‘I never knew you were such a moralist, Frankie.’
‘Aye, well, ye can’t always judge a book.’
‘They’re Mafia,’ said Annie. ‘What more do you need to know?’
‘Aye... well... you haven’t seen what I’ve seen.’
‘And Mr Blaydon?’
‘Getting pulled in deeper and deeper by the minute. They’re corrupting him. But I’ll no turn rat, if that’s what you’re thinking. He’s been good to me over the years, and it’s only since he’s taken up with this lot that things have started to change for the worse. They tell him to jump and he asks how high.’
‘Have they got something on him?’
Frankie gave a harsh laugh. ‘Aye. Money. Put it this way: they’ve invested heavily in him and his projects, and not with the kind of money you can easily pull out, even if it hadn’t already gone bye-byes.’
‘Laundered money?’
‘I’ll no say. That’s not my place. I don’t understand it, truth be told, and I don’t want to. All I know is they’ve got him by the short and the curlies, and he does his best to put a brave face on it.’
‘You’re not sticking around to help him?’ Annie asked.
‘Bah. He won’t listen to reason. D’ya think I haven’t tried? Last time I was up there, I left in fear of my life, the way those goons he keeps by his side looked at me. No. I’ve had enough. I’m away.’ He returned to rearranging the suitcase.
‘Have you witnessed them do something specific, Frankie? Have you seen them kill someone?’
‘I’ll no turn rat.’
‘I understand you have no interest in turning informer,’ Banks said, ‘but do you think you could maybe help us out with just one little thing?’
Frankie sighed. ‘Depends. What might that be?’
‘Could you tell us what really happened that Sunday evening you drove your boss into Eastvale for dinner at Le Coq d’Or? We know you ate at The Red Lion on the market square earlier, but we also know the Merc was parked in the car park at The Oak around ten o’clock. You weren’t in there drinking. What happened during that time?’
‘I’ve told you.’
‘The truth, Frankie. We can take you in, keep you for twenty-four hours, then release you. Let the world know how helpful you’ve been, helping the police with their inquiries. Or you can tell us what we want to know right now and set off for Glasgow before it gets dark. Your choice.’
‘Bastard.’ Frankie sat in silence for so long that Banks thought he had clammed up. Then he rubbed his lumpy nose and said, ‘Aye, I suppose I can tell you. As far as I know, no laws were broken. It was all perfectly simple.’ He eyed Banks with a glint of humour. ‘You know, you had me wondering what you were on about last time we talked. You’ve been barking up the wrong tree, laddie.’
Banks was about to tell him that he would be the judge of that, but stopped himself when he realised that such a criticism might discourage Frankie from saying anything more. ‘In that case, then...’ he said. ‘Do explain. Put me right.’
‘It’s all as I told you. I drove Mr Blaydon to the restaurant, couldn’t park right outside because the street’s so fucking narrow and parked at the back of the market square, like I said.’
‘This was what time?’
‘Just as I said before. About half past seven.’
‘Go on.’
Frankie lit a cigarette. It was unfiltered, Banks noticed. ‘I watched Downton Abbey on Netflix, went for a bite to eat at one of those pubs on the market square.’
‘The Red Lion,’ said Annie. ‘We checked.’
‘Aye, well, you can tell them they need to put a bit more meat and less gristle in their steak and mushroom pies.’
Annie smiled. ‘I’ll do that.’
‘Anyway, a bit later I gets a call from the boss, like.’
‘Blaydon? Can you remember what time?’ Banks asked.
‘Not exactly. It was after dark. Maybe ten o’clock or thereabouts.’
That fit with the time Blaydon got the phone call in Le Coq d’Or, Banks noted. ‘OK. What was it all about?’
‘The boss told me he’d got a call from Gashi in London telling him there’d been a bit of bother at a house on Hollyfield Lane. As we were nearby, the boss told me to drop by there and pick up a young lad and his belongings, then drive back to the restaurant to pick him and the Kerrigans up and head for an address in Leeds. Well, I’m just the driver. I do what I’m told.’
‘What address in Leeds?’
‘I don’t know. It never came to that.’
‘What happened?’
‘I drove over and parked in the pub car park then walked across to the house, number twenty-six Hollyfield Lane. I went round the back, down the alley, so I was less likely to be seen. It was a pretty rundown area of town, but I knew that already on account of I’d driven Mr Blaydon there before on that Elmet Centre business.’
‘You knew that particular house?’
‘No. Just the general area.’
‘If there was nothing illegal going on, why didn’t you just park on the street and approach from the front?’
‘Because I didn’t know what I was getting myself into, all right? I was being careful, is all. It’s my training kicking in. And because...’
‘Yes?’
‘Because life was getting unpredictable with the boss, all right? I didn’t know what was waiting around the corner.’
‘You were worried it might be a trap of some kind set up by Gashi?’
‘It crossed my mind.’
‘OK,’ said Banks. ‘Carry on.’
‘Thank you. When I went in the house—’
‘Was the back door open?’
‘Yes. The back door was open. When I went in the house and walked through to the front, I saw the front door open and a young lad dash out into the street. I couldn’t really see much of him, like, just his silhouette. It was dark, and there were no lights on in the room. I called out that I’d come to pick him up and take him home, but he legged it. Must’ve been scared, I suppose.’
‘Do you have any idea why you were supposed to take him home?’
‘No. At least, not until I saw what was in the room.’
‘Howard Stokes’s body?’
‘I knew it was a body, but I’d never heard of Howard Stokes, not until I saw his name in the papers later. Anyway, I ran out into the street — like I said, it was dark by then, and most of the street lamps there are busted — and I was just in time to see him running off into the distance. Well, I wasn’t going to try and chase him, was I?’
‘Which way was he going?’
‘Come again.’
‘What direction did he run off in?’
‘Oh. He turned right out the front door and legged it up the street.’
Towards Cardigan Drive, Banks thought, the park, and Elmet Hill beyond. ‘So what did you do?’
‘Wasn’t much I could do, was there? I might not be past it yet, but I’ve never been much of a sprinter. Besides, if he didn’t want a ride back to the city, I wasn’t going to bloody force him.’
‘What about his things?’ Annie asked.
‘Mr Blaydon had told me to bring him and his stuff back with me. There was a backpack and a dark jacket beside it, so I took them with me and went back out.’
‘Did Mr Blaydon specifically ask you to make sure you got the lad’s backpack?’ Banks asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Do you know what was in it?’
‘No. And I didn’t want to.’
Drugs, Banks knew. Frankie probably knew, too, but there was no percentage in his admitting it. The delivery. So Samir had arrived in Eastvale with instructions to go to Stokes’s house, the trap house, spend a day or two distributing the wares and delivering orders, working the line, then return to Leeds. But what happened when he got there? Or before he got there? Had Samir killed Stokes? No. Dr Galway had been certain that Stokes had died of a drug overdose, and it was unlikely that Samir knew how to administer a hot shot and make it look like an accident. Besides, why should he kill anyone? So he had arrived at the house, found Stokes dead and panicked. He had called the county lines number and asked what he should do. Then what?