him – the forcefulness of her character, her outspokenness, her need to dominate every situation – and little to earn his sympathy other than admiration for her as a doctor and a nagging resentment at the negative reactions she seemed to attract from strangers. He looked up to find her staring at him.
‘What?’ he asked.
‘Is it me you have a problem with or women in general?’
Acland gave another shrug. ‘You enjoy intimidating people. Maybe the guy did know your name . . . and maybe he is a small-minded bigot . . . but he wasn’t going to think any better of you for being called an “arrogant dickhead”.’
Jackson refrained from pointing out that this wasn’t an answer to her question. Instead, she said, ‘Why should it matter what he thinks of me?’
‘It doesn’t.’
‘He’d have cocked his leg even higher if I’d been wearing a skirt and make-up,’ she responded lightly. ‘Most people take me for a bloke in drag...or a male transsexual going through gender reassignment. I receive fewer sniggers dressed like this –’ she uncrossed her arms and gestured towards her masculine attire – ‘than if I wear women’s clothes. A butch dyke in trousers and workman’s boots is less alarming than a muscular transvestite weightlifter in pastel pink.’
Briefly, humour creased the undamaged side of Acland’s face. ‘You wouldn’t wear pink in a million years. Not threatening enough. I bet you get a real buzz from seeing people move out of your way.’
Jackson watched him for a moment. ‘Is that what the scars and the pirate-patch do for you? Who moves aside faster? Men or women?’
He didn’t answer.
‘You want to be careful how you exploit that, Lieutenant. Some men get a taste for seeing fear in women’s eyes.’
*
The speed of events moved up a pace as soon as the superintendent arrived. He ignored the detective constable’s explanations about how he couldn’t guarantee the mobile was Kevin Atkins’s because he hadn’t been allowed to see it and addressed his remarks to Jackson and Acland. ‘Where is it?’
‘Here.’ Jackson flipped the locks on her medical case and handed him the envelope. ‘The battery was dead but I used a Cellboost to fire it up because I thought it belonged to a homeless kid who’s in a diabetic coma in St Thomas’s. I was looking for next-of-kin details. It’s still switched on.’
Jones slipped the gadget on to the table. ‘Where did you find it?’
‘In this.’ She lifted the rucksack to show him. ‘It belongs to the boy – we think his name’s Ben Russell – although we haven’t been able to confirm that yet.’ She watched Jones touch the end of a pencil to one of the buttons to light up the LCD. ‘I went into ICE, which gave me Belinda Atkins, and then into Atkins. The number recorded under Kevin is the number of that phone. I recognized the name.’
‘His daughter’s name’s Belinda.’ Jones used the pencil to scroll down the screen. ‘Geoff and Tom are the sons, and Sarah’s his ex-wife . . . still recorded under Atkins. It’s definitely his.’ He looked up with a frown. ‘How did you unlock it? Or do we have Lieutenant Acland to thank for that?’
Jackson shook her head. ‘It was me.’ She described how she did it. ‘I’m not so au fait with other makes of phone, otherwise I might have had an attempt at the other one as well.’
‘Which other one?’
She nodded to the rucksack. ‘In here. Also a BlackBerry and some iPods.’
‘Quite a haul.’ He glanced from her to Acland. ‘Where does the lieutenant fit in?’
‘He’s staying with me.’
‘Meaning what? That you returned to the Bell to pick him up before you came here?’
Acland stirred when Jackson hesitated. ‘She came looking for me,’ he said. ‘I was with the boy and another man when she found me. We were sleeping rough in an alleyway. The kid went into a coma and Dr Jackson had him admitted to St Thomas’s when she realized how serious it was.’
Jones nodded. ‘Inspector Beale phoned to say you’d gone in the opposite direction. How well do you know this boy?’
‘I don’t know him at all,’ said Acland.
The superintendent gave a sceptical smile. ‘You expect me to believe that? You come into contact with two complete strangers in under twenty-four hours . . . Walter Tutting and this kid . . .
‘Obviously it does or it wouldn’t have just happened to me.’
‘No one’s that unlucky.’
Acland pressed his palm over his eyepatch, grinding the heel into the throbbing nerve ends. ‘If I am, it’s working in your favour,’ he pointed out. ‘You wouldn’t have the phone if Jackson hadn’t followed me and the boy hadn’t fallen sick. A different doctor or a healthy kid, and the stuff would still be untouched in the rucksack.’
‘Assuming it was there in the first place. How long were you alone with the lad before Dr Jackson arrived?’
‘Never. The older guy was already in the alleyway when I got there.’
‘So there was no opportunity to switch items from the lad’s bag to yours, or vice versa, without anyone seeing you do it?’
‘No.’
