‘You can talk in Mycroft’s study,’ said Elizabeth after the introductions. ‘I’ll bring your coffee in there.’
‘I’ll take the coffee,’ her son corrected. ‘Is there any of that fruit cake left?’
‘Only if you didn’t finish it yesterday.’ This with a wink in my direction.
It turned out that he had.
The study was a rather dim room towards the rear of all that I could discern of the ground floor of the left wing. It smelled a bit musty. Ashley opened the curtains wide – they had been half-closed – but this did not improve matters much as creepers were growing across the window. Invited to make myself at home, I was about to seat myself on a sofa that looked as though it had been lived on by big dogs – that is, sagging – but he uttered an expression of alarm and directed me towards a button-backed chair.
‘I ought to get rid of that but can’t somehow,’ he said, pouring the coffee. ‘At one time we had three Labradors and a Border terrier but they gradually died of old age or had to be put down for other reasons. My father became very depressed about it, said he didn’t want any more.’
‘I understand that your father died very suddenly.’
‘He did, but it might have been preventable. He had no previous history of heart trouble but had been suffering from vague chest pains on and off and Mother made a doctor’s appointment for him. The doc gave him some pills and said he’d arrange for a specialist to see him as soon as possible. Dad kept forgetting to take the pills and then forgot to attend the hospital for the appointment. Three days later, he died. Now, what can I do for you?’
He had seated himself in the only other chair available in the room – the one behind the desk – and was smiling politely. He was good looking, fair-haired like his sister and, oddly, today they were both dressed in similar fashion: pale blue jeans – only his were rather dirty as though he had been kneeling on the ground – and pale cream sweaters. Were they twins?
‘Commander Rolt tells me that he was your boss.’
‘He sent you?’
‘He suggested we talk to you.’
‘May I see your ID?’
I handed it over and, after a quick glance, he gave it back. ‘Why?’
‘He was the senior police officer attacked while on a walking holiday in Somerset.’
‘What!’
‘He’s still in hospital but slowly on the mend. It’s thought whoever did it hoped to kill him.’
‘I’ll kill them,’ Ashley muttered.
You really must swap notes with Patrick, was the thought that immediately flitted through my mind, but I said, ‘The NCA has shortlisted three names of serious criminals being investigated by both us and F9. Initially, you see, we weren’t involved. But, due to circumstances, my husband, Patrick, has been given the case.’ I quickly explained what these were.
‘And the names?’ Ashley queried. ‘God, I can’t get over this. I must go and see him.’
I gave him the list, saying, ‘We showed this to him and he only picked out one, Matt Dorney.’
The man’s face hardened. ‘Son of Len Dorney. I cheered the day that little shit – sorry – died in prison.’
This was personal then. As a writer, I know enough about what makes people tick to realize that while working undercover Ashley must have suffered at the hands of this criminal. If I was his mother I would be glad he was out of it too.
Ashley handed back the list and said, ‘Dorney senior never went on a job personally. God knows what Matt does now. Len only broke his golden rule once and that was because I persuaded him to as he said he was going to retire afterwards. That’s when we arrested him, and then Rolt arranged for me to disappear. I sold my flat in London, got rid of the car I had and lived in a safe house for six months until the dust settled, during which time Rolt took me on as his personal assistant as I wasn’t fit after being shot. Then, a year later, my father died.’
‘Patrick’s thinking of doing the same sort of thing as you did to ferret Dorney out – go right undercover.’
‘He mustn’t! It’s too dangerous.’
‘We are talking about an ex-special operations soldier here.’
‘Nevertheless, it would be the death of him. I worked my way up the hard way – you have to, to be Dorney’s right-hand man. Going to prison with some of his boys convinced him that he could trust me. But Matt’s reputed to be brighter than he was – he probably won’t fall for that kind of deception. Word has it he only hires people he knows or who are recommended by mobster associates. Even then, he insists on constant updates of what’s going on when they’re on a job – he doesn’t trust anyone. He sold Len’s house near Well Street Common. No one can find out where he lives – he probably moves around all the time. We don’t even have a good mugshot of him, just a blurred photo when he was spotted leaving a strip club in Barking. It would be useless for identification purposes.’
