The Fire Man (25 page)

He was cold. Cold, and very wet. One side of his face was partly underwater. His breathing was difficult and the terrible throbbing, splitting pain in the back of his head was almost unbearable. His eyelids flickered but he could see nothing, just blackness.

Slowly, apart from the shattering agony in his neck and head, he became dully aware of other sensations. His face was cold and wet, and it felt as if his lips had swollen enormously. There was something badly wrong with his nose. Something hard in one of his pockets was digging into him, but he felt totally incapable of any movement.

With what felt like a superhuman effort, he finally opened his mouth a fraction and felt water trickle between his giant lips. He could taste blood, grit and soil, and the parched tongue accepted the moist trickle with gratitude. His teeth were damaged and felt foreign; the rough, chipped edges grated against his tongue.

The cotton wool of his mind was impenetrable, like a pulsing cocoon of pain, but other senses slowly began to intrude. The cold, the soaking wetness of his clothes and, somewhere in the distance, a low electric whine.

Opening his eyes, even a crack, was painful. Lifting his face away from the puddle was impossible. He felt paralysed.
Was this death?

The pain in the back of his head was unbearable. He forced himself to move a hand, but nothing happened. Was his back broken? He opened his eyes again, defying the pain. Where was he? Apart from a sheet of broken tarmac and a large expanse of puddle inches from his face, he could make out nothing but shadows. The effort was too much. The eyes flickered closed again, but now he could feel the ice-cold wet fingers of his right hand. He flexed the hand – it moved. He shifted his left leg; consciousness and a vague sense of being were returning, but all he felt was a sense of confused relief. He had no desire to move.

A slight tremor passed through his cheek. It happened again and as his eyes opened, the surface of the puddle in front of him began to tremble strangely. He could hear something low and quiet behind his head.

Pushing with his arms, he slowly turned his ravaged face towards the source of the distant noise. All he could see was a crumbling brick wall a few feet from his face. As he gazed, uncomprehending, at the wall, something about it seemed distantly familiar. He closed his eyes and fell back into the blessed dark.

A dull thump caused him to re-open his eyes with a start; he saw the brickwork vibrate violently. He turned his head awkwardly skywards and gazed towards the top of the leaning wall, which towered darkly above him. As he did so, the wall shuddered again and, to his stunned horror, bricks began to dislodge from the top course. One struck his right arm a glancing blow, which, in his panic, he barely felt. The wall was coming down.

He had to get away from the wall.

With every ounce of his virtually non-existent energy, he began to crawl painfully towards the shadows away from the wall. Ahead of him, he could make out a cave. If only he could reach the cave, he would be safe. He could sleep.

In the microsecond that the pain surged through his body with the power of a tsunami, he realised he had been too late – far too late.

O'Connell was seething. This whole game had gone to fuck. He would have to get out now and close everything down, all because bleeding Alex had been too soft. If he had only followed his instincts, McRae would have been dealt with a long time ago, but oh no, Alex had simply wanted to frighten the guy off.

He had always been the same, full of his public school “fair play” shit. The man thought he was a gambler, but he didn't really want to play when the stakes got high. The other one was just the fucking same, although at least he didn't pretend to be tough. Scared of his own shadow was Derek. What he knew for sure was that Derek was terrified of him, with good reason; so perhaps he didn't need to worry about him? He pondered on the issue.

O'Connell had only ever truly trusted two or three people in his entire life, even his brothers in the IRA. He knew he certainly couldn't rely on Kanelos. Well, if he hadn't decided before, he certainly had now. All the loose ends would have to be tied up.

The boy would be fine; after all, he had some of his own blood in his veins. He had been shitting himself when he sent him off back to Liverpool, but he knew that he would never have a problem with Martin. He knew how to keep his mouth shut. The promise that he would be able to join him later in the States had been enough to keep him quiet.

There was no obvious connection between him and Smythson, and neither of them had any traceable legal involvement with Le Copa. So far as he knew, no bugger had seen the boy enter or leave the warehouse – not today, not ever. The only exception to this was McRae, of course, and he wouldn't be talking to anyone.

He wasn't worried about George either. Gallo's involvement had always been as the frontman for the operations, and while in truth he knew almost everything, he was a proper tough Greek and not some hybrid like Alex. George understood honour. He also only knew part of the equation and had been deliberately (and gratefully) kept in the dark. What he didn't know, he couldn't tell.

No, it was simply Alex and, maybe, Smythson who needed to be dealt with, and he had a pretty good idea of how to wrap everything up sweetly. It was just a pity he would have to wait a few weeks. Regardless, though, with any luck he would benefit from a grand finale.

* * *

O'Connell had owned the Chicago house for three years. It was a roomy, three-storey, four-bedroomed house on Canal Street in Bridgeport on the South Side. He could have got good money from letting it out, but he had never bothered, as he was conscious he might one day need it in a hurry. It was the same with the US passport. He'd had it for six years, even used it a couple of times with no trouble. It wasn't some dodgy copy, it was the real thing – the best that money could buy. All in all, “Michael Ahearne” had a complete identity in Chicago – he even had friends for Christ's sake.
Certainly more than in this shithole
, he thought. The move to the States would be no problem.

