Paddy said, ‘What do I do now?’
‘Now you go back to work, you keep your head down, your mouth shut and you try and keep it legal. If I need your help, I may ask for it, or you may never hear from me again. Depends.’
‘What about the photo?’
‘It remains in play until this is done. But you’ve cooperated, and I’m a man of my word.’
‘And what about when the Millers kill you, what happens to the photo then?’
‘Then I’m afraid it gets released, so you better keep your fingers crossed.’
‘That’s not really fair. I’m helping you and—’
‘Paddy. Fair doesn’t come into it. You’re a murderer. Consider yourself lucky I don’t send this off the minute you walk out of here.’
That said, the minute he walked out of there, I did send it off. It went to DS Hood by SMS, identifying who Paddy was and what it showed and who took it and what their address was. I couldn’t see the benefit of holding on to it, and if Hood and his boss took it seriously, they would hopefully stop hassling me over Bobby’s whereabouts. Plus, I didn’t trust Paddy. I was pretty sure he’d think I was bluffing about having the photo primed for release in the event of anything happening to me. He’d take his chance when he could, so the sooner he was off the streets, the better.
Paddy was a killer, but he was still just a low-level thug following orders. Satisfied that he’d given up everything he could, I told him to go and he sloped off. I sat on, finishing my tea and the other bun. I did two tours of the House of Fraser, up and down the escalators, to make sure he wasn’t following me. I didn’t spot him, though I did spy a couple of rather nice jerseys. Then I checked myself in the mirror and discovered that I’d turned sixty-five overnight. I returned to Victoria Square’s vast and well-lit underground car park. Nevertheless, things tend to happen in car parks. Mostly in the movies, admittedly, but it feeds into your being. I was jumpy. Any movement, any noise, and my heart went off like a car alarm. I couldn’t find my car. I was searching for it for fifteen minutes before I remembered I wasn’t in my own, but Patricia’s. By the time I located it, the only person following me about was a security guard with suspicions. Luckily, he wasn’t from Malone.
Underneath the wipers: a piece of paper.
Face down, something written underneath.
I looked around me again. The security guard had vanished as soon as I beeped the alarm, but with floodlights there are still shadows; there are still pillars to shield the presence of an assassin, cars to duck down behind. I lay flat, checking for a car bomb, and under the surrounding vehicles for evidence of feet or knees.
All clear.
I thought: it’ll be a swastika.
I carefully removed the paper, using the tip of my thumb and forefinger; thinking about prints.
The paper said: Hollister – Spring Sale Now On. I said out loud: Tit.
I phoned Malone Security and asked for Derek Beattie. I was told I was being put through. I hung up. My plan was to follow him home and use the Xbox gun to force my way in for a chat over a cup of tea and HobNobs. I even had the HobNobs, though if I sat for much longer outside his office, I might not. As time wore on and the staff left in dribs and drabs, and the company cars with their nifty logos went too, it became clear that he wasn’t going anywhere soon. The security business is necessarily around the clock; someone is always on call to deal with emergencies. They probably didn’t have to stay in the office to do it, and it didn’t need to be anyone as senior as Derek Beattie, but whatever way it was working, pretty soon there was only one car in the car park, and one light on in the whole building. The car was a black Jaguar of 2011 vintage. I deduced that it was his. The solitary light was on upstairs in a corner office.
I listened to the seven p.m. news on Cityscape FM. There was no fresh violence to report. It might be the calm before the storm, or there might be no storm. I started the car and drove the few hundred metres to the Malone HQ. There were no security gates to stop me entering their car park. There was, however, a security grille and a camera over the front door, which was locked. There was no reason to think that Derek would know what I looked like, or even who I was, but I didn’t want to take the chance of him coming to the door and recognising me before he opened up. Instead I crossed to his car, stood by the driver’s window and cracked it once with the butt of the gun. Immediately the alarm began to sound. I stepped back into the shadow of the building. After about thirty seconds the alarm stopped. I had not thought about the possibility that he could stand at his office window and click it off without having to leave the building.
