The White Horse was thick with smoke and the smell of smoke and booze. Dog-ends spilled from ashtrays and glasses stuck to tables. It was a British boozer.
A smoker’s bar.
It was a place that, like many that coppers frequented, hadn’t needed an extension to its licensing hours because they had never been observed anyway.
It was, therefore, an hour after the last bell had closed the doors and pulled the curtains on the dim lights. The place was busy with stale kozzers on the back-end of their shift doing what kozzers did best and that meant that the jovial old owner with his proud belly hanging over his leather belt and his sour-faced, thin-haired wife were full-time pulling pints and jerking shorts. There were a few others in the bar beside the policemen, good-as-gold regulars who made no noise when they left and wouldn’t even cough if they thought it might cause offence, and that was good enough. ence than would otherwise have been the case, “That sounds like a cracking good idea.”
Chas Walker, ex-army, REME, went on, “You need it strong to put up with the job nowadays. In our squad we’ve got two fucking dyslexics that take twenty minutes to read a caution and a Muslim who stops chasing villains to get his prayer-mat out.”
Their conversation took an unlikely turn as they saw a tall rangy man carrying his drink toward Cole's table.
Walker frowned. Company and Cole didn't go together. Not for a while.
Martin James nodded as memory put a name to the face and he put them right. “That’s Geoff Maynard,” he said soberly. “A dangerous bastard.”
“Him and Cole together,” Walker mused for he had heard the stories. “Should be interesting.”
Martin James nodded and, as his eyes dulled, he said seriously, “Maybe, as long as you don't get caught in the flak. And there's always plenty of that.” He was remembering back to another case when rules were written for someone else.
Geoff Maynard found Rick Cole at a table at the back, partly secluded from the bar and the woodentops by a couple of thick timber stanchions treated to make them look ancient. They'd even got some dummy woodworm holes drilled in. It was a barrier of Cole's choosing. Geoff Maynard said, “What are you going to do when they ban smoking in public places?”
“They wouldn’t dare, would they?”
“You never know with these clowns.”
“God save us from the meddlers and their junk-free lifestyles. The graveyards are full of them, smokeless, vegetarian, composting like the rest of us.”
Maynard smiled. “You take the average family and they haven't got a clue about what goes on, not the things we see. We see things that no one should see; we hear things that no one should hear. Tell me how police officers hold on to their sanity?”
“Do they?”
“You're right. They don't. That's why they never make real friends. That's why their marriages seldom work. No one can live with them, except nurses, maybe, who see the results.”
Maynard eased into a chair opposite and placed his drink on the table.
“Hello Geoff.”
“Rick.”
“You're not a police officer.”
“True. But I can’t get away from it. People like you keep calling me back.”
Cole nodded. “You're paid a lot more than we are.”
“Agreed.”
“And you make more on top of that writing your True Crime books. And most of that's bollocks.”
“They make less than you think. And come to think of it there are a few coppers around who get off on the same bend.”
“Their books are bollocks too.”
Maynard threw him a harmless smile. “So what have we got? More of the same? Fantasies, the fat dogs will tell you, can do no harm. Well, you go tell them that fantasy is where the sex crime starts. Fantasy is the fuse. The explosion comes when the fuse is used up.” “So tell me something new? That was in one of your books too.” “I didn't know you read my books.”
“Only one of them. Couldn't get on with the first person. He did it all by himself.”
Maynard smiled again. “That's not true. I turned you into a celebrity, photograph and all.” He reached out and tapped Cole's glass. “Anyway, the coppers on the Jill Dando case were banned from drinking alcohol for the duration.”
Cole lifted his glass and said, “I could get the wrong man without a drink. It would be that easy.” He lost two fingers and returned his glass to the table. “The idiots who come up with ideas like that are about as useful as a special.”
“I'm not arguing,” Maynard said and made a suitable noise. “But do I detect a fractured and disconnected discourse within the Met? God forbid!”
Cole grinned and said, “What can we do? Our commissioner is so far up Tony Blair’s arse his favourite line is he’s having a Blair on Blair. We’ve got Vote Labour stickers on police cars and we’ve lost over one hundred detectives from the Murder Squad to boost neighbourhood policing. And that’s apart from the shambles at Stockwell. Forget Condon who just about destroyed CID, this guy has destroyed the reputation of the entire force. Protecting the public has become a national joke. At least Stevens was on our side, fighting our pitch, not bowing down to the human rights and politically correct lunatics who run this government. You can’t run a police force when the government is on the side of the criminal. Welcome back.” Maynard’s glance skirted the scythes and other farming implements hanging from the walls, faintly sinister reminders of a cold-blooded time. There was something about the swish of the scythe, maybe because of its association with Death, that sent a shiver down his spine. The place hadn't changed. They had, the detective and the therapist, but the surroundings were fixed in the past.
Maynard’s sleepless eyes came to rest on Cole. They were warm but held a trace of mischief. “So what is Ian Blair up to?” “He’s blaming everyone else, as usual.”
“Menezes?”
“That’s part of it but that had more to do with the people who took out David Kelly than SO19.”
