two officers providing twenty-four-hour cover and a bill that could easily top a million. The papers are on to it and the top brass are running scared. They hope that if they can just get the overtime bill down, no one will notice that the overall bill keeps going up. The Commissioner has said the government already needs to find another twenty million a year to cover all the costs.’
‘Royalty doesn’t do belt-tightening,’ Carlyle commented. ‘Cuts, like taxes, are for the little people — people like us. Buckingham Palace has always refused to allow any cuts. They argue that the police and the state have a duty to protect both the Queen and the line of succession.’
Joe yawned, as he often did when his boss got on his soapbox. ‘Coming back to Dolan,’ he interjected.
‘Dolan has had to diversify.’
‘Into what?’ Joe asked.
‘Into things that some people can’t live with,’ Matthews said cryptically.
‘Be more specific,’ Carlyle demanded.
Matthews tried to stand up, wobbled, and fell back into her seat. ‘That’s all I’m going to say until I get myself out of there.’
Carlyle changed tack. ‘Is Adam himself in on it?’
‘He turns a blind eye. Can
‘I’ll speak to my boss,’ Carlyle said. ‘Why are you telling me all this now?’
‘Because, annoying little shit though you are, you’re my best bet for getting out of this whole mess and keeping my job.’ This time Matthews made it successfully to her feet.
Carlyle tried one last time. ‘What do they do?’
‘Get me out and I’ll give you more. Otherwise, that’s your lot for now.’
‘Dalton was in on it?’ Joe persisted.
‘Dalton couldn’t take it any more. He couldn’t hack it. He was a bit lame that way.’ She brushed past Carlyle, and paused while trying to work out a path through the throng towards the door. ‘Have you seen Allcock yet?’
‘Who?’
‘Dalton’s girlfriend.’
Carlyle was embarrassed to admit that he hadn’t got round to that yet. ‘Not yet.’
Matthews gave him a crooked grin as she pushed her way past another group of drinkers. ‘Better get on with it then, hadn’t you?’
‘Here you go.’
Helen tossed the brochure on to his lap and flopped down on the sofa.
‘I thought it might bring back lots of happy memories,’ she said with a smirk, picking up the remote control and switching on the television.
Carlyle looked down at the
‘When we went on the tour there last year,’ Helen said, flicking rapidly through a succession of channels in search of her nightly fix of audiovisual dross. ‘Alice wanted it for a school project she had to do.’
Carlyle turned the thin volume over in his hands, looking for the price. ‘How much did it cost?’
Helen shrugged. ‘Dunno. . eight quid, something like that.’
‘So,’ Carlyle felt a wave of parsimony wash over him, ‘all in all, with the tickets and everything, the whole visit cost you what — fifty quid?’
‘Easily.’ Helen had just found an episode of
‘Talk about the rich getting even richer.’
Opening the brochure, Carlyle perused the text:
He glanced over at his wife, who was engrossed in watching some girl in a bikini and biker boots being abused by an overly butch photographer in the middle of some desert. ‘Do they really need our money too?’
‘What?’ Helen didn’t look up.
Sighing, he read on.
The inspector felt annoyed by the boundless silliness of it all. ‘Have you got a decent hat? If I sort this mess out, maybe we’ll get invited to a Garden Party.’
The girl on the TV was now in tears. She was being asked to pose naked — apart from the boots — in the desert with some kind of snake. It was a big beast, too, maybe a python. Tossing the
THIRTEEN
Unleashing his inner eight year old, Simon Merrett swivelled round in his chair to look at the bank of video screens ranged above the desk in front of him. ‘This is like the Starship Enterprise,’ he grinned. ‘How do we get to Warp Factor Ten?’
Marshall Monk felt the pain in his stomach intensify. The General Manager of the London Eye tugged at the collar of his shirt and wondered if he should check the CEOP detective’s ID again. ‘I beg your pardon?’
Rose Scripps gave her colleague a dirty look.
‘What I mean is,’ Merrett said hastily, getting his chair back under control, ‘how are we going to do this?’
Monk looked at the two uniformed policemen standing by the door of the control room, on either side of Sandra Scott. Scott looked her usual bovine self. The only thing that persuaded Monk that this wasn’t some kind of a wind-up was the fact that she had turned up for the start of her shift wearing handcuffs. ‘Well,’ he said nervously, ‘as I understand it, you are looking to apprehend-’
‘Arrest,’ Rose interrupted.
‘Detain,’ Merrett added unhelpfully.
Monk frowned, clearly not interested in their childish semantics. ‘You want to get hold of the gentlemen who have booked a private capsule for the seven-thirty flight.’
Merrett glanced at the piece of paper with the booking details on the table in front of him. ‘SEG Enterprises? Who are they?’
‘I don’t know,’ Monk shrugged. ‘But that was their second booking.’
‘Payment?’ Rose asked.
‘Through a corporate credit card,’ Monk replied. ‘Amex, if I remember correctly.’
‘The contact details are for a serviced office in Mayfair,’ Merrett added, pleased to be able to show off that he had done some homework. ‘SEG have rented space there for almost a year, but no one can ever remember anyone from the company actually turning up there.’ He turned to Monk. ‘So, what happens tonight?’
‘One member of the group will need to check in at the priority check-in desk — the fast track booth — fifteen minutes before the scheduled flight time. Once the whole group is assembled, the capsule host will escort the group through the fast track entrance, thus bypassing the regular queue.’
‘The capsule host?’ Rose asked.
‘Yes.’ Monk smiled, happy to be speaking to this sensible-seeming woman, rather than her juvenile colleague. ‘Every capsule has a host for the thirty-minute flight. The host is compulsory because there needs to be a minimum of three adults, over the age of eighteen, in each capsule.’
Rose looked at Merrett. ‘But on that DVD. .’
Merrett looked over at Sandra Scott, out of earshot, staring at the floor and not showing any apparent interest in their conversation. Someone had doubtless been paid off, which made him wonder about Monk himself. Merrett turned back to Rose. ‘We’ll sort that out later.’ He glanced at the clock above the screens, which showed 6.10 p.m. ‘In the meantime, this is what we’re going to do now. .’
‘My daughter Louise is keen to go up on the Eye,’ Rose said, looking up at the giant wheel in front of them.
