The Red Herring (27 page)

‘Which letter?'

‘The letter of complaint about my behaviour that your boss will be sure to want to send to the chief constable the moment he gets back from conductin' his “family business” in London,' Woodend said.

Roger Cray shifted his weight slightly in an attempt to find a more comfortable position on the straight-backed chair.

They couldn't do this to him, he told himself for the hundredth time. This was England, not Russia. In England there were solicitors and barristers, trial by jury and writs of habeas corpus. Citizens couldn't be detained without being charged. That simply didn't happen!

But it
had
happened. He had spent an almost sleepless night in this room with the bricked-up window. All he had been given to eat were sandwiches so old that their ends had started to curl up. And when he had wanted to use the toilet, he had been forced to use a bucket – a bucket! – in the corner of the room.

He heard the key turning in the lock of the steel door, then the door itself swung open and the man who called himself Horrocks was standing there.

‘Are you feeling a little more co-operative this morning, Mr Cray?' Horrocks asked, somehow managing to sound both solicitous
and
contemptuous.

‘I . . . I want to see my lawyer,' Cray croaked, realising how dry his mouth felt.

‘Your friend Dove's been singing like a bird all night,' Horrocks lied. He laughed. ‘That's rather good, isn't it? Dove? Singing like a bird? But it's
what
he's been singing about that's important. From what he's already told us, we've got enough evidence to lock you up and throw away the key. And that's exactly what we're going to do, unless . . .'

Unless what?'

‘Unless you decide you'll give us some of the details that Mr Dove's holding back on – in which case I'll do my best to see that you get off with a lighter sentence.'

Cray ran his tongue nervously over lips which felt like they were made from sandpaper. ‘What . . . what do you want to know?'

‘That's better,' Horrocks told him. ‘What I'd really like to know is exactly what information was in the secret papers you handed over to your little friend in the park the day before yesterday.'

‘Hasn't he given them to you?'

Horrocks frowned. ‘Unfortunately, he's already passed them on – and we can only speculate as to where they ended up.'

‘But you
know
where they'll have ended up,' Cray protested. ‘They'll be in London.'

‘Possibly they will. But we both know that is only the first stage on their long journey.'

‘No, it's––'

‘What was in them?' Horrocks demanded. ‘Drawings of the fuselage? Plans for the engine?'

‘No. It was nothing like that at all. It was mainly costing estimates.'

Horrocks shook his head mournfully. ‘Now why should the Russians be interested in costing estimates?' he asked.

‘The Russians?' Cray exclaimed, amazed. ‘What are you talking about? They were never intended for the Russians. They were supposed to go to the newspapers.'

‘You must think I was born yesterday,' Horrocks said.

‘Look, this is how it happened,' Cray said desperately. ‘I'd already started to have some sympathy for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament before Martin Dove ever approached me, and when he told me how, given my position, I could help, it all made sense.'

‘How you could help!' Horrocks repeated. ‘That's just another way of saying, how you could betray your country, isn't it?'

‘No,' Cray protested. ‘We didn't want to betray
anybody
. We just wanted to show the British public that not only are nuclear arms morally wrong, they also eat up money which could be much better used elsewhere. The TSR2 is costing a fortune – and it's all for nothing, because it'll never fly. It's the biggest white elephant we've ever built, and we thought the British people had a right to know.'

‘So that's what your masters in Moscow instructed you to do, is it?' Horrocks asked.

‘Oh, for God's sake, you're talking like a schoolboy,' Cray said exasperatedly. ‘When are you people ever going to grow up?'

Walter Hargreaves sat at the opposite side of his desk from Woodend, nervously twisting another paper clip in his hands.

‘I don't quite understand why you're here, Chief Inspector,' the deputy head said. ‘As I understood it, you're now working on the kidnapping rather than the murder.'

‘So I am,' Woodend replied, ‘but since there's not much I can do in that direction at the moment, I thought I might as well give my sergeant a bit of a helping hand on the Verity Beale case.'

