“Thanks to naughty Mrs. Wark, I cast my mental net a little wider. Ivy lived on my patch, but along with a third or more of the population, she commuted to work in London. Soon as I took that aboard, it was obvious where Grange had to be hiding. It was a pain, since another force was involved: you can’t just go barging around the Met’ Police’s back yard, it bends them out of shape, makes ’em shrill and spiteful. Cap-in-hand, humble pie time, otherwise known as liaison and professional courtesy... Our assistant chief constable spoke to his opposite number in The Smoke, and then we were off to the races...”
Ivy Challis’s reputation was spotless in Longdown. She explained, but only if asked, that she was housekeeper for a West End hotel group. Good salary, but it involved shift work, unsocial hours.
In reality, Ivy was a prostitute. She worked out of a ground floor studio apartment in an impersonal, incurious block two or three streets behind Hyde Park. The previous year, a Met’ Police colleague had asked Inspector McKell for background on a hooker calling herself Desire, whose car license number turned out to be identical with that of a Mrs. Ivy Challis. If a redheaded Mrs. Challis did live in Longdown and owned a car with that number, she could be eliminated from an investigation. There had been no need for him to question her, so she was unaware of his background knowledge.
In the West End next day, McKell and one of his sergeants met up with Inspector Pete Peters of the Met’, flanked by a brace of burly young men in leather jackets. Thin-faced, crewcut, crafty and slangy, Peters looked more of a villain than most villains. He and Tom McKell were by way of being friends after a couple of shared Home Office courses.
Inspector Peters crowed, “Bless my soul, if it isn’t the Kevlar Kid!” The day was warm, but wirily angular McKell wore a raincoat buttoned to the collar, turning him weirdly bulky for the size of his head, rather like a winter robin with its feathers fluffed out. The sergeant being well-fleshed in the first place, his bullet-resistant jacket was less evident under a tweed topcoat.
“The subject’s an armed robber, possibly badly hurt and therefore erratic, certainly in fear for his life,” Inspector McKell said stiffly. “Better safe than sorry.”
“Providing he doesn’t pop you between the jolly old horns,” Pete Peters retorted, unabashed. “Lady at her place of business, is she? My boys have been keeping obbo since nine this morning, didn’t clock her going in. On the other hand, those flats are a right rabbit warren... corner site with an alley behind, loads of street doors. Hooker heaven, best part of a hundred apartments, and at least thirty of the tenants are brasses. We couldn’t afford a drum there, and don’t forget Les Girls pay a whacking great rent for cribs they’re using maybe eight hours a day, not every day of the week. Goes to prove what the wages of sin is — money, as if we didn’t know.”
His minions sniggered dutifully.
Wishing that Pete Peters was less fond of talking, Inspector McKell said, “Ivy Challis left her house at eight this morning, took the London road. She must be in there by now.” They were in a huddle opposite the apartment block; he spoke while staring across the street. He had wanted to raid the flat in the early hours: Ivor Grange would be at his lowest ebb then and, presumably, alone. But arranging a joint operation and getting the search warrant had eaten time.
“You can’t see her drum from here,” said Peters. “Her window’s round the back, looks out on a courtyard, air well with ideas above its station, really. I borrowed the plans from the letting agent.”
Inspector Peters spread the sheet on the roof of his low-slung car. “Turn left off the reception area and Ivy Challis’s is the third door along this corridor.” Reversing the paper, he disclosed another schematic. “Layout of the flat: tiny little lobby, lounge with an alcove off it, just room for cooker and sink. Open stairs at the right of the lounge, seven steps to the bedroom, meaning a bed on a balcony affair, a big ledge. Bathroom and lav en suite, it says in the brochure, which comes out as a tacky concertina door, fabric on steel ribs, over here at the end of the sleeping area, that ledge. Shower stall and lavatory behind the concertina door.”
Folding the blueprint, Peters led Tom McKell clear of the group. “We have a lot more experience, and this is our patch. Let me and my hounds have a bit of fun, you come in straight afterwards.” Squinting in concentration, voice lowered, Inspector Peters was wholly serious. “I’ve drawn” (signifying that he was armed and had sanction for the weapon) “and I’m not married with two kids.”
McKell grinned, praying that his churning stomach wouldn’t betray him by growling. “Pushy blokes like you need taking down a peg — wait your turn like a little gent.”
“Well, I tried.” Peters expected nothing else, though the offer had been genuine. He slapped his breast pocket. “Got the search warrant, in case you wondered. Might as well do it...”
Returning to the car, he ordered, “Off you go, kids. This guy has been known to carry, he may come steaming out through the window, so heads up. I want a trouble-free shift and us all getting off early, I have this date with Julia Roberts.”
“Dream on,” floated back as the twosome loped away.
Pete Peters looked down his nose at McKell. “City style, please: forget the bell, ‘I am a police officer,’ and all that lark. Let’s have the door bust sharpish, and get right to it.”
“Suits me.” Yet McKell hesitated, appalled by his oversight. “I should have tried phoning the flat, see if she’s there.”
“Been done. She’s got cards in phone boxes from here to Piccadilly. No more Desire, she’s Fire these days. ‘Fire is hot for you...’ and the phone number of that flat. I’ve been calling it since you spoke to me yesterday, tried again just now. Sexy-voiced answering machine every time —‘I’m not available, but Princess Paprika will give you just as good a time, I’m hot but she’s molten,’ and punters get another number to try.”
McKell cheered up. “Then Grange is there. She’s turning trade away, but Ivy’s still been coming to London regularly since he vanished. Nursing him, and she can’t hide Grange from clients in a one room apartment.”
“Seems reasonable.” Peters winked at McKell’s sergeant, who was carrying a cricket bag. From the strain on its leather handles, something weightier than bat and pads was within. “Brought your key, then. Good lad.”
Outside the apartment door, Inspector Peters prostrated himself like an Arab at prayer, sniffing at the crack between the door and carpet. “Somebody’s home,” he whispered. “Radio going full blast, and I smell cigarettes. Funny ones, unless it’s joss sticks. Maybe your guy’s using grass for anesthetics.” He straightened lithely. Then, breath warm in Tom McKell’s ear: “Two locks, both rubbish. Your guy know his stuff?”
McKell, who’d had just about enough of his colleague, said, “Now’s the time to find out.” He undid the top buttons of the raincoat, sliding his hand within the belt holster, confirming by touch that the safety catch was on. Pete Peters, nodding, moved to the other side of the door.
“All yours, Tim,” McKell mouthed. His sergeant, lips pursed thoughtfully, pressed spread fingers between the two locks. Removing the sledgehammer from the bag, he stepped back and swung expertly, once, twice... Changed his grip to drive the hammer’s head at waist height, battering ram fashion.