by Jo Bannister
‘Bloody hell,’ said Charlie tersely.
They hadn’t considered the possibility of something happening which would both prevent the raid and stop Gates warning them. Had some beat copper with his eye on a stripe used his initiative and stopped the small man in white overalls loitering outside the electrical store? Had Gates stepped back for a clearer view up the road and missed seeing a speeding van? Donovan thought he glimpsed blood splashed on the kerb.
‘Slow down,’ said Charlie, ‘and keep going.’
There must have been a dozen people clustered outside the shop: men in suits, a couple of office cleaners and some schoolboys, craning forward and jostling as if something exciting had happened. Donovan could see nothing through the crush of them – no pointy hats, no white overalls – but if he’d been intending to drive through the window he couldn’t have done it without killing someone.
Charlie reached across the girl and gave the wheel a fierce shake. ‘Slow down, you stupid sod! You want them looking at us instead? Something’s gone wrong, we’ll work out what later. Slow down, stay calm, get back on the by-pass, and when you’re sure we’re not being followed head for the cottage. There’s no need to panic – you haven’t frigging done anything yet!’
The moment when he might have done something had passed along with the telegraph pole. When he turned down the first side-street there was no sign of Gates’s car. He made himself breathe again, eased the 4x4 back to a sensible speed; after a moment he fumbled the light-switch off. He didn’t want anyone noticing now. ‘What do you reckon went wrong?’
Charlie was still watching him mistrustfully. ‘Anything – nothing – we’ll hear soon enough. The main thing that went wrong was that you damn near blew it. I thought you said you’d done this before?’
Donovan’s embarrassed shrug was by no means fabricated. ‘I have, so. It’s this business of looking out for people who may or may not be there that’s new to me.’
There was no pursuit. He took the scenic route to be sure and reached the cottage around seven-thirty. The run-about was already in the yard.
Andy was in the kitchen. There was no sign of Gates.
‘Well?’ demanded Charlie.
The boy’s delicate features twisted in disgust and something else which Donovan couldn’t put a name to. ‘The stupid bloody dog, wasn’t it? Tudor would bring it with us. He tried to leave it in the car, it went to follow him and he shut the door on its foot.’
There was quite a long silence. Then Charlie said, not in a critical tone, more as if he wasn’t sure he’d got it right, ‘You mean, we scrubbed a job worth thousands of pounds because the dog caught its foot in the car door?’
Andy nodded, the fair hair flopping over his brow. There was a sort of grim amusement in his voice. ‘There was blood everywhere. The dog was screaming, Tudor was crying, we were drawing a bigger crowd than a three-ring circus. All I could think of was to shovel them both back in the car and go looking for a vet. Tudor wouldn’t leave the dog so I came on to tell you what happened. I’m going back in a couple of hours to pick them up.’
Charlie sighed. ‘I can see the coach’d be upset. Still …’
‘Stupid bloody dog,’ Andy said again. Then Donovan realized what the odd inflection was. It was jealousy.
Donovan went outside and stood by the cars sucking fresh air deep into his lungs. He was thinking of those police officers who spent half their lives in this sort of situation, under cover, associating with people who’d crucify them if they found out. Donovan had been doing it for less than a day, risking not much more than a severe talking-to, and already he’d nearly blown it. He looked at the wood and wondered again about Plan B.
Fear of failure stopped him going. This was his idea, Shapiro went along because he said he could make it work. Circumstances beyond his control were one thing, if it got dangerous he’d cut and run with a clear conscience; but nothing had happened. He was in. Charlie was worried about his competence, not his bona fides. If he quit now there’d be no more chances. If he couldn’t handle this he was just another small-town policeman and before long people would start expecting him to behave like one.
Donovan had always fancied his chances at undercover work. He looked the part, sounded it; he even moved like someone who was up to no good. But you also needed nerve to stay in deep cover when every instinct was telling you to up and run. Donovan had thought he had that, too; until that moment late on Monday night when he delved deep into his reserves of courage and suddenly, unexpectedly, hit rock bottom.
