Gun Street Girl (15 page)

“Michael must have been dragged through the mud over here to some extent. The
Sunday World
?”

“Not as much as you'd think. Habsburg's eccentric lifestyle and notorious reputation captured most of the ink even here. It was his party. His house.”

“Were there criminal charges against Michael or this Habsburg bloke?” Crabbie asked.

“No criminal charges in the end, but Habsburg was rusticated and his reputation was destroyed. By leaving quietly and going home Kelly got the heat off himself. It was the smart move. Michael became a footnote. It was Habsburg the tabloids wanted,” Lawson explained.

“Michael must have had to go back for the inquest,” I said.

“Yes. But he testified the same day as Count Habsburg, so again the next day's papers were devoted to the German.”

Crabbie had grown silent and reflective. “It sounds like quite the scandal, but I don't see how it has anything to do with all of this,” he said at last.

“I looked through Michael's effects and sure enough he had a Round Table Club tie and membership card,” Lawson said.

“So?”

“Maybe he knew the identity of the mystery man? Maybe he knew who supplied Anastasia with the heroin?”

“But he was a good boy. He was quiet. Why kill him now?” I asked.

Lawson shrugged. “Because he knew too much? Because he was blackmailing someone? We're dealing with the elite here. The Round Table Club is the future establishment. Future prime ministers. Future foreign secretaries . . .”

I looked at Crabbie, but he seemed dubious. “There's no evidence of a conspiracy,” he said.

“The complete lack of evidence is the sure sign that the conspiracy is working,” I offered.

“That's what the nutters say,” Crabbie said.

“Sometimes the nutters can be right.”

“I suppose it's not impossible,” Crabbie conceded.

12: OVER THE WATER

Lawson, McCrabban, and myself attended Sylvie McNichol's autopsy in Belfast where the ME found a tiny piece of cotton wool in Sylvie's throat. He admitted that he might have missed it if he hadn't been looking for it. The cotton wool had been dipped in chloroform. Ergo Sylvie McNichol
had
been murdered, and murdered by a professional who had attempted to make it look like a suicide, but who had just got a little unlucky with the passengers'-side car window.

The next job at hand was to interview Deirdre Ferris, Sylvie's flatmate.

Deirdre was also a barmaid at the Whitecliff: twenty, fake tan, dyed black hair, five foot nothing, and not quite as sharp or as pretty as Sylvie. Deirdre was adamant that she knew zilch about Michael Kelly's death or what had happened to her flatmate.

We canvassed Sylvie's friends and neighbors. Sylvie had no debts, had not pissed off the paramilitaries, and had no suspicious ex-boyfriends. No stalkers, nothing in the RUC files.

Under further interrogation at the station Deirdre admitted that Sylvie had acted a little strangely after Michael Kelly's death. She'd made a couple of phone calls from random call boxes, she'd double-checked that the doors were locked at night.

I explained the whole situation to Chief Inspector McArthur and got Carrick CID excused from further riot duty until we had got to the bottom of the Michael Kelly/Sylvie McNichol case.

McCrabban didn't want to travel in “cattle round-up” season so I left him to pursue any local developments while Lawson and I travelled to Oxford to see whether there really could be some kind of conspiracy.

I picked up Lawson at his home and drove to Belfast Harbor Airport. I left the Beemer in the long-term car park and we got the British Midland flight to Birmingham International.

When we got through Arrivals a constable from Thames Valley Police CID was standing there holding up a sign that said “Daffy.”

“That'll be me,” I said.

“Constable Atkins. Thomas Atkins, Thames Valley Constabulary,” he replied.

“Tommy Atkins? You're having us on.”

“No.”

He looked all of nineteen. Younger than Lawson maybe. Skinny, tall, blond, with lifeless but not unintelligent blue eyes.

We shook hands. “Oh!” he cried. “Oh, hold on, I've got a present for you, from the Super, inter-service cooperation and all that. I left it in the café. Shit. Hang about. Hold on.”

He ran to the café and came back with a paper bag with a box in it.

“From the Super,” he said again.

It was a twenty-five-year-old bottle of Macallan.

