Stalkers (30 page)

‘Have I?’

‘What were you doing earlier on in the pub?’

‘Sitting watching those lunatics stuff their faces, while
my
stomach was turning inside out.’

He shook his head. ‘Ballamara’s own boozer, and he didn’t even treat you?’

‘Actually he offered to. But I hardly felt like eating, did I?’ Her voice hardened. ‘Not knowing what was going to happen to me and all that! You
are
going to keep me a bit more informed from now on, yeah?’

‘Sorry to leave you sleeping, but you had to stay behind as a kind of insurance – to convince them I’d come back.’

‘
I
wasn’t convinced you’d come back, never mind them.’

‘Then you don’t know me very well, do you?’

‘Anyway, the answers are “no” and “yes”,’ she said sullenly.

‘Uh?’

‘No, I haven’t had any breakfast yet, and yes, I do want some.’

‘Okay.’

They dismounted the train at Bank, and rode into the West End via the Central Line, where they found a small diner. Heck ordered scrambled eggs, toast and coffee. Lauren had pancakes with syrup.

‘The team we’re looking for call themselves the “Nice Guys”,’ he said while they ate. ‘But I don’t know too much more about them.’

Lauren glanced up, her mouth full and cheeks bulging. ‘They’re the kidnappers?’

‘It’s possible. They were mentioned in Deke’s ledger. Whoever they are, it looks like they paid for the job he did on O’Hoorigan. Not to mention a few others.’

‘What did you do with the ledger?’ she asked, suddenly noticing its absence.

‘Parcelled it and posted it.’

‘Where to?’

‘My home address – safest place I could think of.’

‘I thought you said your lot would be sitting on that address?’

‘They’re only looking out for me. I doubt they’ve got a warrant to check the mail yet.’

Before she could ask him anything else, the blue phone rang. Heck glanced at the number on its tiny screen.

‘Ballamara already?’ she wondered.

He shook his head, before answering. The following conversation was mumbled and inaudible to Lauren, even though she was only on the other side of the table. When Heck eventually hung up, he was frowning – partly with concern, but also with puzzlement.

‘It’s a bloody good job we’ve got twenty grand to spend,’ he said. ‘We’ve got a hell of a taxi drive coming up.’

Heck didn’t want the taxi dropping them off in the exact spot in case ‘things turned nasty’. So instead they jumped out in Allhallows-on-Sea, which was little more than a rural hamlet with a few holiday homes dotted around it, but busy enough in August for them to arrive unnoticed. Once the cab had set off back, they walked, leaving the village and heading along a coastal road that led into what seemed like an infinite distance.

‘What do you mean “in case things turn nasty”?’ Lauren asked.

‘Dunno.’ He shrugged. ‘I’m getting less and less sure about this as the day goes on.’

It wasn’t just the stiff sea breeze that was making him uncomfortable. A good thirty miles from London, they’d alighted on the northern edge of the Hoo peninsula, and were now surrounded on four sides by salt marsh and mud flats. When they finally stopped at the lone payphone that McCulkin had specified to Heck, the only buildings in sight were a few weather-boarded boathouses down at the edge of a narrow creek. Gulls and other seabirds swooped noisily, unaccustomed to the arrival of strangers in this remote place.

‘This isn’t exactly the normal spot for a rendezvous of this sort,’ Heck said.

‘Who is it we’re hooking up with?’

‘Now that we haven’t got some eavesdropping cabbie to report back on us, I suppose I can tell you.’ So he did – about McCulkin, and the agreement reached with him. As he spoke, they proceeded down a path that circled round the derelict boathouses and ran for hundreds of yards along a low dyke.

‘Okay, so this McCulkin is your grass,’ Lauren said. ‘Is he reliable?’

‘He has been up until now.’

‘But there’s still something about this you don’t like?’

‘It’s always good to exercise caution, but
this
…’ Heck indicated the desolation around them. ‘This smacks of overkill to me.’

They were on the north Kent coast, a scenic but notoriously bleak and empty district. Somewhere ahead of them, still a couple of miles off, was the Thames estuary. On the far side of that sat the massive petrochemical complex at Canvey Island. There wasn’t likely to be anyone closer than that – at least, no one engaged in legitimate business.

‘If we’ve got reservations about this, why are we keeping going?’ Lauren asked.

