Ahmed and Strumpshaw appeared on the early evening news. They provided a resume of what the police had done and what they hoped to do. They put up photofits and said that they believed the man and woman were called Hussein and Saddiqe. They appealed for help from all communities.
They were followed by Mr Sharma. A middle aged gentleman with thick dark hair, clean shaven and dressed in smart fitting suit with a red silk tie. Perfectly modulated English allied to a calm demeanour made him an ideal spokesperson for any community. The man made an immensely favourable initial impression.
Mr Sharma, thanked the police for what he believed were their herculean efforts in attempting to track down the perpetrators of the Patel murders. He asked for patience on behalf of the Asian community in the City. He explained that gathering evidence and tracing the killers was a tedious, time consuming and thankless task. He asked for the two photofits of Saddiqe and Hussein to be shown. He made a direct appeal to them. He read out the phone number to ring slowly, clearly and carefully. He did it three times.
Again there were smiles all around the room from Flint, Cushion and Leibnitz. Sharma had performed well. Once more Blunt desisted from smiling.
Then the main event arrived, Rafique Khan. So as to emphasise his importance he had elected to be interviewed on College Green outside the Houses of Parliament. It made it seem as if he had rushed out of the House to deal with more important business... the well-being of the nation as a whole.
He picked up on and extrapolated from the comments made by Sharma on the Norfolk local news. Blunt suspected the hidden hand of orchestration. God he did not trust Khan. Could his detestation be clouding his judgement?
Khan appealed to all the Asian Communities to practice restraint. He explained how police work took time. He alluded to the fact that he had conducted lengthy conversations with Chief Constable Strumpshaw of Norfolk. Indeed so keen was the aforementioned on solving the horrific killing of the Patels that he had assured him, Rafique Khan, that he had taken personal control of the investigation. Not only that but the Chief Constable would keep him abreast of all developments.
He had the news teams show the photofits of Saddiqe and Hussein. Blunt noticed he made a point of not revealing their names. He stated that they were probably related to the Patels or were friends of theirs. They appeared to have gone to ground. The cause could be that they knew who the killers were and were hiding in fear of their lives. He appealed to them to give themselves up to the police immediately. He felt sure that they had nothing to do with the deaths. No-one from the Asian community would inflict such an atrocity on their own, or anyone else for that matter.
He then went on to say that Strumpshaw had informed him that some evidence had been discovered that pointed to a possible Russian connection. He had then paused for effect before looking straight at the camera and saying clearly and firmly, ' A criminal Russian connection'.
'What the hell!!' exploded Blunt banging his fists down on his desk causing the others to jump. 'Strumpshaw should not have given him any specifics apart from the photofit images!!'.
'So instead of riots across the country we now have the possibility of Asian vigilante gangs hunting Russian gangsters....' Said Flint
'Or what they think are Russian gangsters' butted in a livid Blunt.
They continued to watch as the BBC continued to film Khan conducting (for that is what it was) interview after interview. In each the Russians were carefully inserted into his statements.
The BBC then cut to the studio where they were holding a video link interview with the editor of the Guardian. He was extolling the virtues of Khan and emphasising how fortunate the country was to have him in a position of influence. A man who not only preached peace and multiculturism, but practiced it personally. He, the editor had enjoyed the privilege of meeting Khan's English rose girlfriend over dinner on many an occasion. A wonderful woman she had helped Rafique come to terms with the tragic death of his wife. Given everything that had preceded Khan's intervention the man had taken a great risk in coming out as he has had just done. The journalist then ventured that when a change of government took place, hopefully soon, Khan would make a great Home Secretary at the very least! He even expressed the wish that we could see a Prime Minister from an Asian background.
The interviewer asked the journalist what he thought of Khan's revelations about the Russians. Putting on a grave face he launched into a denunciation of how the Soviet Union had split asunder. He pointed out that Russia was in the throes of being hijacked and its assets stripped by a bunch of bandits laughingly labelled 'oligarchs'. These people were criminals and it would appear that they were using the capital from their ill-gotten gains to fund the establishment of a world-wide criminal network. This demonstrated that unfettered capitalism could only lead to misery for the masses. As evidence he gave the Norwich and Weybridge brothels as examples. He surmised that these were probably the tip of a very big iceberg.
Rafique Khan had to be thanked for opening the public's eyes to this threat.
Ahmed arrived back from his 'press' stint in the middle of the broadcast. The Press conference had left him with a very dry throat. Therefore he had detoured by way of the coffee machine.
He stood in stunned silence watching the events unfolding on the screen.
'Have you seen Strumpshaw?' demanded Blunt.
'I left him in the press room. We were pleased with the Sharma interview, it struck just the right note. But Khan's fucking stitched us from what I'm looking at!'
'Have you.....' Blunt tried to ask again
'John, Strumpshaws on the screen now. He's still in the press room' butted in an agitated Flint.
And so he was.
They could tell that he was livid. The smile was a little too forced and the body posture a little too tight.
