“I was thinking more about this Pamela Jeffreys.”

“Couldn’t afford it. She’s a classical musician. Besides, she didn’t really strike me as the jealous type. She said Calvert was just fun to be with. They never made any commitments.”

“She could be lying.”

“I suppose so.”

“And don’t forget the possible porn connection. If Rothwell was mixed up with beautiful women, even under another identity, who knows?”

Banks couldn’t believe it, but he didn’t bother protesting to Gristhorpe. “I’ll have to talk to her again anyway,” he said.

“Poor you.”

“What did the Fraud Squad have to say?”

Gristhorpe scratched his hooked nose. “Funny lot, aren’t they?” he said. “I spent a good part of this morning with DI Macmillan. Used to be in banking. Boring little bugger, but you should have seen his eyes light up when he heard about the locked files. Anyway, they’ve had a quick look at the stuff from Arkbeck Farm, and Macmillan and I had another chat about an hour ago. They haven’t much to go on, yet, of course, and they’re as anxious as young Phil for that by-pass software, but Macmillan’s even more excited now.”

“Where has the software got to, by the way?”

“On its way, according to Phil. Apparently they were out of stock but they managed to scrounge around.”

“Sorry. What did Macmillan have to say?”

“Well, he said he won’t know anything for certain until they manage to open some of those locked directories. He thinks that’s where the really interesting stuff is. But even some of the written documents in the filing cabinets gave him enough to suspect Rothwell was heavily into money-laundering or abetting tax evasion. Apparently, there was a fair bit of cryptic correspondence with foreign banks: Liechtenstein, Netherlands Antilles, Jersey, Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, among others. Dead giveaway, Macmillan said.”

“Tax havens,” said Banks. “Isn’t that what they are?”

Gristhorpe held up a finger. “Aha! That was my first thought, too. But they’re only tax havens because they have strict secrecy policies and a very flexible attitude toward whom they take on as their clients.”

“In other words,” offered Banks, “if you want to deposit a lot of money with them, they’ll take it, no questions asked?”

“That’s about it, aye. Within the law, of course. They do insist that they verify the money’s source is legal. When it comes down to it, though, banks are basically run on greed, aren’t they?”

“I won’t argue with that. So Keith Rothwell was putting a lot of money in foreign banks?”

“Macmillan thought he might have been acting for a third party. He could hardly have made that much money himself. It’s a very complicated business. As I said, either he was involved in aiding and abetting some pretty serious tax evasion, or he was part of a money-laundering scheme. There are still more questions than answers.”

“Did Macmillan tell you how this money-laundering business works?” Banks asked.

“Aye, a bit. According to him, it’s basically simple. It’s only in the application it gets complicated. What happens is that somebody gets hold of a lot of money illegally, and he wants it to look legal so he can live off it without raising any suspicions.” Gristhorpe paused.

“Go on,” Banks urged.

Gristhorpe ran his hand through his hair. “Well, that’s about it, really. I told you it was basically simple. Macmillan said it would take forever to explain all the technicalities of doing it. As far as legal money is concerned, he said, you can either earn it, borrow it or receive it as a gift. When you’ve laundered your dirty money, it has to look like it came to you one of those ways.”

“I assume we’re talking about drug money here,” Banks said. “Or the profits from some sort of organized crime – prostitution, pornography, loan sharks?”

Gristhorpe nodded. “You know as well as I do, Alan, that the top cats in the drug trade pull in enormous wads of cash every day. You can’t just walk into a showroom and buy a Rolls in cash without raising a few eyebrows, and the last thing you want is any attention from the police or the Inland Revenue.”

Banks walked over to the window again and lit a cigarette. Most of the cars were gone from the cobbled square now and the hush of an early Sunday evening had fallen over the town. A young woman in jeans and a red T-shirt struck a pose by the ancient market cross as her male companion took a photograph, then they got into a blue Nissan Micra and drove off.

“What’s in it for the launderer?” Banks asked.

“According to Macmillan, he’d get maybe four percent for laundering the safer sort of funds and up to ten percent for seriously dirty money.”

“Percent of what?”

“Depends,” said Gristhorpe. “On a cursory glance, Macmillan estimated between four and six million quid. He said that was conservative.”

“Over how long?”

“That’s four to six a year, Alan.”

“Jesus Christ!”

“Money worth murdering for, isn’t it? In addition to Rothwell’s legitimate earnings as a financial consultant, if he were in this money-laundering racket he also stood to earn, let’s say five percent of five million a year, to make it easy. How much is that?”

“Quarter of a million quid.”

“Aye, my arithmetic was never among the best. Well, no wonder the bugger could afford a BMW and a new kitchen.” He rubbed his hands together. “And that’s about it. Macmillan said they’ll start putting a financial profile together first thing in the morning: bank accounts, credit cards, building societies, Inland Revenue, loans, investments, the lot. He said they shouldn’t have any trouble getting a warrant from the judge, given the circumstances. He’s also getting in touch with the Yard. This is big, Alan.”

“What about Calvert?” Banks asked.

“Well, they’ll have to cover him too, now, won’t they?”

A sharp knock at the door was immediately followed by Phil Richmond holding a small package. “I’ve got it,” he said, an excited light in his eyes. “The by-pass software. Give me a few minutes to study the manual and we’ll see what we can do.”

They all followed him to the computer room, once a cupboard for storing cleaning materials, and stood around tensely in the cramped space while he booted up and consulted the instructions. All Rothwell’s computer gear and records were with the Fraud Squad, but Richmond had made back-up disks of the relevant files.

Susan Gay popped her head around the door and, finding no room left inside, stood in the doorway. Banks watched as Richmond went through a series of commands. Dialogue boxes appeared and disappeared; drive lights flashed on and off; the machine buzzed and hummed. Banks noticed Gristhorpe chewing on his thumbnail.

“Got it,” Richmond said. Then a locked file called SUMMARY.924 came to the screen:

“What the hell is all that about?” Banks asked.

“It looks like financial records for the last quarter of 1992,” Gristhorpe said. “Companies, banks, dates, maybe numbered accounts. Keep going, Phil. Try that ‘LETTER’ file you mentioned.”

Richmond highlighted the locked file, tapped at the keyboard again, and the file appeared unscrambled, for all to see.

It was a letter, dated May 1 and addressed to a Mr. Daniel Clegg, Solicitor, of Park Square, Leeds, and on first glance, it seemed innocuous enough:

Dear Mr. Clegg,

In the light of certain information that has recently come to my attention, I regret that we must terminate our association.

Yours faithfully,

Keith Rothwell

“That’s it?” Gristhorpe asked. “Are you sure you didn’t lose anything?”

Richmond returned to the keyboard to check, then shook his head. “No, sir. That’s it.”

Banks backed toward the door. “Interesting,” he said. “I wonder what ‘information’ that was?” He looked at Gristhorpe, who said, “Get it printed out, will you, Phil, before it disappears into the bloody ether.”