by Peter Helton
Then he saw it coming, long before the fleeing driver did: a sharp, almost right-angled corner, marked by three cat’s-eyed poles. McLusky braked hard, dipped his lights and wrestled his car to a stop just in time to watch it happen.
By the time the other driver reacted it was already too late. He stood on the brakes, locking the wheels. From that moment on he was just another passenger: locked wheels don’t slow down. Unstoppable, the old Golf skidded, turning to the right until it arrived at the corner sideways. Its nearside wheels briefly dipped into the ditch before the car flipped over and flew through the hedge. It disappeared in a cloud of leaves, dust and smoke on the other side.
McLusky pulled forward around the corner beyond the scene of the accident and got out. A few yards further on he vaulted a five-bar gate into the field that the hedge was protecting.
The car was lying on its roof. The single headlight still miraculously burnt in the crumpled front. Both doors were open, the occupants had disappeared into the dark. McLusky stood for a moment by the ticking, hissing wreck and listened. Nothing. He stuck his head in at the door of the upside-down car. Even through the reek of burnt rubber and spilled petrol the aroma of cannabis was strong. He inhaled deeply. McLusky hated drugs. But he simply loved the smell. Just as he flipped open his mobile to report the crash the lonely police siren reappeared, getting stronger. He folded his mobile and climbed back into the road. The patrol car soon approached and stopped at the black tyre marks.
PC Oscar Weisz didn’t let the mere absence of any car put him off, he knew an RTA site when he saw one, having attended enough Road Traffic Accidents in his six years of rural policing. He got out of his car to investigate. As he rounded the corner he encountered McLusky who by now had managed to hide his blue beacon under the driver seat and held his warrant card out to the searching beam of the PC’s torch.
‘DI McLusky. I was on my way home when I heard the crash. Car’s on the other side. No sign of the occupants. Did you want them?’
‘They were driving like idiots and with one headlight missing. Wouldn’t stop for me.’
‘Stopped now. I could smell weed and I thought I could smell booze as well.’
‘That figures,’ said PC Weisz who thought he could also smell drink.
‘Well, it’s all yours. I doubt you’ll find them without air support. Have a good shift.’ McLusky got into his car and with a screech of the engine disappeared down the lane.
The PC watched him drive away. He could have sworn he’d seen blue emergency lights earlier but he had called it in and been told there was no one doing a blue-light run in his area.
DI McLusky. So that’s what he looked like. Well, if you asked him, that man needed a shave and a haircut. And perhaps a change of clothes. He smelled like an ashtray.
7.31 a.m. One minute after his alarm went off McLusky lit the ancient gas boiler in the bathroom, waited for the water to warm up then squeezed himself under the shower. This consisted of a drooping plastic shower head connected via a plastic tube and rubber cups to the hot and cold taps on the roll-top bath. He had become quite adept in getting the mixture right but one or the other connector not infrequently slipped off its tap, resulting in scalded feet and icy shocks to the body, or vice versa. Either was apt to wake a hungover DI in the morning but McLusky found that even the anticipation of water torture was enough to keep him alert.
Not that McLusky needed alerting this morning. Today the decision of the disciplinary board would be made known to him at a nine o’clock meeting with Superintendent Denkhaus at Albany Road station. Not since he had first walked through the doors at police college had a day felt so momentous. Back then he had felt positive, elated even, now he felt gloomily at the mercy of forces beyond his control.
He managed his ablutions without mishap, shaved without cutting himself. For the inquiry itself he had dressed conservatively and had felt like a delinquent wearing a borrowed suit at a trial. To McLusky nothing shouted ‘liar’ louder than an ill-fitting suit worn purely for show but he had been ‘strongly advised’ to wear one when up in front of the board.
Today he dressed less formally: chinos, black shoes and socks, slate grey shirt and black leather jacket. No tie. His only concession was the shirt. The board had made its recommendation, all decisions had been taken; how he dressed today made little difference. The important thing was not to feel like an idiot when he got out of the superintendent’s office, whichever way it went. The mirror above the bathroom sink was the only one in the house. It was still steamed up. McLusky couldn’t be bothered to wipe off the condensation just to catch a partial view of himself. Pretty enough for the super, he presumed.
