Trust No One

Chapter 8

‘Guv?’

Salter paused in the doorway. Welsby was at the far end of the office, his chair close to the window. Despite the pouring rain, the window was wide open. Some of the papers from Welsby’s desk – those not pinned in place by an array of empty coffee mugs – had already been scattered across the room by the icy draught.

Anyone unfamiliar with Welsby’s tastes might have assumed that he had a love of fresh air. In fact, Welsby wasn’t keen on any air untainted by nicotine. He’d viewed the national ban on indoor smoking initially as a personal affront and then – when it became clear that the ban wouldn’t be rescinded in his undoubtedly shortened lifetime – as a personal challenge. He’d engaged in numerous spats with pub landlords, pointing out in answer to their threats that he was the fucking police, even though this was no longer strictly true. In the office, after a few unproductive run-ins with his superiors, he’d established a compromise that allowed all parties to save face. The only problem was that, in the depths of winter, his office was just slightly warmer than the average fridge. But even that had its upside. It meant that people disturbed him only when they really needed to.

‘Guv?’ Salter said again.

Welsby twisted awkwardly on his seat. His right hand remained dangling out of the open window. ‘Morning, Hugh. Lovely day.’

‘Glorious.’ Salter perched himself on the seat opposite Welsby’s desk. He moved the chair slightly to retain eye contact as Welsby ducked his head out of the window to take another drag. The impressive thing was not so much that the lit cigarette never entered the room, as that Welsby maintained his usual authority in the process.

The cigarette was only half-finished, but Welsby flicked it nonchalantly away, no doubt surprising some passer-by in the street outside.

‘How’s it looking?’

‘Not good. I’ve been back through every possible compromise over the last couple of years. Most of them are something and nothing. Stuff that we’ve logged in case they suggest a pattern. Most probably just coincidence. Someone under observation who changes his plans at the last minute. Someone who stumbles across one of our surveillance devices. Shit happens. Buggers out there don’t play by the rules.’

‘But?’ Welsby picked up the coffee mug and stared into it, as if expecting that it would have miraculously refilled.

‘One or two incidents suggest something more.’

‘Like what?’

‘We’ve had one major operation screwed because the parties changed their plans at the last minute. In fact, reading that report, it looks to me like we were fed misinformation from the start. Then there were a couple of promising-looking enquiries that died on their arses because someone had got wind of our interest.’

‘Doesn’t sound a lot,’ Welsby said. ‘Like you say, shit happens. And the other side usually get ahead of the game with no help from us.’

‘Maybe so. Nothing that couldn’t be explained by bad luck and circumstance. But there’s a lot of it, right up to Morton.’

Welsby nodded unhappily. ‘Ah, yes, our friend Morton. Well, we should’ve been smarter with Morton. Got him into witness protection straightaway.’

‘Meaning I should have?’ Salter said. ‘Don’t remember anyone offering me any bright ideas at the time. All I seem to remember’s a load of paperwork and endless questions about whose budget it was going against.’

‘Nobody blames you, Hugh,’ Welsby said, in a tone suggesting that, now it had been raised, it might be worth giving the idea some consideration. ‘We’ve all learned something. I’m just suggesting that it might be as much cock-up as conspiracy.’

‘If you say so.’ Salter pushed back his chair, as if preparing to leave. ‘Though there’s another consideration.’

‘Which is what?’ Welsby already had another cigarette between his fingers.

‘Those incidents I mentioned. They’re more interesting when you look at them all together.’

‘How so?’ Welsby’s head was outside the window, wreathed in billows of smoke.

‘There was one link between them. Different types of job. Different people involved. But if you track up the food-chain, it’s the same party in the frame every time.’

Welsby spoke around his cigarette, neck twisted to peer back into the office. ‘The suspense is fucking killing me.’

‘Kerridge,’ Salter said. ‘Every time. The party was Jeff Kerridge.’ He paused. ‘Now maybe that’s something we ought to talk about, guv.’

There was a curse from beyond the window. It took Salter a moment to register that Welsby had fumbled his cigarette so that it had fallen back into the room. Welsby swore again and stamped his foot down on the office carpet. He stared ruefully down at the scorch mark and then back up at Salter.

‘Now look what you’ve done,’ he said. ‘You’ll get me bollocked by Health and fucking Safety as well as by fucking Facilities.’