Philip Kerr - January Window

Now ordinarily I’d say that was standard chit-chat from a copper, and I’d have taken it, too; but not this time.

‘You know, if I was impersonating a police officer,’ I said, ‘in a building where there are lots of coppers, I might have a joint in the car outside, just to calm my nerves a bit. To give me the bottle for the job. Whatever that might be.’

The man shot me a sarcastic smile and then ran for it.

Which was like a hare setting off in front of a racing dog.

As a defender I’d earned my fair share of red cards; sometimes you have to take one for the team. A striker gets through and then you simply have to chop his legs and bring him down — like Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. I’d seen some pretty criminal tackles in my time, too. None worse than Roy Keane in 2001 when he tackled Alf-Inge Haaland. I still remembered the red card the Man U captain had got from David Elleray — again — when he took down the Manchester City midfielder. But that’s football, as Denis Law has famously said.

As tackles went, this one was just as high as Roy’s, and of course was well off the ball; and it was probably just as well that the fake copper’s leg wasn’t on the ground when I struck with both feet against his knee, otherwise I could have done him a lot more damage. The man went down and he must have banged the back of his head on the floor, because he lay there stunned just long enough for me to get up and call Maurice on my phone.

A few seconds later the two of us were marching the still-groggy man back to my office for a little Q & A.

A quick search of his pockets revealed another copper’s warrant card, not to mention a couple of joints, and an automatic pistol that gave me more than a pause for thought.

‘It’s a Ruger,’ said Maurice, examining the gun carefully.

‘Is that fucking real?’ I asked.

The fake copper sat down on the chair opposite my desk.

‘What do you think?’ he sneered.

‘It’s real all right, boss.’ Maurice thumbed out the magazine and inspected the bullets. ‘Loaded, too.’ He smacked the man on the back of the head. ‘What are you fucking thinking of, you stupid cunt — bringing a gun to football? There’s tooled up and there’s tooled up, but that shooter’s just asking for trouble.’

‘Fuck off,’ said the man.

I was still searching his pockets; wallet, car keys, a map of Silvertown Dock with an X to mark the spot somewhere on the second floor, a couple of grand in new fifties, a mobile phone, and a door key with a number on it.

‘Tell you what,’ I said. ‘It’s handy that we’ve got so much law upstairs. Makes it easy for us. And for you.’

‘How’s that?’

‘Tell us what you were up to, and we’ll let you go,’ I said. ‘Or else we’ll hand you over to the filth. It’s as simple as that.’

The man moved suddenly for the door but Maurice was there before him — or more accurately Maurice’s fist was. It connected with the side of the fake copper’s head like a wrecking ball and sent him crashing onto the floor.

‘Fuck,’ said Maurice, shaking his hand and flexing the fingers. ‘That hurt.’

The burglar was still lying on the floor.

‘Not as much as it hurt him,’ I said. ‘He’s out cold, I think. Still. Can’t be too careful, eh?’ I pulled open my desk drawer and found the handcuffs I had taken from Zarco’s desk the night before — the ones I guessed he’d used for his sex games with Claire Barry. I took the key out of the lock, dropped it into my pocket and then cuffed the unconscious man’s hands behind his back.

‘That’s handy,’ said Maurice. ‘Christmas present from the wife?’

‘Don’t ask.’

‘You play your games and I’ll play mine.’ Maurice chuckled obscenely.

We pulled the man back onto a chair and waited for him to stop breathing so loudly and to straighten up again. For a moment we thought he was going to puke so I put a wastepaper bin between his feet, just in case.

‘Tell us what you were up to and we’ll let you go,’ I said. ‘My guess is that you’ve got form for this kind of thing. A professional. Talk to us and you can be on your way.’

‘That’s a good offer, cunt face,’ said Maurice. ‘Me and the boss here, we’ve both done some bird, so we’ve got no love for the law. You cooperate with us and you can be on your toes again. But stay shtum and we’ll hand you over wearing a fucking ribbon on your hat. With this gun in your pocket, you’ll get five years.’

The man shook his head. ‘I’ve got nothing to say to you.’

I looked at the key for a moment. According to the plastic identity tag it was wearing this was the key to an executive hospitality box, number 123.

‘Is this where you were supposed to go?’ I said. ‘Box 123? To get something for someone — some money, perhaps?’

‘Fuck off, you muppets.’

‘Muppet, am I?’ Maurice grinned. ‘You got that right, sunshine.’ He twisted the man’s ear. ‘And you know what my Muppet character is? Animal.’

‘Stay here with him,’ I said.

Maurice pushed the magazine back into the handle of the little Ruger.

‘No problem,’ he said.

‘And while I’m out, find out who owns suite 123 and everything about them.’

There were one hundred and fifty executive boxes at London City, all of them on the second floor. For £85,000 — that was the starting price for the present season — you got a private box about the size of a decent caravan, a fully equipped kitchen, a private lavatory, fifteen seats for every competitive home fixture, a support team of elegant hostesses to greet guests and serve food and drinks, a widescreen television and betting facilities. The more you paid the nearer the halfway line you were and the bigger the box was. All the suites were furnished differently, according to the taste — or lack of it — of the person or company owning it. Most were owned by companies like Carlsberg and Google, but the name on the door of suite 123 was an individual and an Arab one: Mr Saddi bin iqbal Qatar Al Armani.

I unlocked the door, switched on the lights and went inside. The room felt cold; colder than it ought to have been. I checked the sliding doors, which were still locked behind the pulled-down roller blinds, then looked around.

Mr Al Armani’s suite was furnished like the interior of a private jet — all thick cream carpets, polished ebony panels and expensive white leather armchairs. He probably owned a private jet like this, too. Occupying a whole wall was a silver print of Monte Fresco’s famous photograph of Vinnie Jones squeezing Gazza’s bollocks, signed by both players — the poster, not the bollocks — and a framed number ten Argentine shirt belonging to Diego Maradona that had also been signed. On an ebony wood table stood a pile of dinner plates edged in gold, a canteen of gold cutlery, a gold table lighter and several gold ashtrays. The widescreen television on the wall was an 84-inch Sony, which looked as big as the sliding doors that led out to fifteen seats that were just fifty feet above the halfway line. Everything looked like it was of the very best quality, even though the taste left something to be desired in my own eyes; I don’t much care for all that Bin Laden bling.

It was obvious Zarco had been there; a black woolly hat lay on the table and his Dunhill chestnut leather grip was on the white leather sofa. I opened the bag, half hoping I would find fifty grand and Zarco’s lucky football scarf inside it — which was still missing — but apart from a pair of motorcycle gloves, it was empty.

I went into the lavatory; there were gold fittings on the sink and on the cistern, and on the wall an aerial photograph of the Al-Wakrah in Qatar — the so-called Vagina Stadium.