The Last Devil To Die

68

Joyce received the call around twenty minutes ago, and is already up on the hillside, engulfed by her winter coat. Elizabeth and Bogdan were there to meet her, and down below she sees Ibrahim, Ron and Pauline making their way up.

‘I hope I didn’t wake you,’ says Elizabeth.

‘You know you didn’t,’ says Joyce. ‘I was watching Antiques Road Trip and crying. Bogdan, you really should be wearing a jacket.’

‘Bogdan considers a jacket a sign of weakness,’ says Elizabeth.

‘Yes,’ agrees Bogdan.

‘I would have brought a flask if I’d known,’ says Joyce as Ibrahim, Ron and Pauline reach them. ‘I could pop back?’

‘Nice morning for it,’ says Ron, and gives Elizabeth a hug. Elizabeth accepts it reluctantly.

‘Let’s not make a habit of that,’ says Elizabeth, detaching herself. ‘Thank you all for coming.’

‘I thought we’d be giving up on the heroin,’ says Joyce. ‘After what you said.’

‘As did I,’ says Elizabeth. ‘But I was awake, as you’d imagine. Thinking about Stephen.’

‘Of course you were,’ says Joyce. ‘I was too. Well, Stephen and Gerry.’

‘I was thinking about all sorts of things, punishing myself with the happiness of it all. And then I starting to think about Kuldesh,’ says Elizabeth. ‘How nice it would have been to have him there. How much Stephen spoke about him lately.’

Joyce sees Ron, after taking a look at Bogdan, start to slip his jacket off. He will not be out-machoed.

Elizabeth continues. ‘But then my mind was off in all sorts of directions. Why was Stephen speaking about him quite so much? He said he’d seen Kuldesh recently, and we all assumed he was talking about his visit to the shop, with Bogdan and Donna.’

‘He wasn’t?’ Bogdan asks.

‘It just struck me,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Perhaps I had missed something. What if Stephen had seen Kuldesh more recently than that?’

‘Meaning?’ asks Ron, pretending not to shiver.

‘What if he saw Kuldesh after Christmas?’

‘After Kuldesh disappeared?’ says Joyce.

‘Well, we know Kuldesh was in trouble,’ says Elizabeth. ‘He rang Nina and told her so. And if Nina couldn’t help, who might Kuldesh ring next?’

‘Stephen,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Kuldesh was in a dilemma,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Had stumbled across some Class A drugs and decided, in his wisdom, to steal them.’

‘And needed someone he could trust?’ says Donna.

‘Precisely,’ says Elizabeth. ‘An old partner in crime. Someone he had seen recently. Someone he could trust completely. Someone who lived somewhere remote.’

‘But Stephen would have turned him down flat,’ says Joyce.

‘Maybe he would,’ says Elizabeth. ‘But I don’t think so. I think Kuldesh came over on the 27th, while we were with Donna and Mervyn. Two old men, a fortune in drugs and trouble on their tail. Where safer to hide the box than Coopers Chase?’

‘When we found Snowy,’ says Bogdan, ‘Stephen said this ground was rock-hard to dig. I didn’t even think of it.’

‘And he told me to take care of an allotment he has never had,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Over and over. Kuldesh and the allotment. Kuldesh and the allotment.’

‘So it’s buried here?’ says Donna. ‘That’s the theory?’

‘We’re about to find out,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Bogdan, could you do the honours?’

Bogdan lifts the new spade and starts to dig, as near to the radishes as he can.

‘You need a hand, Bogdan?’ asks Ron.

‘I’m OK, Ron,’ says Bogdan. ‘Thank you.’

As Bogdan continues digging, and metal scrapes against the ungiving earth, Ibrahim raises his hand like a schoolboy.

‘Forgive me,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I may be being a fool, but why would Stephen help Kuldesh?’

‘Mates, ain’t they?’ says Ron. ‘I’d help you.’

‘If I were burying heroin, you would help me?’ asks Ibrahim. ‘You wouldn’t say, Don’t bury heroin, Ibrahim? Take it to the police, Ibrahim? Give it back to the gangsters before they kill you, Ibrahim?’

‘Well, I wouldn’t say take it to the police,’ says Ron.

‘Good boy,’ says Pauline.

‘But I take your point,’ says Ron. ‘Why would he do it, Lizzie? Messing about with drugs. That ain’t Stephen.’

‘Possibly friendship, Ron,’ says Elizabeth, ‘possibly foolhardiness. But most likely he didn’t fully understand what he was being asked to do.’

This quietens the group a little, and the only sound out on the dark hillside is Bogdan shovelling soil, and Ron putting his coat back on.

Bogdan strikes something solid.

‘Here we go,’ he says, shifting the loose earth around whatever the object is. He eventually kneels and tugs a small, squat, ugly box from the hole. He places it on the ground.

‘Stephen, you old bugger,’ says Ron.

The lid of the box has a slight lip. They all stare at it for a moment.

Joyce decides it is too cold to wait. She kneels next to the box and looks at the others. ‘Shall I be mother?’

Receiving nods, Joyce gently puts her fingers under the lip of the box, and it starts to give. She is sure it is going to be empty. She doesn’t know why, but she is sure. She lifts.

The box is not empty. The box is packed with white powder.

‘Are we sure it’s heroin?’ says Ron. ‘Could be washing powder?’

Pauline bends over the box, takes out her keys and cuts into the plastic packaging. She wets the tip of her finger, dips it into the powder and then tastes it.

‘It’s heroin,’ she says.

‘Good to have you on board, Pauline,’ says Elizabeth.

‘A hundred grand’s worth of heroin,’ says Ron.

‘That has already killed many people,’ says Ibrahim, looking around, as if for snipers in the trees.

Joyce shuts the lid of the box and tucks it under her arm. ‘May I say something? For the record?’

The others indicate that she has the floor. Joyce isn’t certain exactly how to put what it is that she wants to say. But here goes.

‘This is the sort of moment when Elizabeth would normally take charge. But I’m not allowing it. Elizabeth has more important things on her hands. So I am going to take charge again, forgive me, Elizabeth, and this is my position … Bogdan, would you please put on a jacket … We now have what everybody is looking for. And what everybody is killing for. This little box. Kuldesh, Dominic Holt, Samantha Barnes, goodness knows who else. And nobody knows we have it, which puts us in a strong position.’

‘This is very good,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Very Elizabeth.’

‘Thank you,’ says Joyce. ‘So what I suggest is this. Elizabeth, you do as much or as little as you choose, we are here for you. As for the rest of us, those of us who are able to get some sleep, get some sleep. And soon, we let it be known that we have found the heroin. Not where we found it, not where it is, but that we have it in our possession. And then we wait.’

‘Wait for them to kill us too?’ says Ron. ‘Very Elizabeth indeed.’

‘Precisely that,’ says Joyce. ‘We wait and see who comes to kill us. We will use the heroin as a trap and see if it leads us to whomever murdered Kuldesh. You never know, do you? You have to make things happen.’

She gives the gang her very best stern look. She is not to be disagreed with.

‘That’s our gift to Stephen. OK, Elizabeth?’

Elizabeth nods to her friend. ‘It’s whoever murdered Kuldesh, but, other than that, yes.’

69

He has never had a dinner party before. Is this a dinner party? Vegetable curry on a Sunday lunchtime?

‘Turn the heat down,’ Patrice says to Chris, before pouring a glass of wine for Joyce.

Chris supposes it is a dinner party. Of sorts. Donna and Bogdan. Joyce and Ibrahim. Chris and Patrice. The heroin has been found, well of course it has, why did Chris ever doubt it, and now all they need to do is use it to catch a murderer. Simple.

‘I have created a WhatsApp group entitled “Who Killed Kuldesh?”’ says Ibrahim. ‘You are, naturally, all included in the group. I am sending you through a spreadsheet, now I am paper-free.’

‘You know they mine cobalt to make these phones?’ says Patrice.

‘Please,’ says Ibrahim. ‘One fight at a time.’

Various phones ping in different tones.

‘Ron and Elizabeth are both in the group too,’ says Ibrahim. ‘But I think we shouldn’t expect too much from Elizabeth right now. Do you think, Bogdan?’

‘I think,’ says Bogdan. ‘Yes.’

‘And Ron is stubbornly refusing to understand how WhatsApp works,’ Ibrahim adds.

Donna has opened the attachment on her phone and reads. ‘“Who is dead?” That’s a bold start.’

‘Thank you,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Who is dead? Kuldesh is dead. Dominic Holt is dead. Samantha Barnes is dead. According to Donna, the man named Lenny is dead.’

‘Worked for Mitch,’ says Donna. ‘Killed in Amsterdam. I picked that up by the coffee machine yesterday. One of the NCA team was trying to show off to me.’

‘You give me his name,’ says Bogdan.

‘It was a she,’ says Donna. ‘Stop being so binary.’

‘Let me add him in,’ says Ibrahim. ‘That curry smells delicious, Chris.’

‘Are you sure there’s nothing I can help with?’ says Joyce.

‘Everything chopped, everything peeled, everything simmering,’ says Chris, from the hob. ‘You just drink your wine, and talk about drug-related murders, and Donna being chatted up.’

‘OK, I have added Lenny to “Who is dead?”,’ says Ibrahim.

‘So who is still alive?’ reads Bogdan from his screen.

‘Mitch Maxwell is still alive,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Luca Buttaci, and, probably, Garth, though he hasn’t been seen since his wife was murdered. I would suggest that one of the names on our “Who is alive?” list will turn out to be the killer of at least some of the names on our “Who is dead?” list. We must also add Nina Mishra and Jonjo Mellor to “Who is alive?”, as they were involved right at the beginning. Joyce, why aren’t you looking at your phone?’

‘I couldn’t make the spreadsheet work,’ says Joyce. ‘But I promise I’m following it all. Nina Mishra would make a very glamorous murderer. Jonjo Mellor might be a bit wet though? Can we still say “wet”?’

‘Can we add the middle-aged woman who keeps visiting Connie Johnson in prison?’ suggests Donna.

‘Grub’s up,’ says Chris, carrying a steaming pot of curry to the table. The table that, for so many years, sat unloved, covered in takeaway menus, old newspapers and, occasionally, crime-scene photographs. And now look at it. People sitting around with knives and forks, ladling rice onto their plates. What a long way he has come. He does note, however, that there is a large photo of the dead body of Samantha Barnes right next to the okra, so some things don’t change.

‘This is very good, for vegetables,’ says Donna.

‘It really is,’ says Joyce. ‘Ron would hate it.’

‘Where is he today?’ Patrice asks.

‘He’s gone to aromatherapy with Pauline,’ says Ibrahim.

‘So it’s back on?’ says Patrice. ‘It’s like Love Island with those two.’

‘In Poland, Love Island is called Love Mountain,’ says Bogdan. ‘And one time someone froze to death.’

‘Help yourself to more,’ says Chris. He’s always wanted to say something like that. The conversation is flowing, and the food really isn’t at all bad. Donna was right: you honestly wouldn’t know it was aubergines.

‘How are you getting on with the horse thefts?’ asks Joyce.

‘Our toughest case yet,’ says Donna. ‘We’ve been all over. No horses.’

‘Where’s the heroin now? Out of interest?’ says Chris.

‘Somewhere safe,’ says Joyce.

‘That usually means your kettle, Joyce,’ says Donna.

‘There was too much for the kettle,’ says Joyce. ‘So it’s in my microwave.’

‘Not still in that box?’ says Bogdan. ‘Was filthy.’

‘No, I gave the box a good scrub, and it’s perfect for all the bits and bobs I keep under my sink.’

‘Waste not, want not,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Chris, did you know that the aubergine is actually a fruit, and the Americans call it eggplant, because early varieties were white in colour and oval in shape?’

‘I didn’t know that, no,’ says Chris.

‘I’ll send you an article,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Donna, I need to update you on our Tatiana scheme too. I believe we have had a breakthrough.’

Again, various phones ping. A group message. Chris takes a look. It is from Ron, and it is, for no discernible reason, a picture of a panda wearing a hat. They see Ibrahim composing a reply, and it pings through. Thank you, Ron.

‘How are you going to let them all know you have the heroin? How do you set the trap?’ asks Patrice.

Everyone really seems to be getting along, thinks Chris, conversation really flowing now. Could this be described as a success? He thinks it could.

‘It’s very simple,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Tomorrow I’m visiting Connie Johnson again. I will tell her that we have found the drugs, and I will tell her that she mustn’t tell a soul.’

‘And then we wait for her to tell everyone,’ says Joyce. ‘I wouldn’t say no to another drop of that wine, Patrice. We wait, and we see if anyone tries to kill us.’

70

This time Ibrahim has been a little more professional. He’s finished his hour with Connie, and given her full value for money. They have been talking about pain. The shapes we twist into when we try to avoid it.

As he leaves, Ibrahim drops the bombshell.

‘You just dug it up?’ Connie asks. ‘A hundred grand’s worth?’

‘I am told it’s worth a hundred thousand, yes,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I’m not as up on the market rate as I should be.’

