Then he hurried across the room to Bill Stoker’s tiny office, which was largely decorated with photographs of him in his former life as a professional boxer, and told him the developments.
‘Probably a crank,’ was the Detective Sergeant’s first reaction.
‘He was very specific.’
‘Let’s wait and see if Cardiff Police come back with anything on these two Taffies.’
An hour later, Grace received a call from Detective Constable Gareth Brangwen of the South Wales Constabulary. Before getting down to business he asked whether Grace was a football or a rugby man. ‘I’m a rugby man, sir,’ he said, ‘Out of preference.’
‘Good man!’ he said. ‘We’re going to get along fine, you and I! Now, what’s this about two of our undesirables over on your manor?’
The young DC gave him, as briefly as he could, the facts.
‘Well, we do have a Dai Lewellyn and Rees Hughes well known to us. They come from the same estate and they’ve given us plenty of trouble over the years. Housebreaking is their speciality, if you want to call it that. Both of them have form — they were last released from prison six months ago.’
Grace thanked him, hardly able to wait to give Bill Stoker the news.
There were several cars parked along both sides of Tongdean Avenue, so another one, a large plain Vauxhall, did not look out of place. Taking no chances, Roy Grace and another DC colleague, Jon Carlton, had arrived shortly before midnight for the stake-out.
They were parked across the road, a safe distance back from The Gallops, number 111, the target house. A quarter of a mile away, down a side street, other officers waited in an unmarked van. A second unmarked car, with two police officers seated inside, was parked in the street near the rear of the property. No one could go in or out without being seen from one of the roads.
There were to be no breaks, and no one leaving or entering any of the vehicles. If anyone, including Grace and Carlton, needed to urinate for the rest of the night, they’d have to do it into plastic jars, which they had with them.
One of the biggest decisions that had been made, fortunately by his superiors — so there would be no comeback on him at least — was not to inform the owners of The Gallops. The news would undoubtedly worry, if not downright terrify them. There would be no telling how the owners might react — perhaps by keeping the lights on all night long, which could blow the police’s chances of an arrest. The plan was to seize the perpetrators as they attempted to enter the house.
Grace was nervous as hell — so much was riding on this. Would they turn up, or would he have wasted hours of time for eight officers, and DS Stoker, who had also sacrificed his night’s sleep to be on standby for him? He’d have a very red face if there was a no-show, or if it all went, as Bill Stoker had charmingly put it, tits-up.
Grace wondered if he was noticing a pattern. The Gallops, which he had driven past in daylight earlier, was one of the largest houses in this street, but — like the Cunninghams’ house — one of the ones in poorest repair, and there was no burglar alarm box on the wall. There were also no gates to the entrance or exit of the in-and-out driveway.
His colleague was an experienced and chatty DC, who was hoping to move across to Major Crime work, which included all homicides. High-profile murder cases were the best jobs, the Gucci jobs, he told Roy Grace over several cigarettes, which they smoked cupped in their hands to conceal the glow in case their quarry approached unseen, and sickly sweet coffee that was becoming progressively more lukewarm. They were also the cases that got you noticed by your superiors, and which helped your promotion chances.
As the night wore on, it wasn’t promotion that was Grace’s worry, it was his growing fear of a no-show. Had he been sold a pup? Been naive in believing a crank caller?
But the names of the two Welshmen had checked out, hadn’t they? If it had been a crank call, whoever had made it had gone to a lot of trouble.
At a few minutes past five, DC Carlton yawned. ‘What time are you reckoning on calling it a day?’
The sky was lightening a fraction, Grace thought, and a few tiny streaks of grey and red were appearing. He felt tired, and shaky from too much coffee. He munched a Kit Kat chocolate bar, sharing it with Carlton. Then, just as he bit on the last morsel, both men stiffened.
Headlights appeared.
A white van drove slowly past them, with what looked like two men in the front. All the cars parked on this street, and on the driveways of the homes, were modern; this Vauxhall they were in was one of the cheapest, but it was inconspicuous. The van stuck out instantly. The vehicle was wrong for the street — certainly at this hour.
Grace radioed in. ‘Charlie Victor, Tango One approaching Tango Two.’
But the van carried on going and Grace’s heart sank. Then it turned around and came back, and pulled into a space less than a hundred yards in front of them. Two men climbed out. In the glow of a street light he could see they were dressed as postmen, carrying what looked like empty mail sacks. They looked furtively around at the seemingly deserted street, then scurried across the road, hurried along the pavement and down the driveway.
‘Now,’ he radioed urgently. ‘Tango One on scene. Charlie Victor going in. Unit Two, move forward!’
Grace signalled to his colleague to wait for a few more seconds, pulled his torch out of the glove compartment without switching it on, then as quietly as they could, they slipped out of the car and hurried across the road. The driveway of The Gallops was tarmac, and on their rubber-soled shoes they made little noise as they hurried around the side of the house. Then they stopped.
Right in front of them, barely twenty feet ahead, they saw the silhouettes of the two men. Then they heard a tinkle of glass. In the distance, Grace heard the roar of an engine being revved hard. He snapped on his torch, lighting up their startled faces, and yelled, ‘Police, don’t move!’ as both officers sprinted forwards.
‘Shite!’ One of the thieves shouted, dropping his tools and making a run for it across the lawn. Grace broke away to the right, sprinting hard to try to cut him off. Out of the corner of his eyes he saw the other trying to climb the wall into the neighbour’s garden and being dragged back down by Carlton. But all his focus was on the sprinting man ahead of him. Gripping his torch, the beam jigging everywhere, Grace was gaining on him on the damp grass. Gaining. Then suddenly his quarry appeared to trip and plunge forward in the darkness. An instant later, as the ground gave way beneath him, he realized why.
For an instant he swayed wildly, then fell forward too, the torch rolling away from him onto the soft, tensioned cover of the swimming pool. He reached forward and grabbed an ankle, as the thief attempted to scramble away. Grace clung to it, as the Welshman kicked hard and swore, then moments later he broke free, leaving Grace floundering on the material, now sodden with chlorinated water, holding a trainer in his hand. He lurched to his feet, and stumbled forward through ankle-deep water, radioing for assistance.
Ahead he saw the Welshman haul himself back onto terra firma and sprint towards the end of the garden. Not bothering to pick up his torch, Grace sprinted on after him. Suddenly, appearing to change his mind, the thief turned and ran back towards the house, and seconds later was lit up by the beams of three different torches. He stopped in his tracks. Before he knew it he was face down on the ground, with two officers on top of him.