East of Innocence by David Thorne Read Free Book Online Page A

serious character called Vincent Halliday, a local underworld name I am familiar with myself and who had arranged the initial robbery from Tilbury Docks. I can easily imagine his reaction on being informed that not only had he been ripped off by Billy bloody Morrison, but also that Billy was telling anybody who would listen about what a piece of piss it had been.
    Billy’s hit and run was no accident. The hit that Halliday put out on him in retribution, Baldwin tells me, is the worst-kept secret since Prince Harry was born with ginger hair. He doesn’t know who drove the car, doesn’t particularly care; this is one investigation that’s going nowhere fast.
    ‘Spare you the trouble,’ he says. ‘Fuck that Billy Morrison off, he’s a mug and he’s a fucking dead man. Yes?’
     
    Oh, Billy. I busy myself with arranging the pens on my desk, unwilling to meet Baldwin’s eyes, which I know will be relishing this moment. Knowledge is power, and right now Baldwin is making me look like a primary-school child playing at lawyers.
    ‘So, quid pro whatever. The discs, sunshine. Now would be good.’
    ‘I don’t know what I can do with that information,’ I say, looking up at him. ‘Do you have any evidence?’
    ‘Very funny. The discs.’
    ‘Because, this is my problem. If what you say is true, and if there is no evidence of this crime, then how am I going to prosecute this Halliday and get significant criminal damages for my client? And if I can’t get him damages, then how am I going to get paid?’ I frown at Baldwin, an expression of bafflement. ‘I thought you were going to help me?’
    Baldwin looks at me in surprise. The penny is dropping; he begins to understand that I’m not going to hand over those discs. Even if it wasn’t for Terry and his sister, I would keep them on principle; anybody who comes to my territory and acts in the manner he has acted will get nothing from me.
    ‘Oh,’ says Baldwin. ‘You’re going to make me fetch my big stick.’
    ‘You found the door all on your own on the way in,’ I say. He doesn’t reply. I meet his eyes, regard him coolly. ‘So go on,’ I say. ‘Fuck off.’
     
    Visiting hours start at four o’clock, and the two-hour wait to see Billy feels like an age, which I try to occupy with casework but cannot concentrate. The electric buzz from my meeting with Baldwin has me wired like a come down from a night out clubbing. Despite winning the closing round, I cannot shake the feeling that from the bell Baldwin had the upper hand; I replay the moment he walked into my office obsessively, trying different tactics, taking different shots, trying to work out how I could have taken him on points.
    At five minutes past four, I walk up to Billy’s bed where he is talking on his mobile, laughing the exaggerated bark of an Essex wide boy on the make. I would like to force his phone into his mouth, down his throat, the thought of his strangled surprise making my hands become fists. I stand over his bed and he looks up at me, sees something in my face; I have never been adept at hiding my feelings. He says a quick ‘Ta-da,’ hangs up.
    ‘All right, Danny son?’ he says.
    ‘If your legs weren’t already broken,’ I say, ‘I’d be doing them now.’
    As far as Billy is concerned, the crime that put him in his hospital bed is an event as distant as his own birth; he is intellectually incapable of making the link between his petty criminality and his present situation. But my gloves are off; I will not pull my punches.
    ‘Heard of a man named Vincent Halliday?’ I ask him. Billy’s eyes glance guiltily across the room, down, anywhere but at me, like a dog that’s been caught eating the Sunday joint. ‘Because he knows all about you. And while I’m making a mug of myself calling the police five times a day, he’s drinking fucking Martinis in his swimming pool wishing whoever it was he paid to have you offed did a better fucking job of it.’
    But I am not a cruel