RUSS LITTEN was born at the end of the 1960s and spent the subsequent decades in a variety of jobs before becoming a full-time writer at the turn of the century. After writing drama for television, radio and film, his first novel, Scream If You Want to Go Faster, was published in January 2011. He lives with his family in Kingston Upon Hull.
A complete catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library on request
The right of Russ Litten to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
Copyright © 2013 Russ Litten
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, dead or alive, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
First published in 2013 by Tindal Street Press, an imprint of Profile Books Ltd
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This one is for Geordie Mark
… Yeah, yeah, yeah, I got ya guv, I understand all that, yeah, yeah, sweet … OK … Carlton Nesta McKenzie … fifteenth of the tenth, nineteen ninety-one … Flat 56a, Hyacinth House … Crown Heights estate … Hackney … E8, innit. So we rolling, yeah? All right, here’s the thing … it was me who killed the man on the news. The man who got stabbed, yeah? I ain’t even gonna lie guv, it was all down to me. I stabbed him in the chest, boom, right through the heart. You got the man you looking for. Don’t listen to Jack, he’s all mixed up in his head, ya get me? He all emotional about stuff. He don’t know what he’s saying right now. I know he gonna be sat in that other room saying he did this an that, but he just chatting shit, believe me. He feeling all guilty an that, but he never stabbed up no one. The old man is not to blame, trust me …
Ndekwe first learns of the Stewart job while flicking through a discarded English newspaper in a Portuguese bar. A page six headline: YOUTH STABBED TO DEATH IN LONDON STREET.
It is a depressingly familiar story; eighteen-year-old Aaron Stewart died as the result of a fatal knife wound outside a row of shops on the Crown Heights estate, Hackney. Stewart is described as being known to the police, a prominent gang member with a history of drugs and violence. There is a photograph; a sullen-eyed, police-issue mug shot. He looks older than eighteen. Knifed through the heart in broad daylight, it says.
A quote from a Metropolitan Police spokesman emphasizes the need to retain an open mind regarding the circumstances surrounding the death and any possible motive at this very early stage of the investigation. A dedicated team of officers is questioning people on the estate and combing the surrounding area for clues, it says. In the meantime, residents are assured that any information made available to the police will be received in total confidence. Ndekwe can almost hear Gorman’s telephone voice dispensing those carefully chosen words to some drama-hungry hack.
He reads the report out to Sonia, but she feigns disinterest. Just shrugs, spins the ice around her glass and looks beyond her husband to the white and blue boats rested up in the harbour outside. It has been a much-needed break for the pair of them; glorious weather, fantastic food, welcoming locals. Nothing to do except laze around on the beach and take evening strolls along the waterfront. It has been good to get away. But it is coming to an end.
The sardines and salads arrive. Sonia tells him to put down the newspaper.
– We’re on our holidays, Peter, she says. – You promised. Remember?
She is right. He had promised. The holiday had been a last-minute deal; two weeks in the Algarve for just under a grand. They had both agreed that it was exactly what they needed; time spent far away from the stresses of the job and the relentless grind of the city. Early nights and long lie-ins, the chirping of crickets after dark and the lapping waves beneath their window. No streets with raised voices or sirens screaming past, no staring at screens. No dwelling on recent disappointments. No drama. They had both agreed.
They pick at their food and Sonia talks about various things; the sunshine, the boats, the people at the hotel, those funky yellow wedge sandals she’s seen in a boutique window; that cosy little bistro just off the square where they could maybe have their final night’s meal and what does he think they should get her mum for a present? Ndekwe eats and smiles and nods, but her words are just a vague background noise. In his head, he is already back at work.
Detective Sergeant Ndekwe. He is still getting accustomed to his new title. And he is still getting to know all the other notable names on his new manor. The dead youth staring up from the newspaper at his elbow was certainly one of them. Ndekwe had heard of Aaron Stewart and his alleged activities on the Crown Heights estate almost as soon as he’d landed at Hackney nick. Aaron Stewart; street name Knowledge, thought to be the head of a small but tightly knit group of young men specializing in drug dealing, robbery, violence and intimidation. Ndekwe runs a mental checklist of the other prominent names in Stewart’s orbit, but he can’t come up with any clear motive to murder. Drugs, he thinks. Either drugs or a postcode dispute; some petty slight or perceived disrespect amplified beyond all reason. The usual excuses.
They land at Heathrow airport two days later and he checks his phone as they stand among slow-moving lines of luggage. The signal is weak and he has to walk around to find a sweet spot. He gets through to Tom Halliwell at the third attempt. Halliwell tells Ndekwe that they are holding two men on suspicion of murder: a kid in his late teens off the Crown Heights and an older guy.
Sonia tells him to turn his goddamn phone off.
– C’mon, Fast Track, she says. – Fourteen days, yeah? Fourteen full days. Remember?
That’s what she’s started calling him since he got the promotion: Fast Track. It had been affectionate at first, a teasing term of endearment; but now it carries a definite undertone. Everything has happened quickly for them, ever since they met four years ago when her temping agency sent her for a six-week stint filing data at Lewisham police station and they’d progressed from lunch dates to evening dinner to the headlong tumble into love, a short engagement and then the wedding, followed by two house moves back and forth across the river; a new job for her, and promotion for him.
