Текст книги "Dead Man's Time"

Автор книги: Peter James

Соавторы: Peter James
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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

51

Someone else was packing up his life too, and it was hurting. It wasn’t the memories that were painful – Amis Smallbone didn’t have any memories he wanted to pack into a suitcase, other than a photograph of his father and his mother that had been the only decoration in his cell. He no longer had photographs of his ex-wives, or his two long-estranged children, whom his wife had taken to Australia twenty years ago.

The packing, little though it was, hurt him physically. Every moment. His whole body was in pain from the beating he’d had. But what upset him most of all was the damage to his mouth. Not long before his arrest, thirteen years ago, he’d paid a fortune for work on his teeth. Now, five of his front teeth were missing, and his jaw was broken, and hurting like hell. His dentist told him he needed surgery on it. He didn’t have time for surgery, so he dulled the pain as best he could with Nurofen and whisky. He’d get it fixed when he got paid on this deal; until then, in public, he’d have to keep his mouth shut.

It was just past midnight, but he was wide awake, with a cigarette clamped between his lips, as he double-checked the cupboards in his basement flat. The last night in this shithole, he thought with some relief. He was spending the weekend with his mate Benny Julius in his Dyke Road Avenue mansion, just a few doors away from the huge house he used to live in himself, with his Ferrari parked outside. He’d had his villa in Marbella, and a boat in Puerto Banus, too.

All he had here now was one large, cheap suitcase, only half full. How great was that? He was sixty-two years old and his worldly possessions – his clothes and washing kit – did not even fill half a suitcase.

He laid his parents’ photograph down carefully on top of a folded shirt. Maurice Smallbone had been a tall man, with big shoulders and a lean, handsome face, his hair, dyed dark brown to the end of his life, brushed straight back. His mother had been tall and elegant, too. So why the hell was he only five foot one inch? Why had life dealt him such a shitty hand?

Why had Roy Grace picked on him all those years back? Everything he used to have was gone, thanks to Roy Grace’s determination to destroy him. Grace assured him at the time it wasn’t personal, but it was. Amis Smallbone knew that. And Grace was not going to get away with it.

His friends told him to forget it, that Grace had merely been a copper doing his job, but Smallbone didn’t see it that way. He found out from an old lag in prison that Grace’s father, also a detective, had spent much of his career pursing his father, and that one of his big regrets was never potting him.

So it was personal for Grace. The detective had been in his face for years. Even after he had done his time, Grace had continued to go after him. Accusing him of etching a message on his girlfriend’s car, kidnapping him after a funeral and dumping him on top of the Devil’s Dyke, leaving him to walk five miles home in the pissing rain.

Thanks to this one man, not only did he have nothing in his life, but most of his old acquaintances didn’t want to know him any more, as if he was some kind of pariah, a has-been. His father had been the big guy of the Brighton crime scene. Everyone feared and respected him. No one dared touch Maurice Smallbone, not even the police, most of whom he’d had in his pay back in his heyday.

What the fuck had gone wrong?

Detective Superintendent Roy Grace would go to his grave regretting what he had done. You didn’t take away twelve years of someone’s life; and all the other shit that went with it. The prison doctor had warned him about not getting angry, because of his high blood pressure. But fuck that. He stubbed the butt out and lit another cigarette. Then spotted something he had missed. Another framed photograph of his father outside Lewes Crown Court. His father was beaming, arms wide out like he owned the world – and actually he had owned a handsome slice of it. In this photograph, taken minutes after being acquitted by a coerced and frightened jury, his father was walking free from a whole bunch of charges.

Amis Smallbone had not been so lucky, following in his dad’s footsteps.

Thanks to Detective Inspector Roy Grace, as he had been back then.

Promoted now. Huh.

A father now.

On Monday he would become Detective Superintendent Grace’s neighbour. Renting the three-storey house next door to where he was living with his blonde slapper, Cleo Morey. His Probation Officer, who had to approve any change of address, had queried how he would pay the rent in his new abode. Smallbone had explained that his mate Henry Tilney, who owed him a favour, would be paying it for him, until a new business they were setting up, dealing in second-hand cars, was up and running. The Probation Officers had swallowed it.