I gave it another minute, then ventured out into the car park and looked up at his window. No sign of him. I returned to his car and this time put the butt through the glass; I moved sharply back under cover as the alarm erupted anew. Again it was switched off from above, but this time a light came on behind the front door, and a few moments later it opened and Derek Beattie emerged, slightly breathless, in an open-neck shirt and with his sleeves rolled up. His eyes were fixed on the car, at least until I held out the gun and said, ‘Mr Beattie?’
He saw the gun, he saw me. He said, ‘Don’t kill me.’
‘Back inside, then.’
He went into reverse. I followed. I pushed the door closed behind me and locked it. He turned and led the way upstairs into a dark outer office and then continued through it to his own.
He stood, awkwardly. I said, ‘Take a seat.’
He looked at his own chair, and then at me, for approval. Not many people ever looked at me for approval for anything. It might have been the intense look in my eyes or the grim set of my jaw. But it was probably the gun. I nodded. He sat.
There was a chair opposite, for clients; smaller, less comfortable. I didn’t mind. It still felt like I had the upper hand.
‘So,’ I said, ‘how’s it hangin’?’
‘It . . . Fine . . .’
‘Good. It’s looking a bit like rain,’ I said.
‘Just take what you want and go. Shoot me in the leg. Or arm. I was in the military, so I know a little about first aid, I can deal with an arm or a leg until the ambulance gets here, but there’s no need to kill me.’
If he’d been in the army, he’d once been fit. This was no longer the case. He was badly overweight. His chin had disappeared in a sea of fat, making it look as if he had swallowed his own neck.
He said, ‘I knew this day would come, I warned them, and they said, who ever robbed a security company?’
‘This isn’t a robbery,’ I said. ‘What is there to take, apart from stationery?’
‘Oh Christ,’ he said. There was sweat cascading down his face. Given his weight, he was probably always pretty damp. ‘Please. There’s no need. I know it’s all about sending messages, but I have a wife and three young kids. What’s to gain? I won’t say a word. Swear to God. Look, I’ll show you where it is, you won’t have to mess around with taking the safe or torturing me for the combination, just let me show you where it is, take what you want.’
‘This isn’t a robbery,’ I said again. ‘I just—’
‘No, look, please . . . Christ . . . just come with me.’
He got up. He took it as a positive sign when I didn’t immediately shoot him. He came out from behind his desk and moved crab-like to a door on his left. He paused with his hand on the knob and looked to me for approval. I nodded. It opened outwards. I stood so that I could see round the door. Inside there was a small room with a large safe. It probably weighed more than a ton. Like something you would get in a bank. A small bank. Smaller than the Allied Irish, but larger than the Piggy.
He said, ‘It looks impressive, but most of its functions we don’t utilise. There’s a timer, but there’s no need for it, we’re a twenty-four-hour operation, you can’t be having to hang around for seven hours when there’s a customer waiting. Look – it’s easy to open . . .’
He flicked switches and turned dials. He began to open the door.
I said, ‘Easy there,’ in case he reached inside and produced something that could Top Trump my revolver.
His hand was shaking. He said, ‘Of course, of course . . .’ He stood back a little, so that he was fully behind the door, and then slowly drew it back towards him.
The first thing I noticed was a little light coming on, like in a fridge. I’d never thought about that before. But it made sense.
It was good to throw some light on the subject.
Some light on the cash, which sat on shelves in the upper half, neatly stacked in a dozen columns.
‘One million, two hundred and twenty-three thousand, two hundred and forty-five pounds, plus change.’
I nodded.
‘And what about that?’
On the floor of the safe there were three uneven columns of six flat whitish bricks, kind of in the shape of the floats I used to use in the local pool. Each was sealed in tight transparent plastic; on the top ‘floater’ in each column there was something akin to an identifying logo or seal: in this case, the image of a scorpion.
‘How much is the coke worth?’ I asked.
‘About the same.’
I said, ‘Now it’s a robbery.’