He pockets his phone and they wheel their suitcases across the car park under a bright blue cloudless sky. It is nearly as hot as the Algarve; the same relentless sun, the same clinging humidity. They drive back to their house in Woolwich and unpack. They shake the sand from their clothes and open two-week-old post. They go to bed early and rise late. At Sonia’s insistence they keep their phones turned off and their dressing gowns on until at least midday. They eat takeaway food and drink cold white wine and lemonade in the back garden. On the Sunday they go to church with Sonia’s parents and share souvenirs and photographs over a roast beef dinner in the afternoon. They return home and watch TV while he irons five freshly washed work shirts in preparation for the coming week. The Stewart job is mentioned on the local news round-up. Police are holding two men in connection with the murder. No further comment is offered.
They go to bed and Sonia curls herself tightly around him. She strokes his shoulders and arms and kisses his neck, timidly at first and then with an increasing intent until he puts his fingers to her mouth and tells her he has to rest; big day tomorrow. And then he turns over, away from her, and his breathing deepens and steadies until he is asleep.
She lies behind him in the dark, the sheets balled up in her fists, the noise of the traffic outside and the ache in her chest that keeps her from sleep.
The next morning Ndekwe is at his desk before seven, wading through the debris that has gathered in his absence; an endless column of unread emails, angry, blinking voicemail lights and a mountain of memos and paperwork, all demanding his immediate attention on the vital issues of modern police work: health and safety, diversity awareness, prejudicial behaviour and coordinated community planning. He works slowly and methodically as the station around him fills with the bustle of the incoming day shift.
After nearly two hours shining the seat of his pants, he can’t stand it any longer. He rises from his desk and heads for the clamour he can hear coming from the other end of the corridor.
The incident room is buzzing, but not with the tight-lipped urgency that characterizes most murder investigations. The atmosphere here is more akin to a Saturday afternoon down the local pub; officers lolling back on chairs and sitting on desks, banter swapped over computer screens and coffee cups. Laughter and backslaps and good-natured insults. Ndekwe knows this mood: liberation. The intoxicating release of tension that comes with a result. He quietly curses his decision to take a holiday.
He weaves his way between the bodies. A few of the civilian support staff offer a quick smile of greeting, but most of the other CID barely glance his way. Ndekwe is well aware that his arrival three months ago has put a few noses out of joint. There are people on the team who have been sat waiting patiently for years for that DS job to come up and here he is, Mr Fast Track, parachuted in from Lewisham Super Nick on the high potential development scheme. Not that he is overly concerned. Ndekwe isn’t there to make friends. He is there to do a job. And this is the first big one since he landed.
Gorman is seated at the far end of the room at a desk beneath the whiteboard. He is on the phone. Detective Constable Tom Halliwell sits at an adjacent table, organizing a stack of paperwork into neat and stapled piles. Gorman raises a hand in acknowledgement as Ndekwe approaches. Halliwell glances up, nods a greeting and returns to his filing.
Aaron Stewart glares down from the centre of the whiteboard, the same mug shot that was featured in last week’s newspaper. He’s surrounded by a trail of red and black arrows and asterisks. The names SHEPHERDSON and McKENZIE are underlined to his left.
Ndekwe indicates the board.
– We got a result?
– Hopefully, says Halliwell.
– Two of them, yeah?
– Yeah. The boy’s the collar, though.
Gorman finishes his call, puts down the phone. He leans back in his chair and links his hands across his belly like a Metropolitan Buddha, bestows a courteous nod upon Ndekwe.
– Detective Sergeant, he says. – Good time?
– Very good, sir, thanks.
– Nice place?
– Yeah, quiet … well, bit boring, really. Glad to be back.
The detective inspector grins. – Oh we’ve had a right jolly-up here. Haven’t we, Tom?
Halliwell grunts in the positive, head down in his paperwork.
Ndekwe looks at the names on the board. – So where did we find these two then?
Gorman heaves himself to his feet.
– Come on, he says. – I’ll fill you in.
The usual bedlam down in the custody suite; a constant flow of human traffic; stony-faced solicitors, civilian processors and a queue of officers waiting to book in their handcuffed charges. A squabble of raised voices and the booming slam of distant doors. As soon as one body is processed another jostles forward to take its place; as one telephone is picked up and silenced another immediately begins to ring.
Gorman and Ndekwe push their way through the throng of bodies in the admissions office, and head down to the cells. It is cooler here, but despite the hum of the air conditioning there is the constant stink of vomit and stale bodies. A dull banging from somewhere further down, a voice raised in cracked fury:
– I WANT MY SLISSITOR! I WANT MY FACKING SLISSITOR! CAM TO THE DOOR, YOU FACKING CANTS!
The two officers walk past doors of heavy blue steel. Ndekwe adjusts his pace to accommodate that of the older man.
– Shepherdson’s the old guy, Gorman tells him. – They’re both trying to put their hands up, but McKenzie’s the collar, I reckon. Looks like he’s one of Stewart’s boys.
– Yeah? Where does Shepherdson fit in then?
– He was with McKenzie when he got lifted. In Hull, of all places. We brought the pair of them back yesterday.
– Hull?
– Shepherdson’s from up that way, originally. Looks like he’s been trying to help get the lad away.
– Why would he do that?
– Frightened, probably. My guess is McKenzie put the arm on him. Seems like the old boy owed him a few quid.
– Drugs?
– Gambling.
– Yeah?
– Yeah. Horses.
