“You think we can do that?”
“I don’t know for certain. But one thing we can do is buy ourselves a little bit more time.”
“How are we going to do that?”
“Sometimes you have to take out your enemy’s ability to hand out orders.”
“Hand out orders?” Joseph struggled to follow the reference.
“We’re going to arrest Tommy Jay.”
22.
All the usual sources in all the usual places gave them Tommy’s whereabouts. No one hesitated. Why would they? The police talking to Tommy was nothing new. Joseph had often wondered if Tommy encouraged it. Something that might help build up his mythos. The police always knocking at his door but walking away empty-handed. The untouchable Tommy Jay. Time to shatter that illusion.
Tommy sat at the same table reading a newspaper when they walked in. He had on a different outfit, which came as no surprise. Tommy Jay could often be found in the shops around Carnaby Street. This time he wore a light cream military jacket, one of the ones with the little straps that sat on the top of the shoulders. A brown cravat tucked inside it. A cap that looked as if it belonged on the head of a communist revolutionary sat on the table in front of him. He folded the newspaper and laid it in his lap as the officers approached him.
“Didn’t expect to see you two again so soon,” Tommy said with what could have passed for a subtle tone of annoyance or disappointment, which made Joseph wonder if he would come quietly. The two large men standing either side of where Tommy sat stiffened their stances.
“Tommy Jay, I’m arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Gerald Trainer…” Ray got straight to the point.
“This is absolute horse shit!” Tommy snapped as he sprang up from his seat, the arm with the newspaper in swinging up and under the table as he did so, sending it spiralling upwards, landing on its side in front of one of his ‘bouncers’, who remained impassive even as it struck his shin and foot.
Ray continued with the reading of Tommy’s rights as Tommy stood snarling at him. The two bouncers stayed in place waiting for an order. Joseph’s nerves grew inside him. His fight-or-flight mechanism kicked in and he silently willed himself to veer towards fight, to find the same energy and bravery he had when confronting Harry’s attacker. But the more he thought about it, the further away that feeling got.
Ray finished the necessary spiel then stood staring down at his quarry, hands now in his pockets, jacket open and pushed back. Tommy glared back, nostrils flaring, his eyes angrily locked on Ray. The bouncers remained unmoving, unflinching. And Joseph was doing all he could to keep all his bodily functions in check, certain that everyone could hear his heart hammering on his ribcage.
No one moved.
“Kenny,” Tommy finally spoke, but kept his eyes on Ray, his voice low and measured, hiding his anger as best he could. “Call the brief. Tell him where I’ll be.”
“Of course,” came the matter-of-fact reply as Kenny, the bouncer to Tommy’s left, nodded and then turned, walking away.
“I suppose you’d like me to come with you down the station?” Tommy hissed.
Ray said nothing, just nodded and turned. Joseph fell into step behind him.
“What? No cuffs?” Tommy called after them. Louder this time with a little more anger.
“No cuffs.” Ray didn’t even look back as he walked back out of the pub and then to the car.
“Why aren’t we bringing him out? Or waiting with him? He could be telling them to do all sorts. Clean something up. Destroy something.”
“If Tommy Jay is our man, then he will have already covered up anything he could think of that would lead us to him. Best to let him have his moment and walk out of here head held high.”
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea?” Joseph murmured and he really didn’t. There were protocols that had to be adhered to. You didn’t leave a murder suspect with his cohorts. Who knew what they were talking about back there?
“There are some things you have to give people to get what you want.”
As he said that, Tommy Jay came walking out, his scowl long removed from his face, a smirk in its place. His chin tipped toward the sky and his arms swayed by his side as he swaggered, smirking, towards the car. It didn’t look like an arrest.
Ray opened the door, not looking at Tommy as he sauntered past him and into the back seat. “Thank you, Jeeves,” he mocked with an ersatz upper-class accent. Ray shut the door firmly behind him sighing.
“Everything they want,” he said to Joseph.
They had barely got back onto the main road back before Tommy Jay leant forward from the back of the car, resting his forearms on the rear of their seats. “So, what’s all this about then? Why you all got your knickers in a twist over this one?”
“If you don’t mind, Mr Jay, I’d prefer we did all our talking down at the station.” Ray didn’t turn back to look at Tommy, but Joseph caught him glancing up momentarily into the rear-view mirror, checking in on their prisoner. Not that Tommy acted like a prisoner.
“Ah, no, no, this can’t wait. If you’re worried about getting it all down, you know you can rely on your little pencil pusher here. I see him with his notepad out and all that. He loves to document the whole thing, doesn’t miss a trick this one.” He patted his hand on Joseph’s shoulder, squeezing it affectionately.
“You seem a little happier now,” Joseph remarked. “You were quite angry at first.” He couldn’t quite shake the feeling that Tommy had quickly taken control of the situation.
“Well, had to blow off some steam back there, didn’t I? Came as a bit of a shock, you know, all these ridiculous allegations. But then I had the chance to think to myself, what should I do to sort it out? And you know what, the only thing I can do is come down the nick with you pair and get to the bottom of it. I’ve been told you’re the best at what you do. Well, he is.” He nodded at Ray. “You’re still the new kid, ain’t ya? Picture’s a little less clear there.”
“We do our jobs. There’s no ‘best’ in our line of work,” Ray pointed out.
“So modest.” Tommy leaned back. “It does however strike me as quite the leap that you guys have made. Makes me wonder a lot of things. Can’t say that I can think of anything that I would have done to let you gentlemen think I’d killed this chap.”
“Covered your tracks well?” Joseph snipped back.
“Ooh, hark at her.” Tommy grinned at him through the rear-view mirror as Joseph looked back. He talked to Ray as if Joseph wasn’t there. “Thinks he’ll get me to say something silly with bait like that. You never went fishing as a youngster, did you? You want to stick the juicy worms on your hook.”
Joseph sank into the chair. Ray wrested back control of the conversation. “He might not have been fishing, but you’ve spoken to enough officers of the law to know how things work and that starts with us doing the asking, and you doing the answering.”
“Go on then, ask me something. Anything. Sock it to me, baby.”
“Why did you kill Gerald Trainer?” Ray asked.
