Pauline Rowson - Deadly Waters

He asked Marsden to speed up the checks on Morville's background. He was sure there was still something that Morville wasn't telling them. And, although he wanted to bring Morville in for questioning, he curbed his impatience and decided to wait until Marsden came up with more information.

Horton returned to his office with an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. The sounds of the main CID office filtered through to him even though his door was closed: the ringing telephone, the hum of computers, Walters talking to Kate Somerfield… All night he had thought through the case, but he still had more questions than answers. One in particular was bugging him: why had Boston set up Mickey Johnson and his mate and therefore exposed himself to the risk of being caught?

It was time to shake Mickey Johnson's tree and see what fell out. And they might get some conclusive evidence that Boston was the mastermind behind the thefts. With Cantelli, he headed for a small terraced house in Fratton where, after several stout knocks, the door was eventually opened by a skinny, dark-haired woman in her early thirties wearing a tight pair of faded jeans, a body hugging T-shirt, and balancing a crying, food-smeared baby on her bony hip with an equally grubby child clutching her leg.

'Hello, Janey,' Horton greeted Johnson's partner. 'I see Mickey's been keeping you busy since we last met. Is lover boy awake?'

'Mickey, it's the filth. Get your lazy arse down here and see what the buggers want,' she bellowed up the stairs, which were directly behind her.

Cantelli put a finger in his ear and waggled it, wincing. The toddler increased the volume of his screaming. Turning, she swore vehemently at him, then dragging him down the passageway, she stomped into a room on her left and slammed the door on them.

'Poor little blighters,' Cantelli said sorrowfully.

Horton was inclined to agree. In about eight to ten years they'd probably be hauling them up before the juvenile court.

Mickey appeared at the top of the stairs, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. 'I'm on bail,' he grunted.

Horton stared up at the scrawny man with his tousled ginger hair sticking up in tufts from his narrow head. He was wearing grey boxer shorts and Horton thought he detected the emblem of Pompey Football Club on his grubby T-shirt, but he wouldn't swear to it.

'Get your clothes on, Mickey. You're coming with us.'

'No I bleeding ain't.'

Horton sprang up the stairs. He thrust his face close to Mickey's, disguising his disgust at the smell from his unwashed and sleep-fogged body, and said quietly, 'Would you like me to put you in an arm lock and drag you out on the streets like that?'

'You can't arrest me. I ain't done nothing!'

'Tell him, Sergeant.'

They'd worked out their plan in the car on the way there. Now Cantelli intoned, 'Last night, the body of a man was found in Gosport Marina. We believe it to be the man who masterminded the robbery that you committed. Where were you between five p.m. and midnight?'

'Hang on, what you accusing me of? Shut those brats up.' He roared down the stairs, as the crying rose to a crescendo.

'Dress,' ordered Horton.

'I didn't even know the guy.'

Horton reached out an arm to grab Johnson but he sprang back up a couple of stairs and in the process slipped. Crouched on his backside he stared up at Horton. 'I was in the Shearer Arms — you can check — and then I was here.'

'I'm sure your mates will vouch for you, even if you weren't there. And no doubt Janey will swear blind you were tucked up in bed with her, when in reality you were killing the man who set you up, not to mention the head teacher of the Sir Wilberforce Cutler school.' He thought he'd throw that one in for good measure. 'I don't think any clever brief is going to get you off that, or get you bail,' he bluffed. 'You're looking at a long stretch, Mickey.'

'I swear I didn't even know who he was. I never spoke to him, Wayne did.'

His threats had paid off. He'd finally loosened Mickey's tongue. 'Wayne?'

'The bloke that I did the job with. The one you let get away. Wayne Goodall, number thirty-six Wilmslow Gardens.'

'Did you get that, Sergeant?' Horton tossed over his shoulder.

'Yeah. I should have guessed. Wayne can run like the wind.'

Horton said, 'Get dressed, Mickey. We'll send a car to collect you.'

'I gave you what you wanted,' Mickey said sulking.

'We need to check you're not lying, don't we? Now get dressed.'

Mickey pulled himself up by the banister, and as the sound of wailing children continued, he shouted, 'At least I'll get some peace in the nick, not like this bloody place.'

A police car took Mickey to the station and another followed Horton and Cantelli to Wilmslow Gardens in Southsea.

'Wayne's been in and out of trouble since he was fourteen,' Cantelli said. 'Petty thieving, drunk and disorderly. He must be sixteen now.'

That explained why Horton wasn't aware of the youth. For the last two years he'd been working in specialist investigations.

Number 36 Wilmslow Gardens was a dismal street just off the seafront. Horton knew this to be student and social security land. He stared at the filthy curtains at the ground-floor windows and the faded blinds pulled across the gritty windowpanes further up the building and silently vowed that if he were ever to make a home for Emma then it would never be a bedsit, no matter where it was in the city.

There wasn't a back entrance so Horton asked the two uniformed officers to accompany him and Cantelli. He warned them of Wayne's athletic prowess. The youth wasn't going to escape him this time.

Johnson hadn't said which flat Wayne lived in, but Horton found a letter on the stairs from the social security people, which told him it was on the top floor.

Cantelli thumped on the door and shouted, 'Open up, Wayne. It's the police.'

There was no reply and neither was there any sound from inside. Cantelli threw Horton a look. 'Probably asleep.'

'Let's wake him up then.'

Horton nodded at the PC who thrust the ram at the door. It shot open. Cantelli and the other PC rushed in. There was only one room and Wayne was in bed. He sat up surprised, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, saw them, swore, and jumped out of bed. But the PC had restrained the boy before he could reach the door.

'What do you want?' Wayne said angrily, trying to pull his arm away from the constable's grasp.

Horton looked the lad over before replying. Wayne was tall and slender with hunched shoulders and a surly expression on his otherwise good-looking face. He wore no T-shirt or pyjama top. His skin was smooth and white.

'I hope you're going to co-operate, Wayne.' Horton walked slowly round the room, taking in the clothes strewn about the floor, the discarded take-away food containers and empty lager cans. 'You see, Mickey Johnson's told us you were with him on the antiques thefts.'

'Scumbag.'

'And a man has been killed. The one who gave you your orders, and you are currently in the frame for it.'

'I haven't killed anyone,' Wayne said, alarmed.

'Then you'd better tell us all about your little antiques raiding jaunts or you might find yourself going down for murder.'

After a few sniffs Wayne grunted an agreement. Horton nodded at the officer to let him go. Wayne sat down on the bed and found a packet of cigarettes on the bedside table.

He lit up and inhaled deeply before saying: 'This man approached me in the amusement arcade, and asked me if I'd like to earn some money. I thought he was gay at first, but he said he was straight. He wore nice suits and a Rolex and I thought, yeah why not, I could do with a bit of that.'

'What was his name?'

'Bond.'

'You're kidding.'

'No. Why?' Wayne looked confused.