Ndekwe considers this for a beat.
– Are they known to us? he asks.
– McKenzie’s got a bit of form as a juvie: possession, riotous assembly, suspicion of handling stolen goods. Not a serious player; not in the Crown Heights crew anyway. Never heard of the old man before. Nothing on him at all.
Ndekwe nods, sets his face to a serious frown and bites his bottom lip to keep the grimace from forming. He feels slightly uneasy when Gorman throws words like ‘crew’ and ‘player’ around. He can’t be totally sure, but Ndekwe gets the distinct impression that Gorman makes a point of using these phrases when he is in the presence or earshot of black officers. On his first day at the nick Ndekwe had overheard Gorman in the staff canteen loudly informing a CO19 sergeant that it was ‘time to end this beef’ and that they should ‘get the straps out’.
Gorman stops at a door: J. H. SHEPHERDSON.
Ndekwe tilts open the suicide hatch and peers inside. A prone figure on the bed wrapped in a dark blue blanket; a shock of greasy, sandy-grey curls at one end and two grubby grey socks at the other. A laceless pair of battered shoes set carefully to face the far wall, side by side. The blanket rises and falls; a laboured wheeze that builds to a serious of ragged exhalations, suddenly erupting into retching coughs.
– Ahjesusfugginchrist …
The figure rolls over to face the wall, pulling the blanket more tightly around him.
Ndekwe shuts the hatch and looks at Gorman.
– He don’t sound too clever.
– Doctor gave him the all-clear before we questioned him. He won’t be running the marathon this year, but yeah, he’s well enough. Needs to pack the fags in, though.
Gorman gestures for them to move on. They pass another three blue doors until they reach: C. N. McKENZIE.
They stand either side of the name. Ndekwe looks at Gorman. – Your money’s on this one, yeah?
– Yeah. His story holds together. The other guy’s a fantasy merchant.
Ndekwe tilts the hatch. The boy is sat bolt upright on the edge of the bed, upper body rocking gently back and forth, hands drumming against the tops of his thighs. Ndekwe guesses late teens, early twenties. His eyes flicker towards the door at the noise of the sliding metal, then fix themselves back steady on the wall as the body beneath them shudders.
Ndekwe tries to equate the snoring bag of rags in the room three doors away with this agitated young kid.
– What was it over? he asks.
– Money, basically. Gorman scratches the back of his head and feels wet skin. He is beginning to perspire. It is warm down here under the station, the air trapped and heavy. He plasters a few stray strands of pale ginger hair down across his forehead. – And McKenzie’s alleged that Stewart and the rest of the crew raped his sister.
Ndekwe looks sharply. – And did they?
Gorman pulls a sour-faced sneer, shakes his head in the negative.
– Halliwell and Frampton visited the family last night. The sister flatly denies it. Our guess is he’s trying to go for mitigating circumstances.
– Who’s the brief?
– Said he didn’t want one. We put the duty in with him, but he hardly said two words to her.
– And we’ve not charged him yet?
– Not yet, no. Still interviewing. We’ve got till Wednesday though.
Gorman is talking, but Ndekwe is only half listening. A muffled bell is chiming somewhere. Something about the kid’s face in profile seems vaguely familiar. He looks again through the hatch, tries to reframe the boy into some firmer context; a witness box, an interview room, a street corner, the back of a police car. But no solid connection is made. Ndekwe wills the young man in the cell to turn his head so he can get a better look at him. He feels a sudden urge to bang on the door, to startle McKenzie into movement, force him to look fully in his direction. But McKenzie just sits there, quietly vibrating, his hands beating an endless tattoo on his knees, rocking back and forth, back and forth, staring sightlessly ahead.
Where do I know you from?
Gorman is asking Ndekwe a direct question. Something about Halliwell.
– Sorry, sir?
– I said are you OK with Halliwell?
– Oh, yeah, says Ndekwe. – Yeah, absolutely.
– Good, says Gorman. – Take him, and whoever else you need. Frampton’s a safe pair of hands.
It takes Ndekwe half a second to realize the full import of these words. Gorman is putting him in charge of the case. His first job as a DS. He snaps the hatch shut on McKenzie, on the inklings of recognition, and focuses his mind back into the present.
– Yes, he says, yes, no problem.
– Good man, says Gorman. – Right, let’s get you up to speed. He fishes around in his pocket, pulls out a handkerchief, wipes the back of his thick pink neck. It’s too cosy for Gorman down here. He can feel damp patches forming on his shirt.
Detective Inspector Graham Gorman turns on his heel and strides away up the corridor. Ndekwe follows, quickening his pace until he falls back into step with his senior officer.
Ndekwe goes through the case notes in Gorman’s office as Halliwell inscribes a CD with permanent black marker, tongue fastened between his teeth in concentration. He pauses to examine his handiwork, frowns.
– Shepherdson, he says, is that with or without an ‘H’?
– With, says Ndekwe.
Halliwell looks up, exchanges a glance with Gorman and then taps his teeth thoughtfully before making the amendment.
Bollocks, thinks Ndekwe, he wasn’t asking me. He is acutely aware that he’s already irked the Detective Constable by asking him to transfer the interview tapes onto CD. It had taken Halliwell almost an hour to find the necessary equipment and although he hasn’t said as much, his annoyance is tangible.
