East of Innocence by David Thorne Read Free Book Online

priests, so too I believe we should not allow violent sadists to join the police force. His presence makes me want to take a shower.
    ‘Sit down,’ he says. He is in my place of work, giving me orders. It is as if, as I step into the ring for a much awaited title fight, my opponent attacks me from behind with a baseball bat. How can I have been psychologically ambushed in my own office?
    ‘You want to talk about Billy Morrison,’ I say, my voice level, trying to regain the initiative. Baldwin pats hisjacket, retrieves a notepad from his inside pocket, takes his time.
    ‘I’ll ask the fucking questions,’ he says calmly. ‘If you don’t mind.’ He looks down at his notepad then looks up, smiles at me. But his eyes remain flat and expressionless; he has the unassailable air of a predator who long ago took his place at the top of the food chain for granted. I am not easily intimidated but Baldwin makes me wish we had an ocean between us. ‘Francis Connell, that’s your old man. Right?’
    ‘That has nothing to do with the investigation at hand,’ I say. ‘Let’s keep to the script, shall we?’
    ‘Just saying,’ he says. ‘You in the law, him the wrong side of it. Wonder what he thinks. Of all this.’ He gestures with his hand at my little office. ‘All this,’ he repeats, allowing himself a soft wet chuckle.
    ‘Billy Morrison,’ I say. ‘We discuss him or this conversation is over.’
    ‘Right. Down to business. I’ve got some information on young William Morrison, something you might find useful. Save you some of your no doubt valuable time.’ He looks around, looks at me.
    ‘Go on.’
    ‘Don’t fucking go on me, pal,’ he says. ‘First things first. I help you, I’m going to need something from you.’
    ‘As an officer of the law, any information you might have pertinent to my client’s case, you are obliged to share with me,’ I say. ‘You know that.’
    Baldwin closes his notepad, pokes it back in his jacket pocket. He leans forward, the chair creaks ominously. ‘See that? That’s me going off the record. Right?’
    ‘Not right,’ I say. ‘This meeting is finished.’
    ‘Hold up,’ says Baldwin. ‘Let’s see if we can’t help each other. Now, I’ve got a confession to make. I made my mistakes, with Terry. Used the stick, not the carrot. Bad psychology. Didn’t work.’
    ‘Who’s Terry?’
    ‘Right, yeah. Nice try. Fucker’s skipped off, someone tells me he’s in Spain but nothing I can do about that now. He did pass on some useful information though. See, I want what he gave you. You give it to me, I’ll help you out with Billy Morrison. The carrot.’ He looks at me, head to one side as if he’s inspecting a suspect mole. ‘I think I’d need a bigger stick for you.’
    ‘So tell me what you know about Billy Morrison’s case,’ I say. ‘It’d better be some carrot.’
    ‘And you’ll hand over the discs?’
    ‘What would I want with them?’ I say.
     
    It turns out Billy, as Baldwin explains it, doesn’t quite fit the role of innocent victim he has been playing in his hospital bed. Ten nights ago, he and three friends piled into a Transit van, drove up an isolated farm track five miles from junction 28 of the M25 and cut their way through a link of quarter-inch chain securing the gates of a wire fence that ringed a corrugated iron-sided barn. They used an angle grinder to cut through the lock on the barn door and loaded up twenty thousand pounds’ worth of Japanese stereo equipment, which, in turn, had vanished from a shipping container in Tilbury Docks a week earlier.
    In Billy’s world, the perfect crime constitutes one you are not caught at the scene of, and Billy made it back to his house unscathed. As far as he was concerned, he had got away with it; having got away with it, he could not help but boast of it. And this boasting inevitably reached the ears of the aggrieved party, in this case, Baldwin told me, his jowls wobbling with spiteful mirth, a