The Enemy Within by James Craig Read Free Book Online Page B

to think about them.
    A grimace passed across his face. ‘You don’t know he’s innocent.’
    ‘You don’t know he’s guilty,’ she shot back.
    ‘That’s not for me to decide,’ he said firmly, ‘as you well know.’
    ‘Do you even have enough to charge him? Really?’
    He thought about it for a moment. ‘This whole conversation is fairly academic. There’s not really anything I can do about it. It’s out of my hands.’
    ‘Who’s in charge then? Billy Bunter?’
    ‘Martin Palmer? He’s just a kid sent up from London to report back about what’s going on.’ Outside in the darkness, the silence was interrupted by a car driving slowly past. Holt briefly wondered who could be out at this late hour, prowling his streets. Slipping back into his seat, he looked at her carefully. ‘You know you can never write any of this stuff, don’t you?’
    ‘You told me that already.’
    ‘I’m serious.’
    ‘Or what? I’ll end up like Beatrice?’ She tried to laugh but it came out more like a hollow squeak.
    He took a deep breath. ‘Be serious, Fran.’
    Placing her mug on the table, she gave him a reassuring pat on the arm. ‘Don’t worry. I won’t drop you in it. The usual rules apply, however big the story.’
    ‘Good,’ Holt exhaled. At the outset of their relationship the two of them had agreed that no ‘pillow talk’ could ever, under any circumstances, be used in any of Fran’s stories. At the time, it hadn’t been such a big deal; Inspector Holt didn’t have any newsworthy stories. But since they’d been caught up in the mineworkers’ strike, the agreement had been put to the test once or twice.
    Mullin, however, had always kept her side of the bargain.
    So far.
    Did he trust her? He was forty-three years old, forty-four in little more than a month. This had become, more or less, the longest relationship he’d had in his life. He was beginning to think that he and Fran Mullin might even have some kind of long-term future together. If he couldn’t trust Fran, whom could he trust?
    Sitting across the table in the middle of the night, he made a clear decision. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you see, it’s like this: we have been told that the Slater thing has to be cleared up as quickly as possible.’
    ‘Told? By whom?’
    Holt made a face. ‘Just told. This is a very unusual situation. We are kind of at war. The usual rules have been suspended.’ He thought about that statement for a moment, before correcting himself. ‘Well, maybe not so much suspended as blurred. It’s all very confused. Everyone’s making it up as they go along.’
    She stared into her mug. ‘Including fitting people up for murder? That doesn’t seem like blurring the rules to me; that seems like breaking them.’
    ‘No one’s fitting anyone up,’ he protested, already wondering about the wisdom of his decision to come clean. ‘Williamson is a genuine suspect. Plus, don’t forget that he assaulted one of my officers when he was arrested. I saw that myself.’
    ‘Do you think he did it?’
    Staring at the table, he sighed deeply. ‘Like I said, I don’t have to take a view on the person’s innocence or guilt. I just have to present the evidence.’
    ‘How very diplomatic,’ she replied sarcastically. ‘Even a half-decent lawyer will say this is a political prosecution. Ian Williamson is being hung out to dry because he supports the strike. It allows you to kill two birds with one stone. You can silence that dotty old woman who keeps saying embarrassing things about Thatcher and get an NUM yobbo off the street at the same time.’
    Holt shook his head. ‘Williamson isn’t political. He’s just a little thug using the opportunity presented by the current situation to have a scrap every night. He isn’t a miner either. As far as I know, he’s never done a proper day’s work in his life.’
    ‘Still,’ Mullin yawned, ‘that’s not how he’ll be presented. Unless you have a totally watertight conviction.