‘What did it weigh?’ asks Connie.

‘1.2 kilos,’ says Ibrahim. ‘According to Joyce’s kitchen scales.’

‘1.2 kilos, straight from Afghanistan,’ says Connie, doing a mental calculation. ‘A hundred and ten thousand pounds or so. Is it uncut?’

‘I don’t know,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I could ask Pauline.’

‘How white is it?’ Connie asks.

‘Very white,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Probably pure, then,’ says Connie. ‘Might be worth about four hundred grand by the time they’re done with it.’

‘I thought you only knew about cocaine,’ says Ibrahim.

‘A fisherman needs to know the price of chips,’ says Connie. ‘What are you going to do with it?’

‘We don’t know,’ says Ibrahim. ‘What would you do?’

‘I’d sell it, Ibrahim,’ says Connie. ‘I’m a drug dealer.’

‘Well, yes,’ agrees Ibrahim. ‘But if you were us, what would you do?’

‘Ibrahim, the simplest thing to do is take it to the cops,’ says Connie. ‘But when have you lot ever done the simple thing?’

Ibrahim nods. ‘Yes, I think if we felt it would lead us to finding out who murdered Kuldesh, we would take it to the authorities. But I don’t believe Joyce and Elizabeth have a great deal of trust in SIO Regan, and they believe that we might be better placed to find that out.’

‘You any nearer to working it out?’ Connie asks.

‘Well, Mitch Maxwell and Luca Buttaci are still looking for the heroin,’ says Ibrahim. ‘They seem very keen.’

‘That’s heroin for you,’ says Connie.

‘And then Samantha Barnes has also been murdered. But her husband, Garth, is at large. Or possibly dead. Though he doesn’t seem the type to die, so probably at large.’

‘Do they know you have the heroin now?’

‘We haven’t told a soul,’ says Ibrahim. ‘We are plotting our next move.’

‘Well, they won’t hear it from me,’ says Connie.

‘I’m banking on that, Connie,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I think we trust each other.’

‘Can I make an observation though?’ asks Connie. ‘In my professional capacity?’

‘Please,’ says Ibrahim. ‘You know I encourage a frank exchange of views.’

‘1.2 kilos is not an awful lot of heroin,’ says Connie. ‘In the grand scheme of things.’

‘It looks a lot when you see it in Joyce’s microwave,’ says Ibrahim.

‘I’m just letting you know,’ says Connie. ‘Mitch and Luca wouldn’t be killing anyone over 1.2 kilos of heroin.’

‘And yet a lot of people are dying?’ says Ibrahim.

‘Too many,’ says Connie. ‘Everyone’s chasing ghosts, and one of the Afghans has come over. This is about something bigger. Or someone bigger, you mark my words.’

‘But none of it solves the question of who killed Kuldesh?’

‘Well, that’s your job, not mine. I’m quite busy, you know,’ says Connie. ‘But Kuldesh stole from two of the biggest drug dealers in the South of England. A day later he’s shot dead. This isn’t rocket science.’

‘So you think either Luca or Mitch killed Kuldesh? Lured him into that country lane and shot him?’

‘It’s what I would have done,’ says Connie. ‘All due respect to your mate.’

‘But which one of them?’ says Ibrahim.

Connie walks to the door, and opens it for Ibrahim. ‘I’d say the last one to die probably did it. Wouldn’t you?’

‘They’re both still alive, Connie,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Well, let’s see how long that lasts, shall we?’

‘Will you walk out with me?’ Ibrahim asks.

‘Staying here,’ says Connie. ‘Another appointment.’

Connie touches Ibrahim’s arm as he leaves. She has never done that before. It is a very intimate moment, very unlike Connie. Signifying what? I trust you? I’m concerned for you? I appreciate you? Each would be progress in its own way.

Ibrahim steps out into the free world; he will think about it on the drive home.

As he gets into his car, he spots a middle-aged woman walking into the prison.

71

The view from the top of the multi-storey car park is to die for. The English Channel stretching off to infinity. You could turn this place into flats, Mitch is thinking, as he spots the cars up ahead. Property development, that’s the game to be in. Bribe a few local councillors, no one tries to kill you, you get to choose colour schemes. Maybe he’ll have a think about it when this is all over. If he survives.

Mitch parks his black Range Rover next to Luca’s black Range Rover. Next to Luca’s car is a small, yellow Fiat Uno, from which Garth is currently unfolding himself. He looks like he’s been sleeping rough.

‘You been sleeping rough, mate?’ asks Mitch.

‘Yes,’ says Garth, stretching his arms above his head. ‘Thank you both for coming.’

‘You sent me a message with my address and said you’d firebomb my family if I didn’t,’ says Mitch, brushing some sausage-roll crumbs from his jacket.

‘And you threw a brick through my front window,’ says Luca.

‘Well, you’re here,’ says Garth. ‘That’s the main thing.’

The wind is bitterly cold, high above the streets of Fairhaven. What does Garth want with them? Does he have the same information as they do?

‘I’m sorry about your wife,’ says Luca.

What’s this about Garth’s wife? Garth also looks puzzled.

‘Excuse me?’ he says.

‘I’m sorry about your wife,’ repeats Luca.

‘What happened to his wife?’ asks Mitch.

‘Someone killed her,’ says Garth.

‘Jesus,’ says Mitch. How many more people are going to die? Hopefully none. Or at least hopefully not him. ‘Sorry, mate.’

‘Did you kill her?’ Garth asks him.

‘No,’ says Mitch.

‘Then why are you sorry? Now I hear the heroin is at the old people’s village. You hear that too?’

‘Yup,’ says Luca.

Mitch nods. He heard it from one of Connie Johnson’s people last night.

‘So how do we get it without killing them?’ asks Garth.

‘We could ask politely?’ suggests Luca.

‘Or make a deal,’ says Mitch. Imagine, walking into the meeting with Hanif with the drugs in his hand? Or in a bag, sure, but imagine. If he has to pay off four pensioners, so be it. He’d rather be out of pocket than dead. Give Hanif the drugs, handshake and apologies, get out of the game for good. Straight into property development. Or sparkling wine.

‘I don’t make deals,’ says Luca.

‘How’s that working out for you?’ asks Garth. ‘Here’s what I suggest. You two get two hundred grand together. We go down to Coopers Chase again with guns and a suitcase of cash. They give us the heroin, you give them a hundred grand, we get out.’

‘And the other hundred grand?’ says Luca.

‘You give to me,’ says Garth. ‘For my help, and for my emotional anguish.’

‘I’ll tell you what,’ says Luca. ‘Why don’t Mitch and I go down there, wave our guns around and walk out with the heroin? Nothing for them, nothing for you. What about that?’

‘I wouldn’t advise it,’ says Garth.

Luca laughs. ‘Garth, we’re drug dealers. You’re some antiques guy in over his head. So run along home, bury your wife and sell a few clocks.’

Mitch is not at all sure about this. Garth seems like he might be many things, but he’s not a simple antiques dealer. And Mitch has dealt with the old people at the village before too. And they don’t seem scared or stupid.

‘Garth,’ says Mitch. ‘We give you fifty thousand, we give them fifty thousand. No guns.’

Luca shakes his head. ‘Come on, Mitch. Let’s kill him and go.’

‘No more killing,’ says Mitch. ‘Please.’

They hear a siren from the streets far below. Each man stops like a meerkat until it fades into the distance, then they resume their conversation.

‘Last one, I promise,’ says Luca, reaching for a gun tucked into the back of his trousers and pointing it at Garth.

There was a rugby union player, Jonah Lomu, a New Zealand Māori, who rewrote the rules of the game, because of his size and speed. No one had seen anything like him before. This hulk, this oversized tank, who moved with such grace and pace. It is Jonah Lomu that is going through Mitch’s mind as Garth runs at Luca, grabs him around the waist and hurls him over the parapet of the car park. There is a long, astonished silence, followed by a loud, distant crunch, and the wail of a car alarm. Mitch stares at Garth. Garth is combing his hair.

‘How did he know my wife had died?’ Garth asks.

‘Huh?’ says Mitch. He had meant to say more, but that’s all that came out.

‘How did he know my wife had died?’ Garth repeats. ‘Only the cops and the killer knew.’

‘So, he –’ says Mitch.

‘He killed her, and I loved her,’ says Garth. ‘I know I don’t look like the sensitive type. But I am.’

‘I see that,’ says Mitch, trying to regain a little composure. ‘So what now?’

‘I figure we’ve got about seven minutes to get out of here,’ says Garth. ‘Let’s take your car.’

‘Where are we going?’ Mitch asks.

‘To Coopers Chase,’ say Garth. ‘See if we can’t get your heroin back.’

‘No killing,’ says Mitch. ‘I’m serious now. Enough.’

‘Can’t promise anything,’ says Garth. ‘But if they play ball, they’ll be just fine.’

Mitch hears the screams of the public down below, and feels sick to his core. Why is everyone dying? What is he missing?

Please make this end soon. And please let him get out alive.

72

Ibrahim knows that it is just a waiting game now. Somebody is sure to visit Coopers Chase, looking for the heroin. Every new car through the gates could be bringing death.

So, just for today, it is quite nice to have something to take their minds off it all.

Tatiana’s friend ‘Jeremmy’ is coming this evening to pick up his money. Or so he thinks. Truth be told, he may be in for a rude shock. Joyce, as is increasingly her wont, has a plan for him.

They are all meeting at Joyce’s flat at six p.m. Donna is there now, enjoying Joyce’s hospitality. So if anyone tries to steal the heroin today, at least they have some strength in numbers to fight them off.

Ibrahim has invited Bob over a little earlier than necessary, he’s not sure why. Actually, perhaps he is sure why. Time will tell.

‘What must you make of us, Bob?’ Ibrahim asks, pouring two cups of mint tea.

‘I’ve never really felt it’s my business to make anything out of anyone,’ says Bob. ‘I’ve never been good with people. Almost everyone is a mystery to me.’

‘Every true soul is unknowable,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Who says that?’ Bob asks.

‘Me, Freud, Jung, some others,’ says Ibrahim. ‘That’s why I enjoy my job. You can only ever know so much. We remain out of reach to each other.’

‘We certainly do,’ agrees Bob.

‘I know a woman,’ says Ibrahim. ‘A cocaine dealer, who can kill people with the click of a finger. Yet, on Monday, she laid her hand on my arm like a lover.’

‘I don’t think that makes up for killing people,’ says Bob. ‘Unless I have that wrong?’

‘No, goodness, no,’ says Ibrahim. ‘And today she sent me a beautiful bunch of flowers. They are in the sink.’

‘I do like flowers,’ says Bob. ‘But I never think to buy them for myself. It makes me feel foolish. I bought some orchids once, this is a few years ago, and as I was paying I told the man they were for my wife. I don’t know why. Anyway, I left them on the train.’

‘I’ve enjoyed working with you though, Bob,’ says Ibrahim. ‘These last few weeks.’

‘I don’t know that I’ve been much help,’ says Bob. ‘After the initial stages.’

‘You’ve had fun though?’

‘Do you know, I have,’ says Bob, taking a first sip of his tea. ‘Often I just do online quizzes, or read up about things, or wait for lunch, and this has given me something else to do. I think I spend too much time alone.’

Ibrahim nods. ‘It’s nice to have the choice, isn’t it?’

‘And to watch the snooker,’ says Bob. ‘I enjoyed that. I even enjoyed answering Joyce’s questions.’

This feels like a good time? Does it? Ibrahim supposes there will never be a good time.

‘Do you know, Bob, when I was twenty I was a medical student.’

‘I didn’t know that,’ says Bob. ‘I was an engineer in the factory my dad worked in.’

‘Oh, I can see that,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Tell me a little more?’

‘No, no,’ says Bob. ‘You tell me more, Ibrahim.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘We have half an hour or so,’ says Bob.

‘So we do,’ says Ibrahim, and settles back into his chair. He chooses not to look at Bob directly. Instead he looks at the painting of the boat on the wall, the painting he has carried around with him from office to office over many years. ‘I lived in Earls Court, do you know it?’

‘Yes, it’s in London,’ says Bob.

‘That’s it,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I had very little money, but I had a scholarship that saw me through the worst of it. I would study all day, and come home at night to this tiny bedsit. 1963, I would say.’

‘The Beatles,’ says Bob.

‘The Beatles,’ agrees Ibrahim. ‘My English was good; I had learned at school. I got along with my fellow students well enough, I liked to eat out in cafés, and sometimes I would go to hear jazz. If it was free.’

‘That sounds enjoyable,’ says Bob. ‘Might I help myself to a biscuit?’

‘Please,’ says Ibrahim, motioning to the plate. ‘One evening I met a man named Marius.’

‘I see,’ says Bob, through a chocolate digestive.

‘He liked jazz. Not as much as I liked jazz, but he was happy enough with it, and I met him in a pub just off the Cromwell Road. It was called the Cherries.’

‘Mmm hmm,’ says Bob.

