‘That you, Manon?’
Her breath catches in her throat to hear that voice. Can it possibly be? Why now? Perhaps she has a sixth sense for Manon’s heartbreak. She did when they were little.
‘Hello.’
‘I’m … I’m sorry to ring out of the blue like this.’
‘No, no.’
‘Is it a bad time?’
‘Um, well, I’m at work, in the toilets, actually. You might hear the echo.’
She pulls at some of the rough oblong towels, jabs at the tears at the rim of her eye and a corner of the towel pokes her eyeball. She bends over double, blinking and rubbing. The phone is heating up her ear as if it’s radioactive.
It wasn’t just that Ellie’s truce with Una had been a treachery too far; their rift was the calcification of years of rivalry, layers of it hardening into silence over time. Small injuries, gathering; some success Ellie had at work, which Manon couldn’t swallow; or a fabulous boyfriend; or even just a nice holiday she didn’t want to hear about. They stopped calling and then, much sooner than Manon expected, it became too hard to call. Their mother would have banged their heads together: ‘I don’t care about any awkwardness’ and ‘Get over yourselves, for God’s sake’, which would only have made it worse. But their mother is dead, their father all the way in Scotland, which might as well be Canada, Una having subsumed him like some mollusc who crept over the top of him until he disappeared.
‘How’ve you been?’ says Ellie.
‘Oh, you know …’
‘No. I don’t. It’s been three years.’
‘And that’s my fault, is it?’
Ellie sighs. ‘It doesn’t matter, does it? I’m ringing to tell you something important. I’ve had a baby. A boy. He’s three months now. Solomon. Well, we call him Solly.’
‘A baby? You’ve had a baby?’ The blood drains from Manon’s head. She nods distractedly at Kim, who is edging into a toilet cubicle. ‘Are you … Where are you living?’
‘In London. Kilburn.’
‘Wow. That’s … terrific news.’
‘Yes. I wanted you to know, Manon. In case you … Well, perhaps you’ll come up some time. Meet your nephew.’
She pictures herself the prickly pear, lonely visitor to the pink paradise of family life in Kilburn. The park and the swings and Sunday roasts so newly lost to her. Wrinkled aunt.
‘Well, it’s quite busy in MIT right now.’
‘Yes, of course. Must be. You must be a DCI by now.’
‘Not quite.’
‘I better go. Solly’s waking up. We’ve got Baby Bounce at the library this afternoon.’
Manon is so jealous she cannot speak. Envy is physical, the sensation of it: difficulty swallowing, a pain around the temples, panic, and wanting to flee the source.
‘OK, well, nice to talk to you,’ she says. ‘Bye.’
She takes more towels from the dispenser, knowing the tears will come again. Oh, but she loves Ellie, loves her so deeply, and now they have come to this – the slights embedding themselves into wounds and no one to knock their heads together except their better selves, which seem always to be in abeyance, held hostage by meaner feelings. On top of her jealousy, in a nauseous wave, comes guilt. My sister with a baby and no mother to help. My sister who I love, my love killed by jealousy. My sister who I hate for having everything I haven’t got. It is impossible to be Manon Bradshaw.
Everything is broken and she starts to cry, as Kim emerges from her cubicle to the sounds of a fulsome flush. Did Kim hear the word ‘unimaginative’ at Cromwell’s on Friday? Or is Manon blanching just at the thought?
They nod at each other silently, neither mentioning Manon’s tears nor her outburst in the bar.
Back at her desk, she calls Will Carter on the landline.
‘When did Edith first toy with the idea of criminology?’
‘Summer 2009. After we graduated, none of us – well, practically none of us – knew what to do next. She decided to do a kind of work experience with the CIC – these interviews in Whitemoor – to see if it would be something she’d like to take to postgrad level. I remember she was incredibly excited about that first visit to the prison, full of zeal about reform and education, ideas about teaching a prison course in feminist literature to make rapists explore the female experience.’
‘She talk much about Tony Wright?’
‘No, she never mentioned anyone by name. I think the visits ended almost as quickly as they began. I just remember that after a couple of trips to Whitemoor with the CIC, she became really demoralised. Said it was one of the saddest places she’d ever been in. No one treating anyone with a shred of humanity. And all these prisoners without hope and with nothing to do. She said it smelled of cabbage and bleach. She told me there was no interest in rehabilitation in prison. Just overcrowding, lack of money, and the problem of housing this jostling, violent pack of men who the state felt were uncontainable. She went to see Graham Garfield soon after and switched to an English PhD.’
‘So you weren’t aware of an ongoing relationship with Tony Wright? That Edith was visiting him?’
‘No,’ he says softly.
‘One more question, Will. Abdul-Ghani Khalil – do you know the name?’
‘The guy who’s just been arrested? The body in the container at Tilbury Docks? Of course, he’s all over the news.’
‘I wondered if Edith might have mentioned him to you.’
He is laughing.
‘Something funny, Mr Carter?’
