The Dirty Dozen

by Lynda La Plante

  “I just did that, and he said he hasn’t seen you since you went into one of the ground floor flats.”

  Cam looked flustered. “I spoke to him before that—Anyway, I’ve updated the Guv about the owner of garage 29—”

  “Who said—?” She was eager to hear what Cam had found out.

  “He was pleased I’d traced the owner and wants us to return to Rigg for an office meeting,” he said with a smug grin.

  “I meant what did the owner of the garage say.”

  “He wasn’t there—he’s in hospital recovering from a cataract operation. I spoke to his wife, Mrs. Helen Clarke, who’s in her late sixties. She said they’ve lived at the flats for six months, but since his eyesight problems Mr. Clarke couldn’t drive and she hasn’t got a license. They stopped using the garage just after they moved in.”

  “Are they renting it out?”

  “No, they’ve given the car to the daughter and son-in-law to use for now. His wife said if the cataract operation is successful he hopes to start driving again and then they’ll carry on using the garage.”

  “Did they keep it locked when they weren’t using it?”

  “I don’t know—I didn’t ask.”

  “Did you ask who owned it before them?”

  “No—I was told to find out who owned garage 29 and that’s what I did.”

  “Sometimes you have to look beyond the end of your nose, Cam. I’ll speak to the wife myself.”

  She opened the passenger door to get out.

  “She’s gone to the hospital to see her husband.”

  “Did she say when she’d be back?”

  “No. I’ve got their details recorded on a house-to-house form—there’s a phone number as well.”

  “Put it in here with the others you’ve done,” she said, opening the folder the uniform sergeant had given her.

  Cam handed her four completed forms.

  “Is that it? You’ve only visited four flats since we’ve been here?”

  “A couple of them were elderly residents who needed reassuring that everything was fine, so I had a cup of tea and a chat with them.”

  She couldn’t help noticing the crumbs around his mouth.

  “And a few chocolate digestives by the looks of it. I’ll go and get Dabs—then I’d like to go back via Barclays Bank in the High Road.”

  “Why? The team and scene of crime are all finished there and gone back to Rigg, so there’s nothing to do—”

  “Well, there’s something I want to check out—so just do as I ask, please, and don’t question my decisions.”

  Cam gave a grunt of disapproval, making it clear he didn’t think she’d last long on the squad if she started throwing her weight about like that.

  He pulled up outside the Crown public house, where Jane got out of the car and crossed over the road to the bank. The Securicor van had returned to its depot and life had returned to normal in the street, with several people out shopping. Jane stood on the steps and looked around, surveying the scene of the robbery and the short distance to Aylmer Road, where the four robbers in the Cortina had parked.

  “Can I help you, madam?” a well-spoken male voice asked.

  She got out her warrant card as she turned around and saw a man in his forties, smartly dressed in a three-piece gray pinstripe suit, white shirt and tie. She suspected he was something to do with the bank and introduced herself as WDS Tennison from the Flying Squad.

  “Ah, I’m the manager of this branch. Is there something I can help you with? I’ve already been interviewed by a DI Kingston and I also made a statement to a DC, whose name I can’t remember, but everyone else referred to him as the Colonel.”

  “That’ll be DC Gorman,” Jane told him.

  “Would you like to come in and have a coffee or tea?” he asked with a polite smile.

  “Thank you, but I’m a bit pressed for time as I have to get back to the office for a meeting.”

  “It was a relief to hear that the officers in the police car and the off-duty one who got shot here are all all right. The men who did this are the dregs of the earth. I suspect if they knew it was an off-duty officer who tried to stop them they would have shot him with a real bullet as well.”

  “You’re probably right, sir, but thankfully they didn’t and he’s alive—”

  “If somewhat shaken, no doubt. You can still see the rice that was in the shotgun cartridges on the pavement.”

  Jane asked the bank manager if he knew exactly where the men had parked up in the Cortina before the robbery. He pointed across the road.

