New York Valentine (29 page)

‘Don’t mention it, really. Delighted you thought of me. It’s absolutely no trouble at all,’ he assured her in his distantly-related-to-Royalty plummy voice. ‘Which police station is it?’

As soon as she told him, he said: ‘OK, I’ll meet you both there.’

‘Are you sure?’ she asked, but she was smiling at Owen now, a wave of relief washing over her.

‘Of course, no trouble at all. Now, just tell your boy not to say much to those chaps until I get there. On my way. Toodle pip.’

Now when Annie turned to Owen and said ‘It’s going to be OK’, she was much more convinced of it.

Annie hadn’t been inside a police station before. Well, not past the reception area. This station was very brightly lit with fluorescent strip lights in long rows along the ceiling. With Inspector Williams leading the way, they walked through wide corridors, passing rooms filled with desks, computer screens and untidy stacks of paperwork.

She didn’t want to be here and she certainly didn’t want Owen to be here. Her son was involved with pirated goods! Even if he hadn’t known too much about it, the people he worked with were breaking the law.

What if the market stall guys were here too? Gangster film plot-lines began speeding through her mind … what if they were going to try and stop Owen talking? She broke into an anxious sweat.

But there was Harry, striding towards them, cheery greetings not just for them but also for the inspector leading them through the station. Harry was as neatly suited and booted as if he’d just strolled out of his office, rather than been shaken from his bed.

‘Hello, hello there, lovely to see you.’ He swooped down on Annie for a cheek to cheek kiss, as if they were meeting at a garden party.

‘Owen,
splendid
to meet you.’ Harry held out his hand for a bemused Owen to shake. ‘Now, Inspector Williams, before we get settled down for any sort of formal interview, I’ll need to know all about your allegations, then I’ll have to have a jolly quick chat with my man here –’ he put his hand on Owen’s shoulder. It was a firm, protective hand and it signalled to Annie that Harry would take good care of Owen.

Once Harry had spoken in private to the inspector, a tiny interview room was found and Annie, Harry and Owen were ushered inside.

Here, Harry made sure Annie had a cup of tea at her side before he began calmly questioning Owen.

‘So what was the stall selling, Owen?’

‘CDs and DVDs.’

‘And you actually took part in selling these?’

‘Yeah.’

‘You offered them for sale and you took the cash?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Did you know that the CDs and DVDs were illegal copies?’

‘Well … some were proper second-hand, we bought them used from customers. But some looked a bit dodgy,’ Owen admitted.

‘Owen!’ Annie hissed, but she bit her lip at a glance from Harry.

‘Did you have anything to do with copying CDs or DVDs?’

‘No.’

‘Absolutely certain about that?’ Harry asked.

‘Yeah.’

‘Did you see anyone making copies?’

‘No.’

‘Totally positive about that too?’

‘Yeah.’

‘But you sold some CDs and DVDs that “looked dodgy” to you.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Did you sell porn DVDs, Owen?’

‘Not many,’ Owen said, giving his mum a guilty glance.

‘Right …’ Harry paused to make some notes.

‘So how did all that equipment end up in your bedroom?’ he asked.

‘The guys who run the stall asked me to look after it because they were moving flats.’

‘Did they drop it off?’

‘Yeah … they did it when I was the only person at home.’ Owen at least looked slightly shamefaced about this.

‘I see. What are the names of the people who run your stall?’

‘Does he have to tell the police?’ Annie squeaked, vividly imagining gang bosses turning up at their house in the dark of night intent on silencing her son …
aaaaargh!

‘There’s Dimitri, Sandy and Rob,’ Owen replied.

‘Do you know their last names?’

Owen screwed his eyes with concentration: ‘I think Dimitri’s is Theodopolus. Don’t think I know anyone else’s.’

‘Do you know their addresses?’

‘No. We just meet at the stall every week.’

‘How did you get to know these guys, Owen?’

‘We just got talking at the market one day.’

‘I see,’ Harry said lightly, but Annie felt her face burn with shame.

She’d let her 14-year-old son work on a market stall with people she’d not even met. Somehow she’d assumed maybe Ed had met them … or that Owen knew them through school friends. It had never occurred to her that these were dodgy blokes who’d got talking to her son one day and drawn him in to a
life of crime!
She should probably be grateful that Owen was only involved in DVD piracy. He could have been
abducted
and sold into
sexual slavery
by now. Quickly, she began to look in her handbag for tissues, convinced she was going to cry.