‘What’s the name of this place?’
‘Not known. And I have an idea the person who took the picture’s dead – found dead.’
Which was discouraging, to put it mildly. ‘Could you identify Matt?’
‘Unfortunately not. But he might look like his old man.’
‘I rather think Patrick’s planning to set himself up as the boss of a new gang.’
‘What, with cops pretending to be his heavies?’ Ashley asked incredulously.
‘No, real villains.’
‘Can he do that?’
I knew exactly what he meant. ‘Oh, yes, my husband would make a wonderful mobster.’
‘I’d like to meet him.’
‘That’s easy. Come to Bath to see Rolt and I’ll arrange it.’
We spoke for a little longer, then, having said goodbye to Mrs Ashley and Thea, I left.
Hopefully, this would be a man thing.
I was not ignoring the dangerous implications, however, and was hoping that Patrick would consider other tactics. On some previous occasions, when he had initially been determined to go for the no-holds-barred option and I had suggested a different approach, he had come to agree with me. The more I thought about this latest project and my writer’s imagination kicked in with all kinds of ghastly scenarios, the more alarmed I became.
‘You can relax,’ Patrick said when he came home the following evening and, not for the first time, I had voiced my reservations. ‘Greenway, he say no.’
‘Oh. Did he give his reasons?’
‘He said he couldn’t authorize anything like that and he’d get it in the neck from those on high if it all went wrong.’
‘Like all the wrong kind of funerals – yours, for example.’
‘That too.’
‘You could modify your plans.’
‘Yes, I’m working on it.’
I decided to worry about that another time and said, ‘Piers Ashley rang. He’s visiting Rolt tomorrow. Discuss it with him.’
‘Have you fixed up anything?’
‘Yes, I’ve invited him to join us for an evening meal at the pub. He’s staying overnight in Bath.’
Patrick poured himself a tot of whisky and turned to me with a sly grin. ‘You quite fancy him, don’t you?’
‘I can’t imagine what would have led you to think that,’ I replied coolly.
‘You have a little smile on your face when you mention him.’
‘I always fancy good-looking men, including you – sometimes.’
Piers Ashley had arrived before the arranged time and rose and came towards us when he recognized me. He had been sitting on a seat on the village green that fronted the Ring o’ Bells and which we have to cross in order to reach it unless we use a surrounding lane. The rain had finally cleared away and it was a fine, if chilly, evening and very quiet, the only sounds being an occasional car on the nearby road and rooks cawing in the large oak tree to the rear of the old inn.
I introduced Patrick and the two shook hands.
‘I understand you intend to turn yourself into a mobster,’ Ashley said to him as we approached the pub.
‘I’ve done it before,’ Patrick replied. ‘More than once.’
‘Do you have official backing?’
‘No, not right now.’
‘You don’t make it sound as though that’s too much of a problem.’
‘I’ll try to talk him round.’
When we had settled in the lounge bar – our table was booked for a little later – and the men had acquainted themselves with their pints of bitter, Ashley said, ‘One thing I must point out is that I worked hard at this to earn credentials with Dorney. I went with his gang on jobs, drove getaway cars, was sent to prison, got beaten up on his orders if he thought I wasn’t giving him the respect he deserved. You haven’t the time to take months out to do that, even if you wanted to.’
Patrick smiled and said, ‘How did you get him to take you on in the first place?’
‘I lived rough, and I mean rough, for a while, hung around where I knew he could sometimes be found. Word from snouts was that he recruited from a certain pub in Dalston. When I finally came upon him he was looking for bruisers and, as by that time I looked like one, he took me on. I had to prove myself, go with witnesses and beat up someone, which I did.’
‘Who?’ I asked, really, really needing to know.
‘A rival drug dealer who was refusing to get out of what Dorney regarded as his manor. It wasn’t difficult as I happened to know that he was recruiting children and vulnerable people who he issued with mobiles to act as runners to look out for those who wanted drugs. I made sure, though, that F9 scooped him up later from where I’d dumped him.’
‘Tell me about this manor,’ Patrick said. ‘I take it Matt’s inherited it, if that’s the right word.’