  “I believe it was on the left side of Aylmer Road as we look at it—about where that white builder’s van is now parked. I didn’t see the car, other than from behind when they made their getaway. I was in the bank during the robbery and set the alarm off when I heard the sound of a shotgun.”

  “Do you know if the area where the Cortina was parked was searched by the scene-of-crime officers?”

  “I would have thought so. I know they fingerprinted the Securicor van, even though the robbers wore gloves, as there was loads of fingerprint dust over the front and back of it.”

  Jane knew the initial 999 call, about the suspects in a Cortina, had been made by the landlady of the Crown, but she couldn’t remember her name. The bank manager told her it was Fiona Simpson, and he thought DI Kingston had spoken to her as he saw him going in the pub just after he arrived at the scene.

  Jane nodded. “Thanks for your help.”

  She carefully scanned the street as she crossed slowly over to Aylmer Road where the white van was parked. She checked the pavement and road beside the van but didn’t see anything that caught her eye. She went into the pub; the premises had a large horseshoe bar, wooden floor and a snug area around the other side. Although the decor looked faded the premises had a clean, well-run look about it and an old but pristine Wurlitzer jukebox stood out in the corner of the bar. There were also several framed posters and pictures from Alfred Hitchcock films hanging on the walls, prompting Jane to recall reading somewhere that Hitchcock had been born in Leytonstone High Road, above his father’s grocery shop.

  “What can I get you, luv?” the woman behind the bar asked as Jane approached.

  “I was looking for Fiona, the landlady.”

  She frowned. “Are you from the press? Because if you are I can’t help you about the robbery.”

  “No, I’m WDS Tennison,” Jane replied, showing her warrant card.

  Fiona sighed. “DI Kingston said he’d ring me first, and I did tell him I wasn’t available until after three. You’ll have to wait until I close the pub to do the artist’s impression.”

  “I’m not a police artist, I’m one of the Flying Squad officers investigating the robbery.”

  “What? You’re Flying Squad? Do me a favor! I’ve met a few in my time and none of them look like you, darling. You’re a reporter and that’s a fake police card you just showed me, ain’t it?”

  “Two of my colleagues are parked up outside your pub in an unmarked BMW—you can ask them if you don’t believe me.”

  “I will.”

  Fiona lifted the bar counter flap and exited the pub into the High Road. It wasn’t long before she returned and spoke to Jane.

  “The Cortina was parked up opposite the Aylmer Road entrance to the pub, on the far side of the road—just about where Pete the plumber’s white van is now.”

  “Do you know where I can find Pete? I need him to move his van so I can look under it.”

  “Yeah, he’s in the snug bar playing pool with his apprentice. Look, I’m sorry if I doubted you. I just needed to be sure about who you were, especially as you didn’t look like a detective with black marks all over your coat.”

  “It’s soot from a burnt-out car, and you’re not the first to doubt who I am today. I’m beginning to wonder if I should have come to work in jeans and a T-shirt with a false moustache and a deep voice.”

  “Slip your coat and jacket off and I’ll
give them a quick dab down with a sponge and water.”

  “Thanks, but I’m pressed for time, so I’ll do it when I get back to the station. Would you mind asking Pete to move his van for me?”

  Jane noticed a sullen-looking Cam entering through the High Road entrance of the pub.

  “The DI’s been on the radio again wanting to know where we are.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That you were in the Crown talking to the landlady and I didn’t have a clue what it was about.”

  “And what was his reply?”

  “That he’d already spoken to her and to get our arses back to Rigg right away—and that’s putting it politely.”

  “I’ll be a minute or two yet—”

  “What exactly are you doing?”

  “Looking for something.”

  “Looking for what?”

  “I’ll know if I find it.”

  She walked off, leaving Cam shaking his head in frustration.

  As Jane waited in Aylmer Road, Fiona came out of the pub.

  “Pete’s just finishing his game of pool and said he’ll be two minutes . . . Hello, Betty, you all right?”

