Chapter 6

The Actions Of An Innocent Man

After speaking to Ed, the first thing Ironside did was contact the Commissioner. Regardless of his other priorities, he had to keep Dennis informed of what was going on. Having to tell his own superior that Sergeant Brown had just demanded a large fortune in ransom money was one of the worst jobs he'd ever had to do. But Dennis took it surprisingly well, all things considered.

After the stunned silence, and then the angry barrage of questions, the Commissioner sounded almost reasonable.

'Two million dollars is not an easy sum to get hold of at short notice, Bob,' said Randall coldly. 'Is there any way…?'

'No,' replied Ironside. 'If we want that evidence back we'll have to be prepared to pay for it.'

There was a pause, and Ironside could just imagine the Commissioner's expression and was grateful this particular confrontation was taking place over the telephone.

'What happened to no-deal-Ironside?' said Randall.

'If we don't play, it will be destroyed, I'm sure.'

'Bob, is there something you're not telling me?'

Ironside hesitated, not sure how to answer that question. There were a number of things he hadn't told the Commissioner, some of them he wasn't even sure of himself. He had stuck to the facts, however unpleasant and incriminating they had been.

'Just gather the money,' he said. 'And have it ready in good time, Dennis, at least that way we will have one ace to play, if the opportunity arises.'

'Alright Bob,' said Dennis crossly. 'But if this goes wrong, you're going to be the one explaining it to the Mayor.'

That call over, Ironside sat by his desk, trying to clear his head and think.

The initial shock was starting to wear off, leaving a certain level of numbness. It was almost too much to comprehend, in such a short space of time. How do you keep on trusting and believing when faced with such overpowering evidence? But slowly, his confidence was returning. He was rightly proud of his record with the police, and if anyone could get this mess sorted out and get to the truth, it was him. And he was going to get to the bottom of it. He owed it to the Commissioner. And he owed it to Ed, to whatever level he was involved.

'Chief?' said Mark. 'Chief, are you ok?'

Ironside nodded.

'You sure? I would have expected you to be causing an earthquake,' admitted Mark.

'Can't a man have some serene contemplation?' snapped Ironside.

Mark stared at him.

'Serene contemplation? At a time like this?'

'Is there any better time?'

'Well, I don't see how it's going to help Ed.'

Ironside gave him a sour look.

'I was trying to think!'

Mark nodded, and kept quiet, except for offering him a cup of that muck he alleged was coffee.

After a few minutes of serene but fruitless contemplation, Carl Reese appeared at the door and bustled into the office, holding a tape recorder in his hand.

'Just got this from the exchange,' he said. 'They didn't get a trace on the call, too short, but it's likely to have been from the downtown area. Here's a copy.'

Ironside took the machine without much enthusiasm, but he was grateful to Carl for bringing it up without needing to be told. It was something that Ed would have done too. That thought made him frown more deeply. He was more aware than before of how empty the office was and how every small sound seemed to echo. Ed and Eve should have been there, working, helping, doing their jobs instead of being…

Ironside stopped himself. That was not going to help. With a thump, he put the tape recorder on the desk in front of him, and played back the conversation he and Ed had had less than half an hour before.

'Hello Chief.'

'Ed…'

'I know you're going to have this conversation recorded, so there's no need for you to ask any questions. Do you understand?'

'Then get on with it!'

'The ransom for the safe return of the evidence is two million dollars. Do you understand?'

'That's quite a sum for such a small amount of evidence!'

'Isn't it worth it?'

'And what about you?… Alright, what about Eve?'

'What about Eve?'

'Is she alright?'

'You really think I'd let anything happen to her?'

'Ed, what…'

'Shut up and listen! Get the money by four o'clock Wednesday morning. I'll contact you once more about the drop.'

'No warnings about trying to find you?'

'You won't.'

'And what if we don't want to pay?'

'Don't fuck around, Chief! The McDonald case is going to collapse without it. You know that. I know that. Do you understand? That gives you exactly thirty-one hours to get the money or McDonald walks out of the lock-up a free man! You really going to risk that? … Well?

'No. No, I'm not going to risk it. Neither is the Commissioner.'

'Fine. Then we understand each other.'

The whole exchange had taken less than two minutes. Carl looked at the Chief, horrified by what he had just heard.

Hearing it again brought a whole lot of unpleasant emotions to the surface for Ironside. There was too much to react to, so he made a conscious decision not to react. He had to treat this case just like any other. He looked between the other two men.

