and that an upper-class family was ultimately to blame, but the whole thing reads like some cod-Victorian potboiler, and to paint yourself as the hero of the hour is an outrageous falsification. We’ll become a laughingstock if anyone reads about this. What were you thinking of?”
“The royalties, obviously. You really shouldn’t take these things so seriously. The public likes a good story.”
“That’s all very well, but such fevered imaginings could destroy the credibility of the unit,” snapped Land. “You’d be lost without the PCU. You’ve nowhere else to go.”
“I say, that’s a bit below the belt. Actually, I have got somewhere to go, and I’m thinking of taking John with me.” Removing a packet from his pocket, he stuffed his pipe with a mix of eucalyptus leaves, Old Navy Rough Cut Shag and something that looked like carpet fibres from an Indian restaurant before waving Land from his office. “Off you toddle, play some golf, enjoy yourself, the place won’t burn down without you.”
“It did before,” Land reminded him as the door was shut in his face.
Moments later, John May arrived, flicking off his elegant black raincoat and dropping into the opposite chair. “What did Land want?” he asked.
“Oh, some rot about shutting down the unit for computer work, I wasn’t really listening,” Bryant replied nonchalantly. “You know how he’s been ever since he found out about his wife having an affair with the ball-washer at his golf club.”
“I don’t think you should make so many off-colour jokes about him becoming a cuckold. You’re only getting away with it because he doesn’t know what it means.”
“That’s the beauty of the English language. One can wrap insults inside elegance, like popping anchovies into pastry. You’re right, I shouldn’t mock, but it is such fun. Are you feeling all right? You’re as pale as the moon. I think you need a bit of a holiday.” Bryant tried to contain a mischievous smile.
“Oh, no, not me, I’m happy here.” May usually felt much younger than his partner, but today he was tired and out of sorts. He had always prided himself on his ability to embrace change, and had at least retained a walking pace beside the growth of modern police technology, adopting new techniques as they arrived. Bryant, on the other hand, loitered several metres behind each development, and occasionally drifted off in the opposite direction. As a consequence, his knowledge of the Victorians was greater than that of the present Second Elizabethan era. He knew about Bazalgette and the development of drains, the last night of the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens and the cracking of Big Ben, the cholera epidemic of 1832, the fixing of the first London plaque (to Lord Byron, in 1867), the great globe of Leicester Square and the roaring lion that had once topped Northumberland House, but could not remember his computer password, the names of any present-day cabinet ministers or where he had left his dry cleaning.
“You haven’t had a holiday in years,” Bryant persisted. “Unless you count accompanying your ghastly sister and her husband to traction-engine rallies. Raymond seems intent on closing the unit down for a few days, and Janice can run a skeleton staff for us, so how would you like to come on a jaunt with me, all expenses paid?”
May regarded his notoriously cheap partner with suspicion. “What do you have in mind?” he asked. “I still have hideous memories of that clairvoyants’ dinner-dance in Walsall where all the toilets overflowed. They didn’t see that coming, did they?”
“This will be more fun, I promise. A trip to the country. It will do you good to breathe something you can’t see for a change. Down to the Devon coast.”
“You detest the countryside. And it’s February,” May reminded him. “It’ll be freezing, and there’s supposed to be bad weather on the way. What do you want to go there for?”
“The International Spiritualists’ Convention at Plymouth Civic Centre. It should be more fun than it sounds. There’ll be talks, dinners, and demonstrations, not to mention the odd punch-up when the neo-Wiccans get plastered on porter at the free bar and pick a fight with the Druids. We have trade stalls and parties, an awards ceremony, and we always put on a spectacular show for the closing night.”
“Next you’ll be trying to convince me that the people who attend aren’t utterly barking.”
“At least they’re never boring, and they’re from all walks of life. We get judges, shopkeepers, call girls, all sorts. I’m conducting a panel on the incorporation of spiritualism in investigative techniques.”
