Dead or Alive (11 page)

‘I mean, everybody knows whose car it is. He's got a man who drives him around. Big feller called Jez who used to be a boxer. Anyway this car comes past and I see Vince in the back. He looked straight at me. No mistaking who he was – he's got eyes like a shithouse rat.'

‘Winnie! Do your best to be ladylike.'

‘Sorry. He looked at me but he didn't see me, if you know what I mean. To him I was just some tart touting for business.'

‘Were you dressed like tart?'

‘No, I was dressed like this. Can I get on with what I'm trying to tell you?'

‘Sorry, carry on.'

‘Thank you. Anyway his car stops about fifty yards beyond me and Jez gets out and starts walking away, aimless like – as if he's been told to make himself scarce but not to go far. I'm a bit curious so I just hang around on a corner as if I'm looking for punters – which I wasn't by the way,' she added, hastily. ‘Never worked the streets, ever.'

‘That's none of my business anymore,' said Sep. ‘Although I always thought you were better than that.'

‘Really? Oh, that's very nice, thank you.'

Sep shrugged away her thanks and said, ‘I assume there's more to this story.'

‘Oh yes, a lot more. After a couple of minutes another car turns up and parks behind Vince's Bentley. That copper gets out of it and gets into Vince's car.'

‘You mean DI Cope?'

‘I do. When you were a DI did you ever have any secret meetings like that with big time villains?'

‘None that my bosses didn't know about. In fact I can't think of a single one.'

‘Well, this was in the back of Vince Formosa's Bentley and they were there for nearly half an hour. I turned away three punters. Could have made a few quid.'

‘If you hadn't given it up.'

‘Oh yes, I've definitely given it up. Anyway, after about half an hour this copper gets out, chats to Vince through the car window for a few seconds then Vince sticks his mitt out of the window for Cope to shake, like a couple of good buddies. Cope gets back in his own car, Jez appears from nowhere and they both drive off.'

‘And Formosa was definitely in the car?'

‘Definitely. I wouldn't put you wrong on something like that, Sep. I saw it coming down the street, I knew it was his car and sure enough there he was in the back.'

‘And he saw you but he wouldn't recognize you again?'

‘No. He glanced at me for one second and I had a dark wig on. I often wear a wig on the streets. My hair's got a mind of its own. I look like a fucking gypsy half the time.'

‘I quite like your gypsy hair. Would Cope know who you are?'

‘You like my hair? What else do you like about me, Sep?'

‘I quite like your colouring.'

‘You mean my tandoori tan?'

‘I mean your light-brown complexion. Where does it come from?'

Winnie smiled. ‘Not absolutely sure. I know my father was a man called Patrick O'Toole, full-blown Irish, born in Galway and my mother was a bit of a mixture. My grandmother on her side was a brown-skinned woman from Wigan, but she died when my mother was very young and no one really knew of her origins. As for my grandfather he could have been anyone by all accounts. My father was a racecourse bookie whose work took him all over England, including York where he met my mother, who was a real beauty by all accounts. He left her when the York race-meeting ended. I came along nine months after that and my mother died when I was born. They tracked my dad down, with him being well-known in the racing fraternity, but he was also well-known to the police and was locked up for fraud or some such thing. So I ended up in a children's home.'

‘So, you had a bad start. Did you ever track your father down?'

‘Never tried …' She hesitated for a while, just looking at him.

‘What?' Sep said.

‘Well there is one thing you should know about me, though – and it's probably why I took a shine to you.'

‘Why's that?'

‘It's because you killed Cyril Johnstone.'

It was Sep's turn to hesitate now. He stared at her, completely bemused. ‘You took a shine to me because I killed Johnstone?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well at the risk of taking the shine off our relationship, Winnie, I didn't kill him. He died of an epileptic fit. I had no idea he was epileptic.'

‘I heard he was struggling with you when he had his fit.'

‘As it happens, yes he was, but I didn't do anything to kill him. How did you know that?'

‘I talk to people who talk to the police.'

‘Yes, the police did me no favours on that – mainly Cope's doing. He found out I didn't trust him and spread a lot of poison around the station about me.'