‘It’s not there any more,’ says Ibrahim. ‘It’s a Tesco Metro now.’

‘Isn’t everything?’ says Bob.

‘I would always sit by myself,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I’d take the newspaper with me, although I would have read it already, but just so I felt less embarrassed to be on my own. And Marius was at the next table, also with the newspaper. Do you think we ought to think about heading over to Joyce’s?’

Bob looks at his watch. ‘We have plenty of time.’

Ibrahim nods. ‘Yes, I suppose so, Bob. He was German, Marius, I discovered. You wouldn’t know it, didn’t look it. Looked Finnish, if anything, and he said to me, his first words to me were “You have already read that newspaper, I think,” and my first words to him, “I’m afraid I don’t remember,” but he bought me a drink. I didn’t really drink back then, but I asked for a pint, because it’s nice to fit in, isn’t it?’

‘It is,’ says Bob. ‘People like it when you fit in.’

‘It took me a long time to drink,’ says Ibrahim. ‘He drank very quickly. Or normally quickly, I suppose, just, you know.’

‘Just in comparison,’ says Bob.

‘Yes,’ says Ibrahim. ‘And we spoke, and he told me he was studying chemistry at Imperial College, that is also in London.’

‘I know it,’ says Bob, reaching down for another biscuit. ‘You can never have just one, can you?’

‘It is the combination of sugar and fat,’ says Ibrahim. ‘It drives us quite mad. The jazz band started to play then, they were a quartet, very gentle, but they knew their business, so I started listening, and Marius started listening, and before you knew it we were listening together.’

‘That sounds pleasant,’ says Bob.

‘It was very pleasant,’ says Ibrahim. ‘That’s the word. I don’t know that I had done anything together in my life before then. When Marius went to use the facilities, the bathroom, I tipped away the rest of my pint, and, by the time he returned, I had bought two more pints for us, and he said thank you and asked if I had eaten at the Italian restaurant next to Earls Court tube. I hadn’t, but I said that I had, because I wasn’t sure of the right answer to give, and he suggested we have dinner once the quartet had finished, and I said I had other plans, and he said cancel them.’

‘Did you have other plans?’

‘I never had other plans back then,’ says Ibrahim. ‘So I had spaghetti vongole, and Marius said he would have the same.’

‘And what happened next?’ asks Bob.

‘That’s a very good question,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Every story must have a “What happens next”. He walked me back home, we said goodnight, and he said that if it were of interest, he would be in the same pub at the same time the next week.’

‘And was it of interest?’

‘It was,’ says Ibrahim. ‘So I went back, still with a newspaper, you know, just in case?’

Bob nods. ‘Mmm.’

‘And this time I asked for a glass of wine,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Because I felt I could be honest. And it was the same quartet, and we went to the same restaurant, and we talked about Germany, and we talked about Egypt, and we talked about why we found ourselves so far from home, and I spoke a little about my father, which I hadn’t done before, and I haven’t done since, and, underneath the table, his hand found my hand. You had to be careful, of course.’

‘Of course,’ says Bob.

‘We moved in together, after a month or so, into a two-bedroom flat,’ says Ibrahim. ‘In Hammersmith. Do you know it?’

‘I know of it,’ says Bob.

‘And Marius got some work as a cycle courier for one of the newspapers, and I got some work in a shop selling umbrellas, just so we could afford it. And I continued my studies, and he continued his. He had a job waiting for him. Bayer – they were a chemical company, perhaps they still are. He was so strong and so vulnerable, and I became myself, which I hadn’t thought possible. And I talk a lot of nonsense about love sometimes, Bob, but we were in love. I don’t think I’ve ever said that out loud before.’

‘No,’ says Bob. ‘No.’

‘His course was about to come to an end,’ says Ibrahim, staring at the boat on the wall, ‘and his job would take him to Manchester. So a decision was going to have to be made. Make or break. I couldn’t quite see what the future might hold for us. It wasn’t like today. That’s not complaining – you are born when you are born. I looked into changing my course, to a university in the North, and I was told it wouldn’t be a problem. I had good grades. So I thought, you know?’

‘Give it a go,’ says Bob. ‘Hang the consequences.’

‘Hang the consequences,’ agrees Ibrahim. ‘I had always acted from fear before. But I took the leap, and decided to act from love. First time for everything.’

‘Yes,’ says Bob.

‘And then came a knock at the door,’ says Ibrahim. ‘This would have been around nine thirty. May, getting dark. I had beefsteak cooking in red wine. And it was a police officer and he informed me that my flatmate had been knocked from his bicycle and killed, just off the Strand, and did I have details of his parents?’

‘I’m with you,’ says Bob.

‘And I didn’t have their details, they never spoke to Marius, but I said that I would contact them, and you could see the police officer was glad to have the burden taken from him. And so I was able to make the arrangements, under the cover of acting for them, and we had a cremation in St Pancras, and I offered to take the ashes.’

‘Where are they?’ asks Bob.

‘There is a safe,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Behind the picture of a boat.’

Bob looks up at the picture. ‘You don’t choose to have Marius on display?’

‘Old habits die hard, I suppose,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I keep my love locked away. And no one has ever reached for my hand under the table since.’

Bob nods.

‘I think that is perhaps our time up?’ says Ibrahim. ‘You have been very kind to listen.’

Bob looks at his watch. ‘Yes, we should make a move.’

The two men stand together.

‘Thank you, Bob,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Not at all,’ says Bob. ‘I look forward to hearing the rest of your story.’

‘You’ve already heard it all,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Well, yes,’ says Bob. ‘Except, what happens next?’

73

Garth drives like he lives. With an absolute, calm certainty that the rules don’t apply to him.

That is not to say he is reckless, far from it. Yes, he drives through red lights, but he checks both ways before he does. Yes, he will drive on the verge or the pavement to avoid a line of traffic, but if there is anyone walking on the pavement, Garth will wind down a window and apologize for disturbing them. He even gave a woman waiting at a bus stop, whom he had narrowly avoided hitting, a lift to a local village.

It is pitch black, but he only uses his lights when absolutely necessary. ‘Too much light pollution in this country, Mitch,’ he says. ‘In Canada you can still see the stars.’

Mitch would describe his own feelings in this moment as conflicted. He has just watched one of his oldest friends being thrown off the fifth storey of a car park. But he is on his way to pick up his heroin, and save his own life. The swings and roundabouts of a businessman’s life.

‘You think it’s definitely there?’ he asks Garth again.

‘The heroin? Sure,’ says Garth. ‘Don’t sweat it.’

‘Don’t sweat it?’ says Mitch. ‘You know I die this week if I don’t get it back?’

‘You reckon?’ says Garth.

‘Reckon? I know,’ says Mitch.

‘You don’t think it’s weird?’ says Garth, now driving on the wrong side of the road for no reason Mitch can discern.

‘I think it’s all weird,’ says Mitch. ‘Why are you driving on the wrong side of the road?’

‘When nothing’s coming, I drive where I like,’ says Garth. ‘But you don’t think it’s weird, all this excitement over a hundred grand?’

‘I’ve seen everything in this business,’ says Mitch.

‘Are you a clever man, Mitch?’ asks Garth. ‘Do you think?’

That was a fair question. Mitch used to think he was clever. Before all of this. Before the shipments started getting stopped, and people started getting killed. What if he’d just been lucky though? Ruthless and lucky would take you a long way. Mitch realizes he has lost a bit of confidence. His father-in-law had told him once that the first three things to go are the knees, the eyesight and the confidence. Mitch looks over at Garth once again – this man mountain who seems to care and not care in equal and enormous measure.

‘I really am sorry about your wife,’ says Mitch.

‘Thank you, buddy,’ says Garth. ‘I don’t get cut up about much, but I’m pretty cut up about it.’

‘You want to talk about it?’

‘Nope,’ says Garth. ‘Least not to you.’

‘You really think Luca killed her?’ asks Mitch. ‘It feels like maybe –’

‘I said not to you,’ says Garth, shutting down the conversation.

Mitch is aware, as they drive towards Coopers Chase, that Garth is in charge. It might be Mitch’s heroin, but Garth’s wife has just been murdered, he’s just thrown Luca Buttaci off the top storey of a car park, and he probably has a much bigger gun. So Mitch will gladly play the junior partner for now. But he supposes they both know that once they have the heroin, all bets are off.

74

There are five people in Joyce’s flat now. Joyce, Elizabeth, Ron and Ibrahim all present and correct, and their new friend Computer Bob. Ibrahim can see that Bob feels like the fifth Beatle. Ibrahim is glad he is happy, and is glad that he has finally told somebody about Marius.

There had been six people until a moment ago, but Joyce has just sent Donna outside to hide behind a bush.

Joyce has had the whole thing planned, from the moment they dug up the heroin. Ibrahim is very proud to know her.

The laptop has been set up, the tea poured and extra chairs borrowed from around Joyce’s dining table, when the door buzzes for what they know is the final time that night. By this stage of the evening, Alan has sat through three door buzzes and is absolutely beside himself with joy.

Joyce opens the door to a young man, who clearly isn’t expecting such a welcoming committee.

‘Come in,’ says Joyce. ‘You must be Jeremmy.’

‘Where’s the money?’ Jeremmy asks.

‘Jeremmy’: supposedly the ‘emissary’ from ‘Tatiana’. Unfortunately, he is not as clever as he seems. Computer Bob discovered that ‘Tatiana’ and ‘Jeremmy’ both send messages from the exact same IP address.

So Jeremmy is not working for the romance fraudster, he is not doing a favour for the romance fraudster, Jeremmy is the romance fraudster. The man who has stolen five thousand pounds from Mervyn and is here to steal another five thousand.

He may, however, be out of luck.

‘Goodness, no rush, dear,’ says Joyce, and gives him no option other than to follow her into the flat.

Jeremmy looks around. ‘Who’s Mervyn?’

‘He couldn’t make it,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Sit down for a moment – we have a proposition for you.’

‘I have to be back,’ says Jeremmy.

‘Nonsense,’ says Ron. ‘Night’s young. Sit down and have a listen.’

‘You’ll have to make do with a dining-room chair,’ says Joyce. ‘It was first come first served.’

Jeremmy takes his seat, eyes on everyone at once. Arms around his holdall.

‘First things first,’ says Ibrahim. ‘You won’t be getting any money, I’m afraid.’

Jeremmy shakes his head slowly. ‘Five thousand,’ he says, ‘in this bag. Or someone gets shot.’

Ibrahim looks to Elizabeth, out of habit.

‘Don’t look at me,’ says Elizabeth. ‘This one’s all Joyce’s.’

‘Gun in the bag, is it?’ says Ron.

Jeremmy nods.

‘You came down on the train, as a favour for a mate, to meet an old man, and you brought a gun with you?’

‘I’m careful like that,’ says Jeremmy.

‘I don’t buy it, but OK,’ says Ron. ‘OK, OK. Let’s play “Hands up if you’ve got a gun in your bag”.’

The man puts up his hand, and then sees Elizabeth do the same. Ron looks pleasantly surprised.

‘Wasn’t certain you’d have one today, Lizzie.’

‘I’m grieving, Ron,’ says Elizabeth. ‘I’m not dead.’

Ron nods and turns back to the man. ‘So even if you do have a gun, which you don’t, we’ve got one too, so shut up and listen, and we’ll get you out of here as quickly as we can.’

Ibrahim sees Joyce nodding happily.

75

Chris is having the sweet-potato fries. He is convincing himself that they are just as good as chips, but of course they’re not. But we have to convince ourselves of all sorts of things just to get through the day, don’t we? Patrice is watching him push them around his plate.

‘I know, love,’ she says. ‘I’m having the steamed fish, I feel your pain.’

Le Pont Noir is busy, not bad for a Wednesday evening. Chris once arrested one of the co-owners of this place. Drink driving on the A272. Nice Porsche, as he remembers it, so there’s clearly money in samphire and chorizo.

Chris spots SIO Jill Regan as soon as she walks in. Jill is scanning the room, looking for someone.

‘Pretend we’re talking,’ he says to Patrice.

‘I thought we were talking,’ says Patrice.

‘Jill Regan just walked in,’ says Chris. ‘Pretend I said something funny.’

Patrice bangs on the table three times and pretends to wipe her eyes.

‘I just meant laugh,’ says Chris. To his horror, he sees the noise has attracted the attention of SIO Regan. To his further horror, she spots him, and, then, the final kicker, it becomes apparent that Chris is the person she has come looking for, and she walks over.

‘She’s coming over,’ says Chris. ‘Don’t forget, horse thefts.’

Jill drags a chair from a nearby table, and tucks in between Chris and Patrice. She smiles at Patrice. ‘You must be Patrice; I’m Jill Regan.’

They shake hands.

‘I’m sorry to disturb you both,’ says Jill. ‘I need some help, and everyone I work with hates me.’

‘You know we work in the same building?’ says Chris. ‘You don’t have to find me in a restaurant?’

Jill waves this away. ‘What have you learned from tailing Mitch Maxwell and Luca Buttaci?’

