Die Twice by Simon Kernick Read Free Book Online

funeral.’
    â€˜That’s very thoughtful of you.’
    â€˜Thoughtfulness costs nothing, Dennis.’
    â€˜Which reminds me. There’s the small matter of my remuneration.’
    â€˜As if I’d forget.’ He fished a key out of the breast pocket of his expensive-looking suit and chucked it over to me. ‘The money’s in a locker at King’s Cross. The same place as last time.’
    I put the key in the inside pocket of my suit, resisting the urge to thank him. There wasn’t, I concluded, a great deal to thank him for.
    Sensing my continued annoyance, he flashed me a salesman’s smile. ‘You did a good job, Dennis. It won’t be forgotten.’
    â€˜No,’ I said. ‘Somehow, I don’t think it will.’
    *   *   *
    After we’d parted company I grabbed a sandwich at a café just off the Marylebone Road. They didn’t do anything with sushi in it so I ordered smoked salmon, thinking it was probably the next best thing. The sandwich tasted like cardboard, but I wasn’t sure whether that was as a result of the poor-quality bread or my own numbed tastebuds. I ate about three quarters of it, washing it down with a bottle of overpriced mineral water, then smoked two cigarettes in quick succession.
    On my way back to the station I called in on Len Runnion at his pawn shop just off the Gray’s Inn Road. In some ways, Runnion was one of Tomboy’s successors. He dealt in stolen goods of pretty much every description, using the pawn shop as a cover. He had none of the class of Tomboy, though. A very short man with a leering smile that made Raymond’s look genuine, Runnion had cunning, ratlike eyes that darted about when he talked. And he never looked anyone in the eyes, which is something I can’t stand. To me, it means they’ve got skeletons in the closet. From what I knew of Runnion and from what I could guess from his general demeanour, I expect he had a whole graveyard in his.
    In the armed robbery I was still effectively investigating, the two robbers had held up a post office and, after stabbing the postmaster’s wife and one of the customers, had got away with several hundred vehicle tax discs as well as a small sum of cash. I strongly suspected that they were amateurs who wouldn’t really know what to do with the discs other than sell them on to other criminals. Professionals don’t knife two people for that sort of return. It was a fair assumption then that they’d try someone like Runnion as a possible conduit for the goods, and if they had I wanted to know about it.
    Runnion claimed ignorance of any tax discs. ‘What would I do with them?’ he asked me as he polished some garish-looking costume jewellery. I stated the obvious and he told me that he wouldn’t have a clue where to sell such things. I didn’t believe him, of course. Men in his line of business always know where to unload contraband. I told him that the perpetrators had stabbed the postmaster’s wife and one of the customers during the course of the robbery, and that the customer had been lucky not to bleed to death. ‘He was sixty-one years old, trying to protect the members of staff.’
    Runnion shook his head in mock disbelief. ‘There’s no need for that,’ he said. ‘Never any need for violence. It’s all about forward planning, isn’t it? If you use forward planning, no-one gets hurt. The kids these days, they just don’t have any. It’s the education system, you know. They don’t teach them anything any more.’
    This was probably true, but you don’t need to hear it from a toe-rag like Len Runnion. I told him firmly that if he was approached by anyone offering stolen tax discs he should play them along a bit, get them to come back again, and inform me straight away.
    He nodded. ‘Yeah, yeah, no problem. Goes without saying. I don’t have no truck