I would have loved to print out the whole file, but unfortunately the office server used a central printing system that recorded who had asked for what to be printed. How could I explain away an apparent request from Gregory when he was out to lunch? More to the point, how would I explain sitting at Gregory’s desk and using his computer if he returned unexpectedly early?
I instinctively looked at my watch. It was ten to two. I reckoned I should be safe for at least another twenty minutes, but I had no intention of being even half that long.
I flipped through the pages of the file trying to find the names of the Bulgarian agents involved in the project, but it was a nightmare, with PDF scans of the relevant documents all in the local Cyrillic script. It might as well have been in Chinese. I couldn’t read any of the words, but I could read what I thought was a telephone number written in regular digits. I copied it down on the back of one of Herb’s MoneyHome payment slips. It began “+359,” which I knew from looking at the Internet earlier was the international code for Bulgaria.
I looked again at my watch. Two o’clock.
I opened Gregory’s e-mail in-box and did a search for “Bulgaria.” There were six e-mails, all from September two years ago. I glanced through them but nothing seemed amiss. They were about European Union money, and they were all from the same source. I copied down the e-mail address of the sender, uri_joram@ec.europa.eu, and also that of the recipient, dimitar.petrov@bsnet.co.bg. Gregory had been copied into the correspondence but there was no sign of any replies. I took a chance and forwarded the e-mails to my private e-mail address, then I deleted the forwarded record from Gregory’s “Sent” folder. I wished I could have e-mailed myself the whole Roberts file, but our security system wouldn’t allow it.
I reluctantly closed Gregory’s in-box and the Roberts Family Trust file and checked that the screen appeared the same as when I had first arrived.
I slipped out into the corridor, and no one shouted a challenge or questioned what I had been doing in Gregory’s office.
As everywhere in the offices, the corridor outside was lined with cardboard document boxes holding the paper transaction reports. I searched for the box containing those for the date at the top of the computer file.
Mrs. McDowd may not have liked policemen very much, and she was definitely too nosy about the staff’s lives and families, but she was very methodical in her filing. All the boxes were in chronological order with dates clearly written in marker pen on the ends.
I lifted up the box with the correct date and dug through its papers until I found the correct transaction report and associated paperwork. I pulled them out, folded them and stuffed them into my trouser pocket alongside Herb’s MoneyHome payment slips, before putting the box carefully back in the same place I’d found it.
I glanced at my watch once more: twenty past two. Where had those twenty minutes gone? Time I was away. But why did I suddenly feel like a thief in the night? I’d done nothing wrong. Or had I? Maybe I should just go and see Jessica straightaway when she returned from lunch. But the client, Jolyon Roberts, had specifically asked me to have a discreet look rather than initiate a possible fraud investigation that would, as he put it, drag the good name of the Roberts family through the courts.
Nevertheless, whatever else I might do, I didn’t want to be in the offices when Gregory returned from his restaurant.
I went back into my office to collect my jacket.
“Leaving already?” said Rory sarcastically. “What shall I tell Gregory?”
I ignored him.
As I walked down the corridor towards the reception area I realized with a heavy heart that I’d left it too late. I could hear Gregory and Patrick talking. I would just have to face the music.
“Ah, there you are Foxton,” Gregory announced at high volume. “I’ve been looking for you all morning.”
I was so mesmerized by Gregory that I hardly took any notice of a man standing to the side of him and next to Patrick, but the man suddenly stepped forward right in front of me.
“Nicholas Foxton,” the man said. “I arrest you on suspicion of the attempted murder of William Peter Searle.”
7
I spent the afternoon waiting in an eight-foot-by-six holding cell at the Paddington Green Police Station not quite knowing what to think.
The man in the office had identified himself as another detective chief inspector, this one from the Metropolitan Police.
I’d missed his name. I hadn’t really been listening.
I did, however, remember him advising me that I didn’t have to say anything, with the proviso that it might harm my defense if I didn’t mention something when questioned that I later relied on in court. I’d been too shocked to say anything anyway. I had just stood there with my mouth open in surprise as a uniformed policeman had applied handcuffs to my wrists and then led me down in the lift to a waiting police car.
William Peter Searle, the chief inspector had said when I was arrested.
That had to be Billy Searle.
So Billy had been right about one thing.
Thursday had been too late.
I suppose I couldn’t really blame the police for arresting me. Hundreds of witnesses had heard Billy shouting the previous afternoon at Cheltenham. “Why are you trying to murder me?” had been his exact words, even if the Racing Post had distorted them somewhat.
I hadn’t been trying to murder him, but I hadn’t taken him seriously either.
But to whom could Billy have owed so much money? Clearly, someone who was prepared to try to kill him for nonpayment by the Wednesday-night deadline.
I sat on one end of the cell’s fixed concrete bed and went on waiting. But I wasn’t particularly worried. I knew I had nothing to do with Billy’s or anyone else’s attempted murder and surely it would be only a matter of time before the police discovered that.
First Herb Kovak and now Billy Searle. Could the two be connected?
Thursday afternoon dragged on into early evening, and I was left alone in the cell, still waiting.
For the umpteenth time I looked at my wrist to check the time and, for the umpteenth time, saw no watch.
It had been removed when I was “checked in” to the custody suite by the custody sergeant, along with my tie, my belt, my shoelaces and the contents of my pockets, including Herb’s MoneyHome payment slips and the transaction report from the box outside Gregory’s office.
The cell door opened, and a white-shirted policeman brought in a tray that held a covered plate and a plastic bottle of water.
“What time is it?” I asked.
“Seven o’clock,” he said without looking at his watch.
“How much longer am I going to be kept here?” I asked.
“The DCI will see you when he’s ready,” replied the policeman, who then placed the tray down next to me on the concrete bed and went out. The door clanged shut behind him.
I looked under the cover. Fish and chips. And quite good too.
I ate the lot and drank the water. It took about five minutes.
And then I waited some more, counting the bricks in the walls in an attempt to alleviate the boredom. It failed.
The detective chief inspector finally opened the cell door long after the barred and frosted-glass window had turned from daylight to night black.
“Mr. Foxton,” he said, coming into the cell. “You are free to go.”
“What?” I said, not quite taking it all in.
“You are free to go,” the detective said again, standing to one side of the door. “We will not be charging you with any offense.” He paused as if not being quite able to say the next bit. “And I’m sorry for any inconvenience that may have been caused.”