Scott-Marie’s expression lost its severity. Gideon noticed this and also noticed a beading of sweat on the Commissioner’s own forehead, particularly where the hair grew back to make a sharp widow’s peak.
“That’s it.” Scott-Marie stood up and took off his coat, draping it over the back of an upright chair. He didn’t wear braces, and his crocodile skin belt was firmly drawn about a waist which probably hadn’t expanded two inches in twenty years. “I hadn’t given it more than a passing thought, but the Home Secretary has just telephoned to say that he wants special precautions taken.”
“Do you think he has any particular reason?” asked Gideon.
“He gave me no intimation that he had, and I imagine there is some kind of political motivation. He may simply want to be absolutely sure there is no political demonstration — at least,” Scott-Marie gave his dry smile: “none that gets out of control — during his last few months in office.”
“We haven’t done too badly by him yet.” Gideon smiled just as drily.
“We’ve done very well, which, of course, is no reason why we shouldn’t try to do even better.” Scott-Marie took out his handkerchief, shook it free of its folds, and dabbed his forehead. “You’ve heard no rumours of trouble at Lords?”
Gideon shook his head.
“No. But I’ll send out an instruction for all divisions to report any talk there may be. And I’ll brief the A.B. Division to take special precautions. Just one thing, sir,” he added, thoughtfully.
“What’s that?”
“If the Home Secretary has been given a tip, we should be told what it’s about.”
‘I’ll try to make sure that we are,” promised Scott-Marie. “Are you taking special precautions about any of the other events?”
“So far, routine looks likely to be enough. We’ve reasonable time with over three weeks before the Derby, nearly a week to the game with South Africa. Wimbledon’s almost on us, but the real crowds don’t start for a few days. I’ll watch the situation very closely, sir.”
“I’m sure you will.” Scott-Marie gave another dab at his forehead and one at his neck. “I gather that things in general are fairly quiet?”
“The usual summer calm,” Gideon told him. “It always makes me a bit uneasy. There’s a tendency for everyone to slacken off; especially when we have a warm spell, like this.”
“Well, this is the fifth day. I suppose it will break before the weekend.” Shrugging resignedly, the Commissioner stood up and Gideon, feeling much cooler, moved quickly to help him into his jacket. “Thanks. If I have any further word from the Home Office, I’ll tell you. Let me know at once if you have any word from anyone.”
“I certainly will,” promised Gideon, opening the door. Not even this created a breeze and as Scott-Marie walked off, Gideon closed the door and went slowly to the window.
Scott-Marie always provoked him to thought and speculation. His first thought, now, was: how characteristic of the man to take his jacket off — a simple gesture to show that he also felt the heat of the office, and to put Gideon at his ease. His second thought was that the Home Secretary was probably simply making sure the Yard kept on its toes. Taken by and large this particular incumbent, James Teddall, the Minister in charge of Britain’s home affairs, was a good one. The police, through the Commissioner, were directly responsible to him, and he had never pushed the Force too far: never tried to over-assert his authority. As Gideon had said, the police hadn’t done badly by him yet.
The recollection made him smile. At the beginning of Teddall’s ministry there had been threats of a mammoth, combined, anti-Vietnam war, anti-colour bar, anti-colonialism demonstration. Several organisations had joined forces to concentrate four columns, each over twenty thousand strong, in a march on the time-honoured venue for political demonstrations: Trafalgar Square. There had been a great deal of newspaper panic-publicity — even a demand for troops to be brought in to help maintain order, since troops could be armed more easily than the police.
Scott-Marie had presided at a meeting of the several Commanders of the Metropolitan Force together with their chief assistants and Home Office officials. At the end of the meeting, he had said simply: “I think we can cope, gentlemen. We need a minimum of force and a maximum of good-humour. That is the phrase Commander Gideon used and I cannot think of a better. I shall advise the Home Secretary that we do not need help.”
Coming from a man who had reached high rank in the Army before retiring, the advice had carried great weight. But the Commander of the uniformed branch, an old friend of Gideon, had been very edgy.
“These young devils could cause a lot of trouble, George,” he had growled after the meeting.
“Yes, but they probably won’t.”
“It’s easy for you — we bear the brunt of it!” the Uniform Commander had complained.
“You can have every man in the C.I.D., and you know it,” Gideon had replied. “And with all leave stopped and every man on duty, there shouldn’t be much to worry about.”
But even he had wondered, for there were ugly stories of trained saboteurs and experienced rabble rousers being brought into the country; reports of the planned use by the trouble-makers of tear-gas; even reports of alleged caches of arms with which to fight the police. As the Sunday had drawn near, every senior officer — and probably most men of all ranks in the Force — had been on edge, prepared for near-catastrophe.
The demonstration, a complete success, had caused practically no incidents. A few smoke-bombs, a few marbles tossed under the feet of the police horses, a few isolated struggles — and a great deal of good humour and repartee between demonstrators and the police., Trafalgar Square had looked as if all London had been picnicking there over the weekend and left all their rubbish behind them, but there was no damage. Other demonstrations had followed much the same trend. The police had discovered by trial and error the best way to handle would-be rioters and had also discovered something which had not surprised Gideon at all. Most of the demonstrators were good-natured, decent, reasonable human beings.
His smile faded slowly as he thought beyond this. There was one subject which seemed to bring out the worst in all the people involved, even the decent and the reasonable: that subject was racialism. He himself was emotionally incapable of racial prejudice: to him, a man was simply a man. But many did feel such prejudice and there were times when the bitterness of racial conflict reached an ugly crescendo, in London particularly, over the
