‘ You recognise him! You didn’t tell me that,’ she said, almost stamping her feet.
‘ Yeah, well… you should know him, too,’ Henry told her. ‘Something we’ve already been talking about today. 1986 — remember?’
‘ We were talking about Billy Crane, weren’t we? That’s not him, is it?’
FB’s ears pricked up at the mention of the name.
‘ No, it’s not,’ Henry said. ‘You mentioned you locked someone else up that night, didn’t you? A police dog bit him after he’d set fire to a few cop cars in the yard at Northgate.’
‘ You mean that’s..?’ She couldn’t remember his name. ‘But I’ve had a look. I didn’t recognise him.’
‘ It’s not that easy to recognise a head, especially when it’s been sliced off at the neck, flattened and bounced down the road like a football. Go and have another look,’ Henry suggested.
‘ I will.’ Danny walked towards the ambulance.
FB stepped close to Henry and pointed at him thoughtfully.
FB was one of the few ACCs in the country who had served in only one Force, having risen from PC to his present rank in Lancashire. He knew that if he aspired to become a Chief Constable he would need to do some ‘butterflying’ around a couple of other Forces, but for the present he was happy. Having remained in one Force, though, meant that he had a good knowledge of the villains operating in the county — pretty unusual for an ACC in the modern police service. He stuck his finger on Henry’s chest. ‘Billy Crane… correct me if I’m wrong… big time crim, operates mostly with small teams. He shot Terry Briggs, didn’t he?’ Henry nodded. ‘And he had an unusual MO, didn’t he?’ Henry nodded again.
FB pulled his finger off Henry’s chest and sniffed. Slowly, he said, ‘He creates diversions.’
‘ Keeps the cops busy while he does his own business.’
‘ Such as blowing up police cars.’
‘ Or helicopters.’
‘ Sending bomb threats to Control Room. And also to the Comms Room at Lancaster police station.’ FB shook his head in wonderment. ‘Taking a risk doing that helicopter, though.’
‘ Tch,’ Henry guffawed. ‘How many operational cops are there at the dream factory likely to stop such a thing happening? How good is the security?’
‘ Point taken,’ FB conceded.
‘ Anything else been happening in the last hour that’s unusual?’
‘ Not that I know of.’
Danny had reached the ambulance. She asked one of the paramedics if he would show her the severed head of the deceased, which had been put into a plastic bag and sealed. Hoping to make her jump, the paramedic picked it up from the floor of the ambulance and swung it towards her with a laugh. She did not respond, but shot the man a pitying glance and tilted the head up to the daylight. It was a very gruesome sight, floating in thick, setting blood, and she did feel slightly queasy, but maintained her composure. She peered closely at the features. ‘Thanks,’ she said, and returned to Henry and FB who were deep in conversation. They drew apart as she approached.
‘ You were right,’ Danny told Henry. ‘It’s Callum Riley, I remember his name now — the guy I arrested all those years ago. Not a pretty sight.’
‘ Never was,’ remarked Henry.
FB turned on his heels and strutted away, fingering his chin, his decision-making process in action. Then he pirouetted and strode back. Henry and Danny watched him, wondering what masterplan was about to be unleashed.
‘ I want you to get into this now — something big could have happened somewhere in the county and when it comes in I want us to be ready for it. I want us to be ahead of the game — got me?’
‘ I’m off sick,’ Henry stated.
‘ In that case get yourself back on duty,’ FB ordered him. ‘You look all right to me.’
‘ And I’m working on the triple murder at Blackpool.’
FB gave one of his deep, pissed-off sighs which seemed to beg the question, ‘Am I the only one committed here?’ ‘Not now you’re not, Doris,’ FB told Danny. ‘Now get on with it,’ he added quickly and walked away before Danny could respond to the jibe, ‘Doris’ being an old-fashioned, derogatory term for a policewoman.
‘ One day,’ she hissed through gritted teeth, ‘I’ll punch that bastard’s lights out.’
Crane reversed the fully-laden Sherpa into the warehouse loading bay and Smith closed the roller doors. The Audi containing the other three drove into the warehouse through the smaller door. They all got out and bustled eagerly to the back doors of the Sherpa which Smith was unlocking.
He opened them slowly, but with a flourish, and could not resist punching the air at the sight of all the money boxes.
‘ Brilliant!’ Gunk uttered enthusiastically. He lunged to grab one. Crane stepped in front of him, barring his way.
‘ Come on, let’s get ‘em opened,’ Gunk whined. ‘I want to see some dough.’
‘ No, not yet,’ Crane said quietly. ‘You start messing with these and an indelible coloured dye gets released all over the cash and you — which is neither use nor ornament to anybody. You’ll be walking around with a pink head for months and no one’ll touch the cash. They need to be opened properly.’
He pushed Gunk back, not in any way worried by Gunk’s powerful body and mean temper. Crane knew he could deal with Gunk, no problem.
‘ Don? How long?’ Crane asked Smith.
‘ He’ll be here in half an hour — so in the meantime I suggest we all get changed and showered in the bogs back there. Get the clothing back into the plastic bags, get all the weapons and ammo together, then let’s chill out.’
‘ Shit!’ said Thompson irritably. He too was fired up by the sight of all that money, so near, yet so far.
‘ He’s right,’ Drozdov agreed with Crane. ‘Let the expert do it when he arrives. We’ve come this far. Waiting another half hour will not do us harm.’
FB revelled in his rank. He loved strutting around Headquarters, barking at people, ordering them around and being generally unpleasant. He was not a people person, but a hard taskmaster who pushed himself even harder than his subordinates. But such power and drive did have its upside because within minutes of returning to HQ, FB had turfed a handful of Human Resource managers out of a room they had been using for a meeting in the LEC building adjacent to Headquarters and declared it to be the hub of Operation Head Hunt — the first name that sprang to his whirling mind.
Henry and Danny looked on rather shamefacedly as the HR managers collected their belongings and shuffled out, shooed along by FB with words and phrases like, ‘Too many bloody meetings these days anyway,’ and ‘Not enough focus on operational policing,’ and ‘I’m not even sure what you lot do, anyway.’
They left bristling with annoyance. FB basked in their reactions.
When they were gone, the ACC turned to the two detectives.
‘ Down to you,’ he said, and left.
‘ Thanks a fucking bunch,’ Henry said to himself. He sat down heavily, no enthusiasm in him at all. He examined the room. The LEC–Local Emergency Centre — building is a single-storey construction, consisting of a series of rooms which, in the event of a large-scale disaster, incident or emergency, would be staffed by the relevant people from the Police, Fire and Ambulance Services, together with representatives from other agencies. It is geared up to handle such an occurrence in terms of communications and facilities. In between times, the rooms are used by whoever needs them, for whatever purpose — such as an HR managers’ meeting.
Two phones were already installed, together with a fax machine. Points for dozens of others to be put in were available. Flipcharts and dry-wipe boards were dotted around the room.
Henry picked up one of the phones and spoke to the Duty Officer in Control Room. His staff were now back in place following the bomb alert. Henry informed him of his presence and function in the LEC and asked him to forward any information which might be of relevance — particularly reports of large-scale crime in the county.