Roy Grace thought his slapper and baby would be safe inside that little gated residence, did he?

Smallbone smiled. As the saying went, if you can’t beat them, join them.

Roll on Monday!

52

Roy Grace had to hold the Saturday morning briefing in the Conference Room of the Major Incident Suite in order to accommodate his growing team. He had a full turnout, including, he was pleased to see, Glenn Branson, who told him his sister-in-law had taken the kids swimming and was looking after them for the day.

Bella Moy was the first to speak. ‘Working on the information from your contact Hector Webb, who felt it likely the major portion of the items stolen would have been shipped out of the UK in a container, I’ve been focusing on ships capable of carrying containers out of our local harbours.’

Grace noticed that she shot two glances at Norman Potting while she was speaking. He was becoming increasingly curious about whether there was something going on between the two of them.

‘I talked to the Harbour Master at Shoreham Port yesterday afternoon, sir, in his office,’ she said. ‘I went through with him the list of all cargo ships that sailed after 8 p.m. Tuesday the 21st – the earliest time that the items stolen from Aileen McWhirter’s house could have arrived there. Cargo ships can only enter and leave four hours either side of high tide. The next relevant high water was at 02.38 Wednesday the 22nd and then at 15.03.’

She shot Potting another glance and this time Grace caught the old sweat’s wink back to her. Surely not? Bella with an old lech like Potting? But few things truly surprised him.

Bella held up several sheets of paper clipped together. ‘All ships over 500 gross tons weight have to have CERS transponders switched on. It stands for Central European Reporting System – it’s a progression from the Royal Navy’s wartime IFF system, Identification Friend Or Foe. Basically it works exactly the same way as the system for identification of planes for air traffic control. All cargo ships around the world are plotted constantly at sea – this was something brought in after 9/11.’

‘What happens if they switch them off?’ Dave Green, the Crime Scene Manager, asked.

‘They need to have a valid reason,’ she responded. ‘For instance, if they’re in waters known to be at danger from Somali pirates, they’re permitted to turn them off, but only in situations like that.’ She pointed to her sheets of paper. ‘This is a list of all ships that have sailed since 8 p.m. August the 21st, together with their bills of lading. The Torrent, carrying scrap metal. The Anke Angela, carrying oats. The Walter Hamman, carrying fertilizer—’

‘Do we have their intended destinations, Bella?’ Glenn Branson asked, interrupting her.

‘Yes.’

‘Good work, Bella,’ Grace said. ‘First thing is we need to see if any of these ships divert from their stated destinations. Second we need the co-operation of Interpol to check everything they offload against those bills of lading. I need you to circulate the inventory of everything stolen from Aileen McWhirter to Interpol.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘What about trucks on the roll-on/roll-off ferries, Bella?’ DC Alec Davies asked.

‘I’m getting a log of all of them within one hundred miles of Brighton,’ the DS answered. ‘It’s a mammoth task.’ She glanced down at her notebook. ‘Just one thing more, sir,’ she said to Roy Grace. ‘We’re still working on black Porsches with Sussex registrations, but so far none of the owners is on our radar. I’d like to widen the parameters.’

‘Yes, do a nationwide search. It could easily be a second-hand car bought elsewhere.’

DC Jon Exton raised his hand. He had a stack of magazines in front of him. ‘Sir, I’ve got copies of the Antiques Trade Gazette, which I think might be helpful for everyone on the team to read. There’s a Turkish crime family in London who have a very good distribution system to the London antiques markets. This lists all the fairs and markets, as well as the auction calendar both here and overseas. It might be worth the team looking at to learn a bit more about the antiques trade – and just how many outlets there are.’

‘Thanks, Jon,’ Grace said. ‘Please circulate them.’

Exton handed a copy to DS Potting. ‘Sorry, Norman,’ he said, ‘there’s no Page Three girl. Not really your kind of reading.’

There was a titter of laughter. Even Roy Grace grinned.

Potting pursed his lips. ‘Actually, Jon, did you hear the one about the lady married to the archaeologist?’

Again Grace noticed the exchange of glances between Potting and Bella Moy.

‘No,’ Exton said.

‘She said, “The good thing in this relationship is that the older I get, the more interesting he will find me.”’

