The Devil's Home on Leave (Factory 2) (22 page)

‘It goes back.’

‘Did your folk ever check to see if he was on the board of any of the Haweses’ moody companies at any time?’ I said. ‘Long before he was a minister; back in the days when he was just a humble MP?’

‘Christ, no,’ he said. ‘We never did. You might have something there.’

‘I can’t understand how he ever got security clearance to take that job,’ I said. ‘Security isn’t up my street, but still.’

‘Well, our people get the points switched on them,’ said Gordon gloomily, ‘that’s what politics in this country are all about. It makes us a jam puff for the Russians. You’re an ambitious MP, you’re well in with the PM, you’ve got your cronies at cabinet level, the job comes up – bang, you’re in it. And if we or MI5 say hey, wait a minute, we’re told to go and get stuffed. In the nicest possible way, of course.’

‘And so now somebody wants to kill him,’ I said. ‘Why?’

‘That’s going to be a melancholy story,’ said Gordon, ‘when it comes out, and he’s going to have to tell it – the Russians have seen to that. I’ve read the notes he’s had, and they’re bloody terrifying – he had to come to us with them. First, the Russians used him. Now they’re ditching him. He didn’t expect that. They never do; they’re like children. He can’t believe he’s going to lose his job – maybe even his liberty. Just a little treachery to support the old tastes; but a little treachery goes a long way if you’re minister for defence.’

‘Where he came in really handy was over that robbery,’ I said.

‘It’ll have to be proved,’ said Gordon, ‘even though the horse has bolted. This is only how we’re thinking so far, but let’s put it this way – a minister can find out anything he wants to. He was often briefed on that factory – on the face of it he had to be, for cabinet discussions, statements to the House. We know exactly how often he’s been up there. There wasn’t a whisper of publicity, of course. Dark glass on the car.’

‘Get all the dates,’ I said, ‘we might as well find out how far up and down this goes. This Phillips now, who runs the place, he bothers me.’

‘Well,’ said Gordon, ‘he was checked.’

‘That doesn’t seem to mean much, and I don’t see what use the minister would have been if Phillips wasn’t in the deal, and vice versa. I’d like to check Phillips. My way.’

‘OK,’ said Gordon, ‘we may as well try and get it right this time. I’ll tell you about Phillips. Phillips is a software wizard – the sort
of microchip guru who makes a British government foam with excitement, like a snooker amateur with black over the top pocket. A chance of upstaging the Americans? They’d go to any lengths to punt him into the job and no questions asked. And punt him in they did. And ask us about him they didn’t. As for threatening the minister, I tell you, it has to be the Russians that are trying it on. Look at it like this. They read our papers, watch our TV like everyone else. They see the coverage this Hadrill job’s had, also the Hawes jail break; they know fucking well what it’s all about. Also, they’ve just had forty-four of their folk kicked out of here – and now, if this goes to the end of the line, Christ, there’ll hardly be a Soviet left in the UK by the time the dust’s settled. So I reckon they followed this case step by step in the press; they watched us getting closer and closer to the minister, to Phillips, and they said to themselves, we reckon Bartlett’s going to panic, let his knickers down and reveal all. We can’t do a Philby on him these days and have him turn up in Moscow as a major-general in the KGB, so he’ll have to go, that’s all there is to it, he’s gone unsteady. They won’t use their own men, though; they know we’re too sophisticated for that. Christ, these days, you get a native-born Russian ferreting anywhere around where there’s no reason for him to be, he sticks out like a sore cock at a wedding, poor sod with his funny-hat accent – he comes unstuck at the first fence. It’s the Soviets’ own fault. They won’t let their own people out of the workers’ paradise to train, and they won’t trust anything British a bit more up-market because it
is
up-market, no matter how it drags its feathers around in front of them. That, by the way, is where the Russians are really feeble when it comes to the West – they fear our society like the devil fears water right across the board. We know that – and this time it’s against us – and that makes us take liberties with them. We just can’t take them seriously enough, and that’s where we come unstuck.’

‘Are coming unstuck,’ I said.

‘All right,’ said Gordon, ‘all right. Don’t criticize for a moment,
this is my sphere, I’m just briefing you on this, you know nothing about intelligence work.’

‘I’m learning fast,’ I said, ‘it looks just like police work to me.’

‘Maybe you should join us here.’

‘No, it’s too abstract,’ I said. ‘I like to see the body and work everything right back. From back to front.’

