Lee wondered how often other people had wondered whether George should be sectioned or not. His parishioners for instance.

  Lee whispered to Wilko, ‘I’m not humouring him for much longer. I’m getting into that house tonight whether you and him like it or not.’

  Wilko’s phone rang and he turned aside to answer it just as George moved on to another manhole cover. Was what they were doing just a reflection of how bizarre beliefs seemed to have gained traction in recent years? To Lee, who had never ‘done’ religion or alternative therapies and who had never harboured even an opinion regarding aliens from space, the tunnels were just another mad thing on that continuum. Or were they? Well of course they were! Just as he didn’t believe for a second that 5G communications were in some Byzantine way connected to Microsoft magnate Bill Gates supposed desire to ‘rule the world’, he did not hold with these tunnels.

  He stood, waiting in the darkness for either one lunatic to get off his phone or the other madman to stand up straight and stop looking at manhole covers.

  They sat in silence, watching the water at the bottom of the well, fancying at times that it was receding. Mumtaz didn’t know what to say. John was fragile. He’d seen and maybe even done things she couldn’t bring her mind to imagine. And while she wasn’t exactly happy to let him talk about such things in his own time, she managed to content herself that all she could do now was wait. For the water to recede, for John to speak …

  It burst out of him.

  ‘I always knew my old man was a bit of a knob, but I never imagined he was …’ He shook his head. ‘I thought he was like a lot of people, you know, sort of using words that were bad and made you cringe. Old people do it, laughing at old comedians who take the piss out of people for the way they look, the colour of their skin and that. Casual racism they call it. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve never liked it but it was just sort of there. Mum don’t like it either but like me, she just sort of let it go … I never thought about …’

  ‘Where that might lead?’ Mumtaz said.

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘because that wasn’t part of it, not really. No, this is my dad’s family and the people they’ve always known. Cousins are in it, uncles …’

  ‘Luddites?’

  ‘I dunno when it started,’ he said. ‘But I do know it was before the Second World War. They supported Hitler.’

  Neither of them said anything. The City of London had been almost bombed into the ground by the Nazis in World War II. There was an almost universally held belief that everyone in Britain had been opposed to Hitler and his fevered dreams of white supremacy. Mumtaz had learnt a little about the British Fascist Party headed by Oswald Mosley when she’d been at school, about the Battle of Cable Street which had happened in 1936 not far from where she’d been born. The fascists had been defeated by the people of the East End and had disappeared. That was the narrative. But of course they hadn’t disappeared at all – in the sixties and seventies they’d become the National Front, then the BNP and now they seemed to exist amongst purveyors of conspiracy theories online and on right-wing media outlets. Events like the Holocaust were receding into the past and, to some at least, nationalism appeared to be on the rise once again.

  ‘It’s a religion,’ John said. ‘They, we, worship King Lud, the first British king they say. There’s a skeleton in the Shrine they say is his. You have to swear to be a soldier for Albion on it. Then they blood you. I knew nothing about any of it until Dad brought me here and gave me to Arthur.’

  ‘Who is?’

  ‘He’s the Servant of Lud. His family go right back to them times. They’ve always lived here. There’s always been Luddites. These tunnels were built by them. They say you can get a whole army down here and that’s what they want to do.’

  ‘Build an army?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  In spite of herself, Mumtaz laughed.

  John said, ‘Mad innit, I know. An army of fat old white blokes and fucking football mallets, but they mean it! I watched them kill a baby! I screamed and screamed, my dad punching me and telling me to be a man and …’

  He sobbed. Mumtaz moved over to him and put an arm around his shoulders. He was just a kid. How could his own father involve him in such a thing?

  ‘Who killed the baby, John?’ she said.

  He tucked himself into her side like an infant. Mumtaz felt both protective towards this boy and appalled. John’s family were part of something she could barely comprehend. This was, surely, a terrorist organisation? If they were building an army … To do what?

