I promise you that if you obstruct us, I will arrest you and bring the full force of the law, as far as it permits me, to bear. Is that clear?’ Her wide-eyed silence indicated that it was. Romney looked at his watch. ‘Time starts now.’ He walked around behind her and winked at the female PC standing just inside the door.

  *

  As they waited in the station’s front foyer for Romney to visit the bathroom, Grimes volunteered to ease their waiting with a memory. ‘All this talk of prostitutes reminds me of Elsie Rowe, this old Tom on the game down by the docks when I was a beat copper. That was going back a bit, I can tell you. Blimey she was rough as old boots. God knows how she made it pay. Mind you it was pretty dark down there. Anyway, she was always on her corner. Every night, no matter what the weather. I remember this one winter’s evening – it was bloody inclement – blowing a gale and the rain, but she was still there: on her corner. As I walked past her, I asked her how much she’d made that night. I couldn’t believe anyone would be looking for an outdoor back-alley knee-trembler in that. Quick as a flash, she says, four pounds and fifty pence, officer. What tight git gave you fifty pence? I said. All of them, she said. Grimes and Spicer found this a great deal funnier than Marsh who just sighed and left them to their mirth.

  On the strength of this anecdote, Marsh chose Spicer over Grimes as the lesser of two primevals – her words and overhead by the duty sergeant to much amusement – to accompany her to visit the remaining women on the list. The prospect was made worse for her as a duty because she felt sure that nothing regarding Edy Vitriol’s death would be uncovered from the women in question. Why would any of them murder him if it had been clear from the beginning that he was paying them to make sex-tapes with him? Still, it had to be done.

  Despite being saddled with Grimes there was some good news for Romney. At short notice, the uniform inspector had done Romney proud. There were six officers looking suitably menacing and the obvious collective disposition was of a group of men and women looking forward to the fray and some excitement. It raised Romney’s spirits.

  ‘You can keep your dressing up to play soldiers at weekends,’ he said to Grimes. ‘I like the real thing now and again.’ He clapped his hands together and rubbed them fiercely.

  Claire Wright had not held out for the full minute Romney had given her. And Romney was left feeling that it was the vague and unsubstantiated risk to her consumer credit rating that arrest and subsequent conviction might bring which had tipped the balance for her rather than anything else he had threatened or appealed to.

  According to Ms Wright, Animal Rights Enforcers were based at a remote farm on the outskirts of Shepherdswell, a small settlement a few miles outside the Dover town boundary. The Ordnance Survey map of the area showed that the farm benefitted from a single access in and out: a long farm track.

  Ms Wright had decided to cooperate fully with the police. She volunteered that she had been invited anonymously by an out-of-the-blue phone-call to her work to meet a representative of the group. A group she had never heard of and could find nothing on. The meeting had taken place on the seafront in the middle of the day.

  A woman, who didn’t sound like the caller and who had also not given her name, had met the reporter and told her about the theft and the reasons for it.

  Only taking precautions, Claire Wright had not gone to the meeting alone. A male friend had chaperoned her from a distance and then, on the reporter’s instruction, discreetly followed the female activist back home. Animal Rights Enforcers were proving not to be the most cautious of law-breaking groups.

  In response to Romney’s probing regarding how Claire Wright could be sure that the activists were indeed those responsible for the criminal activity at the castle she had produced a short length of celluloid from her handbag. It showed a few frames of the action of the battle. Romney kept it. This, she claimed, had been used by the woman she had met on the seafront to prove her authenticity.

  Ms Wright had sworn she was not able to offer anything else. She had said she had her story and that is as far as it had gone for her. She had harboured no desire, or need, to get further involved at that time.

  Romney accepted this because it suited him. And now he was poised to go mob-handed and discover the rest for himself. Ms Wright was prevailed upon to remain incognito, a guest of the station, until the operation was over in case she suffered an attack of conscience and tried to forewarn the activists. This, despite her protestations that she had absolutely no desire to let them know she had effectively led the police to their farmhouse door.

