Simon Kernick - The Murder Exchange

‘It worked pretty well, too — so well that Neil began to get this idea that maybe things would be better if he ran the organization rather than Stefan. He used to say that Stefan was too traditional in the way he did business, that he didn’t think big enough. A couple of years back he even got us to plant a load of rifles on Tommy Holtz to get him put away. I think Neil’s idea was to start taking out the Holtzes one by one. Anyway, things were going nice, Tony’s doing most of the work, I’m just checking up on him now and again, and then suddenly I get a call one morning last February from Tony saying he’s got a problem. A big problem. I get round there and I can’t fucking believe what I see. I still can’t fucking believe it. There’s this kid, this Robert Jones, and he’s laid out on the floor with his paper bag, and he’s dead, and Tony’s standing over him with this geezer, Shaun Matthews, who used to help him out sometimes, and they’re saying what the fuck are we going to do?’

He dragged hard on the cigarette, shaking his head, reliving the scene. ‘First things first, I ask them what the fuck’s happened, and Tony says that they was unloading some boxes in the front room full of rifles they’d taken delivery of when they heard a noise round the back. Tony goes out to take a look what it is and catches this kid, who’s been looking in the window at what they’ve been doing. Fuck knows what he was up to. Maybe he saw them taking stuff out of the van and got suspicious, and just decided to have a butcher’s. It was a stupid thing to do, whatever it was.

‘So Tony nabs him and drags him inside, but now they don’t know what to do with him. They know they can’t let him go because he’s bound to tell someone, and then that someone’ll tell you lot, and you’ll come sniffing round asking questions, and even if they get rid of the stuff and it’s their word against the kid, Stefan’ll probably find out, and it’ll look bad on them. As it happens, I think they just panicked a bit as well, and Matthews, he admitted it was him, took a knife to the kid and killed him. Then they’re wondering what to do with the body so they call me. Can I have another fag, please?’

Knox pushed the pack over to him and we watched as he pulled one out with shaking hands, put it to his lips, and lit it. Jackie Slap Merriweather, for all his initial bravado, was carrying a lot of guilt about with him, and had been for six months.

He exhaled loudly. ‘So I tells them to get some gloves, not to touch the body unless they’re wearing them, and to make it look like a nonce has done it, then get rid of the thing.’

‘Did you help in that process?’

He shook his head. ‘No. That kid was only a couple of years older than my oldest. I wasn’t going to do nothing. It was their problem, not mine. So I left them to it, but not before I’d told them to keep their gobs shut. I didn’t want Neil finding out about it.’

‘So where’s Tony Franks now?’ asked Knox.

‘Dead,’ answered Merriweather.

‘What happened?’

‘It’s a long story and, I have to tell you, it’s one I can’t hardly believe myself.’

‘We’re in no hurry, Jack. I think you may as well start talking.’

He exhaled loudly again, then began. ‘Well, nothing happened for months. Obviously you lot were looking for the boy’s killers but I was pretty sure we — I mean they — were in the clear because it looked like you was searching for a nonce, and I think they’d covered their tracks well enough. Then, a couple of weeks back, it all went wrong. Someone offed Shaun Matthews.’

Knox looked surprised. ‘What? You don’t know who?’

Merriweather shook his head. ‘No. It was no one from the organization.’

Knox and I looked at each other quizzically. This was an interesting development, and something we’d have to pick up on later.

‘Anyway, as well as doing a bit of work with Tony, Matthews also ran the door at this club called Arcadia, as you probably know. Now, Neil owns Arcadia even though his name’s not on the deeds, but a bloke called Roy Fowler’s the one who’s actually been managing it for him. But Fowler was skimming the club, taking money that was meant for Neil, and Matthews was involved as well. So, when Matthews gets topped, Fowler panics, thinks we’re on to him, which we were, and thinks we’re going to kill him, which we weren’t. Not as far as I knew anyway. The problem is, though, Fowler’s convinced he’s a dead man, so he takes evasive measures.’

‘What sort of evasive measures?’ I asked.

‘Blackmail. You see, he’s got something up his sleeve he’s been keeping as a bargaining chip for just this sort of eventuality. In fact, he’s got two things. He’s got a tape recording he made of a conversation he had with Matthews, and in this conversation Matthews, who as it happens was pissed, is talking about the weapons scam and how it’s run by Vamen, and also what happened with the kid. Just the sort of tape you don’t want falling into the hands of Stefan Holtz. But he’s got something worse as well. He’s got the knife that killed the kid.’

‘How the hell did he get hold of that?’ demanded Knox.

‘I honestly don’t know. Maybe Matthews panicked when they got rid of the body, kept it for a while, then gave it to Fowler to get rid of.’ He shrugged. ‘I couldn’t tell you. But, either way, Fowler decided to hang on to it, just in case it ever proved useful, and so, when Matthews died and he suddenly thought he was next, he sent a message to Neil saying that he had this incriminating stuff and that if we tried to do anything to him he’d make sure Stefan and the Old Bill got to hear about it. He also said he wanted a hundred grand so that he could get out of the country, and if Neil gave him that, then he’d hand over the knife and the tape.

‘So Neil, who’s none too pleased to find out about the dead kid, arranges to meet up with Fowler to do the exchange. At the same time, he finds out from Elaine Toms, who’s like his eyes and ears in Arcadia, that Fowler’s going to be getting his security from Tiger Solutions. Well, Tiger’s run by a bloke called Joe Riggs, who’s a bit of an associate of Neil’s, nothing major, but he’s had some involvement in the weapons side through Tony. So we set it up that Tony would be on the team taking Fowler to the meet. He’d deal with Fowler, and anyone else who got in the way, and take back the evidence. End of story, end of problem.

‘Except it didn’t work out like that. Joe’s been rumbling on about his partner, Iversson — the naked bloke you nicked — for a long time, and even thinks that Iversson might have offed his missus — that’s Joe’s missus — years back. So, when it’s all set up, Joe makes sure that Iversson’s one of the ones escorting Fowler, because he wants Tony to take him out as well. Only problem is, Iversson was a bit tastier than Tony was prepared for, and Tony was the one who got shot.’

‘So Iversson didn’t have anything to do with the murder of Fowler?’

He looked at me. ‘No. He didn’t have a clue what was going on. The thing was, though, he was now a fucking complication. He knew what had happened, plus you lot were after him, so things could have got very dodgy if he’d been picked up.

‘We were still thinking what to do about him when he turns up at the Arcadia and ends up in the sack with Elaine Toms, who, as it happens, is one of Neil’s exes and a girl he’s got a real soft spot for. They were going to have Iversson killed round her flat, which was where he was staying after you lot started looking for him, but then Neil has a bit of an idea. A better way of dealing with him. Like I said earlier, Neil’s been looking to move in on Stefan for a while, but it was never going to be easy because Stefan didn’t move from that fucking house of his, and he’s guarded to the hilt. Plus, Neil doesn’t want to be seen to do anything that’ll make him look disloyal. Far better to get someone else to do it. So he gets Elaine to push Iversson into kidnapping Krys because he knows that’s the only way he’s going to get Stefan out into the open. Joe helps her set everything up, Krys gets lifted, and when Stefan turns up at the rendezvous with the ransom money, he gets popped by our people. And the beauty of it is that no one suspects Neil at all.’