Everyone, except for Glenn Branson, laughed and Grace was happy to see his team smiling. In his experience, it was teams that had some kind of camaraderie that produced the best results. But he was concerned about his mate, and wanted to ensure he was kept involved.

‘Glenn, I’m giving you an action. I want you to liaise with Interpol in Spain. I want to know if there were any suspicious deaths reported in the Marbella area this weekend, or anyone attacked or beaten up, okay?’

‘Want me to go and check it out, boss? Could do with a weekend in the sun.’

Grace smiled. ‘Not at this stage.’ Then he turned to the analyst Annalise Vineer. ‘Have you found any similar MOs anywhere else?’

‘There’s one in Newcastle, sir, and one in Glasgow. I’m looking into them.’

Grace looked around at his team hopefully. ‘Anything else, anyone?’

There wasn’t.

‘I’m making this evening’s briefing at 5 p.m. If there’s nothing significant then, I’m giving you all the evening off, so you’re fresh in the morning. Okay?’

No one objected.

53

His day began at 5 a.m. It was nice, if a tad ironic, Gavin Daly thought, that the older he became, the less sleep he needed. There’d be plenty of sleep soon enough, he thought. Oh yes. The great bard understood.

To sleep: perchance to dream . . .

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause.

He had pause, all right. Three nights a week for the past ninety years he had dreamed of that night his mother was shot dead and his dad was taken. In that dream, the same dream every time, he saw the blood pulsing from her; then the Statue of Liberty fading into the mist beyond the Verrazano Narrows. And then his promise.

One day, Pop, I’m going to come back and find you. I’m going to rescue you from wherever you are.

The words of Hamlet returned.

The undiscovered country,

From whose bourne no traveller returns.

He could not die without having found his father. It was still not too late. So long as he was alive, it was never going to be too late.

54

‘Still feeling in the mood for fish?’ Roy Grace asked.

‘Very definitely!’ Cleo said. ‘And I have a craving for oysters. Followed by a great big Dover sole!’

‘I thought you were only meant to have cravings when you were pregnant?’ Roy Grace looked apologetically at Marlon, swimming around his bowl. ‘Don’t take it personally, old chap,’ he said.

‘Unfortunately I’m not meant to eat shellfish while I’m breastfeeding. So you’ll have to eat some and I’ll just stare at them and enjoy them vicariously!’ She grinned wickedly. ‘Apparently they make men horny as hell.’

‘I don’t need oysters,’ he said. ‘Just being with you makes me horny as hell, all the time!’

‘Cravings aren’t restricted to pregnancy. I’ve got new cravings now.’

‘Oh?’

‘Some rather interesting stuff I didn’t know about that I’ve just learned.’

‘From that book you’ve been reading?’

‘I’m on the third one now. I went shopping this afternoon and bought a few things we could try out when I’m up to it again.’ She gave him a sideways look.

‘You took Noah into a sex shop?’

‘He loved it! He looked around quite excitedly – I think he liked the red and pink colours in Ann Summers.’

‘He’s two months old and you’re getting him into bad ways!’ Grace grinned.

She said nothing for a moment, then she frowned. ‘You do still fancy me, don’t you? Even though I’m fat and I’ve got varicose veins? I read that some men get put off sex after their wives have given birth.’

He took her in his arms and kissed her. ‘You look stunning.’ She did look really stunning, he thought. She was wearing a loose cream linen summer dress, suede ankle boots with killer heels, her hair, the colour of winter wheat, shining and smelling freshly washed. ‘I fancy you like crazy. I fancy you more than ever.’ He kissed her again.

The doorbell rang.

Cleo took a reluctant step back. ‘That’ll be the Aged Ps!’

Grace glanced at his watch. It was 6.45 p.m. Cleo’s parents, who he really liked, always arrived at least fifteen minutes early for anything. They were babysitting their grandson tonight, giving Roy and Cleo their first evening out since Noah’s birth.

*

Although many people considered summer officially over at the end of August, in Roy Grace’s experience September was often the most glorious month of all. Normally he did not like to take any time out during a murder enquiry, and he had felt torn between spending the night working on the Aileen McWhirter case and taking Cleo out.

