The Price Of Darkness (3 page)

Suttle was indicating the spare chair across the desk. In a couple of minutes he’d be through for the day. She could use the phone, read the paper, whatever. Then, if she fancied it, he’d take her to the bar upstairs for a drink. Hamilton was watching him, amused.

‘A phone would be good,’ she said.

 

Detective Superintendent Martin Barrie headed the Pompey Major Crime Team. He was thin to the point of near-invisibility, chain-smoked whenever the opportunity offered itself, and had never bothered to scrub the flat Essex vowels from the throaty whisper that passed for his voice. In the early days, barely a year ago, a couple of the younger detectives on the MCT had found it difficult to take him seriously as a boss - no obvious presence, none of the bullish leadership qualities of their former leader - a mistake Barrie hadn’t allowed them to repeat. One was now back in uniform, teaching road safety awareness to class after class of stroppy Pompey kids. The other had binned the job completely.

Now, finding Faraday at his door, Barrie nodded at an empty chair. As Senior Investigating Officer, he was in formal charge of the Mallinder inquiry but a year under Barrie’s command on other jobs had taught Faraday to expect the lightest of touches on the investigative tiller. If you’d won this man’s trust, then he gave you plenty of leeway. Better still, if you got into trouble, there was no one better to watch your back. And for Faraday, as Deputy SIO, that was no small comfort.

‘The PM?’ Barrie ripped a page from his notepad and reached for a pencil.

‘Exactly as we assumed, sir. Single bullet, point-blank range. According to the cleaner, Mallinder slept with two pillows. Both were missing, so we’re assuming the bullet got no further than the bottom one. Remove it from the scene, and we’re left with nothing.’

‘How about the shell case?’

‘Same MO. The pathologist recovered tiny shreds of fabric from the entry wound. That tells me the killer had the gun in a cloth bag of some kind to contain the expended case. This is a guy heading for sainthood. The anti-litter people would love him.’

‘Any other keyholders? Apart from Mallinder and the cleaner?’

‘Only the agency. We’re checking on keys.’

‘OK.’

Barrie was scribbling himself a note. Faraday watched the bony, yellowing fingers racing across the notepad. At length the Detective Superintendent looked up. Less than an hour earlier, he’d chaired the first Operation
Billhook
squad meet. The size of the investigative team - twenty-three and counting - was testimony to the importance he attached to an early result. People like Mallinder were Pompey’s guarantee of a decent future. The fact that somebody had killed him did little for the city’s reputation.

‘So forensically, we’re nowhere,’ Barrie muttered. ‘No bullet, no shell case, no reports of a gunshot from neighbours. Scenes of Crime have found entry damage around the front door but nothing we can positively ID. We’ve got prints everywhere but I’m betting most of them are Mallinder’s or the cleaner’s or this bloody girlfriend of his. Is the pathologist sticking with three to four in the morning?’

‘Yes. I think he’d like a bit of wriggle room either side but basically … yes.’

‘Terrific. So here’s a guy turns up in the middle of the night. No one sees him arrive, no one hears him at work, no one has a clue how or when he goes. He wears gloves, he uses an automatic and presumably a silencer, and he leaves sod all behind. He isn’t pissed, he isn’t forgetful, in fact he’s Mr Tidy. These people don’t exist in Portsmouth …’ he shot Faraday a bleak smile ‘… do they?’

‘Prima facie, sir, you’d say not.’

‘Fine. So where next?’

‘We need to take a good look at his laptop. It’s over at Netley at the moment but we ought to fast-track it. Do you want me to talk to Wowser?’

Wowser Productions was a Southsea consultancy security-cleared to analyse seized computer equipment. They normally turned jobs round within a working week but charged the earth.

‘I’ll give them a ring.’ Barrie was wincing. ‘What else?’

The two men quickly ran through the tick-list of actions generated by a major incident like this. Checks on CCTV footage were already under way, with two D/Cs trawling through videotapes at the Civic Centre control room. Suttle was pressing the force Telephone Intelligence Department for billings on Mallinder’s mobile and landlines, and had drawn up an application for a Production Order to access the dead man’s bank accounts. The D/S in charge of Outside Enquiries had detailed two D/Cs to locate and interview Mallinder’s lady friend, and Barrie seemed confident that further actions would follow.