'Ok then, gentlemen, what do we know?' he saw the look on Mark's face and was compelled to add: 'We need to remember the facts. We need to stick to the facts.'

Both men nodded, but neither spoke.

'Fact,' Ironside said. 'Ed Brown had been seen talking with another man at the Bayside Motel. Fact, Ed drove to the Property Office and took ten keys of heroin out of there with a forged order.' Carl cast an anxious glance at the tape recorder on the table.

'And Ed's burned out car was found in the warehouse district,' said Carl. 'And whatever clues or evidence that were left in it have gone up in smoke.'

Ironside nodded.

'Fact,' he said. 'Ed vanished, only to call a few hours later to demand a huge ransom for the safe return of vital evidence.' He gestured at the tape machine. 'I don't think there could be many people that would argue that that wasn't Ed Brown.'

'It sounded like Ed to me,' said Mark.

'And me,' added Carl.

'We'll get a voice print just the same, but I'm convinced.'

'When you put it like that, there doesn't seem like much of a way out,' murmured Carl. Ironside stared him into silence.

'All right then,' said the Chief. 'Where does that leave us? What conclusions can we draw?'

'That Ed was forced into this,' said Mark firmly. 'By person or persons unknown.'

'Or…?' asked Ironside.

'Or he's been brought off by McDonald,' said Carl with a despondent sigh.

'As far as I can see, those are the only two possibilities,' agreed the Chief.

There was no need for Ironside to ask which option Mark and Carl favoured, in spite of Ed's apparent betrayal, and the telephone call.

'What do you think Chief?' said Carl. 'C'mon, it's time to level with me here.'

'You don't need to ask what my personal feelings are,' snapped Ironside gruffly.

'What about as a policeman? What about your instinct? C'mon Chief!'

What did he really think? What did his instinct tell him? Could he really separate his personal feelings for a man who was one of his closest friends from the cold-hearted logic that was necessary? For a few seconds, he closed his eyes.

'We are just seeing what we've been shown,' he started, his voice slowly rising in anger as he spoke. 'We are seeing what we are supposed to see. We are being distracted from asking the right questions. We've been left to chase behind, picking up the scraps from what happened, far too late to make any difference!'

'So we have to start asking the right questions,' said Mark.

'Exactly.'

'Care to start?' said Carl.

Ironside smiled without mirth.

'Why?'

Carl and Mark glanced at each other.

'Is that it, Chief?' asked Mark. 'Why?'

'If we're right, and Ed has been forced into this, we need to know why. Why would he have gone along with any plan of this sort? He's a good man, he's a good cop, he's observant, smart. He knows what he's doing, and he's got to know what this will do to his reputation, he's got to know he's looking at a fifteen to twenty year stretch. And yet he leaves evidence around like it's Christmas!'

'So someone threatened him,' suggested Carl. 'Maybe even blackmailed him.'

Ironside nodded. While he wasn't known for taking unnecessary risks, Ed wasn't the sort of man to be threatened into doing something he didn't want to do by anything trivial. The answer grated at the back of his mind. It had been there all the time. Eve…

That old lady was right about one thing; Ed was a gentleman, even if he was a cop too. He would never willingly put Eve in danger. And Ed knew how Ironside felt about her, he'd been there when they'd first met. Eve was effectively his partner on the force. He worked with her every day and they had an excellent rapport and a close friendship. Ironside thought back to the brief telephone conversation he'd had with Ed.

'What about Eve? Is she alright?'

'You really think I'd let anything happen to her?'

Ed wouldn't let anything happen to her. That was the point.

'So how would you get Ed Brown to do something he didn't want to do?' Ironside asked suddenly, looking at Mark.

'I don't know, Chief. Do I get three guesses?'

Ironside ignored the futile attempt to lighten the tense atmosphere in the office.

'Query. If I put a gun to Sergeant Brown's head and told him to destroy one of the most important cases we've brought to trial in the past decade, would he do it?'

Mark didn't hesitate.

'C'mon on, Chief, this is Ed Brown we're talking about,' he said firmly. 'Of course not!'

'And that's always been the stumbling block. Ed wouldn't be threatened into this. It's too big and he knows it.'

'Ok.'

'But what if you put a gun to Eve's head, and said the same thing…?' Ironside let the question trail off.

There was a long pause. Eventually Mark said:

'He'd do it.'

