City of Dreadful Night (28 page)

‘What do you mean I'm next?' Connolly said.

‘He's not stupid,' I said. ‘He knows what's what.'

‘Somebody is knocking off the shooters,' Gilchrist said. ‘And assuming it's not you – because you're too much of a blunt instrument – then you're on the list. My flat was firebombed.'

‘That's just pest control,' Connolly said, but it was clear his heart wasn't in it. He rubbed his dead arm, gave Tingley another look. Then he turned to me.

‘You should know more than me what's going on, Chief Constable. Ex-Chief Constable, I mean.'

‘Why would I?'

Connolly looked at me and shook his head.

‘Don't treat me like an idiot.'

‘That's a tough call,' Tingley said.

‘You're next,' Gilchrist repeated, standing over Connolly. ‘Being a policeman won't protect you.'

‘Yeah?' he said. ‘I'll take my chances. Besides, I'm retiring on health grounds. Going into the security business.'

‘Anyone else retiring?' I said.

Connolly shrugged.

‘Whoever is still alive,' he said.

Kate's bell rang again. This time it was the outer door.

‘Hello?'

‘DS Reg Williamson from the Brighton nick,' a tinny voice said. She recognized the name from Sarah Gilchrist. She buzzed him in.

He was a lardy man, pasty-faced, but with something sympathetic in his eyes. He smelt of sweat and tobacco in about equal proportions.

‘Somebody has been trying to get into your flat,' he said.

Kate told him what had happened.

‘Well, there's no sign of forced entry on the front door of the house, but then another flat could have buzzed someone in. There is nobody in the common parts of the house now. I'll check the other flats to see if they have a guest who rang your bell by mistake.'

Kate double-locked the door behind him. Her phone rang while he was out. Watts.

‘We're on our way,' he said.

Gilchrist was kicking herself for persuading the others to go to Connolly's place. It hadn't done any good. Hadn't even made her feel better – which, if she were honest, had been the point of it. She realized she needed to wait for what Gary Parker was going to say, wait for more on Little Stevie, maybe talk to Philippa Franks. She sensed from what Connolly had said that the investigation was going to be shelved.

She watched the road ahead and cursed herself until Tingley started talking about his conversation with Hart.

‘Hart was a student here. Drunken encounter with a married woman on a hen night – this was back in the day when you did a pub crawl in your own town, not in Prague or Budapest or the south of France. Thinks no more about it. Does his degree, goes off, eventually settles back down here, gets in the papers a bit once he's involved in local politics.

‘This woman gets in touch with him out of the blue about their son. She's a divorcee now; life hasn't been kind to her.'

‘She blackmails him?' Watts said.

‘I think you mean she asks for the financial support to which she's entitled,' Gilchrist said.

‘Hart goes down the DNA route,' Tingley said, ignoring them both. ‘Quietly, because he's married with family.'

‘Then he coughs up?' Watts says.

‘To be fair, it doesn't sound like this woman is trying to screw him – financially, I mean – but Gary as a teenager is a handful so she has a lot on her plate. When Gary is a bit older, she asks Hart to pay for the rent on a flat for him. Hart agrees.'

‘Is that when Gary figures out who his father is?' Gilchrist said.

‘Not immediately,' Tingley said. ‘But, yes, the flat is in the name of one of Hart's companies, and at some unspecified point Gary figures it out.'

‘He blackmails Winston Hart?' Watts says.

‘Apparently not.'

Gilchrist pondered for a moment.

‘So, actually, this doesn't take us anywhere. Gary Parker isn't suggesting that Winston Hart had anything to do with the Milldean thing, is he?'

‘You tell us,' Watts said, glancing towards her. ‘You're the one who's spoken to Gary Parker.'

‘I'm now wondering if his mention of his father and his claiming knowledge of the massacre are actually linked, as I had assumed,' she said glumly.

‘So long as he can tell us about the massacre, we don't necessarily need the bigger picture straight away,' Tingley said.

