tiny perforations to each side.
The hotel dining room was busy with business people in dark suits, enjoying the full English behind the Telegraph or the Mail. In the buffet, the scrambled eggs were congealed and the catering tomatoes swam in a sea of their own juice. The toast, brought to the table too soon, was scarcely brown and almost cold.
'Coffee or tea?' the waitress said with a charming smile, her heavily-accented voice, to Elder's ears, from South America or Spain. Though he asked for coffee, she brought him tea regardless, and he had neither the heart nor the energy to complain.
He met Maureen Prior in the Starbucks on Lister Gate, close by the entrance to the Broad Marsh Centre. She was seated at a table in the rear when he arrived, unobtrusively dressed in brown and beige. He might have seen her in bright colours once, but couldn't easily remember when. Her hair, medium-length, mid-brown, softened the sharp oval of her face.
'Good to see you, Frank.'
'You, too.'
He went to the counter to collect the coffee he'd ordered, carried it back and sat down.
'I'm sorry about Katherine,' Maureen said.
'Thanks.'
'She's been charged?'
'No, thank God.'
'Special pleading then.'
'Not on my part. No favours asked.'
'She's your daughter, Frank. Five grams in her bag. Difficult to see her walking away else.'
Elder told her what had happened, what little he knew, and she listened carefully, breaking off pieces of muffin almost absent-mindedly with one hand.
'They think she's lying, obviously,' she said when Elder was through. 'Covering up for Summers.'
'You know him? Anything about him?'
Maureen shook her head. 'Drug Squad, any idea which officers are involved?'
'Resnick mentioned a name. Bland.'
Maureen smiled. 'Ricky Bland.'
'You know him?'
'By reputation.'
'Which is?'
'Bit of a chancer. Gets results. One way or another. Came up from the Met, oh, good few years back now.'
'You don't like him.'
'I said, I don't know him.'
'You know what I mean.'
Maureen ate some of her muffin. 'What I've heard, let's say he sails close to the wind. Came under investigation once, him and a partner. Eaglin? I'm not sure of the name. Quantity of crack cocaine confiscated and then disappeared. There was some rumour Bland and whoever had sold it back to the dealer they'd taken it from in the first place.'
'Nothing proved?'
Maureen laughed. 'Answer that for yourself, Frank. They're still out there, working. Putting the bad guys away. Some of them, at least.'
'You think they were guilty?'
The laugh transposed into a smile. 'You know me well enough, Frank. Everyone's guilty in my eyes.'
Watching Maureen eat had made Elder hungry and, seeing him eyeing the plate, she pushed it towards him. 'What about you, Frank?'
'What about me?'
'How's it going in London?'
'Not so badly.'
She looked at him seriously. 'When it's over, you ought to consider coming back up here.'
He shook his head. 'It's too complicated. Besides, if I wanted more there's plenty where I am. Devon and Cornwall have just brought four detectives out of retirement and they're scoping round for more.'
'Sheep rustling at a premium, is it?' The smile back on Maureen's face. 'Someone playing fast and loose with the mackerel fleet?'
'Six murders in eight days. One of them specially nasty, couple in a garage badly beaten, then shot.'
'You're not tempted?'
'Not what I went down there for.'
'If you were up here you'd be near Katherine.'
'Not where she wants me to be.'
'You think she means it?'
'I know she does.'
Maureen resisted the temptation to say more. 'Ricky Bland, you're going to see him? I could come with you if you like.'
'It's good of you, but no, it's okay. An address though, just in case he isn't pulling overtime.'
Maureen was already reaching for her mobile. 'Just let me make a call.'
The house was in Mapperley Plains, a once-new development near the golf course, UPVC windows and frosted-glass aluminium-framed doors. A blue Audi A6, dented, stood outside the garage. The front lawn was in need of a final mow, the grass already beginning to clutter up with leaves.
Elder knocked on the door and rang the bell.
Nothing seemed to happen.
An arthritic Honda saloon came cautiously along the street, slowed down almost to a halt, then continued on its way. Neighbourhood watch, Elder thought.
He rang the bell again.
This time there was movement within, an inner door opening and then bolts being released, locks turned. The man who appeared was mid-forties with a thick stubble and close-cropped hair, a V-neck jumper hastily pulled over an otherwise bare chest, patterned boxers and bare, muscular legs.
'Richard Bland?'
'Who the fuck are you?'
'Frank Elder. I used to be on the job.'
He looked at Elder keenly, squinting a little into the light. 'This better be good, pal.'
'Katherine Elder, she was arrested yesterday. Possession of heroin. She's my daughter.'
Bland looked at him again and pulled the door wider. 'Come on in. Tryin' to get some kip. Three late nights on the fuckin' trot. Thought you were one of them bleeding-heart collectors, famine in fuckin' Sumatra or somewhere.'
Dust had gathered in small circles in the corners of the hall. The room Bland led Elder into was almost bare, crumpled clothes and cans and empty take-out boxes on the floor. The Venetian blinds were two-thirds closed.
'Cunt took all the furniture when she left. Had a van come round when I was out. Sleeping upstairs in a fucking sleeping bag.' He pointed towards the kitchen door. 'There's beer in the fridge, help yourself.'
When Bland came back down, blue shirt outside his jeans, he grabbed some beers for himself, lit a cigarette, and instructed Elder to get hold of the pair of plastic folding chairs that were leaning up against the wall.
They sat outside on a small patio, looking out over a rectangle of unkempt lawn, bare borders, a line of recently planted saplings. In amongst the hum of traffic, children cried and dogs set off a chain of barking. January notwithstanding, there was some warmth in the sun.
'Get shot of this fuckin' place,' Bland said, 'soon as I fuckin' can. Get back into the city. One of them new flats, by the canal. Only thing, minute I sell it, the bitch gets fuckin' half.'
