Down Among the Dead Men

1

Brighton, September 2007

‘Are you sure this thing works?’ Danny asked Mr Singh, the gizmo man.

‘You want demonstration?’

‘I’d be a mug if I didn’t.’

‘No problem. Where did you leave car?’

‘A little way up the street.’

‘What make?’

‘It’s the old white Merc by the lamp post.’

‘Locking is remote, right?’

Danny dipped his hand in his pocket, opened his palm and showed the key fob with its push-button controls.

‘Very good,’ Mr Singh said. ‘We can test. Go to car and let yourself in. Step out, lock up and walk back here. I am waiting on street with gizmo.’

Danny was alert for trickery. He wasn’t parting with sixty-odd pounds for a useless lump of plastic and metal. But if it really did work, he could be quids in. Thousands.

The gizmo, as Mr Singh called it, looked pretty basic in construction, a pocket-sized black box with two retractable antennas fitted to one end.

No money had changed hands yet, so the guy had nothing to gain by doing a runner. Danny stepped out of the little coffee shop and did exactly as suggested. Walked to the Mercedes, unlocked, got in, closed the door, opened it again, stepped out, locked, using the smart key, and walked back to where Mr Singh was standing outside the shop with the gizmo in his hands.

‘You locked it, right?’

‘Sure did,’ Danny said.

‘Where is key?’

‘Back in my pocket.’

‘Excellent. Leave it there. Now go to car and try door.’

Danny had walked only a few steps when he saw that the lock pins were showing. Just as promised, the car was unlocked.

He was impressed. To be certain, he opened the door he’d apparently locked a moment ago.

‘Good job, eh?’ Mr Singh said when Danny went back to him.

‘Nice one. Who makes these things?’

‘Made in China.’

‘Wouldn’t you know it?’

‘Simple to operate. You want to buy?’

‘How does it work?’

‘OK. You know how key fob works?’

‘Using a radio signal.’

‘Right. Sending signal from fob to car. Programmed to connect with your car and no other. But this gizmo is signal jammer. Breaks frequency. You think you lock up, but I zap you with this.’

‘Let me see.’

Danny held the thing and turned it over. ‘All I have to do is press this?’

‘Correct. All about timing. You are catching exact moment when driver is pointing fob at car.’

‘Hang on. There’s always a sound when the locks engage. And the lights flick on and off. If that doesn’t happen, the driver will notice.’

‘Did you notice?’

Danny hesitated. ‘There was traffic noise and I was thinking of other things.’

‘So?’ Mr Singh flashed his teeth.

‘In a quiet place the driver would notice.’

‘Don’t use in quiet place. Street is better, street with much traffic.’

Danny turned the jammer over and looked at the other side, speculating. ‘How much are you asking?’

‘Seventy, battery included.’

He made a sound as if he’d been burnt. ‘Seventy is more than I thought.’

‘Fully effective up to fifty metres.’

Danny handed it back. ‘I don’t suppose it works with the latest models.’

‘Now I am being honest. Very new cars, possibly no. Manufacturers getting wise. Any car up to last year is good. That gives plenty choice. To you, special offer, not to be repeated. Sixty-five.’

Danny took a wad from his back pocket, peeled off three twenties and held them out.

Mr Singh sighed, took the money and handed over the jammer.

‘Before you go,’ Danny said. ‘There’s something else. This gets me into the car, but it doesn’t let me drive it away. I was told you have another little beauty for that.’

Mr Singh’s eyes lit up again. ‘Programmer. Which make? BMW, Mercedes, Audi?’

‘I need a different one for each make, do I? How much will it cost me?’

‘Two hundred. Maybe two-fifty.’

Danny whistled. This was getting to be a larger investment than he planned, but he thought about the top-class cars he could steal. ‘Let’s say the Bimmer.’

‘BMW three or five series I can do for two hundred.’

‘Is it difficult to operate?’

