The Moon Tunnel

33

Gladstone Gardens was a street of Edwardian terrace houses a short walk from the railway station, the decorated red brick and stucco work advertising the ambitions of the original builders, while each house bore a name etched into a keystone over the door: Balmoral, Windsor, Hampton, Sandringham… But by each front door, inset with stained-glass panels depicting sailing boats and rising suns, a vertical line of bell pushes proclaimed that the visitor was now in Bedsit Land, that dreary corner of the suburbs where every hallway is crowded with bicycles and junk mail festers on the doormat. But Gladstone Gardens was not just one of thousands of such streets shackling a great city, it was Ely’s only excursion into grotty suburbia – an outlier from the town centre itself, and a brief precursor to the Barratt lands beyond.

The black police van into which the press had been packed was parked at the top of the street, with a decent view through the tinted windows at the façade of No. 56. The pre-raid briefing had been just that: brief. Cavendish-Smith reiterated his belief that the nighthawks were undoubtedly linked to Professor Valgimigli’s murder. The object of the operation codenamed Albert – was to raid a house known to be used by the nighthawks in the trafficking of stolen artefacts. The press and TV were in on the raid because the pictures would get the investigation plenty of airtime the next day.

Detectives had infiltrated the nighthawks’ network in Lincoln, posing as London agents seeking Roman artefacts for non-institutional buyers – rich individuals prepared to enjoy their purchases in private. An officer working undercover had obtained a list of the gang’s contacts across the region. The name of Josh Atkinson, the late Professor Valgimigli’s senior digger, had headed the list. A small team had tailed Josh for a week, moving rhythmically between the site, The Frog Hall, his girlfriend’s shared house in the town centre and his ground-floor flat at 56a Gladstone Gardens. Visitors photographed entering Josh’s home in the last forty-eight hours had included two well-known members of the nighthawks network and a teenager with bright red hair and a dragon tattoo on his neck, known to local police. According to information received the nighthawks had some merchandise to sell: and an appointment with a buyer at 1.00am.

The press sat meekly waiting for the action to begin. The regional TV crew were the most excited, strong-arm raids made great footage, even if there was bugger-all inside the house and they had to wait nearly twenty-four hours to get it out on prime-time news. But if the raid led to arrests linked to the murder they’d make the national news as well. In the cramped van the temperature rose, despite the frosty clear moonlit night. A woman DC was driving, a plain-clothes detective beside her. Another plain-clothes officer, unnamed but introduced to the press as an expert in stolen antiquities attached to the Regional Crime Squad, would enter the premises with the rest of the team. He was in another van, this one full of police officers, parked fifty yards further down the road, while a third was at the rear of the building with a view of a dirt alleyway providing vehicle access. A police radio crackled and the detective reached for it quickly, listened, acknowledged the call, threw open the passenger door, followed swiftly by the sliding door behind it.

‘Let’s go – unmarked van loading at rear of premises.’

They ran, a scampering pack, across the road to the unhinged gate of No. 56. The other team got there first. Six officers in full protective gear charged up the path, armed with a lethal-looking door ram and stun guns, with Cavendish-Smith in the rear, just close enough to get in the TV pictures. The front door splintered with ease, the Victorian stained glass tinkling musically as it fell to the stone step. The TV crew had its lights on and bundled in after the six officers; Dryden – cruelly detained by a loose shoelace – was only twenty yards behind.

By the time he made it to the front door the corridor beyond was deserted, an interior door leading from it also reduced to splinters. Inside the flat there was further evidence of bad manners: two officers were rapidly ransacking the place while others used hammers and crowbars to rip up the edges of the threadbare carpet. Josh Atkinson was in the living room in an armchair, his head back and his blond hair splayed on the leatherette. He was pinned to it by two officers, who restrained his shoulders. Cavendish-Smith was reading him his rights but Josh wasn’t listening. He looked stoned, the well-black eyes viewing Dryden with amusement.

