‘I’ll need time to draft something. Tell them they’ll have it by lunchtime and get that report from the crash site as soon as possible, will you, Aldarino?’
‘Well it’s a bit early for...’
‘Just get me the basics, all right? And please, God, let it be as Bryant and Ferra said it was. The last thing we need is this incident spiralling into a public relations nightmare.’
‘Yes ma’am. Oh, and ma’am?’
‘Yes, Sergeant?’
‘DS Sullivan is here.’
‘Who?’
‘The new Met officer on secondment. Arrived from London last night.’
‘Ah.’
Alderino could see that she was still none the wiser.
‘I briefed you last week, ma’am. You said to-’
‘Yes, yes, all right, Aldarino. I have had a lot on my mind.’
Aldarino nodded and left the room, leaving Massetti a few minutes in which to stew before once more tapping upon the door with another list of urgent matters and dates for her itinerary. Not for the first time and certainly not for the last, Aldarino thanked his lucky stars that he had chosen to remain a sergeant.
The old lady bent to pick up the basket of damp washing on the floor of the kitchen. She would now carry out the familiar job of drying and ironing the clothes that were in it. It was a task she found increasingly difficult to perform - her mobility recently becoming so much more limited with the pain from her arthritic hip joints . If only Maria had been able to stay. For twenty five years her housekeeper had effortlessly taken the weight of household chores away from her mistress. But the old lady had had to let her go. She would not have understood the changed priorities within the household and the very particular demands of the person who now occupied the upstairs bedroom of the house with its view of the upper garden and The Rock. Maria would have wanted to help. To care and ease her mistress’s burden. But the old lady could not allow that. What possessed the house now could only be exorcized by herself and herself alone. It was her duty. A guilt that had to be assuaged.
The old lady moved slowly across the kitchen - the basket of washed clothes in her hands. She had to get them dried and ironed to perfection. The punishment for not doing so would be too much to bear.
‘So, you’re with us for three months then, Sullivan.’ Massetti peered over her desk at the female officer in front of her.
‘Yes, ma’am. I’m very much looking forward to it.’
Masetti knew this to be a lie and made a mental note to make sure that it wouldn’t be the first of many.
‘The last one that came over here from the Met was supposed to have “enhanced relationship and liaison mechanisms” between our two forces. At least that’s what the blurb said. By the time he left, I can’t say I’d spotted much enhancement – though there had been a couple of
‘I’m just here to observe, assist and advise, ma’am.’
‘Ye-es. There’s a lot of observing and advising going on these days. Not much of it seems to be of assistance, though.’
‘Well, I hope I may prove to be of some use to you, ma’am.’
‘Indeed. From what I’ve read of your record, Detective Sergeant, we may be the ones proving useful to you.’ Massetti hadn’t wanted to set this tone, but it had been a rough morning and she wasn’t in the mood for niceties.
‘I very much hope there’ll be some mutual benefit gained during my stay here, ma’am.’
‘I’ll insist upon it, Sullivan. If you think you’re just going to be mooching around like a United Nations observer you’ll be sadly mistaken. I’ve decided that the best way you can observe is to serve. You’re a police officer and therefore you should be doing police work. You can conclude what the hell you like after you’ve finished here. As it happens we’re temporarily short of a Detective Sergeant in CID, so as far as I’m concerned you’re the man. If you have any complaints you can bleat back to your bosses in the Met. Understood?’
‘Perfectly, ma’am.’
‘You’ll be joining Chief Inspector Broderick’s team. He should make your stay on The Rock quite an interesting one.’
Before Sullivan could enquire further about her new mentor, a tap at the door interrupted proceedings. Sergeant Aldarino poked his head around the doorframe.
‘Sorry, ma’am,’ he offered. ‘You’re needed.’
‘Very well.’ Massetti replied. ‘ Get someone to escort DS Sullivan here to the third floor will you?’
Both women stood. Massetti felt a sudden twinge of guilt at her welcoming brief.
‘ Er.. settled into your digs alright, have you?’
‘Actually ma’am, I won’t get into my apartment till the weekend. I’m staying at the Alameda ‘til then.’
‘How very pleasant for you.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘ Look, we’re a tight, loyal and highly professional force here on The Rock. A very different scale of operation to the one you’ve been used to. But if you keep your head down and do the work, you could find you’ve gone a long way to digging yourself out of the hole you’ve made for yourself. Understood?’
‘Perfectly.’
‘Good luck then.’
‘Will I need it, ma’am?’
‘I’d say that’s for you to find out and me to observe, Sullivan. That’ll be all.’
5
Sergeant Aldarino had decided against calling another officer to guide their latest visitor to CID. At a fast pace, he led the way himself.
‘It’s a bit of a maze, but you’ll soon get used to it. Old buildings have their charms, but order and convenience tend not to be among them.’
Sullivan had immediately taken a liking to the tall, grey haired Gibraltarian. He was the only policeman who’d bothered to smile at her for as long as she could remember. They continued up a small flight of stairs, then along a narrow corridor and up a further staircase. At the top of this they passed down a long corridor which occupied several offices partitioned off by walls of frosted glass. Eventually Aldarino stopped outside an anonymous door, second from the end.
‘Here’s where you live. By the way, don’t be put off by the Chief Super’s manner. She’s having a bad morning. She’s the best of them here. I’ve been with her a decade now and I wouldn’t want to work for anyone else. She’ll play fair by you, if you play fair by her.’
A pager attached to the sergeant’s tunic began to bleep.
‘Talking of the devil.’ He nodded towards the door. ’You can make your own introductions. They’ll be expecting you .’
Turning his pager off, the sergeant headed briskly back down the corridor. Sullivan turned, gave the door a cursory tap and entered. The small office was cramped. Too cramped for the four desks and many filing cabinets that met her eye. A single large window looked out across the dry docks and the sea opposite. There was only one inhabitant. A single officer sat with his back to the door - his focus firmly on the computer screen in front of him.
‘Sir?’ Sullivan said . The man did not bother to respond. ‘Sir? DS Sullivan. Just arrived from London. Chief Superintendent Massetti tells me I’ll be working with you.’
‘Nope,’ the man replied, still refusing to be distracted from his work.
‘Oh. There must be some mistake...’
‘And you just made it, Sarge,’ said the man, as he finally spun round to face her. His youthful looks suggested to Sullivan that this was not her boss.
