"I'm afraid something awful has happened." "Social call?" "You working for that Merren bitch?" "The bitch in prison are you working for her?" "She refused the chance of an appeal." "Alice Merren will be hanged in five days' time." "Scotland Yard?" "Good for you." "The translation post has been reassigned." "Your services are no longer required." "Her name's Elizabeth Lancaster." "She's 17 years old." "She can't be my mother." "We abandoned our child because I was young and foolish and not prepared to face the shame." "Please be assured we will take all necessary measures to deal with the matter." "Yours faithfully, Colin Barkdale." "Very good." "Your typing is excellent." "Good speed, good accuracy, Miss..." "Merren." "Alice Merren?" "Yes." "Not the Alice Merren from the newspapers?" "Er...yes." "I'm afraid our agency will be unable to find you a suitable position, Miss Merren." "I'm happy to find any position." "The businesses we supply staff to will only employ people with an unblemished record." "I was found innocent." "I was acquitted." "Yes, but you were in prison." "And in the newspapers." "Good evening, sir." "This way, please." "This way, sir." "Oh, hello, darling." "You made it!" "And don't you scrub up very well indeed." "Thank you." "So, what is this?" "Just an excuse to get you out for the evening." "How did the interview go?" "Fine, fine." "I'm waiting to hear back." "Well, fingers crossed." "Come on." "Let's have a cocktail." "If you're sure." "I'm absolutely sure." "Millie!" "How pleasant." "Excuse me a sec." "Good evening, Anne." "How lovely to see you." "Is George feeling...better?" "He is, thank you." "A week in the Chilterns did him the world of good." "I'm so pleased to hear it." "I wonder...the eau de toilette you found was an absolute delight, and I must admit I've hardly any left." "It's charming, isn't it?" "I'll pick you up a bottle." "Room 214." "Could you make it two?" "My friend Charlotte made me swear I'd ask." "Your friend Charlotte has good taste." "I'll bring you a few." "That way your friends won't run out." "You're a dear." "I'll see you later then." "Bye." "Oh, Champagne cocktails." "Anne seems nice." "Don't worry." "It's just a little sideline." "A sideline?" "Import-export." "Until they take me off the blacklist and I can get more translation work." "Do you mean the black market?" "The war is over, remember?" "There is no black market any more." "This is just flying a little bit below the radar." "Gosh." "Is it safe, doing it somewhere like this?" "Safest place of all." "None of these women would be seen dead in an alley buying out of a case." "But if a well-turned-out acquaintance happens to source them the odd luxury now and then..." "You're very debonair about it." "I'd never have the confidence." "It's my overwhelming sense of entitlement." "Swiss finishing school finally pays off." "Talking of school, how's Lizzie's training going?" "She's found a place." "Started three weeks ago." "You'll never guess where." "Where?" "Bletchley." "No?" "There's a teacher-training college there now." "Right next to the old huts." "Good God." "Another Bletchley girl." "Oh, I'll drink to that." "Don't look now." "I think you've caught someone's eye." "Oh, God, that's Jasper." "My co-pilot, so to speak." "Excuse me just a sec." "She's a new one." "She's not a customer, she's a friend." "Pretty friend." "Hands off." "What've you got for me?" "Four orders of the Lucienne eau de toilette, four of the Envoye De L'amour, the gold one, and two of the Shalimar with the atomiser." "Right you are." "Can you get any more nylons?" "I can get silk." "They don't want silk, they want nylons." "Well, silk's all I can get." "Is that it?" "It's not much." "It's not bad for a Friday night." "Is everything OK?" "Why?" "You look like the Staff Sergeant's sprung an inspection on you." "No, I'm fine." "Every tin of beans accounted for." "Staff Sergeants don't frighten me." "They bloody used to!" "I never got caught, though, did I?" "Now, then, these nylons." "Don't worry." "I'll tell them silk is saucy." "Men prefer it." "Nylons are old hat." "Now, see, that's why you're front of house." "Good girl." "Oh!" "Are you sure you're all right?" "I lied earlier." "I didn't get the job." "Oh, sweetheart." "I'm so sorry." "That's the fourth interview." "All they remember is the newspapers and the court case." "I can't even be a bloody secretary." "We'll find something." "Don't worry." "Lizzie looks at me sometimes." "She's so confused." "Just stop this." "You take the cab the rest of the way home, get a good night's sleep, then come and see me tomorrow..." "I'll walk, it's fine." "Don't be daft." "You're in no state." "Come on, take it." "And this." "What?" "No, no." "Yes, yes." "Millie, I can't." "Yes, you can." "Yes, you can." "Come on." "In you get." "I'll