Sins of the Fathers (35 page)

‘
Leave her alone
,’ he wanted to say. ‘
I
’
m her father.
’ But he kept his mouth shut.

Blushing, Alice shook her head and took another mouthful of Coke. To Carlyle’s relief, the woman moved on. Alice scanned the leaflet, reading aloud: ‘
We are protesting against a culture that is too lenient when it comes to rape and sexual assault . . . that shames women for behaving in a healthy and sexual way.
’ She looked enquiringly at her father.

‘Wear what you like,’ Carlyle told her. ‘But keep up with the karate lessons.’

Alice nodded and went back to reading the leaflet.

The demonstration moved on. Already he had to struggle to make out the protestors as the rest of the city closed in around them.

‘What do
you
think?’ he asked his daughter.

Scrunching up the leaflet, Alice dropped it into the empty ashtray. ‘I think,’ she declared, ‘that I don’t want to walk down the street in my underwear.’

While his daughter went off to Charing Cross Road library, Carlyle walked over to the station. As he jogged up the front steps, he was nearly knocked over by Umar coming the other way.

‘Sorry,’ Umar shouted, not slowing his pace, ‘gotta go. Christina’s waters have broken.’

‘But—’

‘I know, I know.’ There was a look of genuine fear on the sergeant’s face. Stopping at the foot of the steps, he hopped from foot to foot. ‘She’s more than two weeks early. I thought that your first kid was always supposed to be late?’

‘You never know.’

‘Anyway, I’ll give you a call.’

‘Okay.’

‘Oh, and the Ninomiyas are on the second floor.’

‘Which room?’

‘Don’t worry.’ Umar waited for a taxi to pass and skipped across the road. ‘You’ll hear ’em.’

‘Let me know if we can help with anything,’ Carlyle shouted after him, but he was gone.

Carlyle was surprised to see Simpson standing outside Meeting Room 6, arms folded, listening to the angry voices inside, yammering away in Japanese.

‘Did you see Sergeant Sligo?’ she asked, by way of greeting.

Carlyle nodded. He gestured at the door. ‘How long has this been going on?’

‘About twenty minutes.’ Simpson raised her eyes to the heavens. ‘His relief at finding his daughter was quickly superseded by anger at the way she has behaved.’

‘To be honest,’ Carlyle said, ‘I can understand where he’s coming from.’

The shouting went up another couple of decibels. By the sound of things, Ayumi was giving as good as she got.

‘How could she disappear for so long without anyone having a clue where she was?’

‘According to the statement she gave Umar, she and her boyfriend went sailing round the Med and only got back the day before yesterday.’

Carlyle tutted. ‘What about her bloody mobile phone?’

‘Dropped it over the side, apparently. She didn’t know anyone was looking for her, so didn’t bother to call her flatmate or her dad.’

‘Great.’

‘I know.’ The look of abject frustration on Simpson’s face told him that she was working out how much police time and money had been wasted on this particular wild-goose chase.

‘Ah well. At least it’s a happy ending. Imagine if we’d found her dead in a gutter somewhere.’ As if on cue, the shouting from the meeting room subsided.

‘Now that they’ve finished playing Happy Families,’ said Simpson, already walking away, ‘get the loose ends tied up and get them out of here. I don’t need to see the final report.’

As the Commander disappeared through the set of double doors at the end of the corridor, the shouting started up again.
Bloody Umar
, thought Carlyle grumpily,
leaving me holding the baby
. Bracing himself, he reached for the door handle.

‘What’s this?’ Helen held up a scrap of paper with a user-name and a login ID scribbled on it. He had dropped it onto the kitchen counter, along with the rest of the contents of his pockets. Knowing exactly what it was, Carlyle tried not to blush.

‘It’s a login for a website called Leafhopper.’ Cursing himself for not shredding it earlier, he quickly explained the backstory of Ayumi Ninomiya, Ivor Jenkinson, the owner of site, and Ivan Borloo, Ayumi’s sugar daddy.

‘Hmm.’ Helen stared at the bit of paper.

Adjusting his tie, Carlyle tried to remind himself that he’d done nothing wrong. He tried not to feel guilty or look shifty.

Helen let him stew in his own juices for several seconds. Not for the first time, he thought that she would have made the better cop of the two of them. ‘And . . .’ she said finally, ‘have you given it a go?’

‘Huh?’ Staring at his shoes, he could no longer prevent the blush. ‘No, no.’ He forced his head up, conscious of the nervous smile playing across his lips. ‘We found the girl. It wasn’t necessary.’