  John coughed as he began to bring his crying under control. Then he said, ‘Arthur.’

  ‘Arthur killed …’

  ‘She screamed!’ he said. ‘I wanted to die. Then when she was still, me dad put his fingers in her blood and smeared it over my face. It was then that I ran.’

  ‘To the front door of the house?’

  ‘I dunno how I got there,’ he said. ‘I just legged it. I couldn’t go back and trace my route if me life depended on it. I opened the door and there were the two lads. If I hadn’t turned back to see if I was being followed, I would’ve got away. But I did look back and there was Arthur and me dad behind him and it hit me.’

  ‘What did?’

  ‘I’d have to dob in my old man to the police,’ he said.

  And then he began to cry again and she held him.

  When Jordan arrived he was already wearing one of the white plastic coveralls the SOCOs wore when investigating a crime scene. Thin and disposable, he’d found them in a bin outside the dressing rooms.

  The rush hour was coming to an end now and so not too many people stared at them as the three other men put the coveralls on over their clothes in the street. If questioned they would say they were ‘flushers’ or sewer maintenance workers.

  Father George had found what he’d been looking for when Wilko was on the phone to Jordan. The mark that distinguished a ‘real’ manhole cover from a tunnel entrance was a tiny moulding of a menorah or seven-branched candlestick. A Jewish symbol, the menorah also represented the six branches of knowledge which look up to the central light, which was God.

  ‘The Jews who chose to remain after the expulsion in the thirteenth century used these tunnels to hide from the Church,’ Wilko told the others as he pulled on his SOCO coveralls. ‘I’ve picked up info about it for years. Then they … Well, who knows who’s down there now?’

  ‘Yes, but Wilko, as soon as that baby’s body was found, you began talking about the tunnels …’ Lee said.

  ‘Because anything that happens round here could have a connection,’ Wilko said. ‘The tunnels exist. Who made them originally, we don’t know, but they’re here and in my experience, in the past, the coppers have either not known about them or ignored them. Now they might, might have something with your partner, Lee. Just don’t go off on your esoteric schtick, George. And that’s all I’ll say about it.’ Then he looked at Jordan. ‘Can you lift up that cover for us old gits, son?’

  Using the tip of his expandable police baton to hook the cover up, Jordan Whittington opened up a whole new subterranean world to his colleagues.

  There was that pregnant girl again. Arthur turned away. He didn’t want her coming over and asking about that woman. That was all done and dusted. They’d thrown her into one of the deepest rooms and she’d cracked her head and stopped breathing. Sometime when he could be arsed he’d go down there and shove her down the well. With luck she’d be dragged out into the river where she’d be picked up by some boat or other, ID’d by her DNA and deemed to have had an accident. End of.

  And the girl wouldn’t say anything. Arthur turned back and saw that she was looking at him. But she didn’t say anything and she didn’t come any closer. She was like a lot of them. She agreed but she wasn’t prepared to do anything. She, in particular, also slept with the enemy. That would end badly but then that was her business. He knew what she really felt and, if necessary, he could use that against her.

  She was lonely, poor thing, and out of her depth. But he didn’t care. As Val often said, even those who follow are only human stepping stones.

  Manson had told him nothing really. Alone in his office, DI Scott Brown brooded on how the case of the St Paul’s dead baby had been ripped away from him. His suspect Colin Macbeth had been released and Brown’s team had been dismantled.

  All DI Manson had said was that Jordan Whittington had been ‘made’ by one of their operatives in that pub in Bermondsey, the one where Macbeth had said he ‘might’ have met the mother of the dead baby. What had happened to that woman? He couldn’t believe that a mother would willingly give up her child. Was she dead too?

  Now that Counter Terrorism had shut them down, would they ever know? All Manson had said was that they’d been undercover at The Jolly Sailor for months. He wouldn’t say what kind of terrorist activity he and his team had observed in the pub, but Brown surmised it was of a far-right white nationalistic type. Or not. In the world of the great smoke and mirrors generator that was the Internet, those wishing to kill others for God or love or money hid in the strangest places. Every day the world seemed to move further and further towards the kind of crazy conspiracy theories espoused by old nutters like Wilko. Fucking Nazis and Freemasons underneath every rock, according to him.