Within days
Billhook
should be a great deal wiser about the small print of Mallinder’s private life, but in the meantime Barrie could do little but steadily extend the reach of the house-to-house teams in the hope that someone in Port Solent might have noticed a tiny blip in the steady pulse of marina life. A strange car. A new face. Maybe even a visiting boat that no one had seen before. Anything, in short, that might flag a pathway forward.

Faraday mentioned Benskin, Mallinder’s partner. Barrie nodded.

‘He’s down tomorrow, first thing. According to Suttle, he’s cleared his diary. You need to talk to him, Joe, find out what the firm’s been into. These developer guys are canny, keep their cards well hidden, but a class job like this might concentrate the man’s mind. Unless …’ he frowned ‘… he knows more than we think.’

Faraday nodded. Barrie had a point. Business partnerships could be as volatile as a marriage. According to Suttle, Mallinder and Benskin had come from nowhere, piling deal on deal, taking established developers by surprise. The closer the relationship and the higher the stakes, the greater the possibility of events running suddenly out of control.

‘You’re suggesting Benskin might have something to do with this?’

‘It’s possible, Joe.’ Barrie smiled thinly. ‘Either that or Mallinder’s pissed a rival off. We have to start somewhere. ’

He produced a packet of Rizlas from the desk drawer and got to his feet. The pouch of Golden Virginia lay on the sill beside the open window. He slipped off the elastic band and began to roll himself a cigarette, gazing down at the near-empty car park. At length came the scrape of a match and a long sigh as he expelled a thin plume of smoke through the open window. Then he turned as Faraday asked whether there was anything else he needed to know.

‘Yes. Willard’s been on a couple of times.’ He nodded at the phone. ‘It seems the Chief’s taking a personal interest. I gather the emphasis is on an early breakthrough. Quicker the better, Joe, eh … ?’

 

Returning to his own office, Faraday sorted quickly through his e-mails, tapped a reply or two, and then put through a call to the Bargemaster’s House. As he’d half-expected, there was no response. Gabrielle loathed answering the phone. Her years as an anthropologist in various remote corners of the planet had taught her very different ways to measure the world’s pulse and he pictured her now, out in the garden enjoying the last of the sunshine, content for the caller to leave a message under this electronic stone.

‘Me,’ he announced. ‘Sorry about the birds. Back soon.
À bientôt.
’

He put the phone down and eyed it for a moment. Accounting for his every move was something new in his life and he wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. Gabrielle was on holiday from her apartment in Chartres, a month at the very most, but even so he’d found it odd to be fitting the rough contours of a copper’s life into someone else’s routine. Not that Gabrielle had burdened him with demands. Far from it. In fact he’d never met anyone who was so cheerfully self-sufficient. But in a relationship that was getting deeper by the day, he felt he owed her an honest account of himself. This is who I really am, he wanted to say. And this is the life that has made me this way.

He found Suttle upstairs in the social club. The young D/C had commandeered a couple of stools at the far end of the bar and was locked in conversation with Gina Hamilton. The moment Faraday appeared, he was on his feet.

‘What are you having, boss? My shout.’

Faraday settled for a pint of Guinness and found himself a stool. Gina made room for him at the bar. The spareness of her frame and the steadiness in her eyes spoke of an appetite for regular exercise. She’d barely touched the glass of lager beside her battered leather bag.

‘You’re here for a while?’

‘Couple of days. Max.’

‘Drugs job?’

‘Yeah.’ She nodded. ‘Big time. At least in our neck of the woods.’

Without going into details, she outlined an operation she’d obviously been nurturing for a while. A distribution network centred in Plymouth. Cocaine mostly, with special offers on crack and smack when the Scouse dealers could be arsed to get out of bed. A supply chain running into Devon and Cornwall from sources upcountry. Dozens of outlets around the coast. Kick down a few doors, she said, and you’d spoil the party for a couple of weeks. But nail a truly major supplier and the damage might be a little more permanent.

‘So why Pompey?’ Faraday didn’t bother to hide his interest.

Gina hesitated a moment. She looked on the young side to be an experienced D/I, and she was plainly worried about sharing too much intelligence. Faraday was about to put the question a different way when Suttle helped him out.

‘Terry Byrne.’ He handed Faraday a brimming glass of Guinness. ‘Who’d have believed it, eh?’

