The Hollow Man (7 page)

The chest of drawers in the bedroom and the living room were also empty. Belsey searched behind the artworks for a concealed safe but found nothing. He looked under the dining-room table and found folded tablecloths and a box of crystal wineglasses.

He found a dusty sauna in what he had originally thought was a walk-in wardrobe. On the ground floor, beside the kitchen, he discovered a utility room that Devereux probably didn’t know about, with a washing machine, ironing board, tools for cleaners and gardeners, bottles of cleaning products, floor polish, mops, and overalls.

Not a single item of use to him.

The phone began to ring again. It seemed to announce the peculiarity of his situation. Each ring was the splash of oars pushing him farther away from shore. Belsey sat in the study and looked at the model ship and the Winter Palace, the will to plunder momentarily deserting him. Devereux’s possessions felt like words left hanging mid-sentence. They seemed to want to say something. About loneliness, perhaps. Exile was a feeling; he understood that. Belsey looked around and sensed someone trying to make a strange place look like home. Maybe it explained the noncommittal rental style.

What had Devereux thought of, sitting here? Money worries? A deal gone wrong? A country he’d never see again? Belsey imagined snow-covered fields, farm machinery, a dirt track. There were peasant women selling honey cakes to travellers; factories with muscular men and flags. He walked to the window then sat on the floor and looked at the space beneath the desk and the antique chair. Something glinted on the floor. Belsey crawled under the desk to the object. It was a watch, supposedly a Rolex: silver and heavy. The face bore the Rolex logo, but the second hand didn’t glide, which was a giveaway. Devereux didn’t strike him as a man for fakes, but then it seemed Devereux might not have been all he once had been. It was still a watch, ticking and with ambitions. It had five dials on the silver face and a lot of buttons to play with. Even fakes could go for several hundred pounds. Belsey liked it. One of the dials showed the phases of the moon.

He put it on and went to the wine rack in the kitchen. He opened three bottles and tried them all: a burgundy, Clos des Lambrays Grand Cru; a 1996 Riesling from Alsace; finally an Italian red from Piedmont, 1989. He decided the only moral thing you could do with wealth was destroy yourself with it. He looked at the fake Rolex on his wrist and drank the burgundy, then took the Riesling up to the pool. The light was turning grey. Belsey kicked his shoes off and sat on a sunlounger. He wondered what you did once you had achieved luxury, what you discovered on the far side of it. He decided he should learn more about time management. His career had been a substitute for time, he saw now, but the career had come apart in his hands. He didn’t know what would replace it. He wanted to talk to Alexei Devereux.

He made one last search of the premises. He hadn’t investigated the garage any further because it had seemed empty. But a second check showed he had overlooked a garbage bin in the front corner, by the electric door. He lifted the top and saw a blue recycling bag, half full; tore it open and saw paper.

Belsey took the bag to the living room and emptied it on the floor. The various documents preserved the form of whatever single file had contained them. The papers involved correspondence relating to something called Project Boudicca. At the top of the pile was a fax from lawyers representing the Hong Kong Gaming Consortium regarding “what we hope you will find is an arrangement convenient to both parties.”

The proposed arrangement involved the split for a deal: 80 percent payment to AD Development and 20 to a numbered account with the Raiffeisen Zentralbank Austria. The fax gave account details. “Please consider this correspondence sensitive.”

Belsey sat on the floor surrounded by the bin bag’s load. He felt himself swimming above a new depth of wealth, the water colder and darker. Behind every great man is an anonymous account. This one was a Sparbuch. Sparbuchs were so anonymous that the Austrian banks were no longer allowed to supply them, but old accounts changed hands on the black market. The bank didn’t ask you for a name or address. They gave you a small savings book, the Sparbuch itself, and you chose a password. That was it. It was useful to have an Austrian accent, or a helpful Austrian attorney, to ensure no flags were raised. Then you were free to drop as much money in and take as much money out, and all you needed was the password. No incriminating statements, no correspondence, no free pen. Mostly people liked to visit the bank in person but funds could be transferred by wire or telephone. They called it wealth protection and police called it a dead end.