It was Cleo starting to sound a little tetchy last night that had been a reality check for him. It reminded him so much of Sandy. Sandy had never accepted how dead people could be more important than she was. How his work took priority over their life together. He had tried to explain, back then, the words instilled in him when he had been at the police training college, learning to be a detective. An instructor had read out the FBI moral code on murder investigation, written by its first director, J. Edgar Hoover: No greater honour will ever be bestowed on an officer, nor a more profound duty imposed on him, than when he or she is entrusted with the investigation of the death of a human being.

He would never stop fighting his corner for his murder victims. He would work night and day to catch and lock up the perpetrators. And mostly, so far in his career, he had succeeded.

But he was a father now, too. And soon to be a husband again. And that gnawed at him; the realization that there was someone in this world now who needed him even more than a murder victim. His son. And his wife-to-be.

He was glad he had made that decision as he walked hand in hand along Gardner Street with this beautiful woman he was so proud of. They passed Luigi’s clothes shop, where some months ago Glenn Branson, as his self-appointed style guru, had coerced him into spending over two thousand pounds to transform his wardrobe. He was wearing some of the gear now: a lightweight bomber jacket over a white T-shirt buttoned at the front, tapered blue chinos and brown suede loafers. Men turned and looked at Cleo as they passed. Roy Grace liked that, and wondered, with a private smile, if they would still ogle her if they knew what she did for a living, and might one day, if they were unlucky enough, be preparing them for a post-mortem.

They walked the narrow Lanes he loved so much, passing packed restaurants and bars, and came into the square, Brighton Place, dominated by the flint façade of one of Brighton’s landmarks, the Sussex pub. English’s restaurant was directly across, with a long row of outside tables roped off, Mediterranean style.

‘Inside or outside?’ the restaurant manager asked.

‘I booked outside,’ Cleo said decisively, and glanced at Roy Grace for approval. He nodded enthusiastically.

They were led down the line to the one table that was free. From long experience, Cleo indicated for Roy to take the chair with its back to the wall. ‘You take the policeman’s chair, darling.’

He squeezed her hand. After a few years in the force, most police officers only felt comfortable in restaurants and bars if they had their backs to the wall and a clear view of the room and the entry points. It had become second nature to him.

They took their seats. Behind Cleo, an endless stream of people walked along the alley from Brighton’s trendy East Street into the Lanes. He picked up the leather-bound wine list and opened it. Just as he began casting his eye up and down, looking for the dry white wines he knew Cleo liked, and which he liked best, too, he suddenly saw two people he recognized.

‘Bloody hell!’ He pulled the wine list up, covering his face, wanting to spare them the embarrassment of being spotted. Although the Machiavellian streak in him almost wanted them to see him.

‘What is it?’ Cleo asked.

He waited some moments, then lowered the list, and pointed at a couple, arm in arm, strolling away from them. ‘I thought they were coming in here!’

She stared at the couple. The man had a large bald patch, and was wearing a brown jacket and grey trousers. The woman had brown hair cut in a chic style, and wore a pretty pink dress. ‘Who are they?’

‘You’ve met them both, individually, at the mortuary over the years. DS Norman Potting and DS Bella Moy!’

‘They look rather a mismatched couple, from here anyway.’

‘They’re even more mismatched close up, believe me!’

‘She’s the one on your team who doesn’t have a life, right? She cares for her elderly mother?’

He nodded.

‘And he’s been married – what – four times?’

‘Yup.’

Their waiter appeared. Grace ordered two glasses of champagne and some olives.

‘That’s terrible.’

‘He is pretty terrible. But hey, good on Norman pulling Bella!’

‘Good on Norman pulling Bella?’ she quizzed. ‘What is it with you men? Why do men treat pulling women like a sport? What about, Poor Bella, lumbering herself, in desperation, with a serially unfaithful old lech?’

He laughed. ‘You’re right.’

‘So why do they, Roy?’

‘Because, I suppose, for most people, life’s a compromise. That writer – philosopher – you like, whose work you introduced me to a few months ago. What was his great line? Something about so many people living lives of quiet desperation?’

‘Yes. Don’t let us ever get like that, Roy.’

He stared back into her clear, green eyes. ‘We never will,’ he said.

‘Is that a promise?’

‘It’s a promise.’

