Rik shrugged. ‘What?’
Another knock.
‘There — again.’ Henry turned slowly back to Driver, who was watching him, a look of horror on his face. A tapping noise. Henry listened, his head tilted, and then he said to Driver, ‘Open the hatchback, please.’
‘Why?’
‘Open the fucking hatchback.’
Driver came slowly to the back of the car; Henry stood next to him.
‘Like I said, why?’ Driver demanded.
‘Open it.’
‘There’s nothing to see.’
‘Open it,’ Henry growled.
Driver hooked his fingers underneath the lip of the hatchback and released the catch. The hydraulic mechanism slowly lifted it with a hiss, taking up the parcel shelf and exposing the storage area, illuminated by a small light on either side.
Driver did not move then.
Henry looked in, horror-struck. His head flicked up and he locked eyes with Driver, who instantly lurched sideways to run. Henry grabbed out for him, missed and took a handful of fresh air as Driver ducked.
Henry shouted, ‘Get him.’
Driver was fast. Two strides and he was across the footpath, leaping over a low wire fence on to the playing field beyond.
Henry charged after him, clearing the fence cleanly, but with the agility of a dray horse. He landed heavily, slightly skew-whiff, but powered on, keeping his balance.
Rik was right behind, ready to support Henry with his actions, even if he didn’t quite know what was happening.
Driver ran, zigzagging across the close-cropped field, towards the utter darkness at the far side. Henry knew if Driver made it ahead of him, there was a good chance he would disappear into the night.
He couldn’t have that. He upped his speed, focused and gained on Driver, who was only a few feet ahead when Henry — digging out something from his old rugby days — hurled himself at the fleeing man. For a brief moment — in mid air — he thought he’d misjudged distance and speed, but his outstretched right hand latched on to Driver’s belt, his fingers tightened into a fist and Henry hauled the man down to his knees. Keeping up the momentum, Henry scrambled on to him, flattening him face down and kneeling hard between his shoulder blades.
Rik arrived, still unsure of what was happening. Gasping, Henry held out his hand and wriggled his fingers. ‘Cuffs,’ he said.
Henry and Rik dragged Driver back across the field. He struggled ineffectively between the two detectives, who then pulled him over the fence and forced him into the back of the CID car. They then returned to Driver’s vehicle, the hatchback of which was still raised.
The girl inside was gagged and bound, feet and ankles taped together, duct tape across her eyes and mouth. Even so, Henry recognized her as the girl they had seen earlier, walking quickly, and alone, through the streets.
‘I want you to be honest with me,’ Karl Donaldson said.
‘All right — I do not appreciate you calling me at this time of day.’
‘Don’t worry, I won’t keep you long.’
‘How the hell did you get my number anyway?’
‘You gave it to me once — when we were friends, remember?’
‘Only vaguely,’ Martin Beckham said with annoyance. Donaldson had woken the man up with the late night call, but at that moment he didn’t give a damn.
Donaldson was still at his desk in his office. He had the phone on speaker and was leaning back in his big comfortable leather chair, hands clasped behind his head, ankles crossed on the edge of the desk.
‘What is it you want?’
‘One question. An important one.’
Beckham sounded resigned. ‘What?’
‘The flat the two lads were in. You and your team stripped it bare for forensic reasons.’
‘Yes.’
‘What did you find down the drains?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, when your expert team went through the place, what did you find down the drains?’
Beckham paused, his weary brain clicking over. ‘Tell me what you’re getting at?’
‘What did you find down the drains?’ Donaldson repeated slowly. ‘That’s what I’m getting at.’
‘Nothing.’
‘Is that nothing as in we looked, but didn’t find anything? Or, nothing as in we actually didn’t look at all?’
‘We didn’t look,’ Beckham admitted.
Donaldson dropped his feet on to the floor and tipped forwards to tap the disconnect button.
Flynn trailed the man down stinking, poorly lit alleyways, virtually devoid of people, other than the dark mounds that were the sleeping forms of beggars under cardboard and sacking. He managed to keep close tabs on him using distance, shadows and the very obvious fact that the man wasn’t expecting to be followed, a factor that counted for a lot. He was on home turf and it was pretty much a fact of life that when people were comfortable in their surroundings, being followed was one of the last things they ever considered. This principle applied as much to Mafia bosses as it did to hired killers.
The man kept going, taking Flynn further into the city. The problem for Flynn was that while the strip he had started out on was comfortable, with white faces in the crowds, these streets were not. Even darkness and a good tan could not disguise Flynn’s skin colour and ethnic background. White European through and through, he looked out of place in the backstreets of Banjul, especially late at night.
Then the man turned into a building and was gone from sight.
Flynn came to a halt, sank into shadow, considered his position, then stood in a dark recess on the opposite side of the street.
It was a fairly typical style of building for Banjul. White, square, shutters on the windows, just one level to it, a flat-roofed bungalow. Flynn could not work out if it was a home or a place of work. Its whole appearance was alien to him.
The door the man had entered looked flimsy, easily kick-downable. Light showed from the angled gaps in the Venetian-style shutters at the windows.
Then Flynn noticed the car parked a little further down the street. The big, old, black Mercedes. Its sight jolted him. The car that the injured man had been helped into from Boone’s boat, the one that Boone’s killers had later turned up in.
Flynn crossed the street quickly and flattened himself against the wall next to the door. The Glock was now in his right hand, held at his thigh, and he wished he’d had the foresight to bring along the shotgun that Michelle had almost killed him with. It would have been effective in a tight space. He reached for the handle and turned it slowly. Locked. He emitted an exasperated gasp of frustration, then stood directly in front of the door, turned the handle with his left hand and leaned his weight on it with his left shoulder.
As he guessed, it was flimsy. He felt very confident he could open it easily, but it would make a horrible noise as he forced it down.
He hated the lack of planning and wondered if it would be better to back off now. Recce the place in daylight, work out the logistics and practicalities. See who came and went. How many people would be inside, what the inner geography was like… all the sensible things.
Unfortunately he did not get the chance to withdraw. That decision was taken out of his hands because as he stood there dithering, his mind whirring and tumbling as to the best approach, the door opened and he was instantly face to face with the man he had followed from the club, who was putting something into the inside pocket of his jacket, looking as though he was on the way out again.
In those circumstances the outcome of such a surprise encounter was usually determined by the one who