‘In here, sir.’ It was the archaeological expert from the Regional Crime Squad at the bedroom door. Inside the carpet had been ripped back and three floorboards removed. In the recess below was a long folded sheet which had been turned back to reveal a small procession of stolen artefacts: bone brooches and combs, some gold pins and clasps, some leather scabbards and a curved metal bar, dotted with semiprecious jewels, but of uncertain purpose.

Cavendish-Smith called for the TV crew to follow him in to take a closer look.

Dryden moved through the flat to the back door and down a short garden to the alley. The anonymous, ubiquitous white van was parked across the back gate, its side door open, as two uniformed officers searched the interior. Sitting in one of the passenger seats was Ma Trunch, the mobile wedges of flesh which made up her face set now in stone. It was a cold night, and her face was free of sweat, but Dryden detected a thin line of tears in the folds leading to her mouth. On her lap was a wooden box, made from the same mahogany as her polished museum cabinets at Little Castles. The box was open, and lying on the green baize was a short sword, the blade a perfect silver grey, the handle corded in gold.

‘Ma,’ said Dryden. ‘Something for the collection?’

She looked utterly lost. ‘I sold the business,’ she said flatly, ‘for this.’

Dryden saw them then, two figures in a distant conversation, standing in the groundmist of the night, circled by Boudicca. Ma touched the blade with a delicate finger. A uniformed officer opened the driver’s door and showed Ma a set of handcuffs.

‘Can I hold it?’ she asked Dryden, ignoring the policeman.

The officer slipped in beside her, nodding. Ma took up the sword and held it up, the blade close to her lips, feeling the weight, feeling the past. Then she replaced it delicately, and folded the green material over it as lovingly as she would have buried a child.

Dryden left them and went back into the garden. Josh Atkinson now sat on a disused coal-bunker, smoking a cigarette, watched by the woman DC, his hands cuffed. The necklace of another set of cuffs joined one ankle to a cast-iron bolt on the coal bunker.

Josh smiled when he saw Dryden. ‘Shit,’ he said. ‘What a fuck-up.’

‘Indeed,’ said Dryden. ‘What did you tell ’em?’ he asked, nodding to the policewoman.

Josh stubbed out the cigarette. ‘They made me do it.’

Dryden sat next to him. ‘I guess we’re gonna hear that quite a bit. What did they pay you?’

‘I think that’s enough…’ The constable stood. ‘The sergeant will be with him soon.’

Then they heard a woman’s sob, deep and guttural, and the officer who had handcuffed Ma Trunch appeared at the back gate: ‘Joan – can you help? She’s pretty upset…’

The detective reluctantly left Dryden alone with her prisoner, checking the handcuffs first. They heard her trying to comfort Ma as they edged her towards a police van which was parked at the end of the alley.

Dryden took out the Greek cigarettes he saved for his visits to The Tower and offered Josh one, placing it between the pale lips, which trembled slightly.

‘So you got the stuff out of the ground,’ said Dryden. ‘But who shifted it? Who found the buyers?’

Josh tried a cold stare but his eyes swam from the impact of too much nicotine. They listened to the officers overturning the flat.

‘I thought it was Alder – the funeral director,’ said Dryden. ‘But why did I think that? Because a lowlife petty thief called Russell Flynn told me. A mutual friend, I think? You might like to know that the police may well be interviewing Russell – right now. My advice – get your retaliation in first.’

Josh tried to calculate an answer but his brain had been derailed. ‘I’ll phone a lawyer,’ he said.

‘Get a good one,’ said Dryden. ‘My guess is you got the sword out – and took Russell with you. The big question is when. And did Azeglio Valgimigli catch you at it – which is why he’s dead?’

Clearly this configuration had not occurred to Valgimigli’s digger. His face slumped, the heavy features briefly arranged as they would be in ten years’ time. ‘Jesus. They can’t think that.’

‘Really? I’d practise your story if I were you. These guys aren’t jumping like this because of a few pottery shards and an Anglo-Saxon sword. This is a murder investigation, and you’re a suspect.’

Josh was suddenly babbling. ‘Russ said there’d be nobody there. He was right. We never saw Valgimigli. We just got the sword and got out.’ His hands shook violently as he raised the cigarette for another drag.

Dryden nodded. ‘I’d work on that,’ he said, believing him.