It wasn't a pleasant scenario. Ironside tried to imagine what he himself would do. If someone put a gun to Eve's head and told him to break all the rules, he would do it without a second thought, even if there were only the smallest of chances of keeping her alive. And he knew Ed would do the same. Ironside reached out to the recorder, rewound it, listened once more to the conversation with his missing Sergeant, right up to the point where Ironside had mentioned Eve.

'You really think I'd let anything happen to her?'

Ironside snapped the recorder off with a sharp click. No, Ed wouldn't let anything happen to her. That was the whole point. He'd been absurdly slow in understanding.

'You think whoever it was threatened Eve?' Sanger asked.

Ironside nodded. Instinctively, he knew he was right about this.

'But we can't prove it,' Mark reminded him.

'Not yet!' Ironside said firmly. 'But it's an excellent place to start. So let's take this through again.'

'Ok.'

'Fact. Ed was seen with another man, they talked,' said Ironside. 'Now let's assume Eve was threatened, and Ed believed that threat was real.'

'Ok.'

'So, they take Ed to Property, tell him to go in, get the box number with the forged Order, and get back.'

'But what's to stop him telling the cops inside?' said Mark.

'Eve's still in the car, along with their kidnapper,' added Carl. 'Would he risk it?'

'But he didn't even try,' said Mark. 'And this is evidence for the McDonald Case we're talking about!'

'Maybe he did try, but Johnston didn't notice.'

'But still,' said Mark. 'It's a big risk for the kidnapper, letting Ed walk around, even if he does have Eve.'

Ironside had to agree. That was the weakest part of the whole hypothesis. This had been carefully planned, that was obvious. Whoever it was wasn't going to take that sort of risk without a cast-iron guarantee.

'Mark, get me that requisition order. The file's there.' He pointed.

Sanger handed it over, and Ironside studied the paper carefully. There was something that he was missing. He almost had it. There was something here that would help them, he knew it. Ironside had to regain the advantage. And somewhere on that piece of paper was part of the answer, he was sure.

'What are you looking for, Chief?' asked Reese. There's nothing there. It's all filled out correctly too.'

That's it. He handed the paper to Carl.

'What do you see?'

'Just the box number. And your signature, sorry, forged signature.'

'Exactly. There's no mention of McDonald, no mention of heroin. Only numbers. If Ed had been given this piece of paper by someone then he would have no idea what he was collecting.'

'Chief? What are you driving at?' Mark asked, sounding worried.

Ironside looked back at the paper, and the numbers. Ed couldn't know what they meant. Only a Property Officer would know.

'Carl! Get me Johnston! Now!'

Carl grabbed the phone, and started dialling.

'What's wrong Chief?' asked Mark. 'What do you want with Johnston?'

'You need the box number for the McDonald evidence. Ed wouldn't have known the box number.'

'Johnston? You think…?'

'I'm flamin' well going to find out!'

'Johnston?' repeated Mark.

'And,' added Ironside, 'that would explain why Ed didn't try to make contact. If he was warned that Johnston knew, he wouldn't have dared, not with Eve in the car.'

'He could have left a message, or tried.'

'But he didn't have a pen.'

'We've only got Johnston's word for that,' Mark reminded him.

'That's another reason to find him.'

Ironside glanced up at Carl's face. The expression didn't fill him with confidence. Carl looked back, and put his hand over the mouthpiece.

'Johnston's gone for the day. I'm getting a black-and-white to check out his home. Yes…?' There was the muffled sound of a voice, and Ironside waited. 'There's one in the area,' Carl told Ironside. 'But it will take a few minutes.'

'Tell them to bring him in, bring him right here!'

'Yes Chief,' said Carl. 'Yes, bring him in to the Chief's office. Now!'

There was another, long babbling of speech from the other end.

'Mark?' said Ironside. 'Get on the other phone. Get the Records Office. I want Johnston's file over here.'

'Sure, Chief.'

As the calls were being made, Ironside went back over his logic. It all made sense. With Eve's life in the balance, Ed couldn't risk a mistake, and the only way the kidnappers could be sure that Ed would play it straight was if Johnston was in on it too.

But that still didn't answer his first question, why? Why use Ed and Eve? Why play this elaborate game, just to get the drugs out, there were easier ways to get rid of evidence, especially if you have a Property Officer on the payroll. Why go to all the trouble?