‘It’s in Hackney, east London. I wrote down the details.’ He took a piece of paper from his wallet and consulted it. ‘It’s an area of around twelve square miles, roughly bounded by Graham Road – the A1207, to the north and the Regent’s Canal to the south. Queensbridge Road, the B108, bounds it to the west and Mare Street, the A107, to the east. It’s a sort of upright rectangle.’
‘May I have that?’
‘Of course.’ Ashley passed it over. ‘Len used to have what he called his office over a shop in Mare Street which was a Chinese takeaway when I was first on the job. He reckoned that a business that purported on a brass plate by the door to be a distributor of educational videos wouldn’t attract many casual callers. He installed plenty of lookouts, though – no one ever took him unawares. But that’s history – nothing’s the same now as someone firebombed the takeaway one night, destroying a good proportion of the row of shops as well. Initially, a charred body found roughly at the seat of the fire was thought to be Len’s but it turned out not to be. We never found out who it was.’
‘I understand Matt Dorney brags that he can arrange to have anyone taken out as long as the money’s right. Is that just a lot of hot air?’
‘No, apparently it isn’t. He also said – joked, probably – that he would set up a website and call it murders dot com.’
I wondered how he knew that.
‘Who does he use to do the dirty work?’ Patrick went on to ask.
‘No idea. Several hitmen, probably. He might hire from abroad, they pose as tourists and go home afterwards.’
Patrick held up his empty tankard. ‘Another?’
‘Better not, I’m driving.’
I said, ‘I know it’s a bit obvious to say this but the key to this is to discover exactly who tried to kill the commander. Was it the work of someone not actually part of Matt Dorney’s set-up but hired – if indeed Dorney’s really behind it? Has whoever it is left the country? Have they been paid? Hardly any details have appeared in the media so Dorney will have no proof as to whether they succeeded or failed.’
Thoughtfully, Patrick said, ‘The hitman, or men – Rolt thinks there were three of them – wouldn’t have known initially that they’d failed but will have gone to collect their money anyway. Or does he pay for jobs upfront?’
‘No idea, but Len never did and always wanted proof before he handed over the money.’
‘Suppose someone turns up and shows him a picture of Rolt as large as life in hospital. That someone could offer to track down the failed hitmen and, if the money had been paid, get it back or even volunteer to do the job properly.’
‘And if Dorney says in believable fashion that he had nothing to do with it?’ Ashley queried.
‘Plan B.’
‘Which is?’
‘I’ll think of something.’
‘You’ll have to find him first.’
When he worked for MI5, Patrick had carte blanche, but these days he’s a police officer so has no choice but to get permission for what he wants to do. As a courtesy, he first consulted James Carrick, as it was his case. But the DCI, or rather the husky wreck on the other end of the phone that Joanna insisted was her husband, confessed to not being in any fit state to even make useful suggestions. Having a jaundiced view of chasing it through Avon and Somerset’s HQ, being embedded in the force or not, Patrick came to the conclusion that there was nothing for it but to get the train to London early the next morning to tackle Michael Greenway face-to-face. I was requested to go along to exert a little charm.
‘Mike isn’t at all susceptible to charm,’ I argued in vain.
During the journey, Patrick was very quiet, perhaps working out his strategy with Greenway. In my mind, I kept going through what we knew already. Nothing had been found either on or inside Commander Rolt’s car that would provide evidence in connection with the attack on him. No one had tried to break into it even though he had left his rucksack on the back seat. So it had been decided that after he had been given what personal possessions he needed from it, the vehicle would be taken to F9’s HQ for safekeeping. Rolt didn’t want it to be parked where he lived, a townhouse in Woodford Green, but kept the reasons behind this to himself. Not wishing local attention to be drawn to it and start tongues wagging, perhaps. I had an idea he went out in the mornings giving every impression of working in the City.
‘I find very alarming the suspicion that Rolt was followed when he went on holiday,’ Patrick said as we entered the NCA building. ‘The location of F9’s HQ is practically a state secret – I don’t know exactly where it is – and his private address is kept quiet too. How did they locate him and know what he was going to do?’
‘I can’t believe it was just a casual mugging either,’ I said. ‘It was a filthy day and someone could have waited up there for a victim until they died of exposure. Nothing was stolen, was it?’
