Tell the Truth, Shame the Devil(73)

“What’s to say it’s not someone on their way to the campsite to plant a bomb?”

Grazier shrugged. “Email it to me. We’re looking at everything. Whose photo is this?”

“The twins from Ramsgate.”

“Whose parents never return my calls. So what’s the Ortley secret ingredient?”

“Apart from looking after uniformed cops and talking to the community about Guy Fawkes celebrations, Grazier, it’s what I do,” Bish said. “It’s my job. So why don’t you talk to the powers that be and get me back to work? I can do all of this better with access to information.”

“You stuck a gun down the throat of a senior detective, Bish. Do you honestly think they’re going to want you back?”

He wondered how long Grazier had known that. And whether the home secretary and the rest of the world knew too. “I’m regretting that I haven’t done the same to you and Elliot.”

“I think the home secretary would give you a medal for sticking a gun down Elliot’s throat.” Grazier tried to smile. Couldn’t pull it off. He made himself comfortable at the breakfast bar. Bish didn’t. Sitting down meant an invitation to stay. Grazier knew that.

“Talk,” Bish said.

Grazier sighed. “Well, let’s start with the easy part and introduce the country to these brave kids. Everyone’s wanting a human interest story now, and Fionn, Manoshi, Lola, and the other kids on that bus are it.”

The easy part? “I don’t think they’re feeling particularly brave at the moment,” Bish said.

“The home secretary wants the public to—”

“Those kids aren’t here to make the public feel good,” Bish interrupted.

“It’s to take the focus off the deaths, now that the funerals are over. Attention off Violette and Eddie too,” Grazier said. “That’s all we’re suggesting.”

“So we’re going to pretend the dead no longer exist? Out of sight, out of mind?”

“I didn’t say that,” Grazier said in an icy tone. “Don’t put words in my mouth.”

“They’re not ready,” Bish argued. “The kids in hospital are depressed. Charlie Crombie’s being assessed for post-traumatic stress. The others are barely coping. I speak to the parents, Grazier, so I know our little tour of teenagers is falling apart. Thirteen-year-olds getting pissed on alcopops. Getting into fights. Locking themselves in their rooms. Cutting themselves. Bawling all day and night. Not getting out of bed. Taking pills. Screaming in their sleep. Glued to social media for a sighting of Violette and Eddie. Praying that some f*cking lunatic isn’t going to bash the shit out of two innocent kids who sat beside them for seven days.” His head was hammering. Too much shouting in his brain. In his heart. He poured a glass of water and downed it. “So on behalf of the parents, can you tell the home secretary that our kids are a bit on the sad side and not up to being next week’s feel-good story?”

Grazier was studying him with one of those looks Bish could never read.

“Why are you really here, Grazier?” he asked. “Now that we’ve got the easy part out of the way.”

Grazier removed a file from his backpack. “This is what we’ve got,” he said. “French intelligence are fixated on Ahmed Khateb as the main suspect. The Algerian driver of the French bus. They want access to Noor LeBrac.”

“No!”

“Let me finish.”

“What’s their strategy?” Bish demanded. “Get into the head of a terrorist by interrogating a so-called terrorist? We’ll lose Noor and any chance of finding Violette and Eddie.”

“A ‘so-called terrorist’?” Grazier asked. “Is that how you’re seeing Noor these days?”

He ignored that.

“Khateb is the French’s main suspect not only because he was seen arguing with the driver of the British bus on three occasions,” Grazier said, “but because an Estonian kid on one of the buses in Bayeux posted a video. If you remember, the French and British tours were in the same campsites for three nights: Calais twice, and Bayeux midtour. So this Estonian kid has footage of Michael Stanley playing the trumpet and Astrid Copely dancing in the car park of the Bayeux. It’s gone viral. Gut-wrenching to watch when you know those two kids will be dead four days later.”

Bish knew the video existed. He just hadn’t wanted to look at it. “I don’t understand where this is going, Grazier.”

“Your friend Attal is watching this footage over and over again and he picks up something no one else has noticed. The driver of the French bus is in the background arguing with someone. Violette.”

“What?”

“So Attal passes this on to French intelligence and they begin reinterviewing those on board the French bus. According to one of the kids, Violette mentioned Khateb in conversation on the night before the bombing.”

“Then we’re back to Violette being a suspect?”

“No. We’re back to Violette possibly being the target. Who knows why? Payback for Brackenham. A connection with the Zidane side of the family in Algeria. We’re all guessing. But we have evidence that she and Khateb spoke at Bayeux, and he’s been missing since the day of the bombing.”