Time to Die

17

Whiteside took a seat opposite Sol Cohen. He tried to look journalistic. Although he’d been interviewed innumerable times by journalists, print and TV for various cases, he couldn’t remember what equipment they carried. He’d settled for a notebook. He placed it in front of him, together with his phone. He had a police issue MP3 recorder but thought Cohen might recognize it as such. Through the window came the noise of the London traffic. Once again, he had the feeling, looking at Cohen in this pleasant, airy, book-lined room, of being in an academic’s study, pleasingly isolated from the outside world. Between them lay the desk: modern, sleek, Scandanavian-looking.

On the wall was a large computer photo-frame and a variety of faces, predominately white, jowly, middle-aged, came and went on the screen, one after another, a succession of images. He recognized none of them in the endless video picture parade. He wondered if it might be some art installation, a counter to the framed photos of David Ben-Gurion and Jacob Bronowski on the opposite wall. Cohen noted Whiteside’s interest.

‘My rogues’ gallery, my “lest we forget”,’ Cohen said. ‘“Those who forget the lessons of history are doomed to repeat it.” I’m sure you know the quote?’ Whiteside nodded wisely. ‘We’re now looking at Gergely Pongrátz,’ noted Cohen, pointing at the screen.

He suited his name, thought the sergeant. An elderly man with archaic moustaches, silver hair and old-fashioned braiding on his jacket, filled the screen. Whiteside looked at him; the folkloric clothing gave him a deeply sinister air, a character out of Grimm. Whiteside would have picked him out of a line-up as almost certainly the nutter who’d done the axe murder, he had that air of rustic insanity.

Cohen said, ‘The founder of Jobbik, The Movement for a Better Hungary. Mr Pongrátz isn’t keen on Jews. The party line is we shouldn’t be complaining about this but instead be, and I quote, “playing with our tiny, circumcised dicks”.’ Cohen laughed. ‘Mr Pongrátz has a way with words. Quite popular they are, too, in his country. In fact, according to the Hungarian police trade union, no less, Hungary should be preparing for armed battle with the Jews.’ Cohen’s tone was very much that of a teacher giving a lecture to a slightly dim pupil. Whiteside could begin to see why maybe Cohen didn’t have a particularly rosy view of the police.

‘You can’t always trust the law,’ Whiteside said, helpfully, enthusiastically. Cohen shrugged eloquently as Pongrátz faded away to be replaced by another face. ‘Nikolaos Michaloliakos, from the Golden Dawn of Greece, with their trademark, ‘I can’t believe it’s not a swastika’ symbol. You’ll know them from the recent news, they did rather well in the Greek elections.’ Michaloliakos shrank to a corner of the screen. ‘In Athens police are recommending victims of crime go to them for assistance.’

‘Oh,’ said Whiteside. Now a fat-faced, tough-looking man filled the screen.

‘Holger Apfel. National Democratic Party of Germany. Bit of a synonym for National Socialism, no?’ Cohen sighed. ‘We monitor anti-Semitism, Mr Dunlop. It’s as old as the Jews themselves and I would say it’s making a comeback; these are all current figures, not bogeymen from the past. The truth is, anti-Semitism never went away. In Britain alone we logged six hundred anti-Semitic incidents last year. So, as you can see, the reason for our funding is as important as ever. Plus of course we have Iran that wants to destroy us completely — well, and all the Arab countries. Unfortunately, our future here at the institute looks extremely secure. If only we weren’t needed I’d be a happy man.’ Cohen picked up a small remote. ‘There’s a lot more stored on the files for that photo-frame,’ he said. ‘I just wanted to give you a flavour of what we do, put a face to our persecutors.’ He pressed a button and changed the right-wing portraiture for a blue-green picture of an attenuated violinist, floating dreamlike in a night sky over a village.

‘Marc Chagall,’ said Cohen. ‘Let’s cheer ourselves up a bit. Some positive Jewish artistic achievement, eh.’