‘You think she was part of a human trafficking ring? Nothing would surprise me about Edith any more.’ He sighs. ‘Look, I don’t know if she knew Abdul-Ghani whatever his name is. But I didn’t really know her at all, did I?’
No, you didn’t, Manon thinks, but her mind is snagged by the ringing of her replacement BlackBerry, which is scuttling across the desk with each vibration. ‘I’m going to have to go, Will, I’ve got another call coming in. Talk soon.’ She puts down the landline, picks up the mobile. ‘DS Manon Bradshaw,’ she says.
‘It’s DI Haverstock – remember me? Havers, Kilburn CID.’
‘Right, yeah, hi,’ she says, her voice a swell of impatience. She wants to interrogate the Wright–Khalil line, see whether it leads to Edith. She doesn’t want distractions.
‘I’ve got something on Taylor Dent,’ Havers is saying. ‘Turns out he had a second phone – for his various business dealings. We arrested one of his associates and he told us about it, gave us the number. Anyway, we’ve got all the data off it and there’s a voicemail you might want to listen to. We haven’t got a clue who it is, to be honest, so I’m forwarding it to people who might, even though it’s a long shot. Or would you rather I contact team two about this?’
‘No, no, I can look at it,’ she says, simultaneously typing into the police database. ‘Email the audio file over. M_Bradshaw@pcn.co.uk. Thanks.’ Then she throws her BlackBerry across the desk.
She pulls up the call data taken off Tony Wright’s phone after his arrest, highlights the numbers he called after speaking to Edith Hind – most of them dirty phones, PAYG, unregistered, no records attached.
She tries Bryony’s mobile but it goes straight to voicemail.
‘What?’ says Bri. ‘Can’t this wait?’
‘No, it can’t. Are you sitting in front of the Khalil file?’
‘I’m always sitting in front of the Khalil file. I’ve started calling my kids Abdul and Ghani.’
‘I just want to run these numbers past you. Ready?’
‘What’s this about?’
‘Tell you in a sec. Ready? Unknown-638.’
Silence as Bryony types into the HOLMES system.
‘Nope.’
‘OK, unknown-422.’
‘Nope,’ says Bryony. ‘Oh wait, hang on. Yes. That’s one of his. Well, one of his associates, who basically relayed messages to him.’
‘Bingo,’ says Manon. ‘Fucking love you, Bri.’
‘What? Tell me. What’s this about?’
‘Tony Wright made contact with Khalil shortly after speaking to Edith Hind. Khalil and Wright knew each other in Whitemoor. One more thing, Bri. Khalil was trafficking people through ports. Dover, Folkestone, Tilbury Docks.’
‘That’s right – goods containers and trucks boarding P&O Ferries mainly.’
‘And was he taking people the other way?’
‘What, you mean out of the country? Khalil would take anyone anywhere if the money was right. I think – and don’t quote me on this – that there’s always a drip feed the other way. Y’know, people going back, thinking the Continent might offer a better deal, but border control couldn’t care less about that flow so we don’t investigate it. Listen, hon, I’ve really got to go.’
‘Just one more thing,’ Manon says. ‘His drop-offs and pick-ups – did he operate in Cambridgeshire?’
‘Yup,’ says Bryony. ‘All up and down the eastern coastline – out of Felixstowe, across to the M11, down through Maidstone, and out of Dover. Should we be interrogating Khalil on this, asking if he knows anything about the Hind girl?’
‘Not yet,’ says Manon. ‘Gimme a bit more time.’
‘Right, look, I’ve really got to—’
‘Yes, yes, sorry. Thanks, love. Bye.’ Manon lays her phone down on the desk.
Her email box says one new message. She puts her headphones on and listens to the audio file.
After a sprint around MIT, she locates Harriet in Stanton’s office, sunken-eyed, clicking about at the computer. Manon is panting so hard, she almost can’t get the words out. Harriet looks up.
‘What is it?’
Is this a panic attack? Why won’t her words come out?
‘What, Manon? Speak.’
‘Audio file,’ she gasps. ‘Audio file.’ She is pointing at the computer.
Harriet opens up the email Manon has forwarded to her inbox and plays the audio file. She and Manon do not take their eyes off each other. The voice – patrician, superior, commanding. ‘Meet me at the usual place.’
‘It’s him,’ says Harriet.
‘I know,’ says Manon.
‘It’s fucking him,’ Harriet says. ‘What date was this recorded?’
‘Sunday eleventh of December.’
‘Right, I’m authorising an ANPR trace on his plates on Sunday eleventh of December. We need to link this Dent number back to him. I’ll bet he wasn’t using his normal mobile to make that call, so it’ll be a PAYG, paid for in cash. Let’s get a date and location for its purchase – Hampstead High Street, I’ll put money on it – and let’s get our voice experts matching this recording with the recordings of our interviews with him.’
‘Shouldn’t we run it past Stanton—’
‘Fuck Stanton.’