Widows

Now, Fuller looked up when Resnick and Andrews walked back into the office. This is it, he thought. This is the day Resnick gets his papers. Fuller couldn’t help the smirk and Resnick saw it.

‘What you lookin’ so bloody happy about?’

‘I’ve identified the Fishers’ wheels man, sir. Didn’t Andrews tell you?’

Resnick shrugged, uninterested. ‘Big deal. I got Fat Fran to admit that it was Tony Fisher that gave her a pasting.’

Fuller was taken aback. Andrews raised his eyebrows and shook his head.

‘She’s that scared,’ Andrews chipped in, ‘she’ll never give evidence against him. You could nick Tony Fisher, but we all know he’ll never admit it and, without her statement, why bother? He’d walk the same day, then be free to go back and give the poor woman another beating, or worse... kill her.’

Resnick was lost for words; he’d never heard Andrews say so much in one go. Fuller offered:

‘So, if we could put Tony Fisher away on another charge, she might feel safer and open up then?’

‘You’re referring to your sterling police work with regards to the raid on Carlos’s car yard, no doubt?’ Resnick said with a sneer. ‘Where’s this evidence that’s going to rid London of the Fishers then?’

‘On your desk, sir,’ Fuller replied, pointing. If his report was good enough for Saunders, it was definitely good enough for Resnick. As Resnick picked it up, Fuller added, ‘Oh, yes — Andrews, Saunders wants to see you.’

‘What for?’ demanded Resnick.

‘No idea,’ said Fuller. Andrews shrugged and left the room.

Resnick walked into his new glass annex office, turned and walked straight out again. ‘I asked for bloody blinds so I wouldn’t have to look at your ugly mugs all day. Where are they?’ Resnick barked. ‘Get onto Alice — she’s the only way to get things done round here.’

While Fuller went off to track Alice down, Resnick sat in his goldfish bowl annex, opened the Carlos Moreno file and began to read, picking his nose all the while. When Fuller came back five minutes later. Resnick tapped on the glass, smiled and beckoned him into his office.

‘Interesting report Fuller, very detailed and thorough,’ Resnick said as he sat down and placed the report on his desk.

‘Thank you, sir,’ Fuller replied. ‘As you can see, I have uncovered evidence that could put the Fishers away for car ringing and potentially link them to an illegal booze racket in Manchester. That then gives you a fighting chance of persuading the Fran woman to make a statement against Tony Fisher for the assault. If he’s already behind bars, she’s got nothing to be scared of.’

Resnick looked up at him and shook his head. He tapped the report. ‘This is a bloody cock-up! The Jag had its real plates on it when you recovered it and it’s registered to the Fishers’ club, so their prints on the motor are worthless.’

Fuller looked embarrassed. ‘Well, the false plates were in the boot... and they tie up with a brown Jag used on the Manchester job.’

‘So fucking what? The Fishers have an expensive lawyer who will crucify your case. In letting Carlos Moreno do a runner and get squashed to death by a Post Office van, you’ve given them a perfect alibi. If I need to spell it out, Fuller, you’re thicker than I thought. The Fishers can pin everything on Carlos and walk away.’

Fuller felt totally deflated. Resnick was right. The Jag was in for a service, so all the Fishers had to say was that Carlos must have taken the Jag to Manchester for the illegal booze racket. With Carlos dead, there was no one to argue with anything the Fishers might claim.

Humiliated, Fuller turned to leave.

‘Wait,’ Resnick said, opening the file again. ‘Your report says the tip-off about the Moreno garage was anonymous and made by a woman.’ Fuller nodded. ‘An unknown woman also rang Boxer Davis at his bedsit the night he was killed.’ Resnick clicked his fingers at Fuller. ‘Have a look in that box of my stuff down there for the phone tap reports on calls made.’

Fuller searched through the box of files Alice had packed for the move. He found the phone tap report file and handed it over.

As Resnick flicked through the pages and pages of calls made in and out of Dolly Rawlins’s house, Fuller spotted Andrews coming out of Saunders’s office. He looked depressed. Fuller cheered up. It was all coming to a head. All of Resnick’s short cuts, unprofessionalism and sidestepping of red tape, his crazed obsession with the Rawlins case, was coming out into the open and would see the end of him. Andrews would have just told Saunders about the picture of Harry Rawlins Resnick carried in his pocket at all times. Saunders would see him for the obsessed weirdo he was.

Andrews knocked on Resnick’s open door. ‘DCI Saunders would like to see you, sir.’