Besides, he added mentally, if I'd just sat there at my desk, waitin' for Reginald Dunn to make his move, I'd have stood a very good chance of losin' what's left of my sanity.

‘I don't really see what I can tell you now that I haven't already said before,' Hargreaves told him.

‘You probably don't,' Woodend agreed. ‘But that's because you think you can still get away with feedin' me the same load of old bollocks you've been dishin' out since this investigation started. Well, you can't. I'm sick of bein' buggered about an' chasin' my own shadow.'

‘I beg your pardon?'

Woodend sighed. ‘Don't make it any more difficult than you have to, Mr Hargreaves.'

‘I'm still not sure what you want me––'

‘Last night, Sergeant Paniatowski was down in Woolwich, which, since it's where the Arsenal is, makes it a very sensitive place in some ways. She went to the local pub, an' got talkin' to some of the people who drink there regularly. An' it turns out that until last summer, one of them regulars was a redheaded woman called Vanessa Barker. Tell me, does anythin' strike you as particularly significant about that name, Mr Hargreaves?'

‘No, I don't think so.'

‘You're an educated man with a quick brain, Mr Hargreaves. You can do better than that.'

‘I suppose you mean that she has the same initials as Verity Beale,' the deputy head said resignedly.

‘Aye, that's exactly what I mean,' Woodend agreed. ‘I've come across that kind of thing quite a lot durin' my time on the force.'

‘What kind of thing?'

‘Criminals changin' their names but keepin' their proper initials. Not that I'm sayin' Miss Beale, or Miss Barker – or whatever else her bloody name really happened to be – was a criminal. But it doesn't surprise you to learn that she was involved in somethin' which was not – how shall I put it? – exactly on the level. Now does it?'

‘No,' Hargreaves said. ‘It doesn't.'

‘So why don't you tell me about it?'

‘I knew something was not quite right from the start. When the headmaster interviews potential new staff, he always does it here at the school. That's a common enough practice in all schools. It gives the interviewees the opportunity to see the place they'll be working in if they take the job, so they can decide for themselves if they're going to be happy there.'

‘But that didn't happen in this case?'

‘No. The headmaster went down to London for a couple of days, and when he came back he simply announced that he'd hired a new history teacher. We hadn't even advertised the post.'

‘An' there's more, isn't there?'

‘Yes, there's more. Shortly before Miss Beale started working in the school, the headmaster called me down to his study and said that there were special conditions attached to her employment. If she didn't appear at school in the morning, I was not to ring her up to find out what had happened, as I would do with other staff. And however many days she had off work, I was not to ask her for a doctor's note when she eventually appeared again. If her head of department complained to me about her teaching, I was told to assuage him as best I could. If parents complained, I was to deal with them, too.'

‘An' what conclusions did you draw from that?'

‘Isn't that obvious?'

‘Maybe. But I'd still prefer you to spell it out for me.'

‘All right,' Hargreaves agreed. ‘Given the headmaster's wartime background in intelligence work, and given the sensitive nature of some of the installations in the area – the base and the aircraft factory – I was reluctantly forced to come to the conclusion that she was a government agent.'

‘You mean, you think she was a spy?'

‘I suppose so.'

‘Then say it!'

‘I think she was a spy.'

‘Which is why you weren't entirely surprised when you were told that she'd ended up murdered?'

‘I don't think I'd actively thought she'd be killed – we never really imagine there's ever going to be such drama in our own lives – but when I
was
informed, it certainly didn't come as the shock it would have been if any other member of staff had been murdered.'

The phone rang on the desk. Hargreaves picked it up, listened for a second, then handed the receiver over to Woodend.

‘Is that you, sir?' Bob Rutter asked.

‘It's me. Has somethin' started to happen?'

‘We think so. Dunn's just left his house.'

‘Maybe he's goin' to the base.'

‘That's not the direction he's heading in.'

