Angels Passing

by Hurley, Graham

  ‘You haven’t answered my question, pal. Why the questions?’

  ‘Bloke died last night in a house fire.’ He looked at Foster. ‘Terry Harris?’

  ‘Wee Terry?’ Foster whistled softly. ‘My, my.’

  Waterloo station was busy when Winter and Sullivan stepped off the Portsmouth train. They’d briefed the student to invent a story that kept Louise on the concourse for a couple of minutes. Maybe he should get her to check through the bag, make sure he’d remembered everything. Anything to give them a chance to approach her from the blind side. The last thing they wanted was the aggravation of a chase.

  Louise was already waiting outside the Burger King. Sullivan spotted her first. She was wearing the same black puff a jacket but she had a yellow scarf wound round her neck and she’d dug her chin deep into the folds. She looked cold and apprehensive, her hands thrust into the pockets of the jacket, and she stamped her feet from time to time as she searched the crowd for the student’s face.

  Winter and Sullivan disappeared behind the W. H. Smith bookshop, leaving the student to approach her from the other direction. By the time they arrested her on suspicion of conspiracy to murder, the student was on his hands and knees, the contents of the bag strewn across the concourse.

  ‘Twat,’ Winter said.

  The student sensibly disappeared. Winter allowed Louise to put a call through to her uncle at the embassy. When she discovered that he’d already left for lunch, she began to cry. The last thing in the world she wanted to do was go back to Portsmouth. Couldn’t they talk here?

  ‘Trust us, love.’ Winter took the mobile and gave her arm a little squeeze. ‘We’re detectives.’ They took the next train back to Portsmouth.

  Mick Harris turned up at Kingston Crescent police station just after one o’clock. Dave Michaels came down to talk to him. Harris demanded to know what they were doing about his twin brother. It was fucking obvious that someone had been round with a couple of gallons of unleaded and he wanted to know who. Michaels assured him the matter was under investigation. As a matter of interest, where had he been last night?

  Harris took the question personally.

  ‘You’re putting me in the frame? My own fucking brother?’

  ‘No, my friend. I’m asking you where you were.’

  ‘At home. In bed.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘Yeah. You gonna do me for that? Only you guys are starting to get me seriously pissed off.’

  Michaels reached for a pen and pad.

  ‘How do you spell pissed off?’ he asked.

  By mid-afternoon Faraday was convinced that something serious had happened to J-J. At lunch time he’d driven home, searched the house room by room and even checked the garage. Finding no sign of him, Faraday had gone through his bedroom, turning everything upside down, looking for his cheque book and credit cards. They, too, had gone. His passport was still in the side pocket of his rucksack – some small consolation – but the little cache of French francs he’d been saving for emergencies had also disappeared. That and whatever credit he had on the cards wouldn’t get him very far but that wasn’t the point. By now the image of Doodie had begun to preoccupy Faraday, not least because of Phillimore’s input when they’d settled down and talked last night.

  At first the priest had been guarded about the boy. It really wasn’t his business to do Faraday’s work for him and there were confidences that he, Phillimore, was obliged to respect. Nonetheless, it was incontestable that Doodie had severed the mooring rope that ties the individual to society. His father had become a stranger. His mother had given up. His teachers had begged for his exclusion. And so there was no one – no agency, no individual, not even the saintly Anghared – whom Doodie regarded as anything but a traitor. The child was on the run behind enemy lines. He trusted nobody. Five years earlier, in Phillimore’s opinion, he might have been diagnosed autistic. In five years’ time he would in all probability be behind bars. But for now he was one of those rare creatures who simply didn’t know the meaning of either restraint or fear.

  Faraday had pressed him to explain further. Fear of what, he’d asked, and Phillimore had stepped across with the bottle, emptying the last of the Medoc into Faraday’s glass. Fear of consequences, he’d said. Fear of authority. Fear even of gravity. Doodie’s tale of going off the Round Tower was probably true, not simply because he had courage and lots of it, but because he just didn’t care any more. Kids like Doodie were shown the game of life and there were a million people more than eager to spell out the rules. But then it dawned on Doodie that he didn’t have to play this game, didn’t want to play it, and at that point he stepped into a different world, utterly removed, utterly surreal.