He looked at Whiteside with disconcertingly intelligent eyes. ‘So, how can we be of assistance?’

‘Harry Conquest,’ said Whiteside. He spelt the surname for Cohen.

‘OK then, Mr Dunlop.’ Cohen smiled as he said the name.

It sounded ridiculous to Whiteside himself. Who thought of that name? Perhaps they were working their way through tyre brands. He could have been Bridgestone, Pirelli, Marangoni, Goodyear or Michelin. Presumably not Continental. Mr Continental.

Cohen opened a laptop and typed away. ‘Ah ha,’ he said. ‘Well, we do have Mr Conquest on our files.’

Despite himself, Whiteside nearly jumped with surprise. He hadn’t been expecting that.

Cohen swivelled the screen round for Whiteside to see. ‘Do you read Hebrew?’

‘Unfortunately not.’

‘Never mind. I’m sure you can use shorthand,’ said Cohen, nodding at Whiteside’s notebook.

At that moment there was a knock on the door and Celia Westermann came in with coffee. Whiteside glanced at her. She looked so self-effacing he had the strange sensation again that, like the clothes, it was some kind of act. She behaved as if she was playing a secretary from the past. Cohen ignored her. Perhaps this was normal for the institute. As she busied herself pouring the coffee, Whiteside wondered if journalists these days did know shorthand. It sounded archaic. He wondered if it was some kind of joke by Cohen, like an apprentice being sent to buy tartan paint or a sky-hook.

‘I’ll just record what you say on my phone, Dr Cohen. Dyslexia,’ he said ruefully by way of explanation. ‘Dyslexia, a journalist’s nightmare, Doctor.’

Cohen nodded. It was now obvious to Whiteside he didn’t believe a word of anything he said.

‘Well, well, here he is.’ Cohen pointed to the sturdy Hebrew characters filling the screen with the end of a biro. Whiteside looked suitably blank. ‘Better switch your phone on then, Mr Dunlop,’ said Cohen. There was now surely no mistaking the ironic inflection in the elderly Jew’s voice. He looked at Celia. ‘Do you want to stay, Celia?’

‘No, Dr Cohen,’ she said. ‘I’ve got things to do.’ She smiled benignly at Whiteside and left the room.

The gist of Cohen’s file entry was short and to the point. Conquest had been born in Lewisham in South London in the early sixties. He had left school at fifteen. In the late seventies, aged seventeen, he’d joined the Hell’s Angels, what later became the infamous Windsor Chapter, and also become a member of Combat 18.

‘What’s that?’ Whiteside had asked sharply. He’d never heard of them, but the number caught his ear. It was part of what Hanlon had wanted him to ask about. Cohen’s reply was, ‘18 is 1 + 8. What’s the first letter of the alphabet? Mr Dunlop?’

‘A,’ said Whiteside.

‘That’s right, and now the eighth?’

‘H.’

‘Mm hm,’ said Cohen. ‘Put them together and you have A. H. Now, who do you think that might possibly refer to?’

‘Adolf Hitler,’ said Whiteside. Cohen nodded happily. Well, he thought. Hanlon was right. He also thought, so what? Conquest liked Nazis.

Cohen explained that Combat 18 was a small and disorganized racist group. The members were more of a threat to themselves than anyone else. Very much so. In fact, their founder was inside for murder, having killed a fellow member in some internal dispute. At the time, the major right-wing party, the then BNP equivalent, was the National Front, but Combat 18 believed in direct action. Luckily, the only people they had killed were each other.

In 198 °Conquest served a year at Feltham for petrol-bombing a synagogue in Stamford Hill. It was this that had brought him to the attention of the Shapiro Institute. All UK anti-Semitic attacks were logged by them and this one had their highest rating in terms of threat level. In 1982 he was acquitted of dealing Class A substances (amphetamines) and in 1985 he was acquitted of armed robbery of a Hatton Garden jewellers. ‘A Jewish business,’ said Cohen. In both the last two cases, witness intimidation and tampering with evidence had been cited as the reasons for the trials’ collapse.

