took a lot of trouble getting it ready.’
I sighed, concerned by what I was hearing. You think that when you’ve nicked someone and built a decent case against them, then that’s pretty much that. But in reality all we had against Vamen was the testimony of Jack Merriweather and those handful of witnesses prepared to follow his example and point their fingers at him for past crimes. If Merriweather was silenced, then so would they be, you could bank on it. And without them there was nothing like enough evidence to secure a conviction.
‘So, he’s not got any second thoughts about testifying?’
‘He’s doing fine now we’ve got him out of Belmarsh and into a nice little pad in the country. He’s moaning that he wants every creature comfort going, and even Cheryl to come and play happy families, but he’s holding up, and that’s the main thing. This is classified information, though, John. Only a handful of people know about it, and even fewer are aware of the location. Don’t mention any of it to anyone. Not even Tina.’
‘I won’t. I promise.’
A plump girl carrying two plates of steaming food came out from behind the bar and shouted out our number. I lifted my hand to acknowledge her and she came over and dumped them down in front of us.
We ate largely in silence, both of us hungry, but as I finished, a thought suddenly struck me. ‘Do you think what’s happening with Merriweather’s got anything to do with our case?’ I pushed my empty plate to one side. ‘I mean, there’s what Tina found out about Stegs Jenner and his possible involvement with the Holtzes. If he was somehow involved in the leaking of the Heathrow op. .’
Malik didn’t look convinced. ‘There’s no evidence against Jenner, nothing at all, and he seems to be co- operating fully. Plus, as Flanagan points out, there is the problem of motive.’
I nodded slowly, thinking. I’d been doing a lot of thinking these past few days. ‘But there could be a motive if we assume that Stegs is still working for the Holtzes, or at least for Neil Vamen.’
Malik’s eyes narrowed. ‘Explain.’
‘Well, say, Stegs uses O’Brien to set up the robbery at the airport hotel, knowing full well the robbers’ll get caught, thus implicating their boss, Nicholas Tyndall, and causing him no end of trouble — that would be a very nice outcome for Neil Vamen, wouldn’t it? A potentially very serious rival in the shit, which is effectively what’s happened, and if he can get rid of Merriweather at the same time, a chance to be back out on the streets and in complete charge of his old manor.’
Malik thought about it for a few moments, taking the odd pensive sip of his orange juice, which seemed to be lasting an unfeasibly long time. ‘Part of it fits, but there are still unanswered questions,’ he said eventually. ‘Such as, why would Stegs put himself in such a dangerous position, which he undoubtedly did, for someone like Vamen? Also, we’re assuming that Vamen’s positive he’s going to get out of jail, otherwise why would he bother trying to set up Tyndall? And why put his old friends, the Colombians, out of business?’
I finished my pint and placed the glass carefully on the table. ‘Something’s going down, though, Asif. I’m sure of it.’
19
Fiona Ragdale was pale and skinny, with bottle-blonde hair showing dark roots. She looked older than the twenty-three years she claimed to be, and tired too, but then she did have a hyperactive three-year-old boy jumping all over her. ‘Leave it, Jack,’ she said, swatting him away with an arm that was dotted with bruises. ‘I’m talking to these men. Go and play with your train set.’
She turned back to us as Jack ran off towards the other side of the room. ‘I ain’t seen him since that night,’ she said. ‘And I hope I never see him again. Not after what he did to us.’
We were sitting opposite her in the lounge of her cramped tenth-floor flat on the Warwick estate, a collection of monolithic 1960s council-owned tower blocks overlooking the A40 flyover, just west of Paddington station. Malik and I were hunched together on the tiny semi-collapsed sofa, trying desperately to stay upright, while she was hunched forward in a matching chair that looked like it had been savaged by a dog. The room itself was tidy but cold, and it badly needed a new coat of paint. The hole in the ceiling where Panner had fired the all-important round was still clearly visible, surrounded by long spider’s-web cracks in the plaster.
Malik made a manful attempt to lean forward in his rapidly sinking seat. ‘He hasn’t attempted to make contact at all since?’
She shook her head. ‘No. I thought he would. Usually when he threatens something, he comes back to finish it off. Maybe he reckoned he’d gone too far, what with the gun an’ all.’
‘Gun!’ shouted Jack happily, coming back over and standing in front of Malik and me. ‘Gun! Gun! Gun!’ I gave him a brief smile and he continued his running round the room. I thought it was tough on the little kid, being cooped up high above the ground when he should have been outside playing.
‘I’m not working the streets no more, all that stuff’s behind me. And I’m clean too. I ain’t touched a thing since January.’ She looked us both in the eye as she said this, and there was an unmistakable pride in her voice. ‘That’s why he was so pissed off with me.’
‘You’re doing the right thing,’ I told her, hoping she’d be able to keep it up.
Malik pulled the e-fit of our suspect from his jacket and passed it over to her. ‘Can you tell us if Mr Panner looks anything like this?’
She checked the picture out for a couple of seconds, then her face lit up with a surprisingly pleasant smile. ‘Nah, it don’t look nothing like him. This bloke might not be real but he’s a lot better looking. And his hair’s shorter.’
I asked her if she was sure.
‘Ain’t you got a photo of Pretty Boy?’
‘Who?’
‘Panner. That’s his street name. Pretty Boy. I think someone was taking the piss.’
‘I think you’re right. Yes, I have seen a photo of him. I was just double-checking.’
It had been the answer we’d been anticipating. On the way over here we’d checked with the incident room to see if Panner’s name appeared on the list of Desmarches suit owners, and it hadn’t. It still wasn’t conclusive proof that Panner and our killer weren’t one and the same, but it was getting close to it.
Malik took back the e-fit, and now it was his turn to speak again. ‘You said just now that you thought he might have gone too far by coming here and firing a gun. Was that the first time you’d ever seen him with a firearm, then?’
She gave a barely perceptible nod. ‘Yeah, it was.’
‘But he’d hit you before?’
‘Oh yeah,’ she said matter-of-factly, as if this was par for the course in her life. ‘He used to knock me about quite a lot, especially if I wasn’t making enough money for him, or I was threatening to quit. But this was different.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘No, not like that. It’s just that normally he works himself up before he does it. You know, shouts about, smashes a couple of things. But this time he was only in here two minutes before he pulled the gun. He waved it in my face, then fired it into the ceiling.’ She shuddered. ‘I couldn’t believe it. And in front of Jack as well, poor kid. Scared him shitless. He was crying all night.’
‘What happened at that point?’ asked Malik. ‘After he’d fired the gun.’
‘Well, that was it. He told me not to say anything to anyone about what he’d just done, then he turned round and walked out. Didn’t say another word. It was weird.’
Malik and I glanced at each other. She was right. It was weird, and just more confirmation that Panner wasn’t our man. He was just too much of an amateur. But then, if he wasn’t, who the hell was?
‘He didn’t say anything about you going back to work for him, then?’ I asked.
Jack was shouting again — something unintelligible but loud, in a futile bid to get attention — and I had to repeat the question. She told him to be quiet, then turned back to me.
‘He did when he first came in, yeah. Told me that he was sick of me pissing him about, but he didn’t go on about it like he normally did.’