  However, before Manson had left, he had taken the time to get Brown on his own for a moment. Quite unbidden he’d said to him, ‘We will get whoever killed that baby in EC4.’ And then he’d added, ‘We may already have him in our sights.’

  And while Brown felt that Manson may have just said that in order to mollify him, he couldn’t quite make himself believe it.

  Both lying on their stomachs, Mumtaz and John watched the last of the water recede and then looked at each other. One of them had to climb down that ladder if they were going to find out if there was a way out at the bottom. It was a no-brainer.

  Mumtaz said, ‘I’ve no idea what sort of state this ladder might be in at the bottom.’

  ‘Looks dodgy up here,’ John said.

  ‘Which is why I’m going down.’ Mumtaz stood.

  ‘Ah, no, I think it’s …’

  She swung one leg over the parapet and put a foot on the first rung of the ladder. Metal, and she felt it vibrate as it took her weight. She looked at the screws that secured it to the brickwork and saw them move. But what choice was there?

  John said, ‘I think I should go …’

  But he was clearly afraid and he was, at sixteen, just a child. A traumatised child in fear for his life. Mumtaz knew she would have done this for Shazia without a thought. She said, ‘You hold on to the top of the ladder and steady it if necessary.’ Then she smiled. ‘We’re going to get out of here, John.’

  SEVENTEEN

  The young lad switched his torch on and illuminated what was a very short, narrow tunnel. There was a rushing sound coming from somewhere which, considering the entrance to this tunnel had been less than a metre away from the manhole cover, probably meant they were close to sewerage. It would be raw too. Lee could feel his hair stand on end. And what was that smell?

  George was in front of Lee, Wilko behind and Jordan heading up the posse. On one level what they were doing was farcical, while on another it was a reflection of how hard it could sometimes be for the police to gain entry to properties where an offence could possibly have taken place. Especially, it seemed, where a missing person was involved. History was littered with cases of properties either not searched or incompletely searched – where a victim was eventually discovered, usually dead.

  The smell of shit was getting stronger and Lee began to feel sick. Would he be doing this if Mumtaz was just an ordinary punter? Not a chance.

  ‘Canon?’

  Canon Palmer looked up from the book on his desk into the eyes of Enid Hardwick.

  ‘Yes?’ he said.

  Without being invited, she sat down in the chair opposite his desk.

  ‘About the tunnels …’

  ‘They were all blocked up years ago, decades,’ he said. ‘Father George Feldman is a sincere and passionate priest but he lives in the past. No one here had or has any involvement in the dreadful murder of that child. As I told Father George and the police, there are no tunnels. We failed to shut the gates on the night in question, that is all.’

  He was becoming angry. But she persisted.

  ‘Canon,’ she said, ‘you and I both know people. You have worked with them, or rather …’

  ‘The Church always works with the sick, the delusional …’

  ‘I’m talking about the Reverend Harold,’ she said.

  The canon’s office became quiet, save for the ticking of the carriage clock on his mantlepiece.

  Eventually the canon said, ‘It is important that young priests experience all kinds of situations. Some parishioners can be challenging …’

  ‘The Reverend de Vere, in my opinion, is being rather more influenced by – let’s name names – Mr Hobbs – than he is managing to influence him,’ Mrs Hardwick said. ‘I am not saying that Mr Hobbs is in any way responsible for the death of that child. But I know you know of his toxic views, because I have heard a conversation between you and the Reverend de Vere.’

  ‘You should not—’

  ‘Canon, please don’t tell me what I should and should not attend to! You and I both know that the Reverend de Vere was supposed to lock the precinct gates that night. You and I also know that you didn’t say so to the police.’