Ndekwe concentrates his attention back on the notes. It doesn’t take him long to soak up the bare bones. From the information on his knee he learns that both of the suspects insist they had acted alone when putting the knife into Aaron Stewart. Two different motives are offered: Shepherdson claims that he had confronted Stewart over a debt. McKenzie maintains he stabbed Stewart in revenge for an alleged sexual assault on his sister. The body of Aaron Stewart had been discovered on the pavement by a young woman taking her daughter to buy an ice cream from their local newsagent. Stewart was already dead by the time the ambulance arrived. Although there were no bullets in Aaron Stewart, there were eight marks that forensics had identified as ricocheted bullet shots; three in the pavement and five holes in the wall of the chemist’s at the end of the block. Beyond that, there wasn’t much to go on; no other bodies, no murder weapon, no CCTV footage; two cameras, both of them long smashed, defunct; no eyewitnesses, no firm leads or local knowledge. It seemed that the usual collective sensory deprivation had descended upon the residents of the Crown Heights estate. Nobody had seen anything. Nobody had heard anything. Nobody was there. Ndekwe is not surprised. In his experience, nobody ever is. He flicks through the notes once more.
– And the guy in the newsagent’s? Mr … Mr Akhtar?
– Nothing, said Halliwell. – He’s pleading total ignorance, despite it all taking place less than ten feet away from his door. Says he heard the shots and shit himself, understandably. Hid in the back.
Ndekwe frowns, returns to the file. He reads it through again, twice.
Pregnant silence descends upon the room. Halliwell finishes his inscribing and puts down his marker. He leans back and folds his arms behind his chair, looks at his new Detective Sergeant with polite detachment. Gorman maintains a calm and easy posture, elbows propped on his desk, fingers templed, a study in professional patience. But Ndekwe can hear his foot begin to tap a tetchy rhythm beneath the desk.
Ndekwe shuffles the papers back into the file and lays it down on the floor at the leg of his chair. Gorman unlocks his fingers, leans forward. Halliwell unfolds himself from his slouch and sits up straight in his chair.
– Thoughts? snaps Gorman. – First impressions?
Jesus, thinks Ndekwe; I thought I’d already got the job. He clears his throat before he speaks.
– Well, one of them is obviously covering for the other. Question is, why?
– No, says, Gorman pointedly, the question is who.
– Amounts to the same thing, surely?
– McKenzie’s the collar, says Halliwell. He says this in the same way he might have said ‘rain is wet’ or ‘the capital of England is London’.
Ndekwe looks askance at his colleague.
– Yeah? What settles it for you?
That flicker of a glance between Halliwell and Gorman again.
– Come on, Pete, says Halliwell. – Can you really see an old age pensioner doing a bloke like Stewart? Yeah, maybe they were both there, but the smart money’s on McKenzie. Got to be.
Ndekwe doesn’t answer. He searches Gorman’s expression, but the DI’s face is set to neutral. He looks evenly across his desk, blank, detached, mildly expectant. Ndekwe picks up the file again and quickly scans the main points.
– Shepherdson says he put the knife down a drain, he observes.
Gorman nods patiently.
– We’re sending the search team down there this afternoon.
The search team? Ndekwe looks beyond Gorman and out of the window; a holiday brochure sky, boundless blue, not a scrap of cloud in sight. Sonia’s mum had said it had been roasting all last week, and every day the week before that. Like being back home, she’d said, that same clinging humidity, that same inexorable sun hanging uncovered long into evening. There had not been a drop of rain for days, certainly not since last Thursday.
– Why are we sending divers down? he asks.
Gorman frowns. – Who do you suggest we send down there, Detective Sergeant? The dog section?
– Well, if the fingertip didn’t turn it up …
Gorman bristles.
– I don’t know how they do things down in Lewisham, he says, but in this operation we don’t leave stones unturned. Belt and braces, Detective Sergeant; belt and braces.
Ndekwe has heard about Gorman, how he could turn nasty if his balloon of pomposity was pricked. The word among the rest of CID was that, despite his carefully cultivated laidback demeanour, the Detective Inspector could and would be a vindictive bastard if pushed. Ndekwe decides it best not to persevere. Instead, he turns to Halliwell.
– So, you interviewed McKenzie, yeah?
– Yeah.
– What do you make of him?
The DC shrugs. – Slightly better manners than our usual class of customer.
– What about this rape thing?
– Bullshit, in my opinion. I went to see the sister and the mother last night. The sister’s having none of it. Got quite uppity, in fact.
– Why would McKenzie say that, though?
Halliwell sighs, exasperated, as though explaining something to a child for the seventh time. – He’s going for mitigation.
– Hoping for some leniency, adds Gorman.
Ndekwe considers this. He is aware that impatience is building in the room, and he is equally aware that it is directed at him. He decides to ignore it for the time being. He also decides to ignore the attitude coming off Halliwell. Probably still smarting from his sudden demotion to second fiddle, Ndekwe reasons. Bound to be a bit defensive at first. And Gorman, he just wants to wrap the job up as soon as possible; that much is obvious.
The Detective Inspector looks pointedly at his watch and then at his computer screen, shakes the mouse on his desk, clicks several times, then starts typing.
– But he’s mentioning drugs, yeah? says Ndekwe. He slaps the sheaf of papers on his knee. – It says here that McKenzie claims Stewart had given him drugs to sell.