Outside it was unnaturally mild again. He didn’t wear the leather jacket for warmth. It was more a place to stow some of the gubbins that a uniformed officer would hang from his stab vest or service belt: radio, mobile, pepper spray, notebook, as well as things like warrant card, cigarettes and lighter. It might also make him feel less naked under Superintendent Denkhaus’ lizard stare.
When he opened the Mazda’s door even to him the smell seemed unhealthy. Last night he had kidded himself that he had brushed most of the ash and cigarette ends out of the front but in the bright light of this morning it looked appalling. He checked the time: nothing he could do about it now. He found an old edition of the Bristol Herald among the mess on the back seats and sat on that. He hoped the print would not come off on to the back of his trousers. Traffic was curiously light as though conspiring to hasten him towards his doom. This morning he would have welcomed gridlock.
Oh, grow up. That’s what Laura would say. Would have said. Frequently had said. Before she dumped him. Since his short and disastrous fling with Louise Rennie he found he thought even more about Laura than before, certainly more than he did about Dr Rennie. Hardly surprising, when he had spent three years living and quarrelling with Laura in Southampton, while he had seen Rennie no more than a dozen times. And now Laura was here, in Bristol somewhere, as a mature student, of all things. He was in his thirties now and ought to feel grown up, take what life threw at him calmly and competently, but somehow that plateau of serenity still seemed a far-off prospect. If he were a truly grown-up person, he thought morosely, he would have stayed home and sober last night, not got drunk and hared around the countryside in a clapped-out motor that smelled like a cremation.
A quarter to nine, perfect timing. Not so late that he had to rush, not so early that he had to hang around chewing his nails. His parking space was still there. Good omen or an oversight on the part of management? He insinuated his car into the narrow space and left it there with the windows wide open to air it. If your car wasn’t safe in the police car park, then where was it?
Albany Road police station was a crumbling cube of 1970s concrete not far from the harbour. Its architect had not imagined it to age gracefully. He had seen it as disposable, expecting it to turn overnight into instant junk around the year 2000, which it duly had. Instead of pulling it down and replacing it, however, the powers-that-be had ‘refurbished’ it. It had happened before McLusky’s arrival and he suspected rightly that refurbishment had meant a lick of paint and change of furniture, not rewiring or updating the plumbing. And naturally there was still no air conditioning.
Sergeant Hayes greeted him casually as he passed the lobby, as though the detective had been away for no more than a weekend. Upstairs he walked swiftly and with a brief nod past the windows of the CID room, not waiting for a response.
DS Sorbie looked up as McLusky passed. So today was the day. Fingers crossed and with any luck he’d be rid of McLusky before the day was out. The man was a menace, to Sorbie’s career as well as in general. He’d blasted a suspect’s car with a sawn-off shotgun and when it crashed simply walked off to have a quiet ciggie. That ought to be enough to get anyone thrown off the force; people had lost their jobs for much less. And in the current climate … Sorbie briefly crossed his fingers, then returned to the report he was reading.
At the end of the corridor McLusky opened the door to his tiny office with a certain amount of trepidation. He hadn’t really expected to find someone else working behind his desk but in his worst-scenario imaginings the door had been locked or his office emptied. He found all as he had left it: two chairs, one in front, one behind the desk, a couple of gunmetal grey filing cabinets and a grey metal waste bin. It had the dimensions of a broom cupboard and just enough floor space for him to get behind the desk. He looked at it all with something approaching fondness. What he liked most about his office was the fact that the window faced towards the back, the drab service area of the station, affording him a view of the delivery ramp and the wheelie-bins. It allowed him to sit in the window, precariously balanced on the sill, unobserved by his colleagues. McLusky was convinced that it was easier to think that way. His DS, James ‘Jane’ Austin, was convinced that one day McLusky was going to nod off and fall into the wheelie bins below.
