Minimum.
Faraday retreated to the kitchen, hearing the gurgle of water overhead as J-J emptied the bath. Moments later, came the clatter of footsteps on the stairs and a moment's pause. Then J-J was at the kitchen door.
When he got really angry, his mouth tightened to a thin line. Just now, it was practically invisible.
He wanted know why Faraday had turned the TV off.
'Tea?' Faraday signed peaceably.
'I put it on specially. We need the pictures.'
'I'm sure you do. Would you like more tea?'
'You turned it off. Deliberately.'
'Why would I do that?'
'Because you don't care.'
'Really?' Faraday's amused smile drove J-J back into the lounge. He turned the television back on, this time with the sound up. When he swung round to retrieve the towel he'd thrown onto the sofa, he found his father propped against the open kitchen door, watching him.
'The VHS was still recording,' Faraday pointed out. 'I left that on.'
J-J faltered for a second, too angry to make room in his head for the obvious conclusion. Only the TV had been switched off. As far as his precious pictures had been concerned, he'd lost nothing. At length, dismissing the offer of tea, he told his father he might have to go to London for a while. Eadie had found a place where he could carry on cutting the war footage. Better Soho, he signed, than Hampshire Terrace.
Faraday shrugged. So be it. J-J was eyeing the laundry on the kitchen floor. His father blocked the path to the washing machine.
'How long do you think this thing'll last?' Faraday nodded towards the television.
'Months. The Iraqis are fighting back.'
'And you?'
'I'll be doing what I can.' He made a scissors motion with his fingers.
'Editing pictures?'
'Of course.'
'Fine.' Faraday patted him on the shoulder. 'Just remember you're on police bail. OK? I know it's boring but you'd be amazed how angry we can get if you don't turn up.'
Paul Winter treated himself to another splash of aftershave before he got out of the Subaru. He'd checked by phone with the Custody Sergeant before driving down to Central police station. Leggat would be honking.
Winter was sharing the interview with Danny French, the DC who'd accompanied him on the search of Leggat's house. Winter found him in the tiny kitchen, wrestling the lid from a catering-sized tin of Nescafe. His missus was giving him serious grief about Sunday lunch at his mother-in-law's place in Gosport. The old bat had bought a shoulder of pork specially. With luck, the interviews might stretch the whole day.
'Coffee?'
'Black.' Winter checked his watch. 'Two sugars.'
'How's that boy Suttle?'
'Dunno, mate. I'll be finding out later.'
'Beaten up, wasn't he? Gunwharf?'
'Yeah. You know the thing about kids these days?' Winter reached for the coffee. 'Never bloody listen.'
The duty solicitor turned out to be a paralegal from one of the city's biggest partnerships. She was a local girl, no university degree but an implacable determination to battle her way through to full qualification. Winter had come across her a number of times before and had been impressed.
She was waiting in the corridor beside the new AFIS fingerprint terminal: neat charcoal-grey suit, nice legs, hint of a tan from somewhere exotic. Leggat was already in one of the interview rooms, waiting for them all to appear.
'You know he's in the shit, don't you? Seven ounces is practically full flag. We're not talking personal here.'
'My client '
'Yeah, but seriously.'
'I know, Mr. Winter, and so does he.' She smiled. 'Seriously.'
'OK.' Winter shrugged, then shot French a look. 'You might be in luck, Danny.'
'Come again?'
'That lunch.'
They all went into the interview room. Leggat was sitting at the table, facing the door. Already he'd adopted the resigned defensiveness body slouched, eyes blank that badges a man for prison.
'Morning.' Winter pulled back a chair and sat down. 'Lovely day out there.'
Leggat didn't move, didn't answer. French loaded the video and audio recorders before Winter helped himself to the PACE cue card and went through the preliminaries. Then, with a glance at French, he leaned forward. On the training courses, this phase of the interview was termed 'open account', offering the interviewee the chance to establish exactly what had happened. Fat chance.
'Tell us about those lovely little engines, Barry. Pretend we know nothing.'
Leggat was still gazing into the middle distance. His eyes were bloodshot and he needed a shave.
'Car boot,' he mumbled at last. 'Couple of Sundays ago.'
'Which car boot?' Winter didn't bother to hide his disbelief.
'Don't really remember. Could have been Havant. Wecock Farm. Pompey.
Clarence Field. I goes to 'em all.'
'I bet. So how much did you pay for them?'
'Fiver each. He wanted a tenner but I wasn't having it.'
'Who's 'he'?'
'Bloke I got 'em off.'
'Does he have a name?'
'Expect so. Everyone's got a name, ain't they?'
'But you can't remember?'
'Never asked.'
'What did he look like?'
'Nothing at all, really. Ordinary-looking, know what I mean?'
'Age?'
'Hard to tell. Getting on? Forty? Dunno.'
'What else was he selling?'
'Stuff. Rubbish, most of it.'
'You'd know him again?'
'Course.'
'But you haven't seen him since, this bloke? Whoever he might be?
Whatever else he might have been selling? Wherever the car boot was?
Is that fair? Am I on the right lines?'
'Yeah.' Leggat yawned. 'Spot on.'
Winter leaned back while French came at Leggat from a different angle.
A seizure of this size, he warned, they'd check every car boot in the area, take photos of the engines with them, throw serious resources at checking out Leggat's alibi. If it turned out he was lying, he might be giving himself some serious problems a month or two down the road.
'Is that right?' Leggat didn't appear to be bothered.
'Yeah.' French nodded. 'Like a couple of years over the tariff. Not that you're going to be short of bird.'
'Listen, Barry.' It was Winter again. 'Let's just pretend for a moment that we buy the car boot. It went the way you said it went. You spotted the engines, bought them, took them home. Then what?'
'I puts them in the wardrobe.'
'And you left them there?'
'Yeah. I looks at them from time to time, you know, like you do.'