– He reckons Stewart gave him a kilo of weed to shift, says Halliwell. – He’s either spent the money or didn’t want to pay him, I reckon. One of the two. There seems to have been some bad blood between them. Power struggle, maybe.
– They had beef, definitely, states Gorman, not taking his eyes from his computer screen.
Ndekwe flips opens the file marked McKENZIE.
– But McKenzie’s been off the radar for what … nearly three years?
– Don’t mean he ain’t been bang at it, says Halliwell.
Gorman closes down his computer screen and tugs a finger beneath his shirt collar. He’s becoming tired of this. The sun is pressing on his back and the heavy lingering odour of Halliwell’s permanent marker is making his head swim.
– Look, he tells Ndekwe. – McKenzie has got gang connections. Proven gang connections.
Ndekwe knows he is being steered none too gently towards a ready-made conclusion. There are two minds already made up here, he thinks. He looks at the notes again and then at Gorman and Halliwell.
– You think they plotted all this up between them?
Gorman shrugs.
– Why would they do that? snorts Halliwell.
Ndekwe ignores him, asks the question again of Gorman. Gorman shakes his head.
– I very much doubt it. They’re not exactly the brightest. McKenzie certainly isn’t.
– So, you want me to prove that one of them is lying. Right?
– Right. That’s why we need to find this charmer. Gorman hands Ndekwe a file with a photo clipped to the front; a black youth with eyes so spectacularly crossed that he appears to be staring in two different directions at once. He looks like a cartoon character struck from the sky by a falling anvil. Ndekwe imagines a flock of tweeting birds encircling the boy’s head. He would look almost comical if he didn’t wear such a dementedly fierce scowl.
– Who’s this?
– Samuel Isaacs, says Halliwell. – Stewart’s second-in-command. Known to his friends and enemies as Bam Bam. A real piece of shit, this one.
– You know him?
– Been nicking him since he was twelve.
– Where does he fit in?
– He was there when it happened, according to McKenzie. He’ll tell us who was or wasn’t there.
Ndekwe hands back the photo.
– Why would he tell us anything?
– Because, says Halliwell, McKenzie killed his mate.
– Or so he claims, says Ndekwe.
The other two men look at him and say nothing.
Ndekwe can feel which way the wind is blowing. He looks outside at the brilliant sunshine bouncing between the glass-fronted buildings. Far too nice a day to be stuck inside, he thinks. He lays the file on Gorman’s desk, turns it round to face him.
– If McKenzie’s killed Aaron Stewart, says Ndekwe, I’ll charge him.
Gorman nods in firm approval.
– Good man, he says.
The three police officers rise to their feet.
It is Detective Sergeant Ndekwe’s first job in Hackney and he feels as though he has been given a birthday present that has already been unwrapped.
Ndekwe slides the disc marked SHEPHERDSON into the car’s CD player. He starts the engine, manoeuvres out of the station car park and onto the streets of East London. The vehicle has been sat in the full glare of the sun since early that morning and is already a mobile sauna, the trapped air cloying, the steering wheel and gearstick red hot beneath his hands.
The recording begins with a bump and whine of feedback before Detective Constable Tom Halliwell identifies himself and those present, followed by the time, date and location of the interview. The next voice is that of an older man. It is a voice stained with a lifetime of nicotine, late nights and liquor. He sounds like he’s been gargling broken glass.
… no problemo … start now? … okey dokey …
Name: John Henry Shepherdson … Date of Birth: twenty-fourth of April, nineteen forty-one … Address: 34b Conway Court, Bethnal Green, London E2 8UJ.
Halliwell winds his window down and flaps his hands up and down in front of his face.
– Jesus. Sweating like a fucking rapist.
He tugs his polo shirt away from his body, looks at Ndekwe, his buttoned up jacket and tightly knotted tie.
– Don’t know how you can wear a suit in weather like this.
Ndekwe doesn’t respond, just lowers the driver’s window a couple of inches, turns up the volume on the CD and punches the air-con button, waits for the icy rush.
… OK … well, for a kick-off, don’t believe anything the lad tells yer. It’ll all be a load of baloney. He’s a good lad, don’t get me wrong, but his head’s all over the shop right now. He hasn’t got a clue what he’s saying. I’ve been trying to talk some sense into him, but he won’t listen to a word I say …
Halliwell is talking about Portugal, how he went there once and thought the sea was too cold. How the beaches in Spain were better. He asks Ndekwe about the hotel and the food, what the clubs were like, but Ndekwe isn’t listening. He bumps the volume up another couple of notches and Halliwell eventually gets the message. The DC slips his sunglasses down from his forehead onto his nose, falls into a silent survey of the shop-fronts and pedestrians moving past.
The lad’s very upset. So owt he tells yer, it’ll all be a load of Jackanory. OK? You might as well let him go now and not have him waste any more of yer time. I’m the fella yer want – me. And I’ll give yer the full shebang, don’t you fucking worry about that …
Ndekwe divides his attention between the slow-moving traffic in front of him and the old man’s voice in the speaker at his knee. He has to concentrate closely to decipher his words. Ndekwe knows that Hull is up north, somewhere in Yorkshire, but this accent lacks the rolling smoothness he associates with that part of the country. The vowels are flat and elongated, almost Scandinavian sounding. And there are wheezing gasps for breath between every fourth or fifth sentence, followed by bouts of deep, liquid coughing. Ndekwe finds himself clearing his throat in sympathy. He reaches down for the bottle of water rolling around in the footwell, clamps it between his thighs and unscrews the top, takes a slug. It tastes like warm metal in his mouth.