He was being asked to eulogise Khan and he didn't like it one bit. He quickly cottoned onto the fact that even the slightest hesitation would be seen as a criticism of the politician. That would result in the police being seen as ungrateful and possibly racist. He thanked Khan for his help and stated that he looked forward to working with him to find the murderers as quickly as possible. However, one must bear in mind that the presence of a couple of Russian items did not provide conclusive proof or proof at all of Russian involvement.
When he was asked about the Guardian editor's comments he felt on safer ground. He pointed out that the man's task was to sell newspapers. His task was to maintain law and order and to try and protect the public from criminal elements. He couldn't possibly comment on the wider aspects of what the journalist had said. Our priority is to apprehend and charge those responsible for the death of the Patels.
As he attempted to leave the room the press attempted to waylay him. He brusquely pushed past them.
Within minutes he had joined Blunt and the team.
'That prick has got us trussed up like a rafter of turkeys' spat out an obviously angry Chief Constable.
'A what?' asked Cushion
'It's the collective noun for a group of turkeys' the pithy response from Strumpshaw
'Yes sir I agree' commented Blunt, ' He is aiming to push us in a particular direction. And if we are not seen to be going down that direction we lay ourselves open to all sorts of opprobrium'
'And that leftie shit from The Guardian has only made matters worse' added Strumpshaw.
'We haven't said anything about the underage girls yet.' piped up Leibnitz
They all fell silent and turned towards the youngest member of the team
'What about underage girls?' enquired Blunt
Leibnitz went on to explain what the social worker had told her. She then described the response to the questions she asked in one of the taxi offices. Ahmed backed her up.
Strumpshaw did not look pleased.
He looked even less so as Leibnitz explained how she had taken the initiative to ring a few other stations. Each of them was sited in conurbations with large Asian populations such as Rochdale, Oxford and others. She had been advised, strictly off the record of course, that they suspected something similar was happening in each of those areas. Unfortunately, they had no proof and after discussing matters with the community liaison people they decided to let sleeping dog lie.
Blunt asked her to follow up on it. They needed to see whether vice had acted upon the information received and what they had uncovered. If the Asians were involved in trafficking then it had to be dealt with.
He asked for Strumpshaw's help with getting vice to act, and act quickly. He advised Leibnitz that he wanted to know if she experienced any problems with colleagues in other departments.
The Chief Constable realised that this case involved complication piling upon complication. What is it Winston Churchill had said, he thought, 'a mystery wrapped in an enigma enclosed by a riddle', or something to that effect. What an appropriate description of this business. How in heavens name did such complications belong in his sleepy Norfolk? Given everything that had gone on how would it play if they now accused the Asian community of widespread slavery and prostitution of white girls?
Regrettably Blunt had not finished.
'Melanie, can you fill us in on the other matter I asked you to look at?'
'Certainly' she came back with.
She shuffled amongst her papers before holding up two photographs for them all to see.
'What the hell!' exclaimed Flint 'they look just like the photofits. Where did you get them from?'
Blunt looked over at Strumpshaw to gauge his mood. The man appeared to be mulling things over.
'I followed up on the lead that said the two people were Sharique and Hussein. These are photographs from their final year at university. I also managed to get these' she took out another set of photographs and put them on the table so that everyone could see them. 'These are Sharique and Hussein coming through customs at Heathrow two months ago. They were both on a flight from Dubai'.
Each of the officers who had seen the two people at the Patel's shop were convinced that these were the photographs of the same people.
Blunt, remembering his previous conversation with the Chief Constable, looked over at Strumpshaw. He wondered what his reaction would be. BUT before the man had a chance to respond the he turned to Cushion,
'Steve get onto the switchboard. I want to know what response we have had from the news items. I want to know what names have been coming in'
It did not take Cushion long.
'The phones are going crazy. Not one of the names that they read out to me were these two and none were from either Bolton or Keighley.'
'What a surprise' a smug response from Blunt 'I feel that obfuscation is the name of the game.' he turned to Strumpshaw, 'Sir, when you spoke with Khan did you give him the names 'Saddiqe' and 'Hussein''.
'No, I did not. It completely slipped my mind because he was being so damned uncooperative'
'Did he ask whether we had any names?' probing further
'No, he did not' a tentative reply followed by 'Where is this leading Blunt?'
'I find it revealing that of all the calls that have been flooding in not one has named these two.' he pointed to the photographs before continuing 'Statistics show that when we release photofit images and ask if anyone can put a name to them etc a lot of dross is trawled. Those same statistics also show that 3.2% of the calls contain the right details of the people shown in those images.'
'Sir' interrupted Ahmed 'with all due respect we are only talking about a small population, as the number of calls increase then probability dictates that we will get closer to the 3.2%'
'Steve, ring back and ask them what the score is now and how many calls have been received' Blunt instructed Cushion.
'Four hundred and twenty five and still not one positive naming'
'Thank you Steve. It is what I expected. We will get some positive namings. But we will find in this instance that the early statistics do not match what we would normally expect'
The others looked at him quizzically
'Work it out' came his response, 'Now let us get those search warrants and give the Russians and their accountants a rousting'