‘I do if Hart was involved in setting me up.'

‘Jesus, Bob, will you forget that conspiracy stuff.'

Watts shot a look at Tingley. Tingley shot it back.

‘I pushed Hart about what might have been going on behind the massacre. He told me that he had a call from your friend Simpson the night before the meeting at which you resigned. But it was just to tell him about the package Hart could offer if you agreed to resign and that Simpson would phone during the meeting.'

‘Did he know William before then?' Watts asked.

‘That didn't come up.'

Gilchrist was thinking about the man who had threatened Kate. It couldn't be to do with the Trunk Murders. It had to be linked to something in the present – but was it necessarily the Milldean massacre?

‘He was just pushing you to resign, wasn't he?' Gilchrist said. ‘You don't suspect him of anything else, surely?'

Watts didn't answer. Instead, he put his foot on the accelerator.

Heading back to Brighton, I was sticking pretty much to the outside lane, going too fast as usual. Gilchrist was sitting beside me, Tingley behind her. I'd slow to get past a cluster of cars then watch in my rear-view mirror as their headlights faded. Occasionally, I know, I tailgated when drivers were slow to move into the middle lane.

Men, once they had grudgingly given way, immediately accelerated in the middle lane to make it difficult for me to overtake. Once I'd overtaken, they'd slow to the speed they actually wanted to be doing.

I was thinking about William Simpson. I'd assumed he was the messenger from a government that wanted me to resign, but perhaps he was the one pushing for me to go for his own reasons. I was also trying to figure out how this threat to his daughter, Kate, fitted into the story.

‘Is this police driving?' Tingley said.

‘It's the driving of a man used to having a chauffeur,' Gilchrist said.

‘There's a kind of method in it,' I said.

‘Which is?' Tingley said.

‘We're being followed.'

There was this one car. I'd been aware of it for some time. I assumed it was a male driver I'd passed who'd booted up to show he had a penis too. Except he was keeping back maybe half a mile and he was keeping the same pace as me.

Didn't waiver.

I'd lose sight of him on long looping bends, but once we hit a straight there he'd be, maintaining a constant pace, keeping the same distance behind.

I drove faster. This car did too. I drove slower. It came nearer then stayed in place.

We hit a few hundred yards of overhead lights.

‘The dark Rover?' Tingley said. I nodded. ‘You're thinking he's armed?'

‘Maybe,' I said. ‘Are you?'

In the rear-view mirror I saw him shake his head.

‘I'm a police officer, for God's sake,' Gilchrist said. ‘We don't need to run away.'

‘I suspect whoever this is doesn't respect the law,' Tingley said.

‘It may be my paranoia,' I said.

The logical part of me was thinking: why the hell should they be following us? What benefit can they gain? They must know we're going back to Brighton. But I was also conscious of Kate being threatened, of Gilchrist's flat being firebombed.

Tingley was watching out of the back window.

‘No, he's following and he wants us to know he's following.'

‘Can you get his registration?' I said.

‘It's masked.'

‘Naturally.'

‘It always happens in badly scripted films,' Gilchrist said. ‘There's never a good reason for following someone except to inject a bit of false excitement into the story.'

‘I think in this case it's intended to intimidate,' Tingley said.

‘But who is it?' Gilchrist said.

‘That's the interesting question,' I said. ‘Shall I try to draw them in?'

‘How?' Tingley said.

‘I haven't the faintest idea.'

The road narrowed to two lanes just after the signs for Burgess Hill. A car had pulled out in front of the car that was tagging us. I went into a couple of sharp bends faster than I should have. I accelerated up the hill on the other side of the last bend.

There was a turn-off at the top of the hill where the road again went into a couple of – more gentle – curves. If I could take the turn off before he came out of the last of the bends, our pursuer would, I hoped, think I was still on the A23 into Brighton. He would carry on and I could come back on to the road behind him.

I came off OK, went across a short bridge and took the slip-road back on to the Brighton road. I stopped on the slip-road about twenty yards short of the A23 and switched off my lights.

