Hidden Man (7 page)

The supermarket was noticeably less salubrious than the branch of Marks and Spencer’s in nearby St John’s Road, and lacked the international range and
flair of products available at Sainsbury’s. Nevertheless Taploe preferred Asda, largely because it was cheaper and closer to home. He eschewed fancy microwave meals, preferring to cookfrom scratch; indeed, he would derive a certain satisfaction from making a single item last for several days. He could, for example, let a medium-sized battery chicken suffice for three meals: roasted first, then curried, and finally cold. Every week he bought a packet of six Porkinson’s sausages (two meals), three fillets of salmon (one of which he would habitually freeze) and a ribeye steak with oven chips for Sunday lunch. He ignored the aisles given over to juices and did not buy food in tins. For something sweet, Taploe allowed himself ice cream, a single packet of Penguins and a punnet of Elsanta strawberries.

It was a Friday evening, the pre-weekend crowd, and thankfully there were precious few children screaming at the hips of single mothers. Weekafter week Taploe watched them bumping trolleys into shelves and walls, spilling bottles of Sunny Delight in egg-yolkpools on the floor. But he could move with comparative ease tonight, through fruit and veg to wines, and would be home within ten or fifteen minutes, depending on the queue at the tills.

Just before seven thirty his mobile rang.

‘Mr Taploe?’

It was Katy, a low-level researcher less than six months out of college with a degree in media studies from Exeter University. He liked the fact that she
sounded nervous on the phone and made a point of calling him ‘Mr Taploe’.

‘Yes, what is it?’

‘Well, I’ve been looking into Juris Duchev as you instructed, sir, and I’ve been advised by Paul Quinn to contact you directly with some information that I thinkyou might find of interest.’

Taploe was standing beside a bored shelf stacker. He moved towards the tills.

‘Go on.’

‘I’ve spoken to Interpol, sir, and they suspect that Duchev has been involved in at least two recent incidents still under investigation by the relevant law-enforcement authorities in those areas. The first was in Monaco three years ago, the shooting of a French investment banker with links to the Kukushkin organization. He was shot in his car waiting at traffic lights on the lower of the connecting roads between Monaco and Nice. The second tookplace in a Moscow suburb backin 1995.’ Katy breathed in quickly. It sounded as though she was searching through notes. ‘Again, that was a motorcyclist with a passenger riding pillion shooting directly into a vehicle. We suspect that if there’s
razborka
- the Russian term for the settling of a mafia dispute - then Juris Duchev is the individual who would carry it out on the mainland on behalf of the Kukushkin syndicate.’

Taploe didn’t say ‘Thankyou’ or ‘Well done’, simply: ‘Is there any record of arrest?’

‘None, sir. Not on the files. And nothing from RIA.’.

‘So your point is?’.

It was the bully in him, the small man.

‘Well, what we didn’t know, sir, is that Duchev has a UK right of residence. It just came up. At the moment he can come and go as he pleases.’

Taploe reached the end of Aisle 14 and stopped.

‘I see.’ The news irritated him, though he maintained a level tone of voice. ‘Well, thankyou for passing on that information. I’ll come in to see you after the weekend and we can discuss it further.’

‘Very well. Thankyou, sir.’

‘And Katy?’

‘Yes, sir?’

‘I know full well what
razborka
is. There was no need to enlighten me.’

‘Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.’

‘Goodbye.’

As he replaced the phone in his pocket, the back wheel of Taploe’s trolley caught on a sticky ball of waxed paper. He had to bend down to free it and missed a slot in the queue.
Duchev
, he thought. We let men like that live here, let them enter and leave at will. The British, in the name of decency and fair play, wave their enemies through the gates without so much as a glance. Tends to make my job harder, he mused, pushing towards the tills.

10

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Ben drink

Mark sweetheart

Very very busy here. On deadline. Yes, we talked about it last night. Basically he’s still very pissed off, obstinate, the usual thing, but I get the impression it’s not totally a lost cause. I mean how long can he keep going like this?

It’s like he’s making a point not just to his father, but to you, to me, to anybody he comes across. And of course to your mum. You know what B’s like when he makes his mind up.

