Watching the Dark (Inspector Banks Mystery) (45 page)

‘Well, he’s got his answer, hasn’t he?’

‘Yes,’ said Annie. ‘I’ll phone him when I get home.’

When they arrived at Annie’s cottage, Winsome got out of the car and went up to the door with her, and they both went inside. Everything looked normal, but there was no sign of Krystyna. Annie checked upstairs and Winsome checked the kitchen.

‘You’d better see this,’ she said, when Annie came down.

Annie went into the kitchen and saw the cocoa tin where she kept her petty cash. It was open, and there was nothing but a brief note in Polish inside.

‘How much was in there?’ Winsome asked.

‘About thirty quid.’

‘She won’t get far on that.’

There was also a note in Polish stuck to the fridge with a magnet shaped like a buttercup. Winsome put the kettle on and Annie returned to living room, flopped on the sofa and started to cry.

Chapter 11

On Sunday morning around eleven, Banks took the lift down to the Metropol lobby and went out to meet Erik and Joanna for coffee in Viru Keskus. Last night he had spoken for a long time with Annie on the phone. She had been worried and upset by the disappearance of a young Polish girl who had been staying at Garskill Farm with the migrant workers. She had run away on the day Mihkel Lepikson had been killed, and Annie was worried that someone might think she knew too much and try to harm her. He had reassured her as best he could, but he could tell it hadn’t done much good. Annie had also told him about Curly’s lengthy, and quite perceptive, deposition, and that Rachel’s friend, Pauline, remembered the club with no name, that she even had a card bearing its sign. Rachel, too, might have been given such a card, Banks thought, and if the place looked familiar to her, that might well have tempted her to go inside. Perhaps she had thought it was where her friends had gone after St Patrick’s. Bit by bit, he felt, he was getting closer to the truth of what happened.

Annie had also come up with some more names Banks could try on Erik, including the name of the killer Robert Tamm. Surely it could only be a matter of time now? Perhaps most importantly, Joosep Rebane’s name had come up in her inquiries into Corrigan’s business, as well as in Banks’s inquiries about the nightclub. Larisa had named him as Juliya’s boyfriend. Now they had a direct link between Rebane, Corrigan, Flinders and the whole migrant racket. But he still had to find out if, or where, Rachel fitted in.

He made his way inside and up the escalators. The shops were open, and the shopping centre was busy, even though it was Sunday. After a few wrong turns, he finally found the cafe in the large bookshop, where Erik had arranged for them all to meet. Estonians must be great readers, Banks thought, with so many huge bookshops in the capital.

Erik was sitting at a table alone drinking Coke from a bottle and reading a newspaper. Banks went and bought himself a coffee and joined him. People bustled all around them, carrying bags, looking for tables, heading to the shops.

‘Where’s your charming colleague?’ Erik asked.

Banks checked his watch. ‘Shopping,’ he said. ‘She’ll be here soon. I want to thank you once again for that information you got for us the other day.’

‘It helped?’

‘A lot.’

‘I spoke briefly with Merike last night, and she said you seemed happy with your talk with Larisa.’

‘Interesting woman,’ Banks said. ‘And she was able to give us— Ah, the wanderer returns.’

Joanna bent down and set her bags and packages on the ground around the third chair, like presents under the Christmas tree. Banks noticed designer names he didn’t recognise: Marc Aurel, Ivo Nikkolo. There would be no carry-on only going back for Joanna, Banks could see. She might have to buy a new suitcase. Ever the gentleman, Erik offered to go and get her something to drink, but she insisted on going herself. They waited politely until she returned with a bottle of fruit juice.

‘We’ve got a few more names for you to check out, if you will,’ said Banks.

‘It’s getting to be like a hall of mirrors,’ said Joanna. ‘Every time we get one name, it leads to another, and so on.’

‘It’s always like that when you’re getting close,’ said Banks. ‘The storm before the calm.’

‘Don’t you mean—’

‘No. It always gets more and more confusing until it settles down, when you know. The storm before the calm.’