Five minutes to go. Denkhaus had a habit of keeping his underlings waiting outside his office in the presence of his steel-eyed secretary so McLusky had honed his skill in arriving upstairs exactly at the appointed hour, thereby cutting down on waiting time. He opened the window and lit a cigarette – strictly against regulations – and smoked greedily. He really was nervous. The suspension had allowed him plenty of time to realize just how important his work had become to him. He had also asked himself often enough why, if it was that important, he was seemingly incapable of playing it straight, of sticking to the rules? Ninety seconds to go. He flicked the cigarette through the open window and set off towards the superintendent’s office. He hoped that when he got there nobody asked him that very question since he had found no real answer. He admitted to himself that he was too disorganized. Secretly he suspected that he didn’t fully fit into a grown-up world.
He entered the outer office precisely on time. Lynn Tiery, the secretary, acknowledged this fact with a brief glance at the electric clock on the wall and announced his arrival to the superintendent on the old-fashioned intercom. McLusky had no time to sit. ‘Send him in,’ the super’s voice squawked back from the plastic loudspeaker.
McLusky had expected there to be several people but he found Superintendent Denkhaus alone in his large and minimalist office. He noticed that the usually bare windowsill had now acquired an unhappy-looking cheese plant with a minimal amount of leaves. Denkhaus was seated at his desk, framed by the window behind him. Sun glittered on slivers of the harbour waters, visible here and there between the crowded buildings. McLusky was not asked to sit down so stood, fighting the urge to hide his hands in his pockets; instead he linked them as though in prayer. When he felt the irresistible urge to twiddle his thumbs he clasped his hands behind his back instead.
Denkhaus took a theatrical minute to peruse a pile of papers in front of him, then looked up.
‘DI McLusky, I’ll try and make this as short and as painless as I can. Naturally there ought to be a representative of the board present but he was taken ill. I don’t see any point in postponing this meeting so we will proceed without him. The board has mysteriously accepted your explanation that you were only carrying the shotgun because you felt it was unsafe to leave it in your car and that you aimed the shots at the tyres of the approaching vehicle to stop it from running you down in the narrow lane. The board is not normally given to flights of fancy but there we are.’ He sighed. ‘Of course it was not simply the matter of unauthorized gun use but several other breaches of the Police and Criminal Evidence act regarding unauthorized surveillance and false imprisonment that earned you a lengthy suspension. The false imprisonment matter resolved itself when the suspect in question was persuaded to withdraw his complaint.’ Denkhaus breathed in deeply. ‘By me.’ He allowed himself another dramatic pause during which he focused unblinkingly on the troublesome inspector. He gave a grunt as though articulating the next sentence gave him physical pain. ‘You have been reinstated with immediate effect and will resume your duties. However—’ he let the gold fountain pen he had been holding drop on top of the file and leant back in his chair – ‘I have several things to add. One: you can expect to be invited to attend refresher courses on PACE and other aspects of policing soon, together with similarly forgetful officers from around the county. Two: and I want you to listen very carefully to this—’ he dropped his voice as though fearing a listener at the door – ‘the slightest misdemeanour or anything at all unorthodox and you’ll be out on your ear. I’ll make certain of that. Any questions?’
‘No, sir.’
Denkhaus’ voice returned to normal amplification. ‘Then carry on, get yourself up to speed. Oh, and for the time being you’ll report directly to me.’ Denkhaus observed just the tiniest movement of McLusky’s eyebrows and sighed impatiently. ‘Not because of any chicanery on my part but because DCI Gaunt is off sick. He … suffered an accident while on compassionate leave.’
‘What kind of accident?’ McLusky came alive. Not many people at Albany Road would shed a tear if the chief inspector took his time recovering.
The superintendent shifted his bulk in his seat and pretended to busy himself with McLusky’s file again. ‘Ah, er … an automotive accident, I believe. That is all, DI McLusky.’
