“Kelly was physically sick?”
“Yes. I thought I’d told you that.”
“No. How did it happen?”
“She was just sick.”
“What did DS Templeton do?”
“Just carried on as if everything was normal.”
“Have you told anyone else what happened?”
“No, Guv. I’d tell Superintendent Gervaise if I thought it would do any good, but she thinks the sun shines out of Kevin Templeton’s arse.”
“She does, does she?” That didn’t surprise Annie. Just the mention of Gervaise made her bristle. The sanctimonious cow, putting Annie on statement reading, a DC’s job at best, and making gibes about her private life.
“Anyway,” Winsome went on, “I don’t have to put up with it. There’s nothing in the book says I have to put up with behavior like that.”
“That’s true,” said Annie. “But life doesn’t always go by the book.”
“It does when you agree with what the book says.”
Annie laughed. “So what do you want to do about it?”
“Dunno,” said Winsome. “Nothing I can do, I suppose. ’Cept I don’t want to be near the creep anymore, and if he ever tries anything I’ll beat seven shades of shit out of him.”
Annie laughed. The phrase sounded odd coming from Winsome with her Jamaican lilt. “You can’t avoid him all the time,” she said. “I mean, I can do my best to make sure you’re not paired up or anything, but Superintendent Gervaise can overrule that if she wants, and she seems to want to interfere with our jobs a bit more than Superintendent Gristhorpe did.”
“I liked Mr. Gristhorpe,” said Winsome. “He was old-fashioned, like my father, and he could be a bit frightening sometimes, but he was fair and he didn’t play favorites.”
Well, Annie thought, that wasn’t strictly true. Banks had certainly been a favorite of Gristhorpe’s, but in general Winsome was right. There was a difference between having favorites and playing them. Gristhorpe hadn’t set out to build a little empire, pick his teams and set people against one another the way it seemed Gervaise was doing. Nor did he interfere in people’s private lives. He must have known about her and Banks, but he hadn’t said anything, at least not to her. He might have warned Banks off, she supposed, but if he had, it hadn’t affected their relationship either on or off the job.
“Well, Gristhorpe’s gone and Gervaise is here,” said Annie, “and for better or worse we’ve got to live with it.” She looked at her watch. She still had half her drink left. “Look, I’d better go, Winsome. I’m not over the limit yet, but I will be if I have any more.”
“You can stay at mine, if you like.” Winsome looked away. “I’m sorry, Guv, I don’t mean to be presumptuous. I mean, you being an inspector and all, my boss, but I’ve got a spare room. It’s just that it helps talking about it, that’s all. And I don’t know about you, but I feel like getting rat-arsed.”
Annie thought for a moment. “What the hell?” she said, finishing her drink. “I’ll get another round.”
“No, you stay there. It’s my shout.”
Annie sat and watched her walk to the bar, a tall, graceful, long-legged Jamaican beauty about whom she knew… well, not very much at all. But then she didn’t really know very much about anyone, when it came right down to it, she realized, not even Banks. And as she watched, she smiled to herself. Wouldn’t it be funny, she thought, if she did stay at Winsome’s and Superintendent Gervaise found out. What would the sad cow make of that?
“But we’ve got no real evidence, Stan,” Detective Chief Superintendent McCullen argued on Monday morning. They were in his office and rain spattered the windows, blurring the view.
Chadwick ran his hand over his hair. He’d thought this out in advance, hadn’t done anything else but think it over, all night. He didn’t want Yvonne involved; that was the main problem. He had seen the bruise McGarrity had caused on her arm, and it was enough to bring assault charges, but once he went that route he wouldn’t be able to do anything for Yvonne. She was upset enough as it was, and he didn’t want to drag her through court. If truth be told, he didn’t want his name tainted by his daughter’s folly, either. He thought he could make a decent case without her, and he laid it out carefully for McCullen.
“First off, he’s got form,” he said.
McCullen raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“The most recent’s for possession of a controlled substance, namely LSD. November 1967.”
“Only possession?”
“They think he dumped his stash down the toilet when he heard them coming. Unfortunately, he still had two doses in his pocket.”
“You said most recent?”
“Yes. The other’s a bit more interesting. March 1958.”
“How old was he then?”
“Twenty-two.”
“And?”
“Assault causing bodily harm. He stabbed a student in the shoulder during a town-and-gown altercation in Oxford, which apparently is where he comes from. Unfortunately the student happened to be the son of a local member of Parliament.”
“Ouch,” said McCullen, a sly smile touching his lips.
“It didn’t help that McGarrity was a teddy boy as well. Apparently the judge didn’t like teds. Threw the book at him. He was a Brasenose man, too, same as the student. Gave McGarrity eighteen months. If the wound had been more serious, and if it hadn’t been inflicted defensively during a scuffle – apparently the gown lot were carrying cricket bats, among other weapons – then he’d have got five years or more. Another interesting point,” Chadwick went on, “is that the weapon used was a flick-knife.”
“The same weapon used on the girl?”
“Same
“Go on.”
“There’s not much more,” Chadwick said. “We spent yesterday interviewing the people at the three houses who knew McGarrity. He definitely knew the victim.”
“How well?”
“There’s no evidence of any sort of relationship, and from what I’ve found out about Linda Lofthouse I very much doubt that there was one. But he knew her.”
“Anything else?”
“Everyone said he was an odd duck. They often didn’t understand what he was talking about, and he had a habit of playing with a flick-knife.”
“What kind of flick-knife?”
“Just a flick-knife, with a tortoiseshell handle.”
“Why did they put up with him?”
“If you ask me, sir, it’s down to drugs. Our lads found five ounces of cannabis resin hidden in the gas meter at Carberry Place. Apparently the lock was broken. We think it belonged to McGarrity.”
“Defrauding the gas company too, I’ll bet?”
Chadwick smiled. “Same shilling, again and again. The drugs squad think he’s a mid-level dealer, buys a few ounces now and then and splits them up into quid deals. Probably what he used the knife for.”
“So the kids tolerate him?”
“Yes, sir. He was also at the festival, and according to the people he went with he spent most of the time roaming the crowd on his own. No one can say where he was when the incident occurred.”
McCullen tapped his pipe on the ashtray, then said, “The knife?”
“No sign of it yet, sir.”