‘I'm guessing it's why you had to leave,' Winnie said.

‘It was. So why did you take this … shine to me?'

‘Because Cyril Johnstone sexually assaulted me when I was in a home.'

Sep's face froze for a few seconds when he heard this. Winnie added, ‘That's why you arrested him isn't it?'

‘His arrest had nothing to do with you, Winnie.'

‘I didn't mean me personally. I meant because he was a kiddie-fiddler.' She studied Sep's face, but he gave nothing away.

‘I was twelve years old,' she said, ‘and I was scared to death of him. He used to visit the home now and again with him being the patron of a children's charity.'

‘Northern Orphans,' said Sep. ‘I always thought it was a daft name. Very few of the kids were actually orphans – just kids who weren't wanted.'

‘Well that was me. One day he took me into a room where we were alone and took my knickers down and …'

Sep put a hand up to stop her. ‘Whoa, whoa! You don't have to go on. I know all about what he did to young girls … and boys for that matter.'

‘Sep, you don't know! I was twelve years old, and skinny as a rake. Can you imagine how terrifying it was being raped by a filthy giant like him? He was ten times as big as me. I thought I was going to die.'

Sep shuddered at the image it conjured. ‘I can't imagine it, no.'

‘So I'm right about why he was arrested?'

‘Yes you are.'

She gave a huge, satisfied smile, saying, ‘It wasn't just once, he did it to me a lot – every time he came to the home. I dreaded seeing his car turn up.'

‘Did you ever tell anyone?'

‘Oh yes, we had a matron, I told her, but she just said I was lucky to be living there and that Mr Johnstone was a very kind and important man and that I was a dirty girl with a dirty mind and I mustn't tell such terrible lies about him. So I kept my mouth shut. He did it to other kids and they said nothing either. You know, it hung over me all my life. It's the injustice of it … that someone can get away with stuff like that and then lie about it and everyone believes him not you, because you're just a kid. When I heard he was dead it was like a big weight had been lifted off me. I was dying to know why he'd been arrested. I knew it wouldn't be a driving offence like they said it was.'

‘We had him bang to rights,' said Sep. ‘He'd have got fifteen years minimum had he lived and he knew it.'

‘I'm really glad he knew it. It's a pity they can't tarnish his memory like they did with Savile.'

‘Jimmy Savile wasn't a member of the establishment,' said Sep. ‘Rumour has it that one of our former prime ministers was up to no good with kids, but MI5 went to great lengths to cover that up. I wasn't going to let that happen to Johnstone. He knew his game was over, believe me. He got his comeuppance and he knew it.'

‘That's good,' said Winnie. ‘I know it cost you your job but it made a big difference to my life and it would have made a big difference to a lot of people's lives who he assaulted. It's a pity they can't know
why
he was in police custody.'

‘Well I can't tell them or I'll be in breach of an agreement that might land me in jail, but there's nothing to stop you going to the papers. Could you track down anyone else who he assaulted?'

‘Doubt it. Most of them won't want to drag it all up again.'

‘I could give you a few names of people who
would
have gone to court against him had he lived,' Sep told her. ‘If any of them rings a bell I could point you in their direction.'

‘It sounds to me as if you want this story told as much as I do,' said Winnie.

‘Well, I think the story about me being sacked for being the cause of his death will come out at some time. The papers'll certainly make a meal of a story like that. But if your story gets there first it'll do me no harm.'

Winnie grinned. ‘Septimus, that's good enough for me. Let me hear a few names.'

Sep took a couple of minutes reciting names he'd committed to memory some months previously. Winnie knew two of them and those two might know others. He promised to give her their addresses, on one condition.

‘My name does not come up when you talk to the papers. In fact, if you're asked if you got the information about Johnstone from the police, you say no, they're just kids whose names you remember.'

‘Not a problem. I'll tell them it's none of their business.'

‘So, back to why we're here,' said Sep. ‘Would Cope know who you are?'

‘No, and he certainly won't know I know who
he
is.'

‘Then I can't see any reason why Formosa might have an issue with you.'

