Night Vision (25 page)

‘I don't know nothing about a telephone number.' This had been Griffin's line from the start, and he didn't seem ready to vary it.

‘You're wasting your time,' Michelle Sanders said.

Munroe watched Griffin, the way his gaze kept skipping towards the governor and then back again.

‘Neil Robinson didn't give you that number, did he?' Munroe asked.

Michelle Sanders shifted position, impatience conveyed in her every gesture.

‘No,' Griffin said.

That was at least a change of line.

‘Was it another inmate?'

That little sideways flick of the eyes again. ‘No. I don't know. Look, I just picked it up somewhere. I thought it would be a laugh. Get one over, you know.'

‘I told DI Friedman it was a wind up.' Michelle Sanders sounded triumphant. ‘Enough now. We've wasted enough time.'

Munroe nodded, as if in agreement. ‘Strange coincidence then,' he said.

‘What is?'

‘That Griffin here should happen to pick up a number that he should happen to decide he'd use in a wind up that just happens to have relevance to our investigation, don't you think?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘I mean, if it turns out Griffin here is being economical with the truth. If we find out, for instance, that he knew this was the number of the Madigor offices—'

‘Madigor?' Michelle Sanders looked puzzled now, which was progress of sorts, Munroe thought.

‘The bloke what blew up the van?' Griffin looked anxious. ‘I don't have nothing to do with that. I just dropped the number. I didn't know what it was.'

‘No?' Munroe persisted. ‘Of course, then it might add up to a conspiracy charge. It might—'

‘I only dropped the number. I don't know nothing!' Griffin was on his feet.

‘Sit down,' Michelle Sanders ordered.

‘She told me to,' Griffin shouted. ‘Her.'

‘Me?' The governor was outraged. ‘You can't believe – right, I think that's enough.'

‘You gave him the number? Why was that, Michelle?'

‘I think you should leave now.'

Munroe agreed, oddly enough. Was Griffin telling the truth? Munroe could think of no reason why Michelle Sanders would have done such a thing, but neither could he come up with a convincing reason for Griffin telling that particular lie.

‘Michelle?'

She said nothing but opened the door and motioned for Griffin to leave, then tried her phone again, frowning as no one picked up.

‘Eddison still leaving you out in the cold?' Munroe said.

She slammed the phone down on the table and dropped into the chair Griffin had vacated. She seemed at a loss.

‘Did Eddison give you that number?'

‘Why would you think that? How would that make any sense?'

Munroe shrugged. ‘It doesn't,' he said. ‘But then, not much does right now.'

She closed her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose as though a headache was starting. ‘Charlie and I go back a long way,' she said at last.

‘And you and Travers?'

‘Alec told you then?'

‘Not in so many words.'

‘Charlie and I . . . we go back a lot further than that. He's been a good friend to me, was a good friend to my brother.'

‘Your brother was shot, wasn't he?' Munroe said. ‘An armed robbery if I remember right. He got caught in the crossfire.'

She nodded.

‘So you feel obliged to Charlie Eddison, is that it?'

‘Like I say, he's been a good friend.'

‘And that phone number?'

She hesitated, but it was clear she now knew something was badly wrong.

Munroe waited.

‘He said he had intelligence, something linked to Neil Robinson. He didn't say what, only that it was big. He needed – he said he needed a nudge, just to get the investigation moving in the right direction, that he had to protect his source. So he gave me the number and asked me to find a way to get it dropped into the investigation. He said he knew the link was there but he had no way of, well, of making things happen, not now Neil Robinson was dead. That he couldn't make the links.'

‘Links?'

She shrugged. ‘I don't know, he said something about organized crime and computers. He said he couldn't tell me exactly what, just to trust him.'

‘And so you trusted him.'

‘He's been a good friend. I—” She gestured angrily. ‘I had Griffin drop the number where Alec Friedman would see it. It seemed like such a simple thing. I knew it wasn't right, but I couldn't see what was wrong either. I was just doing a favour for a good friend. A good police officer.'