Belsey couldn’t find the savings book itself. But, incredibly, he had the account number, the
Kontrollnummer
. It was crazy to think he’d get further. But it was true that more than half of people write their passwords down somewhere. Seventy-five percent reuse the same one again and again.

Belsey dug through the pile of discarded documents and saw the account mentioned in correspondence with a law firm called Trent Horsley Myers and a firm of accountants on Sloane Square. Finally there was a letter to the solicitors from Raiffeisen Zentralbank Austria, confirming that they now offered twenty-four-hour telephone banking and there were no formal restrictions on the amount an individual could deposit in one day, although sums over 500,000 euros would take forty-eight hours to clear.

Belsey had found the buried treasure, he felt certain. He called the number on the bank’s correspondence.

“
Guten Abend
,” a woman answered.

“
Guten Abend
,” Belsey said. “I’m calling from London. I have an account with you and I need to make an urgent payment out of it.”

“Of course, sir. Can I have your password?”

“I don’t have the password here. I have the account number.”

“I’d need your password, sir.”

“This is urgent. I have a contractor waiting.”

“I can’t do that, sir.”

“What would I need to transfer money out?”

“Account number and password.”

“And I could do that by phone?”

“Of course.”

“What if I’ve forgotten my password?”

“You’d need to bring proof of identity into one of our branches and speak to a security adviser.”

“Thank you.”

Belsey hung up. The money was there, he could smell it.
We brought nothing into this world and it is certain we can carry nothing out
. What had the PA said? Down to his last million. He could believe that Devereux was moved by poverty to take his life, but poverty was relative. One man’s bankruptcy was another man’s nest egg. It was just a question of advancing carefully.

Belsey considered his next move. Then he saw the time. He was late for the end of his career.

10

T
he Internal Affairs headquarters were in High Holborn: a glass-walled office block with a Starbucks on the ground floor. Belsey parked the Porsche Cayenne round the corner and walked in. The headquarters wore a neutral mask; blue carpets, floor-length windows, code-access doors in pale pine. He’d been there once before, after a death in custody, and hadn’t enjoyed it much then either.

“Belsey. Here for a review.”

A front-desk man looked at him, checked something and sent Belsey, accompanied by a guard, to the second floor. There was an open-plan space with a lot of civilian workers at flat-panel monitors. The guard departed and a man came up to him.

“Nicholas Belsey?”

“Hi.”

“Frank Sacco. I’m your lawyer, Riggs and Jenkins.”

He shook Belsey’s hand. Sacco was a short man in an olive-green suit and slip-on shoes, face glistening as if he’d slicked the hair and continued slicking his face. Riggs and Jenkins supplied all the lawyers for internal investigations. It meant Belsey’s case had already reached the union.

“Pleased to meet you,” Belsey said.

“Anything we need to discuss?”

“Do you know much about identity theft?”

“It’s not my speciality.”

“Let’s go in.”

Sacco led the way to a corner office. Inside were two men and a woman—one man and the woman sitting behind a desk with a file, the second man standing, looking out of the window. Belsey walked in and shut the door. The seated man was Barry Gaunt, from IA. Belsey recognised the commissioner from television, where he talked about what went wrong at riots, police who had acted violently. He was too broad for his M&S suit, with a pink face and a thick neck. The standing man was tall, with rat-like features. The woman had a bob and a dark orange trouser suit and craft jewellery. So they’ve brought in a counsellor, Belsey thought. From the office you got a view of Kingsway, the old tram tunnel, Red Lion Square. People were filing in to Conway Hall.

“Please, sit down.”

Belsey and Sacco took the empty seats. The counsellor spoke first, which was never a good sign.

“I’m Janet, from the Mental Health Assessment Team.”

“I’m pleased to meet you, Janet,” Belsey said.

