“Yes,” she said, looking across at Dobson, who was now sitting on the bench, dazed. “The officers were very professional, and they acted with great restraint when my client launched an unprovoked attack on them.”
The custody Sergeant did a double-take. Not much surprised him, but the solicitor’s unexpected endorsement of the detectives’ actions had.
Chapter 28
Jenna Marsh stopped outside the graffiti-covered phone box in Barking Road. Chewing her lip anxiously, she stared at it as though it might bite her if she tried to enter. It was coming up to six-thirty, a full half an hour beyond the deadline that she’d given Rodney. She felt so conflicted inside that it hurt. Had he done the right thing? Had he called the police and told them where to find Winston?
Somehow, she doubted it.
It was heading towards the end of the rush hour, but traffic was still busy along the Barking Road, and as she stood there, watching the never-ending sea of headlights streaming towards her, she wondered what he had done after storming out of the shop.
Jenna’s breath clouded around her, and she rubbed her gloved hands together to generate some much-needed heat. God, it was so cold out here! The weather forecast predicted snow over the coming days, and from the arctic temperature, she could well believe it.
Jenna felt sick. She wondered how Kevin would react if he knew what she was contemplating. He wouldn’t be happy about her ratting someone out, especially not the younger brother of his best friend, a timid man-boy who in many ways was still as guileless as a child. Even her parents, who were as law-abiding as they came, would take a dim view of her telling tales out of school. The truth was that she really didn’t want to grass Rodney up to the police, but she had warned him she was going to do exactly that unless he contacted her to say that he’d called them himself, which he clearly hadn’t.
Jenna took a deep breath and opened the door. It felt as heavy as her heart, and for a long moment, she hesitated, feeling as though she were about to step into a gas chamber and not a telephone kiosk.
The cramped space inside smelled of piss. As the door slowly swung shut behind her, she pulled off her gloves and reached into her coat pocket for the loose change she would need to make the call. Most of the kiosk’s glass had been smashed, so it was no warmer inside than it had been out on the street. It wasn’t any quieter, either.
She had found the number for the Incident Room in an article from yesterday’s London Echo and had written it on the palm of her left hand before leaving work. She stared hard at the smeared digits for several seconds before plucking up the nerve to lift the handset and start dialling.
“Oh, Rodney, why did you have to turn out just like your brother,” she said, shaking her head sadly.
Jenna almost jumped out of her skin when the telephone was picked up and a disinterested male voice said, “Incident Room. DS Wilkins speaking. How can I help you?”
Jenna opened her mouth to speak but no words came out.
“Hello… is anyone there?” The voice sounded impatient, unhelpful. Maybe its owner was just really busy and could do without the distraction?
Jenna hung up the phone and pushed open the door to leave, eager to escape into the fresh air, but then she hesitated. If she didn’t do this now, she never would. Her stomach was doing little flips, and her head was spinning, but she picked up the phone and redialled.
◆◆◆
It was seven o’clock and, in light of the anonymous phone call that had come in half an hour earlier, Jack Tyler was holding an impromptu supervisor’s meeting in his office. Dillon, Carol Keating, Steve Bull, Charlie White, and Tom Wilkins were all gathered in a little semi-circle around his desk. It was a bit cramped, but just about doable.
Carol had been the first to arrive, and she had immediately set about organising hot drinks and chocolate Hob-Nobs for everyone. As each of the others had arrived, they had greeted her with the customary, “Oooh Matron,” receiving a delighted smile and a little quip in return.
Despite her no-nonsense demeanour, she really was a very sweet woman, Jack decided, and he could see why everyone warmed to her.
“Right,” Jack said, after taking a tentative sip of the boiling hot coffee she’d just handed him, “things are moving fast, so I thought we should get together for a quick pow-wow.” He was tired and he was crotchety, and he wanted to get through this as quickly as possible.
“Have you got a particular order of business in mind?” Dillon asked, looking irritatingly fresh.
“Well, the main thing we need to do is discuss our plans for tonight, but before we get started on that, I’d like to top and tail where we are with the four skinheads and the two hookers.”
Jack turned to face Carol Keating, who had been tasked with reviewing all the evidence against them and liaising with Susie to see what had come out of the interviews. “How close are we to being able to charge them?”
“Well,” Carol said, thoughtfully. “I think we’re pretty much there. The interviews for all six prisoners have been concluded. The three skinhead lackeys, Roach, Taylor and Higgins all went ‘no comment’ throughout. No surprise there. Charlie Dobson tried to do the same, but his arrogance occasionally got the better of him, and he ended up blurting out answers when he really would have been better off staying schtum.”
“Anything, in particular, that was worthy of note?” Jack asked.
Carol referred to her notes. “He admitted in interview that he didn’t like black people, so Colin Franklin asked him why he’d
