Dark Matter (13 page)

'So something hit the chamber then?’  Eddie asked, more to himself than John. 

'Yes,' said John, not really having focused on what Eddie had said 'something hit the chamber.................Something hit the chamber.  Something hit the chamber.  Something hit the chamber…or at least it hit something in the chamber!  That’s it Eddie!  You’ve got it!'  John became animated, his face unusually expressive he smiled at his brother, a beacon of hope.  'The experiment didn’t cause the explosion, not directly anyway.  Something in the chamber was hit by something else passing through the chamber.  That something else must have had tremendous momentum.  Now given that nothing of any significant size entered the chamber, it must be extremely small, with incredible mass and velocity.'

Eddie looked at John and asked.

'What does that all mean?' 

'It means,' John replied barely able to control his excitement 'that I may have discovered a new particle, one that is much faster than light.'

7
Arrests

18:07   06 November [00:07  07 November GMT]

Banks Jewellers, Av Presidente Masaryk, Polanco District, Mexico City.

Closing time had officially passed.  Leroy started cashing up, the least glamorous job in any store, it is usually undertaken by the most junior of staff; Leroy never minded it though.  Leroy was used to cashing up; often relishing it. 
The day's takings are quite good,
Leroy thought,
the manager of this store appears to be doing a fine job for the owner.
That thought made Leroy smile, as he was the owner of the store, and not just this one.  Leroy Banks was a successful jewellery retailer with a chain of seven high quality stores. 

Leroy grew up in the worst part of L.A., whilst some of his African-American peers went on to deal drugs; he decided that was not the life for him.  Leroy had gotten a job early in his life working in a local jewellery store.  He had paid attention and learnt all he could; rising quickly to store manager, when the owner came to retire and having no children, it seemed natural to offer to sell the business to Leroy.  In an amazing gesture of faith in him, his boss even acted as guarantor on the loan he persuaded the bank to give Leroy to buy the business.  Leroy never looked back after that, but nor did he forget what his old boss had done for him.

Leroy was helping the manager to close up in store number five.  Leroy thought of all his stores like children, this was the fifth one born into his retail business, Banks Jewellers.  As Leroy was cashing up he was also keeping a watchful eye on one of the last patrons.  He looked local, nervous and out of place.  Banks Jewellers catered for the elite.  This patron looked high on something.  That was not uncommon.  Some of his best clients looked like they slept rough; it was just a question of style and background.  Those with new money, especially made in film or music, tended to dress down, a lot.  This guy however looked different; his clothes were cheap, not expensive trying to look cheap.  Now there was just the guy and an elderly woman.  The woman, he could tell, came from old money, the broach she wore obviously a priceless antique.  The nervous guy had backed up to the entrance. 
Shit!!
, thought Leroy, a fraction of a second before the nervous guy grabbed one of the young sales assistants pushing her into the centre of the store, pulling out a hand gun and pointing it at Leroy.  He threw his backpack onto the counter.

'Fill this up!'  .

Leroy picked up the backpack and started putting the cash into it but keeping an eye on the thief's gun.  This was not Leroy's first robbery.

'Faster!'  The thief shouts, unhappy with the speed at which Leroy is filling the backpack, to show he is serious he hits the old woman with the butt of his gun, sending her crashing to the ground.  As she lay there on the floor, Leroy could see that her head was being bathed in an increasing pool of blood.  Leroy’s heart raced, his blood cooled and his mind cleared.  Leroy held the cash bag high up and out to the side with his left hand gently rocking it to and fro, like a pendulum.

'Here’s the money, here’s the money'.

The thief, transfixed by the sight of the bag, like a predator fixed on wounded pray, he could not take his eyes off it.  Not until his peripheral vision took in the approach of the Glock 9mm in Leroy’s right hand and which Leroy was moving towards the thief's head.  The thief swings his gun wildly toward Leroy, but too late.  Leroy finishes the robber’s life of crime with a single shot to the head.  As Leroy covers the thief on the ground, and knowing that the thief's life is ebbing away he whispers to him.

