Rodent nodded uncertainly. “Pre-paid unregistered. Don’t give them my details,” he recited.
Garston thrust the shopping list and cash into Rodent’s hand and shoved him towards the door. “That’s right. Now, I want you back here by two o’clock at the latest, so you’d best get a move on.”
“But I haven’t had any breakfast yet,” the boy protested. He looked close to tears.
Garston rolled his eyes, peeled off another tenner and threw it at him. “Stop off at a bloody café, and while you’re out, buy yourself some deodorant with the change.”
◆◆◆
The morning had sped by in a sustained flurry of frantic activity. The meeting with George Holland had gone better than expected. Although it wasn’t their core business, he was all in favour of trying to recover the skinhead’s gun stash, and he had been able to recruit an entire unit of TSG – four carriers, each containing a PS and six PCs – to help out with the searches, plus a half-dozen detectives to assist with the interviews.
The local CID had kindly offered to deal with the back-garden runner, who was wanted on a fail to appear warrant, which left AMIP with six prisoners to be interviewed: four men and two women.
Having been put straight into a mandatory sleep period upon arrival, they hadn’t been roused until eleven. Of course, they then had to be given sufficient time to shower, eat some food, and then consult with their solicitors before they could be questioned. As a result, although it was now getting on for one o’clock, most of the interviews were only just beginning.
The searches had taken far longer to organise than Jack had hoped. One of the hardest challenges had been tracking down the PACE Inspector to authorise them. It turned out that he had gone into a meeting and switched his radio off for the duration.
By the time that Carol had completed the briefing and risk assessment documents, all the staff being deployed on the searches had arrived at Arbour Square. They had been hurriedly divided into search teams and whisked off for a quick briefing. Then there was a mad scramble as officers ran around the building trying to round up enough vehicles to ensure everyone had transport, and Jack had been annoyed that none of the officers participating in the searches had thought of doing this before they were ready to set off.
The net result of all the fluffing around was that the premises searches didn’t begin that much earlier than the interviews.
◆◆◆
Steve Bull was leading the search of the lockup behind the parade of shops near Rathbone Market. With no occupants to worry about, it was the smallest of the search teams. In addition to Bull, there were only three other detectives, Kelly Flowers, Paul Evans, and Kevin Murray, who was to be their advanced exhibits officer.
Upon their arrival, they were met by Aaron Stein, a short, fat man in a creased suit, with a wrinkly bald head and bulbous nose.
It transpired that the lockup was actually an end garage in a block of ten units situated behind the shops. They had brought along the five keys that had been in Charlie Dobson’s possession when he’d been arrested and were pleased to see that the chunky key was a perfect fit for the padlock attached to the side of the lockup The first of the two Yale keys didn’t want to know when it was inserted into the lock in the handle protruding from the door’s centre, but the second one turned smoothly and they were able to raise the door upwards and gain entry.
“Well, well, well,” Bull said as he looked inside. “What do we have here?”
Although it was dark inside, Bull immediately made out the large Nazi flag that was hanging in the centre of the left-hand wall. It pictured the swastika in a white circle on a background of red. Directly beneath this was heavy-duty safe that Bull suspected was probably either bolted into the wall or, more likely, the concrete floor.
A penny to a pound, he thought to himself, if we’re going to find anything incriminating, it will be locked in there.
Aaron Stein started to walk towards the opening, clearly intent on having a nose around inside, until Murray placed a restraining hand across his chest.
“Where do you think you’re going then?” he demanded.
The bald man seemed startled by the question.
“Why I’m going inside to see what that hooligan has done to my property,” he said as if it should have been obvious.
Murray shook his head. “No, mate, you’re not.”
“But I own it,” the man protested.
“You might own it,” Murray said, patronisingly, “but right now it’s a potential crime scene and only authorised personnel are allowed inside, and you ain’t authorised.”
Stein opened his mouth to object, but Murray raised a warning finger to shush him. “It’s not up for debate, so be a good chap and go and wait in your car.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Steve Bull saw the lockup owner pivot angrily and storm off towards his vehicle. He walked over to Murray, who was slipping into a Tyvek oversuit. “Not been upsetting people again, have you, Kev?”
“As if I’d do that,” Murray said, working the fingers of his right hand into a latex glove one by one. Maybe it was just Steve’s imagination, but he could have sworn that Murray deliberately left his middle finger extended far longer than all the others.
“Come on you bunch of losers,” Murray said when he had finished. “You need to suit up if you want to come into my crime scene.” With that, he reached into the back of his car and threw them each a set of barrier clothing.
When they were finally ready, Steve led the way over to the entrance and they all had their first proper look inside. The interior