Gaunt spoke: “Barry Gaunt from Internal Affairs. This is Nigel Herring, from Camden Borough headquarters.” He waved towards the tall man. Herring avoided Belsey’s gaze. Belsey knew the name: Northwood’s attack dog, risen to inspector purely by virtue of kissing Northwood’s arse. A shifty character, with his finger in too many pies. He wore a Masonic ring and an unhealthy pallor.

“What do you understand about this situation?” Gaunt asked.

“This situation?”

“About why you’re here.”

“Because I stole and crashed a squad car.”

“OK,” the counsellor said gently.

“Chief Superintendent Northwood wants you to explain yourself.”

“I don’t know if I can explain myself as such. Things happened, and I am ashamed of what happened, and understand that procedures will . . . proceed.”

“It’s not just this, though, is it?” Gaunt said.

“You mean with regards to that night?”

“With regards to everything.”

“With regards to everything, no. It’s not just this,” Belsey said.

Gaunt looked half bored, as if he resented being drawn from serious riots to the small and insignificant riot of Belsey’s life.

“Where were you going?” he asked.

“I think I was actually trying to get to the Heath. In that sense I succeeded. I woke up the following morning on the Heath. Am I suspended?”

“Should you be?”

“Don’t answer,” Sacco said.

“Would it be a paid suspension?” Belsey said.

“Are you in financial difficulty?” the counsellor asked.

“Yes,” Belsey said. He put his hands into Devereux’s jacket. Then he took them out again and checked the time. He thought:
Who drops a watch? If you drop a watch, you hear it. You pick it up. And you don’t drop it anyway, because it’s on you.

“Do you enjoy police work?” the counsellor asked.

“No more than I’m meant to.”

“Would you like to talk about what it means to you?”

“Can I ask you a question about dreams?” Belsey said.

“Let me ask you a question,” Herring interjected. “Did you enter the borough commander’s home on the night of 11 February?”

“Yes.”

“With his wife?” He sounded exasperated.

“Is that an offence? You’ll have half the Met—”

“Watch yourself.”

“Watch yourself,” Sacco said.

“Is this on the square, Nigel? Know what I mean?”

“You’re running out of lives, Belsey.”

“Yes.”

“Yes what?” Gaunt said.

“Yes, I entered it.”

“Why?”

“I was curious.”

Herring turned back to the window with his hands in his pockets.

B
elsey thought about money laundering. Even if he could get access to Devereux’s personal stash he wouldn’t be able to transfer it into his current account without setting off alarm bells. Sudden changes in wealth did that. Transfers from dead businessmen to bankrupt detectives did that. And he needed a financial set-up that could travel. He’d spent several months seconded to Anti–Money Laundering and knew the game. There were three stages to each wash: placement, layering and integration. Placing money meant establishing some door through which you could get dirty cash into the world of finance. It meant finding a vein. Layering was the web you weave, the movement around shells, offshores, numbered accounts, making it untraceable before the third stage: integration. Because no one wants a big cheque from the Bank of Downtown La Paz. But get it into the City of London and it’s legitimate. EC1 was every money launderer’s dream. Just half a mile away . . .

“Northwood says you’ve got previous,” Herring said.

“Does he?”

“Trouble at Borough. Question marks.”

“Chief Superintendent Northwood has some form of his own, doesn’t he?”

Herring began to speak but the counsellor intervened.

“Let’s concentrate on the specific incident,” she suggested, with gentle exasperation. “Try to explain what occurred.”

“Not a great deal occurred. I apologise for taking the car. I’ve been going through a rough time.”

“Had you been drinking?”

“Of course I’d been drinking.”

“Would you say you have a problem with alcohol?”

“No.”

“Any other substances?”

“Ritalin. If I wanted to work here,” Belsey said, “would I have to be close to retirement? Older, I mean?”

Herring tightened his lips. “We’re going to need a urine sample.”

“Where would you like it?” Belsey said.

