Riot Act (38 page)

“Oh, it was just kids, you know, throwing stones,” she said vaguely.

Mrs Gadatra snorted in disgust. “Kids! Stones!” she said, flinging her arms up and shaking her fists so that the bangles she wore on both wrists clashed and rattled. “They threw a brick at her. A
brick!
It’s a miracle she isn’t dead. Who knows what they might have done after that if she hadn’t had the dog with her.”

Pauline smiled again with remembered affection. “Apparently he wouldn’t even let the ambulancemen get near me for a while,” she said.

That, I reckoned silently, would have done Friday’s mad dog reputation no harm at all. Both Aqueel and Gin looked mightily impressed by it as they carefully gathered the snap cards together.

“Why don’t you come and stay at my place for a few days?” I suggested, perching on the corner of the table nearest to Pauline. “Just while you recover. Let things settle down round here for a bit.”

“We can look after her perfectly well,” Mrs Gadatra said sharply, offended. “Mr Garton-Jones will find the culprits, mark my words, even if the police don’t seem to be doing anything.” She sniffed.

“I don’t suppose you knew any of them?” I asked.

Pauline shook her head.

“It all happened so quickly,” she said sadly. “I didn’t see anybody.”

So much for finding out if Jav was mixed up in this, too. On impulse, though, I asked Mrs Gadatra if she knew the blond-haired Asian boy.

She pursed her lips for a moment. “I don’t think so,” she said. “I may have seen him around the place, but—”

“Jav used to play snooker with my brother,” Aqueel piped up, concentrating on holding the box open so his sister could messily put the snap cards away into it. “He’s a very good player.”

His mother glared at him, and I realised that some subtle shift had taken place since I’d moved off the estate. I was an outsider again, and not really to be trusted with inside information about anyone, or anything.

I stood up, gave her a cool stare as I thanked Aqueel. “I’ll go and look for Jav there,” I told him. “I have some questions that I think he may be able to answer.”

“Is there anything I can help you with, Charlie?” Aqueel asked, with a defiant look to his mother. Since his brother’s death he’d grown up at an accelerated rate. And here he was, determined to show her that he was the head of the family now, his own man, and took orders from nobody.

“Thank you Aqueel,” I said again, smiling, but careful not to mock him. “I don’t think so, but if there is, you’ll be the first to know.”

***

Since there seemed to be little I could do for Pauline that wasn’t being done already, I left soon after.

The Patrol was still sitting by the kerb with, surprisingly perhaps, all its tyres, paint, and glass intact. I was just about to try and keep things that way by getting out of there when movement further along the street caught my eye.

A front door had opened, and a large suited figure had emerged. It didn’t take a moment to recognise Mr Ali. I stilled, and for some reason that made him glance in my direction. Immediately, he began hurrying along the path to the road, and fumbling in a pocket for his car keys.

He was slow finding them, and I’ve found I can run quite fast when I’m given the right motivation. I’d reached him before he’d managed to get the door open, giving him little option but to speak to me.

“Ah, Charlie,” he said nervously, his strangely soprano voice strung fit to snap. “How nice to see you again. I have just been visiting Fariman, you know. Thankfully, he is feeling much better.”

“How much better would he be feeling if he knew what you were really up to round here?”

“Up to? I don’t know what you mean,” Ali squeaked. “I have done nothing wrong.”

“No?” I said, advancing grimly and planting my hip against his car door, just in case he got any ideas. “So you won’t mind if people round here find out what you were paying Harvey Langford to do? Keeping the crime figures bad enough for you to make a killing when this whole area gets redeveloped. Do they know you own half their houses, too?”

“No, no!” If Ali’s voice got any higher he’d be attracting passing bats. “You’ve got it all wrong. Please! I must go now. I had nothing to do with—”

He broke off abruptly, eyes swivelling wildly as he realised he’d been about to deny something he hadn’t been accused of yet.

“Nothing to do with what? With Langford’s death?” I jumped straight in with a laugh that was gone before it had arrived. “Oh come on, Ali, he couldn’t have been hiding out at the site without you knowing about it and permitting it. Who was he afraid of?”

I don’t know if Mr Ali was going to answer that one, because at that moment a mid-sized rock came whizzing past my ear and smashed into splintered fragments on the paving slabs a few feet away.

Cursing, I instinctively ducked and spun round.

Mr Ali didn’t need telling twice that this was a good time to make his getaway. He yanked open his car door, thumping it against my shoulder. The blow caught me off balance and sent me sprawling. He was into the driving seat with the engine fired and the gear lever shoved into first before I’d had time to recover. The tyres chirruped as he spun the wheels halfway along the street.

Once he’d gone I got to my feet warily, keeping low, as though the overflowing black bin liner next to me was going to provide decent cover. I couldn’t see anyone nearby. After my somewhat frosty reception from Mrs Gadatra, I suppose being used for target practise was a logical progression, and I shouldn’t have been surprised about it.

Or maybe someone else on Lavender Gardens had discovered Mr Ali’s treachery. Maybe the rock had been aimed at him. Maybe, if he’d hung around longer, we might have had a chance to find out . . .

I waited, with the silence that came after Mr Ali’s dramatic departure punching and kicking at me. Eventually, I realised it was a case of move now, or stay there all day. Besides anything else, something in the bin bag next to me smelt ripe enough to make my eyes water.

I weighed up the distance to the Patrol with my heart banging painfully against my ribs, but decided against making a run for it. It wasn’t likely to make much difference and, in the end, it boiled down to trying to hold on to my dignity.

I nearly made it, too.

I suppose I can’t have been more than half-a-dozen hopeful paces away from the Patrol. I had the keys out ready in my hand, thumb on the remote door lock button, when four bulky figures appeared from one of the ginnels to my right.

