Backlash

Eighteen

David Gill had some time to play with. Not much, because he had things to do, appearances to keep up, but he could not resist visiting his prisoner. He had to see her, talk to her, just for a little while, because he thought she was wonderful. Delivered into his hands by divine intervention. Turning up on the doorstep like an offering from the gods.

He made his way to where he was keeping her. A safe place, entirely appropriate for the occasion. He made his way to the locked room underneath ground level, a room no other person in the whole world knew existed. His own private room which he entered torch in hand, the beam shining into his captive’s eyes.

‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Thought I’d pop in and see you.’

Jane Roscoe did not respond, or move. She was stricken with terror.

‘What’s up, cat got your tongue?’

Roscoe tried to see beyond the torch light to see his face. It was impossible. She was having trouble focusing with the beam burning into her pupils after having been in the dark for so long.

‘No point being difficult,’ Gill said, ‘that won’t get you anywhere.’

‘You won’t get away with this,’ she croaked dryly.

‘Oooh, she speaks,’ he applauded. ‘Get away with it? Course I will, you silly girl. I always do.’

‘Always?’ Roscoe said, picking up on the implication of the word.

‘Always,’ he confirmed.

‘You’ve done this before?’

‘What, is this an interview, Jane?’

She fell silent. The light was in her face. ‘Where’s DS Evans, the officer I was with?’ She had been trying hard to remember what had happened when the door to Gill’s flat had opened, but could not. It had been a blur.

‘Dead, I’m afraid,’ he said in a matter-of-fact way.

Roscoe gasped then screamed, long, loud and piercingly. She could not help herself, it had welled up inside her uncontrollably, something she did not wish to do, but was unable to stop.

‘Oh now shut up,’ Gill said impatiently. ‘Come on, shut up.’

Still she screamed.

‘It’ll do you no good,’ he said, becoming angry. ‘No one will hear you. You are in a sealed tomb.’ Roscoe continued to scream. ‘Right, if that’s the way you want it, you can suffer.’

‘This is the voice of the military wing of Hellfire Dawn. .’

Henry’s eyes flickered around the room at the same people who had been here to brief him before: FB, Andrea Makin, Karl Donaldson and Basil Kramer. All their eyes were riveted on the tape player on the table around which they were gathered. Only Kramer looked up and made eye contact with him.

‘I repeat,’ the gravelly voice on the tape stated, ‘this is the voice of the military wing of Hellfire Dawn. Now you can see it, now you can feel it. The backlash has already started. Our mission is to take the struggle to the streets, to bring about an uprising and in so doing exert the moral rights of the white majority. Your town was chosen as the one in which our fight to victory will commence. Last night we drove a family of black bastards from an estate where they were known to be drug dealers, corrupting our children. Tonight you have felt the power of the Hellfire Dawn movement through the force of the bomb. Be warned — this is only the beginning. This week Blackpool will burn and the government — that weak-willed bunch of queers and coons — will start to topple as the force of the true people of this once proud nation drives them from power — there will be no prisoners taken. Turncoats and informers will be weeded out and destroyed. Bombs are everywhere in the places you think are safe and secure. This is the voice of the military wing of Hellfire Dawn.’

The tape ended. No one in the room spoke.

Henry sat back thoughtfully.

One by one the others did the same with the exception of FB who remained on the edge of his chair, hands clasped, elbows on knees, knuckles white.

‘They’ve finally come out,’ Andrea Makin said.

‘Not the turn of phrase I’d use under the circumstances,’ Henry said. His remark brought a smirk to the faces of Makin and Donaldson. Basil Kramer gave him a hard stare. FB looked as though the words had not registered with him.

‘How did we get the tape?’ Henry asked.

‘A young lad dropped it off at the front desk,’ Makin said. ‘He’s on video handing it over, but at the moment we don’t know who or where he is.’

‘He’ll’ve been paid to deliver it,’ Henry said. ‘I can’t see one of the major players doing such a menial, but potentially dangerous job — dangerous in that there was the possibility of being recognised. I know I shouldn’t need to ask this — but has the tape and whatever it arrived in been properly preserved for evidence?’

‘Once it was established what it was — yes,’ said Makin.

Silence fell on the room. Henry decided to keep quiet now. He wasn’t exactly sure why he had been made privy to this.

‘Lady and gentlemen,’ Basil Kramer announced, ‘we have a very big problem on our hands. What are we going to do about it?’ He looked expectantly at FB, whose eyes remained evasive.

For the first time since he had returned to work, Henry was glad that all he had to do was keep the peace on the streets of Blackpool. It seemed like the easy option.

