He debated whether to ignore it. The number was unfamiliar. And, quite righdy in his view, speaking on mobiles was frowned upon in the FRC; those who did were at risk of being assaulted by fuming septuagenarians armed with half-peeled fruit. But the only other person in the room had just disappeared into the toilets, so Nigel decided to risk it. He needed all the business he could get.
'Nigel Barnes,' he said.
'Hello, Mr Barnes.'
The voice was female, the accent broad but not one Nigel could place.
'This is Detective Sergeant Heather Jenkins of the Metropolitan Police. Sorry to ring out of the blue like this.'
The police? What did they want? He scanned the last few weeks of his life in a millisecond and failed to come up with any misdemeanours. He felt his throat constrict. Surely not. . .
'Not at all,' he whispered eventually.
'We're wondering if you could help us with a case we're investigating.'
He felt a sense of relief mingled with excitement, undercut by the suspicion that this was a wind-up.
'What sort of case?'
'Murder.'
Nigel's mind scrambled as he sought the appropriate response. 'Yes,' he managed to blurt out.
'Good. Look, it's not something I'm comfortable talking about over the phone. Is there any chance I could come to see you? Maybe at your office?'
This presented Nigel with a dilemma. His 'office'
was the crowded sitting room of his flat in Shepherd's Bush.
'I'm currently away from my office for the day, Detective Sergeant,' he lied.
'Oh,' came the disappointed response.
'I'm at the Family Records Centre.'
'Oh, I know that,' the detective said.
Lancashire, Nigel thought to himself. Her accent's definitely Lancastrian.
'Is there a discreet place where we could meet?'
Nigel's brain kicked in at last. The canteen was a no-no: in thirty minutes it would be four o'clock and time for afternoon tea. The place would be crammed with the cardigan-wearing hordes wielding thermos flasks and potted-meat sandwiches. There was only one place he could think of.
'There's a coffee shop on Exmouth Market. I know the owner and I'm pretty sure he'll let me use the downstairs for an hour or so.'
There was a pause at the other end of the phone.
When the detective's voice returned it was stripped of its courteous veneer.
'Well, if you can guarantee us some privacy, then OK. Does four thirty suit you?'
Nigel said it did, and the detective hung up. He swept his documents into his bag and left the canteen, praying that Beni would be willing to close half his cafe -- or he'd look a complete fool.
Foster and Heather drove to Exmouth Market in his car. The interior still bore the leathery smell of the showroom. It was an aroma he loved, and one of the reasons he had managed to come up with a scam that persuaded the Met to give him a new set of wheels annually. From one of the many car magazines he bought each month, he'd learned that almost every solid surface in a car was held together by adhesives and sealant. Research suggested that the gases given off by the compounds may even be addictive, and every time he sat behind the wheel of that year's model, he could well believe it.
On the way across London they spoke about genealogy.
Heather said she wanted to know more about her family, how they lived, the struggles they endured; Foster just sneered. To him, it was a bit like stamp collecting, or grown men building a train set in their attic with hills and signals and sheep and stuff.
He couldn't care less who his ancestors were; all you needed to know was that your greatgreat- greatgrandfather wasn't firing blanks.
Foster found a meter near Exmouth Market and parked. He completed the entire manoeuvre one handed, spinning the steering wheel furiously first one way and then the other with an open palm. He could sense Heather looking at him, not without disapproval. But she drove like a vicar, as he often told her. Hands at ten-to-two, like a seventeen-year old out with her dad for her first drive.
They found Beni's almost immediately. It was a spartan, wooden-fronted coffee shop that thrived on the lunchtime trade, but was in the process of winding down for the day.
'Can I have a decaf latte please?' Heather asked.
'God's sake,' Foster muttered, but she failed to hear. Or ignored him again.
The jovial, rotund man with thick hairy arms nodded. 'And you, sir?' he asked Foster.
'Black coffee, please. Hot as you can make it.'
'We're looking for Nigel Barnes,' Heather said to the barista.
'Downstairs,' he replied, motioning towards a narrow staircase in one corner of the cafe. 'The smokers always sit downstairs.' He looked them up and down, clocking their suits and demeanour. His eyes narrowed. 'You're not police, are you?'
'God forbid,' Foster muttered.
Nigel was waiting, wondering if he'd picked a good place to meet. When he'd spoken to DS Jenkins on the phone, the only discreet place he could think of was the sparsely populated room beneath Beni's cafe.
The handful of people who used it were smokers, allowed by Beni to continue feeding their habit out of sight, if not smell, of the other clientele. He came here every morning on his way to the FRC for a cig and a scan of the newspaper. But now he was wondering if a windowless dungeon filled with the scent of stale smoke was not, after all, the best place to meet a female detective. All of a sudden the place seemed seedy.
She will have experienced worse, Nigel thought.
He shifted nervously in his seat, nursing his coffee, waiting for the arrival of DS Jenkins. He had tried to imagine what she might look like -- she had sounded young, perhaps around his age, early thirties - but he'd given up when all he could muster were images of sour-faced ball-breakers whose femininity and softness had been eroded by years of work in the brutal, relentlessly male world of crime and detection.
Two people descended the stairs, something in their bearing marking them out as police officers. The female was wearing a tight-fitting black trouser suit.
Her black corkscrew hair was tied back, her kohl lined eyes suggested chilliness, and his fears appeared to be founded. Her aquiline nose wrinkled on meeting the polluted air. But on seeing him, and realizing, as the only person in the room, he must be the person she wanted to see, she broke out into a beaming smile that breathed life and warmth into her entire face.
The smile was genuine, not forced. He felt himself smiling back.
Ms Nice, he concluded. Presumably that meant the tall, thickset figure, bored and looming at her shoulder, holding their drinks, was Mr Nasty. DS
Jenkins introduced him as DCI Grant Foster and, once he had put down their coffee, Nigel felt his enormous paw grasp his own less-weathered, perspiring hand and grip tightly. The detective was over six feet in height, his head closely shaved, he guessed in response to a receding hairline, with a face that looked like it had seen a few fights. Unlike his female colleague's, the smile was fleeting and perfunctory.
Nigel sat down, both officers facing him.
'Bit airless down here,' DS Jenkins said, wrinkling her nose once more. 'The smoking room, I presume.'
Nigel nodded. 'Beni realizes there's a few of us desperate souls who like to combine . . .'
Nigel realized his unease over meeting here was not only caused by chivalry. Beni sold sandwiches, so the existence of this room was against the law.
The DS saw the penny drop.
'Don't worry,' she reassured him. 'Secret smoking dens are the least of our worries.' She looked around, taking her bag off her shoulder and laying it on the floor beside her feet. 'Actually, I like it,' she said. 'It's got character. I'd rather have places like this than one of those soulless chains any day.'
'There's been a coffee shop on this site since the seventeenth century, give or take a few decades,'
Nigel said.