If you think it’s a good idea then I would give it a try but I’m not sure how much luck you’ll have. I didn’t push it last night. I don’t want him to think I’m turning against him, and I didn’t say anything about you asking me, of course.

We’ve already arranged to meet in the Scarsdale pub at the back of the cinema on Ken High St - the place you came to before we went to the Doves concert. Can you be there by maybe half-past seven? There might be some people from work so be warned.

Lovely to see you the other night. Thanks for the vodka - weird bottle!

lol
Als
x

From: Mark Keen
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Ben drink

That sounds good. I’ll be there at 7.30 at the latest. Don’t mention anything to him about it, OK? I don’t want him to feel like we’re setting a trap or something.

Thanks for this Alice - I appreciate it a lot.

Mark

Mark hit ‘Send’ and wondered if this was a good idea; he doubted whether Alice would be able to keep their arrangement a secret. Sometimes, in fact, he couldn’t even remember why he was doing his father the favour.

11

Taploe waited for Keen in the downstairs seating area of a Baker Street coffee shop. American-owned, the chain was populated by a preppy clientele drinking foam-laden lattes at Internet terminals. Bewildered by the range of drinks on offer, it had taken Taploe more than three minutes to explain to the South African girl working behind the counter that he simply wanted a black coffee, nothing more, nothing less.

‘You want an espresso, then?’

‘No. Just a black coffee. A normal black coffee. In a mug.’

‘Do you want me to make it a double? That’s longer.’

‘No. I find espresso too strong. Look-‘

He scanned the menu board for the appropriate description. Latte. Mocha. Espresso. Ristretto. Mochaccino. Cappuccino. Iced Mochachino Latte…

‘It must be Americano,’ he said eventually. ‘That looks the closest.’

‘Americano!’ the girl shouted to her colleague and, given that there were four or five people queueing up behind him, Taploe felt that he could not now change his order.

‘Is that a shot of espresso with plenty of boiling water?’he asked.

‘That’s right, sir,’ she said, pointing to the counter on her left. ‘Your order’ll be ready in a few minutes. Can I help anyone please?’

Taploe had found a small round table at the rear of the basement where any conversation would be drowned out by the tapping of computer keyboards, the quack and beep of the World Wide Web. Twenty or thirty people, mostly students, were crowding up the seating area.

Taploe sensed Keen before he saw him, a sudden intimation of good taste and disdain moving through the room. He was wearing a long, darkovercoat and carrying a small white cup of espresso in his right hand. Taploe was reminded of a Tory grandee.

‘Christopher,’ he said.

‘Stephen.’ Taploe’s view of his joe was already coloured by the basic antipathy that existed between the organizations to which both men had dedicated the bulk of their working lives. But the sense Keen gave off of living in an infallible bubble of privilege added a particular hostility to his contempt.

‘Did you find the place all right?’ he asked.

‘No problem at all. But it’s bloody cold outside. They say it might snow.’

‘Well, thankyou for agreeing to the meeting at such short notice.’ Taploe sipped at his coffee but found that it was still too hot to drink. ‘I hope we didn’t put you out.’

‘Not at all. I have a dinner engagement in the West End at nine o’clock. The timing was rather convenient.’

Slowly, Taploe drew the tips of his fingers across the wooden surface of the table. It was an unconscious manifestation of his anxiety, and he was irritated with himself for showing it.

‘Can I get you anything from upstairs?’

Taploe could not think why he had asked the question. Keen simply lowered his eyes and indicated his espresso with a downward nod of the head.

‘Oh yes, of course.’

There was an embarrassed silence that Taploe eventually broke.

‘This shouldn’t take long,’ he said. ‘It was just to find out about your enquiries.’

Keen could see a Japanese student poring over notes held in a loose-leaf folder to the right of his chair. If Taploe considered this a secure environment in which to talk, he would take that on trust, but keep his remarks general to the point of being obtuse. Christian names. No specifics. Operational shorthands.

‘My view is very straightforward,’ he said. ‘If the lawyer is involved to any extent with the Russian organization then my son knows nothing about it. That would indicate to me that this is something that is happening only at the very highest level within the company. That is to say, only Thomas and perhaps Sebastian know anything about it.’

