James Craig - Shoot to Kill

Moynahan was neither apologetic nor insightful. ‘Nothing to do with me.’

Rubbing his neck, Carlyle wondered quite where they should go from here. His dilemma was solved by the appearance of Umar with a large mug of steaming tea in his hand. Putting the mug on the table, he pulled up a chair and sat down next to the inspector. Unshaven, with dark rings under his eyes, his dishevelled appearance immediately made Carlyle feel better.

‘Tough night?’

Umar nodded as he sucked up some of the tea from his mug. ‘I got two hours’ sleep.’ He waved his mug in the direction of Groom. ‘You could at least have played at home, couldn’t you?’

For the first time, the vaguest flicker of an expression crossed Groom’s face.

‘And you got beat.’ Umar added gratuitously.

The goalie shrugged. ‘Shit happens.’

It speaks , thought Carlyle.

‘Shall we get started?’ Moynahan asked.

‘My sergeant will conduct the interview.’ Carlyle said, standing up. He grinned at Groom. ‘Feel free to confess, given that we know you did it. Save everyone a lot of time.’

Without waiting for any response, he headed back upstairs.

Back at his desk, Carlyle decided he needed a break from the station. Grabbing his jacket, he headed back downstairs and nipped across Agar Street, heading towards the piazza. Outside the Box Café on Henrietta Street, he caught the eye of Myron Sabo and signalled that he wanted a green tea. Remaining on the pavement, he pulled out his private pay-as-you-go Nokia from one pocket, and Clifford Blitz’s business card from another. With some difficulty, he laboriously typed in Clifford Blitz’s number and hit Call.

To his surprise, Gavin Swann’s agent picked up almost before he had time to lift the handset to his ear.

‘Blitz.’

‘It’s John Carlyle from-’

‘Inspector,’ said Blitz, all business, ‘how are things going with Mr Groom?’

‘The investigation is proceeding,’ Carlyle said stiffly, ‘but that’s not why I’m ringing.’

‘Let me guess,’ Blitz sighed, ‘you would like some tickets for a game and-’

‘No, no ,’ Carlyle interrupted. ‘I wanted to ask you about something you said when we last spoke.’

‘Hold on.’

Down the line, Carlyle could hear Blitz bark a series of instructions to a hapless minion. Among the words that were clearly distinguishable were ‘Laurent Perrier’ and ‘blow’. Overlooking that, the inspector waited patiently for the agent to come back on the line.

‘Fire away.’

‘When we were talking last time,’ Carlyle said cautiously, ‘you said that you had received bullets in the post.’

‘Yeah,’ Blitz replied. ‘It’s happened a few times, always the same carry-on: some lame-brain with the imagination of a pea wants to threaten you. Thinks that all they have to do is pop a little something in the post.’ He paused to shout a few more instructions to his assistant before coming back on the line. ‘Why do you ask? Is someone trying to put the frighteners on you?’ He let out a loud gaffaw.

‘No, no,’ Carlyle lied, thinking about the three cartridges in the still-unopened envelope that was locked in a drawer in his desk. ‘It’s just something that’s come up in another investigation; nothing to do with Gavin Swann.’

‘Oh.’ If Blitz was curious, he kept it well hidden. ‘I gotta go, Inspector. All I can say is that you don’t have to worry about the kind of people who do this sort of thing. In my experience, it’s always bullshit. They never have the balls to follow through.’

‘No?’ Carlyle asked, wanting to be convinced.

‘It’s strictly for tosspots whose balls haven’t dropped. Real criminals don’t make threats,’ Blitz sniggered, ‘as I’m sure you know.’

‘Yes,’ said Carlyle, not sure that he knew at all.

‘Put it this way,’ Blitz said. ‘If it was me, and I was really pissed off, I wouldn’t send you a bullet, I’d blow your fucking head off.’

‘About Mr Swann,’ Carlyle started, but Blitz had already hung up. Through the window, Myron held up a mug, to show Carlyle that his drink was ready. Nodding, the inspector gestured for him to put it on the table next to where he was standing. Staying outside, he called another number.

Silver answered on the third ring. ‘I was wondering when you were going to get in touch. What’s happening?’

‘Nothing good.’ Carlyle quickly brought him up to speed with a brief run-through of selected recent events.

When he finished, there was a pause.

Finally, Dom spoke. ‘No lecture this time?’

‘No.’

‘Good, because I’m getting more than enough of that at home.’

Carlyle kept his mouth clamped firmly shut.

‘Where are you now?’

‘The piazza.’

‘Okay.’ Dom gave him the address of a bar in Soho. ‘Meet me there in fifteen minutes.’

‘Make it half an hour.’ Ending the call, the inspector went into the café, nabbing a copy of the Metro that one of the other customers had left behind. Unfolding the paper, he turned, as was his wont, to the back page, which was dominated by a picture of Gavin Swann hobbling out of a game after being injured. The story was based around a quote from his manager saying that he hoped to have his star striker back playing within the next couple of weeks.

‘The boy should be back in training on Monday, ’ the manager said, ‘ and we’ll take it from there. Obviously, he will have to work on his match fitness levels but he’s been living like a monk since the injury and I know that he’s in great shape. I want to get Gavin back on the pitch as soon as possible, certainly before the end of the month .’

A horrible thought popped into Carlyle’s head: Swann’s return should be just in time for the game against Fulham. That was the last thing that his struggling team needed. Maybe I should arrest the little sod , he thought, put his recovery back a bit. After all, we can do with all the help we can get .

For a moment, he gave the idea some serious consideration. Then his eye caught the teaser at the bottom of the story: KEEPER QUESTIONED OVER HOTEL DEATH, P. 6 .

It was beyond a miracle that Swann’s name had, so far, been kept away from the case. Whether you loathed them or detested them, British journalists were normally relentless in their pursuit of stories like this. Tabloid hacks in particular had shown time and time again that they were far better at tracking down both people and information than the police themselves. And the inspector had absolutely no doubt whatsoever that every paper on the news-stand would have been called by someone at Charing Cross wanting to sell them some gossip about Swann’s alleged involvement.

The only explanation Carlyle could come up with was that Clifford Blitz was one hell of an operator. Doubtless, he was trading favours and making threats like they were going out of fashion to protect Swann, helped by the fact that an army of £1,000-an-hour lawyers would be trying to bludgeon every hack in town into submission. The inspector felt a grudging admiration for Blitz; very few people were able to play this kind of game with any measure of success. It was almost impossible to beat the press at their own game.

Flicking through the paper, he came to the story on page six just as Myron appeared at the next table and began clearing it away. He was staring at the inspector.

‘What?’ Carlyle snapped.

‘You’ve got glasses.’ Myron wiped his hands on a tea towel with a picture of Buckingham Palace on it that was hanging over his shoulder. ‘Makes you look . . . different.’ Without waiting for a reply, he retreated behind the counter to take payment from a customer waiting by the till.