‘Clever boy,' Tingley murmured.

The Rover went barrelling by a few moments later. I waited until it had gone round the next bend then pulled back on to the A23.

‘Headlights on or off?' Tingley said.

‘On, I think – we're going to hit overhead lights soon anyway so we can't really hide. I'm just hoping he won't notice us.'

It took a couple of miles to get within sight of the Rover. It had slowed, presumably because its occupants thought we'd come off the road and given them the slip. We came into the lighted area near Pyecombe service station and I dropped back. It would go dark again for the last couple of miles before hitting the outskirts of Brighton.

‘The rear registration is masked too,' Tingley noted.

We were about a quarter of a mile behind the Rover so lost it through the next couple of bends. When we came on to the long, straight stretch just outside Brighton, I drew nearer.

‘You're going to have to close up for the roundabout,' Tingley said. ‘He has three options there.'

‘I know it,' I said. This was the tricky bit – not losing them without them noticing us.

I drew to within two hundred yards of them. I'd been hoping for more traffic so there could be cars in between us. With luck he would only be aware of our headlights when the overhead lights resumed at the roundabout.

The Rover slid left into the lanes that went on to the road to Hove and Worthing. I stayed in a Brighton lane for the time being. I saw lights on full beam close in behind me, then a big four-by-four overtook me on the inside lane, heading for Hove and Worthing.

I eased in behind the four-by-four. It hid me from the Rover but it also, I realized too late, hid the Rover from me. Just when I was fully committed to taking the Worthing road, I saw that the Rover had moved back on to the Brighton road and was heading for the roundabout.

‘Shit,' I said. ‘Watch where he's going.'

Tingley and Gilchrist were both straining to see as my lane took me round a tight sweep of bend.

‘Couldn't see,' Tingley said.

‘Nor me,' Gilchrist added.

At the small roundabout ahead I swept back on to the loop that would take me down to the main roundabout. I would have two choices there.

‘What do you think?'

‘Head straight into Brighton,' Gilchrist said and Tingley grunted agreement. I took the left into Brighton but couldn't see the Rover on the long road ahead of us.

‘Let's get to Kemp Town,' Tingley said.

Kate was alone when Watts, Tingley and Gilchrist arrived at her flat. Reg Williamson had left about half an hour earlier. Kate had liked him. She had been comforted by his shabby presence.

‘Detective Sergeant Williamson told me about your flat,' Kate said to Gilchrist as she handed out coffees. ‘I've a spare room here if you'd like to stay.'

‘That might not be a bad idea, in the circumstances,' Watts said.

‘If you're sure?' Gilchrist said.

‘It would be great,' Kate said. ‘Theoretically, it's my parents' room but they never stay here. I'll dig out the spare keys and show you the magic that makes the lock work later.'

‘OK, well, I'm going to go,' Watts said. ‘Give you a lift, Jimmy?'

‘What's the plan for tomorrow?' Kate said. ‘I'm going to go up to the National Archive to look at police files for the Trunk Murder.'

She sensed that nobody else was particularly interested in the cold case just at the moment. To be honest, she wasn't either but she felt she needed to persevere. And she was thinking that when in London she might call in on her father.

‘I'm getting back to Hathaway, see if he has anything for us,' Tingley said.

‘I'm on shift but I'm going to see if I have anything of my flat left,' Gilchrist said. ‘And I'm going to talk to Philippa Franks.'

Only when Watts and Jimmy had left did Kate realize that Watts hadn't said anything about his own plans.

SIXTEEN

G
ilchrist was still waiting for word of a potential deal with Gary Parker. He had been interviewed again twice in her absence but had refused to say anything more until he got his deal. Somebody was stalling – maybe somebody was putting pressure on Acting Chief Constable Sheena Hewitt.

Gilchrist wondered if Winston Hart at the Police Authority was also putting pressure on Hewitt to make the deal for his son. But maybe he was just worrying about the scandal when the press found out about his connection to a sick killer.