‘I haven’t been tailing them,’ says Chris, skewering a sweet-potato fry. ‘I’ve been investigating horse thefts.’

‘I don’t have time, Chris,’ says Jill. ‘Luca Buttaci is dead.’

‘That’s a shame,’ says Chris.

‘It is a shame,’ says Jill. ‘Because he was working for us.’

‘I thought he was a heroin dealer?’ says Patrice. ‘I know the NCA get up to all sorts of things, but even so.’

‘He was a heroin dealer,’ says Jill. ‘Until we nicked him at Claridge’s with a bag of coke, a couple of hookers and his wife’s sister. And since then he’s worked for me.’

‘Who killed him?’ asks Chris.

‘And how?’ asks Patrice. ‘Help yourself to some broccoli.’

‘Do you know a man called Garth, Chris?’

‘No,’ says Chris.

‘Haven’t stumbled across him while you’ve been tracking down those horses?’

Chris shakes his head.

‘Seriously though,’ says Patrice, ‘how did he kill him?’

‘Threw him off the top of a car park,’ says Jill.

‘Oh,’ says Patrice, nodding respectfully. ‘Which one?’

‘Cards on table,’ says Chris. ‘Imagine I know who you’re talking about. Why are you here?’

A woman at the piano has just started playing ‘Tiny Dancer’ softly in the corner of the restaurant.

‘“Tiny Dancer”,’ says Patrice.

‘I’m in trouble,’ says Jill. ‘And everyone in the NCA is delighted about it.’

‘You’re not popular?’ Chris asks.

‘Come on, you’ve met me,’ says Jill.

Chris smiles and nods. ‘You seem OK to me. I didn’t like being thrown out of my office, but you seem like a proper copper.’

‘Jesus, why don’t you just marry her,’ says Patrice.

‘I ran Luca Buttaci, you see,’ says Jill. ‘He was mine. This whole operation was mine. The heroin.’

‘A sting?’ asks Chris.

Jill nods. ‘We’d been disrupting Mitch Maxwell’s operations for a few months. Stopped a lot of heroin, arrested a few foot soldiers, tested Luca’s loyalty and tested his information.’

‘And this was the big one?’

Jill nods again. ‘I couldn’t have one of your chips, could I?’

‘They’re sweet-potato fries, I’m afraid,’ says Chris.

‘Oh, not to worry, then,’ says Jill. ‘We’d got the go-ahead to let this shipment through customs, and to follow it every step of the way.’

‘Catch Maxwell in the act?’ says Chris.

‘Exactly,’ says Jill. ‘Follow every move, photographs, videos, the lot, and when the heroin was safely in Luca’s hands, therefore safely in my hands, we were supposed to swoop in and arrest Maxwell.’

‘Only it never reached Luca’s hands? Or your hands.’

‘My worst nightmare,’ says Jill. ‘The go-between, Sharma.’

‘Kuldesh,’ says Chris.

‘Drove off in the middle of the night, gets himself murdered, and the heroin disappears.’

‘A hundred grand’s worth of heroin out on the streets, and you with no evidence it ever even existed?’

‘Could have been washing powder in that box,’ says Jill. ‘Until we could test it, and prove it was our heroin.’

‘So they bring you all down from London,’ says Chris, ‘to investigate the murder, but really to find out where the heroin is?’

‘Well, we could have done both,’ says Jill. ‘But yes. Now Luca thought he was on the trail. He had new information, and was going to confirm it today.’

‘Until he got thrown off a car park,’ says Patrice. She is then distracted by the pianist. ‘“Careless Whisper”!’

‘So I’m facing disaster, and an enquiry,’ says Jill. ‘And I’m working in a room full of people I don’t trust, all of whom know it’s my neck on the line, and that my job is up for grabs.’

‘What a mess,’ says Chris.

‘What a mess,’ agrees Jill. ‘And it’s all mine. Which is why I’m asking you, officer to officer, can you help? Do you have the same information that Luca had?’

Chris thinks. ‘Let’s say Donna and I had been looking into it?’

‘Chris, I know you have,’ says Jill. ‘I’ve let you both do it.’

Chris raises his eyebrows. ‘I thought the NCA didn’t trust us?’

‘They don’t,’ says Jill. ‘But I don’t trust the NCA, so I took the chance.’

‘And if I help you with this?’ says Chris.

‘Then, oh, I don’t know,’ says Jill. ‘Then, off the top of my head, I never show anyone the surveillance videos of you breaking into the hangar on the day Dom Holt was murdered?’

Chris looks down at his sweet-potato fries, gives a little nod, then looks back at Jill.

‘You knew I’d broken in?’

‘I knew you’d broken in, I knew Donna had gone to the football.’ Jill starts counting things off on her fingers. ‘I know a man called Ibrahim Arif visits Connie Johnson in prison once a week. I know he also went to visit a woman called Samantha Barnes with a woman named Joyce, who, by coincidence, was outside the hangar when you found Dom Holt’s body. I know she took photos of his files while he lay dead. I also know that she was helped by a man named Ron Ritchie, father of Jason Ritchie, whom you went to visit two weeks ago.’

‘OK,’ says Chris, but Jill hasn’t finished.

‘I know Samantha Barnes, Luca Buttaci and Mitch Maxwell went to visit a retirement village ten days ago and now two of them are dead. I know Donna found Kuldesh Sharma’s phone, but I have no way of proving it, so I hope you’ve been putting it to good use. But, most of all, I knew the more you hated me, the more you would investigate, just to spite me, and I knew that you, and Donna, and this group you seem to hang about with were my best chance of saving my job.’

‘Huh,’ says Chris. ‘I did say you were a good copper.’

‘So have you found it?’ asks Jill.

‘The heroin?’ asks Chris. ‘Yes, we’ve found it.’

‘Can I have it?’ says Jill. ‘Do you think?’

‘Depends. Could you help us find out who killed Kuldesh?’ asks Chris. ‘Do you think?’

‘Huh,’ says Jill Regan. ‘Well, I can tell you a few people who definitely didn’t kill him. Would that help?’

‘It would certainly be a start,’ says Chris.

76

Jeremmy just needs to check he has heard Ibrahim correctly.

‘Heroin?’ he asks.

‘You see, we don’t know what to do with it,’ says Joyce. ‘But we thought, what luck, you seem to be a criminal, and you’re coming to see us.’

‘Where did you get it?’ Jeremmy asks.

‘We dug it up by the allotment,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Believe it or not. Heaven knows what it was doing there.’

‘So we thought,’ says Ibrahim, ‘rather than hand it in to the police …’

‘A lot of admin,’ says Joyce.

‘… perhaps we might branch out and make ourselves a bit of money,’ continues Ibrahim.

‘Pensioners don’t have a lot of cash, old son,’ says Ron.

‘So what do you say?’ says Elizabeth. ‘We give you this bag of heroin, you sell it, and we split the proceeds?’

Jeremmy has been given pause for thought. But he’s not convinced. ‘I don’t like it, I don’t know you. Just give me my five grand and I’ll be on my way.’

‘He’s playing hardball,’ says Joyce. ‘You see it all the time on Bargain Hunt. All right, Jeremmy, we’ve been on Google and looked up how much heroin costs, and it’s a lot.’

Elizabeth offers the heroin to Jeremmy, who wets his finger and dips it in.

‘We are no fools,’ says Joyce. ‘Even though we might look it, and we’ve worked out that we have about twenty-five thousand pounds’ worth of heroin here.’

Ibrahim sees Jeremmy twitch. He knows there is an awful lot more than twenty-five thousand pounds’ worth of heroin in the bag. Greed will always get you.

‘That’s worth fifteen grand, tops,’ says Jeremmy.

‘I just told you we’re not fools,’ says Joyce.

‘What do you say, son?’ says Ron. ‘Help a gang of old fogeys live a little?’

‘Say, you give us five thousand, and you can keep the other twenty for yourself?’ suggests Ibrahim.

Jeremmy takes them all in one more time. This master criminal. ‘Five grand for this bag of heroin?’

‘If you’re agreeable?’ says Ibrahim.

Jeremmy is agreeable. Ibrahim is not surprised. He came here for five grand, and he’s going to walk away with ninety-five grand in profit.

‘And, not that we don’t trust you, dear,’ says Joyce. ‘But could you send us the five thousand by bank transfer before we let you go? Just so we’re sure.’

Jeremmy is packing the hundred thousand pounds’ worth of heroin into his holdall, clearly delighted to have pulled off the scam of the century. Bob hands him an account number, and Jeremmy opens his banking app.

Joyce zips up the bag for him. ‘Can I give you some Battenberg for the train home? The buffet at the station isn’t always open.’

‘No, thanks,’ says Jeremmy, and completes his transaction.

‘Your loss.’ Joyce looks over at Bob, who is looking at his computer screen.

Ibrahim has to hand it to Joyce. She had asked Donna’s permission, of course. While the heroin was in her flat, could she put it to work? ‘I know you’ll want it eventually,’ Joyce had said, ‘but would you mind terribly if we borrowed it for a bit?’

‘All there,’ confirms Bob, shutting his laptop.

Meaning that Jeremmy has just transferred five thousand pounds, every penny he has stolen from Mervyn, straight back into Mervyn’s bank account.

‘Off you pop,’ says Ron. Jeremmy doesn’t need asking twice, and is straight out of the door with his huge stash of heroin.

Joyce picks up her phone and rings Donna. ‘He’s on his way. Yes, the whole lot is in his holdall. Hope you’re not too cold behind that bush.’

77

‘You have a beautiful home,’ Garth says to Joyce, his gun pointing straight at her. He’s been here before of course.

They should have got here much earlier, but, as they’d arrived, there had been a long argument with a woman who said she was from the Coopers Chase Parking Committee and Garth, knowing when he had finally met his match, had had to park back out on the main road.

‘Thank you,’ says Joyce. ‘I have a cleaner for two hours on a Tuesday morning. I resisted for such a long t–’

‘Where is it?’ says Mitch Maxwell, gun also pointed at Joyce.

‘Could one of you point his gun at someone else?’ says Joyce. ‘Don’t point it at Elizabeth – she’s just lost her husband. Point it at Ron perhaps?’

‘I just lost my wife,’ says Garth to Elizabeth. ‘My condolences.’

Joyce turns back to Mitch. ‘I’m afraid you’re a bit late, Mr Maxwell. Half an hour ago it was here.’

‘What?’ says Mitch. He starts to visibly shake. ‘Who has it?’

‘You don’t look at all well,’ says Ibrahim. ‘If you don’t mind my saying?’

‘For the love of God,’ says Mitch. ‘Just tell me where it is.’

‘The police have got it,’ says Ron. ‘Taken in evidence.’

Mitch puts down his gun. ‘You gave it to the police? My heroin?’

‘I’m afraid so,’ says Ibrahim.

‘I’m dead, you understand?’ says Mitch. ‘You’ve killed me.’

Garth starts to laugh. He has an infectious guffaw, and soon Joyce is laughing with him, despite his gun still being pointed at her. He calms himself down and turns to a furious Mitch.

‘You still haven’t worked it out, Mitch? All this time, and you don’t have a clue what’s happening here?’

78

The young man they have just interviewed is called Thomas Murdoch. He said ‘no comment’ to every question except when Jill asked who had sold him the heroin and he said ‘five pensioners’, but even his solicitor looked dubious.

Thomas Murdoch can ‘no comment’ all he likes; he has an extensive criminal record and a bag full of heroin, and he will be going to prison for a long time.

As for the five pensioners, Jill doesn’t imagine Thomas Murdoch will be volunteering that information in court.

Jill, out of professional duty, had asked Donna what the real story was, and Donna had told her that Thomas Murdoch was a romance fraudster who stole money from lonely old people, and that was a good enough answer to ensure that Jill had no further questions.

She has her heroin back; her job is saved. She also has her coat and gloves on, because she is sharing a bottle of wine with Chris and Donna in the freezing Portakabin.

‘It wasn’t Mitch Maxwell or Dom Holt,’ she says. ‘They were both being followed throughout. Including the night of Kuldesh’s murder.’

‘Luca Buttaci?’ Donna asks.

‘It wasn’t Luca Buttaci,’ Jill replies, knocking back her wine.

‘You’re sure about that?’

‘Certain,’ says Jill. ‘He was at my place.’

‘Jesus,’ says Donna.

‘Jesus,’ says Jill.

‘I can sort of see it though,’ says Donna, and Jill manages a small smile.

‘So you’ve broken into a warehouse,’ says Jill, gesturing with her wine glass in gloved hand. ‘You’ve aided and abetted tampering with a crime scene and withheld evidence in a criminal investigation, and I’ve been shagging a key witness, which makes us all about even, I’d say.’

‘How do you feel about him being thrown off a car park?’ asks Donna.

‘I suspect I’ll move on,’ says Jill. ‘Thank you both for saving my job.’

‘Ma’am,’ says Donna with a tiny salute.

‘And you’ll help us?’ says Chris.

‘I think that’s fair,’ says Jill.