The shock of that was as real now, as incredible and yet unavoidable, as in the instant when he froze on top of the Mile End Hill. He still couldn’t believe he’d lost it so abruptly, so comprehensively. He could still taste the bone-sucking horror, the numb panic – he was going to die, he couldn’t help himself, and he wasn’t ready! In a moment the blithe assumption that he could take whatever fate dealt him, if not with equanimity at least with self-command, fell to dust. Fear unmanned him. If he wanted to go on doing this job he had to deal with it, and the only way he knew was head on. More hung on this than merely making an arrest. If he couldn’t bridle his nerve now he’d have to rethink his entire career. He turned back to the cottage.
Patsy was standing at the kitchen door. He went to walk round her but she moved too, blocking his way.
‘What?’
Her eyes searched his. She barely came up to his shoulder but she stood close, peering into his face. He could feel her scrutiny like claws in his skin. Her brows, almost colourless, were drawn together by the intensity of her stare. Behind her eyes there was a tense uncertainty, as if she knew something was wrong and didn’t quite know what. Donovan didn’t dare look away. He thought there was still a chance he could brazen it out. He said again, impatiently, ‘What?’
But as they stood toe to toe he saw the cores of her eyes change, the queries harden to exclamation marks as suspicion grew to conviction and the implications began to dawn on her. Her voice vibrated with accusation. ‘You were on the train!’
Chapter Sixteen
Shapiro wondered if he should make an announcement about Liz’s return, decided she’d resent the fuss. In retrospect, though, he wished he had. A word of warning to the Monday morning shift and the first thing she heard as she came up the back steps need not have been an argument between two constables as to whether she should resign.
DC Morgan was not an argumentative man. He came from the same fenland stock as Sergeant Tulliver, shared with him the native’s peaty vowels and morose expression. People tended to ask what he was worrying about when he wasn’t worried at all. He was an easygoing man who made sure of being good enough at his job but not so good that his superiors got any ideas about promoting him.
Another fenland trait that waxed strong in him was a clannish loyalty. He could be roused to a fierce protectiveness by an attack on his own.
It was a measure of Liz’s success that she’d come into this insular community and within two years had its native sons considering her one of them. Her career had been an odd mixture of fighting for acceptance where it should have been automatic and finding friendship in unlikely places.
Morgan said gruffly, ‘That’s like saying anyone who gets his ribs kicked in had better quit because people know he can be beat. ’Course they bloody do. Nobody ever mistook me for Superman, never once, no more than they took you for Wonder Woman, Cathy Flynn! It isn’t necessary, or even desirable, that they should. We need their support more than their adulation.’ This may have been the longest statement ever volunteered by DC Morgan.
‘That’s easy for you to say, Dick Morgan,’ snapped WPC Flynn, who was sufficiently ashamed of her performance the previous morning to be on the defensive. ‘It’s not you that’s taking stick over it. Last time Donovan got himself pulped, did anyone put up witty posters about it? They did not. It’s because she’s a woman, and the attack a sexual one, that the men of this town think it’s funny. As long as they know one
of us was raped and don’t know who, every policewoman in town is going to be fair game. If it was me I’d want a transfer: a fresh start somewhere it wasn’t common knowledge. In everyone’s interests.’
When no one replied, for a moment she thought she’d convinced them. Then she sensed Liz standing behind her and spun in a startled flurry of embarrassment.
‘But mainly,’ Liz said quietly, ‘in the interests of those who can’t deal with a bad joke without thinking it means the end of law enforcement as we know it.’
She didn’t often pull rank on junior officers; she didn’t often have to. She expected, and got, the respect of those ranked both below and above her. It had taken Queen’s Street a little time to get used to the idea of a woman DI – a lot of sentences petered out in hums, hahs, mumbles and coughs until she specified, calmly but firmly, that the feminine form of Sir was Ma’am and the more they said it the easier it would come. Now they knew one another better she allowed some latitude – Donovan invariably called her Boss, which was meant as a compliment, and Guv was an institution among detectives. But it didn’t extend to permitting a WPC who was reduced to hysterics by the sight of a pair of bloomers telling her where to work.
