Riot Act

nearest to Pauline. “Just while you recover. Let things settle down round here for a bit.”

“We can look after her perfectly well,” Mrs Gadatra said sharply, offended. “Mr Garton-Jones will find the culprits, mark my words, even if the police don’t seem to be doing anything.” She sniffed.

“I don’t suppose you knew any of them?” I asked.

Pauline shook her head.

“It all happened so quickly,” she said sadly. “I didn’t see anybody.”

So much for finding out if Jav was mixed up in this, too. On impulse, though, I asked Mrs Gadatra if she knew the blond-haired Asian boy.

She pursed her lips for a moment. “I don’t think so,” she said. “I may have seen him around the place, but —”

“Jav used to play snooker with my brother,” Aqueel piped up, concentrating on holding the box open so his sister could messily put the snap cards away into it. “He’s a very good player.”

His mother glared at him, and I realised that some subtle shift had taken place since I’d moved off the estate. I was an outsider again, and not really to be trusted with inside information about anyone, or anything.

I stood up, gave her a cool stare as I thanked Aqueel. “I’ll go and look for Jav there,” I told him. “I have some questions that I think he may be able to answer.”

“Is there anything I can help you with, Charlie?” Aqueel asked, with a defiant look to his mother. Since his brother’s death he’d grown up at an accelerated rate. And here he was, determined to show her that he was the head of the family now, his own man, and took orders from nobody.

“Thank you Aqueel,” I said again, smiling, but careful not to mock him. “I don’t think so, but if there is, you’ll be the first to know.”

***

Since there seemed to be little I could do for Pauline that wasn’t being done already, I left soon after.

The Patrol was still sitting by the kerb with, surprisingly perhaps, all its tyres, paint, and glass intact. I was just about to try and keep things that way by getting out of there when movement further along the street caught my eye.

A front door had opened, and a large suited figure had emerged. It didn’t take a moment to recognise Mr Ali. I stilled, and for some reason that made him glance in my direction. Immediately, he began hurrying along the path to the road, and fumbling in a pocket for his car keys.

He was slow finding them, and I’ve found I can run quite fast when I’m given the right motivation. I’d reached him before he’d managed to get the door open, giving him little option but to speak to me.

“Ah, Charlie,” he said nervously, his strangely soprano voice strung fit to snap. “How nice to see you again. I have just been visiting Fariman, you know. Thankfully, he is feeling much better.”

“How much better would he be feeling if he knew what you were really up to round here?”

“Up to? I don’t know what you mean,” Ali squeaked. “I have done nothing wrong.”

“No?” I said, advancing grimly and planting my hip against his car door, just in case he got any ideas. “So you won’t mind if people round here find out what you were paying Harvey Langford to do? Keeping the crime figures bad enough for you to make a killing when this whole area gets redeveloped. Do they know you own half their houses, too?”

“No, no!” If Ali’s voice got any higher he’d be attracting passing bats. “You’ve got it all wrong. Please! I must go now. I had nothing to do with—”

He broke off abruptly, eyes swivelling wildly as he realised he’d been about to deny something he hadn’t been accused of yet.

“Nothing to do with what? With Langford’s death?” I jumped straight in with a laugh that was gone before it had arrived. “Oh come on, Ali, he couldn’t have been hiding out at the site without you knowing about it and permitting it. Who was he afraid of?”

I don’t know if Mr Ali was going to answer that one, because at that moment a mid-sized rock came whizzing past my ear and smashed into splintered fragments on the paving slabs a few feet away.

Twenty-four

Cursing, I instinctively ducked and spun round.

Mr Ali didn’t need telling twice that this was a good time to make his getaway. He yanked open his car door, thumping it against my shoulder. The blow caught me off balance and sent me sprawling. He was into the driving seat with the engine fired and the gear lever shoved into first before I’d had time to recover. The tyres chirruped as he spun the wheels halfway along the street.

Once he’d gone I got to my feet warily, keeping low, as though the overflowing black bin liner next to me was going to provide decent cover. I couldn’t see anyone nearby. After my somewhat frosty reception from Mrs Gadatra, I suppose being used for target practise was a logical progression, and I shouldn’t have been surprised about it.

Or maybe someone else on Lavender Gardens had discovered Mr Ali’s treachery. Maybe the rock had been aimed at him. Maybe, if he’d hung around longer, we might have had a chance to find out . . .

I waited, with the silence that came after Mr Ali’s dramatic departure punching and kicking at me. Eventually, I realised it was a case of move now, or stay there all day. Besides anything else, something in the bin bag next to me smelt ripe enough to make my eyes water.

I weighed up the distance to the Patrol with my heart banging painfully against my ribs, but decided against making a run for it. It wasn’t likely to make much difference and, in the end, it boiled down to trying to hold on to my dignity.

I nearly made it, too.

I suppose I can’t have been more than half-a-dozen hopeful paces away from the Patrol. I had the keys out ready in my hand, thumb on the remote door lock button, when four bulky figures appeared from one of the ginnels to my right.

My stride faltered, and I stumbled to a halt.

“Miss Fox,” Ian Garton-Jones nodded as he closed in. “I didn’t expect to see you round here any more.”

I couldn’t tell if he sounded disappointed or not.

He showed his teeth briefly as he stepped between me and the Nissan. Harlow and a man I didn’t recognise moved to cut off a line of retreat. West took station behind his boss’s shoulder, and leaned insolently on the Patrol’s front wing with his arms folded.

I shrugged. “I’m just visiting,” I said.

“Ah yes – Mrs Jamieson,” he said, and there was a certain amount of grim satisfaction in his voice. “Well, we’ve had a little chat with her, and you won’t be needed next time she goes away.”

Did his idea of a “little chat” include thrown bricks, I wondered silently?

“Nice vehicle,” he went on, shifting to stare in through the Patrol’s side window at the interior. He seemed to pause just a fraction too long with his gaze on that dull stain on the passenger seat. I shoved my hands into my pockets so he wouldn’t see the clenching of my fingers.

Eventually he turned back to me. “He lets you drive it around, does he?”

“Does who?”

“Sean Meyer,” Garton-Jones said. “It is his vehicle, isn’t it?” He watched me carefully for a reaction, then added in a sly tone, “Maybe he just isn’t feeling up to driving at the moment.”

He and his men exchanged nasty grins, the kind that sent a spasm of alarm rippling across my shoulder blades. I fought not to let it show.

While Garton-Jones was talking, West had been casually nudging the mud flap behind the Nissan’s front tyre with the toe of his boot. The earth that was caked there dropped out onto the tarmac in small clods.

Garton-Jones glanced down at them. “Been off-roading, have we?” he asked and when I didn’t answer he went on, “Lots of good places for that round here, so I understand. You know – green lanes, bits of waste ground, building sites . . .”

The smile left his face as he said the last words, all pretence at good humour wiped away.

Jesus, had he killed Langford just to frame Sean? Jacob had dismissed that scenario as being too drastic, too