‘You must have looked into rival dealers?’ says Chris. ‘Someone who’d like to get their hands on the drugs?’

‘Mitch and Luca have got no rivals down here,’ says Jill. ‘Not for heroin anyway.’

‘Someone new trying to muscle in?’ says Chris.

‘I just don’t know who else would have been aware of the shipment,’ says Jill.

‘And the Afghans are on the hunt too?’ says Donna.

‘Honestly no idea why,’ says Jill. ‘Maybe worried the police are on to them?’

‘It’s been responsible for a lot of deaths,’ says Chris. ‘Kuldesh, Dom Holt. Luca thrown off the car park, Samantha Barnes pushed downstairs. Someone killed them all. And all for that little bag of heroin. Ridiculous.’

79

It is fair to say that Garth has the attention of the room. He puts down his gun and takes a seat.

‘Sit down, Mitch,’ he says. ‘Let me ask all of you a question.’

Mitch takes a seat.

‘I asked Mitch earlier,’ says Garth, ‘did no one think it was odd? That everyone was running around after this heroin?’

‘Don’t people run around after heroin?’ asks Joyce.

‘A hundred grand though,’ says Garth. ‘That’s worth all this effort, all these deaths?’

‘I needed –’ starts Mitch.

‘I know why you needed to find it,’ says Garth. ‘Your whole enterprise was crumbling, and an Afghan is going to kill you. Of course you wanted it back. But me? Why did I want it so bad? My wife? The Afghan guy you’re trying to avoid? Why were we all chasing a hundred grand so hard? We’re rich people.’

‘I just figured … greed? I don’t know,’ says Mitch. ‘I didn’t really think about it.’

‘So why were you chasing it?’ asks Ron. ‘Like blue-arsed flies, the lot of you.’

‘Can anyone guess?’ Garth asks, looking around the room.

Elizabeth looks up. ‘I can guess.’

‘Go on,’ says Garth.

‘There was one big thing I honestly couldn’t understand,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Why on earth did Stephen agree to help Kuldesh? To sell heroin? Kuldesh wouldn’t ask, and Stephen wouldn’t agree. And when did Kuldesh suddenly decide he knew how to organize a drug deal? That was another thing that bothered me.’

‘I bet it did,’ says Garth.

‘That little box of heroin, coming into the country,’ says Elizabeth, ‘destroyed everything and everyone in its path. People were so desperate to find it, and Kuldesh was so desperate to hide it, and I can see only one reason. It wasn’t about the heroin at all.’

Garth nods, and lets her finish.

‘It was about the box.’

‘By George, I think she’s got it,’ says Garth.

‘The box?’ asks Ron.

‘You must have seen it at our lunch, Garth,’ says Elizabeth. ‘On Mitch’s phone?’

‘We nearly didn’t come to the lunch,’ says Garth, ‘but Samantha had a feeling about you all, and she was kinda interested in heroin. But the second we saw that box, we forgot all about the heroin. It’s the most beautiful thing I ever saw. I’m glad Samantha saw it before she died. Six thousand years old, can you believe that? Made from bone, not terracotta. And carved with the eye of the devil.’

‘I did notice some markings,’ says Joyce. ‘Now you mention it.’

‘Pull the other one, Joyce,’ says Ron.

‘These things were looted,’ says Garth. ‘Hundreds of years ago. From Egypt –’

‘Ooh,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Iraq, Iran, Syria. They’d loot temples, archaeologists some of them, robbers all of them. Smuggle them out. I’ve seen stuff come up from time to time, stuff that shouldn’t be for sale, stuff you’d do serious time for. But I never saw nothing like this. Hoo boy, not never. Those clever Afghan boys were smuggling a box worth tens of millions into the country, Mitch, and they never even told you. That’s why everyone’s killing everyone. No one cares about your hundred grand.’

Mitch points his gun at Joyce now. ‘Give me the box. Now!’

Garth points his gun at Mitch. ‘No, Joyce, give me the box now.’

‘No one else needs to get hurt,’ says Mitch. ‘This is my box, fair’s fair. I’ll take it, I’ll give it back to Hanif, no more guns, and no more trouble.’

‘Dude, my wife died,’ says Garth, gun still trained. ‘I’m having the box.’

Mitch swings around to point his gun at Garth.

‘Perhaps there’s one more death to come?’

‘Perhaps there is,’ says Garth.

Mitch unlocks the safety on his gun. Garth unlocks the safety on his.

‘Boys,’ says Joyce. ‘I don’t mean to spoil your fun, but I don’t have the box any more.’

‘No, no,’ says Mitch. ‘Not when I’m this close.’

‘It was under my sink for a few days, but it started to smell quite musty. Alan didn’t like it one bit, so I put it out for the binmen yesterday,’ says Joyce. ‘It’ll be at the Tunbridge Wells tip by now.’

80: Joyce

What a day we’ve had of it. Alan and I are both pooped. He is face down on the rug with his tongue out, and I’m just going to get everything down on paper before bed. I’m going to do it as a list, in the order of everything that happened today, as I’m very sleepy.

They have had almond milk in the shop for some while now, but I had never paid it much attention until my row with Joanna. I was pretending to browse there earlier and I saw two people pick it up and put it back down again. You can just feel it’s going to catch on. I sent Joanna a photograph of me next to it with a thumbs-up, but no reply yet. I think she is in Denmark for work, so perhaps the message hasn’t got through.

Alan was chased by a squirrel. Honestly, I wish he would defend himself sometimes. He ended up hiding behind my legs as the squirrel stopped about five yards in front of me and stared.

There is a new afternoon quiz show on ITV called But What’s the Question? I didn’t understand it at all, but guess who the host is? Mike Waghorn! Hasn’t he done well for himself? A woman from Aberdeen won a barbecue set, and I will be watching again tomorrow.

The man calling himself Jeremmy came down from London to visit us, with a large holdall, hoping someone was going to give him five thousand pounds. As so often when people think they are going to be able to get things from us, he left disappointed. Tea, biscuits, a good gossip? Yes, we will provide you with those. Money, heroin, diamonds? No. Anyway, we used the heroin we dug up the other day, and, long story short, Mervyn has his money back and Jeremmy is going to prison.

There was something different about Ibrahim. Don’t ask me what, but I will find out when there aren’t quite so many distractions.

Mitch Maxwell and Garth (I’m sorry, I realize I don’t know his last name) came in with guns to get (so we thought) the heroin. We told them the police had it, and you could tell that Mitch was devastated (I’m not sure how much he enjoys his job) but Garth laughed, and we soon found out why.

The heroin wasn’t the issue at all. It was the box. It’s six thousand years old, and it protects you from evil or something along those lines. Though it is doing a fairly bad job of that, I would say. Elizabeth said she had already worked it out, but, honestly, I think she just worked it out in that second, because she had said nothing to us about it. But it was nice to see her on the front foot again, so I didn’t say any of that, I just said, ‘Well done.’

I told them I had put the box out for the binmen and Mitch Maxwell went as white as a ghost – you could see clean through him. He ran. For his life, I suppose. Garth took it in good part and said, ‘Them’s the breaks,’ which is a fun expression, and then we all had a cup of tea. He said how well he thought we had handled everything, and if we ever needed a job to come and talk to him. Then he and Elizabeth spoke for a while and I left them to it.

As Garth was leaving, he spotted the ‘Picasso’ I’d picked up from Kuldesh’s lock-up. As he was looking at it, I told him I knew it was a fake, but I liked it anyway, and he shook his head and told me it was real. Apparently his wife produced most of the fakes in the UK. ‘This is Picasso, not my wife,’ were his exact words. So I own a Picasso. I texted this to Joanna too, but, again, I think maybe the internet is slow in Denmark. They definitely have it there though, because I Googled it.

And one final thing, before I turn in. Elizabeth congratulated me afterwards for my quick thinking, which put a big smile on my face. I think that, since I’ve stepped up a bit after Stephen’s death, I’ve been surprised at what I’m able to do. Elizabeth rubs off on me in a very good way. I hope I rub off on her in a good way too. She was very impressed anyway. ‘A very calm reaction in a situation of great pressure, if you don’t mind my saying?’ I told her I didn’t mind her saying that one bit. Because when Garth had revealed to us the secret of the box – the fact that the box I’d been keeping under my sink was highly illegal and worth millions and millions of pounds – it’s true, I did make my mind up quickly. To tell them I had left it out for the binmen.

Because I hadn’t left it out for the binmen, you see. The box is still under my sink. Though I have taken the bottle of drain unblocker out of it.

Elizabeth says she now has a good idea who murdered Kuldesh, and the box will help to prove it. And she also has one other plan for it.

81

‘I was wondering if it might be Mesopotamian,’ says Elizabeth, as Jonjo examines the box on his desk.

Jonjo Mellor’s office is exactly what you might hope. Two walls lined floor to ceiling with books, a wall of mullioned windows overlooking the University of Kent campus, and every surface covered in vases, skulls, pipes and a ‘World’s Greatest Uncle’ mug.

To make room to inspect the box, he has cleared as much of his writing desk as he can. There are now piles of papers on the chairs and on the floor. His computer is on the windowsill, next to a bronze cow.

‘If that’s a guess, it’s a good one,’ says Jonjo. He is brushing specks of dirt from the box with a fine brush. ‘I’d say you’re spot on.’

‘Stephen spoke about a museum in Baghdad,’ says Elizabeth. ‘He rarely wasted words, even when they were easier to come by. He and Kuldesh must have identified it between them.’

‘It’s an extraordinary find; I will have to report it,’ says Jonjo. ‘But might we sit with it? Just for an hour or two? I have never seen a piece like it.’

‘Stephen talked about pieces on which you could see fingerprints and scuff marks,’ says Elizabeth.

‘Well, he was talking about this,’ says Jonjo. ‘All present and correct. And it was smuggled in by heroin dealers?’

‘Unwittingly, I think,’ says Elizabeth. ‘They thought they were just importing the heroin. So it will have come from Afghanistan.’

‘Makes sense,’ says Jonjo. ‘Wherever there is turmoil, people try to protect their assets. Or sell them.’

‘And it was religious?’ Elizabeth asks.

‘This long ago, everything was religious,’ says Jonjo. ‘All the gods and devils were loose. This, I would say, was a sin box. It would have been outside an important tomb, to ward off the spirits. It will have been looted many years ago. The Iraqis will know for sure.’

‘So what’s the next step?’ asks Elizabeth.

‘I inform the Foreign Office of what we have,’ says Jonjo. ‘They come and collect it, authenticate it, liaise with the Iraqis, and it’ll be in Baghdad within the year. We might ask them if we could display it for a while though.’

‘I won’t wait a year,’ says Elizabeth.

‘I’m sorry?’ says Jonjo.

‘I won’t wait,’ says Elizabeth. ‘I must level with you, Jonjo. I have a proposition, and I won’t take no for an answer.’

‘Goodness,’ says Jonjo.

‘I want the box to go to Baghdad,’ says Elizabeth. ‘And I want Stephen’s ashes in it.’

‘His ashes?’

‘He as much as asked me,’ says Elizabeth. ‘I realize that now. So, once we are done here, I will be taking the box back with me, and I will be keeping it until those arrangements are made and are acceptable to both parties.’

‘I don’t think you should take the b–’

‘I don’t much mind what you think,’ says Elizabeth. ‘And I hope you know that doesn’t come from disrespect. But that is how things are going to be done. Do you think you might be able to swing it?’

‘I suppose I can try,’ says Jonjo, not sounding convinced.

‘Excellent,’ says Elizabeth. ‘That’s all I ask. That you try. The only reason we have this box is because Kuldesh and Stephen chose to protect it. Kuldesh, don’t forget, lost his life trying to protect it.’

‘Still no nearer to finding out how?’ says Jonjo.

‘I’m hoping that the box has one final story to tell,’ says Elizabeth. ‘One final evil spirit in its sights.’

‘Very cryptic,’ says Jonjo.

‘Might there be a back channel we could explore?’ Elizabeth asks. ‘To get the box to Baghdad sooner?’

‘Well … it wouldn’t be correct procedure,’ says Jonjo.

‘The right thing to do so rarely is,’ says Elizabeth.

‘But I’m sure there are ways,’ says Jonjo. ‘Would you be happy to leave that with me for a few days? And the box?’

‘Of course,’ says Elizabeth. ‘I know it’s in safe han–’

The insistent, shrill pulse of a fire alarm fills the air.

‘Blast it,’ says Jonjo. ‘Sometimes it stops after a few seconds.’

They wait a few seconds, but the alarm does not stop. Jonjo looks at the box and looks outside.

‘Come on,’ he says. ‘The box will be safe here. If it’s a real fire, we’ll rush back in and save it.’

Jonjo pats the box; Elizabeth takes a final look out of the window. She sees Joyce making a quiet exit off the campus. Elizabeth pats the box too and follows Jonjo from the room.

‘You make your way down to the quad,’ says Jonjo. ‘I’ll go and check what’s what.’

