Time to Die

34

Julie stood outside Anderson’s cell. It was Thursday afternoon; she was working the two until ten shift. She had often been responsible for the solitary punishment cells in the past — it was felt that a woman might have a calming effect on the more disturbed inmates — and getting to Anderson was simple. It had been a while since the cells had been used. Solitary confinement was out of fashion at the moment, but not illegal. It was regarded as counterproductive and of questionable human rights ethics, but Fordham’s towering rage had put one of them back into use for Anderson’s benefit.

She had been forced to wait until four o’clock, when she’d visited the guard on duty, started a conversation — not hard, she knew he found her attractive — and volunteered to check on Anderson. He smiled as he gave her permission. Quite a few staff had been along to have a closer look at their new celebrity prisoner. As she turned her back on him she could feel his gaze lingering longingly on her backside.

The walk to the cells was short; the other cells were untenanted. She opened the flap below the eye-level viewing window to speak to Anderson. He was standing up, his back turned to her.

‘What do you want?’ he asked, his voice flat and uninflected. The accent was unassertive London.

‘Hanlon sent me,’ she said. ‘I need an address.’

Now he did turn round. It was the first time she had ever seen him in the flesh. He had shoulder-length rat-tailed hair, a thin, almost malnourished face and very deep-set, intelligent, dark eyes. His shoulders were narrow and his hands, which hung by his side, seemed disproportionately large. Julie felt the presence of an overwhelming malevolence coming from Anderson and a feeling of great strength. The hands, with their bitten-down fingernails and long, strong fingers, looked very powerful. They belonged on an animal; they were the kind of hands capable of tearing someone to shreds.

It wasn’t just his reputation that made him so menacing. She had long lost count of the number of convicted killers she had met, there were plenty in the prison itself right now, but none had come close to Anderson when it came to intimidating power. Julie didn’t scare easily, she couldn’t do the job if that were the case, but he scared her more than any prisoner she had ever met.

Anderson walked up to the door and looked at her through the small, open flap. She was very grateful to have the heavy steel door between them.

‘Tell her, Strood Island, near Walton-on-Naze, Essex. Repeat that.’ He spoke softly. He didn’t need to raise his voice. People paid close attention to what he said. His face was framed in the metal hatch like a compelling portrait of evil. She could sense the power emanating, radiating, from him. His gaze was hypnotic, compelling. Julie felt a sensation akin to vertigo, that overwhelming desire to jump, except in this case it was the need almost to beg him not to hurt her. Like a bird hypnotized by a cat, she thought. She repeated the words he’d spoken.

Anderson nodded satisfied, then he said, almost as an afterthought, ‘Tell Hanlon, Conquest is a supplier, not a user.’ Then he turned away from her. His back was a sign the conversation was over.

Julie closed the flap and walked away. As she did so, she felt Bingham had probably got off relatively lightly. That man was capable of far worse.

At half four, the first opportunity she got, she texted Enver with the information.

An hour later, he and Hanlon drove out of London, east, heading for the Essex coast. Hanlon had used that hour for some frantic, last-minute research. She had an excellent series of contacts in Essex and, because it was her, they dropped whatever they were doing to help. Shortly after they left, so did the judge, at the wheel of his own Porsche. His meeting, too, had gone well. His suspicion had been more than confirmed that the Home Office, knowing of the Brussels appointment, wanted to get into the judge’s good favour by the offer of a peerage. The stronger the ties that bound him to the UK government, the more chance of his reaching judgments favourable to his country of birth, that was their hope. The civil servants he had just met, always deferential, were now treating him like uncrowned royalty.

Hanlon drove in silence. They had first of all gone in her Audi to a car park in Bow where Hanlon had swapped her car for an old Volvo estate that smelt of dog and had bits of straw in the boot. Its bodywork was covered with mud and dust. Stickers saying ‘Support the Countryside Alliance’ and ‘I Slow Down for Horses’ were stuck on to the hatch window. He guessed she’d borrowed the car. He assumed it was because her own Audi was too well known to the officers she worked with.

