and then, almost as an afterthought: 'There is a charge, you know, obstructing the police in the course of their duties.'
He took a card from his wallet and slipped it between the man's reluctant fingers.
'I'll be waiting for you to call me. Don't leave it too long.'
Five 'Yes, madam,' the uniformed PC was saying to the old lady at Enquiries, 'of course I can arrange for the Crime Prevention Officer to call round. If you'll just let me have your name and address and phone number, then he'll get in touch with you and agree a time. '
Resnick stepped around the woman as she fumbled in her handbag for the scrap of paper on which she had scribbled all the details down.
'I've just moved, you see, and I forget…'
Off to the right of the stairs, a repetitive yelling came from the direction of the police cells, the same two words, over and over, deadened of all meaning.
'Hold it down in there,' came the custody sergeant's voice.
'I said, hold it down!'
Resnick grinned into the silence that followed. The newly appointed custody sergeant had been transferred from Central CID; six foot three, boots that shone whenever he was on duty and shirts that were always freshly ironed. Most Saturdays he played alongside Divine in the Force's first XV and when he said hold it down, only the most drunken or foolish disobeyed.
Resnick turned left at the head of the stairs, towards the bird-like clamour of phones.
'CID. DC Kellogg speaking…'
'CID. DC Naylor…'
'CID…'
'Graham,' Resnick raised a hand in greeting as he 17 threaded his way between the rows of desks towards his office.
'Any chance of a cup of tea?'
'Kev,' Millington said, looking across at Naylor.
'Mash for us, will you?'
Naylor drew the telephone away from his face, one hand clamped across the mouthpiece.
'Mark, you're not doing anything.'
'Lynn,' Divine began, noticing that she was on her feet, 'while you're up. '
'Don't,' Lynn shook her head, 'as much as think about it. '
'Chuffin' hell!' Divine moaned, heading for the kettle. 'At least when Dipak was still here, you could count on him to fall for it.'
Overhearing, Lynn treated him to a look that would have stripped several layers of wallpaper. Although off duty, DC Dipak Patel had intervened in a brawl in the city centre and been fatally stabbed for his trouble: he had been a close colleague and a good friend.
'What I meant,' Divine grinned, seizing his chance to wind her up, 'one good thing about encouraging all these minorities into the Force, they're so grateful to be here, they don't mind doing a few chores. '
'Yes?' Lynn was out from behind her desk, blocking his path.
'All these minorities? Take a look. Mark. How many can you see?'
'Aside from you' you mean? '
'All right,' Millington said, setting himself between them.
'Shut it.
The pair of you. '
'The pair…' Lynn began.
'Enough!' Like a referee about to issue a yellow card, Millington raised a hand in the air and glared. Lynn held his gaze for ten, twenty seconds, before turning aside, and grudgingly resuming her seat.
Blowing her a kiss over Millington's shoulder. Divine wandered across towards the kettle.
'And you,' Millington said quietly, coming up behind Divine as he was flipping tea bags into the pot, 'don't be so quick with your mouth.
That way you might give what you call a brain a bit more of a chance. '
There were three Home Office circulars waiting on Resnick's desk for him to read, initial and pass on; a subscription renewal form for Police Review and information about a forthcoming course on the computer analysis of fingerprints at Bramshill College. Resnick pushed these to one side and shuffled through his drawer, searching for the flier from the newly refurbished Old Vie the Stan Tracey Duo were playing that season and, if at all possible, he didn't want to miss them.
'Boss?' Millington knocked and entered, two mugs of tea precariously balanced in his one hand.
Resnick reached out and relieved him of one of the mugs, found a space to set it down; was it Millington or his wife, he wondered, who'd selected that particular shade of olive green from the suit rack in Marks and Spencer's?
'Ram raiding,' Millington said, helping himself to a seat.
'Buggers have come up with a new twist.'
Resnick sipped his tea and waited; over the past eighteen months there'd been a dramatic increase in the number of robberies carried out with the aid of stolen cars. As a method it was hog simple: drive the car fast through the front window of a city centre shop, jump out, grab what you can, either slam the car into reverse and drive back out or run like fuck.
'Bloke out at Wollaton, just back in from tending his begonias holly-leafed, apparently, not so easy to grow… anyway, sat himself down to watch a spot of racing, wife about to do the honours with the biscuit barrel and a pot of Earl Grey, when this four-year-old Ford Escort comes steaming up his front drive, detours across the 19 lawn, smack into the conservatory at the side of the house.'
'After his prize blooms, then, Graham?' Resnick asked. But Millington was not to be diverted.
Old boy grabbed the fire tongs and went off to repel boarders, while his missus phoned us. These three youths were into the house through the side door, knocked him flying, concussion, had the old lady tied up with the telephone wire and went out of there in five minutes flat Half a dozen cups gone from his trophy cabinet, silver medals, jewellery box from the bedroom, her fur coat, watch, thirty-five-piece ruby wedding dinner service, didn't as much as bother with the VCR. '
'The couple, how're they doing?'
'Shook up, who wouldn't be? Keeping him in Queen's for a few days' observation. She's got'a daughter, come to stay.'
Leads? '
'Car was stolen the day before, shopping centre out at Bulwell. Found abandoned a few hours later, not so far short of Cinderhill.'
'Wouldn't be much left of it, then.'
'Four wheels and a chassis.'
Resnick had a mouthful more tea.
'Didn't Reg Cossall have something going over that way somewhere?'
'Broxtowe, yes. Still has. Urban Youth Initiative, that's the official name for it. Won't tell you what Reg calls it.'
'Have a word, then, Graham. Might tie in with something, someone he's got tabs on.'
'Right' ' Meantime, description of what's missing. '
'On its way round today. Long as we can keep forgetting the photocopy budget.'
There was a knock and in response to Resnick's
'Come in,' Divine's head and shoulders appeared round the edge of the door.
'Kev and me are just off up the Forest. I was wondering, bloke in the hospital, anything useful?'
Resnick shook his head.
'Not as much as a name. How about Vice?
Anything from them? '
'Low profile last night, as it happens. Promised to put the word out today, though. Turn up anything, they'll let us know.'
