‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ I said, lighting a cigarette without offering him one. He shook his head and mumbled something, lighting one for himself. I sat back in my seat and took the gun out of my pocket. ‘OK, show me what you’ve got in there.’ He unzipped the bag and gingerly took out a shabby-looking .22 pistol. ‘That’s no use to me,’ I told him. ‘Keep going.’ He put the .22 on the carpet and reached back into the bag like a miserable Santa, emerging this time with a sawn-off pump-action shotgun. I shook my head, and he carried on. Next up was more in tune with what I wanted: a newish-looking MAC 10 sub machine pistol. There was no magazine in it, but after a quick rummage around Runnion came up with two taped together. ‘I’ll have that one,’ I told him, and he put it to one side.
He pulled out a further three weapons – all handguns – and told me that was all he’d got.
I smiled. ‘Well, it’s not bad for a man who likes to keep away from weapons.’ Still holding onto my own gun, I gave each of them a brief inspection and settled for a short-barrelled Browning. ‘Have you got ammo for this?’ I asked him.
‘Should have,’ he said, and once again began a search of the bag, bringing out a couple of mint-condition boxes of 9mm bullets which he put with the MAC 10 and the revolver.
I took a long drag on my cigarette and watched him carefully as he put everything else back in the holdall. When he’d finished, I stood up and picked up my newly acquired weapons. I put the MAC 10 in the pocket of my raincoat, along with the magazines, and stubbed my cigarette out in an overflowing ashtray. I picked up the Browning and inspected it again, removing the magazine, checking the bullets.
‘You haven’t got a silencer for this, have you?’ I asked.
‘No, I fucking haven’t,’ he said, remaining seated.
‘Well, I hope when it comes down to it, it works.’
‘I’m sure it will.’
I released the safety and pulled the trigger.
It did.
36
‘I’ve been hearing some funny rumours today, Dennis.’
‘Oh yeah?’ I leaned back against the phone-box glass and took a drink from the can of Coke I was holding. All part of the new diet. ‘What sort of rumours?’
‘That you’re involved in a lot of serious shit. That the police are looking for you with a view to questioning you about some very nasty crimes indeed. Possibly even murder.’
I whistled through my teeth. ‘Serious allegations. Where did you hear them from?’
‘Are they true?’
‘Behave. You’ve known me for close to ten years. Do you really think I’d be involved in murder?’
‘And I’ve been in journalism for close to thirty years and one thing I’ve learned is that people are never what they seem. Everyone’s got skeletons in their closets, even the vicar’s wife. And some of them are pretty fucking grim.’
‘I’ve got skeletons, Roy, but they don’t include murder. Now, have you got the information we were talking about?’
‘I’m concerned, Dennis. I don’t want any of this coming back to me.’
‘It won’t. Don’t worry.’
‘That’s easy for you to say.’
‘What do you mean, easy? I’m the one who’s on the run. Look, I promise all you’ll get out of it is a fucking decent story.’
‘When? You keep telling me this, but so far I haven’t got a thing to go on and I’ve put my neck on the line for you.’
I sighed and thought about it for a moment. ‘It’s Thursday now. You’ll have your story by tomorrow.’
‘I’d better do.’
‘You will. So what’s the address then?’
‘What are you going to do to him?’
‘I need to ask him some questions. That’s all. He can solve a puzzle for me.’
‘44b Kenford Terrace. It’s in Hackney. That’s all I know. And don’t ever fucking tell anyone you heard it from me.’
37
I sat for a long time in the cold darkness waiting for Alan Kover.
His flat, not the one in which he’d committed the infamous rape, was stark in its minimalism. There was only one chair in the cramped little sitting room. It faced a cheap portable TV which had a small cactus plant on it, the only decoration of any kind in the whole room. I sat with my back to the door, watching the blank screen. Watching and waiting and thinking. Kover was the last key in the mystery surrounding Coleman House and its inhabitants. From the wound on Carla’s throat, and the way she’d been attacked from behind, I felt sure that he had also been the man who’d murdered Miriam Fox. But such a scenario still threw up far more questions than answers. Presumably, Kover and Carla had been involved together in Miriam’s killing. There was no other way she could have known the details of it. But how the hell had two such disparate personalities come together, and what on earth did they kill Miriam for? And what, if anything, did her death have to do with the disappearances? Kover and me, it seemed, had a lot to talk about.
I wanted to smoke. Badly. But I couldn’t risk doing it in his flat so I opened my third can of Coke of the day and took a sip. What depressed me about this place was that there was nothing remotely homely, or even human, about it. It was like a bad attempt at a show home created by some very lazy people. I’d checked it over thoroughly, just to see if there were any clues as to what had been going on, but had found nothing. Nothing at all. Just kitchen cupboards with pots and pans in them, a wardrobe with some clothes, a bathroom with a toothbrush and