Hanlon, unsurprisingly, drove fast and well. Enver was glad she was at the wheel. He rarely drove, he didn’t need a car in London, and knew he was at best an indifferent driver. He had a feeling that if he were driving, it would be nerve-racking, like doing a test again.

‘What will we do when we get there?’ he asked. They were leaving London now and heading deep into Essex. The traffic was light and they were making good speed.

Hanlon turned her head momentarily to look at him. ‘Rescue the boy. We’ll worry about the legalities later.’

Enver sighed and stroked his moustache pensively. In other words, there was no plan, or if there was, he wasn’t privy to it. He was used to meticulous planning, diagrams of the premises to be raided, photographs, ball-park figures as to the number of suspects likely to be present, risk assessments. Not ‘Rescue the boy’. That wasn’t a plan. That was a statement of intent. He made a mental note that he would never complain again about excess tactical planning as he had in the past.

They drove past the small seaside town of Walton-on-the-Naze and along the road that bordered the sea. Enver had never been to this part of the world and he was surprised by how attractive it was. He wasn’t used to the countryside. The last time he’d seen so much green was on Hampstead Heath a few years ago in an operation targeting muggers. To their left, inland, rose slight hills with bushes and small trees; to their right, where the land gradually fell away to the sea, were flat fields dotted with sheep and cows. A couple of miles from town, just off the main road, they came in sight of the sea itself and Enver was moved despite himself, by its immensity.

Hanlon slowed and pointed. ‘Down there,’ she said.

There was a narrow, tarmacked track that ran from the road they were on and led down towards the water, glinting blue and silver in the late afternoon sun. At the bottom of the private road lay a small, detached house. There was a sign on the road, its paint peeling, barely legible as they drove past: ‘Strood Island Lodge’. Half a mile or so out to sea lay a long, narrow island with a single hill in the middle. Below the hill, facing the coast, they could see a sizeable white-painted building. Enver felt the adrenaline levels in his body begin to rise now their destination was in sight. That was Conquest’s island and that was where, if Anderson’s information was correct, they would find the boy.

Hanlon slowed the car but kept driving for another mile before she pulled into a lay-by at the side of the road and switched the engine off.

‘Wasn’t that the road down to the island?’ asked Enver. He had a feeling he was in for a cross-country walk he certainly didn’t want and was definitely not dressed for.

‘Yes,’ said Hanlon, ‘but we’re not in London now, Sergeant. We can hardly drive down there and mingle with the traffic and the crowds. We’re in the countryside. We need to be inconspicuous, that’s why we’re in this car not mine.’

She didn’t add that her car was known to quite a few police officers, which is what Enver had suspected was the case and, even if it wasn’t recognized, a trace on the number plate would reveal her as the car’s owner. Conquest would surely not fail to have a check on any unknown vehicles parked suspiciously nearby. Her Audi was a city car, the battered four-wheel drive Volvo estate, its paintwork scratched and dented, looked as if it belonged here in the country.

Strood Island was a good choice for a place that Conquest wanted to keep a prisoner. Even if you got out of the house, surrounded by sea, you’d need a boat to escape. You couldn’t shout for help or attract anyone’s attention. Once you were out there, you were trapped. Hanlon knew from a land registry search she’d done earlier that he owned most of the farmland around, land was cheap round here, and she’d noticed as they drove along that he’d had it rigorously fenced off. There was no danger of any ramblers straying on to it or, more to the point, anyone posing as a rambler. She guessed that if worst came to the worst and the police wanted to place surveillance on the place, it would be practically impossible. Wherever they hid, they’d stand out like sore thumbs. Her respect for Conquest’s organizational skills, already high, rose another notch.

She had learnt from a trusted source in the Essex police constabulary that the track they had driven past led down to a lodge that served the island house. There was a small slipway, a jetty, and moorings for two boats. One was a six metre delivery boat with a shallow draft, used for delivering bulky supplies, the other an eight-seater motor cruiser for passenger use. There was also a small rowing boat with an outboard that was used for single passengers or more informal journeys.