  Jane turned to see who Fiona was speaking to and saw a frail elderly woman with a hunched back walking slowly and pulling a canvas shopping trolley.

  “No, I bloody ain’t, Fi,” Betty replied in a strong cockney accent. “I couldn’t get me shoppin’ done what with all that ’oo-’a goin’ on outside the bank this mornin’. If I was forty years younger, I’d ’ave ’ad a go at them bleedin’ robbers.”

  “It was terrible, Betty, but thankfully no one got badly hurt—”

  “Oh, I’m glad to ’ear that. The sound of that gun goin’ off was deafenin’, and I honestly thought the young man who was lyin’ on the pavement screamin’ was a goner.”

  Jane turned to Fiona. “It sounds like she witnessed the robbery—I’d better have a word with her.”

  “It’s OK, your DI Kingston’s dealing with her. Do you fancy a bottle of stout on the house, Betty?”

  “I gotta get this shoppin’ in the fridge, but I’ll ’ave it when I come in later.”

  She shuffled off.

  As Fiona returned to the pub, a man dressed in blue coveralls came out and held out a set of car keys to Jane.

  “I’d better not drive the van as I’ve had three pints, officer. I was going to leave it here and pick it up in the morning.”

  “I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.” She smiled.

  As Pete got in his van, Jane asked him to reverse back about ten feet as the area behind him was clear. He started the engine, disengaged the handbrake and moved slowly backwards. As Jane watched the front nearside wheel rotating, she saw a squashed two-inch-long soggy-looking brown object stuck to the wheel.

  “Stop!” she shouted, banging her fist on the side of the van.

  Pete hit the brake pedal.

  “Christ, have I run over another cat? That’ll be the second one this week!” he said, ashen-faced.

  “No, there’s something stuck to the front wheel that I need to remove and have a closer look at. Stay where you are, it’ll only take me a second to get it off.”

  Jane removed a small exhibits bag from her coat pocket and, using her pen, slowly prised the brown object from the wheel and it dropped into the bag. Looking closely at it, she was reasonably sure it was what she’d hoped to find. To be certain she opened the bag and took a deep sniff. Not only did the object look like a squashed cigar butt—it also smelt like one.

  Chapter Seven

  It was raining again as Dabs opened the security gate to the rear of the building so Cam could drive in and park up.

  “It would make it a damn sight easier if they left the bloody gate open while the office is manned,” Cam moaned.

  Jane said nothing as she handed Cam the house-to-house folder, then got the bag of exhibits from the boot of the car and ran across the yard to join Dabs. He was entering the number code on the rear entrance keypad. She put the bag down, got out her pocket notebook and pen and asked him what the code was.

  “They’re easy to remember. It’s 1066 for the front door and gate and 1812 for the back—Battle of Hastings and the Battle of Waterloo,” Dabs told her, entering the numbers.

  But when he turned the handle nothing happened.

  “Waterloo was 1815, you dunce,” said Cam, as he pushed past Dabs and Jane to enter the right code.

  “Sorry, I was listening to Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture while I was driving to work this morning.”

  “You like classical music then?” Jane asked.

  “Yes, very much. I quite often go to concerts at the Royal Albert Hall.”

  “It soothes the savage beast in him.”

  Cam smirked as he shoved the door open and entered the building. He made no effort to hold the door open, and as it was on a hinged spring, it would have hit Jane if Dabs hadn’t put his hand out just in time.

  “Where’s your manners, Cam?” Dabs said, as he held the door open for her.

  Cam mumbled an apology, said he needed a “Jimmy Riddle” and turned left to go down the concrete and worn green lino-covered stairs to the basement toilets.

  The hallway and stairwell walls were painted a puke green, which couldn’t disguise the patches of mold, and a damp smell filled the air. Jane was a bit surprised to find the interior of the building was in a worse condition than any police station she’d worked in before.

  “Sorry about Cam—he can be a right surly git at times. He gets frustrated at not being involved in the investigative side of things. Mind you, he is a good driver.”