“Nineteen sixty,” Atkins said appreciatively, and doing an awful Scottish accent he added: “If I was a drinker I'd definitely have a wee dram of that.”

“Tell the Superintendent thanks,” I said.

“Oh, I will. He knew you'd like it. ‘Those RUC boys will love this,' his very words.”

While we waited at the luggage carousel Atkins went off to find a pay phone and let the station know we'd arrived.

“They think we're eejits. Drunken Paddy eejits,” I said to Lawson.

“I see that, sir.”

Atkins came back.

The bags.

The exit.

A police Ford Sierra. Me in the front. Lawson sprawled out over the back.

The M42 to the M40. England racing past at 80 mph.

“We've put you up in a little B&B on the Banbury Road. Lovely little spot. We use it all the time. Get a police rate. Although I'm not really sure if the RUC's paying for it or us. I'm not privy to all the details . . . Actually they haven't told me much of anything. I'm just your liaison. It's your case, Inspector Duffy. The Super will sort you out I'm sure.”

“Were you on the team working on Anastasia Coleman's death?”

“Me? No. It was hardly a team, Inspector, if I remember correctly. I think it was a fairly straightforward affair, no?”

“If you say so.”

“Oh yes, I think so.”

“You get a lot of cabinet ministers' daughters taking overdoses around here?”

He smiled. “No, can't say that we do. But fortunately for us, if I'm remembering correctly, there was no hint of foul play, so we—the investigating officers—dealt with it fairly quickly.”

I caught Lawson's eye in the rear-view.

This had been a major tabloid story for nearly a week. Surely it must have been all hands on deck at Oxford Police HQ. I mean, what else did they have to deal with around here? Stolen bikes?

“Have either of you gentlemen been to Oxford before?” Atkins asked.

We hadn't.

“I think you'll have a lovely time. You're right next to one of the best pubs in the city. And London's only forty minutes away on the train. Suppose you're not into clubbing at all?”

“We're here to investigate a murder,” I grumbled.

“Oh yes, sure, of course, mate.”

Mate
. Not
sir
.

Green fields. Woods. Church spires. The names of the exits: Horton-cum-Studley, Weston-on-the-Green. This wasn't England, this was bloody Trumpton.

“Nah, I only meant that once you have your investigation wrapped up, there will be plenty of time for sightseeing and a spot of R&R. London's close and Oxford has some wonderful old pubs, as I'm sure you'll find out.”

He drove us into the city down Headington Hill. He gave us a tour. The full Waugh, the full Morse: Magdalen Bridge, the High Street, All Souls, and then by a complicated series of cop-car-only routes: Broad Street, Trinity College, the Sheldonian, Balliol . . .

Atkins ran a commentary which I tuned in and out. “Christopher Wren . . . Bridge of Sighs . . . of course ‘new' really means five hundred years old . . . And this is where they burned Cranmer, Latimer, and Ridley, the Oxford Martyrs.”

“Where is this B&B?” I asked.

“Nearly there.”

Atkins drove up the Banbury Road and dropped us at a red-bricked Victorian with tubs of plastic flowers, twee ornamental gargoyles obstructing the work of the gutters, and an ornate cast-iron sign that said, “Mrs. Brown's Family Guest House.”

“The Superintendent thought you'd like to meet at eleven o'clock tomorrow morning, Inspector Duffy?”

“Aye, eleven sounds fine for a meeting. But we'll want to get an early start. We'll need an office for nine.”

“An office?”

“Of course an office. We can't read the case files at the B&B.”

Constable Atkins shook his head. “I don't know anything about any case files. I was told you were having a meeting with the Super. He's going to clear everything up for you.”

I looked at Lawson in the mirror. Your turn, son.

“We'll need to read the case files, if we're to determine if a crime's been committed here,” he said.

Atkins smiled, apparently unperturbed. “Oh, I see. No, I think you fellows may have got the wrong end of the stick. Thames Valley Police has already conducted a thorough investigation into Anastasia Coleman's tragic death. As you know, Miss Coleman died of an accidental overdose of heroin. There was an inquest. A coroner's inquest. The coroner returned a verdict of death by misadventure . . . you may even, ha, ha, have read about it in one or two national newspapers.”

