Banks’s finger waved as he spoke. “I want a name. I want it today. I want you out on the bloody streets, acting like coppers. I don’t care who you get me, I don’t care how you get me them, but bring me a name or so help me God, I’ll be writing yours on a note that says you’re both bloody fired.”
His rant complete, Banks turned back the way he had come, once more crashing through the door. Joseph turned to look at Ray who sat back at his desk, bowing his head and running his fingers through his hair. There should have been something he could say in that moment, but whatever it was supposed to be, it found a way to evade Joseph.
“Well, that was slightly over the top.” Ray finally raised his head, rubbing his temples.
“He’s wrong,” Joseph said, immediately looking at the door to ensure that Banks really had left the room.
“Not completely.” Ray offered a weak smile in return for the support.
“We are going to get him.”
“Well, that much is true,” Ray had regained his normal composure now. He stood. “That much is true. Want a brew?”
“Please,” Joseph said and Ray nodded.
He returned five minutes later with two teas and a plate of biscuits that he must have managed to snare from the kitchen. “Thought we’d earned them,” he explained.
Joseph took his tea, thanking Ray and turning back to his work before he became aware that Ray hadn’t sat back down. He turned to look at him, perched on his desk, which was out of character. Ray was very much the sort of guy who sat in chairs and placed objects on tables.
“I reckon I owe you an apology,” he said when he saw Joseph looking at him. “I was a bit strong yesterday in how I spoke to you. It won’t happen again.”
“Oh,” Joseph replied, planning his next words before he said them. “That’s fine. Nothing to apologise for.”
“There is. I got frustrated and I took it out on you. That wasn’t right. And I didn’t need Banks to make me realise that. I would have said it anyway. I spoke to my wife about it last night. She set me straight. Said I owe you an apology and more importantly, she wants you and your wife to join us for dinner one night.”
“Oh,” Joseph said again, even less sure of what to say this time. He landed on “That’s nice.”
“Yes, well, we’ll get an evening, I suppose. You’ll want to talk to your wife I imagine. If she’s anything like mine, she’s the one who knows when and where you’re supposed to be outside of work.”
That much was very true. “Yes, I’ll talk to her.”
Ray sat for a moment, maybe waiting for Joseph to add something, or perhaps contemplating saying more himself, but in the end neither happened and he stood from his perch, returning to his more familiar seat on the chair.
“We should get ourselves down the docks,” Ray returned the conversation back to work. “Banks might want us to try and avoid it, but we at the very least need to go and see what they’ve found out from last night.”
“Are you not worried that might ruffle his feathers some more?”
“I’ve got to be honest, I’m less and less concerned about what Claude Banks thinks by the moment. I want to feel the collar of the fizzer who did this. Nothing else matters to me. We keep on being coppers, Joseph, we keep on being coppers. It’s all we’ve got, and it’s all we need.”
18.
The smell of the dampened-down fire hit them the moment they got out of the car, somehow finding a way to pierce through the cloud of other stenches that made this part of the river their own. The warehouse had completely gone, collapsed in on itself as the wooden timbers had succumbed to the flames. A blackened pile of charred wood and ash, crushed under the remains of the asbestos roof that had been atop the structure. One single beam of charred wood raised itself from the debris, shattered at the top, but defiantly punching towards the sky. Something had survived, then, Joseph thought as he looked at it. That meant that maybe something significant could have been just as lucky.
Sean Campbell shifted through the carcass of the building. As the Firemaster for the London Fire Brigade, he had the unenviable job of trying to piece together what might have caused the blaze and, more importantly, finding any evidence that could point them towards the culprit. He looked up and saw the detectives standing at the side of the wreckage and ambled over it towards them.
“Hell of a mess you’ve left me,” he called as he walked towards them, the smile spreading over his face. Sean had always been a genial man, the perfect counterpoint to his job. Working through what were often fatal fires took a special sort of character to cope, yet Sean seemed to wear a smile whatever the weather.
“For that we can only apologise.” Ray shook Sean’s hand as they met. “Good to see you, Sean. Looking well.”
“You too, both. Better than this place anyway,” he turned looking back at the debris.
“Any thoughts yet?”
“A couple, yes. Definitely deliberate, of that I’m pretty sure. Aside from the timing, which speaks volumes, I think we’re looking at multiple ignition sources. Corners of the building all seem to have been burnt worse than the rest. That wouldn’t happen naturally. They’re all too far apart. If they used accelerant, it wasn’t a vast quantity, if at all. Someone came in here, lit some small fires and scarpered. Plenty of things to catch light, so probably decided against overkill, or simply didn’t have the chance to acquire some.”
Joseph couldn’t help but find that interesting. He hadn’t been able to get past Harry Jones’s nervous nature the day before. Of everyone at the docks that day, his work in the garage would certainly have given him access to flammable liquids. He couldn’t believe that any would-be arsonist would pass up the chance to help their cause.
“They might just have been in a rush,” Ray said, as if reading the doubts in Joseph’s mind, but more likely in agreement with what Sean had deduced. “We did arrive on the scene out of the blue.”
“So, a crime of necessity, not one that was preplanned. Do you mind me asking why you think they burnt this particular warehouse down?”
“We think it was the scene of a murder. We have a witness who heard a commotion in this area on the night of the original crime.”
“I see. Well, I hate to break it to you, but if there was something in here, a weapon or some such, then it’s probably not in prime condition. Anything wooden could easily have been destroyed.”
“Not everything,” Joseph said looking at the beam that stuck out from the roof.
Sean followed his gaze. “No, of course. No fire is all-consuming. Not at these sorts of temperatures anyway. But the sort of evidence that might link a weapon to a suspect, fingerprints, for example, you would be very lucky if they survived. Especially on something like a wooden handle, should your suspect have used a knife or a hammer or something of that ilk.”
“Blunt trauma to the back of the head. Could be a cosh or an iron bar,” Ray explained.
“A rubber-handled cosh would have begun to melt quickly. I hope for your sake they went with the iron bar. You have a chance of getting something from that, although good luck to the teams working through this trying to work out what is or isn’t a potential weapon. There are going to be a lot of heavy implements out of place in here. ‘Needle in a haystack’ springs to mind.”
“And we’ve got the powers that be wanting this place back up and running as quickly as possible,” Ray lamented.
Sean laughed and shook his head. “Of course they do. What price justice when it comes to commerce? Well, if it helps take the slack from you, I’ll do my bit to make sure our wheels turn a little slower than normal. At least in terms of having my official report at a point where I can release the scene, anyway.”
“You’re a good man, Sean, thank you.”
