'So, Willie, how are you finding the air through here?' Sir James Proud asked his assistant; his deputy in Bob Skinner's absence.
'Pure and clear, gaffer,' Haggerty replied. 'So fuckin' pure that every so often it makes me dizzy.'The Chief Constable's left eyebrow twitched slightly; he realised that the dining room waitress was behind him, and had overheard. 'Excuse my French, Maisie,' he apologised.
'That's a'right, sir,' she said, as she laid a bowl of thick pea soup before him. 'Ah'm frae Glesca myself, originally. Ah know yis are a' linguists through there.'
Still, thought Haggerty, as she laid a salad before Detective Chief Superintendent Andy Martin, this is another king's court I'm in now… even if the prime minister is away.
Proud Jimmy scratched his chin. 'You know, gentlemen,' he mused, 'as an Edinburgh man, born and bred, I'm bound to say that I'm beginning to feel like an outsider in my own force. There's Bob, there's you, Andrew, and now you, Willie; west of Scotland men all of you, all my senior team. Mind you, the balance wil swing back in my favour in a couple of weeks.'
'Aye,' Haggerty grunted. 'The Tay, the Tay, oh the silvery Tay,' he quoted. 'Long may it flow from Perth to Dundee. You looking forward to it, Andy?'
Martin shrugged his broad shoulders; green eyes flashed. 'Sure. On the whole, I am. It'l be a wrench though; I've been in this city for all of my police career so far.'
'Which is exactly why you had to go for the Tayside job, son,' the Chief interjected. 'It's the way things are; you can't be a one-force man any more, not if you have aspirations to command rank.' He glanced at Haggerty, reading his mind. 'I'm no example to quote either, before you do. I'm the last of the dinosaurs. Yes, I've been here a long time; too damned long, a few of our council ors have been heard to say.
They think I'm just hanging on to spite them; I'm not, though.' He smiled, wickedly. 'We've got plans. Bob and I. A couple of years will see them through to fruition, then I'l be off.'
The outgoing Head of CID managed with some difficulty to keep his surprise from showing on his face. He had discussed the future with Bob Skinner, his closest friend as well as his immediate boss, but he had never heard Sir James anticipate his own retirement. He guessed that his imminent departure for assistant chief constable rank in the Tayside force had raised him to another level of confidence.
'So,' Haggerty murmured, pausing in his determined consumption of his soup, 'the balance is swinging back, is it? Is that stil a secret?'
Proud Jimmy sat back slightly in his chair. 'It never was, Willie, not from you. I'm sorry, I thought you'd been informed. It was decided before you arrived, but I had to wait for the man at the centre of it to get back from holiday. He did, today, and we told him. Dan Pringle will succeed Andy as head of CID, when he goes in two weeks.'
'Big Clan, eh. He'll be pleased.'
'He's like a dog with two tails, Willie; like a dog with two tails.'
Martin grinned. 'You should have seen him,' he told the ACC.
'Pringle's such a phlegmatic bugger; I don't think I've ever known him to get excited, before this. When he was passed over last time, he thought that was it for him. He thought that Brian Mackie would be appointed, out of al the divisional CID commanders.'
'So did I,' Haggerty confessed. 'Either him or Maggie Rose, at any rate.'
'Bob and Andy thought it was too soon for either of them,' the Chief explained. 'Besides, Pringle's done a fine job over the last few months in sharpening up the Borders Division. We all agreed that he deserved it.
Actual y, the truth is it's very much an interim appointment; Dan's not that far away from retirement.'
'So who's going to the Borders?'
'Mario McGuire,' the DCS told him. 'He's done his Special Branch stint; he's earned a move as well. So he's off on promotion to a divisional CID command, as a detective superintendent just like his wife, and big Mcl henney's going to the SB job.'
'Which leaves a vacancy as Bob's executive officer,' Haggerty mused.
'Indeed it does,' the Chief agreed. 'That'l be decided after Bob gets back from his conference. Incidental y, he and I have been discussing that subject more generally. After al the fuss we had with Ted Chase, we've decided that you should have the opportunity to appoint your own assistant. Sergeant rank: think about it, eh?'
The new ACC leaned back from the table as the waitress took away his soup bowl and laid a plate of braised beef, carrots and chips in its place. 'Can I have Maisie, here?' he joked. 'She's doing a great job so far;
Proud Jimmy shook his head. 'The needs of the senior officers' dining room supersede yours, William.'
The Glaswegian laughed; yes, the Edinburgh air was different, but it was fresh and it suited him. He had been astonished by Bob Skinner's phone cal, asking if he would be interested in the job, in the wake of the appointment of his predecessor, Ted Chase, to the office of the inspector of constabulary. The bluntness of the question had taken his breath away. He had felt himself to be in a rut, his career path at its end, marked down as too rough a diamond for the command floor, an unlikely choice, as a confirmed thief-catcher, to be given charge of uniformed policing.
'Apply for it, Willie,' Skinner had said. 'The job's yours if you do; Jimmy and I'll make sure of that.'
'But why me, for ruck's sake?' he remembered croaking the question.
'I'm having no more Ted Chases in here, pal. It's as simple as that.
Aye, we want new blood, but this time I'm going to make sure I know what type it is. You're my choice; and besides, it'll be a damn good career move for you. The Dumfries and Gal oway post will be coming up in a few years; that'd be a nice place to command.'
'Jesus wept, you think long-term, don't you?'
'I've got fuck all else to do in this job; other people catch the thieves and murderers now. When Jimmy said he'd make a politician of me, he didn't know the half of it. I don't like the breed, Wil ie, based on bitter experience. But they exist, so I'l play their game.. . only I'll make up my own rules.'
So he had applied, and Skinner had kept his promise, despite what Haggerty had regarded, privately, as the worst interview of his career.
He glanced around the headquarters dining room, at the heavy silver braid on the uniforms. Yes indeed, he thought. A different air from Glasgow.