Ironside was now more convinced than every that Ed had been set up for some reason. But who would have a big enough grudge against Ed to do this to him? It's not just using him to gain access to Property, but twisting the knife, getting him to do all the dirty work and leaving enough evidence to send him to Q for the next twenty years.

Mark put the phone down, and went to find some more coffee. Ironside watched Carl as he waited on the telephone, a sudden fear inside him. This was all so cleverly and thoroughly planned. And there was always the possibility that he was still playing catch up with whoever planned this. There was always the possibility that he was too late.

Carl still had the phone to his ear, waiting, and suddenly there was another burst of speech. Carl's face fell, and Ironside knew exactly what had happened. After Reese put the phone down, he turned to Ironside.

'I'm sorry, Chief. We were too late.'

'Johnston's dead,' said Ironside. It was not a question, it was a statement.

Carl nodded.

'Shot in the back of the head. Looks like it was a thirty eight.'

Of course it was; that was the standard police issue gun, the kind Ed always carried, expect for a brief flirtation with that flamin' 357 Magnum. It wasn't just conspiracy, or theft, or blackmail. It was now murder as well. It wasn't just the rest of his life in Q, now it was the gas chamber.

'Did you find the gun?'

'Yeah, one was left at the scene, and it had recently been fired. Ballistics will have to make a match though.'

Ironside was left asking questions that he already guessed the answers to.

'It's Ed's gun, isn't it?'

Reece shrugged.

'They're checking the serial number right now.'

Ironside hit he table hard in anger, making both other men jump back. Again he was too late. This infernal game of catch up was going to have to stop.

'Get me everything you have on Johnston, Carl. Bank details, friends, contacts, the works. I don't care how many favours you have to call in, or how you do it, just do it! Get it done ten minutes ago!'

'Sure, Chief!' called Reece, already heading for the door.

A sandwich appeared under his nose.

'I'm not hungry Mark. I'm working.'

'You haven't eaten for six hours.

'I've gone for longer with no food,' Ironside replied, pushing the plate away. 'I'm working.'

On the table in front of him was Johnston's file, along with a ballistics report, confirming that it was indeed Ed's gun that had been used to kill Johnston, though they hadn't found any fingerprints on it, only smudges.

Ironside leaned forward, ignoring Mark's muttered complaint, and ran the recorder back to the beginning again, to listen to the phone conversation again. Sometime over the past few hours, he'd lost count of how many times he'd heard it.

'Not again, Chief, please,' said Mark. 'I'm going to be hearing it in my sleep.'

'I'll play it again and again as often as I like!' said Ironside. 'Until I break the flamin' machine! And if you don't like it, Mr Sanger…'

'I can leave, I know!' finished Mark. But he didn't, all he did was take the sandwich back to the kitchen area.

Ironside could sympathise with his friend, hearing Ed's voice over and over was chipping away at his belief. But apart from the disheartening feeling inside, Ironside was also growing convinced that were was something important in what Ed had said to him. He just couldn't figure out what it was. He could repeat the conversation word for word, every pause and every inflection. But he just couldn't get what was wrong with it.

Carl appeared at the door, holding a piece of paper. It was the sketch of the man Mrs Whittaker had seen with Ed.

'Not much, I'm afraid, Chief,' he said, handing it over. 'She's not a good witness.'

Ironside felt it looked familiar, but there was so little detail of which Mrs Whittaker could be sure, that it left them with very little to go on.

'Maybe you can get through to him,' said Mark coming over to stand next to Reese. 'He needs to eat something.'

'I'm not getting involved,' said Carl. 'I don't get paid enough for that.'

'Look, Chief,' said Mark. 'Case or no case, you've got to eat something. Do you understand?'

Ironside whipped around to face Mark.

'What did you say?'

'You have to eat something,'

'No, you said: "do you understand"?'

Mark looked confused, but suddenly Ironside knew what had been bothering him.

'So?' Mark said.

'Listen!' said the Chief. 'And listen carefully.'

Ironside played back the recording once more.

'Hello, Chief.'

'Ed…'

'I know you're going to have this conversation recorded, so there's no need for you to ask any questions. Do you understand?'

'Then get on with it!'

'The ransom for the safe return of the evidence is two million dollars. Do you understand?'

'That's quite a sum for such a small amount of evidence!'

'Isn't it worth it?'

'And what about you?… Alright, what about Eve?'

'What about Eve?'

'Is she alright?'

