Joseph's College.
This came as news to Faraday. St. Joe's was a Catholic boarding school in Southsea, high academic standards plus a dose or two of discipline from the Christian Brothers.
'His father could afford the fees?'
'No way. The boy won a scholarship. I told you just now, the man's bright. Wayward, but bright.'
Bazza, he said, had hated the school. For one thing, they played rugby when he was mad about football. For another, he couldn't stand wearing the same uniform as all those poncy rich kids. By the age of fourteen he'd been suspended twice, once for persistent smoking, and again for running a rudimentary protection racket, extorting everything from Bounty bars to Clash albums. After a monumental row with his disappointed father, he chucked in the towel at St. Joe's and joined his Copnor mates at the local Isambard Brunei comprehensive. Three scraped passes at GCSE provoked another family row, and at the age of sixteen he left home to doss down with his elder brother Mark, who was by now making a living as a painter and decorator.
'Bazza went in with him?'
'Far from it. He's never fancied physical labour. Not then, not now.
He joined an estate agency, got himself a junior selling job, mainly on the phone.'
From his desk in the estate agency, Bazza watched the early '80s property boom gathering speed. Weekends, he partied hard, swallowed bucket-loads of whatever was available, and re-established his social roots. What Prebble termed a leisure shag with a high school dropout called Marie resulted in a baby, Esme, but Bazza never took much interest. By this time he was playing serious football, turning out for a Pompey League Sunday side called Blue Army. The 'S3/'84 season took them to the top of the league, earning a fearsome reputation for on-and off- pitch violence on the way.
'What about the 6.57?'
'He was in it from the start.' Prebble glanced at Imber. 'Am I right?'
'Spot on.' Imber nodded. 'The 6.57 was pub-based to begin with, half a dozen groups coming together for the away games. There was no real leadership, not at the start. Bazza and his mates drank at a Milton pub, the Duck and Feathers. They went along for the laugh, just like the rest of them, and the thing just got bigger and bigger.'
By the late '80s, with Pompey briefly elevated to the old top-flight First Division, the sheer anarchy that fuelled football violence had opened Bazza's eyes to the possibilities of a life of crime. By now he'd abandoned the estate agency after a senior partner had caught him in bed with his second wife, but Bazza's years selling property had taught him a great deal about the commercial logic of toshing and selling on. What he needed was ready cash to buy crap properties and, on away days to the big London clubs, he found it.
'89' Prebble was enjoying himself. 'The summer of love.'
The fighting briefly stopped. Bazza began to import ecstasy tablets into the city by the thousand. After ecstasy came cocaine, an uglier drug but a much bigger mark-up. The violence kicked off again but Bazza was moving on. First a terraced house in Fratton. Then three more in an adjoining street. Then an old bed-and-breakfast ruin in central Southsea. All on drugs money and a string of mortgage frauds.
'We've got a few bits and pieces in there.' Prebble nodded towards Joyce's precious archive. 'His accounts were practically non-existent and he cut every conceivable corner but house inflation had set the market on fire and he knew he couldn't lose. It was money for nothing.
Most of the building materials were thieved and he part-paid the blokes in cocaine.'
By now, his elder brother Mark had tired of Pompey. Mad about sailing, he'd gone to the West Indies to seek his fortune as crew on charter yachts.
'Is that important?' Faraday couldn't see the point.
'It will be.' Prebble nodded. 'Just remember the name.'
Back in Portsmouth, and by now in his mid twenties, Bazza had decided to get himself organised. Cannier and more ambitious by the year, he fell in with a young accountant. The new partner sorted out his chaotic paperwork, bought an off-the-shelf company, and together they set about plotting a route to the serious money.
'The company's called Bellux Limited. It was basically a device to warehouse future developments.'
'Still exists?'
'Absolutely.'
'And the accountant?'
'They fell out a couple of years back. No one knows quite why, but Bazza got himself a replacement within days. Woman called Amanda Gregory. Shit hot.'
There was a rustle of documentation, and seconds later a surveillance photograph appeared at Faraday's elbow, courtesy of Joyce.
'Does her shopping every Friday lunchtime, sheriff. Obliged us with this.'
Faraday studied the photograph. Amanda Gregory had been snapped beside a series 7 BMW, loading groceries into the open boot. She was a small, neat woman with a cap of black hair. The carefully cut two-piece suit had a Save the Children sticky on one lapel. Faraday could see the girl with the tin and the clipboard behind her, picketing the car-park entrance to Waitrose.
The smile that ghosted across Faraday's face spoke for itself.
'You're right,' Prebble said. 'This woman could be pulling mega-bucks from any of the biggies, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Ernst amp;c Young, you name it. Instead, she chooses to work for Bazza. We're talking Mr.
Respectable here. That's just how far the guy's come.'
'And how long has all this taken?' Faraday tapped the photo.
'A decade. Max.'
Back in the early '90s, he said, Mackenzie was still an apprentice millionaire. In those days, according to Imber, the Pompey drug scene was dominated by a fellow 6.57, a scary hooligan called Marty Harrison.
Bazza had known him for years and they had no problem fencing off separate chunks of the exploding drugs biz for their individual benefits. While Harrison specialised in amphetamine and happy pills for the weekend clubbers, Bazza concentrated on cocaine. Long term, it turned out to be a shrewd decision but at the time it was a nightmare.
'Why?'
'There was too much cash around. As fast as the accountant washed the stuff, Bazza would turn up with another bucket-load. One time he and his mates took a truck over to Cherbourg, bought eight grands' worth of booze for resale, and drank half of it on the way back. We've got the press cuttings if you want to see them. Riot and affray charges and letters to the local paper. That was a bit of a watershed. Bazza couldn't play the wild man any more. Not if he wanted to make it.'
Bazza's accountant, he said, had drawn a line in the sand. From now on, they had to clean up their act. One solution was more property: houses, a run-down nursing home off the se afront plus the Cranes-water house featured on the wall. Another was a boarded-up Southsea shop the accountant had spotted for sale. As a fashion outlet it had died on its feet. Bazza bought the lease for a song, put in the builders, and turned the place into a stylish cafe-bar.
'The Cafe Blanc' Faraday had driven past it a million times. Sleek chrome interior, London cappuccino at Pompey prices. 'Place is always packed.'
'Exactly. From the accountant's point of view it was perfect. He could wash money straight through the till. Plus it suited Bazza's love life.'
By now, he explained, he was back on terms with Marie. His daughter Esme had turned into an attractive twelve-year-old and, after a couple of months' negotiation, Marie agreed to join him in the Craneswater mansion. A month later, they flew to Hawaii and got married. One of Bazza's wedding presents to Marie was a Mercedes coupe, bought from a Waterlooville car dealer called Mike Valentine. The other was the Cafe Blanc. The business, Prebble said, was hers.
'And now?'
'Still is. Along with half a dozen others.'
'They're still together?'
'So it seems.'
There was a silence. Faraday could hear Joyce busying herself with the percolator. The smell of fresh coffee
