Cold Courage (17 page)

‘That’s fine,’ Mari said. ‘But that isn’t going to stop us from talking over how to do things, is it?’

‘Well, no,’ Lia admitted. ‘And you’re right. I feel like I’m deceiving them. In a bad way.’

‘We’ve all learned that same lesson at one time or another,’ Mari said, waving at the binders lining the wall.

‘What kind of jobs do you have in those anyway? When will you tell me about them?’

Mari suddenly looked serious.

‘Maybe someday. You already know a lot, Lia.’

In the following days, Lia visited the Fair Rule office often, but always briefly. They had to make sure Gallagher had been using the keyboard for several days before retrieving it.

Gallagher was at the office every day, and the keyboard did not seem to have aroused any suspicion.

Lia’s biggest problem was remembering to wear her ring and to respond casually to questions about her engagement. Word had got around the office. Every now and then someone who had not been in when they had the cake came to congratulate her. Even Tom Gallagher expressed his congratulations, as Lia swallowed her mortification.

After five days, Mari decided that the time had come to bring in the keyboard.

‘Don’t worry. This time no one will notice anything,’ Lia
promised
.

She had decided to simply be the last person to leave the office. In advance, she arranged with Stephen that she would put the finishing touches on the campaign materials.

‘I won’t be in until late though,’ she said.

Lia went to the office at nine o’clock at night, when only Gallagher, Stephen and a couple of others were still around. One after another they left, until at half past ten only Stephen and Lia remained.

‘I have to go,’ Stephen said finally. ‘Shouldn’t you pack it in for the day too?’

‘I really want to get this done. I don’t know if I’ll be able to come in for a few days,’ Lia said.

After showing her how to set the burglar alarm, Stephen wished her good night and departed.

Lia finished the designs. She circled the office to verify that no one else was present. She visited Tom Gallagher’s office and replaced the old keyboard.

She placed the substitute keyboard in her bag, turned off the coffee maker and lights and switched on the alarm as she left.

If this works, I’m never coming back. No more anti-abortion slogans for the walls of Glasgow.

When Lia texted that she had the keyboard, Rico replied that he would pick it up from her at home immediately.

Lia brought the package wrapped in a plastic bag out to the street in front of her building.

‘Thanks,’ Rico said, eyes all aglow.

‘Are you going back to the Studio?’ Lia asked.

‘One guess. And Marge is coming in too. She wants to see what we got
tout de suite.’

Lia smiled at Mari’s latest pet name.

‘Sweet dreams,’ Rico said.

Lia watched as Rico set off down Kidderpore Avenue in the Studio’s familiar grey delivery van. Curiosity won out over
exhaustion
. What would they find on the keyboard?

Quickly she dug out her mobile and rang Rico.

‘Stop. I’m coming with you.’

‘Lots of coffee and hard information. That’ll keep you awake,’ Rico said.

They were at the Studio again, the same threesome, Lia, Mari and Rico, sitting in Rico’s office reading the data they had obtained from Tom Gallagher’s computer.

It was clear that he exchanged messages with Arthur Fried daily.

‘I kicked Stephen and Simon in the backside. The media value of the new posters is pathetic. They’re trying to be artists.’

‘If the money doesn’t show up in the account tomorrow, I might just forget the whole fucking election.’

Specific themes were repeated in the passwords Gallagher used: the party, polo, Tube station names and dogs.

But how could they know what websites he was logging in to with each username and password combination? Lia asked. The sensors didn’t record what pages he visited.

‘That’s surprisingly easy to track,’ Rico explained.

He could find the right pages by searching the web for the passages of text the user entered. Even if the pages were private, the subject matter was obvious from the messages, making identifying things like discussion boards quick work. They could confirm the identification by logging in with the usernames grabbed by the key logging chip.

‘And what if the page records the last time someone logged in?’

Most web users never look at that, Rico said. And changing log information like that was a basic hacking skill.

Prying into Gallagher’s messages was interesting, but there wasn’t anything particularly secret in them.

‘Let’s look for bank details,’ Mari suggested.

Quickly Rico determined that Fair Rule had accounts with at least six different banks Gallagher had visited over the past few days.

Rico’s software showed them what Gallagher’s usernames and passwords were at the various banks, but it was unable to show them the next codes in single-use PIN sequences.

They knew what banks the accounts were with, but could not get into the accounts themselves.

