Catalyst (42 page)

Both men were silent for a while, but with the tense atmosphere persisting. Tom eventually got to his feet.

“Best get going,” he said, and left the room with neither man bothering to say goodbye.

He walked back to Jackie's office in Portcullis House. She was sitting with her back to the door swinging back and forth through a semicircle on her tilt-and-swivel, obviously deep in thought.

“Jackie, are you alright?”

She swung fully round to face him.

“Oh, hi, Tom,” she said, “Sorry to rush out like that, but that smug bastard was really getting to me.”

“You caught him off guard today, though, Jackie,” said Tom, smiling. “I think for a moment he considered tending his own resignation.”

Jackie laughed.

“No, not even for a split second. But I admit to having enjoyed not simpering along and slinking out backwards, curtsying all the way. And do you know something – I don't give a shit what he does; I don't trust him one iota any more. Because I'm certain I know where the leak came from. I mean, this works perfectly doesn't it – and it wouldn't be the first – or last – time it's been done. Leak something controversial and wait, with a prepared denial, for a reaction. Then tear it up if everyone likes what they hear.

“It has to be him, doesn't it?” Jackie went on. “He actually said in there, didn't he – ‘I don't believe it's either of you' – or something like that. He wouldn't say that if he didn't know who
has
leaked it. I mean, who knows about this stuff – in that sort of detail? You, me and Andrew – oh, and Grace Goody. No-one else. And what you also need, for the plan to work, is a scapegoat if it goes wrong – a fall guy. Or a fall girl in this case. He's not going to sacrifice you, is he? And Grace just isn't a big enough meal to feed to the vultures… ”

“Well,” said Tom, astonished at her perceptiveness and firming up his loyalties, “we're a team, Jackie, and in team sports, all the members get relegated together. So he can have a fall-couple this time.”

Jackie beamed a smile at him.

“Why, Tom,” she said, mimicking his recent words to her, “what a lovely thing to say.”

CHAPTER 15

Joaquin Enderby turned up at his house at 6.00 pm that evening as if he had never been away. He knocked on the front door, which was opened by Winston. The boy walked into the living room, seating himself on the sofa and picking up the remote from the floor in front of where his father had been sitting. His parents stood together in the doorway watching him for several minutes in silence as he flipped through the channels without saying another word.

Mary phoned the police before sitting next to her son on the sofa.

“Are you hungry, love?” she said.

“Starving,” said the boy.

“What would you like?”

“Fish fingers and chips,” he said.

“Fish fingers and chips –
what
?” asked his father.

“Fish fingers and chips, please,” said Joaquin.

“Good boy,” said Winston. He looked across at Mary with a wide smile.

Jo arrived fifteen minutes later with Geoff Drury and Judy Standitch, a Care Liaison Officer. Joaquin was seated on the sofa with Winston's arm around him. They were watching some sort of game show, just as if it was what they did every evening at this time.

Twenty minutes later, the three officers left, deciding to postpone questioning the boy until the following day. Joaquin had already fallen asleep in his father's arms.

“We'll be here at nine o'clock in the morning,” said Jo. “But I think it's only fair to tell you this, Mary, Joaquin will have to be taken from you for a while, to undergo psychiatric assessment; to see what can be done to help him. I hope it won't be for long.”

Tearfully, Mary saw them out.

As they drove away, Jo sighed and shook her head. “That's just about the cutest cold-blooded killer I've ever seen,” she said.

Stopping in a lay-by ten minutes from home, Tom sent Mags a text to let her know of his imminent arrival. For a full five days now, in the wake of the revelation about Jad, the subject of their discord had not been mentioned. Perhaps, he thought, they had put that behind them. Perhaps Mags was prepared to moderate her opposition to his work for the benefit of their personal relationship; and the leak to the press would have no effect one way or the other.

The previous two evenings that same text message had prompted her appearance on the steps in front of the house as he pulled in through the gates. Today she was conspicuously absent. He put his car away in the garage – something he rarely did these days – to give her a bit more time to emerge, just in case she had simply mistimed her coming out of the house. He went in, making more than sufficient noise to announce his arrival.

“Mags!” he shouted. “Daddy's home! Mags are you okay; where are you?”

“In here.” The flat statement came from just a few yards away in the front room –
their
front room. Tom went in. Mags was sitting at one of the chairs in the window with her back to him; she didn't turn round.

Tom kept trying.

“Hide and seek, eh? How exciting.”

“Have you read this?” Mags said, without changing her position, but raising the folded paper above her head for him to see.

“Well, no… ”

“But of course, you don't need to, do you, because you wrote it.”

“No I didn't actually; Harriet Bradley wrote it,” said Tom, referring to the name of the reporter.

“But it's yours, isn't it?”

“It's a rather tabloid-ish attempt to trivialise a great deal of very serious work with which I have been involved, if that's what you mean,” he replied.

“Did you leak it?” asked Mags

“Of course I didn't,” he said, but with no indignation, which Mags was quick to pick up on.

