Stealth (25 page)

‘So who's the boss man? Thomas?'

Hamlyn gazed despairingly at the ceiling for a moment and then said, ‘I can distinctly remember telling you that the man's an idiot,
thick.
He just makes a living hiring out hit men even more stupid than he is. The boxing thing is just a front.'

‘And yet I saw him and his minder getting out of a car driven by you outside a pub in Shepherd's Bush.'

‘I was only giving him a lift.'

‘I'm glad you can recollect that. So who is in charge?'

‘Thank you, but I prefer to stay alive, even if I have to do time.'

‘You want to go down for life to protect this individual?'

‘No, but it's necessary to protect . . . others.'

‘Claudia Barton-Jones, for example?'

Hamlyn mutely shook his head.

‘We're back in your novels again,' I said. ‘You're the kind of man to boil down his own mother for glue. Why did you kill Rosemary Smythe?'

‘Who's saying I did?'

‘The Trents were looking for something in her house – you'd given them the keys that you'd tricked Jane Grant into letting you have. I have a theory that on the night you killed that old lady you were beside yourself because it was thought she'd gone off with something highly incriminating from the Trents' garden that had been left lying around. You burst in through the back door, obviously well-fuelled on whisky, and demanded to know what she'd done with it. She refused to tell you and you then drunkenly rampaged around the house trying to find it but were actually too drunk to look properly. Failing to locate it, you lost your temper and threw Miss Smythe down the stairs. Then, discovering that she was still alive, you strangled her.'

‘Your books are lousy and so's that fairy tale,' Hamlyn sneered. ‘Two out of ten for trying though.'

‘But we found it,' Patrick informed him. ‘In one of the attic rooms under a loose floorboard. A Heckler and Koch MP5 sub-machine gun. I understand from one of Miss Smythe's letters that a Thomas thicko-for-hire had played soldiers in the garden with weapons. Was that the chap who sabotaged the tree house or did you do it?' When Hamlyn remained silent he continued: ‘You've told us that Thomas is of no account and isn't the one issuing orders so why protect him and those working for him? Are you intent on taking the blame for everything that's happened?'

Still Hamlyn remained silent.

I said, ‘Someone's well aware that you have an alcohol problem and most of the time have real trouble telling the difference between fact and fiction. He's known that, and you, for a very long time and has been using you for his own ends, for money and to settle old scores. Some of the old scores could well have been yours as well so you were quite happy to go along with it to begin with. But then it all started to get out of hand and—'

‘Shut your idiot mouth!' Hamlyn shouted at me.

‘We're obviously getting somewhere,' Patrick murmured. ‘It seems to bother you more that someone's using you than I would have thought sensible. Who sabotaged the tree house? Was it you? D'you have a thick blue sweater with a hole in it after catching it on a rose thorn climbing over the wall or have you chucked it away?'

‘I—' Hamlyn bit off the rest of what he had been about to say.

‘Chucked it away? I thought so. It's just your style, that tree house. No trouble at all getting into that with your height and long arms. You're probably a practical sort of bloke too and unlike Trent, Thomas and his assorted gutter rats you'd know where to saw and by how much. It's possible it didn't fall down with the old lady in it for a while so you had another go. She apparently heard someone in her garden one night.'

‘You can't prove any of this.'

‘And then there's the oil that a leaking mower had deposited on the Trent's lawn that you walked through on the night you killed Miss Smythe that was deposited, together with grass cuttings, on her hall carpet. The shoes you were wearing will probably still have minute traces of oil on them and you probably won't have thought of throwing those away.'

The author pointed an accusing forefinger. ‘You're just making all this up.'

‘Give me
your
story then.' Patrick leaned back in his chair with a chilly smile.

Hamlyn took a deep breath and then spoke angrily and jerkily. ‘All right. I admit I'm involved with these people. But only as a sort of observer. It's research. But no one's using me and I was not involved with any of the crimes that were perpetrated – by them.'