‘Is this a dead end?’ Mari asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Rico said thoughtfully. ‘The Well has had back doors into almost all of these banks’ systems. It’s just been a while.’

An hour passed, during which Lia started falling asleep in her chair, Mari read printed copies of Gallagher’s information and Rico bore down on his computer.

One by one the banks’ defences began to crumble.

‘I can’t get into two of them. And if I start burrowing into them myself, it’ll take days. But we have credentials for four banks,’ Rico said.

This news woke Lia up again.

They scanned through the account entries. Most of the amounts were small, and the payees and recipients seemed unremarkable: materials suppliers, payments for advertising space, support
payments
to party member organisations.

‘Using the web interface is too slow,’ Rico said.

To speed up the process, for each account he downloaded
spreadsheets
of all available transaction information. From these he easily separated the normal, monthly fund transfers. Lia and Mari looked up information about the recipients and payees online and compared them to the transactions. Gradually they whittled the list down until all that was left was a small number of money transfers lacking any obvious explanation.

‘A few of these do seem suspicious,’ Mari said.

In all likelihood, some of the transfers had gone to expenses the party did not want publicised. They were mostly small sums though, a few pounds at a time.

‘This name comes up several times,’ Mari said. ‘Penitent Catering.’

Several transfers of a few thousand pounds each had been made to this strangely named account, at more or less regular intervals of two or three months. The account was held in the United States, at a bank called Danford Trust.

They tried to search for the company in the international business register. The chairman of the board of Penitent Catering was recorded as Thomas Andrew Gallagher in London, and it gave the impression of being a relatively new shell company. The business had no employees and little activity in the US or anywhere else.

‘Can we get into Danford Trust?’ Mari asked.

‘I’m almost in already,’ Rico replied.

When they got the account open, it turned out that the only thing Penitent Catering had ever done with its money was to transfer it to the same three recipients.

‘They’re all on this side of the pond,’ Rico announced.

In the space of only one year, Gallagher had transferred over £20,000 to three British accounts. Each time he entered the account numbers by hand, apparently not wanting to mark the accounts as regular recipients.

‘That’s stupid,’ Lia said. ‘It’s obvious from the transaction
information
where the money is going.’

‘People do unnecessary things thinking they’re covering their tracks all the time. It makes them feel like they’re being careful,’ Mari said.

Rico listed the transfer recipients in the UK. The accounts belonged to organisations named Battle 88, Gallows and the Nordic Guild.

Mari recognised only one.

Battle 88 was a racist, far-right hooligan group in Leeds. The courts had convicted some of its members of throwing Molotov cocktails at mosques and other equally serious crimes.

Staring at Mari in shocked disbelief, Lia was suddenly completely awake.

‘I know,’ Mari said. ‘We found what we were looking for.’

Gallows and the Nordic Guild operated out of London; Battle 88 was lying low after the judgements against it.

The organisations’ websites did not make pleasant reading, being filled with coarse slogans and pictures glorifying the white race and demeaning everyone else.

Lia made the mistake of glancing through the image gallery on the Gallows page, which included pictures of black people being executed and female victims of sexual assault – all also from ethnic minorities. Lia found herself physically unable to look.

‘Aren’t these pictures… against the law?’ she asked.

‘Some of them are,’ Mari said. ‘Catching someone for distributing them is another matter though.’

The Nordic Guild had ambiguous connections to Scandinavian groups that used old Germanic and Norse symbols in their speeches and images. The mythology made their troublemaking seem ‘deeper’, Mari observed. Most of them were little more than disorganised clubs, but some had full-on hierarchies, online networks, fundraising schemes and profitable enterprises of their own.

But why would Fair Rule give money to borderline-illegal groups like this? Lia wondered out loud.

‘They can’t openly. Supporting people like this is pure poison for a legitimate political party,’ Mari said.

However, openly racist groups were useful. They did the dirty work the party couldn’t. They made Fair Rule look moderate. Through them, young supporters could channel their aggression. They kept the immigrant population in a state of fear, thinning the ranks of their supporters and creating an image of constant chaos surrounding foreign-born minorities.

‘I’d bet the Fair Rule leadership has regular contact with them. They probably have specific requirements in exchange for their support. But we don’t have to figure that out – just the knowledge that a party trying to get into Parliament is supporting illegal activity is enough.’

‘Why does Gallagher go to all the trouble of circulating the money through an American bank?’ Lia asked.

