Business of Dying (18 page)

'No, I don't have anything else, I'm just concerned we get the right man. The last thing we need is an acquittal and allegations of a frame-up.'

'I'm glad you're concerned. It shows you care. But believe me, Mark Wells is our man. If I wasn't damned sure, I wouldn't be charging him. OK?'

'OK.'

'And, Dennis, bear this in mind.'

'What, sir?'

'There hasn't been a single killing of a prostitute in the whole of the south-east with an MO like Miriam Fox's, so it's almost certain it was a one-off. Do you see what I'm saying?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Don't complicate matters, because a lot of the time they don't need complicating. Now, can you do me a favour and send DS Capper in?'

And that was that. I left the room without saying another word, wondering just how much worse things could get.

I found Capper over at the photocopier talking to Hunsdon. I told him Knox wanted to see him, and he went off with a sly smile. When he'd gone, I turned to Hunsdon.

'Have you got those phone records yet?' I asked him.

'Yeah, they faxed them through this morning. I've got them here somewhere.' He picked up a pile
of papers from the in-tray and went through them quickly.

'Were they any use?' I asked him as he searched.

'Not really,' he said, handing me two sheets of A4 paper.

I took them off him and glanced down the first page, which detailed outgoing calls. There was a total of ninety-seven listed, all made in the twenty-eight days up until the date of the murder. The left-hand column gave the date and time of each one, the right-hand column identified the numbers called. The second sheet detailed the incoming ones, of which there were fifty-six.

'These numbers have got no names with them,' I said, looking up at him.

'That's right. That's why they're not much use.'

'Can't they identify the person each number's registered to?'

'Yeah, but apparently that takes a lot longer because it involves more than one company. There's a lot of cross-checking databases, that sort of thing, but they're on the case at the moment. I should be getting a list any time now.'

I put the sheets in the copier and ran a copy, giving the originals back to him. 'Look, can you give me the names of the people you're dealing with? I don't mind chasing it.'

He looked at me uncertainly. 'What's the point?

They're not going to tell us anything. So she made calls to Wells and he made calls to her. That stands to reason.'

'Humour me.'

'The bloke I've been dealing with is called John Claire. I've got his number back at my desk.'

'Well, let's go back and get it, then.'

Reluctantly he returned to his desk with me in tow and dug out the number. I got the feeling he hadn't exactly been pushing himself to get the information on Miriam's records, but that was Hunsdon for you. He wasn't a bad copper in many ways, but he was a lazy bastard, and not the best at performing routine tasks, especially when he thought the tasks themselves were a bit pointless.

I wrote the number down and he asked me again what the point of chasing it up was.

It was, I suppose, a good question. I think at that precise moment my interest stemmed from a real desire to put one over on Knox and Capper and wipe the smiles off their faces. Maybe Wells was the man responsible for Miriam's murder, but it just didn't seem to me to be as cut and dried as they all thought. For the sake of a couple of phone calls, I was more than happy to be the one who proved them wrong.

There were seven numbers which came up more than three times among the phone calls to and from Miriam Fox's mobile, and I decided to concentrate on finding out who they belonged to, as well as all the numbers she'd either called or received calls from during the last three days of her life. It was quite possible that they wouldn't tell me anything; even if they did, it was still going to be extremely difficult to get Knox to authorize any further investigation, particularly now that he'd charged Wells. But I still felt it was worth a try.

I called John Claire from my desk, but his line was busy. I lit and smoked a cigarette down to the butt and called him again, but it was still engaged. He was obviously a hard-working boy. I was going to give it five minutes and try him again but I never got the chance. A knifepoint robbery had occurred at a back-street newsagent's less than half a mile from the station and I was ordered to attend with Malik to take
statements from the proprietor and any witnesses. We were there for about an hour, trying to calm down the proprietor's wife, who'd had a knife held against her throat by a kid of no more than thirteen while his five laughing mates had ransacked the place. The husband, who'd been out at the wholesaler's, was distraught. He harangued us and society in general for turning out kids who thought so little of using violence. We didn't try to argue with him. He was right. I told them we'd do what we could to apprehend the perpetrators and thanked them for their help. We then got a squad car to take the wife to hospital for a check-up and returned to the station to file our report.

At ten past five, I tried John Claire's number again. This time he answered immediately. I explained who I was and why I was phoning.

'Yeah, I was dealing with one of your colleagues, DC . . . ?'

'Hunsdon.'

'That's right. I was trying to get together some information for him. Telephone records.'

'Yeah, I know. How far are you down the line? It's just I need them pretty quickly.'

'I've already sent them,' he said, sounding surprised. 'I emailed them to him this morning.'

'No, we've got the actual numbers; it's the people they belong to we need to know. Who the phones are registered to.'

'Yeah, I know. That's what I sent him. I sent him a list with the numbers on it yesterday. I had to chase down the names of the people and it took a bit of time. I said as soon as I got the information I'd get it across to him. And I did. This morning.'

Clearly, Hunsdon hadn't been checking his mail. I lit a cigarette. 'Maybe the network's down here today or something. Can you send it again?'

'Yeah, no problem.'

'I'll give you two places to send it to, just to make sure it goes through.' I reeled off my work and home addresses, and waited while he wrote them down. 'And can you do it immediately, please?'

'Yeah, of course,' he said, sounding a little nervous. 'No problem, officer.'

I thanked him, and hung up.

The mail hadn't arrived when, ten minutes later, Capper phoned through and asked to see me in Welland's office for a quick chat. He was sitting behind Welland's desk looking far too comfortable when I went in.