‘What makes you so sure?’

‘Body language. A certain openness about the way he answered my questions. No obvious nerves. As our American friends might put it, Mark is out of the loop.’

By his expression, Taploe seemed unconvinced.

‘What did he say about the lawyer?’ he asked.

‘Nothing that you won’t already know. Bit of a chancer, man about town. Taste for what certain people regard as the finer things in life. Champagne, oysters,
bliads
.’

Keen assumed correctly that Taploe would recognize the Russian slang for prostitute.

‘Is that right?’ He pursed out his lips. ‘To what extent is he involved in that when he’s in Russia?’

‘Happens mostly in Moscow, by the sound of it. You know the form. They hang around the hotel lobbies and mezzanine floors, looking for businessmen with a wedding ring…’

Taploe essayed an exaggerated frown, as if the moral implications of Macklin’s behaviour had briefly overwhelmed him. He looked visibly disappointed.

‘And is Mark involved with them as well?’

‘Good God, no.’

Keen’s reply was abrupt and Taploe wondered if he might have offended him. He found himself saying ‘Of course, sorry,’ and then again resented his own awkwardness. A clatter of schoolgirls came down into the basement bearing tall beakers of coffee. One had a lit cigarette in her hand and was smoking it without
skill, like someone sucking on the end of a pencil.

‘Is that an area you’re investigating?’ Keen asked. ‘Women being trafficked from eastern Europe, Russia and so on?’

Taploe’s eyes flicked across to the Japanese student who was still engrossed in his notes. Next to him, about three feet away, sat a vast man in his late thirties - surely American - dressed head to toe in Reebok sportswear. He was slowly typing an email using only the index finger of his left hand.

‘It’s certainly a possibility,’ he said, and swallowed a long intake of still-hot coffee. The roof of his mouth throbbed. ‘Did Mark add anything else in connection to that?’

‘Only that Thomas fools around with them in his hotel room. Perhaps he gets a discount.’

Taploe did not smile.

‘The impression I was given,’ Keen continued, ‘is that our lawyer friend is somewhat overwhelmed by the glamour of the way things work over there, the influence those boys wield. Unchecked power and unlimited violence. Excessive privilege for the select few. Free access to money, girls, narcotics, fast cars, restaurants; he’s in thrall to it all. The adrenalin, you see? Nothing like it over here, back in the old country.’

‘Yes,’ was all that Taploe managed to say, though everything that Keen was telling him fitted the emerging profile of Thomas Macklin. London surveillance had revealed nothing out of the ordinary: an on-off girlfriend (a receptionist in the City), the occasional
escort, no tendency to gamble, a mild, recreational cocaine habit. He had an enthusiasm for lap-dancing and expensive clothes, few close friends, and a tendency to become aggressive when drunk. Macklin paid his bills regularly, but at any one time his major credit card - Visa - was never less than two or three thousand pounds in the red. He had sufficient funds in other bank accounts to pay the debt off, but for some reason failed to do so; Paul Quinn, Taploe’s closest associate on the case, had put this down to little more than negligence. There was nothing unusual about Macklin’s phone records, either at work, from home or on his mobile, save for the fact that he always called his Kukushkin contact in London from public telephone boxes, from which the calls were harder to trace. That, at the very least, hinted at a degree of concealment. The Internet, thus far, had revealed little that Quinn and Taploe did not already know: Macklin used email frequently, but only to stay in touch with developments within Libra worldwide. There had been nothing of any consequence to the ongoing investigation in the analysis of his Internet traffic, only incidents that coloured the psychological profile.

‘And Mark? That sort of lifestyle doesn’t appeal to him?’ Taploe asked.

Keen swallowed his espresso in a single controlled gulp.

‘I’ve told you,’ he said. ‘He’s more sensible, more down to earth. Like his father.’

Taploe did not acknowledge the joke. He thought that this would help him to make up some ground.

‘But you’ve spent a lot of time in that part of the world,’ he said, deciding to take a risk. ‘You can understand why Thomas might be tempted by the high life?’