‘OK,’ said Gordon. ‘Now you’re the Russians. You’ve got to top a British minister who’s bent, before he grasses you. What do you do?’

‘They use our villains,’ I said. ‘They haven’t much choice. But they’re taking as much of a risk using the hard mob as they would be with any of their other solutions.’

‘The Russians just don’t understand the way we work,’ said Gordon, ‘that’s why, I tell you. Take Hawes. No one but a lunatic would ever have used him to rip off material like that. The Russians never took into account that Hawes might be grassed. But he was, and we put him away. OK, now Hawes is in the nick. But if the minister’s caught and starts singing, Hawes thinks, Christ, that’s another load of bird for me – fuck the Russians, they’re too fucking slow, I’ll do the berk myself. Hawes knows we’ll have him on such a bundle of charges when we catch him that he might as well make his will and leave everything to Wakefield; he’ll never get out.’

‘We do know the Grossmans were working for the Russians, though.’

‘Well, we think we do,’ said Gordon gloomily, ‘they said they were. But supposing they were working for Hawes too? They’re old mates. Or supposing Hawes made his break just to top the minister himself, also to stop you questioning him? Or the man scheduled to top the minister may be an entirely different villain. We just don’t know, and what a fuck-up it is, if you’ll excuse the phrase.’

‘Don’t worry,’ I said, ‘I’m always using it.’

‘The worst of the business is,’ said Gordon, ‘we’ve got to wrap
it up in silence. No publicity, those are the orders; we’ve got to sweep every bit of this shit straight under the carpet.’

‘Normally we’ve got a national genius for it,’ I said, ‘but this time it’s going to be difficult. Fleet Street’s got a sniff of burning wires already, and some of that mob feed stuff to mates at lunchtime to such a degree that it’s virtually public before it’s even been printed.’

‘I’ll see to the press,’ said Gordon savagely. ‘This is going to be done the way we want it done, and any half-arsed journalist that doesn’t see it my way can take a bus ride down to the Manpower Centre, he’ll be on the dole.’

‘You could slap a D-notice on.’

‘I’ve got no authority,’ he said. ‘Anyway, we don’t like them – this isn’t Poland.’

‘The angle the press’d like best,’ I said, ‘is this angle on London villains working for the USSR – Hawes, the Grossmans. They’d find that incredibly juicy, the Sundays would go potty over it, especially the highbrows, what is our society coming to etcetera.’

‘Well, I tell you they won’t get a chance,’ said Gordon, ‘not unless the whole of this thing explodes on us like a defective rocket. This new man they’ve got at their embassy here since Andropov came to power. Gureyevich. He’s a cunning sod. It must be his idea; he’s the KGB resident these days. Yes, I bet it looked pretty good to him to start with. But he doesn’t know villains as well as we do; what Gureyevich forgot was that once a villain’s into a really good punter he’ll never let go, why should he? They haven’t admitted it yet, but I can just see the Grossmans having a go at putting the black on the Russians. They sent those notes for them; they smashed up your little grass for them, Smith; they may even have been approached over this contract to do the minister for all we know. You met the Grossmans?’

‘I saw them clocking us the night I met Smitty,’ I said. ‘Heavies from Plaistow, but they go all over town. They’re thorough. What have you had out of them?’

‘Only that they sent the death notes so far, but Serious Crimes hasn’t finished with them yet; they’re at it now.’

‘They’ll be feeling very hard used,’ I said, ‘by the time Bowman’s finished with them.’

‘Yes, I sat in for a while,’ said Gordon. ‘There was nothing delicate about it.’ He added: ‘Well, how are we going to tackle Hawes and McGruder, then?’

‘I’ll have to trust to this double hunch I’ve got,’ I said, ‘if we’re going to play it my way. One, that I’m right about Hawes being shacked up with Klara McGruder. Two, that McGruder’s looking for them.’

‘It must be electric in that flat,’ said Gordon, ‘if the three of them are together. I can see why Hawes would be in there OK, but why McGruder?’

‘Revenge,’ I said. ‘If Klara really thought Billy knew nothing about her fling with Hawes, she really did have her head in the clouds. That doesn’t surprise me, mind; nothing about alcoholics surprises me. Still, I feel terrible about the woman now. I promised her that I’d have her protected.’

‘This sounds a pretty hideous thing to say,’ said Gordon, ‘but if we had protected her McGruder couldn’t have gone there, and we’d still be looking for him.’