see you tomorrow." "Alice?" "Alice?" "Lizzie..." "What time is it?" "Erm, 10 o'clock." "Is that mine?" "I borrowed it." "Sorry." "Is that all right?" "I didn't have anything to wear, and Millie wanted to go dancing." "It's fine." "Come on, I'll make you some breakfast." "No, thank you." "I'll be all right." "Well, I'll put some tea on, then." "Sure you don't want something?" "No, thanks." "I've...got another job interview." "Millie?" "Can I help you, Miss?" "It's all right." "What's wrong?" "How long did you say she'd been gone?" "Since last night." "Not long, then." "We were supposed to meet this morning." "And is your friend usually tidy?" "Not tidy, but nothing like this..." "Had she had anything to drink?" "What's that got to do with anything?" "She might've just decided to spring clean the place." "In any case we do need to wait a bit longer than a night before we can file a missing persons report." "Is there anything else you can add?" "Any other reason you're worried?" "Well, if there's nothing more, then that'll be it for now." "Do let me know if you hear from her." "Spring cleaning indeed!" "What exactly has Millie been doing?" "She called it import-export." "There was a man, last night." "Erm, Jasper." "I didn't get a surname." "Silly, silly girl." "We need to tell the police everything." "And get her into trouble?" "She's already in trouble!" "Maybe serious trouble!" "Lucy's right." "How long's she been selling this stuff?" "I don't know." "Ever since she lost her job, I think." "I mean, she's had no work, but she always seems to get by." "She's been slipping into bad habits." "OK, so what do we do?" "We need to try and find her." "We need to try and find this Jasper fellow and see what he's got to say for himself." "If we have no luck, we go to the police and explain the situation." "No holding stuff back." "We tell them everything." "They've left nothing unturned." "Maybe not." "When I stayed with Millie, she always put important things in..." "Got something." "Good God." "Millie never cooks." "That's a lot of perfume and stockings." "It's an order book." "Wait, go back." "Jasper." "He's around a lot." "Carmichael Station, fourth arch." "Briggs Lane, third door." "What is that?" "Garages." "Lock-ups." "Storage." "Hello?" "Somebody!" "She called him her co-pilot." "Just a turn of phrase, or more than that?" "Ex-RAF, perhaps?" "Here we are, third door." "Careful." "There's blood." "Same stuff." "Oh, Millie." "He liked the dogs." "By the looks of this he was betting on four or five races a day." "He wasn't betting tuppence, either." "Then unless he's very, very lucky, he owed money." "And someone came after him." "Why would they go after Millie as well?" "How did they even know about her?" "All right, all right, maybe we've got this backwards." "Jasper didn't owe money." "Then why would he...?" "He was covering his bad debts out of the business." "Lining his pockets." "Whoever came for him knew about Millie, knew about this place." "Knew everything." "And they left all the merchandise here." "If this was a bookie with a debt to claim, he'd have taken the stuff, wouldn't he?" "So this is someone in the business." "Higher up." "So Millie sells for Jasper." "But who does Jasper buy from?" "If we knew which bookie Jasper used, we could ask them who he hung around with." "He wasn't using a bookie." "Not a licensed one, anyway." "This is snooker chalk." "All Harry's papers were like this." "He used to go down the snooker hall, play a few frames, put on a few bets." "It's off-track betting." "Illegal but the odds are better." "I say if we want to find Jasper's bookie, we go looking in the nearest snooker hall." "Thanks." "Where am I?" "Where is this place?" "What street is this?" "Do you know?" "Please." "I need you to call the police." "Can you do that?" "Call the police." "All right, all right." "Calm down, calm down." "Do you speak English?" "Small." "No police, no police." "OK, OK." "Millie." "My name is Millie." "What's your name?" "Elishka." "Elishka." "Elishka." "I..." "That's not Russian..." "The accent's..." "Baltic." "It's not Hungarian, not Romanian..." "Czechoslovakia." "You're Slovak." "Slovakian." "It's not my best." "So, here's London." "The river." "Yes." "Like the Russian." "River, yes." "Are we north of..." "..or south?" "North or south?" "North." "OK, where north?" "In the middle?" "Further out?" "Where, where are we?" "You don't know, do you..." "All right." "Please, I need you to telephone..." "telephone some friends of mine." "No police." "Friends." "It's all right." "It's all right." "All right." "Elishka, tell me." "Tell me." "I want home." "I want go home." "Me too." "How long..." "How long have you been here?" "How..." "I come!" "Go away here." "Go away here." "Go away." "Let's hope this is the one." "It's men only." "We