‘An issue? You mean he'll have no reason to have me topped?'

‘No reason at all.'

‘Jesus! I can't believe such a crook is allowed to exist in this day and age. This is Leeds in the twenty-first century, not Chicago in the 1930s.'

‘Villains have a bad habit of adjusting to fit the age and place they live in,' said Sep. ‘In Chicago in the 1930s they mainly dealt in booze, nowadays it's mainly drugs. Luckily in this country we've got strict gun laws so our gun crime has always been massively lower than it would be if everyone could buy guns.'

‘There's a few I'd have shot if I'd been able to get my hands on a gun,' she said.

‘You and thousands of others … anything else?'

‘Yes, there is.' Winnie brushed away a strand of dark hair from her eyes. ‘Look,' she said nervously, ‘Formosa doesn't know I know this, and he never must.'

Sep put his hand on top of hers. ‘Whatever it is, he won't get it from me. The odds are that I can't do anything with it. Everyone down at the station thinks I'm a murdering wife-beater who's just come out of a nuthouse. What's this other thing?'

‘It's to do with a girl I knew called Christine. She was killed by Vince's heavies when they went to kill her boyfriend for grassing on Vince for that kidnapping job.'

‘The Strathmore children?'

‘Yeah, poor little beggars. They've been gone a while now. I think Lee Dench was involved. He was Christine's boyfriend.'

‘Don't know much about him. How long ago was this?'

‘A few weeks ago,' said Winnie. ‘The word on the street is that Formosa's behind it. What do you think?'

‘I don't know. I haven't actually had my ear to the ground recently.'

‘I think he's probably killed them.'

‘Doubt it. He won't kill them before he gets his hands on the money. This happened when I was banged up in the nuthouse. Good job I had an alibi or my colleagues would have fingered me for that as well.'

‘What? Oh, yeah. Anyway, I used to keep an eye on Christine – or Chantelle as she called herself, when she was on the streets.'

‘I thought you never worked the streets.'

‘I didn't, but I knew Christine. She kind of looked up to me. She wanted me to get her into Henrietta's but she was always lower end of the market was Christine. Tattoos and piercings and stuff. Never a good look in a high-class establishment.
And
she was a real coke-head, never in her right mind from sniffin' charlie. It's OK in small doses, that stuff, but no one ever takes it in small doses.'

‘Did you ever use it?'

‘Yeah, there's little I haven't done. I used charlie, acid, weed and everything, but I kicked it all when I felt it getting a hold of me. It's dulls the mind and I hated not being in control of me – I'm all I've got. Anyway, I put myself in a private rehab place out in the country, which wasn't cheap. A grand a week for six weeks – and don't ask me where I got the money from.'

‘None of my business, anyway I'm impressed – that makes you very special in my eyes.'

‘Really?' Winnie smiled. ‘Thank you.'

‘So, what's the connection with Cope?'

She hesitated before saying, ‘Lee grassed Vincent up to Cope – Christine told me.'

‘Good God!' said Sep. ‘Talk about the kiss of death!'

Winnie nodded. ‘See what I mean about this being dangerous stuff?'

Sep's brow corrugated, deep in thought. ‘Then Cope used the information Dench gave him to get Formosa arrested. But why would he do that if he's in Formosa's pay?'

‘You think I'm giving you dodgy information?'

‘Oh no – quite the opposite. I'm guessing that Cope told Formosa first, and Formosa
told
him to pass the information on to the police.'

‘Why would he do that?'

‘To cement Cope's reputation with the police. He knew that all he had to do to get himself off was to kill Dench.'

‘
All
he had to do? I'd say it's quite a lot.'

‘Not for someone like Formosa. Having people killed is just business. Cope will have had tabs on Dench's whereabouts. Formosa gives the order and the job's done, just another piece of business to him. I always figured Cope to be staying clear of London while they had their purge of police corruption down there. What you told me about Cope and Formosa ties in with what I already suspect. Formosa moved up from the Smoke about five years ago. It's my information that Cope was tied in with him back then. In fact, I mentioned it to one or two people, which was what set Cope against me.'