This was more like it, thought Whiteside. Ludgate could hang out with former Nazis till the cows came home; for all anyone knew Conquest had long changed his political or racist views, or become a Buddhist, an advocate of rational peace and harmony, but consorting with a drug-dealing armed robber would take some explaining.

In 1985 he started Albion Property, funded, according to the file, by the robbery proceeds. And that, said Cohen, is more or less that. He disappeared off our radar. He looked at Whiteside’s impassive face.

Whiteside considered the implications of what he’d just learnt. For Whiteside, the absence of Conquest’s record from the PNC was the most important thing. It was a very serious matter indeed. He remembered the year before a court official had been sent down for three years for taking bribes to delete motoring offences from the police national database. He knew too, historically, that a great deal of police information had been transferred from paper records to fledgeling computer systems in the early eighties and a lot of low-grade crime records had simply been destroyed or junked. They’d been deemed not worthy of keeping. Conquest’s records were too important for that. Someone in the criminal records system had deliberately removed them. Conquest had to have had some serious influence.

Well, Hanlon had been proved right. Conquest did have a record. He was, or had been, dirty. He wondered, though, if what he’d learnt was remotely important. It could be argued that Conquest was a triumph of the system. He had done time for his crimes, well, one of them anyway, and had built himself a successful, legitimate, life. But he knew Hanlon too well for her to be satisfied with that. Hanlon believed that, on the whole, leopards don’t change their spots. Something else was going on other than redemption for Conquest to have paid a great deal of money to have his records expunged. Property was a good way to launder money. He thought of Conquest’s lavish lifestyle, the former connections with drug dealing. He remembered what Hanlon had said about the money he was spending outstripping the reported income. He guessed that’s what Hanlon was assuming, money laundering, but he didn’t know.

If Hanlon had any faults in Whiteside’s opinion, it was that she played her cards too close to her chest. But then again, Whiteside wasn’t overly concerned with larger pictures. One thought occurred to him as he switched his phone off.

‘Dr Cohen, does that file mention any known associates?’

Cohen glanced at the screen. ‘He set up Albion, the name of his business — the poet Blake would be turning in his grave — with a partner, a Paul Bingham, in the eighties, but there’s no more mention of him.’

Whiteside felt a surge of elation and excitement inside. Bingham. Paul Bingham, could it be? He struggled to keep the tension out of his expression. ‘This Bingham, does he have a nickname?’

Cohen raised his eyebrows and peered at the screen. ‘Yes, he does,’ he said. Please God, please let it be Rabbit, prayed Whiteside. ‘Rabbit. Does that help?’

‘Yes, yes, it does,’ said Whiteside. Oh my God, yes, it does.

‘Will there be anything else?’ Cohen asked.

Whiteside shook his head. Rabbit Bingham. No wonder Conquest wanted any criminal details keeping off his record. If Conquest was involved with crime it was something far more disturbing than drugs. Far worse. He could see now why Conquest would do anything to keep off the police radar. No wonder he was trying to find out what the DI wanted the other night. He must have been shitting himself when Hanlon, a woman with a fearsome reputation for direct action, had turned up on his doorstep.

‘Thank you very much for your time, Dr Cohen. I’ll see myself out.’ Whiteside could have punched the air with elation. Bingham!

As he walked down the stairs Whiteside thought, now I know what you’re thinking, Hanlon. Child sex abuse and murder. You lift a stone and what do you find under it. Rabbit Bingham. And now Conquest. He couldn’t wait to see Hanlon’s face.

When she was delighted, she would raise her left eyebrow. Grim satisfaction, Hanlon’s version of happiness, was a wintery smile. What he now had was maybe enough for the two together.