Woodend felt his grip on the receiver tightening. ‘Where are you now?'

‘I'm just leaving the town centre. I can be outside the school in three minutes.'

‘Make that
two
minutes,' Woodend ordered him.

T
he worrying and self-doubt began to assail Woodend again the moment he climbed into the passenger seat next to Bob Rutter.

Had he been right when he'd said there was no point in pulling Dunn in for questioning? he asked himself. Wasn't it just possible that even a hard bastard like the squadron leader could have been made to feel remorse under the pressure of a skilful interrogation team?

If Helen had already been dead when he had made his decision, then the decision itself made no difference one way or the other. But what if she hadn't been? What if Dunn had decided to kill her, but had botched the job, so that while the team had been doing nothing more than
watch
Dunn, she had been lying alone and terrified, while her life slowly slipped away? And even if Dunn had done nothing yet, wouldn't the strain of an extra night's captivity, which this waiting approach had imposed on her, end up scarring her for life?

I should have pulled the bastard in, Woodend told himself. I should have taken the chance and pulled him in.

The chief inspector reached into his pocket for his Capstan Full Strengths, and realised that his hands were shaking so much he would never be able to extract a cigarette from the packet.

‘How many vehicles have you got on this job, Bob?' he asked, wishing he'd organised it himself even as he acknowledged the fact that Rutter would have done it at least as well as he could.

‘We're using four vehicles in all,' Rutter replied, slipping into gear and pulling away from the curb. ‘Two cars and two vans.'

‘What sort of vans?' Woodend said, knowing, even as he spoke, that there was absolutely no need for him to get bogged down in such operational details.

‘One of them's a painter-and-decorator's van which belongs to Sergeant Cowgill's brother-in-law,' Rutter said. ‘I borrowed the other from the Post Office. It took a little arm-twisting, but it was worth it. Nobody notices postmen driving around town.'

‘Where's Dunn now?' Woodend asked.

‘Out on the ring road.'

‘Headin' in which direction?'

‘Heading in no direction at all. For the last few minutes, he's simply been going back and forth between the roundabout at Green Gates and the one where you turn off for Feltwick. I think he might be doing it just to make sure that he isn't being followed.'

‘Then let's hope to Christ that he doesn't decide that he is.'

‘He won't,' Rutter said confidently. ‘Only an expert would spot a tailing operation which is using four vehicles.'

‘There could be another reason why he's not goin' straight to his destination,' Woodend said sombrely.

‘I know there could,' Rutter replied. ‘The same thoughts have been going through my mind.'

‘One of us should put that thought into words,' Woodend said. ‘Do you want to do it?'

Rutter nodded. ‘Helen isn't dead. Yet! But he knows he's got to kill her now, and he's just getting up the nerve.'

‘Your lads have been told not to lose sight of him, haven't they?' Woodend asked, the panic evident in his voice. ‘They do know that the moment he enters a buildin', they're to go in after him?'

‘They know.'

‘An' I mean
the very moment
,' Woodend said urgently. ‘Not a minute later. Not even half a minute. Because it doesn't take very long to choke the life out of a little kid.'

‘They know that as well,' Rutter said.

The radio crackled into life. ‘This is Unit Three. Target has left the ring road, and is heading back into town, in the direction of the Caxton area. Over!'

Woodend picked up the microphone. ‘This is Unit One,' he said. ‘Don't lose him. Whatever happens, for God's sake don't lose him.'

Martin Dove looked even worse than his partner in crime, Horrocks thought, gazing down at the man sitting on the chair in front of him. And given what a state Cray was in, that really was no mean feat.

‘I've been just talking to your mate, Roger,' he told the bearded Latin teacher. ‘He's very sensibly decided to come clean and confess that you've been dealing with the Russians.'

‘But that's just not true!' Martin Dove protested weakly. ‘I'm not a communist. I'm nothing more than a liberal with a social conscience. That's why I joined CND in the first place.'