‘Of what?’
‘Three dead men would be a start. Justice doesn’t come automatically. It has to be fought for.’
Acland wondered if Jones realized that he was using the same kind of language that politicians use to justify wars. In the end, the only satisfaction was to settle one’s scores for oneself. ‘Isn’t justice the job of the police?’ he asked without emphasis.
‘Certainly,’ the older man agreed, ‘but we can’t do it on our own. You’d have been called as a witness whatever happened, you know. Your association with Jen would have come under scrutiny as soon as we fixed on her.’
‘Only because I gave her to you. If I hadn’t come back to Bermondsey, you’d still be in the dark.’
Jones smiled slightly. ‘We’d have got there eventually. We found the name “Cass” on Kevin Atkins’s mobile.’
‘I gave you that as well . . . and the duffel bag.’
‘You didn’t know it was Jen’s.’
For the last time Acland toyed with keeping to himself the only secret he had left, but Jackson had urged him to be fair. ‘You can’t destroy all the evidence,’ she had said. ‘At least give the police a chance with the Harry Peel photos . . . even if you don’t like Jones much.’
She was wrong about that. Acland had a great deal of respect for the superindentent. He’d recognized the man’s strength the first time he met him, just as he’d recognized Jackson’s. With a sense of regret that he was about to lose Jones’s sympathy, he shook his head. ‘I was watching from across the road when Ben snatched the bag off her,’ he admitted. ‘I always knew it was hers.’
The superintendent didn’t bother with surprise. ‘Did you know who Ben was?’
Acland nodded. ‘I recognized him as the kid who set his girls on Chalky. Jen didn’t make a sound, just got to her feet and stood there as white as a sheet. It made me wonder what he’d stolen.’
‘Why didn’t you tell us this before?’
‘I did. I said several times that I thought a bag existed.’
‘You
‘Not for certain. I couldn’t see what Ben was carrying when he arrived in the alleyway. He collapsed almost immediately, and it was so dark I wasn’t even sure he was the kid I wanted until I shone a torch in his face and checked his breathing. I think that’s when Chalky buried the duffel in one of his own bags.’
Jones tapped his forefingers together. ‘You could have told us you’d witnessed the theft.’
‘There was nothing to tell. For all I knew, Ben had stolen a pile of magazines.’ He saw the irritation in the superintendent’s face. ‘I hoped the bag contained something I wanted. That’s the only reason I went to the alleyway. I thought Chalky might be able to tell me where the kid usually hung out.’
‘What’s the something you wanted?’
Acland hesitated. ‘These,’ he said curtly, putting his hand into his jacket pocket and placing a couple of USB flash drives on the desk. ‘It wasn’t Jen who smashed my laptop, it was me. That’s why I went back to her flat two weeks later. She’d loaded some photographs on to it that I didn’t want anyone to see. I hoped that was the end of it till she sent me a letter the day I went to Iraq with one of these memory disks in it.’ He squeezed his temples between a thumb and forefinger. ‘She said she’d made copies before the laptop was destroyed.’
Jones looked at the two small rectangular objects. ‘Why did you think they were in the duffel bag?’
‘I didn’t . . . it was a possibility, that’s all. Jen was carrying a memory card in her handbag when she came to the hospital. I took it and ran it through Susan Campbell’s computer the next day.’ He shook his head at Jones’s questioning expression. ‘Publicity shots.’
‘What were you doing outside her flat last Friday?’
The good side of Acland’s mouth lifted in a wry smile. ‘Working out how to get in. I could have done it if she hadn’t been so shell-shocked by the theft. A minicab turned up a few seconds later, but she cancelled it and went back inside. That’s what made me curious about the contents of the bag.’ He paused. ‘I had no idea there was anyone else involved. I truly believed it was all about me.’
Jones wasn’t impressed. ‘You must have wondered when you found Kevin Atkins’s mobile in Ben’s rucksack.’
The lieutenant shook his head. ‘Not at the time. I assumed Ben had nicked it along with the iPods and the BlackBerry. I might have guessed if he’d transferred the stun gun.’ He fell silent.
Jones studied him for a moment. ‘Perhaps you didn’t want to believe there was a connection?’
Acland shook his head, but whether in agreement or denial Jones couldn’t tell.
Out of habit, he used the tip of his pen to pull the USB flash drives towards him. ‘Were you searched when you were brought here from the Crown?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why weren’t these on you then?’
‘They were under the mattress in the bedroom. I needed to see what was on them before I handed them in.’
‘And?’
‘One’s blank and the other has some photographs of someone who might be Harry Peel. I think Jen may have loaded them on to my laptop before I destroyed it. If she took pictures of Britton and Atkins, they’ll be on her own computer.’
‘We haven’t discovered any.’ Idly, Jones moved the USB disks again. ‘You should have trusted me, Charles. We