Their champagne arrived. He raised his glass and clinked it against hers. ‘No desperation,’ he said. ‘Ever.’

‘None!’

A short while later he ordered six oysters. Then, when he saw the mischievous look in Cleo’s eyes, he upped it to a dozen.

55

At 11 a.m. on Monday, Gavin Daly sat at his desk, thumbing through his ancient Rolodex looking for a name from the past, ignoring the grinding blatter of the old ride-on mower as his gardener went up and down the lawn, cutting immaculate stripes.

He had heard the news, an hour earlier, that the Coroner had released his sister’s body, and her funeral could go ahead tomorrow, as he had planned.

His thoughts were interrupted by a perfunctory knock, followed by the sound of his door opening, and he turned to see his housekeeper, Betty, enter with a tray containing a wine glass, an opened bottle of Corton-Charlemagne white Burgundy, a Robaina cigar, perfectly cut, and a dish of green olives.

The first of his two glasses of white wine a day, which would be followed by his evening two fingers of whiskey. Everything in moderation was his recipe. All the people he knew of or had read about who’d made it to his kind of old age had their own particular secret. For some, it had been total abstinence from alcohol. For others, it had been a life of celibacy. Poor, miserable sods – they might have lived a long time, but strewth, it must have seemed so much longer! What they all ignored was England’s oldest ever man, Henry Allingham, who had died only a few years ago at 113, and had attributed his longevity, in a radio interview he’d heard on the great man’s 112th birthday, to ‘Cigarettes, whisky and wild, wild women.’

Every morning, as Betty filled that first glass for him, he raised it in a silent toast to Henry Allingham, before lighting his cigar.

In front of him lay the front page of the Daily News from February 1922, in its protective plastic. He thanked Betty, drank some wine, and waited until he heard the door shut behind him. Then he continued his search through the ancient, battered Rolodex index cards, until he found the name and telephone number he was looking for. A genealogist called Martin Diplock, whose service, years back, he had used regularly to check the background history of high-end antiques.

He dialled it, and as he half-expected, heard a number discontinued tone. But just in case the man was still alive, he googled his name. To his surprise he found a simple website giving an email address and what looked like an overseas phone number. He dialled and it rang. Three times. Four. Five.

Then he heard a click, followed by Diplock’s very distinguished, cultured voice.

‘You’re still alive?’ Daly said.

There was a moment’s pause. ‘Who’s that?’

‘Gavin Daly!’

‘Well, well, well! It sounds like you’re still alive too!’

‘Just.’

‘It must be twenty years.’

‘All of that.’

‘So, to what do I owe this pleasure?’

‘I need some family history checked out. Are you still working?’

‘I live in Tenerife – retired here over fifteen years ago. But I keep my hand in – thanks to the Internet, it’s easy to keep up with old acquaintances and developments. Why?’

‘This is probably a long shot, I don’t know. I guess I’m long enough in the tooth to have learned not to dismiss coincidence.’

‘You know what Einstein said about coincidence?’

‘Something about God’s calling cards?’

‘Kind of. He said it was God’s way of remaining anonymous.’

Daly smiled and drank some more wine. ‘It’s good to speak to you, Martin. How’s Jane?’

‘She’s well. She’s in rude health. Sunshine is good for people.’

‘It’s bad for antiques.’

‘So, what information do you have for me?’

‘There’s a man named Eamonn Pollock,’ Daly said. ‘His current main residence is on a yacht based in Marbella called Contented. As I said, it’s a long shot. But I’m happy to pay whatever you charge these days to find out if he is related, in any way, to a man in New York back in the 1920s called Mick Pollock. I think he would have been Irish, and a member of the White Hand Gang.’

‘Do you have any more details than that, Gavin?’

‘Back then, Mick had only one leg – I gather he got gangrene in it after being shot in a gang fight. He had the nickname of Pegleg.’

‘Pegleg Pollock. Anything else?’

‘No, I’m afraid not. Could you try to prepare as detailed a family tree as you can?’

‘I’ll see what I can do, but I can’t promise anything.’

‘Give me an address to wire some money to.’

‘There’s no charge. Tell you the truth, I’m bored. Be good to have a challenge. Is there any urgency?’

‘Everything’s urgent at our age, Martin.’