'I understand you've been told the news,' he said, making only a cursory attempt to contain his pleasure.

'That's right. Congratulations.'

He swung round slowly in Welland's mock-leather seat. 'Thank you. Now, I want us to work together, Dennis. I know we haven't always seen eye to eye in the past, had our ups and downs,
but it's important we all pull in the same direction.'

'I agree,' I said, avoiding calling him sir.

'How did it go this afternoon at the newsagent's? Do we know who did it?'

'I can't say for sure, but I think the one with the knife's Jamie Delly.'

Delly was the fourth and youngest boy in a family of petty criminals, all of whom possessed a nasty streak. He'd first been nicked at the age of eight for trying to set his school on fire; ten years earlier his mum had assaulted me with a frozen leg of New Zealand lamb when I'd tried to arrest her for shoplifting.

'That little toe-rag. Bit out of his league, isn't it?'

'Well, he's growing up now. Time to move on from nicking kids' dinner money and shoplifting.'

'Didn't his mother--'

'Yeah, yeah. Leg of lamb ...'

'You're lucky you didn't get the chop.' Capper grinned at his wit, showing an unruly set of stained teeth. I would have grinned too if I hadn't heard the joke at least a hundred times before. 'Can we get him for this?' he asked, becoming serious again.

'I should think so, if the proprietor's missus can pick him out in an ID.'

'Get one organized, will you?' he said in a tone that almost begged him to round off the sentence with a 'there's a good lad'. I nodded, and said that I would, keen not to rise to the bait, although
wondering how long I was going to be able to put up with this man as my boss. 'Another thing, Dennis, before you go. I understand you were trying to take over Hunsdon's end of the Fox inquiry, telling him you'd chase up the information on the phone records. Is that right?'

'I thought there might be something in there somewhere that could be of use.'

'And you didn't think DC Hunsdon was capable of finding it?' He eyed me closely.

'I was just interested in seeing what I could find. Hunsdon had to make a couple of phone calls, I offered to make them for him.'

'We've charged someone, Dennis, all right? That's it, end of story. I can't have officers of mine going over old ground. We haven't got time. And if for some reason you're not busy enough, I can always assign you some more cases. Because we've got plenty of them.'

'OK, point taken.'

'Have you chased up these records?'

Instinctively I decided not to tell him. 'No. No, I haven't.'

'Good. Don't bother. Concentrate on the stuff that's assigned to you, OK? And if there's anything I can do to help, let me know. Like I say, I want us to work together.'

I asked him if that was all. He said it was.

'I'll get back to work, then,' I said, but I didn't. I
got my coat, told Malik I'd see him in the morning, and headed out of there.

I stopped at the Roving Wolf for a quick pint, then caught the bus home through the rush-hour traffic. It was half past six when I walked in the door, and I rang Danny's home number as soon as I'd shut it behind me.

He answered after three rings. 'Right,' I said, without preamble. 'Do as I say. Go to the nearest phone box, get its number, then phone me with it. Stay where you are and I'll phone you back.' He started to ask what it was all about, but I cut him off.

Five minutes later he called back and gave me the number. I wrote it down, then called it using Raymond's mobile.

'Christ, what the hell's this all about?' he asked, picking up the phone. 'What's all this cloak-and-dagger stuff?'

'I wanted to be able to speak freely,' I said. 'I got a call this morning, Danny. From your sister.'

'Oh, shit.'

'Yeah, that's what I thought. Now, tell me something. What the fuck are you phoning her for? I
told you to just keep calm and let everything blow over.'

'I know, I know. It's just that it's fucking difficult, Dennis. You know, I can't stop thinking about what happened. I'm even dreaming about it. I was in the pub last night and there was even talk that it had something to do with the Holtzes. Do you know anything about that?'

The Holtzes, for those who've not heard of them, are the shadowy North London crime family few people tend to know anything about, but whose name is usually linked to any so-called gangland crime where there are no immediate suspects. I'd have bet my life that Raymond had never even met one of the Holtz family, let alone agreed to commit murder for them.

'Don't be fucking daft, Danny,' I told him. 'Do you really think I'd get involved with people like that? And do you genuinely believe that people like the Holtzes sub out this sort of thing to blokes they don't even know? They've got plenty of resources of their own. So, who was saying all this shit, then?'

'There was a bloke called Steve Fairley in there. He was saying it. I wouldn't have taken much notice if it had been anyone else, but he's a bit of a player. Knows about these things. That' s what worried me.'

I knew Steve Fairley. Tomboy had told me about him. If he was a player, then he was very much
Vauxhall Conference. 'And you reckon the Holtzes decided to tell him all about it, do you? You know, make sure as many people know about it as possible?'

'Look, I know it sounds stupid--'

'You're right. It does.'

He sighed. 'It's just getting to me, that's all.'

'But telling your sister, Danny, of all people. I mean, what the hell's she going to do to help you out of your predicament? Give you a character reference? Now she's been on to me saying she thinks you're in trouble, and can I go and visit you and find out what's wrong, and then get back to her. I don't need this, Danny.'

'I'm sorry, I really am. It won't happen again.'

'It better not.' I almost told him it was that sort of talk that could get us all killed, but held back. There was no point making him even more jittery than he already was.

'I didn't tell her anything important, I promise.'

'You told her you'd saved up some money, that got her suspicions going straight away.'

'Yeah, but there's no way she can link that to anything that's happened.'

'No, that's right, but if you start pouring out your heart every time you've had a few drinks then sooner or later something might slip out, something that could incriminate you and me, and that'd be a truly fucking stupid way to get caught.