Hanlon got out of the car and Enver did the same. He hadn’t come prepared for the outdoors and Hanlon hadn’t thought to warn him. She’d forgotten that city-dwellers are peculiarly ignorant about the countryside. He shivered in the chill sea breeze. It must have been about ten degrees colder than London, if you factored in the offshore wind. He was wearing another of his cheap, dark suits. Hanlon thought, he obviously thinks it’s a bad idea to spend good money on work clothes. Someone might throw up over you if you nick them when they’re pissed, or they might get ripped in a fight. It never occurred to Hanlon that Enver thought his suit perfectly acceptable. He would have been mortified to know her opinion of it. Whiteside, Hanlon thought, always wore great clothes. He used to joke sometimes, especially on undercover work, that you never know when your time will come, so you’d better look smart for the big occasion. She wondered what he’d been wearing when he’d been shot. She hoped it was something nice. God, how she missed him.

Enver’s lightweight, polyester tie flapped in the wind that blew his hair over his face as he stood looking at Hanlon. She was wearing a dark blue tracksuit and dark training shoes. She had a small, expensive-looking rucksack with her. She looked ready for anything, thought Enver. Not like me.

They closed the car doors behind them and she locked the vehicle and gave Enver the key. She took a similar one with the Volvo logo on it, put it in a small plastic bag, and hid it under a stone in the grass by the lay-by.

‘That’s the spare,’ she said. ‘Just in case. Remember where I put it.’

That little gesture brought home to Enver, as nothing else had, the danger they were in. Nobody knew where they were. Come to think of it, he only had a vague idea himself. Conquest had killed or had ordered the killings of at least several people that he knew of; the man wouldn’t care if he added to it. He certainly had very little to lose. Once again, Enver questioned his sanity in following Hanlon. Yet he could appreciate her worry that the mole might tip Conquest off, giving him time to dispose of the evidence by killing the boy. Enver thought, if we die, he dies anyway.

He looked around at the unfamiliar countryside, the flat, featureless fields, the enormous expanse of sea, and suddenly craved the certainty of buildings and the proximity of people. He wanted the safety blanket of London. If anything happens out here, Enver thought, no one would ever know. In London you can always shout for help. Not out here. Only the gulls would hear.

‘Have you had enough of the view, Sergeant?’ said Hanlon acidly. ‘Come on.’

A stream in a culvert disappeared under the road where the lay-by was, and flowed down across the fields towards the sea. From the road you could see its route, lined with bushes and scrubby trees stunted by the cold, salty winds that blew in off the sea. Hanlon intended to follow it downstream. Walking across the fields would make them visible from the lodge; the undergrowth flanking the stream would screen them from sight. She climbed gracefully and lightly over the waist-high barbed-wire fence that ran next to the lay-by, putting her feet on the wire close to where it was attached to one of the upright posts, so it didn’t sag under her weight. She jumped over and Enver tried. The wire bent alarmingly as he trod on it and his foot slipped.

‘Be careful, Demirel, you cretin,’ hissed Hanlon angrily. ‘If you cut yourself open on that wire you’ll be no good to man or beast. I’m not driving you to fucking Colchester A amp;E! Put your jacket over it!’

It was the first time he had ever heard her swear and it gave him some idea of the stress she must be under. He had almost forgotten that Hanlon was human and might well have feelings. He was coming to think of her as robotic, devoid of emotion. Enver did as he was told, now straddling the wire, his suit jacket protecting his groin from the barbs. He got over and the fabric caught on the wire and ripped as he removed it. He sighed to himself as he put it back on. There was a big tear in the material. It was going to be a long night, he thought. A long, cold night.

The stream had cut its way into the earth over time, creating a kind of trench, and it zigzagged down to the sea a few hundred metres distant from the lodge. The two of them followed it down until they were parallel to the house. Hidden from view of the windows by tough, thorny gorse bushes and buffeted by the endless salt wind from the sea, Hanlon and Enver lay on the ground, looking towards the lodge-house. Hanlon had taken a pair of binoculars from her rucksack and they were pressed to her eyes as she studied the terrain.

