Ruthless (25 page)

Janet had looked at Rachel’s interview with Greg Tandy. The guy was
no comment
all the way. He was an odd-looking man, doll-like, his round eyes and high eyebrows gave him a surprised look. But his repeated answer was dull and flat, stripped of any intonation.

Janet wondered if she would do any better now evidence was stacking up against him.

Greg Tandy hadn’t shaved; his jaw was dusted with back dots like pepper where his stubble was growing in. His disposable suit added to the impression Janet had of him looking like a toy, or a puppet, Andy Pandy, Thunderbirds.

‘Mr Tandy, there are two separate matters I wish to talk to you about today,’ Janet said. ‘I’d like to begin by informing you that a search of the house in Crescent Drive where you were staying revealed a cache of firearms, as seen in this picture. I’m now showing Mr Tandy a photograph, exhibit number MG4. Can you explain to me what you were doing with these weapons?’

‘No comment.’

‘Can you tell me how you acquired them?’

‘No comment.’

He had long teeth, uneven and protruding so his lips never fully closed. And he’d a smoker’s cough.

‘Have you supplied a weapon to anyone since your release from prison?’ she said.

‘No comment.’

‘You understand possession of a firearm is an offence punishable by law?’

‘Yes,’ he said. He coughed, cleared his throat, a sound like a car revving and trying to catch.

‘Did you supply Neil Perry with a weapon on Tuesday May the eighth?’ she said.

‘No comment.’

‘A search is currently being carried out at your home in Manton Road. Can you tell me if there are more firearms there?’ Janet said.

‘No,’ but he looked sick. Because they’d find something there or because his family would be affected?

‘Mr Tandy, is there anything you wish to tell me in relation to the firearms found in your possession?’

‘No comment.’

Janet nodded. Turned over the page of her notes, skimmed over them, then sat back. ‘Have you fired a gun recently?’

‘No,’ he said.

‘Are you certain about that?’ Janet said.

‘Yes.’

‘You haven’t fired a weapon since your release from prison?’ Leading him along the path, closer to the trap.

‘No,’ he said, with some impatience.

‘I am now showing Mr Tandy exhibit number MG10. A photograph. Do you recognize this bag?’

He stared at the picture, whistling in his throat. Something, consternation rippling through his expression? ‘No comment,’ he said.

‘This bag was found on top of the wardrobe where you were staying. You own a bag like this?’

‘No comment.’

‘This is exhibit number MG16. You recognize these gloves?’

‘No comment.’

‘They were found, along with a balaclava and a boiler suit, in the bag. Are they your gloves?’ she said.

‘No comment.’

‘We believe they are. We expect DNA testing to corroborate that.’

He gave a hacking cough.

Janet continued, walking him up to the gaping big hole in his account. ‘You have just told me that you have not fired a gun recently, yet the gloves recovered from your belongings contain significantly high levels of gunshot residue. How do you account for that?’

He snorted, eyes hot, the patches of colour on his cheeks darkened. ‘It’s a bloody fit-up,’ he said, ‘you can’t do that.’

‘I can assure you that none of the evidence recovered has been tampered with and we have watertight continuity for everything here,’ she said.

He shook his head, rattled off a cough. ‘It’s a fucking fit-up.’ He turned to his solicitor, ‘I want that on the record.’

Janet didn’t give him time to compose himself. ‘We also found significant traces of kerosene, that’s like paraffin. Highly flammable, sometimes used as a fire accelerant.’

He caught on quickly. ‘No way, no fucking way. I had nothing to do with that, with them shootings. No way.’

‘You refer to the murders of Lydia Oluwaseyi and Victor Tosin.’

‘Any murders. You can’t put that on me. I didn’t even know them,’ he said.

‘Perhaps you can explain then how your gloves came to be drenched in lighter fuel and thick with gunshot residue?’

There was a moment when he faltered, almost imperceptible, but Janet saw it in the minute changes in the muscles around his mouth, and the flash in his eyes, the hiatus in his breathing. He’d realized something, worked something out or remembered something. The moment passed in an instant and he resumed his defence.

‘No comment,’ he said, his lips twitching, reminding Janet of a horse baring its teeth.

‘Can you tell me where you were on Friday between the hours of seven and nine pm?’

