‘I know! Why look further?’ Philippa’s smile fades. ‘So what happened?’
‘There was a girl Tom liked. Demi?’
‘Demelza Whitton, yes.’
‘You know her?’
‘Yes. Nice enough kid. Brother’s a piece of work, though.’
‘The brother being Dill Whitton?’
Philippa nods. ‘Bikes, booze, builders’ tools… You name it, he’s nicked it and been nicked for it. Not the sharpest pencil in the box, that boy.’
‘So I gather. He’s well out of his depth now.’
‘So where’s Tom come into it all?’
‘Tom likes Demi. He takes her to the pub up the road from you, the Four and Twenty Blackbirds. Dill goes to the Blackbirds too and clocks his sister with Tom. He also spots that Tom’s not exactly flush with cash and finds out from Demi that the café pay him next to nothing.’
Philippa shrugs. ‘No bugger ever goes in there. That’s why Tom likes it.’
‘Yeah, well. With Demi to impress, he needs something that pays better. At which exact point Dill introduces him to someone called Fin. Finbarr Williams. Ring any bells?’
‘No.’
‘Fin’s older. Thirty-odd. Mixed-race, very much a free spirit. Comes and goes on a vintage motorcycle.’
‘Ah yes. I’ve seen him around. No idea where he’s from, though.’
‘No one seems to know. But he’s around, and Tom’s impressed, and when Fin makes him an offer, Tom’s as ready as a ripe plum. The job sounds easy. Take the train to London, meet a guy at Waterloo Station who’ll give him a backpack, get the train back to Cranborne, and deliver the backpack, unopened, to Fin. All expenses paid in cash, and 200 smackers for Tom’s trouble.’
‘Oh God,’ Philippa mutters.
‘You can see where this is going, can’t you?’
She nods despairingly.
‘So Tom does a couple of these runs, and the third time Fin asks him to store the backpack at his house for a few days – again, without looking inside. Tom’s nervous now, but it’s 500 quid this time, and he ends up saying yes again. When it’s delivery time, Fin pays him and gives him a watch as a gift. The one you found in his room.’
‘The Rolex? I’ve got it here.’ She takes the watch from her bag. ‘Is it real?’
Eve examines the watch for a few moments. ‘No, it’s a fake. It might be very thinly gold-plated, but if you look at the dial, just below the six, it’s supposed to say Swiss Made. Unfortunately, our faker isn’t a brilliant speller, and it reads Swiss Maid, which I think is a brand of yoghurt. Fin probably buys these wholesale. Hands them out to all his runners and tells them they’re worththousands. It’s one more way of making the kids feel indebted to him.’
‘So what happens next?’
‘Next is yesterday afternoon. We’re both out, and Tom’s by himself in the house. A complete stranger turns up. Eastern European, Tom thinks. He’s almost certainly been watching the place, waiting to get Tom alone. So this guy gives Tom a supermarket bag with something heavy inside, wrapped in a dirty T-shirt. It’s obviously a gun, and Tom’s terrified and refuses to have anything to do with it. But the guy tells him he hasn’t got a choice. He tells Tom that if he doesn’t hide the gun, you’ll be hurt.’
‘Me?’ Philippa whispers, her face colourless beneath the flickering strip light.
‘You. So Tom takes the gun. By this time, he’s not thinking clearly. All he knows is that he’s desperate to be done with this whole scene. So instead of stashing the goods in his room, like he’s been ordered, he waits for the evening and takes the bag to the Blackbirds. When he gets there, he finds Fin, as he hoped, but also Demi, and it’s clear that the two of them are now an item. Fin’s got his arm around her, and the whole thing’s clearly a done deal. At which point Tom totally loses it, flings the bag at Fin so that the gun spills out onto the floor of the pub, and screams at him to go fuck himself, and never contact him again.’
‘Shit.’ Philippa’s forehead sinks onto her folded, tattooed arms. ‘Shit. I just wish he’d?—’
‘I know,’ Eve says gently. ‘But they don’t, do they?’
Philippa gazes despairingly in front of her. ‘And the rest I know.’
‘The rest you know.’