Enver’s shoes were covered in mud and waterlogged. His trousers were filthy and the fabric was soaked with water. He was very cold. Hanlon, by contrast, looked in her element. Enver’s father used to take him hunting when they went back to Turkey, to Rize, where the Demirel family had come from. They used to go there on holiday; it was up by the then Russian border. Now it would be some other independent former Soviet Republic. It had been equally uncomfortable. Enver remembered his father’s suppressed excitement as they drew near their prey, his old rifle in his hands. He sensed the same emotion in Hanlon but didn’t share it. This is what they were doing now, he thought, stalking Conquest before striking.

He hadn’t liked hunting then either, come to that. He’d wanted to go to Fethiye or Kas, sunbathe, go swimming, look at girls. They never did, of course. They went to sodding Rize. There was a lot of rain, he seemed to remember, and a disproportionate number of mosques. They were very religious in Rize. No bikinis there. The noise of an engine broke his train of thought. A Porsche drove down the narrow strip of road and stopped outside the house. Enver saw the driver’s door open and simultaneously a man appeared from the lodge. He’d either heard the car or been expecting it. Then someone got out of the car. He heard an exclamation from Hanlon. She obviously recognized the driver.

‘Who is it?’ said Enver. She handed him the glasses. He put them to his eyes and adjusted the focus. The magnification was excellent and the resolution high. There, talking to the lodge-keeper was a man who he recognized from his TV appearances as a prominent, crusading QC. Not that long ago he’d heard the man had been made a judge; the papers had talked about a poacher turned gamekeeper. The man in the car was Lord Justice Reece.

The last time Hanlon had seen Reece was when Bingham was sent down. Reece was the presiding judge at the trial. She was beginning to feel a strange sense of fate about this investigation. The protagonists had all met before. Reece, Bingham, Conquest. Bingham was connected to her by his past trial and his current role as unwilling informant. Anderson was linked by virtue of proximity to Bingham and as a direct result of Hanlon’s vendetta.

Reece was a surprise. She guessed it shouldn’t be. Sex crimes were democratic, they cut across all bounds of class and money and societal divide. Why should a paedophile judge be worse or more unusual than, say, a famous paedophile film director or child rapist pop star, DJ, TV presenter or actor? Or carpet fitter, labourer, postman or bank clerk, come to that? She supposed because it was a double betrayal, a betrayal of the innocent and a betrayal of justice. Hanlon was ambivalent about the law, but she was passionate about justice. Corruption and hypocrisy turned Hanlon’s stomach. She preferred the company of criminals like Anderson. They didn’t pretend to be anything other than what they were. Anderson was at least honest. He might nail people to doors but he didn’t bleat about upholding their human rights while he did so, or righting wrongs. Reece was far worse. Anderson’s words to Julie Demirel came back to her as if borne on the sea breeze, ‘He’s a supplier, not a user.’ Reece would be the customer. Hanlon clamped her jaw tight in impotent rage. She wouldn’t be able to do anything until evening, until darkness could cover her movements.

She watched through her binoculars as Reece parked the car and the man from the lodge pulled a small rowing boat in from a mooring buoy with a rope on to the shore, a running mooring as it was called. The judge climbed in awkwardly and sat uncomfortably in the bows. He was obviously unused to boats. The boatman handed him his suitcase, tied the mooring up with a sheet-shank, then pushed the old clinker-built boat out into the sea and jumped gracefully into the stern as it moved away from the shore. He started the outboard motor and they headed off towards the island. The boat’s keel bounced a little on the choppy surface of the sea. The judge sat stiffly on the thwart, clutching his suitcase as it balanced awkwardly on his knees. Hanlon’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully as she examined the water. She was thinking of currents, tides and wind strength. She looked at her watch: seven o’clock. Maybe an hour, an hour and a half, before it was dark enough for her.

Peter had spent the day feeling lethargic. He wondered why he felt so tired. Perhaps he was ill. He had finished Animal Farm and was rereading it. He had cried when Boxer, the horse, was taken away to the slaughterhouse. He felt a certain kinship with the animal, bewildered by events he couldn’t understand and beyond his control. Deep down, though, he didn’t really think anything bad was going to happen to him. He had a child’s faith in his own immortality.