‘Dead easy. All cars now have diagnostic connector port. You plug in and programmer reads key code.’

‘Then what?’

‘Code is transferred from car’s computer to microchip in new key. You get five blank keys gratis as well.’

‘So I can drive off using the new key? Have you tried this yourself?’

‘No, no, no, I am supplier only. Supplying is lawful. Driving off with some person’s car is not.’

‘But you can show me how the thing works?’

‘You come back with two hundred cash this time tomorrow and for you as special customer I am supplying and demonstrating BMW 3 series programmer.’

Next afternoon special customer Danny drove away from Brighton with the programmer and the pride of a man at the cutting edge of the electronic revolution. In his youth he’d used a wire coat hanger to get into cars. He’d graduated to a slim Jim strip and then a whole collection of lock-picking tools. But the days of hotwiring the ignition were long gone. In recent years anti-theft technology had become so sophisticated that he’d been reduced to touring car parks looking for vehicles left unlocked by their stupid owners. For a man once known as Driveaway Danny it had become humiliating. The Mercedes he was driving was twelve years old. He’d liberated it in July from some idiot in Bognor who’d left it on his driveway with the key in the ignition.

Everything was about to change.

He would shortly be driving a BMW 3 series.

It wasn’t easy to nail one. For more than a week he patrolled the streets of the south-coast town of Littlehampton (which isn’t known for executive cars) with his two gizmos in a Tesco carrier bag. The new technology called for a whole new mindset. He wasn’t on the lookout for a parked car, but one that happened to drive up while he was watching. He’d need to make a snap decision when the chance came. If the chance came.

Late Sunday evening it did. After a day of no success he was consoling himself with a real ale at his local, the Steam Packet, near the red footbridge over the River Arun. He lived in a one-bedroom flat a few hundred yards away and liked to wind down here at the end of a long day. The pub was said to have existed since 1840, trading under a different name, because the cross-channel ferry that departed from there hadn’t come into service until 1863. welcome aboard the steam packet, announced the large wooden board attached to the front with a profile of a paddle steamer — and in case the maritime message was overlooked, the north side of the pub had a ship’s figurehead of a topless blonde (in the best possible taste, with strategically dangling curls) projecting from the wall. With a little imagination when seated in the terrace at the back overlooking River Road and the Arun you could believe yourself afloat. This was a favourite spot of Danny’s, nicely placed for seeing spectacular sunsets or watching small boats chugging back from sea trips. But at this moment, alone in the half-light at one of the benches around 9:30 on a September evening, his thoughts were not about sea trips or sunsets. He’d just decided he’d wasted his money on Mr Singh’s gizmos. How ironic then that this was the moment when a silver BMW drove up and came to a halt in the parking space across the street.

Danny almost knocked over his beer reaching for the carrier bag. He tugged out the jammer and extended the antennas. Its first use for real. He couldn’t have been better placed, all but hidden by the chest-high terrace wall.

The car’s plates weren’t visible from this angle. He couldn’t tell from the design of the thing which year it had been manufactured, if it was too recent to respond to the jammer. If the trick didn’t work, so what? It was worth the try.

The door opened and the driver got out, no more than a youth, slim, in a dark blue hoodie and jeans. He pushed the door shut. He didn’t immediately use the key.

Danny’s right forefinger was poised over the switch. As Mr Singh had said, this was all about timing. You catch exact moment.

With a springy step and a bit of a swagger, the kid started walking in the direction of the footbridge. No one else was about. He hadn’t used the smart key yet. As if in an afterthought, about three paces from the car, he turned his head and glanced back.

Danny’s view was masked. All he could see was the youth’s back half-turned. It was impossible to tell for sure if the key was in his hand, but reasonable to assume it was. Drivers habitually took a few steps from their vehicle and then turned, pointed the key and pressed.

Now or never. Danny brought his finger down and instinctively ducked out of sight behind the terrace wall.

Nothing happened.

