“Quite a lot, yes.”
“Pay him for it?”
“Sorry?”
“You keep saying that, too.”
“I didn’t understand.”
“Yes, you did. What do you pay him? All these referrals.”
“I don’t … it depends. You know, whether it comes to anything. Sometimes, people, they just want to find out how to make their places more secure, then sort it out for themselves. Either that, or, minute they hear what it’s likely to cost, they don’t want to know.”
“Rees Stanley one of those, was he?”
“I told you, I don’t…”
“Wanted to increase his insurance, went to his broker for advice, broker makes suggestions, everyone demands improved security. All he’s got, let’s say, a box on the wall that says alarm but doesn’t connect to anything. You go along, suss it out, start talking electronic rays, video cameras, the whole works. Stanley’s got his winter holiday to think of, backs off sharpish, he’s been taking the risk for so long, why not a bit longer? So the burglar alarm he’s got doesn’t work, but lots of them are like that, who’s to know?”
“Okay,” said Fossey, back on his feet. “Out.”
“Don’t do it, Fossey,” said Millington, pushing himself up.
“I’m not wasting any more of my time and I’m not answering another question.”
“You mean without your solicitor.”
“I mean, I’m not answering another sodding question.” He jerked the lounge door open wide and stood away from it.
“Oh dear,” said Millington, smiling. “Oh dear, oh dear.”
“You’re not coming into my house, making snide insinuations …”
Millington was passing close enough to shoot out a hand and seize Fossey where his blazer was buttoned together. “Come a long way since Sutton-in-Ashfield, eh, Lloyd? Big house: big words. You’re right though; no more insinuations. Next time, the real thing.” He released his grip and deftly flicked the tip of Fossey’s nose. “Make those files available, do yourself a favor. Don’t make us go through all the performance of getting a warrant. Only makes us short-tempered.”
Mrs. Fossey was dusting something in the hall. It seemed ludicrous to Millington to call her Mrs. Anything. She was still a kid, a child playing grown-up games, playing house. Not so much older than his own. He wondered if there’d been an aisle, if her father had walked her down it, leaning on his arm.
“Thanks for the tea, love,” Millington said, opening the front door.
“Oh, that’s all right.” Her eyes were bright for a moment, then dulled as they turned away to where Lloyd Fossey stood at the entrance to the lounge.
“’Bye,” the sergeant said and closed the door behind him, eager to be in his motor and away. Sensing that he would be back.
Twenty-four
Mark Divine tore the edge from the free holiday offer that had been folded inside his morning paper and eased it between his teeth, high on the right side. Trouble with sodding muesli was you spent till lunch time getting the bits out of your mouth and spitting them through the window. He turned up the car radio a notch as the Four Tops came on-still making it after all those years. Doing the same dances, too. He’d seen them on Top of the Pops: four portly, middle-aged men finger-clicking and spinning in circles. What would he be doing when he was the far side of forty? Living out somewhere like this, perhaps. Christ, no! All that gentility, all those lawn sprinklers and dogs with German brand names. Better another city altogether. Simon Mayo, now, he’d been a DJ on local radio and there he was, doing the breakfast show from London. Radio One, chatting away with whoever was reading the news and that girl, real sexy voice, the one who did the weather. What was her name? Roscoe? No, that was the Emperor, back when he’d been at primary school. Not Roscoe. Ruscoe. That was it. Sybil. Some mornings Divine wished it was television, so that he could see exactly what was going on in the studio; what it was that made her giggle like that.
A car started up and he turned down the volume again, but it wasn’t anything to get concerned about.
Maybe in five years, Divine thought, still poking soggy paper at his mouth, I’ll have my stripes and be down in the smoke. The Met. flying Squad. That’d be the thing. Him and Simon Mayo, both. High flyers.
Another car and this time it was the Citroën. Divine’s fingers flicked the key in the ignition and he moved off from the curb with a speed that left burn marks on the asphalt.
Harold Roy hadn’t cleared his drive before the unmarked police vehicle swung across in front of him and braked sharply, blocking his exit. If Harold hadn’t broken the habit of a lifetime and slotted the end of his seat-belt into place before turning on to the road, no way his head wouldn’t have smacked through the windscreen.
Divine was out of his seat and round by the Citroën before Harold Roy had stopped shaking. Standing there in his light gray suit, pale blue shirt, imitation-silk tie, making the sign with his fingers-wind down your window.
“What the hell …?”
Divine let his wallet fall open before the director’s eyes, someone doing a card trick. “DC Divine, sir. Just a few questions.”
“Questions? Is that any …?”
“Would you mind stepping out of the car, sir?”
“I don’t see …”
“Out of the car, sir.”
“I’ll get out when you’ve told me …”
Divine reached in and flipped up the lock, swung the door back fast. “Out!”
Come down a little hard, the boss had said; not often he encouraged Divine with that sort of leeway. Better make the most of it. Look at this one now, doesn’t know whether to be angry or humble. Puffy eyes, not enough sleep; wouldn’t take much to leave him in tears, shouldn’t wonder.
“Yes, Officer,” said Harold, pressed back against the side of his car, guts turning somersaults like a set without vertical hold.
That’s it, sunshine, smiled Divine to himself, grovel a little. “You’re aware a complaint’s been laid against you, sir? Assault.”
Maria had gone running to the window as soon as she’d heard the double wrench of brakes. Now there was Harold flapping his hands and talking nineteen to the dozen to some identikit policeman. She didn’t know why they bothered with plain clothes. At least the last one they’d sent out to her had been different, Asian, manners like bone china. Nice skin, she remembered that. Surprisingly slim fingers. Almost too shy to hold her stare. Little more than a boy, really.
Not like Grabianski.
The way he’d been when Harold had burst in on them, as if they had been talking about fitting double glazing instead of sharing a bath together in the middle of the afternoon.
We’ve got a lot to talk about.
He hadn’t meant himself and Maria, adultery, the temperature of the bathwater: he had meant business. Maria hoped that whatever was going on at the head of the drive, right then, had nothing to do with it. She tightened the belt of her robe and padded back to the kitchen; one glance at the clock and she was wondering when Grabianski, as he had promised, would call.
What was the attraction, Lynn Kellogg was thinking, and not for the first, not even the first dozen times, of buying a sweatshirt that featured an advertisement for something, somewhere you’d neither use nor see? Dorfmann’s Steel Tubing, the Best in the Midwest. University of Michigan. Ma Baker’s Peach Pies-baked with her own hungry hands. A little logo that read Levis, Pepe, Wrangler, that was enough. That was okay. Personally, though, she drew the line at Hard Core. The remarks that had followed her up the escalator in C amp; A, it wasn’t worth the hassle.
She picked up a striped collarless shirt and wondered what there was about it that made it worth £29.99. Caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, cheeks almost always redder than she’d have liked. The girl with the built-in blusher. If that young assistant didn’t take the smirk off his face, she might wander over and give him something to think about. A kid! Nineteen if he was a day. Gel on his hair, Paco Rabanne, the last of last summer’s duty-free, clinging to his neck and armpits, and dandruff on his shoulders.