This lunchtime there had been a welcome variation in his routine. He had been given soap, shampoo, a towel and clean clothes, jeans, underwear, a T-shirt and a fleece, all in his size. He took a shower for the first time in a week, revelling in the sensation. He was a bit concerned about the TV camera in case it saw him naked, he was a shy boy, but he’d lived with the camera so long now he hardly noticed it. He put his new clothes on and played with Tito for a while. He was feeling a lot better. He suspected that the clothes might be a sign he was going home. His heart thudded with wild excitement at the thought.

On the other side of the heavy steel door the judge, recently arrived on the island, watched him play with the dog through the one-way spy hole at eye-level. His eyes drank in the boy’s physical grace, his long-limbed beauty, his straw-blond hair. The thought that soon the boy would be his to do his bidding was incredibly arousing. Saliva flooded his mouth as he watched unseen. He played various sexual scenarios in his head and decided that, as before, for a while he would want the child unconscious while he explored his body for a couple of quiet hours at least. He found the thought incredibly arousing.

The judge believed himself to be a connoisseur of pleasure. He wouldn’t tip a fifty-year-old brandy thoughtlessly down his throat out of the bottle, or guzzle a Roux brothers’ meal as though it was motorway service-station food. No, beautiful things should be savoured, and he fully intended to savour Peter. He would take his time. This treat had cost him a great deal of money but it would be worth every penny.

The child was due to eat soon. The judge had already issued his instructions to Conquest and the Rohypnol would be given in his drink, as it had been the day before. He’d allow time for the drug to take effect, and the child would be delivered to the Bridal Suite in the upstairs part of the house at about nine o’clock. He turned and went up the stairs that led to a door beside the kitchen in the entrance hall, and walked up the broad, heavy, carved wooden staircase to his bedroom. Conquest had offered him food but the judge had tasted Robbo’s cooking. He shuddered at the memory. It was as crude as Robbo. It was as criminal as Robbo. Such things really shouldn’t be allowed; they certainly shouldn’t be encouraged. The only people in the house tonight would be Robbo, Conquest, Clarissa and the judge.

Upstairs in his room the judge stripped slowly, and wrapped his aged, thin, naked body in a silk, Chinese robe and laid out what he would need for later. Viagra to sustain himself, he needed to last. Cocaine, to heighten his pleasure, and a bottle of 1986 Premier Cru Margaux, his favourite Bordeaux. He also had a pack of three Cohiba Esplendido Cuban cigars. He looked up in irritation at the smoke alarm on the ceiling; he would have to lean out of the window because of Conquest’s ludicrous smoking ban. He turned on the TV and selected the channel that would bring him the feed from Peter’s cell. He rewound the image and watched the boy undressing for his shower, making judicial use of the freeze-frame. He looked at his watch. Not that long to go really. He stared hungrily at the boy’s buttocks. Very soon, oh yes, it would be very soon now.

Enver looked at his watch. It was eight o’clock. The sky was darkening and soon it would be night. There was a three-quarters full moon in the sky, but it was obscured by cloud. The boat, minus the judge, had returned from the island and lights showed in the lodge. They also showed around the lodge as well. The jetty and foreshore were floodlit. There was no possibility of taking one of the boats unobserved. He wondered how they would get over to the island. There seemed no chance now. For a delirious moment he hoped they would call in the police on some spurious excuse. Hanlon would think of something. The boy was over there, there was an Appeal Court judge over there, Conquest was over there presumably, what more did they need? Everybody could be scooped up in one fell swoop.

He had tried talking to Hanlon about what they would do, but had been rebuffed. Now she turned to him. ‘Come on, Sergeant. Follow me.’

He knew then they wouldn’t be calling for help. His hopes faded and reality set in. Hanlon would say, yes, they could call for help and with a high court judge barring the door which copper would dare enter the premises? They’d need a search warrant and what magistrate would issue one based on their evidence? Enver thought, maybe we could stretch the PACE section 18, which permitted an inspector to search premises if the suspect was in custody. They could claim Bingham qualified, albeit indirectly, and hopefully if they found the boy they’d be home and dry. Then he thought, and if Conquest has him elsewhere, we’ll be found guilty of causing Bingham’s torture. We have broken so many rules, so many laws, we’d make police history and not in a good way. No, there was no question of outside help. They’d be doing this the hard way. Hanlon’s way, as she’d doubtless intended all along.

