Bryant & May 08; Off the Rails

Brooke wanted to get away, but was running out of options. Everything had gone wrong, and he had a bad feeling about the way it would end. He thought about slipping into the store and exiting through the rear door, but knew it would not be so easy to shake off the man who was following him. The sight of a taxi with its ‘For Hire’ light glimmering through the sheeting rain forced his hand, and he hailed it, jumping inside before his shadower was able to react.

“King’s Cross,” Toby told the driver, and sat back, turning to see if the policeman was managing to follow.

¦

Meera Mangeshkar was five metres behind Theo Fontvieille, who was looking very unhappy indeed. Rich kid, she thought. He’s more upset about having his car nicked than he is about his so-called mate being killed. But where’s he going? Fontvieille had cut up from the house in Bloomsbury and was heading toward King’s Cross station. Tucked beneath his elegant Smith & Son umbrella, he was immaculately attired in a handmade suit and matching black overcoat. Must be a bit of a shock for him, having to board public transport, she thought. Probably going to visit Mummy and Daddy’s country estate. Meera frowned, looking again. Ruby Cates had appeared behind Theo, near the overcrowded entrance to the tube station.

The top of her spine tingled in alarm. Something was not right – all these people in the afternoon – what were they doing here? Crowds of them milling around, waiting to get through the station entrances. It just looked – dangerous. Cates was closing in behind Fontvieille, but had they even seen each other? From here it was hard to tell. Meera tried to get nearer, but the crowds pressed in.

¦

Dan Banbury sat watching Rajan Sangeeta eat a salad in the UCL cafeteria. The student was idly twirling an alfalfa sprout between his forefinger and thumb as he scanned a paperback copy of Herman Hesse’s Steppenwolf. I’ve really drawn the short straw here, thought Banbury. This one’s far too boring and studenty to be involved in anything dubious. He sat back on the uncomfortable plastic banquette and waited for something interesting to happen.

¦

“Keep going,” said Longbright, giving Mac a shove in the back. “What’s the matter?”

“This is his territory.” Mac was frightened now. They had stopped by the clogged underground entrance and were swiftly hemmed in by new arrivals.

“If you try to give me the slip, I’ll leave you somewhere he can get at you and withdraw police presence, do you understand?”

“He knows I’m here. He always knows when I’m in the station.”

“He can’t be everywhere at once, Mac.”

“This is his home.”

The crowd was still moving. After waiting a minute, they slowly descended the staircase into the ticket hall. So many people were milling around that the makeshift queue barriers for the ticket office had all been pushed back. They weren’t descending to the platforms or using the tunnels, they were just standing there, as if waiting to be told what to do next. A cluster of BTP officers stood off at one side of the crowd near the security control centre, but they seemed uncertain how to act.

“Now what?” asked Mac, panicked. “He could be anyone; I don’t know what to watch for. He could be creeping up beside us right now.”

“You’re going to start making me nervous if you don’t shut up,” Longbright warned. “I want you somewhere with maximum visibility.” She pointed to the guards waiting to feed passengers through the unused ticket barriers. “Go over there and start an argument with one of them. Tell him your travel card doesn’t work and you want a refund. Tell him he looks like a warthog, tell him anything. Make it loud and be bloody-minded – I’m sure that’ll come naturally. Wait.” Her earpiece crackled into life. She listened to Renfield and nodded. “Go! ”

There were at least three other members of PCU staff in the station, but things had a habit of going wrong where Mr Fox was involved. Watching Mac thread his way toward the guards, the memory of Liberty DuCaine suddenly filled Longbright’s head, and she turned around in alarm, half expecting to find a killer standing behind her.

? Off the Rails ?

46

Joker in the Pack

According to the reports reaching John May, three of the five housemates were making their way separately to King’s Cross station, along with Longbright, Renfield and Tony McCarthy. Only Sangeeta and Nicolau were away from the site. Did that remove them from suspicion, or implicate them further? And why were the others all heading to the one place where the PCU was most likely to catch Mr Fox? You’re being paranoid, thought May as he tacked through the stalled traffic. Arthur’s done it to you again, forever trying to join the dots where no links exist. It’s a massive terminus, it’s the weekend, and students are more likely to use public transport, that’s all.

The rain pockmarked the pooled tarmac into shadows of clouds. May darted under the station awning and joined a line waiting to enter the station, several rows back from Ruby Cates, who was no longer sporting her cast.

What am I doing here? he asked himself angrily. I swear, this really is the most chaotic investigation of my career. When I look at our methodology through the eyes of Home Office officials I can honestly see why they’re so keen to retire us. The Unit’s working methods confuse its own staff, so God knows what they do to outsiders. Arthur put his faith in me to close this quickly, but I’m damned if I can see how to do it. There’s something missing that I’m simply not equipped to spot. And now he’s back at the Unit with his jigsaws and his playing cards, letting me slowly hang myself. It’s as if he no longer cares what happens to the Unit or to any of us.

He angrily pushed his way down the steps into the ticket hall, where he was spotted by Longbright. She shook her head at him. No sign of Mr Fox. But there was McCarthy, having some kind of arm-waving argument with a baffled barrier guard.

Looks like everyone’s decided to travel today, thought May. He checked his watch: 3:39 P.M. Not a very satisfying end to our careers, a dead officer and two unsolved cases.

The problem with the students of Mecklenburgh Square was not one of culpability but motive. Without that, the investigation could never be resolved. It seemed to May that the suspects, the victims and the investigators had created a perfect deadlock. As the minutes ticked away, May patted the rain from his jacket, stuck his hands in his pockets and leaned against the tiled wall, watching and waiting as the human whirlpool swirled aimlessly around its axis. There was nothing else he could do.

¦

Arthur Bryant’s office had started to resemble a magician’s display room. In addition to the books of magic, there were now a model guillotine which worked and a full set of Chinese linking rings on his desk. Packs of cards were strewn over the floor, along with random items of evidence, including a number of volumes on the London Underground, the paperback edition of Mind the Ghosts, the students’ opened laptops, Hillingdon’s rainbow raincoat and a series of enlarged frame grabs of tube train seats from a phone.

At times like this, Bryant found it helpful to break confidence and discuss the case with a complete outsider, although he took the risk that Fraternity DuCaine might simply think him unhinged.

“You see, I keep coming back to the cards,” he said, spreading a pack across his desk. “I can’t explain my thinking to you because I can’t entirely explain it to myself.”

“Let me get this right,” said Fraternity. “You see a connection between the playing cards and the death of a woman on a staircase?”

“Believe me, I know how that sounds. But the colours and shapes keep repeating themselves in my