‘I need to find a close relative of Harry Rawlins to check his DNA for a familial match.’
‘The only one I can think of is his cousin, Eddie, but I don’t know if he’s dead or alive.’
Fuller handed Jack a mug of tea, and he took it gratefully. He was exhausted and let his mind wander as Fuller rambled on about villains in the old days. But when Fuller mentioned Dolly Rawlins, he was all attention.
‘She was a stony-faced old cow. At least, that’s the face she showed everyone. She was afforded a huge amount of respect because she was Harry’s wife, but, in truth, she earned it. She was smart. I mean, she gave us the runaround for months — we were chasing our tails and she was watching. And Harry didn’t spend a single day behind bars in his life. That’s not down to luck, that’s down to a loyal wife. People said Dolly was lucky to have Harry — but I think it was the other way round.’
Connie sat on the benches in front of her B & B, eating fish and chips out of paper and drinking stout from the bottle. She looked out over the Blackdown Hills and cried. It was a stunning view: plots of undulating light green land cut into squares by dark green hedges; horses, sheep and rabbits grazed together; the occasional walker made their respectful way along the designated paths that cut through Connie’s little piece of paradise. She didn’t want to leave the comfort of her safe haven, but she knew — she hoped — that her brand new life would be bigger and better than anything she’d ever dreamed of. The excitement of the train robbery flooded back — the vision of millions of pounds shooting up the nozzle of an industrial vacuum and then, moments later, down into the coal shaft of Rose Cottage. Connie giggled through the tears. It had been the most wonderful night of her entire life. The night she knew her life was worth fighting for.
The shift was drawing to an end in the squad room when Anik took the call from Essex. Barry Cooper had been found. The local force had him under covert observation while they waited for two Armed Response Vehicles to be rallied, briefed and arrive at the address. Ridley’s team had time to join them if they fancied being in on the showdown. It was their case, after all.
As Ridley swept through the squad room and headed for the car park, he didn’t even bother to ask where Jack was.
Jack listened to generic acoustic music as he waited for Maggie to come to the phone. He stood, fixed to the spot, looking across the road of a dustbin-lined terraced street, at one specific house which had the lounge light on and a TV flickering away in the far corner of the room. All around him dogs barked, men shouted at a football match on TV, women talked loudly in various languages and the wonderful aroma of foreign cooking filled the air. This part of Whitechapel had been up and coming for a while but it felt as if it still had a way to go.
‘I have two minutes,’ Maggie said.
‘I’m sorry, Mags. I’m so sorry for walking out on you at Mum and Dad’s. I can’t explain what happened. Not yet. I just... Please be patient with me, because I’m nearly there. Honestly.’
Maggie was economical with her words. She had two minutes and she wasn’t joking.
‘I love you, Jack Warr, and I will always be here for you. Tomorrow morning, when I get home, I want breakfast in bed and a cuddle regardless of how bad I smell. And when you get home in the evening, you’re taking me out because I’ve got tomorrow night off. Now I have to go.’
Jack smiled as he put his phone away and headed towards the house he’d been watching.
Eddie Rawlins opened his front door like someone not to be messed with. Tall and with a broad set of shoulders for a man in his late 70s, he had a furrowed face from a lifetime of too many frowns and too few smiles. His deep resonating voice — ‘What?’ — completed the picture of an old East End lag who’d earned his stripes.
But when Eddie focused on Jack’s face, all of his bravado vanished. His shoulders slumped and he stepped back, suddenly diminished. His face drained to white, his mouth gaped, his eyebrows shot up and his eyes nearly popped out of his head.
‘S-sorry, sorry,’ Eddie stuttered as he forced a quivering smile. ‘For a minute there, I thought you was... Well, you reminded me of a man I used to know.’
Chapter 27
Eddie refilled his whisky glass and poured one for Jack. As they silently sipped their single malt, Jack felt something he’d never really felt before. He felt feared. Eddie feared him. Not strictly true, of course — Eddie feared the man he thought he’d seen for a moment standing at his front door, before he remembered that Harry Rawlins was dead.
‘I want to talk to you about Harry Rawlins,’ Jack said.
‘I bet you do.’ Eddie downed his whisky and poured himself another. ‘Let me guess — you want to know if old Harry knew your mum, 30-odd years ago.’ He eyed Jack. ‘I’d say he did.’
Jack had expected to have to pry information out of Eddie, then beg for a DNA sample to test against. But here he was, inadvertently terrifying an old man by his very presence. Imagine, then, how Harry must have felt back in the day — strutting into a room and having every fearful eye on him. Imagine having that power over half of the gangsters in London, over Tony bloody Fisher, over any woman he set eyes on.
Jack realised he was staring at Eddie and, in response, Eddie was sweating and fidgeting. My God, he felt like he was Harry’s boy! However, the same gene pool had allegedly produced the wimp sitting in front him, so Jack wanted to be sure. He glanced around the room, which looked like it hadn’t been redecorated since the eighties, and his eyes fixed on a photo of two boys in their mid to late teens. He went over and picked it up. One was blond and blue eyed, the other was dark haired with brown eyes and a heavy brow. The second boy didn’t look unlike Jack when he was a teen.
‘The blond is Liam — he’s our oldest — the dark one is Jason. Strong genes, our Harry.’ Eddie moved to Jack’s side and took the photo from him. ‘I loved Jason like my own.’
‘Jason is Harry’s?’
‘Liam’s a microbiologist in Edinburgh. Married, second kid on the way. The house he’s in now is the house he’ll die in, I expect.’ Eddie glanced around his own lounge. ‘Jason, on the other hand, never sat still. Got his first motorbike at 16.’
‘Where’s Jason now?’ Jack asked.
‘Knocked off his bike 11 years ago,’ said Eddie. ‘Dragged quarter of a mile under the wheels of a tri-axle lorry. Couldn’t stop fast enough ’cos of the rainwater on the road. He died pretty much straight away. That’s what they told me anyway. Said I shouldn’t see him... so... that was that.’
Eddie put the photo back in exactly the same place, at exactly the same skewed angle. When he sat back down, Jack could now see that the photo was pointing directly at Eddie’s armchair.
‘I don’t know your name,’ Eddie said.
‘Jack. Jack Nunn.’ He had no idea why he’d said this.
‘You’re Trudie’s boy! Of course you are! Poor Jimmy...’ Eddie shook his head as he poured himself another whisky. ‘Why are you here, Jack? What do you need to know?’
‘I want a DNA sample, so I can be sure.’
‘I’m sure, lad. As soon as I saw you, I was sure. It’s the eyes.’ Eddie glanced at the photo of his two sons again. ‘My Jackie left me for a biker called Harvey Rintle. He bought Jason the bike that killed him. I’ll never forgive that man till the day I die, but Harry... I forgive Harry. Harry gave my boy something I never could. He gave Jason “spark”. People can see strength and that gets you respect. I love Liam to bits, but he’s not excited about life. He’ll always be loved, but he’ll never be...’ Eddie brought his hands to his stomach and made a welling motion like a volcano coming from the pit of his belly. ‘No, I don’t need a DNA match to tell me who you belong to, Jack.’