‘And now?' Munroe asked.

‘Now I feel like a bloody fool. Charlie used me, didn't he?'

‘You
allowed
him to use you.'

‘Yes, but I thought—'

‘I don't think you did,' Munroe told her gently. ‘That's just it – I don't believe you thought at all.' He paused and then asked, ‘Did Eddison come here to talk to Neil Robinson?'

‘You've seen the visitors list. He isn't on it, is he?'

‘That wasn't what I asked.'

She shrugged.

‘How about the day Robinson died. He come over for a chat that day, did he, Michelle?'

‘Not to see Robinson. No.'

‘Someone else then. Someone who may have done his dirty work for him?'

One look at her face told him she wasn't going to say anything more. No matter, he thought, he could guess the truth of it and there would be time later to put pressure on the Governor. Right now he had more urgent matters to attend to.

He left, feeling it was enough to have shaken the tree for now, though it would be interesting to see what fell out. Just what game was Charlie Eddison playing, and how far had he and Parks helped him along the road? What damage had they all done – for that matter, damage to what?

Checking his phone as he returned to his car, he found a message from Harry Jones accompanied by half a dozen photographs. Two of which featured Eddison in deep conversation with someone Munroe did not recognize.

When Munroe returned the call, Harry was driving, so Patrick answered. Munroe listened as Patrick explained about the card and the memory card.

‘I think we need to talk,' Munroe said. ‘Where shall we meet?'

He heard the murmurs of a swift conference. ‘Dad says anywhere we can get a decent meal,' Patrick says.

‘I think your dad has a good set of priorities,' Munroe said.

Travers had been moved from the high dependency unit and into a side room on a main ward. He was still very weak, still slept a great deal, but he was definitely on the mend.

Maureen sat beside him on one side of the bed, the family liaison officer, Susan Moran, on the other, and they watched the television news.

Gregory's picture was on the screen. The reporter was reprising the list of offences for which he was suspect.

Including, the attack on DI Nicholas Travers.

‘No,' he said. No one called him Nicholas. ‘No,' he repeated, not sure if that last thought had been spoken out loud. ‘It wasn't Gregory, it wasn't him.'

‘What do you mean?' Maureen asked him. ‘Trav, this is good, they've got his picture, they're out looking for him.'

‘No, it wasn't him.'

Susan Moran leaned in closer. ‘You're saying you know this is not the man that attacked you? Nick, are you sure about this?'

‘I told you, it wasn't Gregory. I know Gregory. There was a brief moment when I thought – a superficial resemblance – then I knew it wasn't him. The man who attacked me was taller, heavier, it wasn't him.'

‘Who is this Gregory?' Maureen was demanding. ‘You don't know a Gregory.'

‘It was a long time ago.'

Susan Moran left him to explain. She called DI Eddison and told him what DI Travers had said.

‘He's mistaken,' Eddison said bluntly. ‘He doesn't know what he's saying.'

Susan Moran was left staring at the phone.

‘Where the hell is Munroe?' Eddison demanded. No one knew, but there were missed calls from Michelle Sanders, and soon the mystery was partly solved.

‘And where is he now?' Eddison demanded.

‘How the hell should I know?' Michelle said, over the phone. ‘He left a half hour ago.'

‘Damn.' He turned on Parks. ‘Find out where the hell he's got to and get him back here.'

‘How do I do that?'

‘Just do it!'

‘Right,' Parks said. ‘Oh, there's a message come through for you. About some place in Wales. Desk sergeant has it.'

Eddison left.

Parks tried Munroe's phone and then, unable to get through, sent a text.
Eddison got news from Wales. U R in deep shit. Trav says it wasn't Gregory.

That, he figured, was about all he could do. He went back to talk to Marsh, convinced now that whoever had attacked Nick Travers, he was just a thug for hire.

‘So tell me more about this man you picked up,' he said. ‘We've got some pictures I'd like you to take a gander at.'

