'Good. Now listen. Do you remember the name of the bloke in London?'
Steven stopped nodding. He made a little choking sound and his eyes wandered away and came to rest on Britney Spears, pasted up on the back of the door: Britney lying back on a yellow pickup truck in a red and white cheerleader outfit.
'Steven?'
He bobbed his head up and down and now she saw he was mouthing something. She bent closer.
'What's that? What you saying?' He put his finger up his nose. 'No, come on, don't do that.' She snatched his hand away. 'Now, come on, you used to know it, you little shit come on, the man what broke your head?'
He frowned suddenly and his eyes glazed over. He tipped his chin back and flapped his face towards the windows as if he was laughing. But he wasn't laughing. He was nodding.
'You remember?'
'Uuuungh.'
'What's his name?'
'AahhhBaaan…'
'Ivan? Is that what you said? Ivan?'
'Ungh.' He jerked his head up and down, eager to please.
'Good. Now if someone asks you, 'Who did this to you?' you say, 'Ivan, Ivan Penderecki.' '
'Aaaahh-Baannn Bemmb-bbbemmb He looked as if he was going to weep with the effort of getting the words out. 'Aaah-Bann. Bember – Ahhbann Bemmberedddih!'
It was good enough. Tracey sat back, satisfied, and lit a cigarette. She felt confident now very confident. Britney Spears, in jeans and a pale blue T-shirt, smiled sideways at them out of a hot day in Times Square.
From the Jaguar parked outside the bank in Lewisham Caffery called Souness: 'I'm not going to make it this morning. I'm sorry, I'm – I don't know, food poisoning from last night or something.'
'Oh, Jesus, Jack.' The two DCs she'd assigned to him were waiting in the office. 'They're sitting here like a pair of wee hairns waiting for their daddy to come and tell them what to do.'
'OK, OK put them on.' He spoke for ten minutes to one of the DCs, giving him the door-to-door parameters he wanted them to cover Logan had already done the west of the park and he wanted the two DCs to start on the east side. Afterwards he spoke to Kryotos, asking her to contact Champaluang Keoduangdy and arrange a late lunch meeting. 'I thought you were dying?' 'Marilyn, please, I just need a little rest.' 'OK, I'm with you, I won't say a dickie bird.' 'The phone'll be off the hook so if you need me use my mobile.'
'Will do. Oh, and Jack?'
'What?'
'The dentist. From Kings. Remember?' She paused. 'He called again, Jack. Can you please?'
'Yeah, yeah. OK. Leave it with me.'
After the call he took off his tie and put it into his pocket. He had felt like a catalogue plate sitting there with the bank manager. But he'd got the money it was in a brown banker's envelope in his breast pocket he had his bargaining tool. Pathetic, so obsessed that you'll pay more than a month's salary for the ramblings of a washed-up old con and then lie about it to everyone. After this, he made a promise to himself: after today he was going to put it all behind him. He pointed the Jaguar towards Norfolk, opening the window, keeping the radio off. If nothing happened today it was going to end: he was going to hand it all over to the paedo unit and tell Rebecca she'd got what she wanted and that the Ewan story was over. But as he drove he couldn't help catching sight of his eyes in the rear-view mirror and all he could see in them was hope as if he really expected to pull the car up at Lamb's and see Ewan saunter around the corner of the house, out into the sunlight, still wearing his shorts and little mustard T-shirt.
And now think what you're really going to see.
An old child's shoe, or a fragment of bone probably. Three thousand pounds and the prize would be delivered with a saintly relic's ceremony. I hold in my hand a genuine piece of the True Cross. Or another animal carcass, green with burial. He knew he was going to be screwed around with he just wished he could get rid of that bubble of hope in his chest.
Tracey Lamb knew the moment she got through the door. She didn't see them, and they'd been clever, hiding their car, but she knew. She dropped the bucket and turned to bolt. A uniformed arm came out, pushing the warrant into her face. 'Miss Tracey Lamb?'
'You never fucking asked to come in my house!' She thrust away the hand and swivelled so that she could look back up the hallway and see the extent of it. 'You never fucking asked.'
'I Didn't have to, Miss Lamb. You weren't here.'
'No! You cuntsV
Everywhere the house was being clawed at. They were walking around in their shirt-sleeves, ignoring her wails, in and out of the rooms, snapping on their latex gloves. At the top of the stairs she could see a step-ladder placed in the attic access panel, and a woman's elegant ankles in tan high heels, cut off just below knee height. She could hear someone walking around up there and see the flash of a torch.
'Get out of my fucking attic!' she yelled up the stairs.
An officer put both hands on her shoulders. 'Miss Lamb, I think you'd be better off just letting us get on with it.'
'You fuckers oh, God She knew she couldn't fight this. Caffery that bastard that fucking-shit-for-brains piece of filth. She sank to the floor, her hands in her hair. 'You fuckers.'
The woman in the attic came carefully down the steps and passed an old blue shoebox, covered in cobwebs, to the PC at the foot of the ladder. He turned and carried it down the stairs.
Lamb saw him coming towards her and was furious. 'Don't you dare take my things.' She grabbed hold of his leg. 'Give me back my things give me that.'
'Yowl' The PC tried to wrench away his leg, holding the shoebox in the air out of her reach, but Tracey clung on. 'Get off get her off me, someone!'
'Miss Lamb,' another officer said. 'That contains evidence.'
'I know what it fucking contains. It's my bollocking shoebox '
'Get her off me '
With unexpected speed Lamb jumped up and swung out her arm, catching the PC enough of a blow for the box to tumble to the floor. 'Jesus, you cow The contents spilled out, slithering along the floor. For a moment everyone fell quiet, staring at the images among their feet. Even Lamb was momentarily shocked by what she saw. She stood over them, her body curled forward, her knees half bent, her face white as if she had been about to fall to her knees.
'Tracey, let's make this as easy as '
'FUCK OFF.'
There were thirty or so photographs the old type of print with a small white border around them, the images grainy. They showed a tiny blonde girl of about six sitting on a garden bench. In some of the photos she wore hot pants with bib and braces, a bunny rabbit embroidered on the bib. Her hair had been back-combed and given a shoulder-length sixties flip, like an adult. In some shots she was pictured playing with a beach ball; in others the bib was peeled down and she was proudly baring her thin white chest, her head tilted on one side for the camera. In two photographs, which had fallen near the back door, between the feet of an embarrassed officer, one slightly covering the other, the same little girl was on a bed. She was straddling the face of a grown man. No hot pants in this one. No knickers.
'No!' Lamb fell forward, landing face down on the photographs. 'No they're mine, don't take them, pleaseV She moved her arms compulsively up and down like an exhausted swimmer trying to stay afloat, gathering the images under her body, one Wellington boot coming adrift.
'Come on, Miss Lamb.' The silence in the hallway broke, and someone put a hand on her shoulder. 'Get up. And pull your skirt down too you're showing the world what you've got.'
'Get the fuck away from me She batted the hand away. 'Let go.'
The PC, afraid Lamb might roll on to her back and kick at him worse, that he'd see more of what was under her skirt backed away a touch, looking up at his colleagues for help.
'Miss Lamb,' a WPC tried, 'that's crucial evidence you've got there. If you don't let me near it I'll have to arrest you. Can't you see what's happening to that poor little girl there?'