‘No?’ She gave him a superior look.

‘No,’ he said firmly.

‘I suppose,’ she said, trying not to grin herself, ‘that you don’t really have the
sugar
to be a sugar daddy, do you?’ She slipped the piece of paper into her jacket and stepped over to straighten his tie. ‘Anyway, c’mon. We have to get going.’

Father Maciuszek doubtless did his best, but the funeral service for Lorna Gordon was feeble at best. A twenty-something Polish virgin talking solemnly about people he knew not and things he could not possibly comprehend. Aside from family, there were only two other mourners in the gloom of St Wulstan’s – an ancient-looking woman who Carlyle suspected was a full-time funeral attendee, and Ken Walton. Walton was an avuncular man in his seventies who had been his mother’s boyfriend for a while when she split from his dad. Despite her promise, Commander Simpson hadn’t made it.

The whole thing took a total of thirty-five minutes.

It seemed like an eternity.

The mood was grim, rather than sad. If his mother had been watching, she would probably have lapped it up. As the curtains closed, and the coffin lurched off towards the gas fires, Carlyle went to loosen his tie, only to be stopped by a harsh look from Helen to his left. On his right, Alice looked down blankly at the words of Psalm 94. The whole thing seemed utterly pointless. It struck him that he’d never been to a funeral that hadn’t been profoundly depressing. Maybe, when his time came, if he wasn’t allowed into Highgate Cemetery, he should get Helen to have him cremated immediately. No mess, no fuss and everyone just goes on with their lives.

Getting to his feet, he took his wife by the arm and they began walking out at a suitably funereal pace. Behind them, he was surprised to see his father fall in with Ken Walton and begin chatting in what seemed like a friendly manner. ‘I hope he’s not inviting him to the wake,’ he whispered to Helen.

‘Why not?’ She squeezed his arm in gentle reproach. ‘It’s good that they can talk – very mature.’

‘A bit late for that,’ Carlyle grumbled as he stepped towards the light.

The wake was held in an upstairs room of a nearby pub called the Sinking Ship. It had been chosen by his father. Carlyle had no doubt that the Palm Court of the Ritz Hotel would have been more to Lorna’s taste but, hey, she wasn’t here. As he suspected would happen, Ken Walton tagged along, so the five of them – Carlyle, Helen, Alice, his father and Walton – sat down to the worst of ‘traditional’ English pub fare of tinned tomato soup followed by roast beef and boiled potatoes.

Ignoring the hostile glances of his wife, Carlyle took refuge at the end of the table with a pint of Stella Artois. He was contemplating a second pint when he remembered that he hadn’t switched his phone back on after the service. Christina must have been in labour for about twenty hours by now, and he wondered how Umar was getting on. He grinned to himself as he keyed in the security code. Immediately the phone started buzzing in his hand. The screen informed him that he had four missed calls.

‘John,’ Helen complained, picking at a boiled carrot. Alice had her head in a book about vampires. The old men ate slowly, methodically, in complete silence.

Dialling his voicemail, Carlyle held up a hand. ‘Sorry. I think it might be Umar, about the baby.’ There was only one new message.

‘
Inspector
,
I thought we had an agreement. What the hell is going on? Call me immediately.
’

Deleting the angry voice of Abigail Slater, Carlyle put his phone away. A spasm of pain went through his abdomen as the Stella mixed with the beef. It sounded like his deal with Iris Belekhsan was coming apart at the seams. That might explain why Simpson wasn’t at the funeral. He needed to get back to the station to see what was going on and whether there was anything he could do about it.

Jumping to his feet, he jogged round the table and told his wife: ‘Sorry, work crisis.’

Helen’s face darkened.

His father placed his knife and fork carefully on to the plate. ‘Is it something serious?’

‘ ’Fraid so, Dad,’ Carlyle nodded, grateful to the old fella for helping him out.

Alexander smiled. ‘You’d better get going then. I’ll settle up for this lot.’

‘Thanks.’ Carlyle quickly shook Walton by the hand and gave Alice a peck on the forehead. Then he placed a hand on his father’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. ‘And thanks for sorting all this. I think it went well.’

Looking down at his plate, his father’s face was blank. ‘Yes. I think we gave her a good send-off.’

Carlyle glanced at Helen but she was still glowering at him so he quickly looked away. ‘You’re right, Dad,’ he lied, squeezing Alexander’s shoulder again. ‘I think we did.’

