I finished the cigarette and lay there for a long time, staring at the ceiling and wondering where I was going to be in a year’s time. Or even a week’s. Out in the hallway a door slammed and I heard a lot of shouting in a foreign language. A man and a woman were arguing. It lasted about two minutes, then there was the sound of someone running down the stairs. I picked up the mobile and wondered whether it was worth trying Danny again. I decided against it. Somehow I knew he wouldn’t answer.
I sighed. Somewhere out there, Raymond Keen was relaxing, enjoying the fruits of his success. Some time soon he’d find out that the attempt on my life had failed, which was going to be more than a little inconvenient.
And some time after that he’d find out that he’d made a big mistake trying to silence me.
32
I left the hotel at just after eight o’clock the following morning, dressed in the clothes I’d changed into the previous night, and took a walk in the direction of Hyde Park. It was a brisk morning and a watery sun was fighting to push its way through the thin cloud cover. I stopped for breakfast and coffee at a cafe on the Bayswater Road and took the opportunity to take a look at the papers.
The shooting incident at the Gallan was front-page news, as I’d expected. However, at the time of going to press, details were still fairly limited. They’d named the dead police officer as Detective Constable David Carrick, aged twenty-nine, but the man I’d despatched remained anonymous. I wondered if they’d ever find out who he was. The report confirmed that a third man had suffered gunshot wounds at the scene and was now under police guard in hospital, where his condition was described as serious but not life-threatening. For the most part, the story revolved around the drama of the shoot-out, with the inevitable witness reports, but it was clear its authors didn’t have any real idea what it had been all about. There was a quote from one of the Met’s assistant chief constables saying that gun crime, though on the rise, was under control in London, although I don’t suppose many of the readers believed him. The paper’s leader column assumed that drugs had been the motive behind the shooting and claimed that the government was going to have to do something radical to quell demand among the nation’s youth. Which was a sensible enough viewpoint, even if it remained to be seen whether drugs had actually been the motive in this case. Whatever Raymond and his associate, Mehmet Illan, were involved in was still a mystery. The only thing I could say for sure was that it was both illegal and highly profitable, drugs, I suppose, was as good a guess as any.
When I’d finished eating and reading, I carried on down the Bayswater Road in the direction of Marble Arch and stopped when I found a phone box just off the main thoroughfare. I wasn’t sure how Malik would react to my call – badly, probably – but he was in a better position than me to do something about the Miriam Fox case.
He answered his mobile after one ring. ‘DS Malik.’
‘Asif, it’s me. Can you talk?’
There was a short silence.
‘About my call last night—’
‘Look, what the hell’s going on, Sarge? The word is you’re involved in a lot of very bad stuff, that you had something to do with the shooting last night. A police officer got killed—’
‘I won’t piss you about, Asif. I’ve had some problems. I’ve got into bed with a few of the wrong people—’
‘Oh shit, Sarge. You of all people. Why the fuck did it have to be you?’ He sounded genuinely hurt.
‘It’s not what you think.’
‘Isn’t it? They told us this morning that you’re a strong suspect in the Traveller’s Rest killings. Is that why you were so interested in how the investigation was going?’
‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Asif. It’s me you’re talking to. The man you’ve worked with for four years. Do you really believe I’m a triple murderer?’ I was conscious that there were probably people listening in to this call and they would be trying to trace its source urgently.
‘So what were you doing up there that night? They said you were stopped at a roadblock near the scene.’
‘I was stopped, but I was on the way back from Clavering. I’ve got a woman up there, someone I see occasionally.’
‘You’ve never told me about her.’
‘She’s married. You wouldn’t have approved. But that’s not what I’m phoning about. Believe what you want to believe, there’s nothing I can do about that. But I want you to investigate Carla Graham. She’s definitely involved in the Miriam Fox killing and maybe those other disappearances I was telling you about as well.’
‘How do you know?’ He was trying to keep me talking, there was