‘We've already established that you threatened Angelo da Rosta. He was alive without paying you a penny, you complained.'

‘You've established nothing. What I said the other day is anyone's guess. You said yourself that what passed between us then can't be used in court as evidence against me.'

‘He's prepared to swear in court that you did.'

‘Any brief worth his salt'll throw that out. It's the word of a third-rate mobster against mine.'

Here Hamlyn bared his horrible teeth at Patrick in a triumphant grin.

I said, ‘It's good to undertake research, isn't it? Go to places, get the feel of the streets you're writing about and beat up women so you know what it feels like. That's why you asked Jane Grant if you could have a look around Miss Smythe's house, because although you wanted to carry on with your search for the sub-machine gun a place like that is in your novel.'

‘You deserved a smack but basically, you're right. And congratulations, you're learning fast,' Hamlyn said.

‘But then you gave the keys to the Trents as you'd had second thoughts about entering the house yourself in case you were seen.'

He just stared through me.

‘Hereward Trent wasn't behind all this, was he? His home was being used as a safe house.'

‘He was a pathetic fool and pathetic them. deserve to be used. I felt sorry for him – sometimes.'

‘The man was so nervous it was obvious he was under huge duress. Threats to his family?'

‘It's always a weak point with fools, something I've discovered during my research. I can always influence them. I admit I leaned on him. I – er – was asked to as he seemed frightened of me for some reason.' This with a smirk, craning his neck a little in the direction of the mirror as though he was trying to admire his reflection in it.

‘How did you find out about his spot of bother at the Essex golf club that was one of the reasons they moved to Richmond?'

‘Oh, that. Someone I know had heard about it.'

‘You used it to blackmail him.'

‘I'm admitting to nothing. Some bastard'll only frame me for his murder.' This with a contemptuous glance at Patrick.

‘It makes you feel big having a hold over others, doesn't it?'

‘It's professional. I like to get right under the skin of my characters.'

‘I understand you sometimes threaten people with rape.'

‘Why ask, d'you fancy it?' the man retorted with a leer.

‘Your leading character does that too.'

‘So?'

‘He's a complete shit. Like you.'

He actually gaped at me.

‘Did you rape Sonya Trent?'

‘I – er—'

‘Offer to get her out of the house in case a neighbour saw something suspicious and called the police? Drive her off in your car, did you? Take her to a quiet place where you raped her?'

‘Er—'

‘I think you did. I asked you this the other day. Where is she?'

Hamlyn responded with an extravagant shrug.

‘You really don't know?'

‘No.'

‘I don't believe you.'

‘I don't know where she is!' Hamlyn shouted. ‘She – she ran off.'

‘After you'd raped her.'

‘OK, yes, but I really don't know where she is.'

‘And you're not really interested because, as you said last time, she wasn't in the book either.'

The man shook his head, eyes closed. ‘Now you're deliberately trying to confuse me.'

‘No, I'm trying to get inside your crazy world. The other day you said – and you do seem to be choosing to remember some of what was said – that getting Daniel Coates framed for Alonso Morella's murder wasn't in the book. If you don't know where Mrs Trent is and that's not in the book either it suggests that those are the things you have no control over.'

‘I could have said anything the other day. As I said before, I wasn't well.'

‘You were examined by a doctor at the remand centre to see if you were fit to be interviewed and he reported that there was nothing physically wrong with you except symptoms of alcohol withdrawal. According to the psychiatrist who also saw you, you go in and out of a psychotic state so I suppose it's a bit like using a revolving door. And when you're like that you're a serial killer – bragging about it too.'

‘Get this bloody woman out of here!' Hamlyn bawled to Patrick.

‘She stays,' Patrick whispered.

I continued: ‘To you, sane or otherwise, everyone's a fool, stupid, an idiot or an imbecile. That sounds like the reaction of a man who knows that, deep down, he's the biggest moron of the lot for being outmanoeuvred by someone who's got right inside his raddled brain. He's controlling everything, and especially,
you.
'

‘This is all utter make-believe!'