He could see by the look in my eye that he had overplayed the pH level that I was willing to tolerate in a constable from the Thames Valley Police.

“But if you'd like, I'll make sure you get a full copy of the coroner's report and the inquest transcripts.”

“Not enough?”

“And I'll get a WPC to get you a photocopy of the CID final report on Miss Coleman's death.”

“That's all very good, Constable Atkins, but we'll still need the actual case files. And the office. And the full cooperation of Thames Valley Police which I'm sure will be forthcoming. None of us wants this to get kicked upstairs to Chief Constable level, eh?”

“Chief Constable level? No! No, of course not! I was merely pointing out that there's no point in both of you wasting your time wading through a bunch of old dusty box files. We've already, uh, solved this case. The coroner has already returned a verdict.”

Lawson and I exchanged another look. Was he being condescending or obstructionist, or was he merely a lazy functionary in a department that had become complacent? And which of those was the more interesting answer?

“I'm sure your work has been exemplary, but we all have masters to serve and our boss wouldn't like us to come back without turning over every stone,” I said diplomatically.

“Yes, I understand. For the sake of form. Yes, of course. But those files . . . they might not even be here. They might be in the records office in Reading. I know it's your right, Inspector, but if you insist upon it, it might take a while and it's going to put a lot of people out.”

He was starting to grow on me, this Atkins. He'd been playing his part quite well for the last two hours. That “Daffy” sign at the airport. The inane chatter. But he had mettle. They had picked a good one when they selected him for the delicate operation of dealing with the invading Paddies.

I nodded at Lawson,
Your turn again, son
.

“Constable Atkins, even if it was an accidental overdose there's still the question of who supplied Miss Coleman with the heroin. Was anyone with her when she injected herself? Did she really inject herself? Who were the witnesses? Who were her roommates? What did her parents know? We will definitely need to see the case files. We can't possibly just go on the coroner's report and what we've read in the
News of the World
, can we?”

Good job, Lawson.

“Well, I shall certainly pass your request on to the CID. Like I say, the records may be in Reading.”

Like fuck they are, son, I almost blurted out.

“But if they're not we'll need them by tomorrow morning in an office,” Lawson said.

“I shall endeavor to do my best.”

“Excellent.”

I got out of the car and we got our bags from the boot.

“And once the business end of your trip is out of the way you lads should really avail yourselves of the opportunity to enjoy a couple of days off from what must be a very stressful job over there. If, uh, half of what we see on the news is true. Like I say, London is very close.”

“If we get the time,” I said.

“Do you want me to help you in with your bags?”

“No, we'll manage.”

“Until tomorrow, then. A pleasure to meet you both.”

“The pleasure's ours, I'm sure.”

He drove off.

“What do you think, Lawson?”

“Seems like a nice place.”

“Of Atkins.”

“Oh, I don't know. A bit of a fool?”

“You think so?”

“You don't, Inspector Duffy?”

“I'm not so sure they would have sent an idiot to liaise with us on such a sensitive matter.”

“Perhaps not.”

“Not unless they consider us to be even bigger fools. But he was nervous, though, wasn't he? And he wasn't telling us everything.”

“How do you know that, sir?”

“Because nobody ever tells you
everything
. We'll go deeper tomorrow. The German gets kicked out of the university and his name is in the papers, the Mick gets kicked out of the university and his name is in the papers, but the third man gets to keep his anonymity and presumably continues with his brilliant career. A lot at stake for that bloke, eh?” I said.

“Yes, sir.”

“I've never been terribly fond of conspiracy theories, but even if a crime hasn't been committed, even if this is a wild goose chase, the last thing Thames Valley want are a couple of Mick detectives blundering in and digging up God knows what, eh, Lawson?”

Up the steps to the B&B.

If there was a theme to the place then the theme would have been Claustrophobic Edwardian: chintzy carpets, uncomfortable chairs, lace, porcelain cats, real cats, Hummel figurines, clocks, ornate candleholders, scented candles, gloomy portraits of severe young women.