‘A good story can be like that, too,’ Erik said. ‘Mihkel knew that. He always talked of so many balls in the air. Like a juggler. Give me the names. I will try tomorrow. I feel like I am working for the British police.’

Banks laughed. ‘We’d snap you up like a shot. First of all,’ he said, ‘I’m curious about a bloke called Robert Tamm. He lives near Glasgow, but my source thinks he’s Eastern European, perhaps Estonian.’

‘It could be an Estonian name,’ said Erik.

Joanna looked puzzled, and Banks realised that he hadn’t had a chance to talk to her since Annie’s phone call. She had been in her room sleeping, he assumed, when Banks took the call, and he hadn’t seen her so far that morning. This time, it was simply circumstances; he wasn’t deliberately keeping her out of the loop. He explained to her briefly what he had learned, including that Joosep Rebane claimed to have a DI Bill Quinn in his pocket.

‘So we’re pretty sure this Robert Tamm is the killer?’ she said, when he’d finished and she had scribbled some notes.

‘So it would appear.’

‘That’s the case over, then, isn’t it? I mean, I know we have to get the Glasgow police to go—’

‘Hang on,’ said Banks. ‘Wait a minute. Are you going to abandon Rachel Hewitt, just like that? Like everyone else?’

‘That’s not fair. She’s not our case.’

‘Dismissing her isn’t fair, either. She deserves more than that. She became our case. You said you were with me on that.’

‘Yes, but only if it helped lead us to Quinn’s killer. It has done, so we’re finished now.’

‘You can do what you want, but I’m not leaving Tallinn until I find out what happened to Rachel.’

‘Don’t be so melodramatic.’

‘I’m not being melodramatic. We owe her. You know what your problem is? You lack—’

‘If you will excuse me for interrupting, children,’ Erik said, holding up his hand. ‘Perhaps you two can save the argument for later? I do have to go home soon. My mother-in-law is coming for dinner.’

‘Sorry,’ said Banks, giving Joanna a dirty look, which she returned with bells on. ‘Robert Tamm, yes. Perhaps you can find out if he has any Estonian underworld connections. Also, there’s a nightclub on an alley off Vana-Posti. It doesn’t have a name, but there’s a sign of—’

‘A gentleman helping the lady into a coach?’

‘That’s right. You know it?’

‘I’ve passed by. I just assumed it was some sort of exclusive sex club.’

‘It is now. Well, not that exclusive. They let me in. And there’s a waitress from Wigan.’

‘Then what do you need to know?’

‘Its history,’ said Banks. ‘Specifically what sort of place it was and who owned it, or ran it, six years ago, when Rachel disappeared.’

Erik made a note. ‘OK. Now you mentioned another name.’

‘Joosep Rebane,’ said Banks. ‘We think he’s the one who hired Tamm to kill Mihkel and Bill Quinn. He said he had Quinn in his pocket but started to get nervous as soon as Quinn’s wife died.’ Banks paused and waited for Erik to catch up, but he put down his pen. ‘Well, aren’t you going to write it down?’ Banks went on. ‘Joosep Rebane. I think I’ve got it right.’

‘Oh, you have got it right, my friend,’ said Erik. ‘I don’t even need to go to my files for that one. Where do you want me to begin?’

Annie had slept badly on Saturday night. She had tried to phone Stefan to see if she could beg him to come over and translate the note for her – or she would even drive out to his place – but all she got was his answering machine. She even got hold of Jan from Traffic, but he explained politely that, whereas he could manage a few phrases in Polish, he certainly couldn’t read and translate the language. Annie realised when she got up that she had been lying awake waiting most of the night, waiting for a knock on the door, for a phone call that she wouldn’t be able to understand. She tried Stefan’s number again. Still no reply.
Bastard
, she thought. He must have picked up some slut or other and was still at her place for a morning shag. She wished it wasn’t a Sunday, then she might be able to gather a posse, get an official search or something going. On the other hand, Krystyna wasn’t a criminal; she was a victim. Annie didn’t want to frighten her, make her feel she was being hunted and chased. God only knew what she would do then. She might also be a witness, able to help against Flinders and Robert Tamm, when the Glasgow police found him. But mostly she was a victim. She had no papers, no passport, but she was a citizen of the EU. Annie could report her missing, she supposed, but Krystyna was over eighteen, and they wouldn’t exactly pull out all the stops so quickly, unless perhaps she stressed that the girl might be in danger because of something she knew. That was what worried Annie most, that Krystyna didn’t realise the danger she was in, that she might go back to these people. The inactivity was driving her crazy. She needed to do something.