wanted to see about a race." "You?" "Well, it's for a friend." "Jasper." "Don't know anyone called Jasper, sorry." "Look, a girlfriend of ours has gone missing." "Missing?" "We think she's in trouble." "Real trouble." "Jasper too." "We know he likes a flutter." "That's fine." "We won't tell anyone." "We just wondered if you'd seen him with any...you know, bad types." "It's all bad types in here, love." "How'd your friend get rolled up in this?" "She and Jasper had a thing going on the side." "Selling." "Yeah, I heard about that." "All right, I know Jasper." "Everyone does." "Bookies' best friend, he is." "Lady Luck always seemed to see Jasper coming and leg it the other way." "But he bounces back." "Maybe not this time." "I'd be sorry to hear that." "We think he was skimming the profits off of this little enterprise to cover his track debts." "And whoever he was in with realised." "Bloody idiot." "Pardon me." "Do you know who he was working for?" "No." "Sorry." "He never said." "Did he ever come in with anyone?" "Someone you didn't know?" "A couple of times he was in here with two Maltese lads." "Big, nasty-looking." "They had cash, though, plenty of cash." "Maltese?" "There's some families around." "They're supposed to run restaurants and that, but you hear stories." "Christ, he didn't cross those bastards, did he?" "Bloody hell." "Did you catch a name?" "Like I said, it was only a couple of times." "They haven't been back." "Thanks." "Look, if you're right, if he's thrown in with that lot, you tell the old Bill and you go home, all right?" "There's some places in this city I wouldn't stick my nose in, and you're not me." "Not by a long chalk." "How come you're asking?" "You can't work here and not get interested." "Yeah, but why this?" "Why not a nice juicy murder for the lovely lady?" "No, thank you very much." "All right." "But you can't tell anyone." "A friend of mine gave me this." "Oooh." "This is bad." "I could have you for this." "It's not legit, is it?" "I mean, I knew it wasn't." "But how do they do it?" "Where does it come from?" "Because it looks just like a bottle of scent, but really it's a whole story behind it, isn't it?" "Well, I reckon you pretty much know where it came from." "Yeah, but the details." "I spend all day watching you lot." "How do you do it?" "How does it go from one bottle of scent to putting someone in prison?" "A lot of filing and paperwork." "You really interested in that?" "Yeah." "I can't let you see anything from ongoing cases." "No, I know." "Then again, a few old files can't hurt." "Cost you, though." "Cost me what?" "Dinner." "You can wear the scent if you like." "I spent all morning copying it out." "So it's gangs, basically, or families." "Usually they're families, and they bring in uncustomed goods either through the ports and cover up what they're doing, or the old-fashioned way, which is smaller boats dodging the coast guards and coming in through little village harbours." "And it's everything from cigarettes to nylons to booze." "Vice shut down one operation and another one springs up overnight." "Any of the active ones Maltese?" "Yeah." "There's one family that is definitely Maltese." "So September 1949 there were four men arrested for possession of uncustomed goods here." "Nikola Magro, Girgor Magro, Stiefnu Testa and Nunzju Rigos." "And then April 1951, there were two men arrested for trespass here." "Gabrijel Lupi and Lazzru Magro." "And then November 1951, there were three men arrested for possession of liquor without a licence here." "Lazzru Magro and two others." "Magro again." "Wherever you find Maltese crooks, that lot turn up." "Let's analyse the pattern of arrests, see if we can narrow it down." "That's all the arrests marked up." "Distribution's clustered in Soho, but extends as far as Wood Green." "It's pretty even." "It doesn't point to one centre of operations." "As patterns go, this isn't much of one." "It just says they like central London." "We need Susan for this." "Well, Susan's in Bombay." "Come on, it's signal flow, isn't it?" "London's just like a giant electrical circuit." "Input, output." "All these little lines and branches, like a wiring diagram." "What we need to do is trace where the signal wants to go." "What signal, exactly?" "Our Maltese friends." "A specific set of people, behaving in one specific way." "These places were chosen because they fit the signal flow of a group whose purpose is to distribute uncustomed goods." "So what does that suggest?" "I would imagine access." "Seclusion?" "Those are mutually exclusive, aren't they?" "How can you have access and seclusion in one?" "Millie, Millie, Millie." "What, what?" "Millie was doing the same thing." "'Let's go and have a dance and a good time.'" "And where do we go?" "A hotel." "Hotels are ideal." "Neutral ground meeting