Free Blood Brothers by Patricia Hall

not lumbered with one of those heavy beggars. You’ll just look like a visitor gazing at the river. You can get to the embankment down the side of the pub there, look. Take a few shots while there’s still a bit of light, and next time we’ll try it in daylight. I know for a fact that Reg Smith is a Millwall fanatic and the stadium’s just down the road. Just the right club for a bastard like him. The fans are all thugs. I reckon he’ll meet up with his mates here on Saturday for a few bevvies before the match and we can catch him then. Be interesting to see who he goes to the match with. And we’ll mosey down to Blackheath in daylight too and see what he gets up to at home. I’ll check out his address.’
    ‘Someone’s coming,’ Kate said quietly pointing at a big car which nosed past them and parked immediately outside the pub’s main door. She felt rather than saw the tension as Price watched.
    ‘That’s Smith’s car,’ he said. ‘And there’s another Jag parked a bit further down, look. Something’s going on.’
    They watched in silence but could not see who the new arrival was. Eventually Price leaned across Kate and opened the passenger door. ‘There you go. No one knows you, so you’ll be quite safe. Have a little mosey round the back. No one will think it odd if you take a few shots of the river. We’re not far from Tower Bridge. You’ll see it on your left.’
    ‘Can you get over the river from here?’ Kate asked.
    ‘Oh yes. There’s a road tunnel just down the road in Rotherhithe and the first one which Brunel built is still there. It’s part of the underground now. It’s not completely cut off from the other side.’
    Cautiously Kate got out of the car and walked down the side of the pub as Price had suggested and suddenly found herself facing a huge sweep of water which, even in the dusk, was still choppy with the wake from strings of barges chugging steadily in each direction. To the left she could make out the bright lights of Tower Bridge sweeping high over the water and opposite the much dimmer lights of Wapping and Shadwell. It was low tide and the unpleasant smell of Thames mud rose up from the beach beneath the embankment wall. The sight and smell of the working Thames made her catch her breath in a moment of nostalgia for her own home town. She hoped that Carter Price’s pessimism about the future of the Mersey as well as the Thames was ill-founded, but she guessed it wasn’t. She took several shots of the river and of the slightly decrepit old pub and then made her way back to the car.
    ‘He’s there,’ Price said as she got in. ‘It wasn’t him in that first car which pulled up. But I saw him quite clearly getting out of a Bentley. It’s parked over there, look.’ He waved in the direction of a couple of large cars at the far side of the pub. You see? I was right. There’s something big going on. We’ll hang on until they go and then meet up again in daylight – Saturday before the match would be ideal if you can make it. And get some snaps of whoever he meets then if we can. Did you get anything useful round the back?’
    ‘There’s a veranda sort of thing facing the river,’ Kate said. ‘There were some people out there with drinks even though it’s so cold. I thought that was a bit odd. I took some shots in that direction but I daren’t use the flash. They would have noticed. The pictures will be very dark but they might just show something with the pub lights behind. I’ll print them up tomorrow and you can have a look.’
    ‘Good girl,’ Price said, starting the engine and easing the car across the road and past the parked cars. ‘Whoever’s in there’s not your usual Bermondsey punter, that’s for sure. They don’t drive around in Jags and Bentleys. And they don’t hang about on chilly balconies unless they’ve something very private to discuss. Something’s going on and if Reg Smith is involved you can be bloody sure that it’s not going to