“But you knew it was going to be leaked.” Mags's voice was quiet, almost a whisper, and all the more threatening for it, like a stealth attack which carries insufficient impetus to meet it decisively head-on. He sat down in the chair next to hers and tried to look into her face. She turned away, avoiding any chance of eye contact.

“Mags… darling,” he said. “You knew I was working on this. You've known for weeks, months. I thought we'd reached a sort of truce; accepting our differences. Don't tell me you haven't enjoyed the past few days as much as I have. Why has that got to change?”

She sprang to her feet, taking a few steps away from him and then spinning round to face him from the centre of the room.

“Because this is obscene!” she said, hurling the paper at him. “I can't believe you're planning to put kids away for ever, when they haven't even committed a crime. Or perhaps I've read that wrong – five or six times! You want to turn this country into a police state, for God's sake! Well, I'm not voting for you and I'll never vote for you again. And I'll make sure that everyone
knows
your wife is not voting for you! I can't believe it! Inserting bombs into people that you can activate by remote control – that's right isn't it?”

Mags was going red with rage, shouting almost hysterically at him.

“That's absolutely
wrong,
in fact!” he yelled back. “And I'd really like to know where you got that from. You've had access to all this stuff all the time I've been working on it. It wouldn't surprise me if it was
you
who leaked this!”

Mags was shocked at the accusation; it seemed to stabilise her for a moment.

“Oh don't be ridiculous! Why would I do that?”

“I don't know,” said Tom. “Maybe because you think everyone out there thinks like you do. To try and disgrace me, or something.”

“Thanks very much,” sneered Mags. “That's what you think of me, is it?”

“Jesus Christ! You just said you're going to tell everyone on the fucking planet that you're never going to vote for me again. Is that supposed to be a public demonstration of marital solidarity?”

Mags didn't speak. Tom went on.

“You didn't say what a bastard Jad was when he said all this stuff. He's a bloody hero; George is a bloody hero; I'm a bloody barbarian! How does that work? Andrew thinks… ”

“Oh, let's not talk about Andrew! If it was eighty years ago in another country, he'd be dressed from head to foot in black leather and goose-stepping to work in jackboots! I thought you were a notch or two better than that! I just can't see what you can possibly achieve with these… well, you said it – barbaric tactics; other than alienating a whole generation of innocents!”

“
Innocents!
There's that fucking word again! Bloody hell, Mags, you only ever read or hear the bits that add to your case, don't you? We're talking about the really,
really
, bad few that contaminate the vast,
vast,
good majority who are, at the moment, too scared not to follow them. We're trying to
save
a generation, if you'd only open your eyes and ears. And seeing as you've asked the question, what we – and I mean me, John Alexander Deverall, the recently widowed George Holland – whose wife was brutally murdered by a group of your
innocents
– and similar heathens – what
we
want to achieve is a world where the bad guys are scared of the police and not the other way round. And if that's a police state, then bring it on!”

Mags turned away from him, making to leave the room.

“Listen, Mags,” said Tom his voice softer now, “if the reaction to this is adverse, then I'll drop it. If the public throw their arms up in horror, like you, then I'll resign – do something else, help you with the business, whatever. I only want to do this because I honestly believe it's what people want. If I'm wrong then that's an end to it. That's a promise. You and I are more important than anything.”

Mags had stopped. She turned back to face him.

“And what if the reaction
isn't
adverse, as you put it? What if everyone – or the vast majority – go for it? What then?”

Tom hesitated.

“Then I'd have to go ahead with it,” he said.

“I see,” said Mags, quietly again. “So just let me get this right. We – you and I – are more important than
anything
. But that's only if people don't support your proposals. If they do, then you'll put the feelings of the electorate before those of your wife, and, presumably, in such a case, you and I are
not
more important than anything.”

Tom sighed; that was exactly the message he had just delivered.

“So basically,” she went on, “whether or not our relationship survives will be decided by the voting public. I suppose I should feel privileged that our future is important enough to be the subject of a national referendum. But, for some reason, I don't feel that way at all.”

He watched her leave the room, not knowing what to say.

David Gerrard was raging around his office at Parkside like a wild bull. It was 9.05 am and he had just taken a call from Jo, who had informed him that the Enderbys were not at home, and their car, a blue Renault Clio, was missing from the close outside.

“Bloody brilliant!” he had yelled down the phone. “We told them they were about to lose their little boy, and then buggered off home and went to bed! Why in Christ's name didn't we leave someone watching the bloody house?”

Jo pulled the car into Long Beach, with Geoff calling out directions from the map of the site to get them to Mary's sister's caravan. Judy Standitch was in the back. There was no sign of the blue Clio outside and no-one was inside the caravan itself. The people next door said they'd arrived very late last night but had left again by the time they had got up.

Jo phoned David.

“Suggest you check Shoeton Point,” he said. He was calmer now. “Mary said Winston had a job there and did some fishing. Get out there.”