The Circus (29 page)

‘I am not cooking up anything,’ Highman protested. He could hear the tension in his voice, and hated himself for it. Why did he let this woman browbeat him so?

‘In that case,’ she said, effortlessly slipping back into smooth CEO mode, ‘why the secrecy?’

‘There is no secrecy,’ he whined, reflexively gulping down another mouthful of scotch.

Mosman smiled sadly. ‘If I didn’t know better,’ she said quietly, ‘I might think there is something of a conspiracy developing here.’

‘There is no secrecy,’ he repeated, ‘and there is no conspiracy. What there
is
. . .’

Placing her hands on the desk, Mosman leaned forward. ‘Yes?’

‘What there is,’ he began again, ‘is a rather significant discrepancy between what we believe should be in the collection and what we can actually account for.’

‘Which means what?’

Highman let out a deep sigh; so much for keeping his own counsel. ‘Which means that, so far, there are more than a hundred paintings – having an estimated total market value of more than thirty million pounds – which we cannot find.’

Mosman stared at him. ‘And what do you think happened to them?’

‘We don’t know.’

‘But you must have some ideas?’

Highman looked her in the eye. ‘I am not going to sit here and speculate.’

‘But presumably you will be required to indulge in some speculation when it comes to your final report?’

Highman shrugged. ‘The National Audit Office will inevitably demand some kind of explanation.’

‘I’m sure they will,’ she sniffed.

‘No doubt we will all then have questions to answer.’
Some more than others
.

‘Mm.’

‘A collective failure of control and monitoring would appear to run all the way through the organization.’

‘All the way to the top?’

Surprised to see that his glass was now empty, he looked up. ‘Yes.’

Mosman drained her own glass and poured herself another. She didn’t offer him a refill. ‘So I’m going to be hung out to dry?’

‘I wouldn’t like to pre-empt what might happen.’

There was a sound in the doorway and Mosman lifted her gaze past her colleague’s shoulder. ‘Can I help you?’ Before Highman could turn round to see who it was, he felt a cool pressure in the hollow at the base of his skull. A look of horror flashed across Mosman’s face as she jumped from her chair. There was a grunt, followed by a metallic click, and then Highman felt himself pitching forward into darkness.

Pulling a box of Handi Wipes from a desk drawer, Zoe Mosman began furiously wiping Harris Highman’s blood splatter from her face. ‘What the hell did you do that for?’ She reached instinctively for her glass of whisky but her hand was shaking so much that she only succeeded in knocking it to the floor. ‘Fuck it!’ Unscrewing the cap, she took a long hard swallow directly from the bottle. And then another. She would have a monster
fucking hangover in the morning, but right now that was the least of her worries.

The man standing over Highman’s body said nothing. She had no idea who he was but she knew perfectly well who had sent him.

Feeling distinctly woozy, Mosman placed a hand on the desk for some support. ‘How are we going to clean this mess up?’

‘We’re not.’ Slowly the man lifted the gun, giving her time to finally understand what was going on, before firing twice.

Bringing the Audi A3 to a halt at the side of the kerb, Toby Gray tried to keep his voice sounding casual. ‘Any chance of a coffee?’

Maude Hall smiled. Toby was okay but it was only their second date, and he was a long way from getting invited into her flat ‘for coffee’. She yawned theatrically. ‘It’s late and I’ve got an early start in the morning. Maybe next time.’

‘Sure, no problem.’

‘Thanks. I had a nice time.’ Undoing her seatbelt, she reached across and gave him a peck on the cheek.

‘Me too,’ Toby blushed.

‘I’ll give you a call.’ Opening the door, she slipped out into the cold night air.

Standing in the entrance hall of Murdoch Mansions, Maude listened to the Audi pulling away from the kerb. Picking up her mail, she slowly climbed the stairs to her first-floor flat. Reaching the door, she carefully placed the key in the lock.

‘Jenny . . .’

Frowning, she turned to face Trevor Miller.

‘Or should I say Maude?’

‘What the fuck is someone doing, out riding a bike at this time of night?’ Marcus Evans made a vigorous hand gesture through the windscreen. ‘Oi, fuckface! Get out the way.’

Gripping the steering wheel tightly, Dennis Smith swerved
round the cyclist and accelerated across the otherwise almost empty Blackfriars Bridge, heading north.

‘Fucking hell, Den, how fast can this thing go?’