As soon as he was outside in the street he phoned the DI. Her phone was switched off so he left a message. ‘Ma’am, you were right. Most importantly, Rabbit Bingham, yes, that Rabbit Bingham, was one of Conquest’s associates. Oh, last thing, that number question: 18 is A. H.’ He wouldn’t need to explain what that meant. Hanlon would know. Those bloody dogs of Conquest’s. If he’d called them Rover and Spike, Whiteside wouldn’t even be at the institute.

Whiteside wasn’t Hanlon. He didn’t hide emotions. He grinned as he flagged down a taxi. Time to go home and celebrate.

Celia Westermann sat upstairs in what had been an attic room at the top of the building and watched Whiteside on one of the twelve CCTV monitors she had on her desk. Her face was no longer that of the amenable, put-upon drudge. It was implacable and cruel. There was no trace now of the downtrodden secretary. Invisible, a malignant ghost sitting at her desk, she had tracked Whiteside’s progress on camera down the stairs, back through security, past Zev and Reuben, the guards on the door, and into the street. She clicked on the icon on her screen where she had herself accessed Conquest’s file and picked up her own phone while she looked at the image of Whiteside as he talked on his mobile.

People say that there are two requisites for betrayal: love and hate. Eta Westermann, Celia’s mother, had dementia. Physically, she was fit for her age, she could live for years, but mentally was another story. She was a seventy-eight-year-old baby. She had a baby’s needs: nappies, washing, feeding, attention. The home that she was in was wonderful. The staff were highly trained and motivated, the building light, airy, clean. It was also extremely expensive. Celia could not afford it on her salary. That was where the love came in. Then there was the flip side of love.

Celia felt she practically ran the institute. She had been here for twenty-six years now, running virtually all of the administration, from IT to wages, and got as much thanks as the expensive computer equipment that surrounded her. Less maybe. She was regarded by the predominantly male workforce as an old maid, practically pitiable despite the fact she probably did three people’s jobs. Indeed, to replace her, they would need three people. Zev and Reuben earned more than she did — she authorized their pay checks for God’s sake, and what did their jobs entail, looking menacing and checking bags. A dog could do that job. A chimpanzee could do it. A retard could do it. And they had the gall to look down their noses at her.

Almost a year ago a bill from the home had arrived that she simply couldn’t pay. The next day she took out a bridging loan from her bank and the same evening, accessing the institute’s encrypted files, worked out who was selected for ‘action’ by the London branch of Shin Bet, Israeli intelligence. She chose one of three names. With the recent assassinations of scientists in Tehran still fresh in Muslim minds, the person concerned was more than grateful for the tip-off.

Payment from the Arab had been swift and generous. Since then, each transaction becoming morally and practically easier, she had done it three times more. Today would be her fifth. From another database, she accessed Conquest’s mobile number and called it. He answered immediately. Celia liked that in a man. He was curious to know who the unknown caller was. She told him why she was calling, using a voice changer to disguise herself. It was a man’s robotic voice that read out over the phone to an increasingly disturbed Conquest the contents of his file. For a price she would give him the name and address of the journalist who’d accessed it. Payment would also ensure she kept an eye on any further access of his details, which she would pass on.

Conquest agreed, as she’d known he would. How could he refuse? Her screen showed the bank balance of the account she had set up to handle these transactions. Within a couple of minutes the balance increased dramatically and she gave him Dunlop’s name and his address from his business card. She hung up. What Conquest did with the information was up to him. Mother had another six months of care.

Well, lekh tizdayen, Zev and Reuben. Lekh tizdayen, Dr Cohen, and lekh tizdayen, Shapiro Institute, and lekh tizdayen, Mr Dunlop. She almost giggled at herself. She never swore usually.

Celia Westermann checked she had left no trace of her recent activities on the computer system. She was as thorough as she was unappreciated. Then she went downstairs to fetch the coffee cups from Cohen’s office. She was a tidy woman.