‘No comment.’ Face closing down, he looked beyond Janet and into the middle distance. A stare of measured indifference, the mask was back in place. She knew he wouldn’t tell her anything else but she was intrigued by his violent reaction to the evidence on his gloves.

24

Rachel reported to hospital reception and asked for Shirelle Young. She needed the ward number.

‘Are you a relative?’ the clerk said.

‘Police.’ Rachel showed her warrant card.

Finally the clerk found Shirelle listed and directed Rachel up to the second floor, to the ward at the end of the corridor.

When Rachel got there the ward was locked, a laminated notice stated that visiting hours were
2–4 and 6–8. No visitors at any other time
. Someone had underlined
No visitors and any other time
with several strokes of a marker pen.

Rachel rang the buzzer and waited. No one answered. She peered through the glass in the door; the ward looked deserted but she saw someone at the far end cross from one bay to another.

Rachel pressed the buzzer again, kept it pressed as she counted to twenty. A disembodied voice answered, ‘Yes?’ Making it sound like a slap.

‘Police, here to see Shirelle Young.’

‘Visiting hours are two till four and—’

‘Police,’ Rachel repeated, ‘here to speak to a victim of serious crime.’

‘God, sorry. Thought you said please.’ A giggle. ‘Come in.’ The tone sounded and Rachel pushed through the door.

It was a big ward, with the nurses’ station halfway down. As she drew closer Rachel could hear someone calling, ‘Nurse, nurse!’

There was an air of abandonment to the place. Rachel hoped she’d die at home, or outside, anywhere but somewhere like this. She hated hospitals, the smells and the mess.

The nurses’ station was deserted. Shirelle’s name was written up on the board behind but, unlike the others, there was no bed number assigned to it.

Exasperated, Rachel poked her head into the nearest bay. Saw only sick people, dozing, drips in their arms. None of them Shirelle.

She walked further down the corridor. The tremulous voice kept on calling, ‘Nurse? Nurse?’ and someone struggled with a hacking cough. Rachel heard a peal of laughter. In an anteroom, two nurses, one tiny, the other like a beanpole, were heaping laundry into bags. ‘Shirelle Young,’ Rachel said, flashing her ID to stop any argument. ‘Admitted last night.’

‘Should be on the board,’ the titchy one said.

‘No,’ Rachel said, ‘not her bed number.’

There was a pause. Titch frowned, the other one shrugged.

‘I could go round every bed,’ Rachel said sharply, ‘if you’ve lost her.’

That riled the smaller nurse, who got all huffy and said, ‘Take a seat, we’ll check for you.’

The seats were a little further along, tucked in an alcove out of sight. Rachel sat, impatient, glanced at the notice banning mobile phones and checked hers. No messages. No one ever paid any attention to the signs. She wondered why they still bothered.

‘Nurse! Nurse! I need the commode!’

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

As far as Rachel could tell, there were only those two nurses, and whoever it was had buzzed her in, covering the ward. That couldn’t be right, could it?

Then the lanky one was back. ‘She’s gone,’ she said. She was trying to look relaxed about it but Rachel could see worry in her eyes.

‘Discharged?’ Rachel said.

‘Not officially. I think she’s just left.’

Rachel’s pulse jumped. ‘Where was the bed?’

‘Near the door.’ The nurse pointed to the entrance to the ward.

‘When was she last seen?’ Rachel said.

‘She got her meds ten minutes ago.’

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake. Call security. She’s a potential witness as well as a victim, she could be at risk. She mustn’t leave the hospital. You can describe her?’

‘Yes, sure,’ the nurse said defensively.

‘Then do it.’

The woman blinked and Rachel ran. She took the stairs, judging it would be quicker than the lift. The stairwell was empty apart from a bloke in scrubs running up. At the bottom Rachel looked about. The place wasn’t too busy out of visiting hours but there were still patients heading into consultations and clinics and others being moved between departments by porters.

Rachel waited, focusing to catch any movement that seemed too swift, out of synch with the slow flow of people. There was only one way in and out, the main entrance. Rachel ran to the automatic doors, skirting past the woman pushing an old bloke in a wheelchair. From the top of the ramp she had a good view of the grounds, across the lawned slopes to the car parks and bus stops below, either side of the road.