Gaunt opened his desk drawer and produced a small pot, which he rested on Belsey’s edge of the desk as if to avoid contaminating himself.
Is that all he had in there?
Belsey wondered.
Receptacles for urine?
“OK, sure,” Belsey said. He took the pot, went towards the toilets, then he kept going to the lifts and out of the front doors.

11

B
elsey looked up “Company Formation” in a Yellow Pages in Holborn Library and found what he was looking for.

Ocean Wealth Protection and Private Banking Assistance. Same-day Company Formation Agent. Start a new business in 3 to 5 minutes: £32.00—Tax Havens and Privacy Solutions.

Privacy solutions sounded right. He knew an international business corporation—an IBC—could be set up in somewhere like Antigua with the click of a button, complete with an office address and even board directors provided by the Antiguan authorities. Your name didn’t come up on any paperwork but you could steer money through. Ocean had a walk-in office in Belsize Park just a few minutes from Hampstead Police station. Belsey knew the street: a parade of estate agents, cosmetic surgeons and boutique clothes stores. He imagined Ocean looked at home there. He was correct.

He parked the Porsche Cayenne outside their office, making sure Ocean had a good view of it. He got out, straightening his suit, and rang the intercom.

“Straight up the stairs.” There was a positive note to the voice. Belsey climbed narrow steps to a door marked “Ocean Ltd.” The office was run by two men, one young and one old, with computers and little else. The older one had the faded sparkle of a player, hair cropped close, gym-build. He looked like a bank robber trying to dress as a banker. The younger one wore a white shirt with suspenders and a pink tie with a fat knot. On the wall was a map of the world with coloured flags pinned to a lot of small islands. A free-standing fan moved cigarette smoke towards a double-glazed window, where it rolled back towards the desks. Belsey was gestured to a seat at a bare desk in the centre of the room.

“Coffee?”

“Black, thanks.”

Belsey glanced at the walls. Around the map were a lot of plaques and certificates that told you little other than the outfit knew how to look cute. The older man poured the coffee.

“How can we help?”

“I’d like to buy a company,” Belsey said. He took a sip of good, strong coffee. “I need to cover my back.”

“What kind of thing were you thinking of?”

“Two IBCs somewhere offshore, maybe Antigua, with nominee directors and a trading record. I want a postbox address that can’t be traced to me and an anonymous deposit account in the name of one of the shelf companies, somewhere untouchable. But I need it respectable enough to transfer medium sums into a European current account without drawing attention.”

They leaned back, nodding. The younger agent balanced a pen between his index fingers.

“Sounds like you know what you’re doing.”

“I need an idea of prices.”

“It depends on the jurisdiction. For an off-the-shelf company, the British Virgin Islands is attractive: Crown property, starts at eight hundred and forty. Jersey is twice that, but then it’s a major financial centre. Otherwise there’s Dominica, the Seychelles, Anguilla. All the companies we sell will have records going back at least three years. Dominica’s the cheapest that we’d feel comfortable recommending.”

“What’s on Dominica?”

He flipped a small laptop open.

“We could sell you, for example, the Dutch Export Import Trading AG, set up March 2005. Or the American Auto Management Corporation, a couple of months older. Each comes with a law firm as nominee director, so that any dealings remain confidential. You get power of attorney so you can manage the company. There’s no reporting requirements.”

“And the bank account?”

“If it was me I’d go for Cyprus, but that will be fifteen hundred. Otherwise, maybe St. Vincent, which is U.S. dollar accounts only but you can receive or transfer money in all major currencies. Minimum deposit would be around two grand; you pay the deposit to the bank, not to us. It’s totally anonymous but they do ask for references. It’s a tough climate out there. You don’t look like a terrorist to me, but . . .”

“Any that don’t ask for a reference or minimum deposit?”

“The Island of Niue.” He pronounced it Nee-oo-yee.

“Niue?”

“A chunk of coral in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Three hours’ flight from New Zealand. Self-governing member of the British Commonwealth, mostly home to seagulls and the registered addresses of Japanese telephone-sex companies. And the Bank of the South Pacific, as it’s known. Essentially, you give us an address of your choice and we type up a bill and fax that to them. It will do. They’ll charge a one-off fee of two hundred dollars for admin.”

