The Hollow Man Read online

  Belsey made it into the CID office and ran a full check on his new shadow. His colleagues were busy, heads down. Belsey tried to be discreet, nonetheless. There was more on Buckingham on the Internet than in UK police files, which said something about his profile and his legal team. The reports painted a charming portrait. Buckingham’s first recorded misdemeanour was kidnap and false imprisonment of a stripper after an altercation in the Pussycat Lounge, Tel Aviv. That was four years ago. Buckingham played the diplomatic card; it turned out he was representing a UK government agency at the time, although it wasn’t clear which agency concerned itself with the Pussycat Lounge. His father was Edward Buckingham, or Lord Buckingham of Tankerness to friends, former shadow defence secretary. Edward Buckingham made a killing off the first Gulf War for reasons that may have involved the Kuwait Sovereign Wealth Fund. His son followed in his footsteps. There were a string of minor diplomatic incidents, rumours of assault, driving offences. Last year he had magically sidestepped a charge of aggravated violence and possession of cocaine. An incident two weeks later in which he ran over a journalist while trying to leave a Paris nightclub took an out-of-court settlement to reach a happy ending.

  The CID phone rang. Belsey avoided it. It rang ten times before Rosen snapped and lifted the receiver and grunted. A few seconds passed and his bloodshot eyes slipped to Belsey. Belsey felt them. Rosen covered the receiver with his fat hand. He didn’t say anything, just stared.

  “What?” Belsey said.

  “It’s a Charlotte Kelson.”

  Belsey sat up. He shook his head.

  “She wants to arrange to speak to a Nick Belsey,” Rosen said.

  Belsey drew a finger across his throat. Rosen slowly removed his hand from the receiver without taking his eyes off Belsey. “He’s not here,” he said. Charlotte must have said something else. Rosen grunted again and hung up.

  “Thanks,” Belsey said. Rosen shook his head and went back to his papers. It was only then Belsey realised how much he had wanted to hear her voice.

  He checked the window. Pierce Buckingham was there, on the pavement opposite. He had positioned himself behind a grey Saab, as if using it for cover. He was alert, scanning his surroundings. But his focus was the station. Skin infection—that was code for surveillance, for those on undercover ops. I’ve got a skin infection. I’m being watched. Now he felt why. His neck prickled. Something about the way Buckingham’s overcoat was buttoned up seemed strange.

  Belsey stepped out of the station. Buckingham watched him but didn’t follow. Belsey walked to the Prince of Wales. The Prince had a public phone tucked away in one corner. He called the Mail and asked to be put through to Charlotte.

  “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

  “How sweet,” she said with quiet caution.

  “What have you got?”

  “This Nick Belsey is a detective at Hampstead station. Do you know him?”

  “I’ll give you something to write about, Charlotte. But leave Belsey out of it. That’s the trade.”

  “Are you Nick Belsey?”

  “This is a very complicated situation.”

  “Apparently he’s in financial difficulties.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “It’s your turn to talk, Nick.”

  While he’d been happily living Devereux’s life, it seemed someone had been deciding how to use him. He had a vague vision of throttling them. But another, cooler part of his mind was profiling: someone sophisticated, controlled, with access to financial records. Someone who might have powerful friends. Someone Belsey had made nervous.

  “Listen, Charlotte, the story’s not about me. It’s about how Milton Granby connects to the Starbucks shooting.”

  There was a laugh. Then silence as she decided how to respond.

  “You’re joking,” she said.

  “I’m serious.”

  “Go on.”

  “I will when I know more. Trust me, Charlotte.”

  “You promised me a story. I get the feeling you’re trying to distract me from one.”

  “I have something. But I need time to get you proof.”

  “I don’t have that time, not on the promise of a bankrupt detective.”

  “Charlotte—”

  “We go to press this afternoon. I can’t work with you if you’re not able to tell me what’s going on here.”

  “Then you won’t be working with me.”

  Belsey put the phone down. He was being screwed with. So was Charlotte. The situation put him in mind of interrogation techniques—when you needed to undermine a hardened group of criminals you made sure every individual felt alone and betrayed. You built vast conspiracies going on beyond the interview-room door so that their values and identities collapsed.

  But Belsey’s mysterious foe had underestimated his resources. They had told Belsey he was on to something. Both he and Charlotte Kelson were on to something.

  And they had made contact.

  He returned to the station and called Vodafone.

  “What the hell’s going on? I faxed through a Section 22 last night and I’m still waiting . . .”

  The police got deference from network operators. They made themselves a lot of Home Office money supplying call information. Belsey was holding twenty sheets of Charlotte Kelson’s phone activity within ten minutes.

  I got a call an hour ago. It said to come here. To tell the people on the door I was meeting someone in the restaurant.

  He looked for calls the previous night, at approximately 10 p.m. There was only one: a landline number. Belsey ran a check and it was a public phone box in the middle of a residential street on the edge of Vauxhall. There wouldn’t even be CCTV to pursue.

  He called British Telecom. “I want all calls made from that box yesterday evening.”