Her own reservations owed more to the gradual sinking of the dyke and the disintegration of the footpath. It was still vaguely visible, beaten through the weeds and tussock grass, winding gamely on ahead, but it was now requiring them to skirt around ponds and leap over ditches. The creek they’d spied was a dozen yards to their left, but was broadening out and filling with water; its banks looked dangerously swampy.

‘Because we haven’t really got any choice,’ Heck said. He grimaced as his foot plunged to the ankle and spurted brackish water up the back of his jeans. ‘All I can say is – the bastard had better be here, or I won’t be impressed.’

The path turned west and they followed it for another mile before it brought them down into a shallow bay. The Thames now lay in front of them, though they didn’t feel that they’d arrived on a riverbank so much as at a point where land ended and the sea began. From this last piece of soggy ground, they could see clear across to the Canvey Island oil and gas terminals and, looking east, to the distant open spaces of the North Sea.

Heck checked his watch; it was five past three, which meant their contact was late.

Almost on cue, they heard the throb of an approaching engine and, glancing left, spotted a small outboard chugging towards them with a solo figure at its helm. It was McCulkin, still dressed – now incongruously – in his overcoat and cap, which had somehow remained on his head despite the coastal wind. He cut the motor about thirty yards from shore and let the vessel glide the rest of the way in, though he stopped it with a paddle ten yards short.

‘Can’t risk letting it run aground,’ he shouted. ‘Sorry, you’re going to have to get your feet wet.’

‘Bit off the beaten track, aren’t we?’ Heck called back.

‘Yeah, but I knew you’d find me okay. You never disappoint, Mr Heckenburg.’

‘I don’t see any sea fort.’

McCulkin pointed. ‘Just round that headland.’

‘Sea fort?’ Lauren asked.

‘Who’s she?’ McCulkin said.

‘A friend.’

Heck waded out, Lauren following, which was difficult with the river bottom deep in soft, slimy sediment. When they reached the boat, McCulkin had to help them aboard.

‘Your friend?’ he said testily. ‘This isn’t a daytrip we’re on, you know.’

‘Stop moaning,’ Heck replied. ‘I need my back watching just like everyone else.’

‘You said only you and me would know about this.’

‘I lied. Don’t act surprised – you told me I had to play dirty.’

McCulkin regarded Lauren warily. ‘You trust this darkie?’

‘Hey!’ she said.

‘Don’t point your finger at me, girl,’ he snapped. ‘After sixty years having to live among you lot, I’ve earned the right to call you what I want.’

‘Which you won’t be doing while I’m around,’ Heck interjected. ‘This lass has done as much good in the last few days as you have in your entire career, and she hasn’t asked for a penny in payment. Now let’s keep it friendly, or there’ll be less work coming your way in future.’

‘I’m not sure I want more work if this is the way you’re going to play it,’ McCulkin said. ‘It’s bad enough one of you knows about this, but two of you … I’ll be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life.’

‘And the people you’ll be looking for will be rotting in prison. That’s the whole idea, isn’t it?’

McCulkin didn’t seem convinced. ‘I asked if you trusted her?’

‘Implicitly.’

‘And no one else knows about this meeting at all? Especially none of her lot?’

Lauren glowered at him, but said nothing. The average white person had no concept of the sort of casual racial prejudices that ‘her lot’ still encountered in Britain even in the enlightened twenty-first century. But to meet overt and unashamed examples like this was now quite unusual. Unfortunately they needed this bitter, shrewish little man; otherwise she’d be tempted to chuck him overboard.

‘No one,’ Heck confirmed.

Reluctantly, McCulkin started the engine and they set off again, turning a wide circle and heading towards the aforementioned headland. Heck and Lauren sat on a low wooden bench at the stern. Bilge sloshed around their feet. Much of the vessel’s metalwork was corroded, its paint flaking off in scales. McCulkin had to stand up to control it; where his chair should once have been, only rivets were visible.

‘Where’d you get the boat, Pat?’ Heck asked.

‘Meaning did I nick it?

‘Put it this way, if you didn’t, you were robbed.’

McCulkin hawked and spat overboard.

‘Where the hell are we going?’ Lauren whispered. ‘A sea fort?’