Flynn blushed scarlet. ‘Sorry, ma’am. We weren’t—’
‘Expecting me? So I gather. You should know by now, I enjoy surprising people. And just for the record, I’m not going anywhere. Anyone who finds me an embarrassment had better learn to live with it.’
Half-way upstairs she heard a quick, heavy tread and Morgan fell into step behind her. He sounded contrite. ‘Sorry, ma’am. We shouldn’t even have been discussing it.’
Liz turned to face him. ‘You weren’t discussing it. You were doing what I expect of you – backing my judgement.’ She flicked him a little grin in case he didn’t know it was a joke. ‘I like that line about needing support more than adulation. I must remember that, it’ll look good in a report sometime.’
‘Well, don’t use it in front of the chief – I pinched it off him in the first place,’ Morgan admitted. Chuckling, they climbed the last flight.
Liz barely had her diary out when Shapiro joined her, and by then he’d already spoken to Morgan. ‘Well, that didn’t take long.’
She gazed at him levelly. ‘No; and it really upset me too. See that? I’m quivering like a jelly.’ The hand she held out was steady as a rock.
Shapiro sniffed. ‘Am I over-doing the Caring Workplace bit?’
She smiled. ‘Just a smidgin.’
He nodded. ‘So what are you doing today?’
Liz tapped her diary with a forefinger. ‘I’m in the Crown Court at some point. Sharon Burke’s applying for bail.’
‘I could do that.’
‘You could blow my nose for me as well, Frank, but I wouldn’t thank you for that either. I want to do Burke because we’ve a better chance of keeping her in custody if I do. If you go it’ll look like a big bad policeman oppressing a poor defenceless woman. If I do it, it won’t.’
‘Who’s sitting?’
‘Cushy Carnahan, he’s a soft touch for a female defendant at the best of times. By the time Dan Fenton’s piled on the agony about how this poor woman was bullied for most of her married life and only retaliated when she felt to be in mortal danger, he’ll have lost sight of the fact that she drugged her husband’s cocoa and set fire to his bed when he was too groggy to leave it. I’ll remind him. I’ll also remind him that she was arrested boarding a Channel ferry with her Italian toy-boy and her husband’s nest-egg.’
‘I take it you’ve not got a lot of sympathy for the notion of delayed self-defence, then.’
The look she gave him was scathing. ‘Self-defence is when you have your back to the wall and no alternative. If Burke couldn’t stop her setting fire to his pyjamas he also couldn’t stop her packing her bags and starting a new life with the Latin lover of her choice. She didn’t have to kill him. And if she gets bail we’ll never see her again. I wonder if Mr Fenton’s thought that if he’s good today his fee may go on gondola rides?’ Liz closed her diary and sat back. ‘What else is new? Any progress on the rapes?’
He wished he had something to tell her. ‘Not yet. I’ve got Scobie visiting known offenders but nobody’s in the frame yet and to be honest the MO doesn’t sound like any of our local perverts.’
Liz shook her head. ‘I don’t think this man’s on record. Anywhere. I think it’s something new with him. More than anyone else, sex offenders stick to a pattern, as if the pattern’s more important than the sex. If a rapist had been targeting blonde middle-aged women anywhere in the country we’d know about it by now.’
‘What’s the alternative? That he’s tried squash and golf and now he’s taken up rape?’ Shapiro wouldn’t have joked about it, however wryly, with anyone else. But Liz was a colleague before she was a victim, and he’d already been warned about tip-toeing round her.
She grinned – a shade rueful but a definite grin. ‘There’s a first time for everything. Maybe he’s just a beginner.’
Shapiro dropped his gaze apologetically. ‘Sorry to get personal but you’re the best witness we have. Would you say he was a youngster – a bit of a novice?’
She wasn’t offended. She thought for a moment but had no doubts about the answer. ‘Actually, no. He knew what he was doing. He wasn’t a big man – I’ve told you all this, haven’t I? – but there was a confidence about him. He didn’t get violent because he didn’t have to: he had surprise on his side. He knew what he wanted, he wasted no time, he took it and then he left. Like a military operation. To me that doesn’t seem like a kid still coming to terms with his sexuality. I got the feeling – no more than that. But it was a definite feeling – of someone about my age.’
