1980

Alderman: ‘We’ve taken a bit of shine – no offence – taken a bit of a shine to one of your punters.’

‘Yeah? Why’s that?’

‘Bit of a naughty boy this one.’

‘Aren’t they all.’

‘Yeah,’ nods Prentice. ‘Aren’t they all.’

Alderman: ‘Tell us about him, this one from Sunday night?’

‘What about him?’

‘Just tell us what happened?’

She rolls her eyes, stubs out her cig and says: ‘About nine I’m sitting with Karen on Wharncliffe Road, junction with Broomhall…’

Alderman: ‘Karen?’

‘Yeah, Karen.’

‘Last name?’

‘Not a clue, officer,’ she smiles. ‘Never met her before.’

Prentice: ‘Go on.’

‘About nine, a brown Rover pulls up, window down, are we doing business? Karen goes across, gives him once over, says no ta.’

‘Why she say no?’

‘Bit creepy.’

‘How?’

‘Didn’t say.’

‘Go on.’

‘Ten minutes later, some Paki pulls up and she’s off with him.’

Alderman: ‘Not that choosy then, this Karen?’

‘Listen lover,’ she laughs. ‘There’s nowt wrong with Pakis; shoot their muck and they’re gone. All over in ten seconds.’

Prentice: ‘Go on, love.’

‘So anyway, Rover comes back and I go over and he seems all right.’

‘All right?’

‘Looked like a good-looking Bee Gee.’

Alderman: ‘A good-looking bloody Bee Gee? What the fuck’s one of them?’

Prentice: ‘Ignore him. Go on, love.’

‘So I tell him it’s a tenner and he nods and I get in and he asks if I know anywhere and I tell him to head straight up the road and turn left by Trades House.’

Prentice: ‘How long that take? Up to the Trades House?’

‘Five, ten minutes.’

‘He talk?’

‘Never bloody shut up, did he?’

Alderman: ‘He tell you his name?’

‘Dave.’

Prentice: ‘What else did he say?’

‘About how he didn’t usually do this kind of thing, the usual. About his wife and how she nagged him morning, noon, and night and how they’d wanted to have kids and all the miscarriages they’d had and I said he should adopt and he reckoned they were thinking about one of them Vietnamese Boat People, that kind of thing. Usual bloody excuses.’

‘Then you came to Trades House?’

She nods: ‘Reversed in, didn’t he.’

‘Odd?’

‘Never seen it before.’

‘And?’

‘And he keeps yapping and after a bit I tell him I want the tenner and he gives it me and I give him rubber.’

‘And?’

‘And I take my knickers off but he says he wants to do it in back seat but I say it’ll be all right here, nothing to worry about, and he unzips it and lies on top of me but he’s too nervous, cold as ice he is, and after a couple of minutes of this I tell him we’re not going to be able to do it.’

‘What did he say? Angry was he?’

‘No,’ she shrugs. ‘Just nodded and said that’s what it looked like.’

‘Then what happened?’

‘Then what happened was you lot bloody turned up, didn’t you?’

‘What did he do?’

‘Froze, then said he’d do all talking and I’m his girlfriend, aren’t I? Didn’t have heart to tell him, I’d shagged every copper this side of Hallam.’

Alderman, laughing: ‘That include Sergeant Chain and PC Skinner?’

‘You’re a bad man you are, aren’t you lover?’ she tuts, winking at the glass.

Prentice: ‘So what happened then?’

‘One of you lot comes over.’

‘And?’

‘And he taps on glass, and Dave, he winds down window and asks if there’s a problem and this young copper…’

‘PC Skinner.’

‘Yeah, he asks who we are and what we’re doing and Dave, now he says he’s Peter Logan and I’m his girlfriend but Skinny, he shines his torch on me and says, hello Sharon, thought you were inside and he asks Pete or Dave or whoever he is, he asks him if it’s his car and whatever-his-bloody-name-is tells him it is and then PC Plod says something witty like, don’t go anywhere lovebirds, and he walks off back to the Panda.’

‘And so you two are alone again?’

‘Yeah, dead romantic it was.’

‘What was he saying now?’

‘Dave? Asks me if we should make a run for it.’

‘And what did you say?’

‘Said there wasn’t much point, seeing as how they knew me anyway’

‘And what did he say?’

‘Nothing. Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum are back aren’t they – taking his keys, tax disk off window, asking who he really is and now he’s saying he’s Peter Williams and how he doesn’t want his wife to know and how he’s been done for drunk driving or something and how he’s going to lose his job. Usual bloody nonsense.’

‘Then what?’

‘Well then they get us out of the car and they see that the plates are only held on with bleeding tape and for a split second I honestly thought daft bugger was going to make a run for it, but he’s just off for a piss he says and then when he comes back, they take us down to Hammerton Road.’

‘He say anything on way down?’

‘No,’ she laughs. ‘Too busy trying not to shit himself, wasn’t he?’

Prentice: ‘Probably had a lot on his mind.’

And then she stops laughing at her own joke and says: ‘Why?’

Prentice: ‘Why what?’

‘Why all questions? Who is he?’

And Alderman, he picks up the bag off the floor and he tips the two hammers, the screwdriver, and the knife onto the table and says -

Says: ‘The Yorkshire Ripper.’