‘I’ve had it up to over ninety,’ Smith grinned, ‘but don’t tell the boss.’ Foot to the floor, he started drumming on the steering wheel of the Vauxhall Combo. ‘Spurs were good tonight.’

‘For a fucking change.’

‘Against shit opposition though.’

‘You can only beat what’s put in front of you,’ Evans mused. Right on cue, a caller on 5Live was making the same point, before concluding, ‘We’re only two or three quality signings away from being a great team.’

‘We’re
always
two or three quality signings away from being a great team, you dick,’ Smith grunted towards the radio. Flicking on the indicator light, he lifted his foot off the accelerator. ‘How do I get on to Queen Victoria Street? Can I turn left up here?’ Looking for a sign, he didn’t see the man in the suit step out from behind the number 63 bus, which was heading south. Head down, he was talking into his mobile phone as he wandered into the middle of the road.

‘Fuck!’ Evans screamed. Before his mate even had time to touch the brakes, there was a huge thud and the windscreen shattered.

‘Fuuuucccckkkkk!!!’ The steering wheel spun out of his hands and Den watched in horror as the van roared across on to the wrong side of the road, heading directly for the water.

Standing on Blackfriars Bridge, the inspector gazed east, past St Paul’s and the City, towards Docklands. The sky was a deep blue, full of promise, and there was a pleasing nip in the air. Another day: busy people simply getting on with their lives. ‘What a great city.’ Breathing in deeply, he turned to his sergeant. ‘What a fucking
great
city!’

‘I beg your pardon?’ Joe Szyszkowski was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Carlyle found himself talking to a pimply youth whom he had never seen before. In an ill-fitting suit, with an appallingly
bad bog-brush haircut, the kid stood maybe an inch or two taller than the inspector himself. Hopping from foot to foot, he had a pained expression as if he urgently needed the bathroom.

‘Who are you?’ Carlyle asked, suitably unimpressed.

‘Eric Peterson.’ Fumbling in the pocket of his raincoat, the youth pulled out a business card. ‘Transport for London and Special Adviser to the Mayor.’ He tentatively offered the card. Hands kept firmly in his pockets, the inspector ignored it.

‘What are you doing here?’ Carlyle gestured towards the south end of the bridge and the yellow police tape flapping in the wind. ‘You should be behind the cordon.’

The youth stood his ground. ‘We need to get this bridge open.’

Carlyle’s eyes narrowed.

‘There are roadworks on Waterloo Bridge,’ Peterson explained, ‘and London Bridge is closed for repairs. If we don’t get Blackfriars open there’s going to be total chaos.’

‘There’s always chaos,’ Carlyle grunted.

‘Improved transport routes are one of the Mayor’s key deliverables. We are already six percentage points down on where we were projected to be this month, in terms of improved traffic flows. That means we are on course for having to provide the Assembly with a written explanation. It is imperative—’

What the fuck is the little sod talking about?
Stepping forward, the inspector cut Eric Peterson off with an angry wave of his hand. ‘This,’ he said slowly, ‘is a crime scene.’

Folding his arms, the young bureaucrat shook his head, annoying Carlyle even more.

‘The point is—’

‘The point
is
,’ Carlyle stepped right up to the guy and jabbed a finger towards his face, ‘people have died here. My job is to find out what happened, and that will take however long it takes. So kindly fuck off behind the tape there, or I will have you arrested for obstruction and wasting police time.’

‘The Mayor will not be happy,’ Peterson huffed.

‘The Mayor will not be happy,’ Carlyle parroted. Out of the
corner of his eye, he noticed Joe approaching. Even at this distance, it was clear that his sidekick had the deathly pallor of a man who had done a full night’s work.

‘Not in the slightest.’ Confronted by the policeman’s full-on hostility, Peterson’s bottom lip had started to quiver and it looked like he might burst into tears at any moment.

‘Well, tough shit. The Mayor’s re-election prospects are not my concern.’ For a second time, Carlyle pointed towards the tape. ‘Now
fuck off
.’

‘Who was that?’ Joe asked as he watched Eric Peterson slouch off towards the tape.

‘Just another fucking idiot sent by the powers-that-be to try my patience,’ Carlyle sighed. ‘What have you got for me?’

Gesturing in the direction whence he had come, the sergeant held up a clear plastic evidence bag containing a mobile phone. ‘We found this in the gutter back there. It’s been fairly bashed up but the
SIM
card should still be fine. We think it must belong to our guy.’

Our guy
. Carlyle smiled. ‘That’s a fucking result.’

‘And a half.’