'You really think I'd let anything happen to her?'

'Ed, what…'

'Shut up and listen! Get the money by four o'clock Wednesday morning. I'll contact you once more about the drop.'

'No warnings about trying to find you?'

'You won't.'

'And what if we don't want to pay?'

'Don't fuck around, Chief! The McDonald case is going to collapse without it. You know that. I know that. Do you understand? That gives you exactly thirty-one hours to get the money or McDonald walks out of the lock-up a free man! You really going to risk that? … Well?

'No. No, I'm not going to risk it. Neither is the Commissioner.'

'Fine. Then we understand each other.'

'Do you understand,' said Ironside. 'He said that exact phrase three times, and used the word "understand" at the very end as well.'

'Ok,' conceded Carl, 'so that's not a phrase Ed uses very often in normal circumstances, but…'

'Exactly! These are not normal circumstances. And he's doing what Mark just did. He's mimicking someone else, who does use that phrase.'

Mark thought about that for a moment, then he shook his head.

'So the kidnapper uses the word understand a lot? I'm not sure that helps us, Chief.'

But Ironside had heard the phrase before. It was a speech tag for someone he knew… Again, he picked up one of the papers on his desk, this time it was Johnston's personnel file from Records. He flicked through to near the end.

'Johnston wasn't always with Property,' said Ironside. 'He used to work in Narco until he was injured in a gunfight. This gunfight.' Ironside pointed.

'Anthony Richards?' Mark shook his head again. 'Never heard of him.'

'Richards?' said Reese fearfully.

'Exactly, he was killed in the same gunfight that Johnston took the bullet.'

'But…'

'Richards was also always very keen on understanding, it was one of his favourite things after making money and hurting people. And guess what was his favourite way of getting rid of evidence?'

'Chief… It can't be Richards,' said Carl. 'He's dead for one thing.'

Ironside had never hoped more fervently that he was wrong. But it made sense; goddamn perfect sense. Who would have a big enough grudge against Ed to do this to him? They had been looking in the wrong place. It wasn't Ed, or Eve. It was him!

'Am I missing something?' asked Mark. 'Just who was this Richards cat?'

'If you called him a cat to his face, he would string you up like one,' said Reese. 'He was a big name a few years ago, big with the Syndicate. Had his own brother murdered for turning state's evidence.'

'Get the Richards file from records,' Ironside said to Reese. Again, Carl picked up the phone.

'Tony R,' Ironside said quietly. 'So Anthony Richards didn't die.'

'But what's this Richards got to do with Ed?' asked Mark.

'It's not Ed that he's concerned about,' Ironside replied in a grim tone. 'Guess who helped bring him down?'

'I don't need to guess, do I?' said Mark. 'I'm looking at him!'

'Richards' brother Tom was convinced to bargain,' said Ironside. 'That was our big break. And do you need to be told who did the convincing?'

'You,' said Mark, his tone now more resigned.

'Yes. I was there from start to finish. It was a big case Mark, and it didn't end well.'

Mark looked at Carl, who didn't hold his gaze, then back to Ironside.

'What do you mean exactly by didn't end well?'

'It ended in a bloodbath,' the Chief said. 'Tony R never forgave Tom for betraying the family. He had him gunned down, and he bled to death on a side street. It got worse after that. Tony was tracked to a warehouse. There was a gunfight then the whole place went up. Three officers died, two innocent civilians, two of Tony's henchmen. And Tony himself was supposed to have been killed.'

Mark was silent for a few moments.

'And it started with a betrayal?' he said slowly. 'You think this whole show is a taste of your own medicine, maybe?'

'I would expect nothing less from Tony R,' said Ironside heavily. 'In fact, I would expect a whole lot more.'

'What are we going to do?' said Mark. 'We have to prove it was him, and that might be difficult since everyone thinks he's dead.'

'We've got to find a lead, Tony R was good, but he was not infallible. We need to find every single scrap of information about him or his contacts. Get something that links him to Johnston. We've got to find Ed and Eve before this gets worse.'

'Worse?' asked Carl.

Ironside nodded.

Mark stared at him. Carl stared at him. The Chief knew that if they had been here, Ed and Eve would have been staring at him too. Inside, he felt a sharp pang of loss; he missed them. 'Well, what are you two waiting for?'

Mark took a rueful glance at Reese.

'I'll start with some coffee. Looks like it's going to be a long night.'