Val McDermid - Crack Down

Somehow, I wasn’t too surprised when the custody sergeant from Longsight walked into Turnbull’s office. ‘That her?’ Turnbull asked.

The sergeant nodded. ‘No question about it, sir. That’s the woman who purported to be Miss Hunter’s assistant the other night. She claimed her name was Kate Robinson.’

‘Thank you, Sergeant. I’ll talk to you later.’

‘Sir,’ the sergeant said.

We both held our peace as the feet retreated back across the Drugs Squad office. Turnbull stared at me, a triumphant little smile on his cupid’s-bow lips. I kept my eyes on his, determined not to show any weakness. As the door closed behind the custody sergeant, Turnbull said scathingly, ‘It’s not just you amateurs that can make deductions. I’ve been wanting to talk to you, Miss Brannigan. DCI Prentice’s phone call just made it a bit easier for me to get you in here without a brief hanging on our every word. Especially since your brief’s left herself wide open to charges of unprofessional conduct. I’m sure the Law Society would be fascinated to hear about her interpretation of professional ethics. And now we both know there’s at least one offence I can hang on to you for, mebbe we can cut the crap and get down to the business.’

I said nothing. When his bluster ran out, he was going to have to charge me or let me go. Either way he was going to have to listen to what I had to tell him. And I felt sure that his threats against Ruth were emptier than a dosser’s bottle. The last thing coppers like him want to do is to antagonize the tightly knit club of criminal solicitors. Turnbull carried on staring at me and started drumming his fingers on the desk. Then he opened his desk drawer and took out a packet of cigars. When I rule the world, the European Court of Human Rights is going to outlaw the obtaining of confessions under cigar-and pipe-smoke torture.

He lit his panatella, the only slim thing about him, and said, ‘Soon as I heard the story behind this car, soon as I heard that technically it was your responsibility, I wanted to talk to you. I mean, what better cover for a drug dealer’s wheels than supposedly investigating some daft car-finance scam? Count yourself lucky you didn’t spend the weekend in the CDC like your boyfriend.’

I shook my head. Clearly, I wasn’t going to get anywhere being sweetness and light. Time for no more Ms Nice Guy. ‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this,’ I snarled. ‘I come along here with enough information to close down a major drug ring and hand you a bloody great score sheet of arrests, and you treat me like I’m the criminal? Jesus, it’s no wonder you lot are always whingeing you don’t get support from the public. If you threaten to arrest everybody that tries to give you a tip-off, it’s a bloody miracle anybody tells you what day it is.’

He leaned forward and sneered. I bet he wouldn’t have if he could have seen how badly his teeth needed a scale and polish. I was surprised his breath didn’t strip them down to the bare enamel on a daily basis. ‘You were supposed to be the bloody lawyer the other night. I shouldn’t have to tell you that it’s an offence to withhold information about a criminal offence. So cough, Miss Brannigan, or I’ll have you banged up so fast your head’ll spin.’

I stood up and leaned on Turnbull’s desk. I was getting good and tired of being jerked around by the legal system. ‘Listen, Turnbull,’ I said coldly. ‘You threaten me once more and I walk out that door and you don’t get another word out of me till you’ve formally arrested me, cautioned me and allowed me to talk to my solicitor. I might not be a qualified lawyer, but I’d be willing to bet I’d score more points than you on a PACE quiz. Now, are we going to talk like grown-ups, or are we going to carry on playing silly boys’ games?’

‘Let’s be clear about one thing,’ he said, still not willing to let the macho bravado slip. ‘I’m not doing any deals with you. None of this “I show you mine and you let my boyfriend go” routine. As far as I’m concerned, Mr Richard Barclay’s in this up to his fancy tortoiseshell specs.’

I raised my eyes to the ceiling and sighed. ‘I just love a man with an open mind. Mr Turnbull, by the time you’ve heard me out, you’ll be dying to release Richard, because if you don’t, you’re going to look like dickhead of the year after the papers have finished with you. And that’s not a threat, it’s my considered opinion.’

‘Sit down,’ he growled. ‘Let’s hear what you’ve got to say.’

Ignoring his order, I leaned against the wall. I took my miniature tape recorder out of my bag and pressed the ‘record’ button. ‘Since you don’t seem inclined to tape our little chat, I’ll do it for you,’ I said. ‘It’ll save me having to come back later and make a statement. I know all your instincts tell you not to believe a word that anybody in custody says, but in this instance, you really should have listened. That’s all I did. The only clue in Richard’s story, as far as I could see, was the business with the trade plates. So I did what any good copper should do: I followed my instincts.’ Turnbull looked like he wanted to throttle me, but the part of him that had taken him to the rank of DCI was obviously dying to know what I’d dug up, and right now his curiosity was stronger than his belligerence.

I took him through it from start to finish, omitting only the details of how I came by the photographs of the inside of Jammy James’s kitchen. ‘Careless of them, leaving the door unlocked, but then, you just can’t get the help these days,’ I finished up, taking the pics out of my bag and spreading them in a fan across Turnbull’s desk.

He poked at the pics with the end of a Biro, as if they’d soil his fingers. Then he shook his head. ‘You expect me to believe this taradiddle?’ he asked scornfully. ‘Eliot James? As in, Eliot James who plays golf with the Chief Constable? Eliot James who runs charity schemes for underprivileged kids at his leisure centres? That Eliot James?’

‘The same,’ I said. ‘Having friends in high places doesn’t stop you being a crook. Look at the Guinness trails. And if doing charity work was a guarantee of staying out of jail, the Krays would still be running London. Look, James is hanging on to his business empire by his fingernails. Check it out. Go down Ice World, The Dinosaur Adventure, Laser Land, or any of his leisure complexes. They’re all empty. His cash flow doesn’t. The only reason DCI Prentice isn’t running a full-scale fraud inquiry into the sleazeball is that she thinks the drugs angle deserves the first bite of the cherry. But if you’re not interested, I know she’ll be after James like a greyhound out of a trap.’

Turnbull leaned back in his chair. The legs sounded like an avant-garde string quartet. ‘It’s funny, isn’t it, how you’ve managed to find all this out so easily when we’ve been trying to get something on this mob for ages?’ he speculated. ‘If I was a suspicious man, I might think it was because you and your boyfriend were in it up to your eyeballs, and you decided to shop the rest of the team to try and get him off the hook. You wouldn’t be the first private dick caught out by the recession who decided to turn their limited knowledge of crime on its head.’

The only thing that stopped me being arrested for assaulting a police officer was the realization that I’d be as much use to Richard as a chocolate fireguard if I ended up behind bars too. So I smiled sweetly at the insult. ‘If I was going to turn to crime, Mr Turnbull, I wouldn’t have to leave the house. Computer crime. That’s where the real, no-risk money is these days. And I’ve forgotten more about computers than you’ll ever know. Look, I’m not asking you for a major favour. I haven’t once said, I’ll tell you what I know in return for you letting Richard walk away from all of this. I’m handing you all this on a plate, and all I’m asking is that you don’t oppose Ruth Hunter’s request for a short remand so you can start to test the value of what I’ve given you.’