Back in his own office McLusky logged on to the network, opened and shut drawers on his desk. His office had been unlocked all these weeks and pilfering was not unheard of at Albany Road. Yet it all seemed to be here, including his tiny travelling kettle, half a bottle of Glenmorangie and a couple of glasses pinched from the canteen, as well as a backlog of unreturned and unwashed coffee cups and saucers. He’d smuggle those downstairs later. Right now he needed to get himself up to speed, find DS Austin and get himself a mug of coffee, in reverse order. He found Austin clacking away at his keyboard in the CID room. The DS looked up apprehensively, trying to read the inspector’s face. He read it correctly and smiled with relief.
McLusky checked the kettle for water and flicked it on. ‘I’ll need you to bring me up to speed quickly, Jane. I’m making coffee, want one?’
DS Sorbie had stopped reading and sat staring unseeing at his computer screen. Unbelievable. It didn’t stick. That man had to be Teflon-coated. How had he got away with it again? If he, Sorbie, or DI Fairfield, say, had kept a stolen shotgun in their car and blazed away at a suspect with it he’d fully expect them to end up in court. He looked around the room. Even DC Dearlove stopped eating crisps long enough to congratulate McLusky on his reinstatement and DS French was smiling at him. French hadn’t smiled for years.
McLusky carried the mugs, Austin the files. In the inspector’s office they sat either side of the twelve-inch tower of CPS papers and case files and blew on their instant coffees. The radiator under the window had been designed for a much larger office, which meant it was very warm in the room, despite the open window.
‘How bad was it?’ Austin wanted to know.
‘Surprisingly painless. Compared with the grilling I got during the inquiry it was nothing at all. He’ll be sending me to a refresher on PACE, together with other miscreants. And he did warn me he’ll be keeping an eye on me.’
‘He always has for some reason.’
‘I know. Probably because he distrusts university graduates. But this time I think it might actually mean spyholes in ceilings.’ He couldn’t help looking up towards the yellowing ceiling tiles. ‘So what’s been happening?’
‘Not a lot while you were away, strangely enough. And you know what that means.’
‘Yes. You haven’t noticed yet whatever it is the bastards are up to.’
‘Aye, that’ll be it. I’ve been working on these from where you left off—’ Austin patted the files on the desk – ‘initially with DCI Gaunt but he’s off sick.’
‘Car accident was it? Denkhaus said something like that.’
‘Is that what he told you? I heard different. Gaunt went up north on compassionate leave because his father had died. And while he was there broke seve
ral bones in a go-carting accident.’
‘Go-carting? That’s one way to distract yourself from your grief.’
‘Rumour has it he’ll be out of action for weeks. I call that a result.’
‘OK, I’ll dive into some of these then.’ McLusky pulled a few inches of the pile towards himself. ‘Any of these you don’t want to part with speak now.’
‘Lord, no, you go ahead and dive.’
‘Anything else around here I ought to know about?’
Austin scratched the tip of his nose while he gave it some thought. ‘Nothing earth shattering. The drinks machine now dispenses only mushroom soup. Or mushroom flavour soup, to be precise. DC Dearlove is devastated. I think he only comes in for the soup, he’s on at least six a day. Chicken was his favourite.’
‘He’ll want counselling, next.’
Austin cranked up his usually mild Edinburgh accent. ‘Och aye, if you ask me he could do with some of that anyway. Then you’ll have noticed the heating is still on full despite the unnaturally warm spring. Apparently it’ll take an act of parliament to turn it off before the usual date, whatever the weather and never mind the cuts. Naturally it’ll snow the day they do turn it off. Apart from that, a few muggings, suspicious car fires and two stabbings outside the Dakota Club, nothing fatal. Oh yeah, and the odd riot in Stokes Croft.’
‘I did notice. I live round the corner, remember?’ McLusky got up and yanked open drawers on the filing cabinets. ‘Half of my files are still missing, purloined by the enquiry. I wonder how long they’ll sit on those with their big overpaid arses.’ The phone on his desk rang. He ignored it for half a minute while he flicked through the files, trying to get an idea of what was there and what wasn’t. ‘Answer that, will you?’