Krystyna hadn’t known where her colleagues were being taken after leaving Garskill Farm on Wednesday morning, but Annie remembered that she had spoken of another Polish girl, Ewa, who had been her friend at the farm and, Annie assumed, had also worked with her at the yeast factory. It didn’t prove very difficult to locate Varley’s Yeast Products in the phone directory, and given the hours that Flinders’ agency demanded of its workers, it also seemed likely the place would be operating seven days a week.

Before she left, Annie tried Stefan one more time. Nothing. She left a message for him to call her as soon as possible on her mobile, and took Krystyna’s note with her in case she got a chance to meet up with Stefan before going home again.

It wasn’t a long drive to the northern edge of Eastvale. The shops soon gave way to housing estates, several leafy enclaves of the wealthy and, finally, after a stretch of wasteland, the old industrial estate where the yeast factory was located. The weather had turned wet, and wind lashed the rain against her car windows. Those few brave souls who had ventured outdoors, most likely on their way to or from church, struggled with umbrellas, many of which had blown inside out.

Annie arrived at the factory gates shortly after eleven in the morning, and she was pleased to find them open. There was a little gatehouse where visitors were required to report and sign in. Annie wound her window down and flashed her warrant card at the man on duty. He barely glanced up from his newspaper before waving her through. As soon as she had opened her window, she could smell the yeast, and she wondered what it must be like to work there day in, day out. It must permeate everything. How could you even get the smell off your skin or your clothes when you got home? Even if you had a decent bathtub or a shower, which the workers at Garskill Farm didn’t.

There were several buildings scattered about the compound, and the yard was filled mostly with pallets, some of them loaded down with containers, others waiting, all getting wet. She found a place to park outside what appeared to be the offices, which must be working on a skeleton staff on a Sunday. She noticed a couple of people standing outside one of the other buildings having a smoke and went over to introduce herself. One of them told her she needed to talk to one of the white hats. She wouldn’t find one inside the building they were closest to, he added, as that was where the yeast grew in vats. The white hats would most likely be over in the main building, where the yeast was processed.

Annie entered through a door at the far end and soon found herself in an open area, where several giant rollers, like the front wheels of bulldozers, turned slowly as the yeast coated them, dried and was shaved off by a fixed razor-sharp blade into large boxes, and then no doubt fed into the other machines. The smell was even stronger inside.

She found a white hat, which happened to be a trilby. He was also wearing a white coat and carrying a clipboard. He seemed to be standing around doing nothing, so she went over and showed her identification.

‘Can I have a word somewhere?’ she asked over the noise of the factory.

He jerked his head in the direction of a row of small offices, and when he closed the door behind him, the volume level dropped considerably. It was a shabby office, furnished only with a cheap desk, chair and gunmetal filing cabinet. There was an ashtray on the desk with several cigarette stubs in it. The room felt uncomfortably small to Annie with the two of them in there. ‘Len’, as he was called, was a red-faced, paunchy man in his fifties who, to Annie’s eye, was fast heading for a coronary, if he hadn’t had one already. He rested one buttock on the desk, which creaked in complaint. Annie remained standing by the door.

‘I’ve come about some migrant labourers you employed here recently.’

The man’s eyes narrowed. ‘They come and go. That’s nothing to do with me.’

‘Are they here now?’

‘Not any more. They wouldn’t be in here, anyway. Most of them usually work over in the extracting department.’

‘In particular, I’m trying to find a Polish girl. I think her name is Ewa. She’s friends with another Polish girl who worked here until a week last Wednesday.’