Rico had the answer. While they had been talking, he had reviewed Penitent Catering’s financial statements. The company had made investments in the United States and taken tax deductions for charitable donations. Deductions had been granted for the past three years at least.

‘Can you guess to which three companies they made their
charitable
contributions?’ Rico asked.

‘You’re kidding me – the same white supremacists?’ Lia said.

‘Exactly.’

All three groups were registered as 501(c)(3) charitable
institutions
. In London and Leeds, Battle 88, Gallows and the Nordic Guild harassed immigrants and caused disturbances in ethnic restaurants. In America, they claimed to produce special education materials for disabled children and organise cultural events.

Lia couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

‘Why the charity mask?’

‘I bet that was Fried’s idea,’ Mari said.

Fried had lived in the US and knew local business practices. Using charitable tax deductions, his party was probably saving many thousands of dollars every year.

‘And the name Penitent. The whole thing had to come out of Fried’s brain,’ Mari said.

Penitent was an extremely peculiar name for a catering business. The company certainly never had any intention of operating
publicly
given a name like that.

‘This is going to be the biggest political story of the year,’ Lia said.

‘One of the biggest,’ Mari said. ‘Now we have two strikes against Fried. We still need a third. And a timetable and plan for rolling them out.’

‘How can we publicise this without our role coming out too?’ Lia asked, thinking of her visits to the Fair Rule office.

Rico assured her that no one would be able to trace the story back to them. Of course Fried would realise that the information came from Gallagher’s accounts, but that would be as far as the trail led.

Planning how to release the information would come later. Now was not the time.

‘Now we all need to go home and get some sleep. Let’s take a few days off in honour of this find,’ Mari said.

At four o’clock in the morning they all stood, groggy with
exhaustion
, waiting for cabs on Park Street. None were in sight.

‘I had been waiting to tell you this. But now is as good a time as any,’ Mari said.

Mari had asked Maggie to investigate whether the comb Lia found meant anything.

Maggie had visited all the stores that sold Baltic goods, checking whether any of them carried the same combs. None of them did. She had also paid visits to British shops that sold similar cheap little sundries. None of the shopkeepers recognised the comb.

‘Thorough work,’ Lia said, astonished.

‘It usually helps.’

The murdered woman had probably bought her comb from the Eastern Buffet.

‘I’ve been thinking I could pay it a visit too,’ Mari said.

Lia looked at her in surprise.

‘We agreed that this was my case, but that would be a big help.’

‘You’ve given me two weapons against Arthur Fried. Now I want to help you,’ Mari said.

Lia’s spent the last day of her holiday sleeping.

When she returned to work at
Level
, she tried not to think about anything related to the dead Latvian woman, Arthur Fried or the Studio.

It did her good.

In their editorial meeting, they talked about story ideas. Sam had a series of articles in progress everyone was excited about. He had been asking the family members of famous politicians their opinions on social issues, a subject which usually only the politicians
themselves
got asked about.

Lia worked on illustrations for her series about socially important books, albums, films and television programmes.

She enjoyed the whole day. She felt like a normal person doing proper work. Nothing mysterious or special.

As she left for home, she wavered between the bus and the Tube. The bus was more peaceful, but she had not been able to take it in months without remembering the murdered woman.

She chose the bus, and when it arrived at Holborn Circus, she tried to stay calm. She had to be able to move through the City
without
her emotions paralyzing her.

She went for an evening jog on Hampstead Heath. As she returned, she saw Mr Vong in the hall of residence garden, looking up at the gutters.

‘Evening, Mr Vong,’ Lia said. ‘I hope you aren’t still thinking about work at this time of night.’

‘We old men tend to believe the world would fall apart without our watchful care,’ Mr Vong admitted.

Lia popped in to her flat to get a package. It was the present she had purchased for Mr Vong to thank him for his night-time rescue mission.

‘My goodness,’ said Mr Vong. ‘A gift is certainly too much. But it is very kind of you.’

He opened the package. In it was a small, waterproof radio
fashioned
in the shape of a floating rubber duck.

‘Now you can listen to the radio anywhere. Even in the bath or outside in the rain,’ Lia said.

‘I cannot remember the last time I received such a delightful gift.’

Lia was already on her way inside when Mr Vong said, ‘Seeing you looking so at peace is nice, Ms Pajala.’

‘Thanks. The feeling is mutual.’