Robert Ryan - Signal Red

'Yup. I saw it-'

Bruce cut him dead. 'They've picked up Mickey Ball.'

It was at that moment the doorbell rang.

Tony Fortune watched the two policemen enter the Warren Street showroom and start appraising his stock. The younger one clearly didn't know much, but the older guy, he went straight to an MGA that had the wrong grill on it. This was one of the Chalk Farmies, Tony thought, an MVE – Motor Vehicle Examiner – from the Stolen Car Squad. They were good, as he knew to his cost. Sharp enough to know when mileage and condition didn't match.

Paddy emerged from the workshop at the rear, an oily rag in his hands. He moved phlegm around his throat at the sight of the coppers, as if he was going to hawk over them but merely glared at the pair instead as they circled the MGA like carrion, and went back to cleaning spark plugs.

'I couldn't match the right year to that one,' Tony said to the MVE, explaining why the style of grill – it had too many vertical bars – didn't quite sit right with the body. 'Well I could, but you know how much they want for a new one?'

The younger man flashed his warrant card. 'Mr Fortune?' When Tony nodded, he carried on. 'Detective Constable Naughton. Flying Squad.'

Maybe, said a voice inside Billy's head, but for how much longer? After Gatwick, he had been savaged by Ernie Millen and Frank Williams, the heads of Flying Squad. It reminded him of the way you saw the lions at London Zoo tucking into a leg of lamb – with him playing the role of the dead sheep. Then the piss-taking had started, about him being in the wrong place at the right time. Every time he gave a destination or address someone would tell him to make sure that wasn't Oxford Street, Aberdeen. Ha-fucking-ha. Unless he got a result on the City gents, his days at the Squad were numbered and his copybook permanently covered in blue- black Quink.

'This is Constable Rowe, of the Stolen Car Squad.'

'How can I help you gentlemen?' Tony asked. Rowe was examining the sticker on the MGA. It was up for £375, not a bad price. 'It's not an insurance write-off,' Tony assured him. 'Legitimate repair. Just you know what some people are like. Once they scratch their pride and joy…'

'It's not about that,' said Billy Naughton. 'It's about Mark Two Jags.'

Tony sighed. 'I'm right out, I'm afraid. Can't help you. Lot of demand for them, but we don't see many of them at this end of the market.'

'That's not what we heard.' What they had heard were names: Ball and James, drivers. And the cars? Word was they definitely came from Warren Street. Six grand reward from BOAC, it jogged a lot of memories.

For the next five minutes the two coppers walked around the showroom. Tony knew the game. They would find something pony and use it as leverage to prise him open. Except there was not a hooky or pony item in the showroom, apart from the odd wind-back on the mileage, and nothing there was too greedy. After the Mk 2s he had made sure of that, just in case a day like this came around. He had been over it dozens of times; there was zero to connect him to the stolen vehicles, no physical evidence. Only if someone grassed would they be able to pin him to them.

'Can we see the log books for all these vehicles?'

'Of course,' said Tony. 'All except the Goggomobil.' 'This was a German microcar, once fashionable but made redundant by the better-performing and more spacious Mini. 'That's in the post.'

He went out the back and fetched the stack of documents from the safe and watched while they painstakingly matched car to book. He made himself a tea while they did so.

'What do they want?' Paddy asked.

'Routine.'

Paddy shot him a look that conveyed his disbelief. 'You been doing something behind my back?'

'No.'

Paddy pointed his wire brush at him. 'You know I did some time once. Never again, Tony. It's not fun.'

Tony poured his PG Tips and a second cup for Paddy. 'Don't worry, nobody is doing any time.'

Back in the showroom, Rowe was still lifting bonnets to crosscheck numbers with documents.

Tony sipped the tea. 'Doing this to everyone on the street, are you,' he asked, 'or did my number just come up?'

They didn't answer, just carried on with their whispered deliberations.

The phone rang. It was his wife Marie, sounding jittery and almost teary, so he didn't mention the police. She immediately sensed something was wrong from the stiffness of his replies and quickly signed off. More grief when he got home.

As he came out of the office, Billy handed the fat pile of log books back. 'That all seems to be in order.'

'Good. Is this about that airport job?'

Billy pursed his lips and looked baffled. 'Can't say, sir. But what would make you think that?'

'Shaw Taylor. He's interested in Mark Twos as well, as I recall.'

Billy smiled. 'Oh yes.' He picked some fluff off his overcoat. 'Well, as you brought it up, and just to avoid any confusion, can you tell me where you were on the morning of the seventeenth, the day of the robbery?'

'At my sister's house in Reading. A christening. I'm the godfather. I'm pretty sure the vicar would remember.'

Billy had to admit that, as alibis went, it wasn't bad. 'I'm sure he will. Well, sorry to trouble you.' Billy turned to go then hesitated. He took out a photograph and held it at eye- level, so Tony could see it. 'Ring any bells?'

Tony looked at the picture of a young man leaning in a doorway, a cocky smile on his thin face. 'No. Who is it?'

'Name's Derek Anderson.'

'What you want him for?'

To wring his bloody neck, thought Billy Naughton, then said, 'Just some routine questions.'

Charlie Wilson counted out the five-pound notes in the snug bar of the Two Kings in Clapham. Colin, the barman, made sure the two men weren't disturbed. Charlie stopped when he got to £500. Then he put two more notes on top, and then a third, pushed them over the table, and took a gulp of his beer. 'There you go. That should keep you all right for a while. But I'd leave it for a year till you show your face in London again. So if you are short, let me know, eh?'

'Yes, Mr Wilson.'

'Charlie.'

Derek Anderson beamed at him. 'Thanks, Charlie.'

'You did well to come to me when they tapped you on the shoulder. A stupider person might have…' he hesitated, '… been tempted. But you'd never get that much from the police kitty.'

'The money's not why I did it, Charlie.'

'I know.' Charlie took another gulp of beer. Derek had been desperate to get back into the family fold, to make amends. That was why he had risked coming to Charlie with a story about the Robbery Squad trying to squeeze him. He should have been angry with the kid, because it was his initial loudmouth act about them doing a job at the airport that had drawn the Old Bill in the first place. That and his drunken, disgruntled sulks once he had been banished. But when Charlie had told Bruce the police had been sniffing about, the Colonel had come up with the brilliant idea of a diversion, a dummy job. 'Just like D-Day,' he'd said. 'Hitler thinks we are coming ashore at Calais, but no, wallop, we do the beaches at Normandy.'

So they had put out enough hints that they were going to turn over cargo at Gatwick to keep the police's eyes looking the wrong way, enabling them to do the Comet House job. Had there been a sniff of new faces or a stake-out at Heathrow, Charlie would have pulled them. When they did the job they were 90 per cent certain the tosspots had bought the dummy. It made it doubly sweet: a successful blag and red faces at the Yard. Shame the boxes weren't full. Still, the shortfall in cash wasn't down to Degsy. He'd earned his little bung.

As the young man reached for the cash, Charlie grabbed his scrawny wrist. 'And you aren't tempted by the reward?'

Derek tried his hardest to look shocked at the very thought. His hand was shaking and he could feel the pulse. It reminded Charlie of a hamster's heart hammering away when you picked it up. 'No, Charlie. Never.'