Page 230 of The Hallmarked Man
‘Thought so, but wanted it confirmed,’ said Strike, shoving one of the plastic containers towards Wardle. ‘Have some, it’s good.’
The policeman helped himself to chicken Madras. He looked as though he’d lost weight recently, and, unlike Strike, he hadn’t had much to spare in the first place. Wardle had been boyishly good-looking when he and Strike first met, but he seemed to have aged far more than the seven years that had passed since, and was now very grey around the temples.
‘This Iverson,’ said Strike, ‘has she looked at Oz’s Instagram account? Because Robin found out a missing girl was in communication with him, name of Sapphire Neagle.’
‘Dunno,’ said Wardle. ‘She probably thinks I’m too matey with you to give me much. I know the team’s seriously fucked off at Truman, though. Did you know he’s a Freemason?’
‘I did, yeah,’ said Strike, glad Robin wasn’t present to hear this.
‘There’s a lot of muttering that Truman wanted that body to be Knowles, to turn attention away from where the killing happened. Nobody needs a bloody Freemasonry-in-the-Met story… Did you know they’ve ruled out those four blokes in Wild Court?’
‘I did, yeah.’
‘So now they’re trying to work out how Wright and his killer gotto the shop, because there doesn’t seem to be camera footage of them anywhere.’
‘A Peugeot was involved, wasn’t it?’
‘That the silver car they think picked up the killer at three in the morning?’
‘Yeah. I assume they’ve tried to trace it?’
‘Yeah, but no dice. They’re combing through camera footage, but it disappeared into a residential area and got lost.’
Strike had just picked up his knife and fork again when his mobile rang and, seeing that it was Robin calling, answered at once.
‘Hi, are you free to talk?’ she said. Cheered by the fact that she’d called him instead of emailing, Strike said,
‘Yeah, of course, give me a minute.’
He got up from the table and pointed at the front door, signalling to Wardle that he needed privacy for this conversation.
‘Right,’ said Strike, who’d now let himself onto the landing outside Wardle’s flat, ‘fire away.’
‘I’m in casualty – I’m fine,’ she added quickly. ‘Plug’s here, with his son. The son’s been injured, badly, on his face. Bitten. Strike, I think I know what’s going on.’
‘What?’
‘Dogs. Dangerous dogs. The boy was bitten in that house in Carnival Street where they put whatever animal was in that allotment shed. They were both unmarked when they went in. Twenty minutes later, Plug half-carried his son out, with blood all over his face.’
‘Fuck,’ said Strike, thinking of the compound outside Ipswich. ‘Dog fights. That’s it, isn’t it? The cash is for bets, or buying dogs… OK, good work, now we know what we’re dealing with. With luck, a doctor might call in the police once they see what the injury is.’
‘Plug looks absolutely furious. I’ll bet you anything he’s going to pressure the boy not to say what really happened – say it was a stray dog, or something.’
‘Yeah, he probably will, in which case it’ll be on us to nail him. Easier now we know what we’re trying to prove. Have you done anything about that Land Rover, by the way?’ Strike asked, keen to keep fostering this slightly more amicable atmosphere.
‘Yes, I’ve made an appointment to go and see it Sunday afternoon. I’d better go, the boy’s been taken away to get stitched up.’
‘OK, bye,’ said Strike, and he returned to Wardle, who was opening his second lager.
‘Robin,’ Strike said.
‘Ah,’ said Wardle.
‘Listen, I’m grateful for the info,’ Strike said, sitting down again. ‘Good to know there’s still someone in the Met who doesn’t think I’m an arsehole.’
‘They’ve got their own share of arseholes,’ said Wardle, and Strike noticed the use of ‘they’, as opposed to ‘we’.
‘Were you serious,’ he asked, ‘about leaving?’
