STAKEOUT
by Richard Banks
On-street
surveillance isn’t everybody’s cup of tea. Usually, it’s a parked car job, a
building to be watched, people in, people out, everyone, save the postman, to
be photographed and logged on audio.
Easy peasy you’re thinking, and usually, it is. Stay unnoticed and the only problem you have is in staying awake. Get
rumbled and you had better drive off quick before someone decides to pay you a
visit and lay one on you. It’s happened, so, you’re nothing less than sensible.
The car you use is bog standard, nothing that stands out, the doors stay
locked, you don’t get out, every few hours you park up somewhere new, never too
close to the target, but always close enough to see.
Do all that and you stay safe and get
paid, cash in hand for every hour worked. The real skill is when you don’t have
the car. Some streets don’t allow parking during the day, some never, so you
have to find another way. If there’s a cafe or pub with good sightlines you
use that; nice and cosy especially when the weather’s rough, but you don’t get
paid expenses so every pint and sandwich is down to you.
Sometimes the only way you can do the
job is on foot in clear view of whoever you’re watching. That can be a real
game of cat and mouse, and as often as not you’re the mouse so you had better
be good at what you do. The trick is to blend in, be one of the matchstick men,
a figure so familiar he attracts zero attention, a usual sort of man, doing
whatever usual men do in that particular street.
Today I’m on a domestic. The Client’s
checking-up on his wife of only six months. He’s abroad on business, wants to
know who she’s letting in while he’s away. So far it’s no one except a woman
old enough to be her mother, which is good news all round and a quiet life for
me. Nevertheless, I’m not taking any chances. Today I’m a hoodie, a familiar
sight around here. Most of them are unemployed layabouts with nothing to do but
kill time. So, I stood in a bus shelter. Waiting for a bus is not going to
attract much attention, especially as some of the routes only come by once or
twice an hour. Even if I am noticed no one gets a clear view of my face which
means I can come back later and be someone else.
The woman comes to the window and peers
out. A rain check, or is she expecting company? Apparently neither, she sprays
the window with an aerosol and wipes it clean with a cloth. Is this what it
seems or is she signaling that the coast is clear? If it’s a ruse then she’s
expecting a visit from someone down here near to where I’m standing. A young
guy in a suit crosses the road and turns left towards the house. I take a
picture on my mobile and ready myself to get another as he goes inside, but
he walks past the house and keeps going. And because I’m looking at him I
nearly miss the guy who’s coming along behind. He’s up the steps to the front
door before I know he’s there. The woman answers the door and he’s halfway
through before I get a single shot of her face and the back of his head. This
isn’t good, but it’s not a disaster. He has to come out at some point and that’s
when I’ll get him full-on.
Right now I could do with a camera that
takes pictures through walls. Second best would be a listening bug but that’s a
big bucks job, and anyway it’s against the law. As the client on this job is
paying standard rate all he gets to know is who goes in and who goes out, and
that doesn’t stretch to names and addresses, only what they look like and how
long they stay which is why I need to keep alert and take some decent pictures
when the guy steps out.
Sometimes you get lucky and see
something you’re not meant to, a kiss, an embrace, viewed through a window or
the front door. No one should be that careless, but it happens. In half an hour
it will be getting dark, room lights on and curtains pulled. For a few seconds, rooms will glow with light like they’re a
I’m guessing that the first curtain to
be drawn will be in the house I’m watching and sure enough as day fades the
downstairs lights come on and Mrs G appears at the window looking out. Is she
looking at me? something’s caught her eye. She half turns towards the man who’s
now in his shirt sleeves. He comes forward, stands almost behind her and peers
over her shoulder. A bus pulls up at the stop, blocking my view, blocking
theirs. By the time it pulls away the curtain is drawn but I have a photo of
them together, a single frame followed by three of the bus.
There is a single shadow on the
curtain, the two of them either side of a thin sliver of bright light where the
curtains don’t quite meet. They are still looking. If the man comes out and
chases after me there will be time for one last snap before I leg it down the
back doubles. The shadow disappears, but the door stays shut.
All’s well and my stint’s nearly over.
In twenty-five minutes when the parking ban ends my replacement will arrive in
a black Polo and park up outside the Factory Shop. That done I will get on a 21
bus and head back home. Monique, my girlfriend, is cooking tonight, something
special, she says. It’s our first year anniversary. It’s going to be a romantic
evening, just the two of us, with a big bash on Saturday for friends and
family. She tells me she has a new dress, and I can’t wait to see it on, and
off.
Life’s good, and then suddenly, it ain’t;
a police car pulls up at the bus stop. The copper inside winds down the window
and tells me to get in the back. It’s PC Greenhough. This is not the first time
he’s done this. It’s harassment of course. OK, so what I’m doing isn’t strictly
legit but there’s no way he’s going to bring charges against me. He’s got too
much else to do, so he gives me what he says is an informal warning, that way
he doesn’t have to fill out a hundred and one forms. But next time, he tells
me, it will be different.
“OK, OK,” I say, “there won’t be a next
time”. What I mean is that from now on I’ll only do jobs off his patch. We
drive on. Where we are going I don’t know but he|’s not going to tell me, so I
don’t ask. Anyway, there’s something else I need to know, something that will
almost certainly be relevant to the case.
“Who told you what I was up to? Mrs G,
the man?” If it was them, it stands to reason they have nothing to hide from Mr
G or anyone else. But if it’s not them, then who?
PC Greenhough stops the car at a
traffic light. “Mr Adams,” he says, “who else?”
I say I don’t know anyone of that name.
“Is he sure?”
He says he is. The lights change. He
turns left into a dimly lit side road, and right onto the gravel driveway of a
large house. There’s something familiar about this place, something I should be
remembering, but don’t.
PC Greenhough turns off the engine and
gets out of the car. He tells me to do the same and walks me up to the front
door. He’s about to ring the bell, but there’s no need. Our arrival has been
spotted from within and the door is opened by a large man in a crumpled, grey
suit. He looks daggers at me while talking deferentially to PC Greenhough. He
says he’s sorry, so sorry to have involved the police again. He hopes I haven’t
got into any trouble.
PC Greenhough says, “no. Just the usual
thing, looking in people’s windows and taking photographs. No one’s complained.”
The man looks relieved, thinks I may
not have been taking my medication. Even under supervision it is not always
possible, he says, to be sure that it has been swallowed and properly ingested.
I’m taken into the day room and sat
down in my chair. Molly, who I call Monique, sits on her chair, staring
vacantly at the TV unaware that I am back. A nurse is preparing to give me an
injection. This is not how life should be.
Copyright Richard Banks
