She spoke again before he had time to fully marshal his thoughts.
‘You’d better get on with it,’ she said.
Vogel felt his cheeks flush. He didn’t like it when his usually clinical approach was tainted, as he saw it, by even a hint of emotion. That was when mistakes were made.
‘Oh, it’s nothing,’ Vogel said.
‘For God’s sake, shoot,’ said Michelle.
‘W-well,’ Vogel stumbled. ‘Marlena told me you said you’d just come back from a course when you visited her the other night. That you’d been with the Diplomatic Protection boys in Belfast. There was no such course in Belfast.’ Vogel paused. ‘Indeed, as far as I can discover, there was no such course at that time anywhere, and although you have made an application to Diplomatic Protection you’ve not been interviewed yet, let alone sent on a course. And apparently you called in sick those two missing days.’
Michelle stared at him.
‘You really have been checking up on me, haven’t you?’
Vogel felt the flush in his cheeks deepening. He didn’t reply.
‘For goodness’ sake,’ said Michelle, the impatience clear in her voice. ‘I took a sickie to go back to Dorset to see Phil. The tart he left me for has dumped him, which serves him right. Trouble is, I still love the rotten bastard. He called me in a dreadful state in the middle of the night on Sunday and I upped sticks and took off straight away. It was too late to apply for leave so I just went sick. And I didn’t want Marlena or any of the rest of our lot to know, because I’ve done nothing but slag Phil off to them all. So I lied. I couldn’t bear the thought of them knowing that I went running back to him at the first opportunity. I can’t believe you picked me up on that, Vogel.’
‘I can’t help it,’ said Vogel.
Michelle managed an ironic laugh. ‘No, you can’t, can you? You pick everyone up on everything. You dissect every detail. And that’s why I asked you to look into this. So serves me right you’re currently dissecting me, I suppose.’
‘Sorry,’ said Vogel.
‘That’s all right,’ said Michelle. She downed the last of her coffee and binned the paper cup. Vogel was still holding his cup even though it was already empty. After all, he’d spilt most of it. Michelle turned on her heel and headed on to Traffic HQ. For a second or two Vogel watched her go. Then he called after her.
‘So are you two getting back together again, then?’ he asked.
Michelle glowered at him. ‘I don’t want the whole fucking world to know about this,’ she said.
‘There’s no one else here,’ said Vogel reasonably, gesturing with his free hand at the empty corridor. ‘Are you?’ he persisted.
‘I don’t know,’ said Michelle. ‘And in any case it’s none of your fucking business.’
She seemed extremely angry. If she did still carry a torch for him, she certainly wasn’t showing it. Or perhaps that merely added to her anger. Vogel wasn’t sure. Vaguely wishing he hadn’t got involved in the first place, he headed back to his desk. The trouble was that now he’d started his investigation he wouldn’t be able to stop. He knew that much about himself. He wished he could but he couldn’t.
He had a new email from his superior asking him to look into a couple of queries concerning his report on the fraud case. He decided to deal with that straight away, but his mind kept wandering.
Finally he gave in to temptation. He had to reassure himself about Michelle, he just had to. He called a colleague with Dorset police, Ben Parker, a man he’d trained with at Hendon many years previously whom he knew was a sergeant at the same station as Phil Monahan.
Only when he’d successfully completed that call did he feel able to return to finalizing his part of the fraud case. After that he considered himself free to return to the matter which was now constantly nagging away at him. He checked out his contact details for the rest of the friends and began to set up interviews for that evening and the next day. He arranged to meet Alfonso a little later on during the waiter’s break from duty at the Vine. Bob agreed to come to the station the following morning at 10 a.m. He decided to visit the three men, whose dogs had died so horribly, in their own homes and made appointments to call on both Tiny and George the following afternoon. Billy, it seemed, was planning to return to work the next day but offered to come to Charing Cross police station as soon as he left his office.
Vogel wanted to speak to each of the friends individually, just in case there were contradictions or even minor variations in their stories which might give him some sort of lead.
He also wanted to interview Greg and Karen again, this time separately. He remained convinced that both had something on their minds which they weren’t telling him, particularly Greg.
He had mobile numbers for the Walkers, but neither answered, so he left messages asking them to contact him, and wondered how long it would take them to do so.
Then he began to pack up his desk ready to leave for his appointment with Alfonso, who had suggested they meet in a Costa café just across the street from the Vine. Vogel logged out of his computer and closed it down. He cleared his desk of any bits and pieces that he didn’t carry in his pocket, like his calculator and his desk diary, and locked them in a drawer. Vogel was naturally tidy and as meticulous with objects as he was awkward with people. His desk always looked as if nobody used it. There was never any personal paraphernalia, no photographs, no loose notes. Nothing.
He was just leaving the building when his mobile rang.
It was Ben Parker in Dorchester.
‘You were right to be suspicious,’ Ben began. ‘I’m having a pint with Phil Monahan. I’ve just stepped out of the pub to call you. He’s not seen or spoken to Michelle in over a year.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Well yes, I think so. I enquired about Michelle as casually as I could. Phil has no reason to lie to me.’
‘No, I suppose he doesn’t,’ murmured Vogel thoughtfully.
‘And there’s another thing,’ Parker went on. ‘The new bird’s pregnant.’
‘So she’s not dumped him, then?’
‘Seems not. She phoned while we were in the pub. I wouldn’t say it’s a match made in heaven, but there’s no doubt he’s over the moon about having a kid. Something he always wanted, apparently.’
Vogel was disturbed by what Ben Parker had told him. Apart from anything else, Michelle Monahan seemed to have left herself without an alibi for the time of the Marlena incident, although Vogel still found it hard to accept that she needed one. But her husband surely had no reason to lie. Certainly not to Parker.
Vogel wondered if Michelle was aware that the new woman in her husband’s life was pregnant. Either way, what was she playing at? She had asked him to investigate after all, so surely she had nothing to hide. But maybe that was double bluff. He still couldn’t believe that the young policewoman could be responsible for any part of the unpleasant sequence of events he was investigating. Nonetheless he didn’t like it, he didn’t like it one bit.
Ten
Greg, of course, did not really believe that the unpleasant incidents concerning his family were random acts of vandalism. Not at all. Not the slashing of the tyres on his van, nor the brick through the window of his apartment.
And he shared none of the professed doubts of the other Sunday Club members concerning who may or may not have been responsible. The other episodes, the pranks, the Marlena incident, the horrible attack on the two little dogs, they were one thing. What had happened to his van and to his home, the danger his whole family now seemed to be in, was entirely another. Greg knew who was responsible. Absolutely. He had no doubts at all.