‘Blacksand Tower,’ Heck replied. ‘It’s basically a fortified gun-emplacement. They built a number of them to fire at German aircraft navigating towards London along the Thames. They were called TESDUs, or Thames Estuary Special Defence Units. Most of them are now gone, but a few remain. They’re all derelict, of course.’

She stared past his shoulder, focusing on something that had just come into view. He turned to look. The fort had appeared around the headland. It was located maybe three miles from shore, and from this distance it was a lowering mass of rusted girders and weathered, moss-eaten brick. But the closer they got to it, the more they were able to distinguish. It consisted of four towering edifices, the nearest one a massive stone cylinder, which was something like the tower of a medieval castle but lacking the crenellations at the top. Heck guessed that this would once have served as the fort’s admin section and barracks. The other three towers, which were probably the gun-towers, looked more representative of the modern world; they were octagonal steel superstructures sitting on top of massive concrete legs. Each was of a uniform height – about ninety feet, Heck estimated – and all were located about fifty yards apart, connected to each other by high steel catwalks.

Heck watched closely as they approached. The whole thing was a scabrous ruin, streaked with dirt and seagull crap, but it was impressive all the same.

‘Who is it we’re meeting, Pat?’ he asked. ‘Surely you can tell us now?’

‘He used to work for them,’ McCulkin replied.

‘Worked for who?’

‘You know.’

‘You mean the Nice Guys? You don’t even like saying their name, do you?’

McCulkin clammed up as he steered them towards the concrete tower. A landing platform was visible on its south side, a timber raft held to the mighty structure by chains. The lower section of the tower, up to about ten feet in height, dangled with bright green river weed. Above this there was a tall aperture that might once have had a door fitted in it. A steel stair ran up to this.

‘I don’t see any other boats,’ Lauren said. ‘You sure this bloke’s here?’

‘He’s here,’ was McCulkin’s grunted response.

They were now far from shore, and the wind was stiffer and colder. This close, the fort cast an immense shadow. Waves slapped against its foundations; the cries of gulls and guillemots echoed eerily from its parapets. McCulkin cut the motor and again the boat glided the remaining distance. He brought it hard against the timber raft – there was a dull
thud
, then he jumped out and roped it to a hook.

‘Bit of an expert, isn’t he?’ Lauren observed.

‘When you’re brought up in the docklands,’ Heck replied.

‘This is it,’ McCulkin said, rather unnecessarily.

He tilted his cap back and stood waiting for them, tensely.

‘You nervous about something?’ Heck asked, climbing out.

‘Are you not?’ McCulkin replied.

Lauren jumped up beside them. The platform rose and fell – this part of the Thames was strongly tidal, and the swell came straight from the North Sea. They glanced up the stair towards the entrance. Rusted bolts hung at regular intervals down the pillar on its left-hand side, revealing that there had once been a door there. But access to the interior was still restricted: masses of barbed wire might have made an impassable barrier had someone not gone at it with a pair of clippers, clearing a narrow path to the room beyond.

‘After you,’ McCulkin said.

Heck went cautiously up the stair, which was not anchored down and shifted under his weight. At the top, he peered through the chopped wire into a dark, dripping interior.

Lauren appeared at his shoulder. ‘You sure you trust this guy?’

‘Why?’

‘You’ve already said this arrangement is abnormal. Even I’m getting that now. I’ve got to tell you, Heck, I don’t like this at all.’

‘Me neither.’ He pressed forward, sidling along the path and entering a surprisingly confined holding space, its cement floor puddled with oily water, a few empty barrels occupying one of the corners.

To their right, a metal ladder ascended into dimness. They gazed up, and as their eyes attuned, made out hanging chains and dangling strips of canvas. The underside of the floor above was composed mainly of riveted steel, though there were some gaps in it. Heck moved to the foot of the ladder. Twenty feet overhead, it passed through a hatch and vanished, but light was visible up there – probably daylight filtering through the grimy first-floor windows. He tested the ladder, which seemed sturdy, and began to climb it, acutely aware that the clanks of his footfalls were probably sounding all the way to the top of the tower. When he was about seven feet up, he glanced back – Lauren was standing down there alone.

‘Where’s McCulkin?’ he asked.

She looked around. ‘Don’t think he even came in.’

An engine growled to life outside.