The Murder Exchange (44 page)

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for all his initial bravado, was carrying a lot of guilt
about with him, and had been for six months.

He exhaled loudly. 'So I tells them to get some
gloves, not to touch the body unless they're wearing
them, and to make it look like a nonce has done
it, then get rid of the thing.'

'Did you help in that process?'

He shook his head. 'No. That kid was only a
couple of years older than my oldest. I wasn't going
to do nothing. It was their problem, not mine. So I
left them to it, but not before I'd told them to keep
their gobs shut. I didn't want Neil finding out about
it.'

'So where's Tony Franks now?' asked Knox.

'Dead,' answered Merriweather.

'What happened?'

'It's a long story and, I have to tell you, it's one I
can't hardly believe myself.'

'We're in no hurry, Jack. I think you may as well
start talking.'

He exhaled loudly again, then began. 'Well,
nothing happened for months. Obviously you lot
were looking for the boy's killers but I was pretty
sure we -1 mean they - were in the clear because it
looked like you was searching for a nonce, and I
think they'd covered their tracks well enough.
Then, a couple of weeks back, it all went wrong.
Someone offed Shaun Matthews.'

Knox looked surprised. 'What? You don't know
who?'

Merriweather shook his head. 'No. It was no-one
from the organization.'

Knox and I looked at each other quizzically. This

410

was an interesting development, and something
we'd have to pick up on later.

'Anyway, as well as doing a bit of work with
Tony, Matthews also ran the door at this club
called Arcadia, as you probably know. Now, Neil
owns Arcadia even though his name's not on the
deeds, but a bloke called Roy Fowler's the one
who's actually been managing it for him. But
Fowler was skimming the club, taking money that
was meant for Neil, and Matthews was involved as
well. So, when Matthews gets topped, Fowler
panics, thinks we're on to him, which we were, and
thinks we're going to kill him, which we weren't.
Not as far as I knew anyway. The problem is,
though, Fowler's convinced he's a dead man, so he
f-akes evasive measures.'

'What sort of evasive measures?' I asked.
'Blackmail. You see, he's got something up his
sleeve he's been keeping as a bargaining chip for
just this sort of eventuality. In fact, he's got two
things. He's got a tape recording he made of a conversation
he had with Matthews, and in this
conversation Matthews, who as it happens was
pissed, is talking about the weapons scam and how
if s run by Vamen, and also what happened with
the kid. Just the sort of tape you don't want falling
into the hands of Stefan Holtz. But he's got something
worse as well. He's got the knife that killed
the kid.'

'How the hell did he get hold of that?' demanded
Knox.

'I honestly don't know. Maybe Matthews
panicked when they got rid of the body, kept it for

411

a while, then gave it to Fowler to get rid of.' He
shrugged. 1 couldn't tell you. But, either way, Fowler
decided to hang on to it, just in case it ever proved
useful, and so, when Matthews died and he
suddenly thought he was next, he sent a message to
Neil saying that he had this incriminating stuff and
that if we tried to do anything to him he'd make
sure Stefan and the Old Bill got to hear about it. He
also said he wanted a hundred grand so that he
could get out of the country, and if Neil gave him
that, then he'd hand over the knife and the tape.

'So Neil, who's none too pleased to find out
about the dead kid, arranges to meet up with
Fowler to do the exchange. At the same time, he
finds out from Elaine Toms, who's like his eyes and
ears in Arcadia, that Fowler's going to be getting
his security from Tiger Solutions. Well, Tiger's run
by a bloke called Joe Riggs, who's a bit of an
associate of Neil's, nothing major, but he's had
some involvement in the weapons side through
Tony. So we set it up that Tony would be on the
team taking Fowler to the meet. He'd deal with
Fowler, and anyone else who got in the way, and
take back the evidence. End of story, end of
problem.

'Except it didn't work out like that. Joe's been
rumbling on about his partner, Iversson - the naked
bloke you nicked - for a long time, and even thinks
that Iversson might have offed his missus - that's
Joe's missus - years back. So, when it's all set up,
Joe makes sure that Iversson's one of the ones
escorting Fowler, because he wants Tony to take
him out as well. Only problem is, Iversson was a bit

412

tastier than Tony was prepared for, and Tony was
the one who got shot.'

