John Harvey - Ash & Bone

'Jerk off into them, do you?'

'No.'

'Mr Kennet,' Karen said, 'when you're alone in these places, these rooms, do you ever indulge in any kind of sexual activity?'

He looked at her carefully before answering, her eyes, her mouth. 'Sometimes,' he said, 'I masturbate. Into a condom. Take it home. That the kind of thing you mean?'

'I think, Mr Murchfield,' Karen said, 'your client can have a break. Twenty minutes, no more. This interview suspended at twelve nineteen…'

'What do you think, Frank?'

They were standing outside, the sky overcast but the temperature a good five degrees warmer than the day before. Karen had come as close as this to snagging one of Ramsden's cigarettes and was munching her way through a Bounty instead.

'You had him sweating, no doubt about that.'

'Like a Turkish bath in there.'

'All that stuff about the murder really had him in a state. Once he'd copped to the break-ins, though, different again. Proud of it, almost. Relieved, certainly.'

'You think I let him off the hook?'

'I don't see what else you could have done.'

'You said yourself. It was as if he'd got away with something.'

'You'll keep on at him. If there's anything else there, you'll make him crack.'

Karen stuffed the last piece of Bounty into her mouth, screwed up the wrapper and pushed it down into her jacket pocket. Black today, funereal black.

'Frank, the other night. At my place. We've never really talked about it.'

'Maybe there's no need.'

'Not worth remembering, then?' Just a hint of a smile.

'That's not what I meant.'

'I just don't want you to think…'

'What?'

'You know, that it meant anything… anything special, I mean, between us.'

There was an amused look in Elder's eyes. 'You mean we're not engaged?'

She punched him, quite hard, on the arm.

'I don't want you to expect…'

'Believe me, I don't expect anything.'

'You're sure? Because if…'

'Listen, listen. It was great. I had a great time. A total surprise. But a one-off, okay? I understand.'

'Okay.' With a quick glance round to make sure no one was looking, she kissed him on the cheek.

'Though of course if I go back inside with your lipstick on my face…'

She went to punch him again, but this time, laughing, he dodged out of the way.

Elder had barely parked outside his flat when his mobile began to ring. Katherine, he thought. Maureen. Instead it was Framlingham's familiar burr. 'That place of yours, Frank. Presentable, is it?'

'You should know.'

'Twenty, thirty minutes. I'll be there.'

He arrived within fifteen, bearing gifts. Scottish oatcakes, a chunk of Mrs Kirkham's Lancashire cheese, a bottle of wine.

'Thought you might be peckish, Frank. Must have been a busy day.'

'Busy enough.'

'This Kennet, enough to hold him at least?'

'I think so.'

Framlingham unwrapped the cheese and set it on a plate. 'Your thought that Grant might be an informant, protected that way, doesn't seem to pan out. But as a line of inquiry, not without its worth.' He was ferreting for a corkscrew in the kitchen drawer. 'Aussie plonk, Frank. Garlands Shiraz. Family winery near Mount Barker.'

The cork came free with a pleasing pop.

'Mike Garland, he's the cellar master, knows what he's about.'

Framlingham brought the glass to his nose to sniff the bouquet, then drank, holding the wine for a long moment in his mouth before swallowing.

'Lovely stuff, Frank. Tobacco, spice, liquorice, plum.'

Elder cut off a piece of cheese and it crumbled against the knife.

'This whole business,' Framlingham said, 'Grant and Mallory, unravelling that makes reading Ulysses like Harry bloody Potter. Key thing is this, though. For years now, going back to when he was a DI, Mallory's registered informant was Lynette Drury. Former prostitute, more recently brothel keeper and, more importantly, before that, shacked up with a known villain named Ben Slater.'

Framlingham broke an oatcake in two and set cheese deliberately on each half.

'The contact between Mallory and Slater seems to have come first. As much as twenty years ago, '84. Along with three others, Slater was up on trial for a payroll robbery out at Romford. Five days in, the judge ruled no case to answer. Slater and the rest walk free.'

And what's Mallory's connection to this?'

Framlingham smiled. 'Mallory was in the Special Patrol Group called in by the team on the ground. This is a couple of years before it was disbanded.'

And he'd be what then? Thirty? A little more?'

'Twenty-nine.'

Nodding, Elder tried the wine.

'So now,' Framlingham said, 'we move on two years later to '86. There's a series of armed robberies in the Home Counties, all of them within a thirty-mile radius of London. Post offices, building societies. By this time Mallory's moved on to the Territorial Support Group with the rank of sergeant. Slater's put under surveillance, his phone bugged, everything. Finally arrested on one charge of robbery after a raid on building society offices in Colchester. Thanks to a tip-off, the TSG are there in force. At the trial, however, one of the officers crucially fails to identify Slater as being present. No need to tell you which one. Slater walks free. Begins proceedings against the Met for harassment and wrongful arrest, which he later drops. For a while, things go quiet. Then in '89 there's an armed robbery, appropriately enough at Shooters Hill. Securicor van rammed into on the edge of Woolwich Common. Four men got away with eighty thousand in used banknotes. Slater and another man called Warland were questioned but not charged.'

'Mallory's involved?'

'Not yet. Eighteen months later, this bloke Warland's stopped for speeding going north out of the Blackwall Tunnel. Turns out he's got half the proceeds of a supermarket robbery in the car with him, a sawn-off shotgun in the boot. Plus a quantity of illegal drugs on his person. Of course, he rolls over. Coughs to the Woolwich Common job, names names. Slater for one.'

'Slater's arrested?'

'Arrested and charged.' Framlingham ate some more cheese, drank some more wine. 'When he comes up before the magistrate, the police case against bail's not as strong as it might be. Surprise, surprise. Slater skips the country, probably to Spain. Looks as if he stays away until some time in '92. By which time Mallory's a detective inspector in the Flying Squad.'

'The Sweeney.'

'Absolutely. With Maurice Repton his DS, holding his hand. Dennis Waterman to his John Thaw. It's around here Ben Slater's former girlfriend, Lynnette Drury, is registered as Mallory's informant. What connection there was between them before that it's impossible to say. But my guess is they'd been close for years. The pack of them.'

'Where exactly does Grant come in?'

'Not so much later. Slater stays clean as a cat's arse till '95. Then he's suspected of a bullion raid at City Airport. Gold ingots. Three quarters of a million pounds. And this is the first time Slater's name is linked with Grant. Familiar story. They're both arrested and charged but the case falls apart when it comes to court. The evidence of one of the principal witnesses is tainted and the jury's directed to ignore just about everything she's said.'

'She?'

'Drury. Lynette Drury.' Framlingham's smile lingered longer this time. 'Rumour has it her relationship with Mallory went well beyond the terms regarding informants laid down by the Yard.'

'They were lovers?'

'The way you put it, Frank, it sounds old-fashioned, almost charming. For all I know, she was still shtupping Ben Slater at the same time. Grant, too, for that matter.'

'And there's nothing more recent, linking them all together?'