‘It’s on me.’
Her eyes widened.
The music was definitely more folksy-rootsy than hip-hop and any tall black guy should have been obvious and was not, but Paul Gilbert was able to pick his pint of real ale from an abundant selection. The Bell’s large interior had a well-used feel to it. A whiff of malt, a live band playing, a congenial atmosphere. The somewhat hippy clientele averaged fifteen years older than the crowd at the Porter.
Ingeborg had a spritzer and a packet of crisps. They worked their way through the crush to a games room at the back with table football and darts, far enough from the music to make conversation possible.
‘We won’t have much to report to the guv’nor,’ Gilbert said.
‘He can’t say we didn’t try.’
‘Did we try enough?’
She said with a sharp note of disfavour, ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Let’s be honest, Inge. Your heart isn’t in it, and neither is mine.’
She was silent for a while, then shed any pretence at irritation. ‘True. I’ve never felt like this about a case before. I want the sniper off the streets, of course I do. I guess I want it on my terms, without rubbishing a dead colleague.’
‘Leaving everyone’s reputation okay?’
‘Except the sniper’s.’
‘Him? He’s scum. Goes without saying.’
‘Am I asking too much?’ she said. ‘When Harry was murdered, I was shocked, of course, same as everyone. I looked at the papers next day, and thought there’s something different here, the way it’s being reported. For once the Old Bill are getting a good press. Outraged headlines that someone should kill a policeman. None of the flak we’ve got used to about clear-up rates and never being on the spot when you’re needed and turning a blind eye to rampaging kids. They want us to catch this creep before he shoots another cop. But here at the coalface it doesn’t feel like that. First the boss talks about our own people coming under suspicion and then he’s suggesting Harry was bent. How’s that going to play with the public if it ever gets out?’
‘If it’s true,’ Gilbert said. ‘Personally, I don’t see it.’
‘The guv’nor does, and he’s no mug.’
‘Do you think he knows something he isn’t telling us?’
She shook her head. ‘He plays it straight. There’d be no point in keeping back information. But he’s troubled. I can read him.’
‘I wish I could.’ He stared into the foam still settling in his glass. ‘Was it his wife being murdered that turned him so grouchy? It couldn’t have helped.’
‘The truth is, he was like it before. He takes it personally when a case is difficult and he doesn’t know how much it shows. When I was a crime reporter, I used to watch him do press conferences. The press boys baited him for sport. They liked to see him lose his rag. A big laugh, especially as they didn’t have to work with him. There was a DI called Julie Hargreaves who was brilliant at deflecting questions. He relied on her a lot and I think she put up with a lot. Even she got to the end of her tether and put in for a transfer. He was gobsmacked.’
‘Did she leave?’
‘Left Bath, yes.’
‘Is she still serving?’
Ingeborg nodded. ‘She did very well career-wise, ending up at headquarters. She’s a DCI now. She was one of the interviewers when I applied for the job here. I remember her telling me it wouldn’t be a bed of roses and by God she was right. But she also said I was lucky to be joining this team because it was the best-led in the county.’
‘She meant him?’
Ingeborg nodded. ‘And she was right about that, too. Watch him with Jack Gull, who’s supposed to be the class act. There’s no comparison.’
Gilbert yawned. ‘I guess we’d better drink up and move on. Is it worth talking to any of this lot?’
‘Didn’t you ask the barman about Anderson?’
He blushed. ‘Sorry. I was deciding which ale I wanted. Took all my concentration.’
‘You could return the glasses and see if he’s heard of him.’
He drained his and wiped his lips. ‘That was something else. Okay, I’ll give it a shot.’
Outside in Walcot Street a few minutes later, he was buoyant. ‘Anderson has a regular steak dinner in the Hudson Bar and Grill up the street. This way.’
‘I know the Hudson,’ Ingeborg said, standing her ground. ‘It’s not cheap. A steak there sets you back twenty to thirty pounds.’
‘So?’
‘Anderson obviously eats well.’
‘He’s not the only one, by the sound of it.’
She laughed. ‘I don’t pay for steak dinners. I was taken there a couple of times. I knew it better as the Hat before it went upmarket. The Hat and Feather. A great pub with a DJ called Dave who was a local legend, the oldest in the biz. The trouble was that the brewers kept putting up the rent, so the pub was always changing hands. And it was a listed building even older than the Bell. At one stage there was a danger of the floor upstairs collapsing. Seeing as the stage was up there and that was where the dancing went on, it was a real headache for the publican.’
Ingeborg’s memories of wilder times weren’t going to help their quest. She seemed to want to linger outside the Bell. ‘Let’s go find him, then,’ Gilbert said.
‘Where?’
‘The Hudson.’
‘I wouldn’t bother,’ she said. ‘It’ll be closed. It’s after 1 A.M.’
He swore. He almost stamped his foot. ‘I don’t get it.’
‘I think I do. Did you say you were police?’
‘Well, yes.’
‘You were being sent on a wild goose chase.’
‘Bloody hell. So where do we go now?’ Gilbert asked.
‘Isn’t that obvious?’
‘Not to me.’
‘Wait and see.’ She took a step back into the shadow of the building next door and tugged at Gilbert’s arm for him to do the same.
They didn’t have long to wait. A tall black man in a suit stepped out of the Bell and into the street speaking into a mobile phone, looked to right and left and waited at the kerb.
‘I didn’t see him in there,’ Gilbert said, in awe of Ingeborg’s foresight.
Immediately the sound of a car with speakers on full volume filled Walcot Street. A white Lexus came from nowhere and halted in the centre of the road. The speed of all this was worthy of a bank robbery except that robbers don’t usually have Black Eyed Peas going at full belt. The nearside door was open and the man was in the act of getting in.
‘Stop him,’ Ingeborg said.
Gilbert didn’t need telling. He had already sprinted forward. Just before the door slammed shut, he dove for the man’s arm and got a grip. The stitching on the sleeve gave way and a wedge of white was revealed at the shoulder. Gilbert’s hand came within a microsecond of being crushed in the door.
The boom of the music stopped and the car window slid down. Gilbert was on his knees in the road.
The man said from inside the car, ‘That will cost you. That was a Savile Row suit.’
Ingeborg caught up with Gilbert. ‘Are you okay?’
‘No problem,’ he said.
‘Is
‘Are you Anderson Jakes?’ she said.
‘Sure. And you’re the fuzz. It will still cost you.’
‘DCs Smith and Gilbert. We’d like a few words. Do you mind stepping out of the car?’