  They sent the information through without protest. There was only one other call made from the phone box last night. It was to a Hampstead number: 37 The Bishops Avenue.

  They called Devereux’s home at eight minutes past ten. The call lasted forty-one seconds. Had he been in?

  Something began to shift into place.

  He called Les Ambassadeurs. A woman answered.

  “Yesterday, a man called from your restaurant, confirming a booking. For Alexei Devereux.”

  “Did they?”

  “You tell me. He sounded maybe French or Italian.”

  “I’m not sure about that, sir.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s not our usual procedure.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The table would be held for an hour, as a matter of course. After that we would try to seat the party where possible. We don’t make reminder calls.”

  “No one from the casino phoned yesterday?”

  “I doubt it.”

  Belsey put the phone down. He tried to cast his mind back to that voice, but a voice on a phone line was not a face, let alone a fingerprint. It seemed they wanted to scare him, but also to show him something. They wanted him to investigate. A lot of criminals liked the attention they got, but this was different. This one had something to show.

  Belsey found Devereux’s envelopes in his jacket and tore them open. Of eight letters, one was from a mental health charity and seven were demands for payment. In varying tones of politeness, obsequiousness and impatience they suggested it was time for the businessman to cough up: Carte Blanche International Yacht Charter, Sprint Domestic Cleaners, the Alan Cristea Gallery on Cork Street, the European Casino Association, Henry Poole Bespoke Tailors, Handford Wines in South Kensington, Les Ambassadeurs.

  Finally there was an invoice from a courier company, Goldstar International. It was for a job the previous Saturday, 7 February; the day before Devereux died. But it was the amount owed that made Belsey take a closer look. The job cost £295. It involved t
hree vans. Whatever required this amount of transportation had been collected from 33 Cavendish Square, 11:40 a.m.; delivery to postcode EC2V.

  Belsey typed the full drop-off postcode into his office PC and it came up as the Guildhall.

  The Guildhall was the City’s own grand banqueting house, its town hall, a fifteenth-century status symbol with roots down through the Middle Ages to Roman London. Most of the City admin got done in a modern building to the north, leaving the opulent space available for corporate hire. What was Devereux doing?

  Belsey thought he might have better luck with the pickup address, but he was wrong. Thirty-three Cavendish Square was a huge tower behind Regent Street, providing office space to twenty-seven separate companies, from Dental Protection Ltd., Coller Capital, Esselco Services and Sovereign Chemicals to Star Capital Partners, Advisa Solicitors, Lasalle Investment Management, MWB Business Exchange, TOTAL Holdings UK Ltd., Coal Pension Properties Ltd.

  The names swam before his eyes in shades of corporate grey. The invoice didn’t list anything but the address and there was no obvious place to start. None of the names looked familiar from paperwork he’d seen at Devereux’s home or office.

  Belsey called the couriers themselves.

  “Goldstar.”

  “Hi. I’ve just received an invoice for a job—but we don’t have any record of it this end.”

  There was a groan.

  “Have you got the reference there?”

  Belsey read the reference.

  “Well,” the man said, “we certainly did it, because I remember it.”

  “What was it?”

  “Very large, very fragile boxes. You tell me.”

  “Which company did you pick them up from?”

  “If it’s not on the invoice I’m not going to know.”

  “Can you remember what the event was?”

  “The event? Look, we just delivered them—”

  “How many boxes was it?”

  “I didn’t count. You were the one being secretive about it.”

  “It’s escaped me. Are there any of the drivers there? Perhaps they remember what it was about.”

  “They’re working. There’s no doubt we did the job. Maybe it was so sensitive that’s why you’ve forgotten all about it.”

  Belsey hung up. He thought about the delivery address. Guildhall: the City. Milton Granby’s domain. It was one of the few leads open to him. Belsey found a number for the Chamberlain’s office and got through to a humourless woman with an affected accent who said that Granby was unavailable.

  “When can I catch him?”

  “What does the request concern?”

  “It’s personal.”

  “Try tomorrow.”

  “What’s he doing today?”

  “He’s taking schoolchildren around the Barbican, for Community Week.”

  “Is it Community Week?”

  “Yes.” She hung up.

  Belsey signed out an inconspicuous black Peugeot 307 and drove to the Barbican. It was all simple, really. He would discover what Project Boudicca was and how it killed Devereux, steer the Jessica Holden investigation in the right direction, use the knowledge to play Kovar, avoid getting killed, avoid falling in love, avoid whoever was playing games with his head, leave the country, re-establish some quality of life . . . Rain dripped down the surfaces of the grey complex. He cruised past Cromwell Tower, Shakespeare Tower, searching through the desolate shards of concrete for signs of Community Week. Eventually he found school buses parked beside the Museum of London and, a little farther on, some security guards and a photographer from the local paper. Beyond them was Granby’s entourage.

  Milton Granby stood in the centre of a crowd once more, this time an adviser, PA, some interns and a makeup girl. Everyone was busy apart from Granby, who looked a little queasy and unstable without the tuxedo. The makeup girl was putting life into his cheeks. The hangover made him irritable. Granby shouted something at the adviser and one of the interns, something Belsey couldn’t hear. The schoolchildren kept their distance. This was going to be interesting, Belsey thought. The PA walked in his direction. He saw what was happening too late.