'You could have taken the money asshole; I would have given you the money.  But you had to hit the old lady didn’t you…………now you ain’t gonna hit anyone else, ever.'

18:19   06 November [00:19  07 November GMT]

Banks Jewellers, Av Presidente Masaryk, Polanco District, Mexico City.

The Mexican police were quickly on the scene.  They had left when the silent alarm had alerted them that a jewellery store in the very upmarket Polanco district was being robbed.  The two officers entered the store, weapons drawn, the second covering the entry of the first. 
Six occupants,
he counted to himself,
two down
.
Of the four standing, two are male and two female.  The women, are quite young and undoubtedly in the early stages of shock.  They have name badges marking them out as sales assistants.
  The policeman turned his attention to the two men, still keeping the whole room covered from the entrance. 
One male is white, a local by the look of him, again the name badge, possibly the store manager. 
That left the black male. 
The black male is well-dressed, tall, around six feet, bald with a moustache that meets under his chin, a kind of mini-goatee.  Fit and probably late thirties
.  The most important feature to the officer was that he was stood close to the people on the floor and closer still to a mean looking handgun, a nine-millimetre if he was correct.  Keeping his eyes alert he looked at the two people on the floor.

One an elderly female with what appeared to be a head wound; the other...the other he recognised even with most of the back of his head missing.  It was Ricardo Gonzales; he had arrested him just a few months ago for drug dealing and weapons offences. 
He should have been coming to trial in a week or so.  Probably trying to raise the money for a lawyer.

'You' the officer said in Spanish to the store manager, pointing with his gun.  'Tell me who you are and what happened here.'

The store manager stood perfectly still, very aware of the gun pointed at him.  The second that day, he reflected. 

'I am Rafael Hernandez, the store manager.  These ' he said waving his right hand towards the two sales assistants, 'are Catarina and Maria they work for me.'

He stopped instantly; the policeman's gun had moved to target the store manager's heart region in response to his waving his right arm.  The store manager slowly relaxed his right arm to his side and went back to standing perfectly still. 

'To my left' the store manager continued, making sure he didn't even nod in that direction, 'is Mr Banks, he owns this store, and he shot the robber, who is lying on the floor.  The robber hit the old woman.’  He added, by way of explanation.

The policeman called to his partner, who came around his right side, making sure not to get in his line of sight, the second officer approached Leroy, crouched down bending his knees not his back, and reached for the handgun on the floor.  All the time keeping his eyes fixed on Leroy.  Leroy didn't move at all but kept his gaze on the first officer, aware of the second with his peripheral vision, he was taking great care not to “eye ball” the officer as that would only increase the tension in the room.  Once the second officer had retrieved the handgun from the floor in front of Leroy, and retreated to the side of his colleague, Leroy ventured into speaking.

             
'Thank you for getting here so quickly.’  He said, clean simple words; he hoped their English was good. 

'You're welcome.'  The first officer said, in English.

Everyone in the room relaxed a little more.  A second police car arrived with two more officers, shortly followed by an ambulance crew.  They checked the two people on the floor and finding the male with a large proportion of his brain missing, they worked on the elderly female, her blood-pressure was low but stable, they moved her into the ambulance and left. 

The two sales assistants were allowed seats as they were definitely in shock now; trembling, shaking, crying they weren't making much sense either.  One of the other officers knew the store manager, who in turn again vouched for Leroy.  Despite this, Leroy was handcuffed and taken to the police station.

18:50   06  November [00:50  07  November GMT]

Central Police Station, Mexico City, Mexico
.

The drive from his store to the police station was not a pleasurable one for Leroy.  Handcuffed in the back of the police car, with a large metal grill between him and the officers in the front he couldn't pretend that he was taking a taxi to the hotel or being chauffeured to the airport. 

