Shaking his head, Grace said, ‘Congratulations, it’s taken less than five years of being a detective to turn you into a cynic?’
‘Better than starting off as one from the get-go like you, right?’
Grace smiled. ‘I don’t think the Kiplings are lying. They’ve nothing to gain by giving us a made-up story. I think they’re real. It would be a different ballgame if the painting had been insured for big money.’
‘If you say so,’ Branson replied dubiously.
‘What’s making you so suspicious of them?’ Grace asked him.
He shrugged. ‘I don’t know, something doesn’t feel right about this. They buy a picture in a car boot sale that might be a fake, might be worth a fortune. Invent a tie-up robbery, hit the press and bingo, the picture must be genuine. Yeah? A clever marketing ploy.’
‘Maybe if they still had the painting, but they don’t.’
‘They say they don’t.’
Grace shook his head. ‘I don’t think the Kiplings are wide-boys. They’re just decent people, in my view, and they’ve been to hell and back.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Let’s get back to base, we’ve got our next briefing and I’ll need to update the ACC.’
For the next ten minutes as Branson drove, Grace made a series of calls. His first was to Jack Alexander, asking him to put back the time of their morning briefing to 9.30 a.m. and asking him to organize a substantial outside enquiry team to do a door-to-door around the vicinity of the Kiplings’ home.
Next, just as he was dialling Norman Potting’s number, the DS rang him.
‘Chief, I’ve just had a call from Forensic Services in Guildford. They’ve been experimenting with some new technology on that DNA on the restaurant bill that was in Charlie Porteous’s wallet, and they’ve got a match!’
‘Tell me?’ Grace asked.
‘I think you are going to like this, chief! It’s Ross Briggs.’
Grace thought for an instant. ‘The man who rented the garage for the Audi A6 from Ricky Sharp?’
‘’It would appear to be the very same,’ Potting confirmed.
‘Ross Briggs,’ Grace said with clear recall and shooting a glance at Branson. ‘He’s an employee of Art Recovery UK Ltd of which the head honcho is Stuart Piper?’
‘Correct, chief. I have some more intel on him – and his brother – if you’d like to hear it?’
‘Go ahead.’
‘His brother, Maurice, is a total charmer, like Ross, as you know from when we met them. The twins used to have a security business, doing nightclub doors until they got done for GBH fifteen years ago. A nicer pair of identical twins we couldn’t ever hope to meet. Members of the National Front, they also used to advertise themselves on social media as the UK’s prime representatives of the Ku Klux Klan. They beat up a black kiddie pretty badly for no greater sin than he tried to enter a Brighton nightclub. The Briggs brothers got two years each, during which their creditors bankrupted their business. Since their release from prison, they have been employed by Art Recovery UK Ltd.’
Grace banged his right fist into his left palm, repeatedly, with excitement, thinking fast. ‘Good work, Norman. We know there’s another employee of this company, the American, Robert Kilgore. Kilgore and the two Briggs brothers fit the description of the offenders in a nasty tie-up robbery in Brighton last night that I’m about to brief everyone on. One of the witnesses heard the name Ross being used. It all fits. Straight away I felt they were connected. Luke was trying to establish Kilgore’s whereabouts, but it sounds like he’s in Brighton, or certainly was last night. I want you and Velvet to nick both Briggses on suspicion of the murder of Charlie Porteous. You’d better take a Public Order team with you in case they kick off. I’ll also have Kilgore arrested and brought in for questioning in connection with last night’s robbery. And I’ll ask Jon Exton to get a search warrant for Stuart Piper’s house.’
‘I think we might be a little late for that, chief,’ Potting said.
‘What do you mean?’ Grace quizzed.
‘Just had a call from Luke. Piper’s mansion, Bewlay Park, caught fire during the night.’
95
Wednesday, 6 November
At midday, as Daniel Hegarty, following the directions on his Touareg’s satnav, turned into Mackie Crescent, he was tormented by doubt. Was this really the right thing? During his time in prison, all those years back, at the same time as honing his painting skills in copying the greats of the past, he’d also tried to catch up on the education he’d missed out on at school, by reading avidly.
He’d discovered to his surprise that he loved Shakespeare, in particular for the colour of his language. And the plays of the grand old bard he had loved the best were the tragedies, in particular Othello, which for some reason struck a deep chord in him and inspired some of the work he’d done while inside.
As he shot a wistful glance at the rectangular parcel on the passenger seat beside him, and the envelope beside it, some of the words of Othello came back to him.
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away. Richer than all his tribe.
He was about to do just that now.
But did he have a choice?
If Piper sent his henchmen back to his house and found the painting, God knows what reprisals he might exact. He could cope with a beating, but no way could he risk any harm to Natalie, the woman he loved, the most precious thing in his life. They were happy, they were in a good place, she was all the riches he needed. She was richer than any pearl. Richer than any damned painting was worth.
You are doing the right thing.
There was some quote about doing the right thing that he was trying to remember, but in his ragbag-of-nerves state he could not think what the hell it was, at this moment.
The satnav informed him his destination was a quarter of a mile ahead.
Then, as he drove up the street he saw, diagonally opposite tennis courts to his right, a marked police four-by-four parked on the left.
He hit the brakes and pulled into the kerb. A few hundred yards ahead he now saw a uniform copper walk out of a driveway, followed by Harry Kipling, a fair-haired woman – presumably Harry’s wife – and a teenage boy. The copper opened the rear door and the woman and boy climbed in, Harry going round to the front passenger door. Moments later the vehicle made a U-turn and headed back down the road in his direction.
Hegarty shrank down low, making himself as invisible as he could, until he saw the vehicle receding into the distance.
He stayed still for some moments, just in case for any reason they came back. Close one, he thought, feeling beads of perspiration popping on his brow. He’d reckoned on the Kiplings being at work and the boy at school. Although it wouldn’t really have mattered if one of them had been at home, he had his story ready for them. But this made it easier, less explaining to do. As he was about to drive on, his phone rang, the number withheld.
He answered furtively, even though there was no one in earshot. ‘Daniel Hegarty speaking.’
It was Weasel. ‘You on a secure phone?’
‘No, I don’t have a secure phone, I’m legit these days.’
‘Haha, that’s funny. Listen, you ever heard of the Fates?’
Immediately Hegarty stiffened. ‘Why are you asking?’
‘Contact of mine has got a billionaire client in China who likes them French artists from the seventeenth century.’
‘They’re called fête galante,’ Hegarty corrected him.
‘Yeah, right, that’s it. Well I’ve got a shopping list of artists’ names – what’s old Billy the Brush got on the back of his business card?’