‘Yes, despite what you said I'm quite creative too. But I think I've got this right. You need this person because he's your mental prop to remaining the famous author who writes amazingly authentic novels. You have to keep him sweet or he'll blow you and your illusions to bits by grassing on you to the police. And he's playing with you: he made you go and find him in Cannes to get the money he owed you. I did a little bit of research and discovered that you haven't bothered to attend a literary festival before. Too boring? Too many idiots there?'

The crime writer leaned across the table towards me. ‘One day, I'll find you, and then . . .' With a triumphant smile he left the rest to my imagination.

I smiled back. ‘There you are, Big Jake – that's his name isn't it? Big Jake, the all-powerful, right under the thumb of a shitty little mobster. I'm pretty sure it's Daniel Coates – directing everything from his boat somewhere in the Med and on rare visits to this country using a stolen identity. Coates, showing you up as the truly pathetic man you really are.'

It came as a shock to me when I saw this remark strike home.

I continued: ‘Did he laugh at you on that boat while holding a gun on you before throwing you just some of the money you'd told him he owed you? Laughed at you while you scrabbled on the floor for it? You missed one of the fifty euro notes. Then he probably carried on laughing while forcing you to leave the boat by clambering on to the one moored next to it and from there up on to the outer harbour wall. It was quite a long walk back from there, wasn't it?'

‘I shall kill him for what he's done,' Hamlyn said slowly. ‘And you and your screwing mate.'

‘You can't, it's not in the book now. I've rewritten it. And the end now is that Big Jake's going to end up in a secure mental hospital.'

‘You can't do that!'

‘I've done it. I
know
it's true. You're finished.'

The man sat there motionless, his face set.

‘Tell me it's Coates.'

‘I'll tell her if you promise to kill him,' Hamlyn said to Patrick.

Patrick shook his head. ‘No. Tell her and we'll arrest him instead.'

‘But . . .' He gazed helplessly from one to the other of us. ‘If you've rewritten the end . . .'

‘I'll delete it if you confirm that it's Daniel Coates,' I promised.

‘But . . .'

‘You're finished!' I yelled in the man's face. ‘Tell me it's Coates who's responsible.'

‘It's Coates,' Hamlyn said in so low a voice as to be hardly audible. And then, shockingly, his heavy features crumpled and he sobbed, the tears running down his face.

Outside the room I found I was shaking so much my teeth chattered. Patrick put an arm around me and steered me to the canteen where I was treated to a steaming mug of hot chocolate.

‘W
ell, as you know,' the commander said, ‘Hamlyn was questioned again this afternoon by a Met DCI and his sidekick working on the Berry, Duggan and Rapla murders and they did, at my request, slip in asking him about the whereabouts of Sonya Trent. He was a bit more composed by then, perhaps had slipped back into his comfort zone of telling himself he was undertaking research – what it's like to be grilled by the nasty mob – and although the question took him unawares he still said he didn't know. I said I'd give looking for her priority for two days and I have. There's no sign of the woman. We have no idea who her friends are. Her parents in Dartmouth have been questioned and they can't suggest where she might be. They're frantically worried, of course.'

‘The poor woman might not even know that her husband's dead,' I said. ‘What was reported in the media?'

‘That the body of a so far unidentified white male has been found near Hackney,' Greenway answered. ‘I can't believe she would think it was him if she read or heard about it. D'you reckon Hamlyn killed him?'

‘He was pretty convincing at being surprised by the news.'

The commander rose from his chair, stretched, his hands brushing the low ceiling and then said, ‘Coates. I haven't congratulated you yet, Ingrid, but that was a fine piece of work.'

‘Nothing's proved though. I may be wrong and he said that to get rid of me.'

‘That's possible, but—'

His desk phone rang. He snatched it up but it was a routine call.

Patrick said, ‘What was the outcome of the questioning this afternoon?'