Evil Turn (Nathan Hawk Mystery) (13 page)

“Not in the slightest.”

“This gets tidier by the minute.”

He shook his head. “Anything else we can help with? Before you go home?”

“Are the wives being charged in any of this?”

Carew said that would depend on the evidence they gave at Flaxman’s trial.

“You want them to blame it all on Flaxman.”

“I want them to tell the truth.”

I climbed back into the Land Rover and Carew came over to the window. I rolled it down.

“You couldn’t give us a lift back to the main gate, could you?” Carew asked.

“I could, but the walk’ll do you good.”

Sweetman came at me with the only thing he had left. “That Smith & Wesson in your glove box. You got a licence for it?”

I laughed. “You’ll have to do better than that.”

I turned the key, did a rocky three-point turn, and drove away.

And another thing: it used to be that when you arrived at the edge of a town, you pulled in somewhere and checked a local map to find exactly where you were going. Or, God forbid, you asked a local. Now you keep listening to a disembodied voice on a GPS and it takes you right there. I was looking for the postcode which had stuck in Petra Fairchild’s mind, DN31 7SY,
The Amethyst
, and quite reasonably I’d expected to find a stone-built, pokey little dockside pub, weathered trawlermen seated at the bar, with accents so impenetrable I’d need a crowbar to understand them.

But after winding through a wasteland of disused warehouses, separated by acres of broken concrete through which grass and weeds were making their comeback, I arrived at my destination. The satnav had taken me to the estuary side of Fish Dock, more a marina these days than a working dock, with access at each end to the mighty River Humber. A few sad-looking trawlers were tied up there, paint peeling, tar flaking, victims of the pernicious quota system. Alongside them was
The Amethyst
, an old cargo packet with the guts ripped out of her, replaced by a state-of-the-art kitchen, a bar and thirty tables. It was also a food bank for hundreds of gulls, screaming and wheeling as they waited for the leftovers.

I parked alongside a handful of middle-range Audis and Mercs which told me most of what I needed to know about the people on board having lunch. The men would be jacket and shirt, no tie, mid-thirties and monied: the women would be young professionals, dressed in their success with expensive hair and body parts that didn’t move. I turned a few heads as I went aboard, heads belonging to the brave couples who were up on deck sipping drinks at wooden tables, defying the onshore breeze and that tang of raw sewage that comes with enclosed water.

As I reached the bottom of the stairs, a man the size and shape of a small planet came over to me. Kristian, his name tag said, and he clearly wished I was three or four people, not just one, wanting lunch. He showed me to a faraway table and I ordered a double scotch in a tall glass with ice to the brim. He checked that I’d meant what I’d asked for and went to get it. As he turned I was able to read the quotation on the back of his black shirt, the company livery. It was a favourite of mine, one that I often use as an excuse for poking my nose into other people’s business. ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. Edmund Burke.’ Quite a mouthful to get on the back of a shirt, but then it was a big shirt.

A young lad, name tag Rob, brought my drink and a menu. I chose posh fish and chips. Coals to Newcastle, really, but what the hell. He was a skinny kid but the back of his shirt read: ‘Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. Oscar Wilde.’

As I sipped my drink I sussed out the waitress who seemed to be the chattiest and eventually called her over.

“Yes, sir. Can I help?”

“Tina, hi! What does it say on your back, by the way?”

To my surprise, she knew. “ ‘A crown is merely a hat that lets the rain in. Frederick the Great.’ ”

“I like that.” Her big smile was still asking if she could help. “Does an Emma Jago work here?”

“No, but there’s Emma Wesley.”

Some would say I deserved the break; I say I should’ve done my research, at least dug out some basic info about the trawlermen’s wives. It might not have taken me straight to Emma Jago and Emma Wesley being one and the same person, but it would’ve forced me to check.

No matter. Here I was in the same room as Vic’s widow and the questions were forming a disorderly queue. Why had she changed her name, how much did she know about the murders, was she due to give evidence at the Flaxman trial, why had Liam Kinsella sent her a birthday card and was that her walking over to my table, the company smile on her face? It was a hard but well cared for face, black hair tied back to keep it out of the food. The eyes were sharp, intelligent, dead-giveaway eyes, so I banked on getting the truth from her.

“Emma, this gentleman was asking...” Tina began.

“Emma Jago or Wesley?” I said, rising and stretching out a hand.

She stopped, like someone crossing a dance floor and suddenly hearing the wrong music.

“Who are you?” she asked.