‘As you wish,’ says Elizabeth, and descends a spiral stone staircase. It opens out onto the large, lawned quad, currently dominated by students delighted with the excitement and the brief moment of freedom the fire alarm has gifted them.

How young they all are, though many of them will feel old. How beautiful they are, though how ugly some of them will feel. Elizabeth remembers lying on the grass in quads like these, almost sixty years ago now. Though, of course, not sixty years ago, because she is still there, can still smell the grass and the cigarettes, and the rough tweed arms brushing against hers. She can taste the wine and the kisses, neither of which she had yet developed a liking for. She can hear the cries of boys looking for attention. She can breathe in the air. How young and beautiful she was, how old and ugly she felt. She feels young and beautiful now – Stephen made sure of that. Made sure she understood who she was. Whether today, or sixty years ago, Stephen was right, as he so often was: our memories are no less real than whatever moment in which we happen to be living. The big clock to the left of the quad has a job to do, of course. But it doesn’t tell the whole story.

Two girls kiss to her left. To one of them, kissing is new, and this moment will live forever. Things that happen do not unhappen. Stephen’s death will not unhappen. Elizabeth’s childhood will not unhappen, but the wine and the kisses and the love and the helpless laughter will not unhappen either. The glances at dinner parties, that final crossword clue, the music, the sunsets, the walks, none of it will unhappen.

None of it will unhappen until everything unhappens.

And Joyce, Ron and Ibrahim? They will not be unhappening any time soon. Elizabeth knows she is utterly alone, but knows, also, that she is not. She will be existing in this state for some while, she thinks. The experienced girl props herself up on one elbow, while the inexperienced girl looks up at the sky and wonders if this is her life now.

Elizabeth lies back and looks up at the sky too. At the clouds. Stephen isn’t up there, but he is somewhere, and it’s as good a place as any to find him. To find his smile, and his arms, and his friendship and his bravery. Elizabeth starts to cry, and, through the tears, gives her first small smile since that awful day.

The fire alarm stops, and students reluctantly start returning to lecture halls and libraries. Elizabeth pushes herself up, and brushes grass and earth from her skirt.

As she heads back to Jonjo’s staircase, she meets the man himself coming out of a nearby door.

‘False alarm,’ says Jonjo. ‘Hope you weren’t too bored.’

‘Not at all,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Time of my life.’

They reach Jonjo’s landing, he opens the door, and she follows him in.

Two walls, lined with books. One wall, overlooking the quad. Tables of vases, and skulls and pipes, and a mug saying ‘World’s Greatest Uncle’.

But the box is gone.

As Elizabeth had known it would be.

Because the box still has a story to tell.

It has one final devil to catch.

82

The British motorway service station in the grey January rain. Not where anyone would choose to be. Which makes it perfect really.

And, on this occasion, there are compensations.

The box is, what, six thousand years old? Just sitting there in the car boot. Worth millions of course, to the right person. And there were plenty of right people if you knew what you were doing. One of them will be popping along in just a moment. A quick coffee, a handover and then what? Out of the country, certainly. Lebanon perhaps?

Six thousand years old. And people still thought they were important.

Looking about. A man with a briefcase and a sad face plays an arcade machine. A young mum with red eyes pushes a stroller back and forth, trying to kill the day. A teenaged girl can’t believe what she is being told on her phone, and an old man in an overcoat hunches over a plastic table, an undrunk cup of coffee in front of him.

It makes you think.

We are all tiny insignificant blinks in history, in a world that couldn’t care a hoot if we live or die. You think whoever made this box six thousand years ago cares if we do Pilates and eat our five-a-day? We complain about life so endlessly and so bitterly, and yet we cling to it so dearly? Surely that makes no sense?

There is a covered walkway which traverses the road. It must have looked so glamorous, so sleek and futuristic in the 1960s. It must have looked like the future. Well, guess what? The future’s right here, and it’s as grey and tired as the past. Whatever they were hoping to achieve with their walkway, whatever their grand vision was, they failed. Everything fails, everyone fails.

At that moment, the unmistakable bulk of Garth appears through the windows of the bridge. Here he comes. Someone else who gets it.

The butterflies begin in earnest.

Mankind finds futility very hard to stomach. People find all sorts of things to give their brief lives meaning. Religion, football, astrology, social media. Valiant efforts all, but everyone knows, deep, deep down, that life is both a random occurrence and a losing battle. None of us will be remembered. These days will all be covered, in time, by the sands. Even the five million pounds Garth is going to pay for the box will be dust. Enjoy it while you can.

These are not original thoughts, sure, but they are soothing ones. Because, once you really accept the hollowness of everything, it makes it an awful lot easier to kill someone.

To kill Kuldesh.

83

Ron rarely ventures North, but, whenever he does, he enjoys it. The nights out he had with the Yorkshire miners in 1984. The steel workers in County Durham. They could all drink the cockneys under the table. Three coppers once broke his ribs in a Nottingham police station. One rib each. Does Nottingham count as North? It does to Ron. They are currently heading to a motorway service station near Warwick, and even that counts as North. As a precaution he is wearing a thick jumper over his West Ham shirt. Pauline has recently been buying him clothes, because, as she says, ‘I have to be seen with you, darling, don’t I?’

‘You can’t rely on the food,’ says Joyce, unpacking a Tupperware box of chocolate hazelnut brownies. She, Elizabeth and Ibrahim are squished together in the back seat. Bogdan is driving. A steady 95mph so far.

Is Elizabeth asleep? She has her eyes closed, but Ron doubts it.

Donna and Chris are heading up separately. With SIO Regan. Apparently they are all friends now. You just never knew with coppers. Law unto themselves.

Elizabeth has told the police to be there by three p.m. But the deal will be done at two p.m., and Elizabeth will accept the consequences when the police find out she has lied.

Ron starts to think, ‘There never seem to be any consequences for Elizabeth,’ and then remembers himself. Grief scares him, Elizabeth’s grief particularly. To see her laid so low. To see that there was an iceberg finally able to sink her. You have to be so careful with love, that’s Ron’s take on the thing. One minute they’re buying you jumpers and smoking pot with you on the bowls lawn, the next minute you care, and your heart is not your own. He looks down at his jumper and smiles. He wouldn’t have chosen it himself in a million years, but what are you going to do?

‘Brownie, Ron?’ Joyce asks from the back seat.

‘Not for me,’ says Ron. He is saving himself for a full fry-up at the service station. He hopes there will be time.

‘Is it true that Pauline puts marijuana in her brownies?’ asks Joyce.

‘She does,’ says Ron. ‘Marijuana and coconut.’

‘I wonder if I should try marijuana,’ Joyce says.

‘It makes you very talkative,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Oh, perhaps I shouldn’t, then,’ says Joyce. ‘You barely get a word in as it is.’

Up ahead, Ron spies the long, covered walkway that spans the motorway. Grimy windows, and long-faded primary stripes. Bogdan leaves the fast lane for the first time in ninety miles, and arrows the car towards the service-station slip road.

‘We’re here!’ says Joyce.

Elizabeth opens her eyes. ‘What’s the time?’ she asks.

‘1.52,’ says Bogdan. ‘Like I told you it would be.’

Bogdan aims the car for a parking spot far enough from the exit to be discreet, and with a view of the covered walkway. Ron can smell the fry-up. He is aware that they are here for other reasons, but you’re allowed to have what Pauline calls a ‘side hustle’. Pauline’s ‘side hustle’ is selling used Iron Maiden drumsticks on eBay. She buys them in boxes of fifty from the music shop in Fairhaven.

Meanwhile, talking of boxes, the unmistakable figure of Garth appears through the grimy walkway windows.

‘Here we go,’ says Ron.

‘Good luck, everybody,’ says Bogdan.

84

Garth can feel the walkway shake as he strides across. It is rusting and unloved. He likes it. He has already pressed record on his phone. He knows the deal.

Since he threw Luca Buttaci from the roof of the car park, the police have been searching for him. Garth can see their point. They won’t catch him, not in this life, but they wouldn’t be doing their jobs if they didn’t at least try. He reaches the steps at the end of the walkway. He smells cheap, fried food and urine. The downside of never complaining is that the British really do put up with a lot. Imagine this in Canada. Or Italy.

Italy might be where Garth goes next. A good place to lick your wounds, and Garth has wounds for the first time since he was a kid. He was all set to go last night, before Elizabeth found him at the house deep in the woods.

How on earth had Elizabeth found him? Garth has no idea, but he is glad that she did. She told him what she knew, and she told him what she wanted. Told him who had killed his wife, and told him how to get his revenge.

Garth walks past the toilets, past a man with a sad face and a briefcase playing an arcade machine, past a red-eyed woman pushing a stroller. He places a hand on her shoulder and says, ‘It’ll get easier, you’re doing a great job,’ and walks on. An old man sits hunched over a cardboard cup of coffee. Garth dips into his own pocket and gives the man a ten-pound note. ‘Get yourself some food, pops,’ he says. Garth finds kindness interesting. It’s not really his thing, but Samantha would have spoken to the mum, and would have given the old man money for food, so that’s the sort of thing Garth will do from now on.

And then Garth sees his wife’s killer. He sits down opposite her.

‘Hey, Nina,’ he says.

‘Garth,’ says Nina. ‘Thank you for meeting me.’

‘You have something I want,’ says Garth. ‘Let’s get this done quickly. I have to be out of the country and I’m guessing you do too?’

‘I don’t have to go anywhere,’ says Nina. ‘No one knows I have the box, except you. No one saw me steal it. And you don’t seem the type to tell. So I’m in the clear.’

Elizabeth told Garth about the theft. As soon as she’d known about the box, she’d had only two suspects: Nina, and her boss, a professor. A friend of Elizabeth had set off a fire alarm, another friend, a computer guy, had rigged up a little camera, and Nina had walked straight into her trap. A guy from the KGB has been tailing Nina ever since. They knew she had the box, but they had no evidence to prove that she’d killed Kuldesh to get it. Which is why Garth is here.

He’d rung Nina last night, told her he couldn’t find the box for love nor money, but, if she ever stumbled across it, he had a client who would pay handsomely for it. Which is actually true, but Garth knows he is not getting the box. Elizabeth wants it, and when she told him why, he happily agreed. Garth’s reward is seeing his wife’s killer go to jail. Ideally he would like to kill her, but Elizabeth is a bit too canny to let him get away with that. You have to know when you’ve met your match.

‘You have it?’ Garth asks.

Nina opens a bright blue IKEA bag at her feet. In the bag is the box.

‘Can I touch it?’ Garth asks.

‘Sure,’ says Nina. ‘But try anything and it leaves with me.’

Garth can’t help but laugh. He touches the box. It’s kind of a buzz. Samantha would have loved it, he knows that. They’re crazy, all of them, Samantha, Nina, Kuldesh. Childish, getting so excited about a box. Garth got excited about how much the box was worth, sure, but not about the box itself. So someone made it a long time ago? Get over yourself. So it has the eye of the devil? Ain’t no such thing, Garth knows that. The devils walk among us.

But Kuldesh had laid down his life for it, and Nina had killed for it. Samantha probably would have killed for it too, Garth has to accept that, but Nina got to her first. As soon as Nina worked out that Garth knew what the box was, she’d signed Samantha’s death warrant right then and there. And he’d gone off to eat a burger while she’d done it.

Though, now he thinks about it, how had Nina worked that out? Garth worries that perhaps he has some kind of ‘tell’. It would be very unlike him to have a weakness. And, besides, if Nina hadn’t killed Samantha, then who had?

He expects that Nina would have killed him too if she could, but Garth isn’t easy to kill. Many have tried.

‘You set up the company like I told you?’ Garth asks, taking out his phone.

Nina nods.

‘Then you’ll get an alert the second the five million hits your account,’ says Garth. ‘After that, it’s up to you. They’ll never trace that account, but how you get the money into regular accounts is your business. You can look this up online.’

‘I’ve been doing little else,’ says Nina.

‘Why’d you have to kill him?’ says Garth. ‘That’s the only bit I wouldn’t have done.’

‘I didn’t kill anyone,’ says Nina.

‘Nina,’ says Garth. ‘I don’t think like other people, you get that?’

‘I get that,’ says Nina.

‘Then don’t lie to me,’ says Garth. ‘You don’t need to. I respect what you’ve done. You saw an opportunity, you’re making five million, while everyone’s chasing their tails.’

‘Thank you,’ says Nina.

‘But I still don’t get why you killed him? Why not just scare the guy and take it?’

‘He was eighty, Garth,’ says Nina.

‘OK,’ says Garth.

‘This box was six thousand years old,’ says Nina. ‘Can you even begin to comprehend that? None of us matters, Garth. We pretend that we do, we pretend that we have a purpose, but this planet existed without us for millions of years, and it will exist for millions of years more without us. Every breath we take is a dying breath. Human life isn’t sacred.’

‘That’s all very convenient for you,’ says Garth. ‘At least just say you were greedy and you didn’t care a single damn. You could have simply stolen the thing.’

