But what was happening in the Hunt family? Patricia Hunt was not being honest with him. And, in his experience, people who were not honest with the police usually had a very good reason not to be so.
Kate Walker fished the herbal teabag from the mug it had been sitting in, white china with the words ‘I’d rather be in Ballydehob’ written on the front. She had ordered it for Jack online, but somehow appropriated it for herself. Crystal Mountain organic Himalayan green tea. Blended with four botanical herbs, she discovered from the packet: peppermint, angelica, lemon verbena and ginseng. It was supposed to create a deliciously refreshing infusion that would awaken the mind and revitalise the body. Kate blew on the surface, took a cautious sip then added a squirt of honey from a squeezy bottle she kept on her desk. She liked the drink and found it worked for her. Maybe it was a combination of a sense of well-being from being pregnant and giving up the alcohol. Maybe it wasn’t. One thing she did know for sure, though, was that it wasn’t a few glasses of ice-chilled Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc after a hard day’s work that she missed. It was the jolt in the morning that the espresso machine in her kitchen gave her. Coffee was her secret vice. In that respect, she empathised with Jack’s senior boss Superintendent George Napier, if with little else. She took a sip of her tea and permitted herself a small smile. Actually she empathised with the man in one other major way. He had to deal with Detective Inspector Jack Delaney and that could drive any man, or woman, to stronger stimulants than freshly ground Jamaican Blue.
She pulled out the folder she had recently liberated from the courier’s padded envelope and started reading the medical files on the missing man. The Reverend Jeremy Hunt. Last seen in the parish some twenty years previously. She pulled her notepad towards her and started to make notes, correcting herself as she did so. According to the conversation she had just had with Jack, he hadn’t actually been seen twenty years ago. Just made a phone call and never turned up. Jack had put a call though to immigration to chase up entry and exit visas, but, as she well knew, the wheels of that particular bureaucratic engine could turn very slowly, and neither of them had access to the kind of grease required to speed up their progress. Kate made a few jottings as she turned the pages of the various reports and papers, not just Jeremy Hunt’s medical record but his history of service through Africa in the Seventies onwards. Her cup of tea grew cool.
After a while, she picked up her phone and punched a speed-dial button.
‘Hey, Jack,’ she said as the call was answered. ‘Whoever we dug up yesterday from St Luke’s church …’
‘Go on,’ said the familiar voice.
‘Are you smoking?’
‘Never mind that.’ Delaney adopted a professional tone that didn’t fool Kate for one second. ‘What do you want to tell me, Doctor Walker?’
‘Well, Detective Inspector Delaney, I can tell you for a fact that whoever it was we dug up … it wasn’t Jeremy Hunt!’
54
PC DANNY VINEM and PC Bob Wilkinson were out on foot and none too happy about it.
‘Jeez, Bob,’ said Danny. ‘Why couldn’t they give us a car? My plates are freezing here.’
‘Feet are a part of the job. You know that, Danny.’
‘I think I’m going to go into CID,’ he continued as the two of them walked to the top end of Oxford Street. ‘Yeah, lookit …’
Bob Wilkinson stopped and stared at him. ‘Did you just say “lookit” to me?’
The younger constable shrugged. ‘What about it?’
‘I’ll tell you what about it, Danny Vine. You ever use the expression, “lookit”, “innit” or “knowwhat-imean”, and I will stamp on your size-ten plates of meat, and then you will really know what chilblains are.’
‘You going racist on me, Bob?’
‘I’ll go racist with my asp up your arse in a minute.’
‘Seriously though, why not?’ Danny persisted as they passed the only pub genuinely to be found on Oxford Street, The Tottenham.
‘Did you know, Danny, that in 1852 there were thirty-eight pubs in Oxford Street and now there is only one?’ Bob jerked his thumb sideways as they passed it. ‘Now, if that ain’t a sign of the times, I don’t know what is.’
‘Seriously though, Bob, what do you reckon? Should I go for CID?’
‘Get to work a bit closer with the lovely Sally Cartwright. Is that the idea?’
Danny Vine shook his head, a little flustered. ‘No. Not at all.’
‘You don’t have to be coy with me, son. I’ve worn out enough shoe leather in this game to know a thing or two or the mating dance of the lesser spotted constable.’
They turned left at the intersection and walked up Tottenham Court Road. The snow underfoot had turned to mush although the temperature was definitely dropping again.
‘Don’t get me wrong, Bob. She’s an attractive woman.’
‘She’s gorgeous. Clever. Personable,’ Bob Wilkinson agreed. ‘If I was sixty-eight years younger, I might be giving you a run for your money.’
‘But she’s made it quite clear she’s not interested in me. Can’t say I blame her after what happened.’
‘The guy got what was coming to him, that’s for sure.’
‘Jack Delaney sure don’t take no prisoners, does he?’ said Danny.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘First Michael Hill and now Michael Robinson. Both taken out. You’ve heard the gossip.’
‘What, he don’t like people with the name Michael?’
‘Couldn’t blame him if he did. I was just saying …’
‘Well, don’t.’
‘Fair enough.’
‘Seriously, Danny, DI Jack Delaney may have a lot of enemies on the force, but he’s got a lot of friends too.’
‘Yeah I know. Jeez, Bob! I didn’t mean anything by anything.’
‘Good. That’s that then.’
‘But CID, you know. People like Jack, they get to make a difference.’
‘Sometimes.’
‘That’s what I want.’
‘We make a difference too, lad.’
‘What, out tramping in the cold and snow, homeless shelter after homeless shelter?’
‘You think CID just sit around in warm pubs drinking mulled wine this time of year, and waiting for inspiration to strike?’
‘Guinness maybe,’ Danny laughed and held up his hand before Bob Wilkinson could reply. ‘Joke, Bob. Joke.’
The constable shook his head. ‘Well, you might just be right on that one.’
Five minutes later and they were in the offices of one of the many homeless shelters dotted around the capital. Not the one Bible Steve was usually taken to. That had been their first port of call. Then lots more.
The woman in charge of the centre was in her fifties, with a plump figure, thick dark hair and a sense of energy and enthusiasm that was a dramatic contrast to the hangdog attitude of Bob Wilkinson.
‘So how can I help you, officers? My name is Marian Clark.’
‘We’re just constables, ma’am,’ replied Wilkinson, although PC Danny Vine here has plans to become the next Commissioner.’
Marian Clark smiled at the young constable. ‘Well, as the great man once said … you have to have a dream in the first place, for that dream to come true.’