“By air?”
“Yes.”
“Who flies there?”
“Which airlines, do you mean?” Okonkwo laughed. “No airlines fly to Biafra. Only aid. And only from Portugal now. He would take a plane to Bissau. And from there to the island of Sao Tome. That is where the French are flying their aid planes from.”
“So he’s probably trying to head to Portugal?”
“How could he get there? You are watching out for his house?”
“He wouldn’t dare go near there. There must be half the Met there,” said Tozer.
“What about the committee?” said Breen. “He must have some friends on the committee.”
“He has no friends on the committee,” said Okonkwo angrily. “Even before he stole our money, we had argued. He did not approve of our tactics. He is a traitor.” He put down the spoon, pulled another cloth from a drawer and dusted down his desk. “You should try the hospital. He could borrow money from a colleague.”
“Do you have any idea where he was when he phoned?”
“It was a phone box. He reversed the charges. He could have been anywhere.”
“Did you hear anything in the background that might have given you a clue?”
“It was in a street. There were cars. That is all.”
Breen stood silently in the shop for a minute, looking at the clutter around him. A white-faced wooden figure, standing like a toy soldier on a shelf. A chess set made of tiny wooden carvings of Africans.
“Maybe we should go to the hospital,” said Breen. “Take a look there.”
“You seriously think he’ll have gone back there, sir? It’ll be crawling with our lot.”
Breen looked at the poster that said Save Biafra. The same picture of a young boy who had starved to death for the cause.
It was dark when they left the shop and walked to the car.
“So. We going to the hospital now? I don’t think he’ll be there, sir, honest.”
Breen said, “Just get in the car.”
“What?”
“Drive up a little way and park somewhere out of sight.”
Avoiding a man walking past on the pavement, struggling with an enormous brass candelabra, they got in.
“Why, sir?”
“Act normally and just drive away a little bit.”
“Is he still watching us?”
“Probably. Don’t look. Just drive.”
Tozer did as he’d said, pulling up down an alleyway next to a launderette.
“What are we doing?” she asked, switching off the engine.
“Did you recognize the woman who knocked at the door of the shop?”
“No.”
“I think it may have been Mrs. Briggs. Her face was covered up with a scarf but she ran off the minute she saw us in there.”
“You think Ezeoke is in the shop? Hiding?” Tozer asked.
“I don’t know. Something’s going on.” It was a small road. People around eyed the police car, wondering what they were doing parked up in their street.
“But he said he hated Ezeoke.”
“Well he would, wouldn’t he?”
“Oh. I see what you mean. God.” She looked at Breen. “So what are we going to do?”
“The shop has a front and a back entrance. Did you see the corridor at the back? We’ll split up. You take the back. There’s a pub opposite Okonkwo’s shop. It should be open. I’ll call up the station from there. That way I can keep an eye on the front of the shop.”
“Great. You get to sit in the pub and I get to stand on the street.”
“You’re in uniform. You’ll be more conspicuous out front.”
“I suppose.” They walked back down the street towards Okonkwo’s store. Ten yards before the shop was Blenheim Crescent, which led down into an alleyway.
“That’s the back door to the shop there, isn’t it? I’ll be OK here.”
Breen said, “Don’t worry. The station will send people soon. If anyone moves, don’t follow. Just tell us who it is and which way they’re headed.”
“I’ve always wanted to do surveillance,” she said. “Like in the films.”
Waiting until he could conceal himself among a crowd of people moving up the street, Breen walked up as far as The Prince of Wales. It was a big square Victorian building on the corner, with large windows from which Breen could get a good enough view of Okonkwo’s front door, a little to the right and across the road.
He went into the pub and ordered a half-pint of best, keeping one eye on the street outside. He sat with his back to the bar. “You got a phone?” he asked the barman.
The barman nodded towards the toilets. The payphone was in a corridor. He wouldn’t be able to see Okonkwo’s shop from there. Breen split a ten-bob note for change. “Five bob if you keep an eye on that door. If anyone goes in or out give me a wave, OK?”
He took a last look. The sign on the front door still read CLOSED. Dimly through the glass, he thought he could make out the dark silhouette of Okonkwo moving behind the muddle of bric-a-brac in his window.
Leaving his position at the bar, Breen got through to Marilyn. “How are things?”
“Prosser just came in and resigned.”
“So I heard,” said Breen.
“No reason. Just jacked it in. Weird, hey?” He looked over to the barman. He was polishing glasses, but his eyes were fixed on the street like they were supposed to be.
“Weird.”
Breen told her about Okonkwo. “Tell Bailey. Tell him we need some officers here. Discreetly. And as soon as they can. I think they might lead us to Ezeoke, wherever he is.”
“Is that Constable Tozer woman with you?”
“Just give him the address. I’ve got to go.”
He made it back to the bar; the shop looked the same, still closed. “All OK?” he asked the barman.
Breen must have been away from the window a couple of minutes. He peered into the dark behind the junk in the window and tried to make out if there was any movement, but couldn’t make out anything. He wondered if Tozer had found a safe place from which she could keep an eye on the back of the shop. A light drizzle had started to fall. If she hadn’t found a shelter she would be getting wet.
The barman took the ashtray off the bar in front of Breen and emptied it, then wiped it with a beer towel. The pavements were filling again. He looked at his watch; it was just past five o’clock. They had been watching the shop for just ten minutes. Shopkeepers were switching off lights. Men were returning from work clutching evening newspapers and umbrellas.
“Like another?” said the barman.
“No. I’m OK.”
Another voice said, “It’s Breen, isn’t it?”
He was conscious of someone taking the bar stool next to his. Breen tore his eyes away from the window for a second. He recognized the big Irish man at the bar; it was John Nolan. He was holding his hand out towards Breen and it looked like he had been drinking all afternoon.
“Give this man a whisky on me.”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Great news, isn’t it?”
Breen looked away from the shop again. “What?”
“You’ve not heard?”
“Which news?”
“The best news. I left you a message. Did you not get it?”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“About Patrick Donahoe. The fellow who I thought must have fried in that fire. Do you remember? I’d been trying to contact his relations in Mayo.”
“I remember.”
“You haven’t heard then?”
“No.”
“Patrick Donahoe. He worked for me on the building site. He’d gone missing. You were afraid-”
“I was.” Breen looked back at the doorway of the shop. A large blue Pickfords lorry obscured his view, crawling so slowly through the early evening traffic that it seemed like an age for it to move. “You said it was good news.”
“I got a letter back from his mother this Friday. The stupid bastard was in prison the whole time, thanks be to God.”
“In prison?”
“Pentonville. He’d only got arrested for trying to hold up a petrol station, stupid bollocks that he is.”