Barry Maitiland - Spider Trap

‘All the same, I’ll keep one or two people working on it for a day or two, tidying up loose ends.’

‘Mm.’ Sharpe’s attention had returned to the cover sheet on his file. ‘You’ll let me have a one-page summary, will you? The OCLG want it on record.’

Brock frowned, puzzled. The Organised Crime Liaison Group was a subcommittee of the Joint Intelligence Committee, the central body for interdepartmental intelligence, reporting directly to the Prime Minister’s office.‘Is the OCLG interested?’

‘Apparently there’s a standing brief on friend Roach. I’ve warned Penny that she’ll have to go elsewhere for her next motor, but it’ll be hard to avoid Paramounts. Have you seen their latest prices for Cote de Beaune?’

‘I didn’t know they had a file on Roach.’

‘Nothing that would have been useful to us.You know what their research office is like, Brock-hoarders of inconsequential trifles, stamp collectors.’ Then, as if changing the subject completely, Sharpe added,‘You mentioned that MP in your earlier report, Michael Grant. Has he been in touch again?’

‘He gave us some help in tracking down possible witnesses. Useful.’

‘Mm. Admirable fellow by all accounts. Very supportive of Trident,strong anti-drugs and anti-crime stance in his constituency and in the House. Bit of a fanatic, though, I’m told. Cuts corners, ruffles feathers. All right for him, of course, he’s protected by parliamentary privilege. For the rest of us, it’s best to be wary.’

Dismissed, Brock descended to the street and began to walk back to his office in Queen Anne’s Gate. There was a deceptively spring-like lift to the morning, pale sunlight sparkling off wet pavements, a feeling that heavy coats might soon be discarded. He picked up a cappuccino along the way and continued past the end of his street and across Birdcage Walk into St James’s Park, where he crossed the grass to an empty bench in the sun. A military band was playing in the distance, some children chasing along the edge of the lake towards Duck Island, groups of tourists drifting towards the palace. As he sipped at his coffee his phone burbled in his pocket.

‘Chief Inspector Brock? It’s Michael Grant here. How are you? Were my contacts any help?’

‘I was just thinking of you, Mr Grant. They were very useful, helped us put together good likenesses as well as personal information for all three bodies on the railway land.’

‘Yes, I’ve seen the posters.What about the killers?’

‘I’m afraid we haven’t been so successful in that area. Not yet, anyway.’

‘There’s talk in Cockpit Lane that one of Spider Roach’s sons has been charged. Is that not true?’

‘He was arrested yesterday morning, but released later for lack of evidence.’

‘Ah.’ Silence for a moment, then, ‘I can’t honestly say I’m surprised. Are you very busy today?’

‘I’m currently sitting on a bench in St James’s Park contemplating the ducks and envying their simple life.’

Grant chuckled. ‘How do you fancy lunch at my factory? I think I can offer you something better than stale bread.’

‘Sounds interesting.’

‘Do you know the Red Lion pub on Parliament Street? Behind it in Cannon Row there’s an entrance to Portcullis House. I’ll meet you there at twelve-thirty, okay?’

Brock made his way there at the appointed time and found the MP chatting to the security staff at the rear entrance to his ‘factory’, the Houses of Parliament. Further down the lane loomed the striped brickwork of the old Norman Shaw building in which the Metropolitan Police had once had their headquarters, and Brock recalled old photographs of his predecessors in that place, waistcoated, moustached and bowler-hatted men like Chief Inspector Walter Drew, snapped digging with his team in Dr Crippen’s garden in Hilldrop Crescent. A hundred years later, he thought, and we’re still digging.

‘You don’t need to worry about this one, Artie,’ Grant said. ‘He’s a copper.’

‘Seen you on telly, haven’t I, sir? Britain’s Most Wanted , was it?’ He chuckled.‘See you later,sir.’

Grant led the way down a corridor that came out into the glazed-roofed atrium forming the centre of Portcullis House, the modern annexe of Parliament across the street from Big Ben. The court was busy with people, groups talking at tables, individuals hurrying to appointments. Brock recognised famous faces among them, one of them stopping to say hello to Grant.

‘Charles, let me introduce you to Detective Chief Inspector Brock.’

‘Ah yes.’ The Home Secretary beamed at Brock, shaking his hand. ‘My wife’s a great admirer of yours, I assume because we both have beards. I hope Michael’s not wasting police time press-ganging you onto his committee, is he?’

Grant laughed.‘It’s not my committee, Charles.’

‘No, just feels like that sometimes.’ He clapped Grant on the shoulder and they moved on.

‘All chums together,’ Grant murmured as they reached the far side of the atrium and entered the corridor leading under Bridge Street to the Houses of Parliament proper. They emerged briefly into the watery sunlight to see a long queue of women in hats moving slowly across New Palace Yard.

‘Widows of war heroes,’ Grant said. ‘The Queen’s holding a reception for them in Westminster Hall. Have you been here before?’

Brock hadn’t.

‘I’ll give you a quick tour, if you like.’

He led the way again,through the Victorian Gothic splendours of the Palace of Westminster, its corridors and lobbies, chambers, libraries and committee rooms, pointing out its treasures with a kind of hushed glee that reminded Brock of a small boy taking a friend into the forbidden haunts of his father’s den.

‘ The Death of Nelson , see? Never mind the quality, feel the width-all forty-five feet of it. Look at the ceiling above . . . Can’t show you the only really old bit,unfortunately,Westminster Hall. Can’t crash Liz’s party.’ He chuckled.

They finally arrived at the Strangers’ Dining Room, where they took a table by the window against the terrace overlooking the Thames.

‘This view is very important, very symbolic,’ Grant said.‘Over there is the real world.’ He nodded at the bulk of St Thomas’ Hospital across the river. ‘That’s where they took the boy who found the bodies, wasn’t it? And beyond that, a short ambulance ride, is Lambeth and Brixton and Cockpit Lane. The river is like the Styx, separating the living world from the beyond. Monet captured it perfectly. He sat over there on the south bank and painted the towers of Westminster across the river,glowing through the fog like the city of heaven. Over there people die violent deaths; over here we are immortal.Did you know that?’He grinned.‘Truly.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘It’s a tradition. Nobody dies in the Palace of Westminster. If one of us has a fatal heart attack or stroke, we remain, be we stiff as a board, technically alive until the ambulance crosses the river to St Thomas’, where we are pronounced dead.Whereas on the other side, the boy was found dead on the railway tracks and brought back to life in St Thomas’s. A nice symmetry.’

Grant leaned forward, lowering the volume of his voice a little, though not its intensity. ‘I’m not playing with words, David. This distinction is a living thing for me. It is what motivates everything I do. My mother and father met briefly in Kingston docks. She was a whore and he was possibly an American sailor,though she was necessarily vague about that. They exchanged infections-she gave him clap and he gave her me, which was worse for her. As soon as I was born she did what she’d done with my brother before me and gave me to our grandmother, who made some kind of an honest living from the Dungle in Riverton City,which I think I mentioned to you.I grew up on a rubbish dump,literally.It sounds like some Victorian fable, doesn’t it? But it’s true. So when I look at myself sitting here, when I show a visitor around my palace, when the Home Secretary jokes with me in the corridor, I am in a state of suspended disbelief, and it is very important that I should remain so.’