“Perfect.”

“Great. What else? We can do you a Certificate of Good Standing for ninety-five pounds, a virtual office in a city of your choosing which can hold mail and forward calls. That’s around seventy per month. For twenty-five pounds we can even give you a rubber stamp of the company.”

“What does that do?”

“It’s a stamp made out of rubber, with the company name on it.”

“I’ll get one of those.”

“OK.”

“How does this call-forwarding service work?”

“However you want. When someone dials your company it goes through to them. They answer the phone and say this is X company, so-and-so is in a meeting, and then they call you to pass on the message. Or not. They can wait for you to call, or pass messages once a week. They can sing the caller happy birthday, if you want. It’s your call, you see?” He grinned.

“I see. I’ve got a lot of money in an Austrian account that I want to transfer. What works best for that?”

“Niue will be fine. We can use one of the IBCs to set up an account on the island. That will come with a local office address, which is a statutory requirement, but we’ll throw in a virtual address package which means you can operate from anywhere in the world and not worry about unwanted bureaucracy.”

“That would be great.”

“Of course it would.”

Belsey sipped his coffee. He felt, for the first time, what every career criminal must feel at least once and never forget: the possibility of getting away with it; the knowledge of policing’s limits, the limits of international cooperation, and the space of freedom beyond them. He gazed out of the window and thought of tropical seas.
Wash me whiter than snow
, the prayer went.
Wash my sins away
.

“What’s the total?” Belsey asked.

“For an address, two shelf companies and a bank account you’re looking at six grand, tops. Probably more like five thousand eight hundred.”

“I don’t have the money on me right now.”

“Sure. Come back when you do. It’s all ready to go.” The young man looked up from his screen and smiled.

B
elsey tore a parking ticket off the Porsche’s windscreen, tossed it and drove to a travel agent’s on Hampstead High Street. All the assistants were busy. He took a seat in the waiting area and thought of the last time he’d been out of the country: a weekend break to Palermo, a spur-of-the-moment thing with a blonde estate agent who had been a witness in a club shooting. They’d gone straight from the Old Bailey. That was last May, his only holiday in five years. But he remembered the feverish promise of those days, of places in which London seemed a long, dark dream;
that
was the kind of place he was going.

He took a brochure and scribbled a list of non-extradition countries on the back. He knew the police forces that were hard to liaise with. There’d been several cases where they tried to liaise with Morocco. It was impossible; no one spoke English, no one answered the phones. To Morocco and then . . . on, farther.
They give you weapons training. Play a bit of squash, stay in shape . . .

“Can I help?” A young woman called him over.

“How much is a flight to Morocco?” Belsey asked.

The woman ran a search on her computer.

“Right now, starting at two hundred and twenty, one way, Casablanca.” She tilted it so he could see.

“Including tax?”

“No.”

“What’s the cheapest flight you do?”

This check took a moment longer.

“Dublin,” she said.

“I need somewhere farther away than Dublin.”

“How about Bremen? That’s in Germany.”

“How much is that?”

“Four pounds without tax. Probably twenty-eight with.”

“Flying from Stansted?”

“That’s right.”

“What does the train to Stansted cost these days?”

“Return?”

“Single.”

“Hang on.” She wheeled her chair over to a colleague, then wheeled it back.

“Nineteen.”

“Thank you.”

He walked out of the travel agent’s and into a cafe, took a newspaper from the bin and wrote in the blank spaces of an advert: flight, taxes, train. He listed the prices for each one. And he felt a quiet satisfaction at seeing the bottom line—forty-seven pounds to start his life again. Then he wrote five thousand eight hundred pounds alongside it, the rough figure quoted by the company formations agent. That would keep alive the possibility of a more dramatic regeneration. But it meant significant start-up capital. He turned the page over and wrote a list of Devereux’s possessions in the margin and, beside it, a column of what he thought he could get for them.