'So Iversson didn't have anything to do with the
murder of Fowler?'

He looked at me. 'No. He didn't have a clue what
was going on. The thing was, though, he was now
a fucking complication. He knew what had
happened, plus you lot were after him, so things
could have got very dodgy if he'd been picked up.

'We were still thinking what to do about him
when he turns up at the Arcadia and ends up in the
sack with Elaine Toms, who, as it happens, is one of
Neil's exes and a girl he's got a real soft spot for.
They were going to have Iversson killed round her
Hat, which was where he was staying after you lot
started looking for him, but then Neil has a bit of an
idea. A better way of dealing with him. Like I said
earlier, Neil's been looking to move in on Stefan for
a while, but it was never going to be easy because
Stefan didn't move from that fucking house of his,
and he's guarded to the hilt. Plus, Neil doesn't want
to be seen to do anything that'll make him look disloyal.
Far better to get someone else to do it. So he
gets Elaine to push Iversson into kidnapping Krys
because he knows that's the only way he's going to
get Stefan out into the open. Joe helps her set everything
up, Krys gets lifted, and when Stefan turns up
at the rendezvous with the ransom money, he gets
popped by our people. And the beauty of it is that
no-one suspects Neil at all.'

'What happened at the farmhouse?' asked Knox.
'We found Riggs's body there, as well as a number
of others, including Krys Holtz's.'

413

Merriweather sighed. 'That was Riggs's fault. He
was meant to sort out Krys and Iversson and leave
their bodies there so that Iversson would get the
blame for everything, but that fucker's got a real
knack for staying alive, and it was Riggs who got
killed. When Riggs didn't show up to say that it
had all been sorted, we had to take our own evasive
action. We thought Iversson would head for
Elaine's so I went round there, just in case she
couldn't handle things, and that's where you found
me. She tried to kill him, he attacked her, and I just
got in the way.'

'What about Shaun Matthews?' I asked. 'Who
killed him if it was no-one from your own
organization?'

'Christ knows/ said Merriweather. 'Who the fuck
poisons anyone anyway? It's a recipe for getting
caught these days, what with all them technological
advantages you lot have got.'

'Our information strongly suggests that
Matthews's girlfriend of a number of months was also a mistress of Neil Vamen.'

'Who's that, then?'

'Her name's Jean Tanner.'

For the first time in the interview, Merriweather
laughed, although there wasn't much humour in it.
'Oh yeah, you were on about her in the Seven Bells
the other week, weren't you? Nah, I wouldn't put it
quite like that. They went out for a little while - old
Neil likes to have a few girlfriends - but it was all
over way back.'

'When?'

He shrugged. 'I dunno, four, five months ago?

414

But she was a right weirdo. Used to work in
Heavenly Girls, but even the punters stayed a bit
clear of her. She was nice looking, and all right
when you first met her, but, I dunno, it's difficult to
put your finger on, but something about her wasn't
quite right, know what I mean? I know old Neil
was glad to get rid of her. As it happens, I think
she was the first girl he'd ever been with who
ictually scared him - not that he'd ever admit it, of
course.'

'So, what about Craig McBride?' I asked.

'Craigy? They said he died of a smack overdose,
didn't they? Not that I ever saw him take any.
Always thought he was more of a coke man myself.
He died round her place, didn't he?'

That's right.'

'Well, it wouldn't surprise me if she'd helped him
along.'

'Why would she do that?'

'I dunno, maybe he was annoying her or something.
The thing is with her, she was the sort
you could imagine doing something like that,
do you know what I mean? She was dodgy.'

'And it takes one to know one, eh, Jack?' said
Knox.

'Whatever.'

We all sat in silence for a while while
Merriweather sucked up what was left of his latest
cigarette.

'So, do you think she could have killed
Matthews, too?' asked Knox eventually.

He shrugged again. 'Fuck knows. That's for you
to find out, isn't it?'

415

Monday, eight days later

Gallan

But we never did find out who poisoned Shaun
Matthews.