‘Do you have their mobile phone numbers?’ Harry continued.

‘Yes. On my phone.’ Owen reached into his anorak pocket, brought out a mobile and held it out to Harry.

Harry took it from him and slipped it into his own jacket pocket. ‘OK, I think just for now, we’ll say you haven’t brought your phone … if it comes up.

‘Right, so you knew them by their first names, you didn’t do any copying, but you did sell their stuff for them. Did you apply for the market stall licence?’

‘No, don’t know anything about that,’ Owen shrugged.

‘They’ve put the stall in your name, I believe.’

‘How?’ Annie wondered.

‘Maybe they just sauntered along to the town hall with some forged documents in Owen’s name.’

‘But why not just use another made-up name?’

‘Indeed.’

With his fountain pen, Harry wrote further notes. As Annie watched his loopy, illegible handwriting form across the page, she once again felt soothed.

‘OK Owen, here’s the plan,’ Harry said when he’d finished writing. ‘Be very, very nice and polite to our officers. Tell them everything you’ve told me – except the tiny bit about your phone – and if we’re extremely lucky, we might get off with a caution.’

As Harry led Owen in for his police interview, Annie had to wait on a hard plastic chair outside and brood. Her son was in a police station being interviewed about things he had done while she was gallivanting on the other side of the world. The guilt was going to kill her. She should have been right here, looking after him. She should have meddled right into his business. The money he was making! No way should she have turned such a blind eye to it. Money didn’t appear out of nowhere! People had to work hard for it. How much more of an alarm bell had she needed than for her 14-year-old son to be sending his dad to New York for a weekend?!

‘Annie, they’re just going to caution Owen now,’ Harry said, suddenly at her shoulder. She’d been so lost in guilt, she hadn’t even heard him come out. ‘You can come in for this … if you’d like to.’

Feeling dazed and mentally bruised, Annie walked out of the police station with a jaunty Owen and the ever-charming Harry, who clicked open the locks on his Bentley, held out the door for Annie and insisted that he give them a lift home.

There were so many things Annie needed to say to Owen. She had to make sure he was OK. She needed to ensure that he’d understood exactly what had happened here today. But these things would have to wait until they were back home, because right now, there was an urgent question for Harry burning in her mind.

‘Harry … thank you so much for what you did here for us today.’

‘Don’t even mention it,’

‘There’s something else I really need to talk to you about.’

‘Go on,’ Harry said.

‘Those people were copying porn in our house – on Owen’s computer. Is there any way that what they were copying could have somehow got on to the computer system at Owen’s school?’

‘Oh God!’ Owen slapped his forehead dramatically, ‘that’s it! That’s how it happened!’

Annie looked round at Owen in the back seat.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘Well, I know all about Dad’s suspension. I mean, I know you and Dad haven’t told me the full details but it’s all anyone can talk about at school. But that’s it! That’s how the viral stuff has ended up all over the school system and been traced back to Dad’s computer. Dimitri and the guys said they needed more back-up, so I gave them the password …’

When Owen saw the horrified look on his mother’s face, he exclaimed: ‘I didn’t know they were copying porn. Honestly, I had no idea.’

‘Owen!’
she hissed, ‘you are grounded … for the rest of the year! For the rest of your bloomin’ life!’

‘So, what’s all this about Ed?’ Harry wanted to know.

The more Annie told him about the situation, the more astonished Harry looked.

‘I don’t believe it,’ he spluttered. ‘I mean, yes, I can totally believe that Owen’s dodgy Daves have managed to infect the entire St Vincent’s system, but I can’t believe you let Ed stew about under a simply horrendous cloud like this without phoning me immediately! The school has suspended him, without a single shred of evidence. That is outrageous! Good Lord, Annie, by the time I’ve finished with them, they will rue the day. They will jolly well rue the day!’

Mr Ketteringham-Smith:

White shirt (M&S)
Grey suit (Austin Reed)
Blue tie (same)
Black shoes (Jones)
Watch (Timex, gift from mother)
Total est. cost: £450

‘I will be writing to your parents …’

St Vincent’s was an old-fashioned, traditional, private school. It was all about Victorian Gothic cloisters, lashings of wood panelling and children with regulation neat hair wearing woollen blazers.