  Some nights, when Doodie had stayed over, Phillimore had found himself talking to the boy about his mother. Deep down, if you pressed hard enough, he’d admit he missed her, even loved her. Deep down, God knows, it might even be true. Once, a week or so back, he’d confided to Phillimore that he wanted to buy her a really good present. Invited to explain what that present might be, Doodie had said a destroyer, a big destroyer like the ones you saw in the harbour, lots of guns and missiles and a helicopter on the back. Something she could do whatever she wanted with. Take across the sea. Take somewhere where she could get brown and be happy. On her destroyer.

  ‘And you know what I asked him after that?’ Phillimore had said. ‘I asked him what he wanted to do. And you know what the answer was? He wanted to get big and really strong. He wanted to eat loads and go to a gym. And then, when it had all worked, he wanted to find the bloke and break his legs.’

  ‘Who? Break whose legs?’

  Phillimore hadn’t a clue. In his view, Doodie had lost his grip completely, swapping some childhood fantasy for real life. That’s why the boy needed help. That’s why he’d been happy – no, obliged – to offer him sanctuary.

  Faraday wasn’t convinced. There was another interpretation here, infinitely more cynical, and the more Faraday thought about it, the more likely it became. Doodie wasn’t stuck in some childhood time warp at all. On the contrary, he’d discovered the kind of freedom that can only be recognised by someone who has made a clean getaway, by someone who has stepped out of society and found himself in a world ungoverned by any constraints. Not loyalty. Not respect. Not compassion. And certainly not – as Phillimore had rightly concluded – fear. Clinically, there was a word for people like Doodie. They were psychopathic, and that made Faraday very nervous indeed.

  Phillimore, inevitably, had disagreed. If they were talking psychology, he’d said, then Doodie was addicted to extremes: to shoplifting, to vandalism, to housebreaking, to the spray can, to the kind of wild public adventure that had taken him to the top of the Round Tower. Anything to attract attention. Anything to get himself noticed. There was potential in that kind of behaviour, the possibility of goodness, of redemption, and it was wholly wrong to stuff him away in a box and label it ‘psychopathic’. There were too many boxes in the world and too many labels, and if the experience of Angola had taught Phillimore anything, then it had to do with the infinite potential of the human spirit. Drag a child out of a minefield, bandage up what remained of his legs, and he was still a human being, still capable of the most incredible achievements. Doodie, he’d insisted, was like one of these kids. Maimed, yes. But not beyond salvation.

  The evening had ended in stalemate, a polite agreement to disagree, but half a day later the policeman in Faraday, and the parent, was only too aware of what someone like Doodie was capable of. He’d seen these kids on countless occasions with their pale, dead eyes. They looked like figures from some black and white newsreel, refugees from a long-forgotten war. Damaged, yes. But terrifying, too.

  Louise Abeka was only too happy to accept the Custody Sergeant’s offer of the Duty Solicitor. Hartley Crewdson was duty that day, an experienced defence lawyer with a substantial reputation in front of the magistrates. He’d built a successful criminal practice in the north of the cit
y, hoovering up offenders from the Paulsgrove and Leigh Park estates, and brought a sharp dress sense and a flamboyant personal style to the dowdy world of the bench. Winter had known him for years and had always sensed an unspoken kinship. Both men had a talent for interpreting the rules to their own advantage. And both men understood the distinction between means and ends.

  ‘She’s in the shit, Hartley.’ Winter had cornered Crewdson outside the interview room. ‘Maybe not from our point of view but certainly from hers.’

  He outlined events to date. There was strong circumstantial evidence to suggest that she’d been pressured by Kenny Foster. An affair with Foster wasn’t a proposition that any woman would take lightly. If you were silly, naive, or strong-minded enough to blow him out, then you risked certain consequences. And those consequences, in Winter’s opinion, had flagged the path to Hilsea Lines.