He had to remind himself that the whole point of the jammer was to get a negative result.

When Danny put his head above the wall again, the kid was halfway across the bridge, moving briskly. Danny stowed the jammer in the carrier and hurried out, leaving almost half a glass of real ale behind. On his way through the lounge he raised his free hand in a farewell to the barmaid and stepped out of the building and round the side to where the BMW was parked.

A thousand blessings on Mr Singh. The pins were up. The car was unlocked, begging to be liberated.

But not yet.

He needed to use the second gizmo, the programmer, to make his own key before he could drive his free gift away.

After checking to make certain no one was about, he stepped round to the driver’s side and let himself in. The interior was still warm and smelt faintly of body odour. He left the door open. He dumped the carrier bag on the passenger seat and lifted out the programmer. Now it was a matter of locating the onboard diagnostic system and plugging in the sixteen-pin connector.

Should be simple.

Danny had been given a demonstration by Mr Singh, who was as wiry as a strip of three-core flex. Danny was overweight. Grovelling under the dashboard of a car wasn’t easy. On his knees and breathing hard, he made more room by pushing the seat back to its fullest extent. Just above the pull switch for the bonnet he found the cover with the letters OBD on it. He opened up, plugged in, watched the programmer light up, used the controls to collect the key code and then remembered he would need something else. He reached for the carrier and scrabbled inside for one of the blank fobs, found one and pressed it against the programmer.

All done in under three minutes.

Relieved, he unplugged, extracted himself and stood up. His hands were shaking and his knees were wobbly. He looked towards the footbridge and saw no one.

The next job would be more familiar: driving the thing away to get the registration plates changed. A guy called Stew was the local specialist, always relocating to outwit the fuzz and currently on a trading estate in Chichester, not more than twelve miles away.

Danny got in, slotted in the key and yelped in triumph as the dashboard lit up. The fuel tank was three-quarters full.

Bridge Road, the main road to Chichester, went past the front of the Steam Packet. Danny drove off as sedately as if he was taking his mother shopping. He didn’t want to get pulled over for speeding. The good thing was that the young owner was still unaware his car had been driven away and with any luck he wouldn’t return for a couple of hours. You couldn’t have much sympathy. He was probably some rich kid whose father had bought the thing for him. Dad would shout the odds and then buy him another.

The Bimmer handled well and was a smooth ride. Danny didn’t object to driving an automatic. Not much over two years old, he reckoned. No need for a respray when there were so many silver saloon cars out there. Once this had the new plates, he’d dump the old Mercedes. Selling wasn’t an option in the stolen-car game. But it was all very satisfactory, and for not much outlay so far. Stew would be more expensive than Mr Singh, but that had to be faced. New plates were essential.

Now that he was clear of the crime scene, so to speak, Danny needed to check with Stew that he was willing to take delivery. The guy had never been known to turn down a job, but he liked to be contacted first. Only reasonable. Generally he was in his workshop until around midnight.

Out in open country, after the A259 had changed its identity from Bridge Lane to Crookthorn Lane to Grevatt’s Lane, he found a field entrance with enough room to pull off the road and make the call on a cheap mobile he’d bought specially for this job.

‘You working?’

Stew answered and he knew Danny’s voice right away. ‘Yep. Got something to show me?’

‘If you got time.’

‘When were you thinking of?’

‘Now if you want. Say twenty minutes.’

‘See you then.’

Having made the call, Danny wedged the phone under the back wheel of the car so that it would be crushed when he drove off. Technology is a two-edged sword to anyone in a high-risk occupation. He was tempted to do the same with the gizmos, but they’d been an expensive buy.

Before leaving, he thought he would also clear the glove compartment of the manual and any documents. It’s common sense to remove everything that can reveal the owner’s identity. The seats and door panels were free of obvious clutter, which was a help. For a young owner, it was all incredibly tidy. He leaned across and clicked the latch. The flap pushed against his hand.