‘So, tell me what happened.’

‘What we
think
happened?’

‘Yeah, your best guess.’

‘Okay.’ Joe took a deep breath. ‘Based on what we’ve pieced together so far, from CCTV and a couple of eye-witnesses, the assumption is that our guy went into the Government Art Collection building over there,’ he pointed past the statue of Queen Victoria towards an office block on the north-east corner of the bridge, ‘and shot both Harris Highman and Zoe Mosman. Then he waltzes out and starts crossing the bridge, heading towards where we are now. After tossing his gun into the river, he makes a call on his mobile. Deciding to cross the road, he walks out from behind a bus and gets taken out by Fred’s Fabulous Fruit ’n’ Veg van, which is coming the other way at somewhere north of eighty miles an hour.’

Fred’s Fabulous Fruit ’n’ Veg?
The name vaguely rang a bell but Carlyle couldn’t immediately place it, so he let it slide.

Joe pointed towards the ragged hole in the fencing almost exactly in the middle of the bridge. ‘The van careers across the road, taking the pedestrian with it, then crashes through the barrier – and
splash
!’

The pedestrian, meaning the shooter
.

‘Out-fucking-standing,’ Carlyle grinned, gazing down at the pontoon from where police divers were trying to recover the bodies. ‘How long till we get an ID?’

‘Dunno,’ Joe shrugged. ‘If we can work it out from the phone, maybe a couple of hours. If not, we’ll have to wait for the river to give him up. They reckon there are two guys still inside the van but they haven’t found the pedestrian yet.’

‘All three are sleeping with the fishes?’

‘Not down there, they’re not,’ Joe laughed. ‘They probably died of poisoning rather than drowning.’

‘I thought the Thames was supposed to be cleaner these days?’

‘I dunno about that.’ Joe pointed at the murky grey-brown water. ‘I mean, look at it.’

‘Fair point.’ Carlyle returned his attention to the bridge itself. ‘Anyway, this is probably the most excitement they’ve had here since Calvi in the early eighties.’

‘Eh?’

‘Roberto Calvi, God’s banker.’

Joe still looked at him blankly.

‘He was an Italian banker, with links to the Mafia, the Masons and the Vatican, yada, yada, yada.’

‘Clever boy.’

‘Yeah. His bank went bust and he was found hanged underneath the arches, weighed down with bricks and fifteen grand still in his pockets.’

‘Before my time,’ said Joe with the air of a man having more pressing things to worry about.

‘Mine too,’ Carlyle mused. ‘Just.’ A thought suddenly struck him. ‘Where’s Maude, by the way?’

‘Haven’t been able to get hold of her so far this morning.’ Joe held up the battered mobile again. ‘I’ll go and get this checked out.’

‘Fine,’ Carlyle nodded. ‘Then go and see Mrs Mosman’s lawyer. Tell him, if he’s withholding anything from us, I will make sure that he faces conspiracy charges.’

‘Conspiracy to do what?’

‘We’ll work that out later.’

‘Fine,’ Joe laughed, walking away.

Considering his next move, the inspector turned his attention back to the vista in front of him, ignoring the angry horns of snarled-up traffic on both sides of the bridge. Right here, right now, London was his.

What a great fucking city.

‘What we are doing here, in a very real sense, is parlaying food into a branch of performance art.’ Standing in the mud of the Funky Food Field, Liam Shakermaker popped a cube of his award-winning
Everything’s Gone Green
brand of organic goat’s cheese into his mouth and began chewing thoughtfully. In his deerstalker hat, tweed jacket and plus fours, he looked like a country squire from a 1950s Ealing comedy.

‘Mm, yes,’ Edgar Carlton mumbled, uncomfortably aware of a journalist hovering on the edge of their conversation, digital recorder in hand. At least it wasn’t raining – yet – and there was no sign of Sonia Claesens. But he felt horribly exposed, all the same. Where the hell was Trevor Miller? Anastasia had taken the kids off to have a go at milking some goats, while he suspected that his Head of Security had sneaked off to the real ale tent.

Shakermaker finished chewing and offered Edgar a taste from the plate of samples sitting on a beer barrel that doubled as a table. ‘Why don’t you try some? It’s delicious.’

‘I’m sure.’ Edgar tried not to grimace. He wasn’t a cheese man.

‘I make it at my organic farm in East Sussex. One hundred per cent natural ingredients, and we follow a traditional recipe used by Ancient Britons since the time of Stonehenge.’