My stride faltered, and I stumbled to a halt.

“Miss Fox,” Ian Garton-Jones nodded as he closed in. “I didn’t expect to see you round here any more.”

I couldn’t tell if he sounded disappointed or not.

He showed his teeth briefly as he stepped between me and the Nissan. Harlow and a man I didn’t recognise moved to cut off a line of retreat. West took station behind his boss’s shoulder, and leaned insolently on the Patrol’s front wing with his arms folded.

I shrugged. “I’m just visiting,” I said.

“Ah yes – Mrs Jamieson,” he said, and there was a certain amount of grim satisfaction in his voice. “Well, we’ve had a little chat with her, and you won’t be needed next time she goes away.”

Did his idea of a “little chat” include thrown bricks, I wondered silently?

“Nice vehicle,” he went on, shifting to stare in through the Patrol’s side window at the interior. He seemed to pause just a fraction too long with his gaze on that dull stain on the passenger seat. I shoved my hands into my pockets so he wouldn’t see the clenching of my fingers.

Eventually he turned back to me. “He lets you drive it around, does he?”

“Does who?”

“Sean Meyer,” Garton-Jones said. “It
is
his vehicle, isn’t it?” He watched me carefully for a reaction, then added in a sly tone, “Maybe he just isn’t feeling up to driving at the moment.”

He and his men exchanged nasty grins, the kind that sent a spasm of alarm rippling across my shoulder blades. I fought not to let it show.

While Garton-Jones was talking, West had been casually nudging the mud flap behind the Nissan’s front tyre with the toe of his boot. The earth that was caked there dropped out onto the tarmac in small clods.

Garton-Jones glanced down at them. “Been off-roading, have we?” he asked and when I didn’t answer he went on, “Lots of good places for that round here, so I understand. You know – green lanes, bits of waste ground,
building sites . . .
”

The smile left his face as he said the last words, all pretence at good humour wiped away.

Jesus, had he killed Langford just to frame Sean? Jacob had dismissed that scenario as being too drastic, too unbelievable. I wondered if he would change his mind now.

But, if Garton-Jones
was
responsible, why give me what amounted to a confession? Unless they were going to make sure I wasn’t in any fit state to repeat it.

I was almost surprised, then, when he stepped back from the door of the Patrol and let me open it. He moved in again quickly, though, getting right in my face. I prayed he wouldn’t look down, otherwise he couldn’t fail to miss the Glock in the door pocket.

“I’m a reasonable man, Miss Fox,” he said, in much the same tone that he’d once used to tell me he was a violent man, too. “Grudges and feuds are all part of my business. Just tell Meyer to stay off my estate and this won’t go any further. OK?”

Ah, so
that
was it.

I glared at him without making any moves he could possibly take as a sign of acquiescence. Eventually, he just grinned, the action accentuating the tightness of the skin over his death’s head skull. He stepped back again with an arrogant wave of his hand, bored playing games with me.

I bit my tongue and did as I was invited. Resisting the urge to mow down the lot of them was a difficult one, particularly since I was probably in an ideal vehicle to do so.

Sometimes it’s just heroic, the self-control I have.

***

Much to the obvious surprise of the policeman who’d warned me on the way into Lavender Gardens, I escaped from the estate without picking up any unexpected modifications to the Nissan’s bodywork. I gave them a cheery wave as I weaved between the panda cars, but this time I didn’t stop.

Instead, I headed back into Lancaster. I drove through town concentrating too much on the actual mechanics of driving to give a great deal of thought to the little confrontation I’d just had with Garton-Jones and his men. But it was there, all the same, niggling away in the background.

At least my driving seemed to be getting better with practise, and it was quite a revelation to suddenly have road presence. Other car drivers just didn’t try and cut me up like they invariably did when I was on the Suzuki.

Ten minutes later I pulled up outside Attila’s place and killed the engine. I sat for a few moments before getting out, trying to work out how I was going to phrase my request to my boss.

I had told Sean that I knew just the back-up I could call on before going to confront Jav, but now it came down to it I wasn’t sure if I had any right to ask.

A loud knock on the side glass made me jump. Wayne was grinning at me through the window.

I opened the door with a hand on my chest. “God, you frightened the life out of me!”

“Sorry girl,” the black man said, still grinning. He had his coat collar turned up against the steady beat of the rain. Gym bag in hand, he was just leaving from his workout. “So, what’s with the motor? You finally get fed up of that bike of yours, or did you just win the lottery?”

“Neither,” I said, jumping down from my seat onto the gravel. “It’s Sean’s.”

“What did you do, shoot him for it?” Wayne asked quietly then, and I realised that I still hadn’t shifted that damned gun out of the driver’s door pocket. Wayne’s eyes were riveted to it.

I sighed. “No, but someone else did,” I said. I picked the Glock up and leaned over to shove it into the glovebox, slamming the lid. Then I shut the car door and rested my back against it.

Wayne seemed to snap out of it once the gun had disappeared from his view. He put a meaty hand on my shoulder, and when I looked up I found his face full of genuine concern.

“What’s going on girl?” he asked, brow furrowed.

I jerked my head towards the gym door. “Come inside,” I said, “I’ve got to tell Attila all about it anyway and there’s no point in saying it twice.”

The place was going through its usual early-afternoon lull when we walked in. Attila and Wayne were able to sit on a couple of the weights benches and listen to my story about Langford, Ali, Jav and Garton-Jones without an audience.

Very little expression showed on either man’s face when I came to the part about finding Langford’s body, and about Sean being hit.

I listened to my own voice calmly explaining it all as though I was going through a shopping list, and realised that it simply hadn’t sunk in. When it did finally register, I was probably going to come apart at the seams. I knew I couldn’t let that happen.