  ‘She needs to be frank with us,’ he concluded. ‘You’d be amazed how nice we can be sometimes.’

  The interview started twenty minutes later. Winter hadn’t a clue what Crewdson had said to his new client but the transformation was remarkable. The defensiveness, the glint of panic in the eyes, had gone. Instead, if anything, she looked relieved. Stuff to get off that magnificent chest. A chance to sort out the last chaotic month or two.

  ‘You want to start when you met Finch?’ Winter gave her an encouraging smile.

  Louise thought about the question. She was under caution, the tape decks were running and the clock was on.

  ‘It was like I told you the first time,’ she said at last. ‘It was the summer. He kept coming into the café. We met there.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘We talked a lot. He got to know when we weren’t too busy. When Mr Galea wasn’t there, we’d have tea.’

  ‘Who was buying?’

  ‘Me, always me. I didn’t care.’

  ‘You liked him?’

  ‘I felt sorry for him.’

  Winter glanced at Sullivan and grinned. Sympathy for this stray who’d wandered in from the cold. Exactly the way Winter had called it.

  Louise went on. She and Bradley had started going to the beach together on her days off, and on one occasion they’d taken the hovercraft to the Isle of Wight. Then, round October time, Bradley had suggested a trip to London. She’d said yes because she didn’t go to London very often and she’d just got a cheque through from her father in Lagos. They’d seen a favourite band of Bradley’s in Shepherd’s Bush and it had gone on longer than they’d expected. The last train back was at a quarter to midnight and they hadn’t bothered.

  Winter stirred.

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘We found a place, a cheap place.’

  ‘And stayed?’

  ‘Yes.’ She nodded.

  ‘Together? One bed?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And that was the first time?’

  ‘Yes.’

  There was a long silence. Sullivan was praying that Winter wouldn’t push it any further. Louise Abeka was class. You didn’t ask a girl like this how it had been.

  ‘So how was it?’

  ‘It was fine. Like I said, not too expensive.’

  ‘I didn’t mean that.’

  ‘No?’

  Crewdson shot Winter a look. Winter put the question a different way.

  ‘Regular boyfriend? After that?’

  ‘Yes.’ She looked down at her hands.

  ‘At his place?’

  ‘He didn’t have a place.’

  ‘He moved in with you?’

  ‘Not really. He often stayed over but he had other places too.’

  ‘Like where?’

  ‘He’d never tell me. Apart from his nan’s place.’

  ‘You think he went with other women?’

  ‘I don’t know. He said not. He …’ She frowned. ‘It was so hard with Bradley because he was like a little boy sometimes. So obvious.’

  ‘Obvious how?’

  ‘His lies. He lied all the time.’

  ‘And you didn’t mind that?’

  ‘Not really. I knew when he was doing it. I knew every time. Like he’d tell me sometimes he had a son, a little boy, but I knew that wasn’t true. He had no one.’

  ‘He had a mum,’ Sullivan pointed out. ‘We met her.’

  ‘No one who loved him, though.’

  ‘You loved him?’ Winter again.

  Louise was still looking at Sullivan. Then she ducked her head, refusing to answer the question.

  Winter pushed the story onwards. Christmas came. Louise and Finch swapped presents. She gave him a ring and he gave her a necklace of shells he’d picked up from a beach in Dorset. Nicked, thought Winter, as she described the Christmas dinner she’d tried to conjure from a microwave and a couple of battered saucepans. Then, in the New Year, the phone calls started.

  ‘From?’

  ‘His friend. Foster.’

  ‘What did he want?’

  ‘Me.’ She glanced at Crewdson and whispered something in his ear. He nodded and patted her arm, telling her to carry on. ‘Bradley had some pictures of me. I thought he’d been fooling with the camera. I didn’t realise there was film inside.’

  ‘What sort of pictures?’

  ‘Photos. Of me.’ She shrugged. ‘Naked.’

  ‘And he showed them to Foster?’

  ‘He must have. He said he hadn’t but he must have done. Some of the things Foster said on the phone he could only have known …’ Her voice trailed off. ‘I was really angry with Bradley. I shouted. He could be so stupid.’