Carlyle headed back to the station at a steady clip. Not wanting to be buttonholed again by Abigail Slater, he nipped in through a side entrance. Approaching the front desk from the rear, he sidled up to Angie Middleton who, as usual, had her head stuck in some celebrity magazine.

‘Ange,’ he hissed. Flipping the page, the desk sergeant didn’t look up. He crept closer to the desk. ‘ANGE.’

‘Eek!’ Middleton jumped an inch into the air. ‘What are you doing?’ she squealed. ‘Creeping up on me like that; you’ll give me a heart attack.’

‘Sorry,’ Carlyle said meekly. ‘Where’s Simpson?’

She looked at him suspiciously. It was not a question that you often heard from the inspector. ‘Upstairs. On the third floor, I think.’

‘Ta.’ Carlyle wheeled around and walked right into Abigail Slater.

She pushed him away angrily. ‘Where the hell have you been?’

He thought about mentioning his mother’s funeral but decided against it. You didn’t play for sympathy with someone like Slater. ‘Where’s Iris?’

‘Downstairs,’ Middleton interjected. ‘She’s scheduled to be taken to Holloway later this afternoon.’

Damn. Things really were slipping away from him. Slater started to say something but he held up a hand. ‘Stay here,’ he said, trying to inject some authority into his voice. ‘Let me see what I can find out. I will be back in five minutes.’ He turned back to Middleton. ‘Ange, can you arrange some tea for Ms Slater?’ The desk sergeant gave him a
get it yourself
look but he faced her down. ‘I’ll be right back.’

The inspector found Simpson in a meeting room overlooking the courtyard. She was on her mobile when he burst in. He hesitated in the doorway but she signalled for him to come in and sit down, while she finished her call.

‘He’s just arrived now.’ She looked at Carlyle while talking into the handset. There was an excited burst of chatter from the other end of the line.

‘Well, he
was
burying his mother.’ She rolled her eyes to the ceiling.

Cremating her actually
, Carlyle thought.

‘So you should try and cut him some slack. Whatever’s happened, the DPP have made their decision; it’s a matter for them now.’

Carlyle’s heart sank. If the Director of Public Prosecutions had decided to go ahead and charge Iris Belekhsan, it was game over for his attempts to save Rebecca from the clutches of Westminster Social Services.

More indistinct chatter emerged from the handset.

Simpson began to look really annoyed. ‘You know about Slater as well as I do, sir. Whatever claims are being made, the fact is that the inspector has run this case professionally and expeditiously. He has done a great job.’

Carlyle tried to look modest. But it was true, wasn’t it? He was the one who had made the connection between Belekhsan and McQuarrie. After that, it all came together quite nicely, whatever the collateral damage.

After patting himself on the back, he tuned back into the conversation.

‘
I
will deal with Ms Slater,’ Simpson was saying with what seemed like genuine relish. ‘Yes, of course I will keep you fully informed. No, there will be no fallout, I can guarantee it. Okay. Good. Thank you.’

Finally, she ended the call and dropped the handset on the table.

‘Who was that?’

‘The Deputy Commissioner.’ Simpson didn’t say which one. ‘He’s been getting earache from Abigail Slater about your “deal” with Iris Belekhsan.’ She frowned. ‘What the hell were you doing?’

Carlyle tried to look nonplussed. Hadn’t she just said he’d done a great job? ‘I just wanted to try and make sure the daughter was looked after in all of this.’

‘For Christ’s sake, John.’ She picked the handset off the table and for a moment he thought she was going to chuck it at his head. ‘You can’t try to do a deal with someone suspected of employing a bloody hit man to kill her husband.’

‘That’s one way of looking at it.’

‘It’s the only way of looking at it,’ Simpson thundered.

Digging in, Carlyle folded his arms. ‘Look . . .’

Simpson cut him off with a wave of her hand. ‘And with Abigail Slater, of all people. I know you think that she’s some kind of joke after what happened with the mayor . . .’

Despite everything, Carlyle grinned. Happy memories.

‘But she still has access to a lot of people. She can cause plenty of trouble.’

‘It was a perfectly reasonable approach.’

‘Not the way she tells it.’

Well aware that Slater might try to drop him in it, he had his story ready. ‘You and I both know that George McQuarrie was probably the instigator of the Julian Schaeffer killing, thinking that he could make some serious money out of it. The kid has already lost one parent. Social Services won’t let her stay with her grandparents. Should I really just toss her into Care, saying “tough luck”?’