His partner was fighting with the lid of a tartan thermos.
It wasn’t much warmer in here than it was outside.
Logan wiped the melting sleet from his face. ‘Anything happening?’
‘Sod all.’
The one in all the coats and scarves stuck up his hand. ‘I got frostbite.’
‘Your leg fell asleep, it’s not the same thing.’ PC Thermos gave the top one last twist and the smell of instant coffee drifted out into the van’s interior.
At one point the ancient council van must have been lined with metal shelving, now only the uprights remained, still bolted to the bare walls. The floor was a rust-streaked landscape of bumps, dents, old Burger King wrappers and Coke cans. A portable TV and video recorder sat on top of a stainless steel box, a thick black cable connected to a set of big batteries in the corner, another stretching up the van’s wall and across to a video camera mounted in the air ventilation unit on the roof. Everything held in place with masses of silver duct tape.
Seating was courtesy of a set of green plastic chairs that looked as if they’d been stolen from someone’s patio.
PC Thermos waggled his tartan container. ‘Coffee?’
Danby settled himself down on one of the plastic chairs, stretched his right leg out and rubbed at a spot on his calf, grimacing. ‘Long as it’s hot.’
Logan peered at the little TV – getting a bleary view of Knox’s front garden. ‘So what’s the plan for today then?’
PC Frostbite shrugged. ‘Maybe a barbecue later on, if the weather picks up a bit. Game of tennis on the lawn. Perchance some skinny-dipping in the Don.’ He took a slurp from his coffee. ‘We haven’t quite decided yet, have we Sandy?’
Thermos filled a plastic cup for DSI Danby. ‘Apparently Knox wants to go see his sainted granny’s final resting place. Sacro’s going to drive him, we’ll give them a thirty-second head start, then follow.’
Danby nodded. ‘What about the rest of the surveillance team?’
Thermos looked at Frostbite, then Logan, then back to Danby. Eyebrows squinched together, top lip curled. ‘Erm…we’re it.’
There was a pause. ‘Are you seriously telling me that the best Grampian Police can manage for a
‘Well, it’s not like we have to keep it low-key, is it? He knows we’re watching him. We don’t need to do the whole line-of-sight-target-handover routine.’
Danby closed his eyes and massaged his big, pink forehead. ‘When’s he going out?’
PC Frostbite checked his watch. ‘About half an hour? Want a biscuit while you wait?’
Fucking Aberdeen. Not even snowing properly yet, and it’s already colder than a witch’s titties. Tony shifts in his seat, wriggles even deeper into his jacket and wishes he’d brought some decent gloves with him. Not just the latex ones that don’t leave any fingerprints. ‘Think I saw a polar bear over there, hiding behind a wheelie bin.’
Julie just smiles at him. She’s got Frank Sinatra on the Range Rover’s stereo. Old-fashioned shite warbled by some Mafia stooge. Whatever happened to proper music, eh? Bit of Coldplay, or Travis, or James Blunt: something with a decent tune.
But it keeps her happy, so they put up with it.
Neil turns round in the driver’s seat. ‘Yeah, but look on the bright side.’ He points through the windscreen at where Danby and some local plod from CID are clambering out of a maroon piece-of-shit Transit van. ‘Now we know where the surveillance is on Knox’s place. One council van and two cameras covering the front. Long as we go in round the back, no bugger’ll see a thing.’
Tony has to admit that he has a point.
Danby hobbles across the road and through the gate to a shagged-out two-storey with rain-streaked walls and a garden Tarzan would have felt at home in. Yeah, if he’d had a fucking parka on. Wear a loincloth in that and it wouldn’t just be the brass monkeys missing something, know what I mean?
‘So,’ Tony rubs his hands together, ‘we going in tonight?’
Julie shakes her head, boop-de-booping along with that Sinatra crap.
Neil groans. ‘Tell me we don’t have to spend
‘Sorry, Darling.’ Julie stops singing, but she’s still keeping time with a finger on the dashboard. ‘The boss says we wait till Monday. He’s got to get everything in place for when we show up with Danby. Don’t want it turning into another Birmingham, do we, Babe?’
Tony shivers, and for once it’s got nothing to do with the crappy weather. ‘Fuck that.’
‘Exactly.’ She smiles. ‘Now why don’t we go drop off our little present, then we’ll see if we can’t find a Starbucks, OK?’
Neil puts the big Range Rover into gear, and pulls away from the kerb.
Sitting in the back, Tony watches Knox’s house disappear into the sleet. Two more days and they’ll be back in Newcastle, and DSI Danby will wish he was never bloody born.
The lounge was actually warm for a change. All that praying Knox had done was finally paying off: God had brought the three- bar electric fire back from the dead.
Unfortunately it just made the stink of mildew even stronger.
