The Hawk Is Dead

9

Monday 20 November 2023

Sir Jason Finch was a well-liked member of the Royal Household. In his role as Keeper of the Privy Purse — essentially Comptroller of The King’s finances — he had one of the finest offices in Buckingham Palace, a corner ground floor on the east wing, with glorious views of the parade ground from both windows. He loved the views and he loved his work.

His increasingly portly figure attested to his years, post-military, of what he called proper lunching and dining. Today he was looking forward to a regular lunch meeting at Wiltons, his favourite fish restaurant, with an art dealer and old school friend, James Mayor. Mayor always knew exactly what was going on in the art world, and he liked to pick his expert’s brains.

In particular, today, he was interested in asking Mayor about the recent explosion in value of the paintings of a number of historic artists currently in fashion. In an article in the Financial Times he had in front of him, he saw that Gustav Klimt’s Dame mit Fächer had recently sold for a world record £85.3 million. And that Claude Monet’s Le bassin aux nymphéas had made nearly £60 million. They had no Klimt works in the Royal Collection, but they did have several Monets. They also had some Fragonards — and one had been sold a few years ago for another world record — £17 million.

He had recently — and discreetly — taken some photographs on his phone of high-value paintings in the Royal Collection, to show the art dealer at lunchtime, over a bottle of Mayor’s favourite tipple, Corton Charlemagne.

Using scissors, he carefully cut out the newspaper article, folded it and placed it in a file, which he slipped into one of the drawers of his desk.

10

Monday 20 November 2023

Roy Grace had taken a few minutes out of work, needing a break from the double murder case he was working on. He made a fresh cup of coffee and sat back down, googling ‘air fryers’. It seemed that everyone he and Cleo knew had recently bought one of these kitchen appliances and swore by them as both an efficient cooking tool and good for the environment, too.

As he enjoyed cooking, and all the more so cooking healthily with as little fat as possible, he avidly read the food sections of newspapers, curious about any new recipes. He’d recently started using avocado oil to cook with instead of olive oil, after reading that, at frying temperatures, olive oil became unhealthy. But he was struggling to get his head around the concept of air fryers.

They definitely seemed to be energy-efficient, a big tick. But he was still not sure, despite Glenn Branson telling him that he and Siobhan wondered what they’d done before having one.

Just as he clicked on Amazon, to look at what they had to offer, his phone rang.

‘Roy Grace,’ he answered, and immediately heard the voice of a Control Room operator he recognized, Carol Walker. The Comms operators were normally calm but Carol sounded way more anxious than the norm.

‘Sir,’ she said. ‘We’ve just been alerted to an incident involving the Royal Train bringing The Queen to Brighton. It’s a sketchy report but we understand the train has been derailed inside Clayton Tunnel.’

For a moment, he did not believe his ears. ‘Derailed? What information do you have?’

‘Just that, sir.’

‘When you say derailed what exactly do you mean?’

‘That’s all the information I have, sir.’

‘Any report of casualties?’

‘No, sir, at least not so far. Oscar One is trying to get more details.’

He thought hard for a moment. Derailed inside a tunnel. Was this the work of terrorists or protestors? But that didn’t matter for now. All that mattered was ensuring The Queen was safe. ‘Who’ve you alerted so far?’ he asked.

‘Fire and Rescue, the Ambulance Service, all Armed Response units and of course British Transport Police. Oscar One has requested NPAS-15 to attend in case it is needed — and the Royalty and Specialist Protection team. The Duty Inspector at Haywards Heath is sending all resources they have to both ends of the tunnel. I thought that, as Silver Investigations, you needed be informed, sir.’

NPAS-15 was the National Police Air Service helicopter for their area.

‘Thank you,’ Grace said, barely able to believe what he was hearing. ‘The Royal Train — you are absolutely sure?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And The Queen is definitely on board?’

‘From what I understand, sir.’

‘Please update me with any news.’

‘Yes I will, sir, either myself or Oscar One.’

Ending the call, Grace, thinking shit, speed-dialled his immediate boss, Nigel Downing. ‘Sir,’ he said, as soon as the Assistant Chief Constable, a calm and pragmatic man, answered. ‘In case you haven’t already heard, we have a Major Incident.’

‘I’ve not heard anything, Roy. What’s up?’

Grace related what he had just been told. Downing was silent for a moment, then asked, ‘Is there any terrorist implication here?’

‘I don’t know yet, sir.’

‘Do you think those anti-monarchists might be behind it?’

‘It would be an unconscionable change in tactics for the major groups, sir, but an unknown splinter group could be a possibility.’

‘Shit,’ Downing said. ‘Not great for Sussex, is it?’

Grace raised an eyebrow, a little surprised Downing was more concerned for the PR image of Sussex than Queen Camilla’s welfare.

‘BTP will have primacy on this, for now, I suppose,’ Downing continued.

British Transport Police was a separate national police force, with the same powers as the regular force, but funded independently by the railways. They always had initial command of any incident occurring on railway property.

‘I imagine the Scotland Yard Counter Terrorism team will be all over it within the hour,’ Grace said.

After a few moments, Downing said, ‘I’ll inform the Chief — update me as soon as you hear anything more.’

Grace assured him he would, then immediately called Glenn Branson.

‘Dull day at the office?’ the Detective Inspector answered. ‘Need someone to chat to, to relieve the mahogany, as my old teacher would say?’

‘We have a major crisis on our hands, mate.’

‘I have one, too,’ Branson retorted. ‘But you go first.’

‘How about Queen Camilla’s train derailed inside Clayton Tunnel? Would that be more of a crisis?’

There was a brief silence. ‘No way?’

‘Seriously.’

‘Holy crap.’

‘That’s one way of putting it.’

‘Is she hurt?’

‘I’m waiting on news. Who do we have available to respond if we need?’

‘Norman and Polly are in. I’ve got a car signed out, we can be on the road in less than five.’

‘I’ll get back to you,’ Grace said.

‘You know something, boss — beats me why she’d want to travel on an ancient piece of rolling stock, when she’s got a pukka helicopter at her disposal.’

‘Apparently Her Majesty believes the train is safer.’

‘Does she still think that?’