The superintendent nodded. ‘Yes, sir. Colin Mawhinney introduced us when he took me on a tour of some of the precinct offices. Sorry it’s like this, Nolan.’
‘Me too, Mario, me too.’
The chief constable introduced the two Americans to Chief Superintendent Day. ‘I thought it right,’ he said, ‘that they should come straight to the heart of the investigation. Is DI McIlhenney in?’
‘Yes, sir,’ McGuire replied. ‘He’s in the office he’s using. I told him I’d bring you through when you arrived.’
‘Shall I organise refreshments, Chief?’ asked Day.
‘I’d appreciate that.’ He turned to the Americans. ‘How about you, gentlemen?’
Donegan nodded. ‘To be truthful, I’m flagging after that flight. I’d welcome some coffee.’ He turned to his colleague. ‘Eli?’
The crew-cut lieutenant seemed to stand even more stiffly than before. ‘No, thank you. I should check in on the investigation right away.’
As Donegan and the chief were led away by the divisional commander, McGuire showed Huggins through to the CID suite. ‘Good trip?’ he asked casually.
‘No,’ the American replied curtly.
McIlhenney saw them coming through the glass panel in the door of the cubicle that McGuire had described as his office; he rose from behind his desk and opened it for them, then introduced himself to the visitor. ‘Eli Huggins, Lieutenant, Internal Affairs Bureau, NYPD,’ the man replied shortly.
Name, rank and serial number, thought McGuire. He sees us as the fucking enemy.
‘Who’s the senior investigating officer?’ asked Huggins.
‘I am.’ McIlhenney was always amiable; but on occasion it was a little forced.
‘You are? Maybe I misunderstand your ranking structure here, but isn’t a superintendent superior to an inspector in your force?’ He turned to McGuire. ‘And are you, sir, not the divisional detective commander here?’
‘Well done, you’re right both times.’
‘In that case, sir, I have to tell you that I do not believe that my chief of detectives would approve of command of this investigation being delegated to a junior officer.’
‘Nor would he approve of me walking into his office and telling him how to do his job. You’re not going to be a fucking seagull, are you, Eli?’
‘What’s a seagull?’
‘It’s a name the managers of American-owned companies in Scotland sometimes give to the guys from head office. It means that they fly in from far away, make a lot of noise, shit all over you and then fly away again. The story is that the man at the top of our chain of command has decided that it would not be appropriate for me to command this one. Colin and I became good friends in the time we knew each other. .’
‘You mean your objectivity is in doubt?’
‘I mean I’m a potential witness to his state of mind.’
‘There is another reason,’ said McIlhenney quietly. ‘When these people are apprehended, we do not want to have them carried into court by paramedics.’
‘It’s my Italian blood,’ McGuire added. ‘Makes me excitable; that and my Irish blood.’
Huggins showed his first sign of loosening up. ‘Don’t you have Scots blood to calm you down?’
‘Nope. Fifty per cent Wop, fifty per cent Mick, that’s me.’
‘With breeding like that you’d be Commissioner of Police in New York.’
‘I doubt that, very much. I’d probably be at war with myself over control of a labour union.’ He reached out to open the door. ‘I’m going to leave you guys alone, now. By the way, Lieutenant, Neil isn’t on my staff, so I haven’t delegated anything to him. He’s Special Branch.’
‘Is that something like me?’
‘If you mean that you’re both secret policemen, I suppose he is. But that’s as far as it goes.’ He left the room with a smile.
‘Take the weight off your feet,’ said McIlhenney, as the door closed, ‘and tell me why you came in here like a man with a thistle up his arse.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Huggins, as he accepted the first invitation. ‘Before I left I had an interview with my boss and his boss. They both explained to me what the personal consequences would be if any of the information I’m carrying got into the public domain.’
‘That’s good man management.’ The big inspector chuckled.
‘Maybe, but I can understand why.’
‘Are you telling me that your man Mawhinney was bent?’
‘Absolutely not. There was no straighter officer on our force.’
‘What’s the story, then?’
‘I’ll get to that,’ said the New Yorker, ‘but maybe you could bring me up to speed on your investigation.’
‘Sure.’ McIlhenney ran him through everything they had, detailing all of Mawhinney’s movements since he and McGuire had arrived for the second leg of the exchange visit, and ending with Spoons’s statement, and the search for a single Land Rover among over a hundred thousand vehicles.
‘He wasn’t forced into the automobile?’
‘Not according to the witness statement,’ the inspector repeated. ‘He stopped, there was a period of communication with the people inside, then Colin got in himself, and the vehicle drove off. Next morning he was found in the dock.’
‘Do you think he was meant to be found?’
‘It is only an opinion, you understand, but I don’t. If he was, why bother taking him there? Why not just dump him in the river, or in one of the lochs in Holyrood Park? He was weighted down and dropped in deep water. It was a pure accident that the chain snagged and he didn’t go to the bottom. He wouldn’t have stayed there for ever, but I reckon the thinking was that he’d be down there long enough to fuck up the forensics.’ He looked up. ‘So what have you got?’
‘Before I begin,’ said Huggins, ‘I need to know who will have access to this information.’
‘If it’s that sensitive, only two people: me and Bob Skinner, our deputy chief, my boss.’
‘It will remain secure?’
‘Bet on it.’
‘I’m betting my career. That’s why I was so awkward earlier. Okay, here goes. As you know, I am a member of our IAB. Before he was transferred to patrol division, Colin Mawhinney was also an IAB officer.’ Huggins hesitated. ‘You probably think of us in the way that most people do, that we’re real bottom-feeders, cops who persecute other cops. But everything we do, and every investigation we undertake, is in response to a complaint from the public of corruption or serious misconduct, with the emphasis on serious. We don’t go looking for work; we don’t have to. It comes to us, by telephone, by letter and these days even by e-mail.’
‘Understood,’ said McIlhenney. ‘It’s a dirty job, but it has to be done properly in everyone’s interests, cops included.’
‘Right. In Mawhinney’s time as a sergeant in IAB, he investigated a detective officer named Luigi Salvona. The complaint followed a killing in Brooklyn, a gangland execution in which the victim, one Al Tedesco, was lured to a restaurant in a quiet street and strangled as he ate. Salvona was at the table with him; he was the man who set up the meeting. He testified that the men who did the job wore masks, and that he was beaten unconscious. There were no witnesses; they were the only diners in the restaurant and both waiters were conveniently in the kitchen when the killing took place. Under questioning he said that Tedesco had been an informant of his, and that he assumed the execution had been a reprisal.’ Huggins leaned across McIlhenney’s desk, picked up his water carafe and a glass. ‘May I?’
‘Of course.’
He poured some water and took a sip. ‘The complaint came from the victim’s widow,’ he continued. ‘She said that her husband had been set up by Salvona, and that far from being a police informant, he was an organised-crime member himself, and that Salvona was on his payroll, not the other way around. When the FBI was consulted they confirmed that Tedesco had indeed been on their surveillance list, and that he had been under investigation, although not actively at that time. Such a complaint, a mobster’s wife admitting his past and accusing a policeman of complicity in his assassination, remains unique in the annals of IAB. Sergeant Mawhinney was the investigating officer; he saw a problem from the outset with Salvona’s story. He was a patrol officer, not a detective. How would he come to have an informant as connected as Tedesco?’