… Right, here’s the script – I’m confessing to the killing last week on the Crown Heights. That lad who got stabbed outside the shops. I’ll sign a statement, owt yer like, no bother. You can close the book on that one, pal, cos it was me that did it …
– OK, yeah, we’ll come to that in a minute, Jack. But first I want you to tell me how you and Carlton ended up in Hull.
– Yeah, right … well, as you’ve probably guessed I’m not from London originally, Christ no … been down here for a good while now though … about … oh, donkey’s years now. Left Hull in … what, early seventies? Hang on, bear with me … Nineteen seventy-two, seventy-three, I think it was. Just after they started work on that bridge, whenever that was. Hardly ever go back these days. Once or twice, like. First time I went back was when Hull won the Challenge Cup in that replay at Leeds. Nineteen eighty-one, was it? The rugby, like. Met up with a few old faces and ended up going back on one of their coaches, pissed up, like. Darted in and out a couple of times more since then, to see family, mainly, but … no … not been back for a good while now … tell you what, though; it’s altered a bit up there. By hell it has. I was shocked when I saw how it had all changed. Inevitable really, I suppose. March of progress and all that. Shame, if you ask me, it used to have a bit of character, that city. Used to be a proper port. Looks like everywhere fucking else now. Same shops and all that carry on. I didn’t hardly recognize the city centre, the train station and all round there. Knocked the ABC down, the picture house … cinema, like. Got this big glass and metal shack thrown up now. And then there’s that daft bloody pointy affair sticking out from the pier. What’s that meant to be? They’ve tried to make it look like a ship, the bow of a ship, like. Strangest bloody ship I’ve ever clapped eyes on. A submarium, that’s what they call it. They just make these names up don’t they? A bloody submarium. What the hell’s that when it’s at home? Sounds like summat out of Captain Nemo … but aye, anyroad … I left Hull years ago.
Marriage went tits up; that was me main impetus. Pressure of being away all the time, I suppose. Most of the other women just got on with it, their men being away at sea, but my Dorrie was never any good at coping, God rest her soul. Very highly strung woman. Lived off her nerves, she did. First few years were all right, but then we moved out to that new estate … this was after they condemned half of Hessle Road; slum clearance, they called it. Unfit for habitation, they said. Cheeky bastards. Had a little palace down there we did. Mind you, I suppose it did need doing. I drove past to show me laddo where our old house was. It’s a bastard supermarket now. One of them super-duper king size jobs. Half the shops down Hessle Road are boarded up. It was sad to see, that, I must admit. Was always thriving down there. Progress, though, innit? Anyway … after the council turfed everyone out we moved out there, onto North Bransholme. I didn’t mind it, meself. I thought it was more than adequate. Plenty of space, plenty of green fields. Nice new house as well. Decent neighbours. I thought it was all right, me. Dorrie, she bloody hated it though. You’d think she’d been left stranded on the bloody moon the way she carried on. Too far away from her mam and all her sisters, that’s what it was … too far away from her coven of bloody witches. That’s when all the rows and the upset started, after we moved on there. We’d be at it the minute I dropped me bag in the hallway. Then you’d get her sister round and her mother and all the rest of it, the full fucking shebang. I just used to go straight back out to the alehouse and stay there until it was time to sail again. Bollocks to the lot of em … went on like that for months, it did. A good two years or so, anyroad. Then I come home from one trip and she’d just cleared off, handed the rent book back to the council and flogged all the furniture, the chairs, the tables, oven, fridge, the lot; lock stock and frigging barrel. Took the bain and moved back in with her mother. So that was that, twelve years of marriage; over, kaput, do not pass go do not collect two hundred pounds. I thought, balls to it, I aren’t coming back to an empty house every month. So I come off the trawlers and I left the city, left for good … Y’see, I’d been fishing since I left school, since I was fifteen and I just fancied a change, I suppose. There’s only so many times you can stare at a bloody iceberg before the novelty wears off. I wanted to widen me horizons, see what else the world had to offer …
– And that’s when you came down to London?
– Aye … Well no, not at first, like. First off, I pitched up with some pals in Great Yarmouth and joined the Merchant Navy. Marvellous life. Went all over the shop – Spain, Portugal, France, Africa, Far East, Caribbean. Everywhere. Loved it, me. Had a marvellous time. Fit as a butcher’s dog. Earning a fortune, I was. Mind you, I spent a bastard an’all. But that was how it was, you know? C’est la fucking vie, brother. Whatever will be will be. Can’t buy freedom, can yer? Anyway, bear with me, this is all leading up to … this is part of the entire script, this is … how I came to be down here … Hang on, let me think … aye, that was it … came ashore for good just after I turned forty. Had a chance of a pub in South London and me and me partner at the time just decided to go for it. Made a good fist of it an’all, to be fair. Happy times over there, south of the river. Greenwich, it was. Lovely place. Good time to be in London, an’all. Plenty of money sloshing about back then. The Queen Mary. Good little boozer that was. Had it running like clockwork, we did … but anyway, yeah, to answer yer question … that’s how I ended up here in London. Been down here for nigh on thirty year now. Never lost me accent, though. Never found a better one, I suppose …
– And you’ve known Carlton for how long?