places and anonymity rolled into one." "Access and seclusion." "What if it's the same for the Magros?" "All the advantages of a base of operations, but if the police come by you can roll it all up and move on." "Well, it should be here." "Here we go." "September '49, arrest." "Lingrave Bed  Breakfast." "Not this one, not this one..." "April, Mulligan Lane Hotel." "This is the pattern." "So Millie's in a hotel somewhere." "We need to search all the hotels in London!" "These are all old cases." "What we need are some recent arrests with a hotel address." "Well, Lucy's seeing Ben tonight." "With me." "Where is my money?" "Where is it?" "I haven't the faintest idea." "If that's true, then we can part on good terms." "Is it true?" "Yes." "But how can I be sure?" "Jasper!" "Millie!" "It's not so bad." "A man loses some teeth, maybe an eye, he looks like a rogue, a pirate." "Almost romantic, don't you think?" "But for a woman it's not the same." "For a woman, a scar, well, that's not so romantic." "One of you is stealing from me." "Which one?" "Or maybe both." "Lazzru, cut her." "It was me." "It was me." "It was me." "I'm sorry." "Millie didn't know." "So where is my money?" "I can pay it." "I don't believe you can." "I can." "You're not the only supplier in London, you know." "I've got other interests... ..and sometimes I have to balance one side against the other." "I've got a big shipment coming in tomorrow." "I can collect that and you have your money." "And then some." "Well, you pay me what's mine, 'and then some', and then you take yourself far from here, as far as you can get so that I never have to see you again." "Stay with him until he collects the shipment." "Take Millie back to her room." "What?" "Marta, you can let her go." "It was nothing to do with her." "She's my guarantee." "I'll let her go when I get my money." "I'm sorry, Millie." "Thanks." "What do you reckon?" "It's nice." "Thanks." "You're welcome." "It's French." "How do you like the wine?" "Erm, I don't know." "I'm not sure how it's supposed to taste." "It's supposed to taste like this." "Oh, then it's nice, I suppose." "There you go." "Those files you showed me, about all the arrests and so on, I found it really exciting." "And I kept thinking about it." "So I went back and I had another look." "What do you fancy?" "Lemon sole...manure?" "Yeah." "It sounds lovely." "Anyway, so I was looking through and some cases had this funny foreign name." "It was Mag or Maggo." "Magro." "Yeah, that's it!" "Do you know the case?" "It's more than one case, I believe." "Are you investigating them?" "Cos there's a lot of files, and that same name keeps coming up." "Do you know where they're based?" "I can't really talk about active cases, remember?" "We shouldn't be talking about work." "It's bad luck." "Or if it's not, it should be." "I just wondered if you were tracking them down." "Look, black market, it happens all the time, ever since the war." "A few bottles of brandy and some stockings ain't going to bring down the government." "I joined Vice to catch real villains." "Anyway, let's order, I'm starving." "You speak a bit of English, don't you?" "You understand me?" "Please." "Please try." "Small." "I learn." "You're from Czechoslovakia." "You came here." "Why?" "Work." "A new life." "Marta..." "Did Marta help you get here?" "Uncustomed goods." "Like the Russian.." "'Friend'." "No, no, no." "I am no friend of Marta." "No friend of Marta." "Elishka..." "Mama." "Tata." "I don't understand." "Try it..." "Try it in your own language." "Like the Russian. 30." "Every 30 days." "Every month." "Girls." "The girls move to new hotels?" "Bad men." "'Window'." "This hotel is like a window." "I..." "The men?" "The men choose the girls." "And they pay." "Like a shop window." "You..." "You must run away." "No." "Why?" "Branka." "Branka?" "Your little sister." "She's coming here." "You..." "You told her to come here." "Next time she come." "Marta say we together." "You mean she's selling you together." "Selling..." "Yes." "Either he doesn't know or he doesn't want to talk about it." "I think he's embarrassed they haven't caught them." "They make the police look like idiots." "They've been caught plenty of times." "Maybe they can't get anything to stick." "They're always one step ahead." "By Tuesday morning it'll have been three days." "Let's meet at Millie's flat." "If she's not there, we'll go to the police and tell them everything." "Millie and Jasper, the Magros, the black market, everything." "Better she's in trouble with the law than with those people." "Where's Jasper?" "Calm down." "He's not here." "Then where is he?" "The business between Jasper and me is finished." "His shipment came in, he paid his debts, and he is a long way from here now." "Did you know about his other suppliers?" "This balancing