  ***

  12

  Capitaine Poisson had waited patiently in CID for sometime before making the decision to go alone to visit the castle. He understood without any hint of ill-feeling how busy a police department could be and that his English colleagues had important work to do. Providing a companion to show him around a tourist attraction simply for the pleasure of it would have been low on their list of priorities, despite what had been said in the pub the night before. Something easily offered and just as easily forgotten. In the front foyer, he asked if the duty sergeant might help him to find a taxi and was grateful when instead he arranged a patrol car to drop him off at the castle gates.

  The Frenchman did not begrudge the entrance fee. He even bought a guide book. However, before he would allow himself to relax and enjoy the experience of soaking up centuries of history, he had an obligation to perform. He used the little fold-out map at the back of his souvenir to navigate his way through the various sections of the fortress and eventually to exit the Fitzwilliam Gateway in the outer wall onto the raised ground that looked out over the trees and across the adjoining field.

  It was with a sense of some melancholy that he stood surveying the scene that had only a few days before staged a battle in which a man had been killed.

  It was important for him to see where his countryman had fallen. The man’s family might ask him something of it, although he could not think what. But he must be prepared. And to that end he cleared his mind of distractions and alerted his senses to soak up what they might. It was also important for him to fulfil a promise made to the dead man’s distraught wife. She had sought Poisson out, tracked him down through the channels of communication and command on discovering that he was to be the official French police representative to visit the site of her late husband’s death, to beseech him a kindness.

  Poisson crossed the open walkway that spanned the big dry ditch and threaded his way along the well worn path through the adjacent copse of mature trees. Magpies protested his intrusion with their machine-gun-chatter, but the Frenchman inevitably paid little attention to their threats as he reflected on Paul Henry’s wife’s request. It was certainly a curious one, but one that Poisson, who still retained some nostalgic notions of honour and respect had not been able to refuse. It was, after all, not such a great thing to ask of him.

  He walked across the field made springy by recent rain and churned up by the stiff leather boots of hundreds of soldiers and the iron shoes of dozens of horses until he felt he was approximately at its centre. This is where the police report on Paul Henry’s death had indicated the man had fallen – probably dead before he hit the turf with the cold, cruel steel of
an English bayonet, wielded by some drunken oaf looking for a thrill and a laugh, stuck in his heart.

  In a fleeting moment of self-consciousness that brought him an odd sense of shame, Poisson found himself looking around to see if he was being observed. Satisfied that he was alone, he removed from his jacket pocket a piece of paper and cleared his throat in preparation to read from it out loud.

  It had been a desperate wish of Paul Henry, his wife had told Poisson, that when his last day on earth should arrive someone – preferably a surviving relative, his wife or one of his children, perhaps – should mark the spot where he expired – where he believed, with the zealous religious fervour that infected his later years, his spirit would be released into the ether – with the recital of a list of names. Paul Henry had convinced himself that only with such a reading would his soul be free of eternal torment. And his wife had promised him. And, in turn, Poisson had promised the wife. It really wasn’t such an indulgence to the man’s superstition.

  Steadily Poisson began to read. To reel off in slow deliberate respectful tones the one hundred and ninety-three names of passengers and crew who had died as a result of the capsizing of the Herald of Joint Enterprise twenty-five years before. Lives that had been lost as a result of human error: negligence and carelessness. Men, women and children whose lives had been cut short because seamen hadn’t done their jobs. Men like Seaman Paul Henry who had been working a double-shift for the overtime on the car deck and who had sloped off for sleep when exhausted with his duties and without thought for the appalling event that was waiting to happen.

  Paul Henry had lived the last twenty-five years with the cloud of guilt shadowing his daily life. Paradoxically, the further the incident retreated into history, the worse the pain of what had happened and his part in it became. Eventually, Paul Henry had sought refuge in God and over time He had provided some solace for the man.