An avalanche of banknotes tumbled out. Masses of them, mainly twenties.

The thump, thump wasn’t the money hitting the floor, it was Danny’s heart. Either the young guy who drove this car didn’t believe in using banks or he robbed them. There must have been more than a couple of grand here.

Alternately swearing and thanking God, Danny scooped up handfuls and stuffed as many as possible into his pockets. The rest went down his socks. How glad he was that Stew hadn’t found this lot.

What a turnaround in his luck. If it wasn’t so late in the day he would have bought a lottery ticket.

Fully ten minutes passed before he calmed down enough to drive again. Even then he was mentally spending the money. Good thing the route was obvious. He was through Felpham and Bognor and on to the Chichester Road without registering that he’d passed anywhere.

Concentrate, he told himself. The job isn’t done yet.

The last stretch of the A259 was a dual carriageway leading to the A27. Two roundabouts and he would be at Stew’s. He could safely go up to seventy here and test the acceleration. Watch the speedo, but feel the power.

Faintly over the engine sound he heard the twin notes of a police siren.

Can’t be me, he thought. I’m inside the limit.

In the mirror he saw the blue flashing light. Do what any law-abiding motorist does, he told himself. Pull over and let them pass.

He eased his foot off the pedal. Hardly anything else was on the road and they could easily get by, but he did the decent thing.

Instead of overtaking, they closed in behind him and flashed their headlights. What now?

He pulled over, braked, lowered the window and switched off.

Bluff this out, he thought. They can’t possibly know this quickly that the car is stolen. It’s got to be some minor infringement like a faulty rear lamp.

He grabbed the bag of gizmos and pushed it out of sight under the passenger seat.

They were taking their time, probably checking over their radio that the car wasn’t on their list.

Finally a figure appeared at the window. Heavy black moustache. ‘Evening, sir. Are you the owner of this car?’

‘I am.’

‘Step outside, please.’

What was this? The breathalyser? He hadn’t finished his pint of real ale. He’d be well under the limit. ‘Is something up?’

There was a second officer, a policewoman.

The male cop said, ‘Place both hands flat against the car roof and stand with your legs apart. I’m going to search you.’

‘What for? I’ve done nothing wrong.’ As he said the words, he thought of all the banknotes stuffed inside his pockets.

He did as he was ordered and felt the hands travel down his body. What the fuck was he going to say?

‘What’s your name, sir?’

‘Daniel Stapleton.’

‘Date of birth, please.’

‘Ninth of October, nineteen seventy.’

‘Mind if I call you Daniel?’

‘Danny will do.’

‘What’s this in your pockets, Danny? Keep your hands exactly where they are.’

‘Some cash.’

‘Quite a lot of it, apparently. What’s all this money doing in your pockets?’

‘I, em, did some business. Cash transaction.’

‘What sort of business?’

‘In Littlehampton. I sold a boat.’

‘Is that where you came from — Littlehampton?’

‘Yes.’

‘And where are you travelling to?’

‘Only Chichester. Bit of a night out.’

‘Spending all this money?’

‘Not all of it.’

‘You said you own the car. It’s been reported as stolen. That’s why we stopped you.’

‘This car? Stolen?’ He was able to say the words with genuine disbelief. The young guy had disappeared across the footbridge. He’d been on his way somewhere. He couldn’t have returned so soon and got on to the police.

‘Do you have any proof of identity? Your licence?’

‘That’s at home.’

The search had been progressing down his body. ‘Do you normally keep banknotes in your socks?’

The cop didn’t seem to expect an answer, so Danny didn’t attempt one.

A large amount of cash might be suspicious, but it wasn’t necessarily illegal. They hadn’t found drugs or a weapon. They were probably disappointed. Danny was wondering if the comment about the stolen car had been a bluff.

The cop said to his female colleague, ‘Let’s have a look in the boot, shall we?’

Danny heard her open it.

She said, ‘God help us.’