one hand against the other?" "Were you part of that?" "No." "I had no idea what he was doing." "What was your arrangement with Jasper, then?" "I was his 'front of house' as he called it." "He could find buyers for the cigarettes but not the perfume and nylons." "That was me." "I took my cut, we were doing well." "We trebled orders in the last three months." "As you probably know." "I had no idea Jasper wasn't paying what he owed." "Interesting." "Let's leave Jasper aside, shall we?" "Which leaves you." "What shall I do with you?" "Me?" "Yes, you." "You need someone who knows the business as well as Jasper, but who isn't cheating you." "True." "And you would like to work for me?" "For me, not for someone in between?" "I think that would be an excellent idea." "Do you?" "Or are you telling me what you think I want to hear?" "Jasper never found the high-paying clients." "I did - while he took most of the profits." "My filling his shoes wouldn't just be good for you, it'd good for me too." "Fair enough." "I think you can do well." "Good." "Well, let's see how we get on, shall we?" "The same amount of merchandise as usual?" "Actually..." "..I'm sure I can do rather better." "Really?" "With my contacts and direct access to your stock," "I'm certain I can open doors Jasper could only dream of." "Let's discuss real amounts, not fairy tales." "How much are you talking about?" "Half as much again." "Easily." "Very well." "I'll arrange it." "If I need to see you again, do I come here?" "Where are we, by the way?" "Not here, sweetheart." "There is a Greek restaurant on Stovington Road." "Come there any morning." "Lazzru." "I'm leaving." "I go." "Help me." "Branka, please." "No talking!" "Come on." "Wait." "Lazzru." "If we're going to be working together, we need to be friends, don't you think?" "Maybe you're right." "I can be your friend." "No, no!" "Or maybe I should come and find you at night, when you're asleep." "And be friendly then." "Would you like that?" "Would you like that?" "!" "Oh, I think you would." "Or perhaps you should just shut your stupid mouth and do as you're told." "Millie..." "Millie!" "Thank God." "We were so worried." "What happened?" "Where were you?" "Meeting some new friends." "Maltese friends?" "So you know?" "We had to." "We were trying to find you." "Why didn't you tell us what you were doing?" "Because I knew you wouldn't approve." "You're right." "How could you be so stupid?" "I know I've been a bloody idiot." "I don't need you to tell me." "I'm sorry." "I'm sorry you had to find out." "I'm sorry..." "What happened?" "Are you all right?" "Yes." "Yes, I am." "I'm all right." "I'm lucky." "Millie...what's going on?" "What did they do?" "Nothing." "Not to me." "I've been such a fool." "It was just stockings and perfume." "A sideline." "And then it became a way to pay the bills and when I got blacklisted I didn't have anything else." "Before you know it you're..." "Where did they take you?" "I don't know." "They were very careful." "You're safe now." "You never have to see those people again." "Come on." "Let's tidy this mess up." "I know you need money for bills and we'll find a way." "But this nonsense ends here." "It's not quite that simple." "It isn't just ciggies and perfume and nylons." "There are people." "What people?" "Girls." "There were seven that I saw." "There could have been more." "Their parents pay to get them out from behind the Iron Curtain, and Marta and her family make it happen." "They bring them here, to a kind of holding pen." "A cattle market, I suppose you'd call it." "They think they've got themselves jobs as chambermaids but actually they're being marked up and bid on by the men who come as guests." "And then when they've told their families that they're safe and well, they're passed on to their pimps." "The parents are paying her to sell their daughters." "It's..." "It's very clever." "How did you find out?" "One of the girls talked to me." "She didn't have much English but we got there in the end." "She's already convinced her sister to join her and it's too late to warn her off." "So she's staying put." "They'll both be sold off together." "What about Jasper?" "He paid them off and they let him run for the hills." "Jasper wasn't in a position to pay anyone off." "He had some big deal coming through." "Millie, all Jasper had was his gambling debts." "We spoke to his bookie." "I don't think there was any big deal coming in." "She said he'd paid his debts." "Jasper!" "Jasper, it's me!" "Get away." "Get back." "Don't go in there." "Don't!" "It's OK." "All we need is a Type X. Is there someone at SOE you can ask?" "I know where there might be some." "Bletchley." "Consignment, delivery or handing over." "That's it." "Keep going, keep going." "She's completely new here." "Completely new." "Perfect." "Careful!"