She scrutinized people systematically, eyes roving over faces, body shapes and clothing, looking for a match. Her gaze snagged on a figure leaning on a low wall, half turned away from her about eighty yards from where she stood. The white jacket, her size, the shape of her head, the dark hair all fitted. Rachel was halfway there when Shirelle looked round, sensing her approach, and began to move, running in an uneven gait down towards the road.

Not this time, matey
. Losing Keane yesterday had been bad enough. Rachel pelted down the slope, gaining on the girl. Ahead Shirelle stumbled and Rachel would’ve got to her but for a family group, five adults with two buggies, who chose that moment to cross the road and block the pavement.

Swerving around them, Rachel cut into the traffic. A taxi braked hard, blaring its horn, the driver mouthing outrage when Rachel’s hand glanced off the bonnet. She felt sweat break across her neck and back, the thunder of her heart in her head. Rachel regained the pavement, Shirelle veered right and back up the grass slope towards the hospital outbuildings, perhaps looking for cover. Rachel followed, chest aching, legs straining, heat in her face.

Shirelle was slowing, Rachel could hear her panting as she closed the distance between them. When she was near enough, Rachel lunged, grabbed Shirelle in a flying tackle that sent them both on to the grass with a thump. Shirelle screamed. The impact forced the air from Rachel’s lungs, jolting her elbows, reawakening the tenderness where Neil Perry had throttled her and the bruises from Tandy’s arrest.

‘What you doing?’ A scandalized voice, an Asian bloke. ‘Get off her, leave her alone.’

Other people drifted their way, adding their own comments.

‘Twice her size, she is.’

‘Probably pissed.’

‘Let her alone.’

Rachel could smell the grass and earth and some faint perfume on Shirelle’s hair and a whiff of antiseptic.

‘Nasty bitch.’

‘Cat fight, is it?’

‘Get security guards,’ some man yelled.

‘What have you done to her?’ a woman said, face like a whippet. ‘That’s brutality, that is.’

‘I’m calling the police,’ the good Samaritan yelled at Rachel, phone at the ready. ‘Get off her now.’

For fuck’s sake.
Rachel rolled off Shirelle and planted one hand between her shoulder blades to keep her prone.

‘I am the police,’ Rachel said.

‘Yeah, right, and I’m the Queen of Sheba.’ The guy looked around, inviting the clot of onlookers to share his derision. The Whippet was using her phone camera.

‘If you want a witness,’ she said loudly to Shirelle, ‘it’s all on here, darling.’

Oh, frigging perfect, Rachel thought, be all over YouTube.

Rachel reached for her warrant card and swung it around with her free hand. ‘Satisfied?’

Some of the crowd melted away but most stayed for the sideshow while Rachel dragged Shirelle to her feet and said, ‘I am arresting you on suspicion of the possession of banned substances with intent to supply. You do not have to say anything but it may harm your defence if you do not mention, when questioned, something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence against you.’

The Asian guy stood his ground, face still like a smacked arse, mouth pursed, shaking his head as if deeply disappointed in Rachel and how she’d conducted herself.

Shirelle looked worse in the clear light of day, her face more swollen. Stitches ran across the deeper cuts over her eyelid and cheek and lip. She had lost teeth too, gaps at the front. Livid bruises on her forearms and hands. Rachel imagined the blows, smashing the girl against the hard ground. Boots or fists or bats?

Nevertheless Shirelle had been examined by the police doctor and found fit for interview. A duty solicitor was present. Rachel stated the grounds under which Shirelle had been arrested, and cautioned her.

‘You know we searched your flat,’ Rachel said. ‘We found a number of items banned under the Misuse of Drugs Act.’

Shirelle gave a small sigh.

‘Can you tell me why you had these drugs in your possession?’

‘No.’ Her voice painfully hoarse.

‘What were you doing at Stanley Keane’s? Getting stocked up?’

‘No,’ Shirelle said quickly.

‘Is he responsible for your injuries?’

‘No.’

‘We can help, you know. You don’t have to deal with it on your own. And we can keep you safe, if that’s what you’re worried about. Keane works with Marcus Williams, doesn’t he? The Williamses of this world, they sit up there, king of the shit heap, raking in the money, calling the shots, but it’s people like you always pay the price. I don’t think that’s fair.’

The girl was unmoved.