Terry Byrne was a young Scouser who dealt from a chaotic terraced house barely a mile from Kingston Crescent and had won himself a city-wide reputation for ultra-violence. Lately he’d been settling heroin debts with a kettle full of boiling water tipped over the lower body, a process known as jugging.

Suttle resumed his seat beside the West Country D/I. Faraday could sense already that he was determined to make the most of his social responsibilities.

‘Cheers, boss.’ Suttle turned to touch glasses with Gina. ‘And here’s to some decent scalps, yeah?’

Faraday was still thinking about Byrne. The city’s cocaine trade was largely controlled by a prominent local criminal, Bazza Mackenzie. Recently, he’d been setting up a series of arm’s-length franchise operations, minimising his own risk while still enjoying huge profits, which he washed through his ever-expanding business empire. Dealers staked by Mackenzie were all Pompey boys, people he’d known most of his life, and collectively they’d made it very plain indeed that they intended to keep things local. A toerag Scouser like Terry Byrne could flog as much smack as he liked. But the moment he moved into something respectable like cocaine he’d be looking at a serious turf war.

‘Byrne’s really the target?’ Faraday needed to be clear.

‘Yes.’ Gina nodded. ‘He is.’

‘And you’re sure about the intel?’

‘Yes. I gather our Force Intelligence blokes have been talking to yours. I don’t know whether you’re in the loop or not but he’s expecting a delivery. Wholesale. Industrial quantities. Tomorrow, if we’re lucky.’

‘Cocaine?’

‘Yes.’

‘With some of it heading your way?’

‘That’s the story.’

‘How much?’

‘Between one and two kilos.’

‘Shit.’ It was Suttle. He looked impressed.

Faraday was still watching Gina. That weight of cocaine in the lock-up would be the making of a young D/I.

‘You’re serious?
Two kilos?
’

‘Yes.’

‘And you’ve got Byrne plotted up? Pennington Road? Surveillance? The whole nine yards?’

‘Absolutely. And tomorrow, if it all pans out, we’ll be on the road back west with him.’

‘So who orders the strike?’

‘Exeter makes the decision. Then I handle the tactical end. That kind of weight, I imagine we’ll settle for a traffic stop once we’re close to home. There’s no way my bosses would let it run. We’d have the media all over us if we fucked up.’

‘Sure.’ Faraday nodded. ‘So you’ll be relying on interview for further arrests?’

‘That’s the plan. The bloke at the wheel will be looking at five to six years. That’s a big incentive to come up with a few names.’

‘And this guy’s known to you? The courier?’

‘We’ve had dealings, yes. Bloke’s an animal but he’s just hooked up with a Ukrainian lady, a real stunner, and she’s another reason he might come across. Who knows?’ She reached for her drink, took a tiny sip, then checked her watch. ‘Shit. I’d no idea it was so late.’

Faraday ignored the hint. He still wanted to know how Byrne had laid hands on a couple of kilos of cocaine. In Pompey.

‘I’ve no idea. Force Intelligence are talking some kind of deal in Manchester but that’s something I can’t vouch for. Me? I’ll be happy with that kind of seizure and a day or two in the interview suite. Fingers crossed, we’ll end up with both. Plus a handful of arrests down the line. You want the rest of this?’

She handed Suttle her glass, still two-thirds full. Suttle looked at it a moment, then poured the contents into his own glass.

‘You know who’d cream themselves over a conversation like this?’ He was looking at Faraday. ‘Paul Winter. Two kilos of the laughing powder? Plus someone to work over in the interview room? Shit. A couple of days and you’d start running out of holding cells. Shame, eh?’

‘Shame, what?’ Gina had slipped off the stool, slipping her jacket over her shoulders.

‘Shame Paul’s not around any more. You’re driving?’

‘Yeah.’

‘No wonder.’ Suttle gestured at her empty glass. ‘If only he’d been as cluey as you.’

TUESDAY, 5 SEPTEMBER 2006.
22.15

 

Paul Winter had always hated Gatwick Airport. Now he edged the luggage trolley through the scrum of waiting relatives and friends on the Arrivals concourse at the South Terminal, following the couple ahead of him. For reasons he didn’t fully understand, he seemed to have acquired three sets of bags. A dodgy wheel gave the overloaded trolley a mind of its own, and two hours of business-class hospitality on the flight from Santiago de Compostela didn’t help. When the short, stocky figure in the tan chinos came to a sudden halt, Winter caught him squarely in the left thigh.