‘No, not even the money in his wallet, although it must be borne in mind his wallet was in a concealed pocket.’
‘Which is surprising as one would have thought that in order to avert suspicion from themselves they’d have tried to make it look like a mugging carried out by local yobs.’
‘They might be stupid. And we must face the possibility that everyone’s completely wrong about Matt Dorney being responsible. There’s absolutely no evidence yet to connect him with the crime. The case was only raised as a priority because of Rolt’s position and because the commander’s fairly sure Dorney was behind it, so he’s the chief suspect. That line of enquiry might be a complete waste of time.’
‘But Dorney is on the Met’s Most Wanted list,’ I reminded him. ‘He needs to be grabbed anyway.’
‘Good point.’
Greenway was in a meeting and we had to wait in the corridor outside his office. Patrick endeavoured to access the one he had used when he worked there but someone else had it now, a small detail that I think finally drove home to him that he was now outside the heart of the organization.
‘This looks like a deputation,’ Greenway said when he finally turned up and went into his room, momentarily out of our sight. There was a crash as he must have dropped the files he was carrying into a tray on his desk. He reappeared and glanced at his watch. ‘Lunch. Please join me.’
An hour later, Patrick was no closer to getting what he wanted, despite having presented his case persuasively. This investigation, Greenway insisted, would be handled using established police methods and protocols. There would be no ‘iffy’ contrivances, schemes or intrigues.
‘Evidence,’ the commander said, not for the first time. ‘There aren’t any leads at all yet to connect Matt Dorney to the crime and Rolt’s theories can’t be used as the basis for our investigation. We can’t be seen to be using his department’s unorthodox methods.’
‘Why not?’ I asked before Patrick could react in a more robust fashion.
Greenway put his coffee cup back in the saucer with a loud clatter. A big man, he tends to be noisy anyway. ‘Because while what Rolt does is perfectly acceptable in a small way, you have to be careful that it doesn’t get out of hand so everyone wants to give it a try. It simply can’t be allowed to replace careful and accurate conventional policing. Not only that, think of the fallout if Patrick was hurt or even killed.’
Shortly afterwards, we thanked him for lunch and left him finishing his coffee.
‘No gunpowder, treason and plot,’ Patrick muttered when we were outside. ‘What did you make of it?’
‘He doesn’t approve of F9 and gives the impression that he doesn’t like Rolt much either. Is Rolt senior to him in some kind of way?’
‘Only in the sense that he’s more highly thought of. F9 was the brainchild of an extremely senior Met officer who’s dead now but had connections with what I’ll call the right people. I’ve been told that Rolt has connections with the right people. Mike’s worked his way up and has succeeded because he’s damned good at what he does, but that’s it. It’s unfair on him but I think the answer to the question is yes, and, as you yourself said, Rolt’s royalty. Mike resents it and is determined to carry out the investigation meticulously, with none of my previous loose cannon stuff.’
Although I basically approved of the commander’s thinking, it did sound like male point-scoring. I said, ‘So, on the one hand he’s saying he wants progress and on the other insisting that you don’t do it in the way that’s been so successful in the past.’
‘Any references to rocks and hard places right now will have me chucking myself off the Shard,’ Patrick replied absently. ‘What does the oracle think?’
‘I’ve told you what the oracle thinks. Your wife thinks exactly the same – that you shouldn’t necessarily follow your instincts. You wanted the potentially safer West Country job for your family’s sake. You can’t have it both ways, either.’
He flagged down a taxi. ‘Shall we stay the night and think about it?’
We didn’t. A little later, Patrick got a call from Acting Detective Inspector Lynn Outhwaite to say that two men had been found hanged in the wood near where Rolt was attacked.
The bodies were still in situ, the area cordoned off, scenes-of-crime personnel in their protective clothing moving about beneath the trees, the normal dimness banished by rigged-up lights. A pathologist had already taken a quick look at the corpses and his first impression, he had told Lynn, was that the men had been alive immediately before being strung up – in other words, someone had not merely hung up dead bodies. Also, in his view, they had put up a fight either shortly before this occurred or at some time previous to that. Obviously, he would know more when he performed the post-mortems.