  “You don’t need to apologize for Cam’s behavior. If he wants to be an investigator he should apply to become a detective and stop moaning.”

  Dabs put his hand on Jane’s arm.

  “Mind you don’t slip on that wet patch. We’ve got a leaky roof, which was supposed to have been repaired weeks ago, and some of the stairs to the top floor are a bit wet as well. The cleaner does her best to keep on top of it, but she can’t predict the rain unfortunately.”

  “Was this building ever a working police station?”

  “No, it used to be an office block with a woodwork factory on this floor where they made doors. The company went bust and the building lay empty until the Met bought it specifically for the Flying Squad a few years ago. As you can see, it needs some repair work and a lick of paint, but it’s much better upstairs in the squad office.”

  “Who uses the downstairs?”

  “The surveillance team—though one section of it is used as a lock-up for the exhibits we seize during our investigations.”

  “What—like guns and ammunition?”

  “Yes, among other things. They go up to the firearms unit lab first for examination and when they’ve finished with them we store them here.”

  “The building doesn’t look very secure,” Jane said, having seen the outside in the morning.

  “Believe me, it is, especially the exhibits room, which has an alarm linked to central control at the Yard. We had a case a year ago where a criminal did try and break in. He wanted to get the gun he used in a robbery so there was no evidence against him, but he was caught in the act and got an extra three years on his sentence when he was found guilty.”

  Jane followed Dabs up the flight of stairs to the top floor landing, which was decorated similarly to the ground floor, though the mold on the walls and smell of damp were not so pronounced.

  “Through the first door on the right there’s a small kitchen area with a fridge, electric cooker and a kettle. Would you like a coffee?”

  Jane said she was fine and Dabs continued.

  “Next to it is the ladies’ toilet.” Dabs pointed to a door that had an A4 sheet of paper taped to it and KP’s TOILET written in large black letters. “She’ll have to add JT to that notice now,” he joked, and Jane smiled. “The squad office is down the end on the left and opposite is my office with all my equipment
and a forensic examination area. Though I do go into the main office quite a bit for a chat and office meetings.”

  “How many are on the team?”

  “Not including the surveillance team, there’s twelve in total. Ten detectives—that’s including the two Governors and you, PC Murray the driver and myself as the SOCO.”

  As Jane followed Dabs she saw a wooden plaque screwed to a door and knew it was the squad room. On the plaque was a golden eagle, with its talons outstretched as if about to grab its prey. Above the eagle were the words THE FLYING SQUAD and below it NEW SCOTLAND YARD written in gold lettering. She knew the swooping eagle was the emblem of an elite unit, which had gained a reputation for courage and determination in opposing the most violent of London’s armed robbers and hardened criminals. She touched the plaque with her hand, not for luck, but because she felt immense pride in being the first woman detective posted to the Flying Squad in its sixty-year history.

  Standing in the corridor Jane could hear male voices chatting and laughing on the other side of the door, as well as the click-clack of typewriters and the ding of the bell as the carriage reached the end of the page. She straightened her coat and swept her hands through her hair. She didn’t know why, but for the first time in ages she felt nervous about walking into an office full of male detectives, as Dabs opened the door for her. But her anxiety eased as she recognized the hearty laugh of DS Stanley. Being the first female member of the Flying Squad probably wasn’t going to be a bed of roses, but it felt like it was the beginning of an exciting new chapter in her life. She walked into the room and saw the Colonel and Stanley standing together, with their backs to her, looking at something on the wall. Before she could speak, the Colonel nudged Stanley with his elbow.

  “Get me Tennison’s joining photo out of her job file on KP’s desk—I’ll stick it on the poster under her nickname.”

  The Colonel sniggered, still with his back to Jane.

  Stanley turned around and took a few steps towards the desk before he saw Jane and grimaced. She glared at him and held her finger to her mouth, making it clear she wanted him to keep quiet. She could see her police file, with her CID photograph clipped to it, on a neat and tidy desk near the door, which had a “Katie Powell” name plaque on it.