Lynda Plante - Tennison

Bradfield slumped down in a chair, shook his head and looked at Gibbs wondering what the hell was going on.

‘I don’t know whether to laugh or cry, Spence. This bloody case will be the death of me.’

‘You referring to your health or career, guv?’

‘Piss off.’

The officers in the shoe shop confirmed that an angry-looking Silas and Danny had opened the yard gates and let the van in. Knowing all three targets were inside the café, Bradfield actually managed a smile. ‘Looks like it’s game on again, Spence. I can feel it in my gut that we’re going to nail those bastards tonight, so let’s get down there.’

‘I take it I’m back in the shitty shoe shop?’ Gibbs asked.

‘It’s too risky for you to go in with Clifford watching from the car park. You’re in the old lady’s with me as we can use the back staircase.’

‘Should I come with you, guv?’ Kath asked.

‘Not just now. Stay here with the arrest teams and you can help Tennison with the indexing. I’ve got to pop back here later this afternoon to deal with something so I’ll take you with me when I go back down to the op.’

Jane loved watching Bradfield smile and laugh. She was glad to see he was once again on a high, but at the same time she felt sad that he hadn’t even said a word or really looked at her since she came on duty. However, she knew how busy and distracted he was and tried not to let it bother her.

Kath noticed the way Jane was looking at Bradfield with smitten eyes, but said nothing. She decided to have another word with Bradfield when he picked her up later.

Silas was in a real temper, prodding John in the chest with his stubby finger.

‘Me an’ Danny are pissed off, you are fuckin’ late and we been workin’ our bollocks off.’

‘Listen, we come out of the flats, and there’s only a bloody hearse parked right in front of the garage, we couldn’t believe it, cars lined up for the mourners. We just had to wait until it all moved off before we could get into the van.’

Silas’s mood changed and he laughed. ‘We’d better get down to work.’

John crawled into the tunnel and took over from Danny. He’d just started the drilling when Clifford made contact.

‘Eh, stop work everyone. He says there’s some kids out the front kicking an effing can around.’

‘Shit,’ John snapped.

Silas waved his hand for them to keep quiet as he went up to the ground floor.

He opened the café door and stepped out.

‘Oi! You two will get a thrashin’ if yer don’t move off! You’re disturbing the peace and quiet — move it... PISS OFF.’

They didn’t need a second warning and were off up the road like a pair of whippets. Silas then went upstairs to his flat to use the toilet and was sitting reading an old newspaper when he thought he heard the toilet from the shoe-shop flat flushing. He finished his business, did up his trousers and stood leaning against the wall listening.

Hudson who had just used the toilet was heading down the stairs when his concerned partner looked at him and whispered,

‘What in the hell were you doing? Bradfield said not to flush the toilets when the targets were in the café! I could bloody hear it in the basement!’

‘Well, what you want me to do, leave a floater, for Chrissake?’

Silas went back down to the cellar. John and Danny were sitting with dust-caked handkerchiefs round their mouths and John was wearing swimming goggles pushed up over his eyebrows.

‘Listen, I’m worried as I think I hear a toilet flush next door when I was on de crapper.’

‘Shit, that Hebe woman’s not come back, has she?’ Danny wondered.

‘Me dad ain’t seen nothing or he’d have said,’ John remarked.

‘Her Morris is not in her yard as I check already. Hold off everythin’ while I go take look and see what happening.’

‘See if that bloody tailor’s van’s still there as well,’ John said.

‘He pain in arse. He honest, hard-working Jew, but sometimes don’t take a day of rest — not even the Jewish Sabbath,’ Silas remarked, raising his hands in the air.

‘Get some fish and chips, will ya, Silas, I’m starving,’ Danny said, but John said they couldn’t afford to waste time eating.

Danny turned angrily to John. ‘Listen, you were late because of that fuckin’ funeral and I’ve been down here an’ I’m starvin’ and I ain’t gonna eat any of that sweet shit Silas got... never mind his stinking cans of tuna.’

Silas cracked his knuckles. ‘Don’t you go callin’ my food shit, them tins are good quality.’

John sighed. ‘Eh, the pair of you, just calm down and go get us some fish and chips, Silas.’

No sooner had a tense Bradfield arrived at the surveillance flat when yet again Mannie Charles turned up at the tailor’s shop in his Austin van, this time accompanied by his wife. The couple began to bring out plastic-covered clothing items to stack inside the parked van. Two women were walking together and stopped to look through the shoe-shop window, and it seemed an age before they moved off. All these incidents were relayed by Clifford, each time causing work to cease in the café basement.

Bradfield was pacing up and down the old lady’s living room, cursing under his breath as she shuffled behind, desperately trying to hand him two buttered scones on a plate. Gibbs took the plate from her and said Mr Bradfield wasn’t hungry but he was and wouldn’t let them go to waste.

Bradfield watched Silas leave the café, worried that he might have seen or heard Mannie Charles arrive and was going over to speak to him. If Mannie mentioned anything about his and Kath Morgan’s visit the other night it could result in everything going wrong. If they did a runner he didn’t even have arrest teams in place yet. He thought about calling them at the station to take up positions nearby but decided to wait. The officers in the shoe shop were warned Silas was on the move.

Bradfield watched anxiously as Silas went to the shoe-shop window and pausing briefly looked in whilst shading his eyes with his hands. Silas moved on and Bradfield could feel his blood pressure rising as he got nearer the tailor’s shop. It nearly exploded when Mannie and his wife walked out and stopped to have a chat with Silas. Thankfully it appeared to be a brief hello before they got into the van and drove off.

The sound of Clifford’s voice came over the radio asking where Silas was going and Danny told him it was to check out the shoe shop and get fish and chips. Clifford said that the tailor had pissed off and he hadn’t seen anything at the shoe shop and told them there was no time for food.

Silas went into a phone box, picked up the phone book and started to flick through the pages. He then dialled a number and held the door open with his other hand as it was so hot inside. In the shoe shop the officers heard Hebe’s phone ringing. It wasn’t the one they had installed for the observation so they knew not to pick it up and simply let it ring, which it did for almost a minute.

Silas left the phone box, content that Hebe was not there and he must have been mistaken about the toilet flushing. He continued down the street and turned left entering a fish-and-chip cum kebab shop. The undercover officer tailing him went in behind him and pretended to be looking up at the prices on the illuminated menu positioned above the fryers. Silas ordered a large doner with chilli sauce and two portions of fish and chips. He chatted with his fellow countryman in Greek as he prepared the order. Silas was so engrossed that he didn’t even glance towards the undercover officer. He asked for salt and vinegar on the fish and chips and watched the food being wrapped in paper and placed into a plastic bag. He paid at a till at the end of the counter whilst the undercover officer ordered sausage and chips.