His time at the police station made him feel immediately nostalgic for the drive in the police car.  Fingerprinting, being photographed, DNA swabbed and then locked in a cell with criminals; Leroy's heart sank lower with each activity.  His cellmates didn't speak English, and he didn't speak Spanish.  He sat in silence and started to wonder at the number of things that had had to happen, in sequence, to bring him to this point.  He could have visited his Mexico store on another day, or had been visiting another store.  He could have left the cashing up to his staff and left for his hotel before the arrival of the thief.  The thief could have picked a different day, time or store.  He could have left the elderly woman alone and lived.  Leroy could have been unarmed or he could have chosen to let the robber hurt someone else. 
Random chance
, he thought to himself.
I end up here just because of random chance.

It was two hours before Leroy was finally called forth as his lawyer had arrived.  He had no way of knowing, as he was no longer in possession of his watch or his phone.  His lawyer, it turned out, was one of the best in the city, called by his store manager as soon as he had seen Leroy arrested.  The lawyer had come on recommendation from the firm's corporate law firm.  Expensive, but then the best usually are however; the store manager had warranted that his boss would expect nothing less.

Leroy sat in a private interview room alone with his lawyer.  He took him through the events of that afternoon.  His lawyer made him go through it again, twice more, to check his story for consistency.  He had learned this from his mentor years before, there is nothing worse than changing your story, even slightly, in front of the police, or heaven forbid, a courtroom.

Leroy finished his third telling of the day and was then questioned intently by his lawyer.  He knew the truth when he heard it, and it seemed to him that Leroy was both telling the truth and holding nothing back.  Finally, the lawyer gave his opinion.

'Well,' he began, 'it is good that I was called because you are in a great deal more trouble than you realise.' 

Leroy's face fell at this, he felt bad at being arrested, of being held in a cell, but he knew he had done nothing wrong; he had protected people, probably saved lives.  Leroy began to think that his lawyer was exaggerating to justify a big fee,
fine
, he thought to himself,
let him charge what he wants I just want to get out of here.

'Firstly, and most crucially,' the lawyer began, 'is the issue of your gun.  Unlike the United States gun ownership is illegal in Mexico.  The fact that the gun was illegal means that the shooting must also be illegal; this means that you will be charged with murder.  You will undoubtedly be found guilty at your trial as it would be unthinkable if it were to happen any other way.'

He saw Leroy's face fall even further at this news, his shoulders slumping too, he carried on, believing it was best to get all of the bad news out in front.

'Our best hope, only hope really, is to appeal it as far as we can, my country is not big on case law, but it can happen, we will have to build such a case that a senior judge is persuaded to make us a precedent.  That is a huge deal here.'

'I just want to get out of here.'

'I know.'  The lawyer responded, actually feeling for his client.  ‘However the fact that you are a foreigner, with business interests abroad and considerable available funds facing a murder charge makes you a flight risk.  Bail for you will be most unlikely, but I will push for it.  Finally…'

There had to be
a
finally
, Leroy thought.

'…with local elections around the corner,' the lawyer continued.  'you might be made an example of, which could go one way or another.  I will arrange some positive media coverage to try to push things our way.'

'What…what’s going to happen to me?' 

'Well, the police will interview you.  But don't worry I will guide you through it, just stick to the truth.  Then you will be formally charged and taken to prison.  Your case will be given over to the
agente
, that's the district attorney's office, this will be state, rather than federal as homicide is a state crime.  It will probably take around a year before you go to trial to be found guilty, and then we can start the appeals process.'

'A year.'  Leroy said, incredulously, 'A year?  I will have to be in prison for a year?'

'Longer probably.  At least a year I would estimate, maybe two or more depending on how the appeals process goes.'

             
'What will I do?'

'Well there are practical matters that need to be addressed, such as who will run your business in your absence.  In addition, our prisons are not like yours.  You will be charged rent on your cell, and for your food and other things.  The food also is not great, it would be best if you arranged for your food to be brought in to you.  I will give you the name of someone who is familiar with all this and they will make the arrangements.  Also, you should start to learn Spanish; those guards who do speak English are often limited in their vocabulary.  Now, we should prepare ourselves for the interview, just remember, stick to the truth, and leave nothing out.'