– All right, here’s how it panned out. I’d been getting some decent tips off this owner, this Irish fella who had two or three nags. I’d done a few bits of graft for him here and there and we both shared an interest in the gee-gees so he started giving me the nod when there was summat going off. Nowt massive at first; just the odd little each way, mebbe a decent long shot every now and again. Enough to keep yer interested, like … so … anyway … I used to use this bookies down Bethnal Green Road and I got talking to this other fella in there, this fella called Paulo. Italian lad. He was always putting these big bets on, and not doing very well it has to be said. Show better, yer know? Always flashing his wad about. Used to back some right lemons he did. He’d slap a fortune down on some barmy long shot and then stand there moaning and groaning as it staggered in last. In my book there’s only one way to bet and that’s to back the winner. Wanna know how to double yer money in a bookies? Fold it in half and put the bastard back in yer pocket … Anyroad, I’d seen him in there but I’d never let on to him or owt like that. I usually mind me own business when I’m having a bet. I don’t like to get too pally with anyone cos it generally leads to a load of heartache. But he seemed a nice enough bloke this Paulo, a decent fella like … so I was in there one afternoon, filling me slip in and he’s stood right next door to me. He’s running his finger down the list for Newmarket and he catches me eye, asks me what I fancy. I was having a couple of bob on this two-year-old I’d been following. It was about four to one, five to one, summat like that. I wasn’t having a proper bet on it, just a few shekels each way like, but this Paulo was all like, right, here we go, this is it, I’m getting on it. I told him it wasn’t any inside info or owt like that, just one I’d had me eye on for a bit. But he decides to put his shirt on the bugger. Like I said, he was that type of punter. Impetuous. I’m more of the cautious type, me. I like to sit back and weigh it all up, properly study the form … I stick me daft little bet on and he ships out this big roll of notes and peels a slack handful off, sticks about a hundred quid on this two-year-old. I’m thinking, oh aye, fucking Rockefeller here. Seen loads of punters like that down the years, me. Flash Harrys with more money than brains. They might have one or two results but it always ends in tears. One week they’re slinging their money about, buying drinks for every bastard in the pub, the next week they’re looking for tab ends in the street. Gambling’s an illness with characters like that. Me, I like to cover all me options. Bet to win money. That’s the only way to approach the job. No sense in doing owt else, is there? I don’t mind piling it on if I’ve done me homework and the odds are right. But I don’t go for any of that gut instinct baloney … Well, bugger me, it romps home! Pissed it by about five lengths! I’m twenty quid to the good and he’s hauled in about five hundred quid, summat like that. Well, I would have been grateful for that, anyone would, but this Paulo … Christ, you’d think I’d given him the secret to eternal life. He’s slapping me on the back and giving me these big bear hugs and telling me I’m his pal for life and all this carry-on. You know what them Eyeties are like, how carried away they get … well, I got to bumping into him regular after that. He’d come in the bookies and greet me with open arms, like I was his long-lost brother. Giving it all the old pals act. My friend, Jack, he used to say, my friend, my friend! I knew his game; he was after some more winners. Thought I had the Midas touch he did. The truth of the matter was I didn’t have two farthings to scratch me arse with. That was the bloody joke of it …
… One day, though, I did have a tip, a proper one, off the Irishman. He had this horse. I think it was called Singing the Blues. Summat like that. Anyway, it had done nowt all season, but they’d been holding it back and holding it back, waiting for the right meet and this one afternoon the Irishman reckoned it was gonna be trying. So I puts Paulo onto it and it comes sailing in and he’s all chuffed to jolly bits again. Course, he’d put his usual king’s ransom on while I was pissing about with spare change. That’s when we got properly chatting and he asked me what I did and I told him I was looking for work. I’d been nightwatchman on this site up near Stratford, this big development for the Olympics. Anyway, there was a bit of bother and I got laid off. Nowt to do with me; some of the lads were thieving and the charge hand decided to make a clean sweep and get rid of all the suspects. Opportunity to get a load of his chinas on the job, no doubt. More fiddles down there than the London Philharmonic, I’m telling yer …
A fresh bout of hacking and coughing. Ndekwe pauses the CD.
– Doesn’t exactly cut to the chase, does he?
– I had a full afternoon of him yesterday. Halliwell grimaces. – He nearly sent me to fucking sleep.
– Sounds like he’s coming apart at the seams.
– Full of shit, I’m telling ya. Look, Sarge, do I have to sit through all this again? Halliwell stifles a yawn and stretches, pushes the full length of himself against the confines of the car. He collapses back into his seat, watches the passing streets. – Anything you want to know just ask, he says.
– I’ll fill you in.
– I’ll just keep it on low, says Ndekwe. He catches the incredulous look on Halliwell’s face in the passenger-side wing mirror.
– I just need to hear it for myself, all right?
Gorman hangs the INTERVIEW IN PROGRESS sign on the other side of his office door and settles down at his desk with a fresh mug of PG Tips and a packet of Rich Tea biscuits. Not as bad as HobNobs, he reasons, or his personal favourites, Gypsy Crèmes. At least a Rich Tea isn’t covered in chocolate, Gorman thinks. He allows himself three in quick succession and then reseals the packet, pushes it out of reach.