So it was a little strange to see a bright yellow banner hanging over the school gates which read: ‘Bring on Mr Leon.’

‘That’s nice,’ Harry said from behind the wheel of the Bentley as he drove them smoothly into the courtyard. Whenever Svetlana went out in the family’s car, she hired a driver for the day. But Harry wasn’t flashy, he liked to drive the Bentley himself.

Ed, sitting in the front seat beside Harry, was blushing about the sign. Annie could tell even though she couldn’t see his face, because his ears always went red when he blushed.

‘Look, Dad,’ Owen spotted the banner for the first time: ‘someone’s put that up there for you! There was talk of everyone wearing badges as well. I wonder if anyone made the badges!’

‘You have got to be joking,’ was Ed’s astonished response.

‘I should bloody well think so! After all they’ve put you through,’ Annie said.

The Bentley glided to a standstill in the courtyard and immediately one of the sixth form prefects appeared to open doors and guide the party into the school’s reception area.

‘Time for me to split,’ Owen announced and ducked out of the way to join the rest of his class for the morning’s assembly. ‘Cheers for the lift, Harry!’

Not long after, the headmaster, Mr Ketteringham-Smith, appeared and shook everyone by the hand, including Ed, who looked increasingly awkward.

‘Ms Valentine – or do we call you Mrs Leon?’ Ketteringham-Smith asked as he took Annie’s hand and pumped it vigorously.

‘I’m Mrs Leon today,’ Annie told him, trying to make her smile genuine, but Kettingham-Smith and Annie had never quite seen eye to eye. There had been too many little awkward run-ins in the past. And as for the sight of the school bursar over there, Annie just about shuddered, remembering all the times in the past when she’d had to scrimp and save and pay the fees with a wing and a prayer and a totally over-extended credit card. How he’d looked down his nose at her then. She could never forgive him for that.

‘I’m absolutely delighted we can put all this behind us,’ Ketteringham-Smith was telling Ed. ‘So glad you could all join us for our special assembly. Mr Roscoff, you included.’

Harry shook the head’s hand brusquely.

‘Well, just want to make sure it’s all absolutely up to scratch, sir,’ Harry said, smiling with charm, then adding lightly, ‘otherwise I’ll be advising my client to sue.’

‘Oh, there will be no need for that,’ K-S laughed nervously.

‘I do hope not,’ Harry said and smiled just as sweetly as if he’d ordered a Pimm’s.

A bell rang, the sound of hundreds of footsteps thundering through the corridors followed and finally Harry, Ed and Annie were led in by the headmaster to take their seats up on the podium beside the other members of staff for this special assembly.

It was only after a hymn, a prayer and various notices for the day ahead that Mr K-S began his speech.

‘I would like to welcome back Mr Ed—’

He was interrupted by a cheerful round of applause punctuated with several whistles and whoops.

Annie had always known that Ed was a popular teacher, but such a vivid demonstration brought a lump to her throat.

‘I’m sure everyone here has heard all sorts of gossip and rumours about why Mr Leon has been away from school for a brief period. There was a computer virus which spread through the school’s system. I’m afraid this virus was, mistakenly, linked to Mr Leon’s computer.’

Mr K-S paused, looked up at the school then continued to deliver the difficult speech which Harry had thoroughly vetted.

‘I took the decision to suspend Mr Leon. I realize now that this was entirely the wrong decision. Mr Leon is a valuable member of staff who has given us many years of devoted service. There has never, ever been the slightest question as to his conduct or character. So when he told me he was entirely innocent, I should have believed him.

‘I am truly sorry that he has had to endure any gossip, rumour or hint that he behaved inappropriately. We should all hold Mr Leon in the highest regard and I will be writing to your parents to explain this situation fully. Thank you.’

As Mr K-S drew to a close, loud applause broke out, accompanied once again by whistles and cheers. Ed, shy and overwhelmed, blushed deeply pink and gave his audience a smile and wave of acknowledgement. Annie reached over to hold his hand in hers and to whisper in his ear: ‘Fantastic! You’re going to be the school star for a week or two.’