“Your guess is as good as mine,” said Greg. “I wasn’t here at the time it happened. I was up in Eastvale. My last visit, as it turned out, though I didn’t know that at the time. The county line just went dead. When I got back to the city and went round to the center back in Seacroft, there were two blokes I didn’t know, and they wanted the money I’d collected on the shipment. Foreign accents. In the end I just gave them it and bunked off. Never went back. I was wanting out, anyway. My girlfriend didn’t approve of the line of work, and I have to say, the foreign blokes scared me a bit. And the place was empty. It looked like they were moving somewhere else to run their operations. Then word got out that Lenny was dead. But not how. Lenny wasn’t so bad. He paid well. He’d had a tough life.”

“Tough death, too, by the sound of it,” said Banks. “So what did you do next?”

“Got busted, then released pending charges. It was my chance to get away, break free from the life, and I haven’t looked back.”

“So who took over? You mentioned strangers with foreign accents.”

“Word has it there’s this Albanian cunt in charge, interested in going county, and the blokes I saw were part of his crew. I don’t know the big guy’s name, but I think he stood in the background all the time I was there. In the shadows. Only saw him that once, all smiles, expensive suit, but you could tell, you know, that he was a vicious cold bastard underneath it all. He wasn’t a big bloke, not threatening in that way at all. But he had a cruel mouth. And nasty eyes. Really nasty eyes.”

“Leka Gashi,” said Blackstone. “We worked that out, but we’ve no evidence. Of course, he was out of the country at the time the crime was committed. He doesn’t usually do these jobs himself, though I’ve heard he’s not averse to administering a bit of punishment when the occasion merits it.”

Banks turned back to Greg. “How long were you operating up in Eastvale?”

“On and off for about a year.”

“How many lines was Lenny G running?”

“About six. All roughly the same distance as Eastvale. Different directions, like. Furthest was out on the coast. Runswick Bay.”

“That’s a tiny place,” said Banks.

Greg shrugged. “What can I say? There are markets for that shit everywhere. And I know you won’t believe me when I say it, but I never actually touched the stuff myself. A few joints, maybe, booze, yeah, but never the hard stuff. Heroin. Crack. Never.”