Tom blinked with what he hoped resembled admiration while he digested this. Mandler need be in no doubt now about Rolt’s connection to Stutz.
‘I understand your impatience. I know what happened to you in Afghanistan made you thirsty for revenge. Come back in twenty-four hours and I’ll see about giving you a heads-up.’
Phoebe put her head round the door. ‘Sorry, Vernon, your four-thirty’s here.’
75
Vestey’s house was a new-build on an anonymous estate outside Basingstoke, one of four that sat at the end of a cul-de-sac behind neat, square lawns with no flowers.
The van said ‘Lawlor Landscaping’, with a green tree logo on the side. They left it on the main road, and walked up: one from MI5’s digital intelligence team and the other a forensics specialist, trained to work under severe time pressure. Woolf had asked Tom along on the grounds that, with his background, he might notice something they would overlook, though he didn’t need much persuading.
The two techies were kitted out in anonymous, greenish-hued overalls that suggested gardeners, and each carried a dusty rucksack that contained, inside sealed pouches, all they needed for the job: gloves, card readers, a pair of hard drives in case one failed during the uploading, and a lightweight forensics kit with all the essentials for the recovery of fibres, fingerprints and any kind of sample likely to yield DNA. Woolf had gone to town and had a folder tucked under his arm also marked ‘Lawlor Landscaping’, with the same tree logo as on the van. For a team so short on resources, they’d risen to the challenge quite impressively.
The house was like countless soldiers’ homes Tom had seen in the past, soldiers with OCD to be exact: the downstairs open plan and dominated by a huge flat-screen TV, the sofa and other furniture arranged exactly to line up with it, as if on a grid. Most squaddies were untidy, just like Tom. It was the NCOs’ griping that kept them in order. Otherwise most blocks would have looked like a gorilla had gone crazy during the night.
Even the magazine on the coffee-table, Autocar, was placed in one corner, the edges flush with those of the table. On the mantelpiece above the fireplace, a collection of memorabilia from Vestey’s army days gave the only indication of his previous calling: a nickel-plated SA80 bayonet with ‘Farewell and good luck’ engraved along the blade; a brass Arab coffee pot with the obligatory matching little goblets; a picture of his old rifle company. Three rows of men in their number-two service dress, medals glinting in the sun. The first row sitting cross-legged, left over right and closed fists resting on thighs, the centre row standing at ease, and the rear the same but with their legs cut off by bodies as they stood on chairs to give them height. Tom smiled to himself as he looked down at the company commander’s feet to see the obligatory yellow Labrador lying in front of him. Vestey was, no doubt, one of the young bloods standing proud, but the photo was years old, from his glory days.
He touched the edge of the frame with a gloved finger: not a speck of dust. Even the bin in the kitchen, for which Woolf made a beeline, was spotlessly clean.
‘Nothing,’ he announced, when he had taken out the bin liner, shaken it carefully and replaced it, taking care not to rearrange the single fish-finger packet and used teabag he had found within. Tom watched him with interest; his kind were easier to admire when they were quietly deploying their core skills, i.e. doing the actual physical snooping, than when sitting round boardroom tables blustering at each other.
‘I must say it’s been a while since I’ve done this,’ he said. ‘I’ve rather missed it.’ He winced as Tom moved the kettle to look behind it. ‘Just make sure —’
‘— it’s in exactly the same place. I know.’
Woolf opened the oven and the microwave while Tom took the fridge.
‘Careful when you open the freezer. That’s when you get bits of ice on the floor that thaw out into puddles and give you away.’
Tom knelt down and opened both of the two freezer drawers: nothing other than a box of Iceland burgers and a four-pack of Cornettos. No ice to drop. ‘He defrosts regularly. My mother would be impressed.’
The venture was beginning to look futile to Tom.
‘Hard to look for something when you don’t know what the fuck you’re looking for.’
The digital techie had already done Vestey’s computer, a laptop he found under some socks in the bedside drawer. He plugged in his gear and sucked up the contents of the hard drive in less than a minute. Tom didn’t have a lot of faith that it would reveal anything, apart from porn. His gut feeling was that if Vestey was their man he would have covered his tracks very carefully.
While Woolf worked through the bookshelves, drawers and cupboards, moving items and carefully replacing them, Tom stood in the middle of the room for a few moments and tried to imagine Vestey at home, here, the sort of life he lived, his routine. Did he have any girlfriends, or any friends for that matter? A lot of men didn’t and, once out of the beehive that was the services, became loners, adrift from the normal social networks. He looked in the bathroom cabinet for any evidence of female visitors: nothing. The only other room was a spare bedroom that looked as if it was never used. Nonetheless he went in and studied the single bed, the small bedside table and lamp, and the narrow wardrobe, empty except for five hangers and two spare blankets.
The only other item in the room was a mat beside the bed, the default souvenir brought home from Iraq or Afghanistan by countless service personnel. Tom had given his mother at least three over the years. In the pattern of this one were images of a comb and a jug, reminders to the faithful to perform wudu: to wash their hands and comb their hair before coming to pray.
Woolf appeared in the room beside him. ‘Nada, I’m afraid. He doesn’t even have any dirty socks.’ He bent down to lift the mat.
For a moment Tom was lost in thought, staring at it. ‘Wait!’
Woolf looked up. ‘What?’
‘It’s not straight.’
‘So?’
‘Everything in this place is lined up exactly or at a right-angle to everything else.’
‘Ye-es… And?’
‘This is out by least a hundred mill.’
Woolf’s face showed his confusion.
Tom took out his phone, touched the compass icon, and held it out for Woolf to see. ‘This mat’s facing Mecca. Someone’s prayed here.’
76
‘What’s going on with you?’
That was Sam’s mother’s way of starting a conversation. Not a hello or a how-are-you. Since she’d discovered Skype it was even worse.
‘Hello, Mother. How are you?’
‘How do you imagine I am? All these days I’ve texted and you don’t reply back.’
She was dressed in a beach robe and her hair was wet, as if she had just come in from a swim. So she was managing to enjoy herself a bit, then.
‘I’m sorry, it’s been frantic.’
‘Frantic? I’m the one who’s frantic. Worrying myself to a frenzy about your brother while you’re doing God knows what. What you dressed up for?’
Sam had on a suit and tie from another of the Party’s endless policy reviews. They always placed him somewhere prominent for the cameras but seldom asked for a contribution.
‘It’s just a suit for work.’
The truth was, he felt guilty for not keeping her informed, but explaining Karza’s situation was out of the question. She would just blame him, then hassle him even more for news.
‘I’m sorry I haven’t any concrete news. I’m making enquiries but as you can imagine it’s very tricky, very delicate, okay?’