‘I shall rephrase that,’ Basil Kramer said coldly. ‘The question, ACC Fanshaw-Bayley, is what are you going to do about it?’

For the first time ever Henry saw FB at a loss. His spirit and drive seemed to have deserted him and maybe the true man was now apparent. Conceivably underneath all that bluff and bluster lurked an inadequate personality which was hidden by being overbearing and sometimes outrageous. Henry thought that he should have felt for him but, wicked as it seemed, he rather enjoyed the moment. Revelled in it, actually.

Donaldson and Makin shifted uncomfortably. Henry folded his arms.

Basil Kramer was remorseless, giving a glimpse of the ruthless streak in him which had enabled him to become such a massive business tycoon and an MP at such a relatively young age. ‘What are you going to do about the fact that last night riots tore apart your town on the eve of the party conference? That an Asian family were driven out of their home? That one of your officers is critically ill suffering from severe burns? That an Asian man has been murdered and another young man murdered? Two of your officers are missing under mysterious circumstances and a bomb has gone off destroying a club frequented by gay people. Just what are you going to do, ACC? You have simply lost control. The press are having a field day, and tomorrow — God, I hate to think what tomorrow will bring — and tomorrow is the day when the PM delivers his law and order speech. This police force and the government will look like fools. So I say again, ACC, what are you going to do about it?’

Henry exhaled, unaware he had been holding his breath. The public drubbing he had received from FB was nowhere near as bad as this.

FB took the tirade and reeled with the verbal assault. Henry wondered if he was seeing his hopes and dreams of advancement into the HMIC disappearing before him. If so, it must be a devastating sight. Black rings circled the senior officer’s eyes. He did not respond for a few moments. The room was deathly silent.

Slowly FB raised his head, his eyes fixed firmly on Henry Christie, making Henry’s heart sink down to his boots. Then he looked at Basil Kramer. ‘I can assure you,’ he said, ‘that I have lost control of nothing.’

Twenty minutes later, FB came back to Gold Command from an office on the floor below where, apparently, he and Kramer had exchanged views with a certain frankness.

Henry, Donaldson and Makin were helping themselves to coffee, chatting and wondering what the hell was going on.

They all looked at him as he entered. FB seemed to have returned to normal. Henry had liked the battered version better, but realised that all good things come to an end.

‘OK, this is the plan of action,’ the ACC said smartly. ‘It may well seem that everything is going to rat shit for us this week — and that may be a correct assumption — but let me assure you I haven’t completely lost sight of the squirrel yet. To say the least, resources are stretched. Everybody and his dog is now going to be dragged in to police the conference following the bomb and the disturbances — hardly a riot, in my book, still — ’ he shrugged. ‘So the streets of the rest of Lancashire are going to be devoid of cops, pretty much, for the next seventy-two hours, but that’s the way it goes. What the government wants, the government gets,’ he said expansively. ‘As far as the bomb goes, I’ve got a team on it, scraped up from the bottom of the barrel, but what concerns me more than any of this is the disappearance of Jane Roscoe and Mark Evans. I’d like to think they’ve eloped. I could handle that — and sack the bastards — but I seriously doubt that is the case. I just have the vaguest feeling that their disappearance has something to do with the bigger picture — just a hunch from a man who used to be a real detective.’ He sighed. ‘Only problem is that I haven’t got anyone to put on to it.’ He paused and pursed his lips. ‘Except you three.’

Without exception, their chins dropped.

FB held up a hand. ‘I know, I know. Andrea, you are a Met officer and you are here to assist us in other ways and I can’t order you to do anything; Mr Donaldson’ — Henry noted FB’s retention of formality to Karl — ‘you are an employee of the US government and have no powers in this country, but I do appreciate you have highly developed investigative skills and I can only plead for your assistance. You don’t have to give it and I won’t blame you if you don’t. But I also know that you’ve worked very successfully with Henry in the past. Your choice. The only one I can order about, and it gives me great pleasure to do so, because I saw your expression of happiness when Kramer was bollocking me, is you, Henry.’

‘And I’m the recently transferred reactive inspector and I’ve got Blackpool to look after,’ he pointed out, hiding a gush of inner excitement.

‘Well tough shit. I want you on Roscoe’s case. I’ll get Dermot Byrne to act up. I want you to pick up where she left off and find her.’ FB’s eyes roved across all three of them. ‘We’ve got seventy-two hours before the conference ends. I’m asking you all to give that time to see if you can find Roscoe and Evans, alive or dead. What do you say?’

‘I say yes,’ said Makin.

Karl Donaldson nodded.

‘I don’t have a choice,’ Henry said. He checked his watch. It was one minute before midnight.