‘He was asking me to take it to a museum. He trusted me,’ says Nina. ‘Trusted that I would take it to the right people. He’d known me since I was a kid, known my parents. You think he would have kept quiet when I sold it?’

‘Throw him a million?’ Garth says. ‘That might have bought his silence.’

‘He would have said no,’ says Nina. ‘But look at it this way. He was old, he’d had fun, a full life, whatever people mean by that. He rings me, he trusts me, he tells me what he has. I tell him not to be frightened, that we can find our way through this, that I’ll help. I’m calm, and that makes him calm. We arrange to meet –’

‘In the woods?’ says Garth.

‘As far away from prying eyes as we can,’ says Nina. ‘I could tell, by the time we’d finished talking, that even he was getting a little excited.’

‘It is pretty exciting,’ says Garth.

‘He drives to Kent, drives down the lane, meeting someone he trusts. Up I walk, one shot. He doesn’t see it, doesn’t feel it, has no moment of fear. His life ended quickly, which is all you can ask for, isn’t it? A long life and a quick death, that’s the dream. I did him a favour.’

‘A painless death for him, and five million for you?’

‘Everybody wins,’ says Nina. ‘It’s everything my parents never would have done. I don’t intend to ever be poor again.’

‘You’re a pretty good shot,’ says Garth. ‘Hard to kill a guy through a window with one bullet. Believe me, I know.’

‘YouTube videos,’ says Nina. ‘I’m a quick learner. I wanted it to be painless, so I watched videos of vets killing horses.’

‘Jesus,’ says Garth. ‘And they call me a psychopath.’

‘I’m not a psychopath,’ says Nina. ‘I had no money, I have debts, I have a job I hate. My parents are gone. Suddenly the chance to never work again fell from the heavens.’

‘This box doesn’t come from the heavens,’ says Garth. ‘It comes straight from hell.’

‘It’s just a box,’ says Nina.

Garth shakes his head.

‘So I did the rational thing,’ says Nina. ‘That’s all I did.’

Garth thinks about this. He finds philosophy interesting. But, whichever way he cuts it, he can’t agree with her. Kill people, sure, if they’ve done something wrong. If they deserve it. But for profit? No. He only realized when Elizabeth explained it to him that Luca Buttaci hadn’t killed Samantha. Luca knew she was dead because he was working with the cops. Which is almost as bad.

But Luca had killed plenty of other people. And if you kill plenty of people, you’ve got to expect someone’s going to throw you off a car park one day. One day someone will throw Garth off a car park, or run him down with a truck, and Garth won’t have any complaints. But Kuldesh didn’t deserve to die.

‘You could have not killed him?’ says Garth. ‘You could have buckled down at work, you know?’ says Garth. ‘Got on with your life, paid off your debts and taken some responsibility for your own problems.’

Nina nods. ‘I suppose so, but this was so much easier.’

‘You have a bad attitude,’ says Garth.

‘My whole life I’ve had a good attitude and been poor,’ says Nina. ‘Now I have a bad attitude, and suddenly I’m rich.’

‘And killing my wife was the rational thing too?’

‘Your wife?’ says Nina. ‘Samantha? I didn’t kill her.’

‘Don’t lie to me,’ says Garth.

‘I killed Kuldesh,’ says Nina. ‘And he didn’t feel a thing. I didn’t kill your wife. Why would you give me five million pounds if you thought I’d killed your wife?’

‘You killed her,’ says Garth. ‘There is no five million. The deal was just that I get you to confess, and they’d let me disappear.’

‘Who would let you disappear?’ says Nina.

‘Who do you think?’ says Joyce, as she, Elizabeth and Bogdan sit at the table.

‘No, this is … What are you d–’ Nina cannot get her words out.

‘Walk with us please,’ says Elizabeth. ‘No struggling, no fuss. Garth, you have twenty minutes to disappear.’

‘Obliged to you,’ says Garth, and hands his phone to Elizabeth. ‘It’s all on there.’

‘You can’t do this,’ says Nina.

‘And yet here we are, dear,’ says Elizabeth.

She turns to Garth. ‘And where will you go now?’

‘Spain,’ says Garth. ‘I love the tapas. You be careful with your grief now, take your time with it.’

‘I will,’ says Elizabeth. ‘And you stop killing people.’

‘Only bad guys, ma’am, I promise,’ says Garth. He turns, and they watch him leave, followed by his massive shadow.

‘You’re just going to let him go?’ says Nina, now being shepherded towards the car park by Bogdan, as Elizabeth and Joyce walk behind.

‘That was the deal, yes,’ says Elizabeth.

‘We could make a deal?’ suggests Nina.

‘No, dear,’ says Joyce.

Nina looks around her. ‘What if I start screaming?’

‘Then I’ll start screaming too,’ says Elizabeth. ‘And, believe me, I may never stop.’

85

It is somewhere below freezing, a sheeting rain is falling, and Mitch Maxwell is clambering up an enormous pile of waste at the Tunbridge Wells tip. A mountain of metal and slime, the smell clinging to him as he slips and slides his way up and across. Unable to wipe the appalling sweat from his brow, because of the unspeakable smears on his gloves. All the while searching, burrowing into the depths, looking for the box that will save his life. He is, in this moment, a frightened animal, scavenging for survival. He thinks about his yacht, moored in Poole Harbour. He’d once had Jamie Redknapp the footballer on board for a barbecue. He thinks of the stables at his house, his daughter’s horse, the ski trip they have planned for the half-term holidays. He thinks of touch-screen TVs and cashmere sweaters, and premium vodka in gold bottles and front-row seats at the boxing. He thinks of first class on British Airways, of dinner at Scott’s, of being measured for suits at Oliver Brown on Sloane Street. Of castles with helipads and nightcaps. He thinks of ease and comfort and quiet, expensive luxury.

He thinks of his children and their schools, and their friends with pools. A shard of metal slices through his jacket and cuts his arm. He swears, and slips, and falls. Blood starts to seep through as he makes his way back up the pile. The stinking mass of everyone else’s lives. Somewhere in this pile is the box. Somewhere in this pile, his salvation.

He is seeing Hanif at two, at an airport hotel next to Gatwick. Hanif has asked him to bring the box, and has said that if Mitch isn’t there, he will find him and kill him.

But Mitch is not going to die today. Not after everything he has been through. After the life he has made for himself – from the home he grew up in, to the home his children enjoy. He wishes it hadn’t been heroin that had brought him such success, but he wasn’t from a place that gave him a great deal of choice. It was what he grew up with, what he was good at.

But, after this, if he finds the box, when he finds the box, that’s it. Luca is dead, and the Afghans won’t trust him any more. Time to diversify. He’s been talking to the English sparkling wine people. There’s a plot of land in Sussex, in Ditchling, south-facing slope, chalky soil, the works. Mitch will buy it, they’ll run it, a real business.

And if he doesn’t find the box? Well, then, a change of plan. He will still go to Gatwick, but instead of heading to the piano bar at the Radisson he will head straight to check-in and he’ll be on the three p.m. flight to Paraguay before you know it. He knows people out there.

His wife and kids flew out this morning. Kellie has been around long enough to know that if Mitch tells her to pack a suitcase and get the kids out of the country, he’ll have a good reason. She texted him as they were about to take off. The Afghans won’t catch him in Paraguay, that’s for sure. They’d have to get through the Colombians, and they won’t have the heart for it.

Mitch continues to clamber up the slope of rubbish, arm bleeding, clothes soaking, legs bruised and aching. He’d gone straight to the tip after leaving Joyce’s flat, but they don’t let you climb the rubbish piles. So a couple of calls and a contact in Kent County Council have bought him ninety minutes in which to search today. A group of men in hi-vis jackets are sheltering in a Portakabin with tea-steamed windows, wondering what the Scouser in the padded jacket is up to. One of the more enterprising ones even offered to help, but Mitch wants to do this alone. None of them recalled seeing a small terracotta box coming in on a Kent refuse truck.

Mitch steps on a doll that says ‘Love me’ in the deep, slow voice of a toy with low batteries. The wind blows a KFC box into his face. He bats it aside and keeps climbing. He is nearly at the top now, the wind howling around him, carrying the smells of everything that has been left behind, everything that has been discarded. Still no box. Mitch knows he is not going to find it. He knows he is going to have to flee. To take his wife from her job, his kids from their friends, to start anew, somewhere unfamiliar. He breathes in the stench and welcomes it. For a moment his heart skips as he sees a box. He digs down, through nappies and toasters, clearing a line of sight. He imagines, for a bright moment, some kind of glory, but, as he dislodges a spaghetti of coat hangers, he sees that this box is simply an old orange crate. Of course it is. Mitch starts to laugh.

Up and up he climbs, no longer really looking, just anxious to reach the top. Why? Who knows? We all want to reach the top, don’t we?

Mitch crawls onto a fridge freezer, green with slime. This is it. The very top, nowhere left to climb. Gingerly he pushes himself up to standing. A broken, bleeding, soaking man at the top of the world. He looks out at the view. Nothing. Just grey cloud, grey rain and grey mist.

It will be sunnier in Paraguay, and he will find work. Build a business. Something wholesome. Fruit or something. If any of the Colombians want to come and say hello, then that’s fine. He’ll tell them he’s out of the game. They can keep their cocaine, and he’ll keep his bananas. If they grow bananas in Paraguay.

Mitch wipes a brown smear from his Rolex. One p.m. Time to head to Gatwick. He rests his hands on his knees for a moment, recovering from the exertions of his climb, and preparing for his descent. With decent traffic he can –

A pain shoots through Mitch Maxwell’s left arm. He clutches it. He feels the rain pouring down his face, before realizing that it is no longer raining. Mitch slumps onto his knees, then his knees slip from under him on the slime of the freezer. There he lies for a few moments longer, before Mitch Maxwell, at the top of the pile, heart on fire, gasping in pain, filth and greyness all around him, shuts his eyes for the final time.

86

Ibrahim leans his elbow on the roof of the squad car, and listens to the traffic thunder by in the distance.

Chris and Donna arrived with SIO Jill Regan about fifteen minutes after Joyce and Elizabeth left. Ron just had time to sneak in his full English breakfast, and Ibrahim has rarely seen him look so happy. He is currently on the other side of the car, contentedly patting his stomach through his new jumper, which is actually a wonderful colour on him.

‘What are we calling that? Cerise?’ says Ibrahim.

‘Red,’ says Ron.

The three officers are listening to the recording in the back of their squad car. One by one they emerge. Jill holds up the phone.

‘The other voice on this recording?’ Jill begins. ‘It’s Garth?’

‘It’s unmistakable,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Where is he?’ Chris asks.

‘He got away,’ says Ron. ‘Couldn’t stop him, big lad.’

‘You told us to be here at three,’ says Jill. ‘And this phone starts recording at just before two.’

‘Not my area,’ says Ibrahim. ‘You’d need to talk to Elizabeth.’

‘And where is Elizabeth?’ asks Chris.

‘Back at Coopers Chase,’ says Ibrahim. ‘As far as I know. We’re trying to give her a bit of space at the moment.’

Elizabeth and Joyce are currently being driven home by Mark from Robertsbridge Taxis. It was explained to Mark that the job was fairly time sensitive, and he wouldn’t be able to join Ron for the full English breakfast. He had looked crestfallen, but, at heart, he is a professional.

‘So you and Ron organized this whole thing yourselves?’ says Chris.

‘We are capable men,’ says Ibrahim, as Ron lets out a small belch, and apologizes.

‘To be clear,’ says Jill. ‘You told us to be here at three p.m., and that you’d deliver Nina Mishra, Garth and the box to us. I see Mishra, but I don’t see Garth or the box? You told us to trust you?’

‘I would say this,’ says Ibrahim. ‘In our defence. We have already delivered the heroin to you. And we are now delivering the murderer of Kuldesh Sharma and Samantha Barnes.’

‘Murderess,’ says Ron.

‘It’s just “murderer” these days, Ron,’ says Ibrahim.

‘But the man who probably murdered Luca Buttaci has mysteriously vanished. Maybe murdered Dom Holt too,’ says Jill. ‘And where is the box?’

Ron shrugs.

‘I promise you it’s quicker just to accept it, ma’am,’ says Donna. ‘It honestly saves so much time.’

‘The box will surface, I’m sure,’ says Ibrahim. ‘And, as for Garth, justice will catch up with him one day. But I suspect your superiors will be delighted that two murders have been cleared up and their heroin has been recovered. I suppose you have tested it by now?’

‘Absolutely pure,’ says Chris.

‘And so you will be able to arrest Mitch Maxwell also,’ says Ibrahim.

‘I’d say that’s a result,’ says Ron. He motions over to the Daihatsu, and Bogdan emerges to bring Nina to them.

Jill meets them halfway, reads Nina her rights, cuffs her and leads her to the squad car.

Chris looks at Bogdan. ‘This lot lying to us, I understand. But you must have known you were due here at two?’

‘1.52,’ says Bogdan.

‘But you lied to us anyway?’ Chris continues. ‘You lied to Donna?’

Bogdan looks at Donna.

