James Craig - Then We Die

It took a couple of minutes to finally retrieve Swain from the basement and place her next to Lieberman and Goya. Lost in thought, Silver gazed at the three of them, sullen and brooding, trussed up on the kitchen floor. After a few moments Gideon cleared his throat, breaking the silence. He looked at his boss, who gestured to the back door. Nodding, Gideon and his colleague slipped out into the night. ‘At last,’ Dom sighed as he watched them go. ‘Now we can go and really get pissed. Or at least I can.’ He looked at his watch. ‘The call to the police will be made in five minutes. Let’s see what they make of this mess.’ Stepping round the bodies, he stood at the kitchen table, on which had been piled the Somalis’ Uzis and the Israelis’ Browning semi-automatics. Using the kitchen cloth, he carefully picked up one of the Uzis and tossed it down the stairs into the basement. Then he did the same with the second Uzi and one of the Brownings. The final gun he took in his hand and stepped over behind the three Israelis, shooting each one in the back of the head.

‘Dom!’

Carlyle slumped against the kitchen wall as a wave of nausea washed over him. ‘For fuck’s sake,’ he whimpered.

‘Don’t be such a fucking pussy,’ Dom scowled. ‘How can we leave any witnesses?’

‘But — we’ve. . you’ve. .’ Tears welled in the inspector’s eyes. He felt as if he was ten years old again, on the receiving end of a monster shoeing from some fat bully in the school playground.

Ignoring his sobs, Dom calmly wiped down the grip of the gun and tossed it into the basement with the others. ‘That was for Joe.’

They repaired to the Old Swan pub. Only a couple of blocks from the horrors of Peel Street, life was proceeding pretty much as normal. Stepping into the saloon bar, Carlyle let Dom order him a double of Jameson’s while he himself went to the gents to clean himself up. Before returning to the bar, the inspector took his private mobile out of his pocket and removed the SIM card. Dropping it down the toilet, he flushed and watched it disappear into London’s crumbling sewerage system. Then he smashed the handset against the porcelain and dropped it in the waste-bin by the door.

Dom was sitting at a table when he returned. On a TV fixed to the wall, Chelsea was playing some foreign team that Carlyle didn’t immediately recognize. Squinting at the screen, he could see that the chavs were winning 1–0. ‘Wankers,’ he hissed.

‘Too right,’ said Dom, who was a West Ham man.

‘I’m changing my phone number,’ Carlyle said as he took a seat. ‘The old one isn’t working any longer.’

‘Okay.’ Dom took a mouthful of his Theakston’s Paradise Ale and nodded. He was already three-quarters of the way through his pint, with a second one waiting on the table.

Carlyle swallowed about half of his whiskey. ‘I’ll let you have the new number in the next couple of days.’

‘Fine.’

For a few minutes, they watched the game in silence. It was extremely one-sided, and it was no surprise when Chelsea quickly scored a second goal. Carlyle shook his head in disgust.

In the distance, they heard a succession of sirens.

‘Gideon obviously made the call,’ Carlyle smiled.

‘Gideon is very reliable,’ Dom replied, now well into his second pint. ‘How long are you going to give it before you put in an appearance?’

‘I’ll wait for them to call me.’ Carlyle drained his glass. Taking his work mobile out of his jacket pocket, he placed it on the table. ‘Meantime,’ he said, getting to his feet, ‘it’s my round.’

It started to rain as the inspector stood on the pavement waiting for Anita Szyszkowski to buy her post school-run latte from Caffe Nero. Despite the poor weather, the widow decided that she wanted to drink her coffee while sitting under the awning outside. After giving her time to settle, he braced himself and waited for a break in the traffic, so that he could cross the road.

By the time he approached her table, Anita had been joined by a miserable-looking blonde, sucking an orange and mango smoothie through a straw while chatting away through the other side of her mouth.

‘So I told him that I wasn’t prepared to do that sort of thing,’ she trilled indignantly.

With her back to Carlyle, Anita nodded while sipping on her coffee.

‘It just can’t be hygienic,’ the woman continued, ‘can it?’

Carlyle tried to tune out of the discussion and yet catch a pause in their conversation at the same time.

‘I mean. .’ The woman caught Carlyle’s eye and stopped in mid-flow. Following her gaze, Anita turned in her chair. A look of surprise and anger swept across her face.

‘Hello, Anita.’ Carlyle moved around to where she could see him more easily.

‘What do you want?’ She looked pale and drawn, but her eyes sparkled with hatred.

When she didn’t offer him a seat, Carlyle rocked back on his heels. He had rehearsed what he wanted to say, but the words suddenly stuck in his throat. ‘I’m sorry that I didn’t get the chance to speak to you earlier, but-’

‘You have nothing to say to me,’ Anita said bitterly. The blonde, unsure what was going on, pulled a phone from her pocket and began playing with it nervously.

‘I just wanted to let you know,’ Carlyle continued, keeping his voice deliberately calm, ‘that we got the man who did it.’ The rain was coming down more heavily now. He could feel the dampness seeping through his jacket but made no effort to find cover. ‘He’s dead.’

‘Is that supposed to make me feel better?’ Anita demanded.

‘I just wanted to let you know,’ Carlyle told her.

Anita gripped her cup tightly, spilling coffee over the table. ‘Why should I care?’

‘Because it’s important,’ he said gently. ‘The kids can know that the man who killed their dad didn’t get away with it.’

‘Important? The only thing that’s important,’ she said, tears welling in her eyes, ‘is that their dad is gone.’

‘I know,’ said Carlyle, head bowed.

‘And the only thing that would make me feel better was if it had been you rather than him.’

‘I just wanted to let you know,’ he repeated.

‘Fuck off, John,’ she sobbed. ‘Just fuck off. Leave me alone — and leave the kids alone, too.’

The blonde bashed at several keys on her handset and lifted it to her ear. ‘If you don’t bugger off,’ she squawked, ‘I’ll call the police.’

‘Okay. I’m going.’ Carlyle held up both his hands and watched a solitary tear roll down Anita Szyszkowski’s cheek and fall into her lap. Turning away from the weeping woman, he walked off down the road, relieved that — for him at least — it was finally over.

Was Ana Borochovsky giving him the eye? Or was he just imagining it? Either way, after his run-in with Sylvia Swain, Carlyle had vowed that he would never gawp at another woman again. Carlyle quickly broke off eye-contact with Julius Jubelitski’s granddaughter and lifted his gaze to the heavens. He shuffled from foot to foot and stifled a yawn. Turning to Roche, he whispered, ‘Why can’t they just bloody get on with it?’

‘Be patient,’ she replied, giving him a gentle smack on the arm. ‘It won’t take long.’

Carlyle looked at his watch and sighed. ‘It has already been almost forty-five minutes.’

‘Don’t be so grumpy.’ She pointed to a large black limousine that had just pulled up outside the northern gate of Lincoln’s Inn Field. They watched as the back door opened and a small silverhaired man climbed out. Accompanied by a young female aide, he walked briskly over to the small group of friends and family standing close to the spot in the park where the skeleton of Julius Jubelitski had been dug up a few months earlier. After shaking hands with the Council Services manager, he stepped over to the piece of ground where what looked like a large navy towel was lying on the ground. Lifting a hand for quiet, he pulled a piece of card from his pocket.