Murphy looked in his pocket notebook.
‘The name Tina was lip-read by Rachel Wilson, wasn’t it?’ he asked Jane.
She nodded and looked in her pocket notebook.
‘M1 said to M2 in the cafe, “If yesterday hadn’t been a total fuck-up I could have paid our Tina’s wedding off in cash.”’
Murphy looked pleased. ‘Interesting. Do we know who owns the garage?’
The Colonel shook his head. ‘We’re still working on it, Guv. Companies House isn’t open until Monday, but I reckon there’s a good chance GR could be the initials of the owner, so it could be Ripley.’
‘What about the keyholder’s card for GR Motors?’ Murphy asked.
‘There’s no alarm on the premises or keyholder’s card at Tottenham. The authorizing vehicle inspector’s signature on the inspection is “G. Smith”.’
‘You reckon he might have had a key cut in order to steal the car?’ Dabs asked.
Bax nodded. ‘The traffic officer’s conclusion also supports that theory.’
Teflon looked at Jane, who nodded.
‘Jane and I got some stuff that ties in with what the Colonel just said re GR. Nick, the cafe owner, said M1 is George and M2’s called Tommy and they’re brothers. He also said Tommy was the new owner of the snooker club, who we know, thanks to Jane, is Thomas Anthony Ripley.’
‘That’s good information, but we need some documentary evidence to prove GR Motors is owned by or connected to George Ripley. Have you run a PNC check on him?’ Murphy asked.
‘Yes, sir, and I got a few hits. I was going to print them off and go through them after the meeting. We also got some information about a Graham Smith from an estate agent’s in Wanstead,’ Teflon said.
‘I don’t recall authorizing any enquiries at an estate agent’s...’ Murphy frowned.
Jane interjected. ‘It was my idea to go there and make enquiries about the previous owner of forty Edgar House. I thought I’d mentioned it at the last meeting, but obviously I didn’t,’ she said, knowing that she’d informed Kingston and he’d told her to visit the estate agent’s.
Murphy sighed. ‘OK, tell us about Graham Smith.’
‘He bought flat forty for his mother Elizabeth about a year ago and paid just over ten thousand pounds cash—’
‘That’s a lot of dosh,’ Stanley remarked.
Jane continued, ‘Then he inherited it when she died, and sold it through the Wanstead estate agent’s for a tidy profit. Garage twenty-nine was owned by Mrs. Smith, who, as far as I’m aware, didn’t have a car, though she may have rented the garage out — or her son Graham could have used it and kept a key when he sold the flat.’
‘That’s all very interesting, Tennison, but Smith is not exactly an uncommon name, and you don’t have any firm connections between the Colonel’s G. Smith and yours.’
‘I think she does, sir...’
Everyone looked over at Cam.
‘Sergeant Tennison asked me to check out a phone number with the PO — it turned out to be registered to GR Motors Ltd. in Lordship Lane.’
‘Bloody hell, this gets better and better!’ Baxter exclaimed.
‘The estate agent had it as a contact number for Graham Smith when he was selling the Edgar House property,’ Teflon added.
‘Another thing you forgot to mention to me, Tennison,’ Murphy growled.
‘She didn’t know — I forgot to give her the result when she got back to the office,’ Cam explained.
She gave him a subtle nod of thanks and made sure the bit of paper with the phone number details was still in her pocket.
‘Any description of your Mr. Smith, Tennison?’ Murphy asked.
‘Not yet, sir.’
‘Make it a priority to get as much as you can on him.’
‘Yes, Guv. Would you like me to go over what the cafe owner told us?’
‘After we’ve heard what the snooker champions have to tell us,’ he said drily, raising a few chuckles of laughter.
Stanley put on a stern face. ‘The most important thing I have to tell you, sir — and everyone else in this room — is don’t play snooker for money with this short-arsed bandit!’
‘Didn’t you know Dabs played for the Met?’ the Colonel laughed.
‘No, I did not!’ He scowled at Dabs, who grinned back.
‘Apart from you getting fleeced, what happened at the snooker hall?’ Murphy asked.
Stanley gave detailed descriptions of Aidan, the manager, and the Spanish barmaid, Maria. Based on the registered keyholders for the snooker hall, he concluded that they were Aidan O’Reilly and Maria Fernadez.
Dabs emphasized the recent cut to O’Reilly’s forehead and the blood trail at the Woodville Road scene and on the door sill of the Cortina, suggesting that the passenger in the getaway car had sustained a head injury.
‘Any sighting of someone who might be Tommy Riley?’ Jane asked.
Stanley shook his head. ‘No, but Aidan told Maria that Tommy wanted to speak to her in his office, so he must have been on the premises.’
Murphy looked pleased. ‘Good work, you two. Keep digging and see what else you can find out about them.’
‘If O’Reilly is involved in the robbery, and the one who started shooting at the police car, it’s hard to believe he hasn’t any previous convictions,’ the Colonel remarked.
‘He could be using a false identity,’ Bax suggested.
‘It’s possible, but when we were in the snooker hall it struck me that the Aidan O’Reilly we ran a PNC check on might not come up if he’s only got a criminal record in Northern Ireland or the Republic — their PNC systems aren’t linked to ours. I tried the Garda in Dublin first, but it was like pulling teeth — their systems are from the Stone Age. I then tried the RUC criminal records office in Belfast. Based on the detailed description and age range I gave them, they had four hits on the surname O’Reilly. I asked them to send the results through with copies of their fingerprints — that’s why the fax machine’s been whirring away.’
‘Have you got something to compare the prints to?’ Murphy asked.
‘O’Reilly served me a drink, so I nicked the glass. I’ve already dusted it in my office and managed to lift a couple of good prints onto acetate, which I can compare to the ones the RUC fax over.’
‘Nice work, Dabs. You and Stanley get the stuff off the fax and have a look through it while we continue the meeting.’
Dabs nipped out to get the fingerprints he’d lifted, while Stanley grabbed the sheets of paper from the fax machine and started to go through them.
Murphy looked at Jane. ‘Let’s hear what else the cafe owner had to say.’
She went over the details about the younger man, Carl, and the man in the brown camel hair coat.
‘Is Carl related to any of them?’ Murphy asked.
‘He could be, but Nick didn’t know for sure,’ Teflon replied.
‘Maybe Carl’s the man who’s marrying George’s daughter Tina,’ Dabs suggested as he examined the fingerprints.
‘Did you find out any more about the wedding?’ the Colonel asked.
‘Nick knew about it, but not when or where it’s going to be,’ Teflon said.
‘What about using his cafe for surveillance?’ Murphy asked.
‘It wasn’t suitable due to the viewing angles, but the newsagent’s on the corner of the road overlooks the cafe and snooker hall. We spoke to the owner, who’s happy for us to use the upstairs and didn’t ask any questions.’
‘I asked Nick about doing some UC work as a waitress,’ Jane added. ‘He said I could start Monday—’
‘That’s an option worth considering, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves—’
‘We got a fucking hit!’ Stanley shouted, waving one of the fax sheets in the air. ‘Connor Aidan O’Reilly, aged thirty-six, born Belfast 1944, six feet four inches tall, with dark brown hair.’