Hanlon slithered backwards on her hands and knees, Enver following, and they dropped into the gully where the stream was. They followed its path down to the beginning of the beach where it trickled across the pebbly sand, into the sea. On the island they could see lights in the window of Conquest’s house. The lodge to their right was about five hundred metres away from where they stood, ablaze with light. Enver guessed they would be practically invisible in the gloom.

A sand dune screened them from view of the house. Hanlon turned to Enver. She looked at her watch. ‘What time do you make it?’ she asked.

‘Ten past eight,’ he said.

‘Fine. I’m going over there.’ She pointed to the island. In an Iron Man triathlon, Hanlon could swim 2.4 miles at sea in an hour and a half. This was only half a mile, but there would be currents and the sea was choppy. Still, she reckoned she could do it in half an hour. On the plus side, the salt water would be buoyant and she certainly had all the motivation she needed. ‘If I’m not back with the boy by ten, call for backup. You can get a signal from the car, but my phone’s dead down here, have you got a signal?’

He took his phone out of his pocket and checked. No signal. ‘No,’ he said bitterly, thinking, we wouldn’t have this problem in London.

‘How are you getting over there, ma’am?’ he asked, feeling stupid.

Hanlon stood up and unzipped her tracksuit jacket. She took her training shoes and socks off, then her T-shirt and tracksuit bottoms. She was wearing nothing now but black Lycra shorts and sports bra. Her supple, muscular body gleamed palely in the fitful moonlight. Enver suddenly thought with a shock, she’s unbelievably attractive, and then smiled at how ridiculously inappropriate the thought was. Then he smiled again at the cliché of the ugly duckling’s transformation into a swan, like in a film when the unattractive girl turns out to have been a stunning beauty all the time. He should, by rights, now gasp in amazement and say, ‘My God, Detective Inspector, you’re beautiful.’ Of course, he thought, Hanlon was perfectly aware of how attractive she was. She just didn’t choose to show it. He thought too, thank God it’s not me having to take my clothes off, I can’t imagine DI Hanlon swooning in delight at the sight.

‘Why are you grinning like that, Sergeant?’ she said in an irritated voice.

‘I was just thinking you’re a very beautiful woman, ma’am,’ he said, with mock solemnity.

She nodded her head in her Hanlon equivalent of laughter. It was an almost Whiteside comment and it cheered her up more than she could say. ‘I know that,’ she said, matter-of-factly. She stuffed her clothes into the small bag. It was obviously waterproof. She turned and said in a warning tone, ‘Ten o’clock.’ He nodded and watched Hanlon as she walked down to the beach and slipped into the water, as sleek as a seal or a porpoise.

A mile or so away from them, the unknown man whom Hanlon had named the Joker was examining the Volvo with a flashlight. His brow was furrowed thoughtfully. He was 90 per cent sure it was hers, but he was a man who liked to know. If it was Hanlon’s, then he was sure he could guess her next move. He walked over to the barbed-wire fence and by the light of his torch looked carefully. Hanlon’s light feet had made no trace on the ground, but he could see in the bent grass the marks of shoes and some deeper prints from a heavier weight than the detective inspector’s. There on the fence was a torn piece of cloth caught on a barb of the wire. He smiled grimly and nodded to himself.

He climbed over himself, first breaking open the shotgun he was carrying for safety purposes. The two copper shells gleamed in the moonlight. He himself was no longer young and he was cautious with firearms. He didn’t want any accidents.

He walked down to the stream and in the mud by the side of the water he saw the confirmation he was looking for. There they were, the two sets of footprints he was expecting. He smiled to himself. The Volvo had been a neat touch and he congratulated her forward thinking. She’d guessed he would investigate any stray vehicle, and she had nearly had him fooled. The Volvo was perfect. He’d been checking for either her Audi or a car he would associate with that fat idiot sergeant. He snapped the shotgun closed and slid the safety off. He was not the kind of man who underestimated Hanlon.