‘It looks as though they might have driven up in some kind of 4x4,’ Lynn said. ‘Which, of course, we’ve all had to do.’
‘Obliterating any other tyre tracks,’ Patrick observed, gazing around at the various vehicles.
‘Surely you didn’t expect everyone to walk,’ she countered, brittle with nerves in the face of so much responsibility having been thrust upon her.
Patrick placed a conciliatory hand on her arm. ‘No, we drove up too. I’m just thinking aloud.’
‘Not exactly the kind of place where there would have been many witnesses.’
‘Probably just as well or they might have ended up dead too.’
‘Surely this is connected with the attack on Commander Rolt.’
‘It would be an amazing coincidence if it wasn’t. Two serious crimes committed in the same fairly remote vicinity in the space of just a few weeks? Do we have any idea yet who they were?’
Lynn shook her head. ‘Not with faces like that.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I’ve never seen anyone who’s been hanged before.’
Gently, Patrick said, ‘Seeing that there’s every chance of a connection with the Rolt case, which appears to have landed in my lap, would you like me to carry on here?’
She gave him a grateful smile. ‘I’ve a serious rape and a couple of break-ins to deal with back at base.’
When she had gone, he said to me, ‘You do realize that I’ve never been in charge of a murder inquiry before. Just as well I attended a really boring lecture about procedures recently. Will you do something for me?’
‘Of course.’
‘Skirt the cordoned-off bit and take a look to see if there are any tyre tracks in the field on the far side.’
In the failing light and glad that we keep boots in the car, I made my way through the trees and wandered around the field, which was still just down to the stubble of the harvested cereal crop, being careful not to tread on anything that might turn out to be evidence. There were plenty of footprints from dog-walkers and ramblers in the damp ground and an even greater number of hoof-prints. A series of tracks, coming and going, led towards the centre of the field. I abandoned following up those when I belatedly realized that that was where the rescue helicopter had landed when I found Rolt. There were also the cloven hoof-marks made by a cow, an escapee perhaps, and those of deer. I found no vehicle tracks until I widened my search and then came upon tyre marks made by something with a very narrow wheelbase, possibly a quad bike. There appeared to be two sets. Two quad bikes, two journeys or, come to think of it, four trials bikes? Walking well to the side of them, I went downhill and eventually discovered that they led to the gate at the bottom. Perhaps this was nothing more sinister than the farmer inspecting his land on more than one occasion recently. I retraced my footsteps and found that the tracks went very wide before becoming lost in the rough vegetation on the edge of the wood. Some of the tyre marks, I reasoned, might have been made during a return journey. What I needed was someone good at tracking.
By this time Patrick was clad in an anti-contamination suit, inspecting the bodies. I had no wish to do that so called to him from the edge of the taped-off area. He waved and said he wouldn’t be very long.
‘It might be absolutely nothing important,’ I said when he joined me about five minutes later.
I waited – one set of footsteps less to confuse any further investigations – while he walked around the area I had indicated, pausing now and again and finally doing as I had done, going down the field to the gate. He took what seemed a very long time over it and I began to shiver in the chilly north-easterly breeze.
He came back. ‘Two quad bikes, both quite heavily loaded on the way up but with a lighter load on the way back. Can you see if they were parked up here?’
‘It’s just a mass of rough grass and squashed greenery near where people and animals go through the gap in the fence,’ I told him.
‘They were left here for a while,’ Patrick said, having bent down to take a closer look. ‘One has a bit of an oil leak. We need an expert to look at this but not today – it’ll be dark soon. I’ll ask them to cordon off this area as well.’
‘It might be worth asking Colin Reed, the farmer, before you do anything,’ I suggested.
‘Good idea. I made a note of his number.’
We quickly found out that, early that morning, Reed had discovered his two quad bikes were missing but they had been found on the edge of the wood at around eight thirty a.m. by a neighbour walking his dog. He and his son had ridden them home. There was no apparent damage so he hadn’t reported the incident to the police.
‘Young tearaways, no doubt,’ Reed had concluded dismissively.
He was told that the machines, plus the clothes he and his son had been wearing, would be taken away and sent to a forensics laboratory.