the family. Where else would he get a return like that? It's simple arithmetic, mate. Give me the back of an envelope and I'll show you the way it works. Big profits.
Zero risk.' He took another long pull from his glass. 'How come you don't know all this already? I thought you were on Cathy's squad?'
'I am.'
'Then what's this about?'
Winter had anticipated the question. For once, he'd barely touched his second pint.
'Does the word Tumbril mean anything to you?'
'Of course it does. Some half-arsed covert, isn't it? Run out of Major Crimes?'
'You tell me. All I hear is gossip.'
'That's all I hear but it sounds pretty fucking kosher to me. Problem is, the thing'll never work.'
'We're talking Bazza again?'
'Yeah. Right target maybe but these guys are five years too late. The time to nick Mackenzie was when he was down in the trenches, taking a risk or two. Nowadays you'll never get anywhere near the bloke. You should go down the command chain, look for the up-and-coming Bazzas.
They're the blokes to target.'
'And you think that would make a difference?'
'Not the slightest. You're the guys who've been chasing round after the Scouse kids, aren't you? It's supply and demand, mate, not rocket science. Take the local blokes off the plot and all you do is open the door to those nutters. It's like Iraq. Say we win this war. Say we kill Saddam. And say the country falls apart afterwards. What'll happen in twelve months time? Everyone will be running around looking for a strongman, someone to sort the Iraqis out, someone to impose a bit of order.'
'A Bazza?'
'Yeah, a Bazza. He had this city taped until the Scousers turned up.
Now it's a mess.'
'Is that Tumbril's fault? If they've been trying to take him down?'
'Haven't a clue, mate. Who knows, they might even get a result despite everything I say. But that's not going to solve the problem, is it?
Not when kids want to get off their heads all the time. I'm telling you, Paul, it's a dog's breakfast. Supply and demand. The magic of capitalism. Thank Christ I'm out soon.'
'So there's fuck-all point even trying?'
'There's fuck-all point thinking you're gonna solve anything. Trying's different. Trying's what we do. Problem with blokes like me is we've tried so bloody hard all our lives that conversations like this really begin to hurt.' He nodded, combative now, moist-eyed. 'Your age, Paul, it might be different. You're still just young enough to kid yourself you can make a difference.'
'I never thought that in my life.'
'You didn't? Then why do you bother?'
'Because I enjoy it.'
'Well that makes you very rare. Blokes like me, we're stuffed in the end because we really did believe we could make a difference, but then you wake up in the morning and you realise there's absolutely no fucking chance. Number one, the problem's too massive. Number two, we haven't got a clue what to do about it. We're like the military, always fighting the war before last.'
'So what's the answer?'
'You're asking me?'
'Yeah.'
'You jack it in.'
'And the rest of us?'
'No idea, mate.' He reached for his glass. 'And you know something else? I don't fucking care.'
Faraday took a taxi back to the Bargemaster's House. There was a message from Eadie waiting for him on the answer phone She sounded excited, wanted to share something with him, and for a moment he was tempted to ring back. Then he changed his mind and helped himself to a couple of bananas from the fruit bowl.
Outside, on the square of lawn between the house and the towpath, he demolished the second of the bananas before stepping through the squeaking gate and heading north along the path. The tide was high, lapping at the sea wall, and as the slap-slap of the halyards in the dinghy park began to recede, he could hear the honk of brent geese, way out on the harbour. Come May, he thought, these birds would have gone, returning to their breeding grounds in Siberia. By October, they'd be on the harbour again with their young, part of the slow pulse of the passing months that Faraday recognised more and more as a kind of solace. No matter how bad the job got, the geese would always be back.
A mile from the Bargemaster's House, the towpath ducked inland around the jetty where the dredgers discharged their sand and gravel, and Faraday paused in the windy darkness. He was now certain about the phrase of Mackenzie's that had lodged in his memory. He could even picture the moment when he'd first heard it not yesterday in Willard's Jaguar outside the hotel, but days earlier, at Tumbril HQ on Whale Island.
For Faraday's benefit, Prebble had devoted the best part of the morning to profiling Mackenzie. The young accountant had led the new DI step by step through the target's life, exploring the short cuts he'd taken, explaining the way he'd turned casual drug use into a multi-million-pound fortune, introducing the professional friends he'd picked up on the way. Then, towards the end of this impressive presentation, had come a sudden intervention from Imber. Something had angered him. Maybe the nerve of the man. Maybe the sheer scale of Mackenzie's success. Whatever the reason, he'd left no doubt that it was the business of Tumbril to strip Mackenzie of his assets. That way, Imber had said, he'd be back where he'd begun: a punchy little mush from the backstreets of Copnor.
Seconds later, thanks to Joyce, Faraday had been looking at a sheaf of wedding photos, Mackenzie's daughter surrounded by dozens of Pompey's finest. He could still remember the plump, moneyed faces beaming at the camera outside the cathedral but it was the earlier phrase that stuck in his mind. A punchy little mush from the backstreets of Copnor.
Faraday turned and began to make his way back towards the distant twinkle of the Bargemaster's House, wondering who in that room had passed it on. He could visualise the three faces around the table:
Prebble, Imber, Joyce. Why on earth would any of them betray Tumbril to Mackenzie?
Chapter twenty-three
MONDAY, 24 MARCH 2003, 09.35
Faraday was late getting to Kingston Crescent, delayed by an accident in Milton. Knocking at Willard's door, he stepped into the Det-Supt's office to find Brian Imber and Martin Prebble already sitting at the conference table. With Willard still at his desk, locked into a particularly difficult phone call, Joyce was busy in the adjacent kitchen.
'Sheriff?' She'd stolen up behind him.
Faraday made way for the tray of coffees and sat down at the table.
Imber wanted to know what was going on. All three of them had been denied entry at the Whale Island guardhouse. More alarming still, they'd had to surrender their security passes.
'All in good time, Brian.' Willard had joined them at last. He took the seat at the head of the table and winced when he tasted the coffee.
Joyce rarely used less than two spoonfuls of instant.
Imber was still looking at Faraday. Already Faraday could sense the suspicions shaping behind the tight smile. The collapse of Tumbril, he thought, had wreaked havoc. And one of the casualties might well be his friendship with this man.
Willard opened the meeting with a surprisingly chaotic account of the way they'd tried to sting Mackenzie. Faraday couldn't work out whether it was embarrassment or simple exhaustion, but it was only slowly that the real shape of the entrapment swam into focus. With Willard's preamble complete, it was Imber inevitably who sought