‘He didn’t lie to me,’ says Donna. ‘I knew too. Garth was the only one Nina would confess to. And without the confession we had nothing. I would have done anything to get her. Kuldesh was the first person who knew Bogdan was in love with me.’

‘I told a guy at the gym too,’ says Bogdan.

‘Don’t spoil it, baby,’ says Donna.

Chris looks at the motley crew in front of him. Ron and Ibrahim, Donna and Bogdan. He shakes his head.

‘And where’s the box?’ he asks.

‘Elizabeth needs it,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I hope that’s enough for you to forgive us?’

87

Hanif looks at his watch, and finishes his coffee. Mitch Maxwell isn’t coming. He’s not suddenly going to walk into the Gatwick Radisson holding the box.

So be it. Hanif had come up with the whole scheme. Sayed had had an offer for the box, from a Swedish guy who lived in Staffordshire with ten million burning a hole in his pocket. Rather than going to the trouble of finding some elaborate new route to smuggle it in, why not just send it through their regular chain? If they’d told Mitch and Luca what it was, they’d have asked for a cut. He actually should have cut them in; in retrospect, they might have taken a bit more care. Although Hanif is starting to hear that they’d been having trouble with shipments, so, really, he shouldn’t have trusted them at all.

A young cousin of Hanif had been tasked with following the box every step of the way, and retrieving it from Luca Buttaci. Hanif had even bought his cousin a motorbike for his troubles. But then the box went missing, and his cousin was only following ghosts.

Hanif had messed up, that was the long and short of it. Thought he was being clever, but didn’t do his homework. Everybody lost money, everybody died, and it was all because of him.

Still, you can’t go round apologizing for every little mistake, can you? That way lies madness. The chaos that follows in your wake is not your responsibility.

If he flies back to Afghanistan, he will be killed too, and so, on reflection, Hanif will stay in London, out of Sayed’s reach. The heroin trade has been a steep learning curve, not to mention very, very lucrative, but perhaps it is now time to take what he has learned and do something new? Fresh start, clean sheet, no regrets.

A friend from university has offered him a job at a hedge fund, and someone he met at the party suggested he go into politics and offered to make a few introductions.

Nice to have options.

88

Caroline kills people for Connie, always has done. If you need her, you call the number for a launderette in Southwick and ask for a service wash. She’s quick, she’s reliable, and she’s a breath of fresh air in a traditionally male-dominated industry.

Connie is emailing her with a bit of good news. Somebody else has murdered Luca Buttaci for them. Connie’s emails are all encrypted by a highly sophisticated piece of software that is illegal in every single country in the world except Venezuela. Naturally Caroline will keep the 50 per cent engagement fee for the job, as per their usual agreement.

Connie and Caroline have been very busy recently.

You have to spot opportunity when it falls into your lap. That’s how Connie has got where she is today. Not in prison, that part was unfortunate, but the leading cocaine dealer on the South Coast of England.

And now, as she reads another email from Sayed in Afghanistan, the leading heroin dealer too.

But Connie feels guilty. And she is struggling to work out why. She feels guilty, and she recognizes that this is a new emotion for her. She doesn’t like it one bit, but, for once, she will not hide from it. Do what Ibrahim says, let it all in. Sit with it, even if it’s painful for you. And the guilt is painful for her.

It all started when Ibrahim told her about Kuldesh.

Connie is very glad they caught the woman who killed Kuldesh, she really is. He wasn’t in the business, was he? If you’re in the business, you expect someone’s going to shoot you at some point. Comes with the territory. But Kuldesh just got involved in something he shouldn’t have. Connie prides herself on knowing everything, but even she hadn’t known who shot Kuldesh. No one in the drugs world seemed to have a clue about it, and now she understands why. It wasn’t anything to do with drugs.

But from the moment Ibrahim told her about Kuldesh, she had started planning. Mitch and Dom were in trouble already, and this had unbalanced them still further. Connie had sensed their weakness, sensed the opportunity to take their business, and gone on the attack. She had decided to kill Dom Holt the moment Ibrahim told her the story. Two hours later she was on the phone to that launderette in Southwick.

She remembers she and Ibrahim had had a discussion about whether killing someone and paying someone else to kill someone were the same thing. They had agreed to differ, but perhaps Ibrahim had been right.

Caroline had killed Dom Holt for her; she had subcontracted the killing of Maxwell’s third-in-command, Lenny Bright; and Luca Buttaci had been next on the list.

Samantha Barnes had come to visit her. With the same idea as Connie. She had suggested a partnership. Connie had listened, recognized some of the benefits that Samantha and Garth could bring to the business, and promised Samantha she would think about it. They shook hands, and minutes later Connie was on the phone to the launderette again. Word is the police actually think that Nina Mishra killed Samantha too. Poor Nina. Though, in Connie’s experience, when you start killing people you do tend to get stereotyped. Comes with the job.

When Caroline killed Samantha, she had intended to kill Garth at the same time, but he hadn’t come into the house. Must have been spooked by something. Fair enough, the Canadian fella clearly has a survival instinct. Now he was out of the country, so he’s a loose end that might need tidying up someday.

But why is she feeling guilty?

Everyone Caroline killed was in the business, so that’s not what Connie feels guilty about. They would all have killed her if the situation had been reversed.

The contracts with Sayed are signed, and she is now a major heroin importer, but that’s not what she feels guilty about either. Someone is going to import heroin, so why not her?

In truth she knows. Of course she knows. She has lied to Ibrahim. Worse than that, she has used him. She had wanted to say sorry when he left the other day, but she doesn’t yet have the words. Connie is not sure she has ever said sorry and meant it. Her florist had organized flowers for him, but that’s not saying sorry either.

Connie shuts her eyes. She tries to think about Garth, running loose. He’ll find out at some point that Connie ordered his wife’s death, and he’ll come looking for her. That’s fine – Connie enjoys thinking about that sort of thing. Garth v Connie, that’ll be a battle worth watching.

But the images of Garth keep getting replaced by images of Ibrahim, his kind eyes and his gentle soul. His belief in her. She tries to concentrate on guns, and drugs, and chaos, but Ibrahim’s kindness is stronger.

Connie will find a way to say sorry one day.

89: Joyce

The box, that simple little box, which once held the spirits of the devils, then held a big bag of heroin, then contained my drain unblocker, multi-surface polish and bin bags, now contains Stephen’s ashes. Jonjo flew over to Iraq with it. It’s on his Instagram. I didn’t know professors were allowed Instagram.

It is in its rightful place in Baghdad, and we have an open invitation to visit if we are ever in the area. The Foreign Office got involved at one point, but Elizabeth made a phone call.

Elizabeth is going to fly over there next month. She promised Stephen they would visit together one day. She is going to Dubai with Viktor soon, to follow up some leads on the Bethany Waites case, and apparently the flight from Dubai to Baghdad is not too arduous.

Quite what we will do with her when she gets back is anyone’s guess. Bogdan is going to redecorate while she is away. Not too much though. You mustn’t paint over everything.

Coopers Chase is full of widows and widowers. Falling asleep with ghosts, and waking up alone. You have to soldier on, and Elizabeth will do that. Of course not everyone here assisted in the death of their partner, but, between you, me and the gatepost, there are more than you’d think. Love has its own laws.

They told us that Mitch Maxwell died looking for the box at the tip. You live by the sword, you die by the sword. Ron’s hip is still giving him grief.

You’d think that the closer you get to death, the more it would matter, but I’m finding the opposite to be true. I don’t fear it. I fear pain, but I don’t fear death. Which I suppose is the choice that Stephen was faced with.

What else can I tell you? Joanna bought me an air-fryer. I’m just experimenting with it at the moment – a spaghetti Bolognese and some sausage rolls – but so far so good. I realize I’ve had a kettle full of diamonds and a microwave full of heroin recently, so you never know what it might come in handy for one day.

Mervyn was delighted to get his five thousand pounds back, but is otherwise heartbroken. I would say that at least it was a lesson learned, but the last I heard Mervyn was planning to invest the whole lot with a broker who had emailed him out of the blue about buying into a secret fund ‘the experts don’t want you to know about’. Donna had to pop round and have another word with him.

Ron and Pauline have just got back from a weekend in Copenhagen. I asked Ron what it was like and he said it was like everywhere else abroad. When Ron dies, I don’t think we will be taking his ashes to Baghdad.

Also, and I swear this is the truth, he was wearing a lilac polo shirt. It really brought out his eyes.

Ibrahim has been quiet. I think he finds being around sadness very difficult. I think he takes it all very personally, loads it onto his own shoulders. I get sad when others are sad, of course I do, but life will give you enough sadness of your own to be getting on with, so you must be careful. Sometimes you just have to slip your big coat off, don’t you?

I saw he was having lunch with Computer Bob on Saturday. That made me happy. Ibrahim relies too much on Ron for company sometimes, and I think he and Bob have a lot in common.

The daffodils are out very early this year. I’ve seen the daffodils bloom for nearly eighty years now, and they are still a miracle to me. To still be here, to see the flowers that so many other people won’t see. Every year, poking their heads up to see who’s still around to enjoy the show. Though they are out very early this year, which I know is probably global warming, and everyone will end up dying. You can still appreciate a flower though, can’t you? Gives you hope, despite the apocalypse.

Alan has been to the vet after a cat scratched his nose. Ron was very mean, saying he can’t believe Alan lost a fight with a cat, but Alan is a lover, not a fighter. The vet said Alan was in fine shape, and that I was obviously looking after him well. I said that Alan was looking after me well too.

I think we’re due a period of peace and quiet now, aren’t we? A few months without murders, and corpses, without diamonds and spies, without guns and drugs and people threatening to kill us. Some time for Elizabeth to find her new feet.

I’ll tell you what I’d like instead. A few weddings. I don’t mind who. Donna and Bogdan, Chris and Patrice, Ron and Pauline, maybe Joanna and the football chairman. That’s what happens when you get older. Too many funerals, not enough weddings. And I love a wedding. Bring them on. Bring on love.

There’s something I forgot to mention. Do you remember, a few weeks ago now, before all this kerfuffle, I’d spoken about a man named Edwin Mayhem? A new resident, about to move in?

I’d got excited because of his name and had imagined so many wonderful things about him. A motorcycle stunt rider or TV wrestler.

Well, it turns out that it was just a typo, and his real name is Edwin Mayhew, which actually makes an awful lot more sense. When I went to see him he was just wearing a jumper and an old pair of cords. He is from Carshalton and used to be a quantity surveyor. His wife died about four years ago – a decent enough interval, I think – and his daughter, who is Joanna’s age and also lives in London, persuaded him to move in here. I asked if his daughter still drinks proper milk, and he said that she doesn’t. He said that last week she had made him a turmeric latte, and it had disagreed with him.

Anyway, Edwin’s daughter, Emma – lovely name, I would like to have been an Emma – thought that Coopers Chase might give him a new lease of life. I know that it will, but you could see that he has his doubts. No offence, he said, but I worry the pace of life might be a bit slow for me here. As if Carshalton was Las Vegas.

He was very grateful for my lemon meringue though, and he said if I ever needed anything fixed, that’s where his talents lay. Taps, shelves, you name it, he said. I said I had a Picasso that needed hanging, and he laughed.

He made us a pot of tea, then walked in with the tea cosy on his head and pretended he couldn’t find it. Alan was beside himself. I’ve promised to show him around, and to introduce him to a few people. He will fit right in, you can tell straight away. One day I will tell him that I thought he was called Edwin Mayhem. Not today but one day.

That’s the thing about Coopers Chase. You’d imagine it was quiet and sedate, like a village pond on a summer’s day. But in truth it never stops moving, it’s always in motion. And that motion is ageing, and death, and love, and grief, and final snatched moments and opportunities grasped. The urgency of old age. There’s nothing that makes you feel more alive than the certainty of death. Which reminds me.

Gerry, I know you’ll never really read this, but then perhaps you will? Perhaps you’re reading over my shoulder right now. If you are, then that silver gravy boat you bought at the car-boot sale is very fashionable now. So you were right and I was wrong. Also, if you are reading this, I love you.

I didn’t mean to sound morbid, by the way, I just feel tired, like I need a holiday, a nice little break somewhere. Joanna is buying a cottage in the Cotswolds, so maybe that will fit the bill. I really am very proud of everything she has achieved. She eventually replied to my message about the almond milk and told me I was now officially a hipster. I told Ron, and he said he was going to be an artificial hipster one of these days.

I am going to make a pavlova later. But with mangoes. I bet that has surprised you? I saw them do it on Saturday Kitchen. There will be plenty for Ibrahim, Ron and Elizabeth. And maybe, just maybe, there will be some left over for Edwin Mayhew.

By the way, when I went to see Edwin, he asked me if I was a member of any of the clubs at Coopers Chase.

Am I a member of any clubs at Coopers Chase?

I think that’s probably a conversation for another day, don’t you?

Time for me to turn in now. I know it sounds silly, but I feel less alone when I write. So thank you for keeping me company, whoever you might be.