Maynard nodded. “That makes sense. It explains a lot, and why the commissioner’s take made less than sense.”
“It doesn’t do SO19 any favours though, having to cover for those incompetent bastards.” Through the smoke of his JPS Cole threw him a smile. They knew each other too well. He said, “Where are you staying?”
“Just got in. The gear's in the boot. I was hoping your spare room was still spare.”
“I think you've still got the key.”
“Guessed it might come in handy.”
It had been years but it felt like yesterday. They'd worked a nasty case and it had bonded them. Old soldiers knew about camaraderie and the shared experience. That's why sixty-five years on the few that were left were still going back to Dunkirk.
“So!” Maynard said. “What’s happening in the real coppering world? You've got yourself a serial slasher?”
“A bit premature for a serial, but maybe. A bomb builder too.” “Let's talk about the slasher. It’s more my line. Have you got anything at all?”
“Not that counts. You’ve seen the front pages and you can imagine our senior policemen knee-jerking like a bunch of geriatric rockers. Nothing changes. The arseholes remain in charge.”
Maynard's smile was cut short as Sam Butler arrived carrying a tray of drinks. Standing next to him, rock solid on two-inch heels, was the slim figure of Anian Stanford. Her dark eyes were smarting. “Hello Geoff.” Butler met Maynard's friendly smile. “Heard you were in town. Same old story, is it? Women in trouble.”
“It seems that way.”
“We're not interrupting, are we?”
Maynard half-emptied his seat. “Not at all. Join the party.” Sam Butler glanced sideways at the DC. “This is Anian.” His glance must have caught Cole for Maynard picked up on it. Nothing obvious, just a slight flicker of the eyes.
She slid into a chair and lifted her glass of red wine and only then looked at Cole. “Guv,” she murmured.
Cole’s nod of acknowledgement only served to increase Maynard’s curiosity.
Butler said, “I promised Anian that I'd show her the local, just in case she's moved over here.”
Maynard asked, “So what's happening at Hinckley?”
“We've got some missing women.”
“But unfortunately,” Cole cut in. “They haven’t got a case!” Out of earshot the Sheerham kozzers stole glances at Cole's table while Chas Walker filled them in. “She nearly killed Jack Wooderson over at Hinckley. He had to call it a day. He was going home smelling like a chicken Madras every night and his old girl was getting suspicious.” Peter Ward said, “She'll do me.”
“You've got no chance, son,” Walker said seriously. “Anyway, apart from Jack Wooderson even the fucking tide wouldn’t take her out!”
Some of the uniforms propping the bar overheard and edged forward for more.
From the back DC Martin James put in, “It's all the Kama, isn't it? The bow and arrows, the bowstring of bees.”
Vacant looks required an explanation.
“Saw the video. Kama Sutra. Watched it with the missus. She wasn't all that. Standing on her head with a banana up her arse didn't appeal. She said we could try it again if we get double glazing. Funny, though, it wasn't Pakis in that. Still, I'd give her one…” James nodded toward Anian.
Chas Walker looked surprised.
“Well, wouldn't you?”
The DC looked from James to Ward and back again. He said, “You two are supposed to be married and pillars of the community. But no, I wouldn’t. Apart from the colour, she’s too skinny.”
“She'd be perfect for the part of Rosalind.”
Ward's ears picked up. “ As You Like It,” he said and looked pleased with himself. “The daughter’s reading it for the GCSE.”
“Yes, mine too. Forcing me to play half the parts. Surprised at how much cross-dressing old Shakespeare got up to. Quite a party they had in those days. Gwyneth Paltrow's tits…”
Walker wagged a finger. “Now you’re making sense.”
Two shots over the limit, Butler gave the DC a ride back to Hinckley where she shared a flat with two nurses who worked at the Royal Free. Their shifts were all over the place, worse even than Anian's, so life was noise free. There was always someone sleeping or trying to. In the car she said, “Tell me about him?”
Butler knew immediately that she was referring to Cole. “He’s a DI at Sheerham.”
“I know that much.”
“What then?”
“Tell me.”
“His wife left him some years ago. Went off with an American. Blamed the job, as you do. He was involved in a couple of high profile cases that… Well, they were pretty bloody nasty. He spent too much time on them and not enough on her. You know the score. Christ, Anian, you're in the job.”
“What else?” She sounded tired, as if talking was keeping her awake.
“Nothing else.”
“I heard some rumours, a certain policewoman.”
Butler nodded and checked the mirror. The roads were quiet, washed with lonely electric. The silent shop displays blazed the Christmas message of false hope
“I heard them too.” Gossip had never come easily to Sam Butler. “Well?”
“I don't know. They might have got a bit too close, but they saw sense, backed off. She's married, happily I believe, moved back to Ipswich. End of story.”
“No, no, you're not getting off there. Was it an affair?”
“I wouldn't put it like that. A daydream, maybe, a mental lapse, a day off. That's it, a day off. That's how I'd put it. Everyone's allowed a day off, just once. It's all forgotten now. It was a long time ago.” Under cover of darkness Anian Stanford nodded thoughtfully and smiled.