The doctor has told him to cut down on the sweet stuff after his last check-up, but Gorman has got up late this morning and skipped breakfast. He is in dire need of sustenance; he can feel his blood sugar levels plummeting. In stark contrast to his stress levels, which are rising more rapidly than Her Majesty’s prison population.
He takes another biscuit, dunks, dips, and considers Ndekwe.
Gorman has been careful not to broadcast the fact, but Ndekwe had not been his choice for the DS role. Gorman would have preferred Halliwell or possibly Frampton; both decent, hungry young coppers who know the manor like the back of their hand. But the final decision had come from above and Peter Ndekwe had been chosen. Ndekwe had come highly recommended and with a host of glowing commendations from his previous senior management team in Lewisham. And, from what Gorman has seen these last three months, Ndekwe seems to be a trustworthy and capable police officer. No denying that. More than capable, in fact; his track record south of the river was undeniably impressive. He’d been involved in some pretty decent results, it seemed. Hurrah for him, thinks Gorman. But there is something in Ndekwe’s demeanour that doesn’t quite sit right with him. Gorman isn’t sure what, exactly. Ndekwe isn’t insolent. He’s not a boat rocker or a back stabber or a shit stirrer or any of the other loathsome movers and shakers that Gorman has seen gradually infesting the job over the last twenty or so years. He doesn’t seem to have that naked ambition that a lot of young lads who fancy themselves seem to have. Ndekwe isn’t even particularly aggressive. Not that that would ever be a problem; Gorman is not averse to a healthy streak of aggression in the people beneath him; encourages it, even. Gorman is of the firm opinion that there’s no way an officer can function in the modern policing environment without a sizeable pair of hairy, swinging bollocks. Especially not in this part of London.
Gorman takes another biscuit, but declines to dunk. Instead, he snaps it thoughtfully in two. He can’t pin it down, what it is about his new Detective Sergeant that irks him so. But, he has to admit, Ndekwe gets right under his skin.
Gorman crunches up one half of the thin golden disc, slides the other half back into the packet and bundles the lot away into his drawer. He rises from his desk, takes his tea and looks down onto the street from his window. People, he thinks, all look the same when they’re beneath you.
Gorman likes to pride himself on being relaxed and open in his dealings with the officers under his command. He invites discussion and debate in their day-to-day operations; welcomes it, in fact. Unlike some other senior officers he could mention, Detective Inspector Gorman does not mind being challenged. As all the training courses and awareness seminars constantly stress, an atmosphere of open and frank discourse is conducive to good working practices and relations in the modern policing environment. Gorman agrees with that sentiment, agrees with it wholeheartedly.
But from what he has seen so far, Ndekwe always seems a bit too quick with his assertions. A bit too keen to stick his two bob’s worth in. Like that remark about the Search Team. Speaks before he bloody well thinks, that fella.
Gorman watches a group of school kids cross at a zebra crossing below. They shout and laugh and jostle, take too long in crossing and provoke a volley of honking from the waiting traffic, which elicits jeers in reply.
Self-confidence, thinks Gorman. All well and good in small doses, but Detective Sergeant Peter Ndekwe seems to be a little bit too convinced by his own hype. If he were a bar of chocolate he’d eat himself. Gorman allows himself a small chuckle at this observation, but reminds himself to never repeat it aloud. He is painfully aware that you can’t make a remark like that these days – however innocently it’s meant. Remarks like that can land you in a lot of bother. Certain types of people delight in taking things the wrong bloody way, quick to take offence where there’s none intended. Bloody bleeding heart liberals, thinks Gorman; add them to the long list of people who are slowly but surely fucking up the job.
At the end of the day, Gorman considers himself one of the old school. He is fifty-eight years old and has locked up more criminals than he cares to remember. His copybook is spotless and his retirement is on the near horizon. In Gorman’s book, that demands a certain amount of deference. He does not make a habit of pulling the chain of command, but when he does he expects his men to fall into line, to acknowledge the greater insight and experience of their commanding officer. You do not, repeat not, argue the toss with your elders and betters – no matter how much smoke you happen to have had blown up your arse by the top brass. The high potential development scheme is all well and good when it rewards genuine talent. What it should never be used for, thinks Gorman, is a weapon of positive discrimination, a way of boosting the representation of a particular sub-section of the force. Gorman holds very strong views in this respect. Ability and expertise are developed from the inside, not the outside. All the fast track progression in the world will not alter that fact.
But there it is, he thinks. Despite his own personal views, he has to work with the bloke, and that is the end of the matter. And Ndekwe cannot bollocks this one up, reasons Gorman, surely to Christ. Talk about an open goal. The statistics speak for themselves: the vast majority of young black men in London are killed by other young black men. And that’s not opinion, that’s fact. Gorman can access all the data he needs to back this up. And anyway, the McKenzie lad has coughed, loud and clear. All Ndekwe has to do is tidy up a few loose ends and, bingo, job done. And if that other barmy old bleeder wants to go down with him, well, Gorman is certain Her Majesty can always squeeze one more in.
Gorman looks down at the streets below; a constant flow of human sewage, he thinks.
Carlton McKenzie. Gorman tries to remember his body language and bearing from the interview room. Gorman prides himself on his ability to sniff out a liar. He can always tell when someone is spinning him a line. He encounters falsehood every day, on both sides of the law. Almost thirty-five years’ experience; Gorman can spot a lying bastard at a hundred paces, can smell them even, the salty stink of bullshit as it seeps out of their skin.