Forward planning had always been Michael O'Connell's forte. The PIRA had appreciated his coolness and God only knew they had enough hotheads. A bit of intelligence had always been at a premium. He would have liked to have done more for the organisation and for the cause, but after the debacle in Dublin and the so-called “Peace Process”, they had been happy for him to make a bit of money in England so long as he kept a steady trickle coming back over the water. It had worked well for everybody – at least it had until McRae had stumbled onto the scene.

He blamed Derek for mishandling the whole Birmingham affair. He didn't claim to understand why Derek had appointed McRae's adjusting outfit in the first place. And although he could just about appreciate the rationale, he was pretty sure that getting the guy kicked out of his job hadn't been smart. If there was one thing O'Connell understood very well, it was the bearing of grudges.

In his own way, he could almost identify with McRae's dogged pursuit of the truth. In the unlikely event of his ever being in a similar position, it was what he would probably have done himself. He even had a grudging respect for the man. Kanelos had completely misjudged the guy in his opinion, and he despised himself for allowing Alex to persuade him to try the soft approach. The whole fucking business could have been sorted with a simple accident miles away from O'Meara Street, but now he was stuck with a bloody body next door.

On the good side, it seemed that no one had observed the wall collapse. The area was as dead as you could find in London and apart from the pub, hardly any of the surrounding properties had been occupied. Legally the wall belonged to the pub, everyone knew it had been in dodgy condition and old walls collapsed after heavy rain all the time. So far as he knew
,
McRae had had no connection with Le Copa whatsoever. The only mystery would be what the man had been doing in the beer garden in the first place and that wasn't any of their concern. McRae hadn't been married, he lived alone, he was a bit of a lone wolf – no one would miss him.
Bit like himself
, he thought.

The way he saw it, with any luck the police wouldn't ever associate the tragic wall collapse with Le Copa. Gallo would never be let in on the facts and his ignorance would be their greatest defence.

* * *

Once the wall had come down, he and the boy had remained in the silent darkness of the warehouse for over twenty minutes, listening keenly for the slightest sound. There had been nothing. No lights, no sirens, no alarmed voices – just the sound of the rain. He had been surprised that the landlord of the pub, the guy with the ponytail, hadn't come down to take a look, but he clearly hadn't heard a thing in his bedroom at the front.

‘Probably listening to Iron Maiden on his fucking headphones,' Martin had whispered.

Finally, after waiting tensely for a few further minutes, O'Connell had concluded that no one was showing the slightest interest in the collapse and that it was safe to leave. Nonetheless, they chose the back exit into the darkness of the lane.

What remained of the shattered wall still stood over seven feet in height. Neither of the men could see directly into the pub yard, but the dreadful, horrific damage that must have been wreaked by the tons of falling brickwork caused Martin to shudder as graphic images flashed into his brain.

He hadn't signed up for this. He was just the “fire man”.

The odd couple drove as rapidly as Suzanne could manage from Liverpool Street to Commercial Road. An awkward silence prevailed.

We have nothing in common
, she thought,
apart from the fact that neither of us have bothered with make-up
– unless you counted the residual smudge of eyeliner that clung obstinately to her own face. The policewoman was a cold type; Suzanne couldn't begin to envisage her with McRae.
Attractive enough
, she supposed,
but very clipped and controlled
.
Silent
,
but not as if lost in thought – just silent.

Tina, for her part, had been surprised by the chaotic, babbling, excitable young woman who had picked her up on the station approach. Somehow, the girl wasn't quite what she had expected. She wished she would shut up and just concentrate on the driving. She needed to think and it was hard to concentrate with this incessant questioning.

As they drove, Tina tried calling McRae for the umpteenth time. Again, the phone rang out before switching to voicemail. Wherever he was, the phone was still active. She finally decided she could no longer keep the matter unofficial. She would just have to deal with the consequences and talk her way out of the mess.
Misusing police resources is a serious disciplinary matter. Let's hope it doesn't come to that!

A quick call to Thames Valley Technical Support was all it took. They agreed to speak to the phone company and get a fix on the location of McRae's phone. It would take around ten minutes, maybe a little longer at this time of the day. She hung up, horribly aware that she had taken far too long to make this simple step. She was also acutely conscious that McRae might simply have lost his phone or (
God forbid
) be sleeping with some woman somewhere. Now that would be embarrassing – deathly humiliating, in fact. She dismissed the thought. Somehow, she was certain that the position was more serious than that.

As Suzanne turned the silver Vauxhall Astra – untidy and in serious need of a carwash – into the Great Eastern Street one-way system, she spoke again: ‘How long have you and Drew been an item?'

‘We're not an item. We're just friends,' replied Tina, in a voice that discouraged further enquiry.

‘What about you, how long have you worked with him?'

