‘What, I call this and I get to go to jail again, this time for drugs?’
‘Remember that girl you met on the Underground? You liked her, got her number, then lost it, you put an ad in “Lost Connections”, she never saw it, that was the last you heard of her?’
‘How do you know she never saw it?’
Usman shrugged. ‘She told me. That’s her mobile number.’ He made for the door. ‘And in case you’re wondering, no it wasn’t easy.’
‘Fuck you,’ said Shahid to his brother’s back, though with less conviction this time.
103
In the days after his visit to Shahid Kamal at Paddington Green station, DI Mill had come to a conclusion about the enquiries he had been making into the Pepys Road harassment campaign. He had talked it over with the DC who’d been working with him, and they agreed: We Want What You Have was two different series of events, run by two different people or sets of people. For the first few months, the postcards and website and the DVDs were the work of a person or persons with a local interest but no particular animus at any individual. There was something almost abstract about it: no people in the photos, no abuse, no criminal damage. That person, whoever he or she was, had a link to Shahid Kamal; at the very least, he or she had hacked into his internet access; more likely, it was someone known to him. Then the whole thing went away for a while. Then it came back with someone else behind it, someone who did not have that link to Mr Kamal – or if he or she did, he or she was for some reason now eager to conceal the link. This person was much angrier with the people of Pepys Road. He or she had a darker sensibility. His or her acts began with graffiti and abuse and turned to vandalism, criminal damage against property and the use of dead animals. This person or persons seemed to be escalating his or her or their campaign. The first person(s) had arguably not broken any laws; you could probably slap an ASBO on them, get them to promise not to do anything similar again, and leave it at that. The second person(s) had certainly broken several laws, probably enough to earn a custodial sentence. But the blog was registered behind several layers of anonymous identity, and there were no fingerprints anywhere. Now that police patrols were taking an extra interest in Pepys Road after the cars were vandalised, there had been no further activity. The blog had been taken down. So Mill was closer to knowing the sort of person he was looking for without knowing who it was.
He wasn’t worried. Mill was sure something else would happen. Most detective cases are solved by hard routine work, or by luck – the latter category including stupid mistakes by the criminal. Experience taught Mill that he would have to wait for a piece of luck. Until it came, he mentally parked the issue and got on with other work. His feeling was that he wouldn’t have to wait long, and he was right. The break came out of the blue, two months after Shahid Kamal was released from prison. His DC came up to his desk, smile lines etched deep around his eyes, and without comment passed him an issue of the Evening Standard, folded open to page three. The headline said:
EXPOSED: ARTIST KNOWN AS SMITTY
His artworks are controversial, his stunts infamous. His provocative graffiti have travelled the journey from Underground station walls to prestigious art galleries. He makes collectors’ pieces which sell for millions. But nobody knows who he is. His name is Smitty, but his identity is one of the art world’s best-kept secrets. Until today, when an Evening Standard investigation reveals that Smitty’s real name is Graham Leatherby, a 28-year-old Goldsmiths graduate who lives in Shoreditch, the son of Alan and Mary Leatherby, whose home in Maldon, Essex is worth £750,000.
There was a large photo of Smitty, wearing jeans and a hoodie with the top thrown back.
‘Sweet Jesus!’ said Mill.
‘That’s right,’ said the DC.
‘The Leatherbys owned that house at number 42. The mother died and they inherited it. There must be something to this,’ said Mill. ‘It’s too much of a coincidence. I know this guy’s work. Janie has a book by him and she made me watch a documentary. He’s always doing this, you know, art stuff, installations and pranks and practical jokes. This is right up his street. If you’ll forgive the expression. We’ve got to go and have a word. No way this is just a coincidence.’
The red light on Mill’s phone was winking: a sign that the switchboard was asking if they could put a call through. He picked up.
‘Switchboard here. We’ve got someone wanting to talk to you. Says he has information relevant to an inquiry. Wouldn’t give his full name, but said to say to you that he’s the artist formerly known as Smitty.’
Mill and the DC just looked at each other.
104
No one was answering the buzzer at Smitty’s warehouse studio, so Mill buzzed another of the entryphones, identified himself as a policeman, and he and his DC were let in. They clanked up the metal stairs to Smitty’s floor and walked into a huge, high-ceilinged workspace with a blackboard all across one wall, an enormous wooden desk, and a young man sitting in front of a PC.
‘He’s not here and anyway he’s not talking to the papers,’ said the young man, without fully taking his attention away from the screen in front of him.
Mill held out his warrant card.
‘Oh. OK. He said there might be police. He’s in the office. His other office. The Bell. Off Hoxton Square, yeah?’
The two policemen went back down and out. The pub was about a five-minute walk away, through the mixture of semi-gentrified and still-slummy streets. Mill shoved through the heavy door into the saloon bar. It was empty apart from three or four people sitting at the bar and, at a table facing the entrance, the man who was recognisable from the newspaper photograph as Smitty. He sat to the left of the dartboard, beneath a huge old Watneys mirror. In front of him was a mobile phone, a pint and a packet of crisps. The two policemen went over and stood in front of him. Smitty looked up.
‘Hello. You look like coppers,’ he said.
Mill held out his warrant card. Smitty gestured at the seats opposite him.
‘You ever watch The Simpsons? Bart. I love Bart. You know one of Bart’s sayings? “I didn’t do it. Nobody saw me do it. You can’t prove anything.”’
‘We’re not here about anything in that Standard article. I don’t care what you’ve done in the course of doing your, er, stuff,’ said Mill. ‘In the course of your legitimate art work. Actually, I have your book.’ That wasn’t strictly true, since it was Janie who owned a copy of Smitty, Smitty’s lavishly illustrated book about himself. But he thought that would be gratifying to the artist, who indeed did look a tiny bit pleased. ‘I’m not talking to you under caution. I just want to ask about something. Another pint?’ He pointed at Smitty’s drink. Smitty thought for a moment.
‘IPA,’ he said.
‘Pint of IPA, bottle of Kaliber, and whatever you’re having,’ he said to the DC, who headed off to the bar. Smitty stretched his arms out and looked around the pub.
‘I love this place. Know why? It’s what I call PM. Proper Manky. Hasn’t been cleaned up and tarted up like most of London. I love this mirror. When did Watneys go out of business, what, twenty years ago? And they’ve still got the mirror. Formica tables. Beer towels. Everywhere else round here, it’s caipirinhas and Perrier-Jouët. See those regulars at the bar? See any of them move or speak? Exactly. They never do. Fancy some food? They’ve got crisps, pork scratchings, or if you’re feeling really flash, pickled eggs. That’s Proper Manky. In another few years, there won’t be anywhere like this left anywhere in London. It’ll all be lychee martinis, decaf vanilla lattes, and complimentary Wi-Fi.’