  Winter scribbled a note to himself. She was right. Bradley Finch had been a very silly boy. Sharing those pictures with Kenny Foster had probably cost him his life.

  ‘So Foster kept phoning you?’

  ‘Yes, until I changed phones.’

  Sullivan leaned forward. He wanted the numbers of her mobiles and Winter nodded in approval, remembering the crossed-out mobes in Louise’s address book.

  Louise said she couldn’t remember them. By now it was late January, barely a fortnight ago, and Foster was beginning to pay her occasional visits.

  ‘I just wouldn’t answer the door,’ she said hopelessly. ‘I hid from him upstairs.’

  ‘What about the boys downstairs?’

  ‘They were never in. They never met him.’

  ‘Did he threaten you at all? Foster?’

  ‘No, not me. Bradley. He’d give me messages and tell me to pass them on.’

  ‘What kind of messages?’

  ‘He’d say how he wanted me for himself and if that happened he said I’d never go with Bradley again, and Bradley would know it. He scared me, that man. He really did.’

  ‘And Bradley? How did he react to all this?’

  ‘He kept saying it was just a joke. Everything was a joke to Bradley. He could be really childish. He just didn’t understand.’

  ‘A joke? Are you kidding?’

  Winter was back in Foster’s basement flat hearing the woman’s voice next door; back in Captain Beefy watching Foster servicing Simone. He hadn’t been wrong. Foster really was a dog. Show him a woman like Louise Abeka and you’d start a war.

  ‘So what happened on Friday night?’

  This time Louise shook her head. Even now, even after all this, there was something holding her back. Given what he knew of Foster, Winter wasn’t surprised. Self-preservation was a very good reason for suddenly going no comment.

  ‘You need to talk this through with your lawyer, love,’ Winter murmured. ‘I suggest a little break.’

  He reached for the tape deck, announced the time and switched it off. Minutes later he found Hartley Crewdson down the corridor beside the coffee machine.

  ‘I suspect we’re talking witness protection,’ the lawyer said. ‘Is there somewhere quiet we can discuss this?’

  Winter found an empty interview room. He shut the door. Louise was prepared to go on but only on the absolute assurance that she’d never set eyes on Foster again
.

  ‘No can do,’ Winter said. ‘She’ll have to give evidence.’

  ‘Of course she will. That’s what I told her.’

  ‘We can talk to the judge about a screen. She need never actually see the guy.’

  Crewdson shook his head.

  ‘She won’t do it.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Positive. She’s terrified of him.’

  ‘So how much does she know?’

  Crewdson looked at him and then smiled and shook his head again. Even if he knew himself, there was no way he was letting on. There were lines in the sand here that even Winter shouldn’t ignore.

  Winter glanced at his watch and then frowned.

  ‘Give me ten minutes,’ he said.

  Outside, in the car park, Winter used his mobile to contact Dave Michaels. He outlined the problem and asked how Willard would view an undertaking not to produce her as a witness in court.

  ‘He won’t do it,’ he said at once. ‘I know he won’t. Witness protection, yes. Screens, by all means as long as the judge agrees. But if she’s got something to say then she definitely appears in court.’

  ‘That’s what I told Crewdson.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She definitely won’t do it.’

  ‘So what happens next?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Winter glanced at his watch. ‘The PACE clock’s still ticking. I’ll bell you later.’

  Winter returned to the interview room. Louise was looking glumly at her coffee while Sullivan chatted to Crewdson about a recent Nicholas Cage movie. The moment Winter sat down, he started the tape machines again and announced the time.

  Crewdson stared at him.

  ‘You’ve talked to someone?’ Winter nodded. ‘And?’

  ‘Witness protection, no problem. Screens, no problem. But she has to stand up in court. Assuming, of course …’ he gestured at the space between them ‘… your client has something material to say.’ He paused, looking from one face to the other. ‘You want us to leave you to it for a bit?’

  Winter stopped the tape machines again and ushered Sullivan into the corridor. Moments later, they were back. Hartley Crewdson, for once, was looking apologetic.