You must do what this officer tells you… otherwise you’ll be shot.
He was expertly searched. His wrists were secured up his back in rigid handcuffs. He was placed in the rear of a police van which had been called to the scene. Two burly cops climbed inside with him. The back door was locked. Henry instructed them to take him directly to Blackpool.
Henry picked up the shotgun and placed it carefully on the back seat of his car.
He and Seymour looked into the Range Rover, baulking at the sight of the blood and bits of skull and brain splattered all over the passenger side.
Henry opened the back door.
When he lifted the blanket he realised why Dundaven had been so anxious not to get caught.
‘ Looks like we’ve bagged a gun-seller,’ said Seymour.
Chapter Eight
It is claimed that the best job in the FBI is to be stationed at the London office, situated on the fourth floor of the American Embassy in Grosvenor Square.
Karl Donaldson agreed wholeheartedly with the proposition.
He had been appointed as an assistant to the legal attache some twelve months previously, having fought off fierce competition for the post. Since then he had never been happier in his professional as well as his personal life.
In the last year he had acted as FBI liaison with many British police forces, MI5 and MI6. Thanks to cooperation between himself at the FBI, Scotland Yard and the Spanish police in Madrid, a Colombian-backed money-laundering scam handling billions of dollars of drug-trafficking money between the US, Channel Islands and Isle of Man and a crooked Egyptian finance house, had been smashed and literally dismantled.
Donaldson had recovered and seized over two billion dollars and destroyed a service to the cartels which had probably seen twenty times that amount pass through it in four years. He had also been involved in the investigation of many other international conspiracies, several of which were ongoing, some of which had come to nothing.
The work, he found, was demanding, exciting and fulfilling.
Just as his personal life had proved to be.
Previously having been a resident in Miami, he had moved to England and married Karen Wilde, cop, formerly a Chief Inspector in Lancashire. They had met and fallen in love whilst Donaldson — then a special agent had been investigating mafia connections in the north of England. Karen had transferred to the Metropolitan Police and was presently seconded to Bramshill Police College, where she held the rank of Temporary Superintendent.
Without having tried particularly hard, they were expecting their first child.
Life was being very good to them both.
But occasionally there was a downside — which Donaldson was experiencing now.
He was sitting at a window seat on the direct GB Airways flight from London to Madeira. In spite of his destination, that lush green Portuguese island in the Atlantic, Donaldson’s face was set hard, as it had been for the whole of the three-and-a-half-hour journey.
The plane was on its final descent into Santa Catarina Airport on the east coast of the island.
He gazed out across the wing. He could not be said to be taking in the steep banking of the plane, nor the expert manoeuvring, the twisting and dipping, in order to line up with the runway; his aesthetic sense did not appreciate the clear blue sea below, shimmering in the sunshine, nor the tantalising glimpses of the island itself.
Neither did it particularly concern him that the runway is one of the shortest in Europe, the end of which drops literally into the sea.
Normally he would have revelled in everything.
He readjusted his seat belt and braced himself for the landing which he knew would be characterised by extra reverse thrust and sharp braking. It was surprisingly smooth and lurch-free.
Within minutes the plane had taxied to the small terminal building.
Donaldson reached up and opened the overhead locker, lifting out his only piece of luggage, a small overnight bag. His stay was to be short, but not sweet.
The heat of the day hit him whilst walking from the plane to the terminal.
Even though it was January, Madeira was much warmer than London. He experienced a very brief reminder that, since being posted to London from Florida, he had seen little sun.
He went straight to Customs, showed his American passport and sailed through.
A dark-faced man with a black moustache and brown, intelligent eyes, approached him.
‘ You are Mr Donaldson, I believe, from the FBI in London,’ the man said. ‘Muito prazer.’
Donaldson nodded. ‘Muito bem, obrigado,’ he replied. It was one of the few Portuguese phrases he knew. He was not familiar with the language, but spoke Spanish well and German fluently. With his knowledge of the former he expected to be able to read menus and road signs, but nothing more complicated.
The two men shook hands formally, no smiles.
‘ I am Detective George Santana. May I welcome you to Madeira on behalf of the police service. Please accept my deep regret that the circumstance of your visit is not more pleasurable.’
Donaldson nodded. They had walked out of the airport. A car drew up to the kerb, driven by a policeman in uniform.
‘ I’d like to see the body as soon as possible.’
Donaldson touched down at one o’clock on Monday afternoon. By that time, Acting Detective Inspector Henry Christie had been at work for seven hours and was beginning to flag. He had only finished Sunday’s tour of duty at 2 a.m. and with less than four hours’ sleep under his belt, his eyes felt like a bucket of grit had been thrown into them.
He rubbed them once more with his knuckles, blinked a few times and ran a hand around his tired face. He stifled a big yawn, but only just.
The evening before, Hughie Dundaven had been booked into the custody system at Blackpool by about eight. He remained compliant in terms of his behaviour but said little and refused to divulge his name and address. He demanded to see a solicitor, which was one of his legal rights.
He had been strip-searched and all his clothing was seized for forensic. He was given a white paper suit — a ‘zoot suit’ as they are fondly called and a pair of slippers to protect his modesty. Nothing in his property gave any indication as to his identity. All he had in his wallet was cash. Six hundred pounds of it.
Non-intimate swabs were taken from his hands. Hair was plucked from his head for DNA sampling — the norm for all prisoners arrested for serious offences.
He refused to sign a consent form to allow his fingerprints to be taken.
By the time this had all been done it was ten o’clock. Dundaven had not yet been interviewed about anything.
The duty solicitor rolled in shortly after this and had a confidential chat.
Henry had appointed a DS and a DC to carry out the initial interview, but the solicitor said his client was not prepared to be interviewed at that time of day. He should be allowed to rest — all prisoners were entitled to a period of uninterrupted rest for eight hours in any twenty-four.
Henry hit the roof. He demanded an interview and got it.
It turned out to be a short one, just to establish why Dundaven had been locked up and to give him an opportunity to give his side of the story. He refused to say a word.
By the time that farce had ended it was midnight.
Dundaven got his wish then. He was led to a cell, where under a rough blanket he slept like a baby.
Henry and his detectives convened in the CID office where, over coffee, they planned next morning’s strategy.
Then he went to the property store where Dave Seymour and the ARV crew had unloaded and listed all the property from the Range Rover.
Henry raised his eyebrows. ‘That’s an awful lot of firepower,’ he said appreciatively, looking at the guns and ammunition which had been laid out and labelled.