For some reason I’d expected watered-down Geordie accents from everyone, but what I’d heard so far were more Moss Side than Tyneside. Apart from the Small Planet, Kristian, who was all-purpose Scandinavian.

“My name’s Nathan Hawk and your next question’ll be ‘What do you want?’ ”

She gestured for me to answer it.

“Why did Liam Kinsella send you a birthday card and present?”

Kristian was moving towards us, aware of a problem. He in turn beckoned to a bloke behind the bar, who side-vaulted the counter and joined his boss. The waiter Rob went to the kitchen door, opened it a fraction and called to someone named Josh. He turned out to be the chef and he’d forgotten to put down his chopping knife before joining us.

An old Desk Sergeant once told me it was the threat of violence, not the violence itself, that lay at the heart of controlling a situation. It was wisdom based on experience, but was now going to be ‘the exception that proved the rule’? Cicero, I think, but not embroidered on anything I was wearing. Trouble was, there was one of me, five of them and rising as a couple of young men left their table and came to join the party.

I reached out and picked up one of those foot-tall, wooden salt grinders from my table and suddenly realised what they were intended for, because they’re no bloody good at grinding salt. I held it truncheon-style, slapping the end into my other hand.

“The first one into my space gets his head broken.”

The waiter Rob laughed.

“You think that’s funny?”

He withered, instantly. The Vaulting Barman looked at his boss for permission to beat the crap out of me but Kristian didn’t give it.

“I think you should leave,” he said.

“I’ve only just got here.”

“Fucking salt cellar?” said Josh the chef. “You’ve got to be joking!”

“Thing is, Josh, I know exactly where to bring this down, maximum effect. They used to teach us stuff like that. I doubt if you know how or where to stab me to make any real difference.”

He looked down at his hand and seemed surprised to find that he had a lethal weapon in it. He appeared to weigh up the pros and cons of using it, all the while conscious of my salt grinder. Then a voice called into the silence.

“Josh, don’t do anything daft, love.” It was Emma Jago, arms out, patting down the hot air that had risen. “Please, boys, cool it.”

“You heard her,” I said, my eye on the knife. “Step back.”

It was all the excuse Josh needed to retreat, a pace or two at first and then right back to the kitchen. To this day I think he was more frightened by what he might have done with the knife than ever he was of me. I can live with that.

The Small Planet turned to the troops he’d mustered, thanked them and they drifted away back to the bar, back to their places.

“What do you want, Mr Hock?” said Kristian.

“You to pronounce my name properly. Hawk. Then I want to ask Emma a few questions.”

“Are you copper?”

I shook my head. “Solid brass, mate.”

“Then you...”

Emma butted in. “Kristian, thanks, but can you give me ten minutes with this gentleman?”

He eventually said, “Call if you need.”

As he walked off, Emma sat down opposite me.

“Jago?” I asked.

“Maiden name.”

“Not Wesley because of the smuggling charges against you...?”

“Because of my murdered husband,” she said, wearily. “I’m sick of people’s sympathy. Here I’m just Emma.”

“Emma whose back says?”

“ ‘If the facts don’t fit the theory, change the facts. Anonymous.’ ”

I smiled. “Some copper will’ve written that. Where’s Kristian from?”

“Oslo.”

“That’s just across the Baltic from Liepaja, where your husband and his crew picked up 15 million quid’s worth of heroin.”

Her stillness was natural, not forced. “Is it?”

“And you still haven’t told me why Liam Kinsella sent you a card and present.”

“Because it was my birthday and he knows how much I miss Vic. Liam’s a very sweet guy. And brave.”

“That’s the last thing I’d have called...”

“Listen, I don’t know who you are, and I don’t much care, but can you imagine the guts it must’ve taken to turn on Aaron? I hope they hack off his balls and lock him up forever!”

“I’ve never met Aaron. I only met Liam Kinsella three weeks ago.”

The waiter Rob emerged from the kitchen with my posh fish and chips and came over. I leaned back as he put the plate down in front of me.

“Any sauces? Another drink?” he asked, quietly. I shook my head and he turned to go. I called him back. “Sir?”

I picked up a fork, turned over the chips on the plate, stabbed one and said to him, “Eat that.”

The request brought out his stammer. “I couldn’t, we don’t...”

“You don’t like chips?”

“It’s not that, it’s, it’s, it’s...”

“It’s more what Josh has cooked them in, specially for me? Bodily fluids? Take it back to the kitchen, son, tell Josh I’ll be in later to push the whole lot, plate and all, down his throat.”

His hand shaking, Rob picked up the plate and went back to the kitchen.