“For God’s sake don’t let Faraday or Kasavian find out about that,” warned May. He knew how eagerly the Home Office ministers were looking for reasons to shut the unit down. “How are you intending to get there? Your old Mini Cooper’s not up to the journey, for a start.”
“I’m taking down the stage props for the closing show, so I’m borrowing Alma’s van. She uses it to ferry the North London Evangelical Ladies’ Choir around, and seeing as most of them tip the scales at eighteen stone, it should be up to the job. Janice and Dan can keep an eye on things here, just to make sure that Land doesn’t get up to anything underhand. We’d only be gone for a couple of days, you know.” He attempted to look pathetic. “It’s a long journey for a lonely old man. I could really do with someone to share the driving, or at least handle the map- reading.”
“There’s no need to pull the homeless-puppy routine with me, Arthur; it doesn’t wash anymore. I don’t mind coming with you. If Banbury’s going to be pulling up floorboards and relaying server cables I wouldn’t want to be here anyway. Besides, you’re not allowed to drive alone on motorways since that business with the travelling circus.” Seven years earlier, Bryant had accidentally rear-ended a Chessington Zoo truck and released a startled lion into the slow lane of the M2. “When are you planning to leave?”
“First thing in the morning.” Bryant dragged out a much-folded map and pinned it on the crowded wall behind him. “I’ve already plotted our route, although this ordnance survey map was published before the war, so it may contain inaccuracies.”
“Good God, it won’t have motorways marked if it was published in the forties.”
“I meant before the Great War. 1907, actually.”
“That’s no good,” said May, “I’ll print something from the Internet.”
“No, you won’t, the system’s down.” Dan Banbury sauntered in, eating an iced bun. He always seemed to be eating or drinking. “Raymond told me the unit would be empty this week.”
“He didn’t think to warn any of us,” Bryant complained. “Anyone else here?”
“Full complement,” said Dan through a mouthful of sugared dough. “They’re milling around in the hall, waiting to be told what to do.”
DC Colin Bimsley came from a long line of spatially challenged law enforcers. Like his father and grandfather before him, it was enthusiasm rather than expertise that kept him in the field. Despite perforated eardrums, flat feet and an inner ear imbalance that found him periodically lying on his back, he was determined to bring honour to his family. On the plus side he had a heart of oak, being humane, decent and fair-minded, as strong as concrete and, barring the effects of an occasional self-inflicted head wound, quick to react. True, his brain sometimes lagged a little behind his body and his hand-eye coordination was virtually nonexistent, but to any woman who valued fidelity and reliability over smart-arse remarks, he was a godsend.
All of which made it even more unfathomable that DC Meera Mangeshkar could remain so stubbornly resistant to his charms. His compliments were greeted with sarcasm, and his attempts to lure her out for a drink were met with unforgiving dismissal. The diminutive Indian officer was ambitious and determined, hard in mind and body, and following a career path as preordained as a logic board. Bimsley’s shambling heroism impressed her no more than his offers to take her down Brick Lane for a curry with his mates. But they were shackled together now, sharing an office at the unit, and there was no alternative but to make the best of things. John May had planned it this way; he drew the best from staff by placing them in the proximity of opposites.
Wary of her threat to stick him with a harassment charge, Colin Bimsley entered the office quietly and began leafing through the week’s activity folders. Meera raised her head from her paperwork, regarding him suspiciously. “What?” she asked finally.
“I didn’t say anything.” Bimsley looked startled. His fellow DC rarely instigated any conversation.
“Exactly; you’re being too quiet. You’re up to something.”
“I can’t win with you, can I?” He sighed. “If I speak, you always tell me to shut up.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t trust you.”
“You don’t trust anyone, Meera.” He knew she had spent time on some of the capital’s poorest estates, in Peckham, Dagenham, Deptford, and Kilburn. It would be hard not to become cynical after a daily diet of gunshot wounds and stabbings committed in chip shops and at bus stops, where drug feuds were as liable to be settled at family weddings and christenings as on the street. Even so, there were days when she seemed barely able to
