James Craig: Man of Sorrows

‘Sounds like a load of bollocks to me,’ he snorted.

‘Sports people use it.’ She mentioned a few names, a couple of footballers, cyclists, even a snooker player.

‘Good for them.’

‘Maybe you should go and see a shrink,’ Roche said gently, ‘help you cage your chimp.’

‘I am seeing a shrink,’ Carlyle pointed out. ‘Boss’s orders.’ He shook his head at the absurdity of it all. ‘The silly old bugger couldn’t cage a kitten.’

‘Maybe you need to try someone else,’ she persisted.

‘Life’s too short.’

‘Life’s too short for all this hopeless crusading,’ she countered. ‘Whatever happened to “don’t fight battles you can’t win”?’

Carlyle shrugged. ‘Some battles you have to fight, even if you’re going to lose. But this is one that I certainly don’t want to lose. You can’t give people who abuse children a free pass.’

‘Well,’ she replied, lifting her demitasse to her lips, ‘there seem to be plenty of people who disagree with you.’

‘Tell me about it.’ Carlyle took a sip from his own mug and winced. Wherever Marcello got his supplies from, his green tea wasn’t a patch on Helen’s. ‘This case has been knocking around for years now. No one wants to touch it with a barge-pole. It only ended up on our desk by accident.’ That was literally true. Carlyle had been waiting for a file on the case of a local politician who had been burgled three times in six weeks. Instead, Archives had sent him the McGowan file. Once he’d read it, he’d dropped an email to his boss, Commander Carole Simpson, telling her that he was going to take another look at it. He knew that Simpson could be very hit and miss when it came to email communication, so there was every chance she would not try and stop him until he’d either made some progress or reached a dead end.

Roche gave him a look.

‘Okay. It only ended up on my desk by accident.’

A sad smile spread across her face as she put a hand on his forearm. ‘Your burden is my burden, Kimosabe.’

‘Thank you, Tonto.’

Her smile vanished. ‘But now McGowan’s lawyer will have a field day – police harassment, brutality, assault with intent; you’ve really dropped yourself in the shit on this one.’

‘I know. I’ll speak to the boss about it.’

‘Simpson? She’s not around.’

‘What?’ In recent years, the Commander had a good track record when it came to watching his back. He relied on her network inside the Met more than he cared to admit. If Simpson wasn’t around, he could find himself very exposed indeed.

‘I heard that she’s been sent on some work experience jolly to Canada for three months.’

‘Great.’ Carlyle’s heart sank. ‘So who’s replacing her?’

Roche shrugged. ‘Dunno.’

‘Okay.’ Digging some change out of his pocket, he got up and walked over to the till. ‘We’d better get back to the station then and see how bad things are.’

Biting her bottom lip, Paula Coulter tried not to cry as she glanced at Luckman and Mohammed, spread-eagled on the floor in the middle of the store, guns to their heads. A pool of dark liquid was trickling across the wooden floor where one of the men – the manager, she presumed – had pissed himself. Squeezing her legs together, Paula swore to herself that she wouldn’t lose control of her bodily functions, difficult though that might be. She glanced at the door, praying that someone might ring the buzzer and realize that something was wrong. The clock on the wall had just ticked past five, but the sign on the door clearly said that they stayed open until five thirty. She tried to clear the sour feeling in her throat. Someone had to come, surely? The window blinds had been drawn and she watched one shadow, illuminated by the late-afternoon sunshine, saunter past, quickly followed by another. She could hear a couple of women chatting outside.

‘ I don’t care if the silly old cunt buggers off with the au pair ,’ one squawked in best estuary English, ‘as long as I get the money.’

‘ Good for you! ’ the other laughed hysterically.

Normal life was proceeding unhindered just a few feet away, on the other side of the glass. Paula thought she was going to vomit with disappointment and fear.

On the floor, Mohammed started wheezing. ‘I’ve got asthma,’ he gasped. ‘I need my inhaler.’

The white guy gave him a kick and lowered his gun to where the security guard could see it. ‘Shut up!’ he hissed. ‘We’ll be gone in five minutes. You’ll have to wait.’

Paula felt the tears welling up in her eyes and she let out a sob.

‘Don’t worry about them,’ the black guy grinned, pulling a Harrods plastic bag out of his pocket and tossing it to her. ‘Just start filling that up and no one’s going to get hurt.’

The bag landed on the counter in front of her and she opened it up. Looking around, she had no idea where to begin.

‘Start over there,’ the black guy said impatiently, gesturing at the display of watches in one of the windows.

Paula stepped unsteadily from behind the counter and moved towards the window. Belatedly she realized that she needed to unlock the display.

‘I need the key,’ she wailed, bursting into tears.

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ the white guy screamed. Lifting his gun to shoulder height, he fired three times, into the centre of each of the store’s main windows. Falling to her knees, Paula covered her ears. A split second of silence was instantly replaced by the sound of a dozen alarms going off at full blast.

‘You fucking idiot,’ the black guy spat at his companion as he hauled Paula to her feet. Thrusting the bag at her chest, he pushed her towards the display. ‘You have three minutes to put as much stuff in that bag as possible,’ he shouted, ‘or I will blow your fucking head off!’

Jumping over to the window, Paula began grabbing at handfuls of watches, jewellery and broken glass. Ignoring the cuts to her hands and fingers, she shovelled handful after handful into the plastic bag. For the first time, she was conscious of her heart beating like crazy. But more than that, she was conscious that the fear had fled. Her ordeal was nearly over. Trying not to rush, she counted down the seconds as she dropped a tray of single stone diamond rings into the bag, followed by a fin-de-siècle dragonfly brooch and selection of gold charm bracelets. With every minute that slipped by, she grew more confident that these tossers were going to be caught. Smiling to herself, Paula had reached forty-three when she heard the first sirens in the distance.

The black guy roughly snatched the bag from her. ‘That’ll do!’ Grabbing the collar of her blouse, he shoved her forward. ‘Open the fucking door! Quickly!’

After fumbling with the lock, Paula pulled the door open. Fuck off, you wankers, I hope that they gun you down in the street. Trying to step aside, she felt a hand around her neck, pushing her out onto the pavement. When she tried to break free, the grip tightened.

‘Get going, bitch!’ She recognized the voice of the white guy behind her as they tumbled out on to New Bond Street. ‘You’re coming with us.’

Ducking through the back streets at a brisk pace, it took them less than five minutes to make it back to the station. Walking through the entrance lobby, Carlyle caught the eye of Desk Sergeant Kevin Price who was taking a break from reading the Sun in order to survey his domain. Price’s grim expression suggested that the problem in B3 was growing.

‘Trouble?’ Carlyle asked.

Price nodded. ‘Francis McGowan’s lawyer, a woman called Abigail Slater.’

Oh, bloody hell. Carlyle made a face. ‘I know her. At least, I know of her. Ambulance-chaser de luxe.’