  ‘Locking up is a joint enterprise …’

  ‘Which was assigned to Harold de Vere that night!’ she said. ‘By you!’

  He looked down at the paperwork on his desk.

  ‘The Reverend de Vere and myself have had several conversations about Mr Hobbs and his alleged activities,’ he said. ‘It was and is my belief that the Reverend de Vere was challenging Mr Hobbs’s distorted opinions whilst at the same time giving his views respect.’

  ‘The man’s a nationalist nutter!’ Mrs Hardwick said.

  The time for cool heads and reasoned argument was over. She’d had a text from Father George, telling her he was going to attempt to get into those tunnels now blocked off from the great church.

  ‘Canon, a child has died and a woman is missing,’ Mrs Hardwick said. ‘Father Edward has appeared. How much more evidence do you want? Get Harold de Vere in here now and call the police!’

  The bottom of the well was slimy and wet and Mumtaz was glad it was too dark for her to be able to see anything in detail.

  She could see the boy looking down into the shaft and called up. ‘I’m going to look for where the water might be coming in. I’ll have to feel my way.’

  Neither of them had a phone or a torch and so in the absence of any other light source they were effectively blind. As she moved her hands slowly across the brickwork, Mumtaz wondered what they would do even if she did find an exit. It would probably mean they’d have to move through a tunnel in complete darkness, the threat of rising water levels a constant concern.

  They could die – easily. And so when her fingertips did find a void in the brickwork, at first she said nothing. The edge of the hole was wide if not tall. They would have to duck down low to fit inside. They would also have to pass through the slime- and ooze-crusted sides of the tunnel. She ducked down to see whether she could discern any light at the end of it.

  John said, ‘Can you see anything?’

  ‘Yeah, I …’

  But there was no light. Not even a pinprick. When she stood up she said, ‘There’s a tunnel that I hope leads to the river, but I don’t know. Come down and tell me what you want to do.’

  Brown had gone home when the call came in. DS Melina Pinker took it. She said, ‘I’m sorry but that case has been taken out of our hands.’

  She heard the canon sigh. She had no idea what an ecclesiastical canon did, but she did know that he was by way of being a powerful figure in the cathedral.

  He said, ‘So who is now in charge of this investigation?’

  Telling him that Counter Terrorism were now involved would probably cause alarm. She said, ‘May I ask what aspect of the investigation this is concerning, sir?’

  He sighed again and then said, ‘It’s a member of my staff …’

  ‘Yes?’

  There was a long pause and then she heard a woman’s voice say, ‘Oh for God’s sake!’

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello,’ the woman said. ‘What Canon Palmer is trying to tell you, is that a member of the ministry team here at the cathedral has come under malign influence and we think that this may be pertinent to your investigation.’

  ‘What sort of malign influence?’ Pinker asked.

  Did they mean a ghost or …?

  ‘He has been having regular discussions with a man we believe is a far-right activist,’ the woman said.

  Pinker sat down. ‘I see. Can you give me some more details, please?’

  Father George stopped. Breathless, he turned to Lee and said, ‘There’s some sort of hatch ahead. Constable Whittington is attempting to open it.’

  ‘OK.’

  Wilko, wheezing behind Lee, said, ‘Let’s hope it leads somewhere bigger.’

  Try as they might, none of the men could avoid the crushing feeling of claustrophobia being in such a narrow space evinced. Cramped and hot, it also reeked of human waste. Lee turned his head away from George’s looming behind and stifled a cough. He had occasionally wondered how all the tunnels underneath the city fitted around each other. Sewers, Tube lines, cellars, foot tunnels. So far he felt none the wiser and now that they were stationary, he could feel panic beginning to build inside his chest. It was the same feeling that had assaulted him when he’d been in tanks. He’d fought in the first Iraq War during his service with the army. It was why, later, when he returned home, he’d become an alcoholic. Dying in a tin can where you barely had enough room to fart had been an everyday occurrence in Iraq. It had left its mark.