monotones. I could see Sparky through the window. When he caught my eye I made a 'two teas' gesture to him.
He nodded and went over to the kettle.
'Poor kid, what happened?' I asked.
Maggie sat back in her chair and looked at me. 'Have a guess,' she invited.
'You don't mean… injecting?'
She nodded.
After a while I said: 'Jesus Christ, we're living in a cesspit.'
Tea and work are my recipe for survival. We drank our tea and I off-loaded the armed robbery on to Tony Willis. Then I took Maggie to have a word with Julie Simpson's parents.
They lived in a respectable house just off one of the big estates. It was probably a council house which they had purchased. The garden was tidy and several alterations had been made to the outside. They were both at home. Julie had complained of pains in her leg for several days, and had stayed off school. She wouldn't see the doctor, though.
When her foot turned black Mrs. Simpson sent for him and he had her ambulanced straight to the General.
'Have you been told what caused the gangrene, Mrs. Simpson?' asked Maggie.
She nodded and sniffed. Her husband replied for her.
'They said she'd been injecting drugs. Heroin.'
We asked about her friends, where she went at night, who might have influence over her. They knew nothing, apart from the two girls Julie was arrested with. Julie was just a typical teenager, with a typical secret life.
'Does Julie have her own room?' I asked.
'Yes,' replied her mother. 'Her older sister is married. There's just the two of them.'
'Do you mind if we look through it? You never know, we might find something.'
Mrs. Simpson led us upstairs. She said: 'I've tidied it up. It's usually a dreadful tip; you know what teenage girls are like.'
I didn't, so I stayed silent. Maggie said: 'Yes.'
The room was neat, and more childish than I expected. A row of teddy bears sat across the pillow and the wallpaper was more suitable for a nursery than the room of a girl burgeoning into womanhood. Several posters of stripped-to-the-waist pop stars doing strange things with microphones added a note of conflict.
'Mrs. Simpson, could you possibly leave us alone?' asked Maggie.
'Julie might not be very pleased if she knew you had looked through her things.'
I looked quizzical, but Mrs. Simpson saw the sense of what Maggie said, and left us to it. I went straight to the drawers at the side of the bed, but they were locked. Maggie cast an expert eye round the room. Near the window was a brass rubbing, in a heavy frame, presumably done by Julie in happier times. It was half concealed by the curtain, and easily overlooked. Maggie lifted it away from the wall and a key fell into her hand.
'Feminine intuition,' she said with a wink.
'I'm impressed,' I replied.
The top drawer contained mainly cheap jewellery. Underneath was some surprisingly sexy underwear for a sixteen-year-old, and a couple of hard-porn magazines. Now I knew why Maggie had wanted the parents out of the way; or I thought I did.
I was mistaken. In the bottom drawer we found a three-month supply of the Pill and two packets of condoms. Maggie held one of them up.
'She's sensible about some things,' she said, 'but I don't think her mum and dad would agree.'
'Put them back, Maggie,' I told her. 'I need some fresh air. And a drink.'
I picked up one of the teddy bears and took it downstairs with me.
'When do you visit Julie?' I asked her parents.
'Just in the afternoons,' said Mr. Simpson. 'We don't like travelling on the buses at night. You don't feel safe.'
'How's she bearing up?'
'Not very well, but she was still a bit groggy yesterday.'
'Do you mind if I call in to see her? Not to question her, just to see if I can cheer her up.' I held up the teddy bear. 'I'll take him along, maybe tomorrow night.'
They didn't mind. They wouldn't have minded if I'd offered to sell her to the King of Tonga. Not because they didn't care, but because they'd taken just about as much as they could. Maggie came down the stairs and joined us.
'I don't know where we've gone wrong,' sobbed Mrs. Simpson. 'She was such a good girl. It all started about eighteen months ago…'
I looked at my watch. 'We could give you a lift to the hospital,' I said, 'If you'd like to go now.'
They thought about it for a second or two, then declined. They wanted to do some shopping first. Maggie took Julie's mother by the arm and told her not to be too hard on either herself or Julie. They went through into the kitchen.
'Do you work?' I asked Mr. Simpson.
'No, I was made redundant fifteen months ago.'
'Where did you work?'
'Anderson's Engineering. There twenty-two years.'
'And now it's gone.'
'Yes.'
When Maggie was ready we left and went to the pub for lunch. Neither of us felt very talkative, so we ate our sandwiches quickly and quietly, then set off for the second girl's home. Sharon Turner was a year younger than the other two, but we believed her to be the major influence in the gang. We could have been wrong, though. She had escaped when we confronted them, but the others gave us her name when we showed them the video. Walking up their path we were aware of the Turners being a rung or two lower on the ladder of luck than the Simpsons. The front garden made mine look like Sissinghurst, and a big Alsatian was going berserk in a compound at the back.
Sharon answered the door. 'Mam, it's the police,' she yelled over her shoulder, before we could speak.
Mrs. Turner appeared with her indignant head on. She fell into the category known to anthropologists as Big Fat Slags. 'What do you want now?' she demanded.
Maggie introduced us and asked if we could come in and have a word with her. The room we entered illustrated the triumph of hopelessness over poverty. The floor covering stuck to your feet as you walked across it. Two toddlers with angelic faces, wearing only tattered vests, smiled up at us. We didn't sit down. Sharon was hovering near her mum, so Maggie said: 'Alone?'
When Sharon left us, Maggie asked Mrs. Turner: 'Do you know Julie Simpson?'
'Yeah, she's the one who grassed on our Sharon,' she replied.
'Did you know she'd had a leg amputated?'
'I heard. What's that got to do with us?'
'She had gangrene, through injecting drugs. They were stealing to pay for drugs. We believe Sharon might be at risk, too.'
'Nonsense. My Sharon don't do no drugs; she's a good girl. It's them other two what got her into trouble. She didn't know what they were doing. I asked her if she knew and she swore she didn't. That's good enough for me. She wouldn't lie to me.'
We were wasting our time. 'Has Sharon left school?' I asked.
'Er, no. She's a sore throat, so I kept 'er off today.'
'Is there a Mr. Turner?'
'Yes, he's out, though.'
'Out where?'
'I don't know. Just walking round. Sometimes he helps a pal down at the allotments.'
'What's your husband's first name, Mrs. Turner?'
'Eric. Why? He hasn't done owl.'