‘Yes, it is a hideous thing to say,’ I said, ‘and I’ve exposed her by mistake on purpose, the way you expose a goat to a lion, I’ve seen that on TV. Yet, seeing that you’ve got the Grossmans, there’s a chance that either Hawes or McGruder have the contract to top this minister.’

‘Well, if they have,’ said Gordon, ‘they won’t have a chance to carry it out. I tell you, the Russians aren’t going to do it. Christ, if a Russian did it and was caught, they’d have a diplomatic forest fire on their hands that they’d never put out, and we’re supposed to be trying to get back to the age of détente.’

‘You’d better make sure neither Hawes nor McGruder get out of that flat if they’re in it, though,’ I said, ‘over the roofs, say – you’ll
be in trouble if they do. I reckon the best thing would be to take the minister into protective custody, a safe house somewhere.’

‘But that’s just what I can’t do!’ Gordon shouted. ‘What? Have him just vanish? It would go straight onto page one of every paper in the Western world, which is exactly what we’re trying to prevent. No, we’ve got to take a chance.’

‘OK – so have I the authority to play it my way?’

‘As long as it’s quiet. Will it be really, really quiet?’

‘If it turns out right,’ I said, ‘you’ll only hear the tune in the distance.’

He sighed. ‘Yes, all right,’ he said, ‘we’ll do it your way. You know the bastards. Men to watch and cover, we’ll see to that. There have been two cabinet meetings over it, and it’s all agreed; the PM’s taking a personal interest.’

I went out into the street and stood on the pavement watching the traffic. Soon a squad car passed; I stopped it.

‘All right, sport,’ said the blond young copper beside the driver, leaning out, ‘what’s it down to?’

‘It’s down to me,’ I said. ‘I’m in a hurry.’

The copper started to laugh in an incredulous way, but the CID sergeant in the back put a stop to it. ‘Hello, Sid,’ I remarked, ‘well, it’s been a while.’

‘I should think so,’ he said, ‘seeing you’re dead and buried over at A14.’

‘Sid, get me over to the Factory,’ I said. ‘I’m on this Hawes–McGruder thing.’

‘Christ, that? That sounds hairy.’

‘Will you do it?’ I said. ‘I’m in ever such a hurry, and I’ll buy you a pint one of these days.’

‘A whole pint? What, have we had a raise or something? Get in.’ He said to the driver: ‘Make it to the Factory, Dave. Put the wailer on.’

On our way we overtook a Planet car returning empty and going too fast. ‘I’d like to have booked him,’ said the blond young copper, ‘them bleeding minicabs.’

‘I wouldn’t mind your job,’ I said.

‘You’d take a drop in wages, sarge.’

‘It might be worth it,’ I said, ‘for the relative peace and quiet.’ We stopped at the Factory and I got out. ‘Thanks, Sid.’

‘Always a pleasure to do business with Unexplained Deaths,’ he said. ‘Is it all right if we piss off and get some sleep now? We’ve been on since midnight.’

‘Yes, dismiss,’ I said, ‘and sharpen your darts game up.’ I walked into the Factory past the usual bag of thieves, whores and pisspots who were being assembled for the Black Maria to take them to Great Marlborough Street. I went downstairs and said to the girl on duty at the computer: ‘I want you to check a name, it’s McGruder.’

‘We’ve been busy with that name,’ the girl said. She looked tired but pretty, her long fair hair gathered at the back of her head. Something about her face touched me. You have to keep putting yourself in situations where you care: for once you accept anything, it’s dead. It occurred to me to wonder if someone like her would ever replace Brenda, the WPC who had gone off and got married – someone to put some real flowers in Room 205 instead of plastic ones.

‘No, not the man,’ I said, ‘the woman, the ex-wife. The Christian name’s Klara with a K. I want everything you’ve got on her – some of it I mightn’t know. I’d have asked you before, but I’ve had no time. I’ll give you the maiden name in a minute, wait while I get my book out, it makes a noise like a tank backfiring in a foreign street. Here you are, Godorovic.’

‘I’ll do it now,’ she said, and started the computer off on its search. It took under a minute; then she looked up.

‘I’m afraid there’s nothing here,’ she said, ‘just the date she came into the country as a woman married to an Irish national.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘Tell me, how many names have you got on that?’

‘Over a million.’

I looked at her tired face again. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Hazel,’ she said, ‘and I’ve got a boyfriend, if that’s what you mean.’

‘No,’ I said, ‘I didn’t mean that. I mean it’s just nice to see someone normal for a change.’