Howard Linskey - The Drop

What else does the Drop provide? Influence; political and otherwise. I’m not saying that somebody goes around using our money to bribe cabinet ministers into changing the law in our favour. I’m not saying that. It’s a damn sight more subtle but it probably amounts to much the same thing.

Here’s how it works. Amrein’s people take in a lot of money and some of it is used to make political donations to the major parties. The money doesn’t go straight from Amrein. Instead it is filtered through legitimate organisations run by some quite high-profile businessmen. People you have probably heard of. They shell out enough to get the ear of the men in government; lunch with the Party Chairman, an invite to Chequers, that sort of thing. During the course of their discussions they let slip that they might be willing to increase their funding; let’s say one hundred thousand pounds a year could be turned into a quarter of a million, if only the government would share that businessman’s sense of priorities about the area he lives in. At which point the greedy little eyes of the party chairman light up, he leans over his glass of Chassagne Montrachet and asks confidentially what these policies might be. He is then given a passionate entreaty about how the police waste their time and resources in the north east of England. Why are they chasing a couple of big time gangsters who only seem to spend their time fighting amongst themselves? When instead they could be concentrating on other, more serious matters, such as people trafficking, which we have no interest in, or cracking down on those heroin dealers on the sink estates, or burglary, which is definitely of no use to us at all.

If it’s done properly, the mug on the receiving end of this patter will walk away convinced that the legitimate businessman who, after all, has been solidly vetted in advance, has an eccentric but touchingly heartfelt belief in, for example, the provision of community bobbies, who will patrol the streets every night, catching burglars as they shin down drainpipes with bags marked ‘swag’ on their shoulders. Frankly, he will deduce that for a quarter of a mill in the party coffers, humouring the old boy seems a small price to pay.

A discreet missive will then go out to the Chief Constable of Northumbria Police Force, telling him that the Home Office wishes to see an increased clean-up rate on burglaries. There may even be a follow-up phone call, containing a hint that their Chief Constable is on the shortlist the next time the Head Boy at the Met implodes and there’s a vacancy. Overnight the emphasis on solving a certain kind of crime shifts. Officers once earmarked to investigate the supply of blow and Es in nightclubs suddenly find themselves stepped down and redirected to intelligence gathering on burgling crews. A few months down the line and a notorious gang of burglars is arrested, charged then convicted, receiving lengthy jail sentences for their evil deeds. The Police Commissioner will even go on television to boast of his officers’ success in combating a crime he himself finds personally abhorrent. He will then do everything in his power to ensure footage of this interview finds its way to the relevant minister in Whitehall. It’s all perfectly legitimate and everybody involved, kids themselves, are somehow fulfilling a public need. Meanwhile we carry on earning our living largely unmolested.

You might not believe it works like that but I’m telling you that it does. Why do you think people like Bobby Mahoney carry on operating for so long when everybody out there knows who they are?

We parked the car down by the river next to a little hotel I’d stayed in once before. Not today though. I wanted to be in and out of there as quick as you like. We walked through Shepperton. It was a small place, just a couple of pubs and restaurants, the hotel and some houses normal people couldn’t afford. Not much to do but pretty enough. The place seemed to exist purely to give prosperous southerners somewhere respectable to retire to.

‘It’s a bit quiet,’ said Finney, looking about him at all the trees that lined the route between the centre of the little town and Amrein’s property.

‘I don’t know,’ I said looking about me at the old houses bathed in a sunlight that rarely ventured as far north as Newcastle, ‘I quite like it.’

You’d be forgiven for assuming a place like Shepperton is about as far removed from the world of drugs and protection money as it is possible to be and it is, at first glance, which is why we bring the Drop here. What’s the alternative? Handing it over in disused factories or at the top floor of an NCP car park after dark? That’s strictly for the movies. Those places are usually covered by CCTV or full of junkies shooting up. Not the kind of venue you’d choose to hand over a lot of cash safely.

Here, at the weekend, the population is swelled by amateur boatmen mucking about on the Thames, but during the week it’s quiet. It was the kind of place where the vicar walked by and said good morning to strangers, somewhere there’d be a cricket match played on Sundays. I had to remind myself that we were on our way to meet the most dangerous man I knew.

Amrein’s house was at the bottom of a country lane. All the houses here were set back discreetly from the public road and we had to press a buzzer at the gate. I looked up directly into the CCTV camera so they could get a good look at my face, frowning impatiently as if this was a routine drop and I didn’t have the time to be messed about. There was a loud buzzing sound and the gate clicked and swung in on its hinge. We walked up the long, gravel driveway and Finney looked about him at the vast expanse of manicured lawn on either side.

‘Jesus,’ he hissed, ‘how the other half live eh? You could put a full size football pitch on that lawn.’

‘I think you should suggest it,’ I said.

Our destination was a huge, white-painted house at the end of the drive. It was tucked away just far enough round a natural bend that it couldn’t be seen from the road. Lord knows how many rooms Amrein had. He was clearly doing pretty well for himself, on the back of us and others.

Two of Amrein’s men met us at the door and patted us down, quick and professional like. They even took our keys, car keys, wallets and my silver Cross pen, leaving nothing that could remotely be used as a weapon. The only thing they didn’t touch was the case Finney was carrying. He wasn’t going to let go of that until he was face to face with Amrein.

We were shown into a large dining room with a highly-polished table that would have comfortably seated a dozen for dinner. Sunlight shone through the enormous French windows at the far end, picking out little specks of dust that hung in the air.

‘Mister Amrein will be here presently Mister Blake,’ said one of the men who’d patted us down. We stayed on our feet and, sure enough, a few moments later, Amrein himself arrived with yet another bodyguard and a third man who didn’t look like muscle. Amrein was a small man in late middle age. His hair was receding around a widow’s peak and he wore wire-framed spectacles on his long, angular nose. His thin, bloodless lips were pressed tightly together like he meant business. Amrein looked more like a banker than a villain. Some times I think the world is run by small men in wire-framed spectacles.

There were handshakes and I introduced Finney. If Amrein was put off by the presence of Bobby’s scariest employee, he chose not to show it.

‘Gentlemen please,’ he said amiably as he held out a hand to indicate we should each take a seat around the table. Amrein’s English was flawless, without a trace of accent. He’d been educated somewhere very expensive but he still had the look of a foreigner. Was he Swiss, Belgian, Nordic? He was impossible to place. Amrein sat with us while the bodyguard stayed on his feet behind him. Finney handed over the case and left the talking to me.