James Craig: Nobody's Hero

‘I believe so.’ The sergeant looked up, to let Carlyle know that he was getting pretty fed up himself with the constant interruptions to his reading. ‘Maybe. We haven’t had a lawyer turn up yet.’

‘Okay.’ As he was about to leave, Carlyle was conscious of someone arriving at his shoulder. Turning, he faced a guy much taller than himself, maybe six foot, give or take. Tanned, with a light five o’clock shadow, he was wearing a grey pinstripe suit with a blue shirt, open at the neck. Ignoring the inspector, the civilian addressed the sergeant in a businesslike tone. ‘Michelangelo Federici. I’m Mr Rage’s legal adviser.’

The sergeant shot Carlyle an o ver to you look.

Turning to the inspector, the lawyer held out a hand. ‘Michelangelo Federici,’ he repeated.

With no particular enthusiasm, the inspector took his hand. ‘Inspector John Carlyle. I’m in charge of this case.’

‘Good. In that case, I wonder if you could show me to my client, please.’

‘Come this way,’ said Carlyle, gesturing towards the doors leading to the station proper. ‘We can go and see him together.’

* * *

Downstairs, Carlyle paused at the door to the interview room. Turning to the axeman’s lawyer, he adopted what he hoped sounded like a worldly-wise, we’re all in this together tone. ‘The basic situation here appears to be very straightforward,’ he said quietly. ‘Your client smashed his way into the victim’s flat and then tried to kill him. Taimur is lucky that Mr Belsky was able to lock himself in the bog or we would no doubt be looking at a murder charge.’

Federici nodded in polite agreement. ‘I understand all of that, Inspector. Taimur explained to me very clearly what happened. And I know that you will want to pursue a quick and uncomplicated investigation.’

‘Always.’

‘For my part, I have no intention of dragging this out any longer than is necessary. No one benefits from turning this into a circus.’

Carlyle could feel a but coming on. Taking a deep breath, he braced himself for the weasel words that would inevitably follow.

‘But, as you know, things are rarely as simple as they seem.’

Exhaling, the inspector replied, ‘On the contrary,’ trying to sound as philosophical as possible. ‘In my experience, things are often exactly as simple as they seem.’

Federici dropped his case onto the threadbare carpet. ‘As I said, you will get no interference or obfuscation from me.’

That’ll be a first for a lawyer , the inspector thought sourly. ‘I appreciate it,’ he said aloud.

‘And I don’t think you’ll have too many problems with Taimur himself. He’s a nice, quiet boy.’

‘Who tried to put an axe in a guy’s head,’ Carlyle interjected.

‘For what it’s worth,’ said the lawyer apologetically, ‘I don’t think he would have gone through with it.’

‘Mm.’

‘Have you spoken to him yet?’

‘No.’

‘He’s not some kind of religious fanatic, rocking backwards and forwards, mumbling passages from the Koran.’

‘I’m sure, like you say, he’s just a normal kid who took a wrong turn. But you know better than I do that all that stuff should be saved for the judge. All I want to do is get the facts down on paper and then it’s a matter for the CPS.’

‘I understand perfectly.’ The lawyer held up his hands. ‘But surely you are interested in the boy’s backstory? Presumably you want an explanation of what happened?’

‘Explanations . . . excuses. It’s all the same thing. Keep it for court.’

‘Fine, fine,’ the lawyer snapped. ‘What are you going to tell the media?’

Carlyle thought about his run-in with Bernie Gilmore. ‘As little as possible.’

‘Good.’

‘It’ll be quite the little shit storm as it is.’

‘Yes.’ The lawyer did not seem that distressed by the prospect.

‘I would suggest the less all of us say, the better,’ Carlyle went on.

‘Agreed.’ There was a moment’s reflection before Federici added, ‘However . . .’

Here we go , Carlyle thought. ‘Yes?’

‘I fear that we will have some problems with the boy’s parents.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘They can be difficult.’

‘If they’re that bothered,’ Carlyle snorted, ‘where are they?’

‘Sorry?’

‘If they are that worried about their son,’ he repeated, speaking slowly, ‘why have they not come to the station to see what’s going on with him?’

‘They’re working,’ Federici said lamely. ‘At least, the mother is. Technically, she is my client.’

‘She pays the bills.’

At the mention of money, a pained expression crossed the lawyer’s face. ‘Yes.’

‘And the father?’

‘I have only met him a couple of times,’ Federici explained, ‘but he doesn’t seem to have any problem with me representing his son.’

‘So this is not the first time Taimur has been in trouble?’ Carlyle asked, looking through the window in the cell door and nodding at the youngster who still sat, staring vacantly into space.

‘There’s been nothing like this before,’ the lawyer said hastily. ‘Have you not read the file?’

‘Not yet,’ Carlyle admitted. The reality was he hadn’t even seen the damn thing yet. ‘Anyway, the parents have not been able to keep him on the straight and narrow.’

‘They are long divorced, which is part of the problem.’

Carlyle scratched his head. He was about as interested in dysfunctional families as he was in religion. What was it that Tolstoy had said? ‘ All happy families are the same , each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. ’ The quote was one of the few things rattling around his head from his largely long-forgotten school days. ‘However . . . strained the domestic arrangements, I would impress upon both parents,’ he said, slipping into his best approximation of social worker mode, ‘the need to support their son at this time.’

‘Of course.’

‘You should stress that they will not do that, however, by shouting their mouths off to the press.’ The thought popped into the inspector’s head that Bernie Gilmore was probably tracking them down already and Carlyle realized that he was almost certainly wasting his breath.

‘I will see what I can do, but there are no guarantees.’ The lawyer reached down for his bag. ‘I’ll talk you through the family situation in more detail later. Let me speak to my client first and then we can deal with your questions.’

‘Okay,’ Carlyle agreed, suddenly distracted by the smells that had started coming down the hallway from the nearby canteen. Despite his recent visit to the 93 Coffee Bar, he was still feeling hungry. In the back of his mind the idea was growing that an egg roll, smothered in ketchup, and a mug of green tea would be just the thing to hit the spot. ‘Talk to your client,’ he said. ‘I’ll be back in fifteen minutes or so.’

Pushing open the door, Federici gave him a broad smile. ‘Perfect.’

Having sauntered out of the police station at Charing Cross without a care in the world, Seymour Erikssen decided to celebrate his unexpected release from the cells with a pint of ridiculously expensive Estonian lager in the Enclosure Bar, just off Seven Dials. All black paint and chrome fittings, the Enclosure wasn’t really Seymour’s type of place, but the clientele – a mixture of loud Eurotrash, gormless tourists and working girls – potentially provided some interesting pickings. Thanks to the best efforts of the Metropolitan Police, his timing was good. It was getting late; people were becoming drunk and drunks made good victims.