TWENTY-EIGHT

G
regory had come ashore to watch. The children were called Kay and Jilly. He hadn't known that. They ran on the beach, their father in tow, his stiffness of movement testament to his injuries. The little girls were tanned and lithe, their blonde hair flying out behind them. The father was dark-haired and olive-skinned, handsome in a fine boned way, Gregory thought. Clara was of more solid build.

The man was nervous, alert. Twice he looked towards Gregory's hiding place, as though sure he had sensed something unusual. Gregory did not move. An untrained eye on high alert was as likely to spot the unusual as any trained observer, especially with so much at stake.

What was he here for? Gregory asked himself. Just what was he hoping to achieve? Were Clara's family actually in any danger now?

That depended, he thought, on how the tide turned next. It might ebb gently and the matter be quietly forgotten, Clara and her children be left alone. Or the storm might break over them, as it had her brother and Jamie Dale, and that rather depended on what Eddison did next.

Had he drawn Eddison here? Had he made it worse? That, Gregory acknowledged, was a major possibility. He had come here initially to direct Paul to leave, to take the children elsewhere until home was once more a safe place, as it should be if Eddison was finally rid of Gregory, and that would be easy. He had seen the news, heard the accusations, knew he was a wanted man, a hunted man, and that the one who hunted him knew all the tricks of the trade. Had been trained as Gregory had been trained. Another of the dinosaurs, Gregory had thought, but one with the skill to pretend to be a mammal.

Once the family had passed out of view, he took the opportunity to check his phone, logging in to the various web-based mailboxes he used, and he froze. His first thought was that Eddison had sent the message. Jeannie1948, that was the email Jamie had chosen – though to his knowledge she had never used it.

Noting there were attachments, he opened the message:

I don't know what these are, and I don't know who I'm sending them to, but Jamie Dale left this email address and she hid these pictures so we think they might be important.

Yours sincerely, Patrick Jones

For a moment or two Gregory just stared at the message, overcome by the absurdity of it.

Well, you're polite, Patrick Jones, he thought. And very, very foolish. Then he opened the attachments and he understood. When had Jamie taken these pictures? The boy said she had hidden them. Where and how, and how had they been found? The boy might not have known the importance of these pictures, but Gregory understood it the moment he saw Eddison in the photographs and recognized who he was talking to. He understood just what a threat Jamie must have become to them. And why she had died.

The armed guard was still at the hospital, the family liaison officer there too, and Travers' wife, Maureen, sitting by the bed. Ironic, Munroe thought, that he was at most risk from someone supposed to be on the same side.

‘I need to talk to your husband alone,' he told Maureen. ‘I'm sorry, but I have to ask you to leave for a few minutes.'

‘Whatever you have to say, I want to hear it.' Maureen lifted her chin defiantly.

‘It's all right, Maureen. Please, go, just for a little while.'

She looked daggers at her husband, but she went, along with Susan, the liaison.

Munroe took Susan's seat beside the bed. ‘Tell me about Eddison,' he said, ‘and about Gregory. And tell me fast, I don't have much time.'

Travers looked puzzled and then confused. He eased his position on the bed. ‘There's not much I know,' he said.

‘But a lot you suspect. So . . .?'

Travers closed his eyes. He still looked exhausted. ‘It wasn't Gregory,' he said.

‘Eddison is insisting that it was.'

Travers nodded. ‘That would suit him,' he said.

‘Why? Nick, I don't have much time. Eddison is way ahead of me.'

‘Where's he gone?'

‘Parks reckons he's headed for Wales. Neil Robinson's sister and her family are there. Maybe he thinks this Gregory is too.'

‘We all served together. There were five of us. Flynn was killed, and I was sent back home wounded. I went back, briefly. Then, well, let's just say I found a way out.'

‘That much I know,' Munroe said. ‘You were considered unfit to serve, got discharge on medical grounds, spent some time in a psychiatric unit.'

Travers nodded. He smiled wryly. ‘It's not the kind of record you want known. It's in my file, of course, but not many are aware either at work or at home.'

‘Maureen doesn't know?'

Travers shook his head.

‘But, of course, Eddison did.'