We first got onto him through Anita. ‘I shouldn’t be telling you this,’ she goes with a giggle, ‘but there’s a client — head office insists we don’t call them customers any more — who’s a real puzzle to me. I call him my city break man. He’s always making short trips, mostly to Europe, and sometimes to America. When I say always, that’s an exaggeration. I mean about five times altogether. I shouldn’t complain. It’s good business for us. He pays cash, which is unusual, and the banknotes all pass the test. He buys some of the local currency from our foreign exchange, not a huge amount, about two hundred pounds worth, and he stays in middle bracket hotels for a couple of nights. He doesn’t want to be friendly with any of my staff. They’re company-trained to remember clients and greet them by name, but I can tell he doesn’t like that at all so I told them to ease up. I’ve never seen him smile. He’s usually wearing a dark suit and boring tie. He’s about forty, I would guess. We’re supposed to have a contact address and phone number and all he’s willing to give is a box number and a mobile number.’
‘He must have given you a name.’
She shrugs and smiles. ‘Smith. John Smith. That’s the name we use for the bookings. I don’t believe it.’
Vicky makes one of her solemn remarks. ‘There are plenty of John Smiths. On the law of averages, he’s more likely to be John Smith than William Shakespeare or Albert Einstein. Perhaps it’s true.’
‘Darling, it’s precisely because there are so many that he chose it.’
‘Doesn’t it need to match his passport?’
‘It’s not difficult getting a false passport.’
Vicky nods. ‘He’s into something dodgy, that’s for sure.’
I’m like, ‘Drugs?’
Anita goes, ‘I hope not. My company wouldn’t want to get involved with anything like that.’
And Vicky is like, ‘Two hundred quid wouldn’t buy much hard stuff. It’s not even worth the trip.’
How does she know about such things? I wonder.
‘Trafficking?’
‘He’s not the sort. The guys who go in for that are sexy foreign brutes, and they’re not going to use a travel agency.’
‘A spy? Using an agency would be a good cover.’
Anita pipes up, ‘You girls are getting carried away and I haven’t told you the strangest bit. At lunchtime when it’s nice I sometimes buy a sandwich and go for a walk in the park. Just across the street from the sandwich shop is the job centre and a couple of weeks ago I saw some guy in tattered old jeans and a hoodie coming out of there obviously having just collected his social and — get this darlings — it was city break man. I swear it was him. I know the walk. Two days later he’s in my shop wearing his suit and tie and booking two nights in Rome and buying his two hundred pounds worth of Euros. Unemployed, funded by the taxpayer, and off on another trip.’
Vicky tut-tuts at such behaviour. ‘He’s a benefits cheat.’
And I’m like, ‘Are you sure it was him, Anita? Hundred per cent?’
‘Positive.’
‘Does he know you saw him?’
‘He wouldn’t have used my agency again if he did. The way I see it, cheating the taxpayer is one thing, and someone ought to report him, but all these trips abroad make me think he’s up to something bigger.’
‘Such as what?’
‘I don’t know, but I sure as hell want to find out.’
Then I hear myself saying, ‘The three of us ought to be up to it.’
‘Finding out, you mean?’
‘Combining our skills and talents to discover the truth.’
‘The three snoops.’
‘Please,’ I say. ‘Sleuths.’
Suddenly it sounds like an adventure. We’ve been friends up to now, giggly, on the same wave-length, whiling away our spare time, but aimless. This is something more, a project, a bonding exercise. I can tell we all fancy it.
Vicky claps her hands. ‘I’ve got it. Next time he books a trip, you can book places for all of us to tail him and find out what he does.’
‘Too expensive,’ Anita says. ‘The company runs a tight ship.’
‘Send one of us, then: Ishtar.’
And I’m, ‘What do you take me for? I can’t go jetting off to foreign places like James Bond. I’ve got my job to do, delivering flowers.’
Anita shies away, too. ‘And I couldn’t fund it. That’s not on. But I tell you what, Ish. We could do some sleuthing at a local level. Next time he comes in, why don’t I give you a call and get you to follow him in your van, see where he goes, and at least we’ll find out where he lives.’
‘How would that help?’ I’m backtracking fast, wishing I hadn’t suggested this sleuthing game.
‘We’d get to know more about him, wouldn’t we?’
‘Going to the police might be a better idea.’
So Anita does some backtracking of her own. ‘And you know what they’ll say? It’s all suspicion so far. Besides, I don’t want it known that I’m snitching on my own customers.’
I’m happy to agree. ‘You’d lose most of your business. Anyone who can afford a foreign holiday these days must be on the take.’
‘Oh, come on.’
We bang on for some time like this, but deep down I’m hooked. I want to find out what city break man’s game is. After we’ve caught him out, who knows, we could go on to bigger things and get on the trail of the Somerset Sniper. Just joking.
The truth is we’re all turned on by this adventure. Vicky’s eyes are shining. Anita is practically purring. The three snoops. Sorry, sleuths. And guess who’s standing by, waiting for that call from the travel agency?
I’ll report what happens in my next blog — if I’m not dead meat already.
8
Jack Gull said without a scrap of sympathy, ‘Shouldn’t you be at home?’
Diamond widened his eyes. ‘With one of our guys dead and the other fighting for life? I’ll see the day out.’
They were back in Manvers Street police station in the incident room freshly created by DI John Leaman as office manager. Give Leaman a job and he delivered. Display boards were in place with photos from the scene and details of principal witnesses, the morning’s statements already on computer, civilian support staff installed as receiver, indexer, action allocator and statement readers.
Calls were coming in steadily from the public. The standard request for information had already been broadcast. A team of trained staff were noting everything. Ninety per cent of what came in would be of no use, but every snippet of information had to be recorded and prioritised. Later Diamond would make a personal TV appeal for assistance.
Gull was forced to admit that everything was in place. His only grudging comment — in case his own empire should be undermined — was that this had to be a temporary arrangement, which prompted Diamond to say that if an incident room ever got to be permanent they’d better resign, all of them.
Photos of Harry Tasker’s corpse and the wound to Ken Lockton’s head dominated one end of the room, a reproach to everyone who entered. On another board were grim close-ups of the two previous victims of the sniper. In each case shots to the head had caused death.
Leaving Gull to check the displays, Diamond went across to Leaman and asked what news there was from the hospital.
‘No change, guv. He’s in a coma and they say it could be for weeks.’
‘Are his people with him?’
‘His wife and son.’
‘Someone is with them, I hope.’