‘Old as that, eh?’ Shapiro murmured sardonically.
‘You know what I mean – past the first flush of youthful indiscretion, still this side of senility.’
‘What about a psychiatric case?’
‘No,’ she said immediately, with a certainty she could not have explained. ‘No, he was in control all right. Control was what it was all about.’
Shapiro nodded slowly. Then he looked at her. ‘I will get him, you know. Whatever it takes. If the DNA’s good enough I’ll go for a mass screening.’
The hiss as she caught her breath was sharp enough to hear. ‘Hell, Frank, I don’t know if that’s a good idea.’
‘There’s precedent.’
‘Yes, but not all good. You can’t supervise big numbers with total accuracy. Remember the time the culprit persuaded a friend to give a sample in his name? – confused the whole investigation.’
‘So we’re careful,’ said Shapiro doggedly. ‘And we could limit the numbers, if you’re sure about his age. Men between thirty and fifty, say, excluding those above fourteen stone. He’d be in that group.’
‘So would most of Queen’s Street. So would Brian!’
‘And most of Queen’s Street, and Brian, would gladly give a blood sample to eliminate themselves from the inquiry. So will most other men. Then we take a closer look at the ones who don’t– who’re too busy, or too squeamish, or away on holiday – whatever.’
She stared at him, impressed and appalled in equal measure. ‘Have you any idea the man-hours you’d be getting into? You’re talking of expenditure in excess of one hundred thousand pounds. You’ll never get it approved.’
He raised one eyebrow. ‘Have you any idea how stubborn I can be if the need arises?’
She had. She thought he could probably make it happen if he wanted it enough. ‘There’s a civil liberties aspect to this.’
‘We’re giving men the opportunity to clear themselves,’ he said shortly. ‘Where’s the infringement of liberty in that? Besides, rape is a civil liberties issue.’
‘Tell me about it.’ For perhaps a minute Liz said nothing more; but Shapiro could see her thinking and knew the conversation wasn’t over. Then she said, ‘It’s too big a sledge-hammer.’
‘Three r
apes inside three weeks is no nut!’
‘It isn’t Armageddon either. This is our town, Frank, I don’t want to see it split. Making people take sides on this is too high a price even for catching a rapist.’
‘We should wait for him to do it again? Or we could tell women to stay off the streets unless they travel in packs. Do you like what that’ll do to the town?’
‘Frank, I don’t like any of this,’ she said forcibly. ‘But I don’t think all-out war on half the population is the answer. Damn it, neither did you before Friday! I think the answer is detective work.’
‘I have nothing to go on!’ exclaimed Shapiro, bitter with frustration. ‘The DNA’ll help us put him away if we get him, but screening is the only way it’ll help us find him.’
‘What about a TV appeal? I doubt we’ll persuade him to give himself up but we might reach someone who knows him. Women friends in particular might be anxious enough about their own safety to pick up the phone. We’ll need a confidential line, this is too delicate to expect them to talk to an officer.
‘But if we stress that we’re just asking for ideas at this point, that we expect to get dozens of names and clear most of them right away, maybe women who’ve felt uneasy about a date will get to wondering and call us. After we’ve eliminated the improbables you could ask the others for blood samples.’
Shapiro had to concede she was right. Mass screening a town the size of Castlemere would be a logistical nightmare. It was a last resort, they weren’t that desperate yet. He hadn’t considered it after the rape of Mrs Andrews. He’d have to watch that. If Liz could keep the thing in perspective he had no excuse for not doing.
‘Yes, all right, I’ll see what I can set up. God, I hate going on telly!’
‘Maybe I should do it,’ said Liz.
Shapiro looked at her quickly but couldn’t be quite sure that she was joking. He gave a disapproving sniff. ‘You concentrate on keeping Sharon Burke behind bars. And catching my ram-raiders. I don’t wish to gloat,’ he added untruthfully, ‘but it is the Tynesiders: Donovan made contact.’