The conversation dragged on in a similarly banal way until they reached Whitechapel. It hadn't taken long; the traffic was still light, almost non-existent by London standards. Tina glanced at her watch: 5.48. The drizzle that had been persistent was beginning to lift, but it was still not quite dawn.

‘There it is,' said Suzanne.

Tina gazed through the smeared windscreen at the pub on their right-hand side, where, apart from a light on the top floor, all was in darkness.

‘Drive past and park at the bottom of the side street, please.'

Suzanne turned into O'Meara Street and, as they cruised the few yards across the cobbles towards the dead end, Tina saw the Le Copa sign on the left. Again, the warehouse appeared as dead as the proverbial doornail.

‘Okay. Can you see if you can raise the landlord while I take a quick look around? I'll catch up with you in a couple of minutes.'

Before Suzanne could even respond, Tina had left the car and was striding athletically back towards the junction.

It didn't take long for her to get a sense of the simple geography of the pub and the factory, but she found little of interest. The rear alley was not particularly narrow, but it was constricted enough to prevent any real view of the backs of the properties. She tentatively tried the rear access doors to both the pub and factory yards, but both were locked.

By the time she re-joined Suzanne at the O'Meara Street entrance to the pub's lounge bar, a somewhat dishevelled bare-chested figure in paisley-patterned jogging pants was unbolting the door.

‘Mr Montague, sorry to disturb you this early.' Suzanne smiled sweetly.

Bewildered, Dwayne Montague looked blankly at the two women. ‘It's only six o clock; what do you want? It's not about the bloody wall is it?'

Suzanne started to explain, ‘No, it's—'

She was interrupted abruptly by Tina, ‘Look, can we come in? I'm D.C.I. Forsyth of Thames Valley Police and this is—'

‘I know who she is. Anyway, you'd better come in.'

He led the way into the bar. Conscious that the whole situation must seem surreal to the half-awake landlord, Tina quickly explained that they were seeking the whereabouts of McRae.

‘But why the hell would he be here?' said the man.

‘Let's just say that we believe he may be in this vicinity,' replied Tina. ‘Mind if I take a look around?'

‘Go ahead; feel free. You can look wherever you want, but I don't think he's here. I might as well make a cuppa while you're at it – want one?' His natural good nature had quickly returned.

‘Uh, yes please,' replied Suzanne. Tina nodded.

‘I'll start down here, you start at the top,' instructed Tina.

* * *

The search had revealed nothing by the time the two women met on the second floor. They trooped back down the staircase to the bar where Dwayne had set out a couple of mugs of tea and a sugar bowl on the bar counter.

Tina picked up her mug, eschewed the sugar and sank wearily down into a chair. As she did so, her mobile rang. She quickly went outside to take the call.

When she returned, she found Suzanne and Dwayne looking at her expectantly. ‘The fix on his phone shows it to be here. At least, somewhere near the junction of Whitechapel Road and O'Meara Street. It doesn't mean he is here, but his phone definitely is! I think we had better start looking again.'

Energised, she stared fiercely at Suzanne. ‘Ready?'

‘Of course.'

‘Okay, you start at the top this time and I'll start in the cellar.'

* * *

Accompanied by Dwayne, whose chest tattoos increasingly fascinated her, Suzanne fished around the landlord's surprisingly neat flat before rapidly concluding that wherever the phone was, it certainly wasn't in the apartment.

‘I thought you'd come about the wall your boss was on about,” couldn't understand how you knew about it already' said Dwayne, by way of conversation.

‘What about it?' she replied. ‘Well, it collapsed in the bloody rain last night – looks a right bleeding mess. The funny thing is that it made hardly any noise. I only noticed it when I went to the bathroom about 3am; I could just see piles of sodding debris and knew immediately what had happened. It's been dodgy for months.'

She strolled through to the bathroom and raised the roller blind. Looking down, she could clearly see that the dividing wall had indeed partially collapsed. Large sections of brickwork lay scattered across the right-hand side of the beer garden, some of which had demolished the picnic benches. A sudden thought struck her. ‘Have you been down there?' she asked.

‘Fat bloody chance,' replied Dwayne indignantly. ‘It's only just getting light, innit? You woke me up, you did!'

Without a further word, she turned and ran down the stairs, shouting for Tina as she went. ‘We've got to check the garden, the wall's down,' she shouted as she dashed past the startled Tina and into the rear passage.

‘Hold your horses, ladies, you'll need the key.' Dwayne shouldered his way past the women and led the way to the rear door, before unlocking it.

The right side of the yard was littered with loose bricks and jagged pieces of fractured brickwork, which lay in peaks and troughs like a miniature mountain range. It was a chaotic scene, with upended trestle tables, crushed chairs, drunken parasol umbrellas and the pervading smell of old damp mortar.

Silently Tina took out her phone and dialled McRae's number. ‘Quiet,' she ordered and the trio stood mutely amongst the shadowy scene of destruction.

It was faint, but distinct. Suzanne's ears detected it first. The opening bars of ‘Stairway to Heaven' echoed dully in the damp air.

‘Oh my God!' She buried her face in her hands and grabbed at Tina's arm as her knees buckled.