Five days on, and after much internal discussion,
the likeliest scenario suggested that, for whatever I reason, Jean Tanner had been the one. The theory, t
agreed by all the original investigating team, but
with absolutely no evidence whatsoever to back it
up, was that there had been some sort of relation- :'
ship between Tanner and Matthews, but it had |
ended before his death and, for whatever reason, 4
there'd been bad blood between the two of them.
Being a girl who liked to throw her favours around,
she was also seeing Craig McBride, and had got
him to supply her with the poison to get rid of her
ex-boyfriend. McBride was the only person we
could think of who might have had the means to
obtain it, almost certainly when he'd been out in
Bosnia. He was also stupid enough to think that he
could get away with it by making Matthews's
death look like an accident. Jean had undoubtedly

416

thought the same way, and had administered the
fatal dose to her unsuspecting ex.

Then, a few days later, we'd paid a visit to
McBride and he'd panicked, thinking we were
getting too close. He'd gone round to talk to Jean,
they'd had an argument, and at that point she'd
decided that he was now a liability. Maybe he'd
been suggesting she come clean and tell the police,
or something like that.

Jean had acted decisively. Somehow, she'd
managed to obtain and inject him with a huge
quantity of heroin and, unable to get rid of the
body, had left to plan her next move, before finally
deciding that it was probably best to return and
make out that the whole thing had been an accident.
Bur ley, then, had probably not been as corrupt as I'd
first thought and, rather than trying to protect her
as a favour to Vamen, he was simply being too lazy
to do his job properly, and his obnoxiousness was
natural rather than artificially created. Fair enough.
Hopefully some day, someone in charge would
notice it, and he'd suffer as a result.

We'd brought Jean Tanner in for questioning and
Berrin and I had kept her in for twenty-four hours
while we'd interrogated her. She might have been a
weirdo (although I have to say I found her to be
pretty level-headed) but she was no fool and,
knowing that the police had nothing on her bar
theories, had denied everything. She didn't know
who'd killed Shaun, she hoped they caught whoever
it was, and, as for Craig McBride, that had
been a tragic accident that had taught her the
dangers of drugs. When I'd pointed out that

417

McBride had had a phobia about needles, her jaw
had dropped, her eyes had widened, and she'd
simply said, 'Really? How odd.' In the end, we'd
had to let her go. Benin had been pissed off, and
was particularly concerned that a woman who
might well have committed two murders in the
space of a couple of weeks was walking the streets
unmolested.

'Let me tell you something,' I'd told him. 'Crime
can sometimes be a good short-term career move,
sometimes it can even be quite a good medium
term one, but I promise you this, it's never a good
long-term one. They all get caught in the end. If she
is a psycho and she really did kill those two blokes,
then somewhere down the line, she'll try it again, and
she'll come unstuck. In the meantime, just make sure
you don't ever go out with her.'

'Do you think she did it?' Benin had asked.

'Thinking it and proving it are two very different
things. If I can't prove it, then I prefer not to make
a judgement. Probably is all I'd say. Probably.'

It was a sunny morning in early September and I
was walking down Cleveland Street towards the
Middlesex Hospital. My mobile rang. It was Malik.

'John, how are you?' His tone was cheery, which
wasn't really a surprise. The object of his last year
and-a-half's work, the Holtz family and their
immense criminal enterprise, was finally unravelling.
Some might even say it had something to do with
my perseverance.

'I'm well, Asif. You?'

'Very good. Look, the reason for my call, it's a

418

thanks, really, for all the work you've done, and to
let you know that this morning we arrested Vamen
and six of his associates on a whole variety
of charges relating to their activities. And
Merriweather's continuing to sing like the
proverbial canary.'

'I'm glad he's proving useful. It's a pity he's got
to get immunity, though.'

'Well, he's not going to get full immunity. There
are a couple of charges he's going to be facing, and
he might get a nominal spell inside.'

'Not nearly as much as he deserves, though.'
'You know the score, John. Sometimes you've got
to swallow your principles when you're dealing
with people like that. Whatever happens, he's a
marked man for the rest of his life. I'd rather not be
in his boots.'