  “Are you here for the shoot?” she asked.

  “I’m a police detective.”

  “OK.” It didn’t seem to ruffle her. “Follow me.” She moved him to the crowd in front of a sign that said “Building Communities Together.” “We thought you’d be in uniform,” she said.

  Belsey had his picture taken with the Chamberlain and the schoolchildren. The children made a lot of noise and the Chamberlain gritted his teeth. After five minutes the photographer had what he wanted. The crowd broke up, with some words of wisdom regarding life opportunities from Milton Granby, and then he was being called away by his adviser. Granby made for the cars. Belsey caught up with him.

  “Nick Belsey, Detective Constable from Rosslyn Hill.”

  “Honoured to meet you, sir.” He shook Belsey’s hand with the sincerity of someone who had to fake it often enough. Belsey could see, underneath the pomp of office, that Granby was a bruiser of a type you could find in any bar from Mile End to the Palace of Westminster. He strode along beside the Chamberlain. “Police are central to my vision for the City of London,” Granby said.

  “By necessity.”

  The Chamberlain thought about this. He looked at Belsey again.

  “Rosslyn Hill isn’t in the City,” he said.

  “I’d like to talk to you about a man called Alexei Devereux.”

  Now Granby stopped and shielded his eyes against the winter glare to get a better look at Belsey.

  “What is this?” he said.

  “I’m worried that people are making trouble for you unnecessarily.”

  “You’d be amazed,” Granby said tightly.

  “I think I can help.”

  “What do you want?”

  “A chat.”

  Granby waved the waiting car away and told the rest of his entourage to follow, saying he’d see them at the office. They left, casting suspicious glances in Belsey’s direction.

  “What about Alexei Devereux?” Granby said.

  “He might have got himself in trouble. Before he did, he wanted a visa. He came to you. Do you remember?”

  “I’ve never met him.”

  “Is that right?”

  “I’ve tried to meet him. If you know how I can meet him, please tell me. But contrary to what the Ham & High might claim, we remain strangers to this day.”

  “But you don’t deny sponsoring him.”

  “He’s an international figure. I was happy to encourage his presence in London.”

  “Do you sponsor many applications?”

  “No.”

  “What did you get for it?”

  “Nothing.”

  “How’s the Children’s Fund?” Granby looked around, exasperated. “Didn’t Cicero once say be nice to policemen?” Now Granby fixed Belsey with narrowed eyes.

  “I don’t believe he did.” The Chamberlain’s hands had developed a distinct tremor.

  “Why don’t we get a drink?” Belsey said. “You can tell me about Cicero and explain the situation so I can make sure no one gives you trouble over this again.”

  They ducked into a wood-panelled bar-cum-dining club on the corner of St. John Street and were offered a table at the back. The staff seemed to know the Chamberlain. They seemed to know what he’d be drinking. Belsey ordered a vodka and Coke.

  Granby fiddled with his cutlery while they waited for the drinks to arrive.

  “Mr. Devereux’s a very successful and respected businessman interested in investing in our city. He’s an asset. We should be bloody grateful.”

  “How much did he give the Children’s Fund?”

  “I don’t have to tell you that.”
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  “Tell me about Project Boudicca instead.”

  “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “It’s the reason Devereux came to London. Not ring any bells?”

  “No. But if it brings money in then I wish him luck. We need some new tricks around here. Listen, Detective . . .” A gin and tonic arrived and he lifted it and took a gulp before the rattling ice could draw too much attention. His voice emerged gritty and low. “We are an inch away from disaster. We need to be very, very bloody resourceful.”

  “You in particular?”

  “No, not me in particular. Everyone.”

  “What’s Devereux’s idea?”

  “Who’s your sergeant?”

  “What did he need to send to your Guildhall in three vans?”

  “My Guildhall? That’s nice. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Belsey recognised a look of ignorance when he saw one. Granby had no idea. “I’ve never met Devereux and I know remarkably little about him. I’m sure that’s how he would choose to have it.”

  “I think you’ve met Devereux.”

  “No one’s met Devereux. I don’t need to lie.”

  “No one?” Belsey downed his drink. “Have another on me,” he said. He wanted another minute of the Chamberlain’s time. They ordered two more drinks and stepped out to the beer garden, picnic tables on their sides against the wall, umbrellas dripping wet. The Chamberlain lit a cigarette. He didn’t offer one to Belsey, but he’d softened.

  “If I had my way I’d fill every house in this town with men like Alexei Devereux. And there’s enough of them out there. One day they’ll stop coming and we’ll miss them, we’ll wonder where all the money went.” He put a hand on Belsey’s shoulder. “Tourism. That’s what Devereux understands. There will always be rich people and they will come to London if we give them reason.”

  “Like what?”

  “The thrills rich people seek. Have you seen the Financial Times today? Devereux means business. Don’t mess with him. Can I rely on you for that?”