Beast of Burden (6 page)

Our chief suspects. Three of them. Mrs Sadler pointed them out as soon as she managed to calm down. One kid, Justin Scott, is a proper vandal, done youth time for it. Keen on burning stuff at one point, from what I hear. The other two are brothers, Aaron and Karl Hills, ginger twins who were a double pain in the arse, one of whom
has
a pain in the arse thanks to Mrs Sadler. But they're nothing special, tagged a couple of buildings in their time, never struck me as more than a couple of delinquent Weasleys.

Still, when Karl makes a move from the couch, Paulo's on him.

“The fuck d'you think you're going?”

“Bog.”

“Sit down.”

“I'm fuckin'
bursting
.”

“You'll park your arse or I'll put a clout on you, son.”

“He's going to piss on the couch, then,” says Aaron.

“You piss on the couch, you're cleaning it.”

“I can't hold it.”

“You're a grown fuckin' lad, you
can
hold it. Get your brother to tie a knot in it if you want, but I see you shift from that seat, I'll do you.”

“It wasn't us,” says Justin.

“We'll see.”

“Here,” says Aaron. “Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?”

“Whatever happened to children being seen and not fuckin' heard?”

Justin blinks at that one. Paulo points a warning finger at the three of them, then closes the office door. It's a few seconds before he realises that everyone's looking at him.

“You finished?” says Frank.

Paulo's eyes narrow for a second, until he realises that he interrupted one of Frank's questions. Then he folds his arms and pulls a face that reminds me of the dad on the
The Wonder Years
. He nods at Frank. “Sorry. You carry on.”

Frank rubs the corner of his mouth. While he's been talking to Mrs Sadler, he's been rolling a Chupa Chup around his gob, which hardly makes him the most intimidating interrogator in the world. Now he points at the floor with the lolly, gesturing for Mrs Sadler to continue.

“I'm sorry,” she says, “I don't remember what the question was.”

“That's okay. I just asked you what you were alleging against those boys out there.”

Alleging. Paulo and I glance at each other, both wondering who bought Frank the Word-A-Day calendar. Mrs Sadler looks into her tea, then up at Frank, who's put the lolly back in his mouth.

“They slashed my car tyres,” she says. “Put bricks through my window. They left …
dog mess
on my doorstep, scrawled things on the back door of my house. I can forgive general mischief, Mr Collier, but this isn't just youthful exuberance.”

“Nobody said it was,” says Frank in a low voice.

“You're sure it's them lads out there that did it?” says Paulo.

Mrs Sadler opens her mouth to speak, then stops herself. She sips her tea, heavily sugared by Frank to help with the stress of the situation. The action reminds us we all have our own drinks going cold, and when I knock back the dregs of the Americano, they twist my gut into a knot.

“Well?”

Frank shoots Paulo a glance — don't be so aggressive with her — which Paulo sees and promptly ignores, moving closer to Mrs Sadler. Because he won't believe that those lads outside the office had anything to do with this. He still reckons she's a mental case, but he has to hear her out because she's committed to punishing his lads. And nobody's going to punish Paulo's lads except Paulo.

So he nods when Mrs Sadler finally says, “No.”

“No, you're not sure?” says Frank.

Paulo's already pushed himself off the desk and stalked to the door.

“You three,” he says. “Fuck off.”

Karl leaps from the couch and sprints to the toilets. The other two stand there looking stupid, not entirely sure that they're allowed to go. Paulo takes a step towards them and they move off, backwards.

“Go on,” he says.

Justin and Aaron head across the gym, talking to each other with occasional glances back at the office. Aaron puts on a heavy limp as he walks.

“I'm sorry,” says Mrs Sadler when Paulo returns to the office.

“It's fine,” he says. “Just needed to be sure.”

She sniffs, and tears aren't far behind. “It's just, I don't know what to do. I was
positive
it was them. I'm sorry, it's really …”

“Here.” Frank holds out a tissue. “It's okay. No harm done.”

Paulo glances at me, his eyebrows raised.

“I thought I clipped one of your boys,” says Mrs Sadler.

“You did,” says Paulo. “But he walked out of here, so he should be alright. Any problems with the guardians, I might have to come back to you, mind.”

“I'm sure that won't be an issue,” says Frank.

“I'm so sorry, it's just too much for me at the moment.” She makes a rattling sound as she blows her nose. “You try to help these kids, and some of them, I'm sure they think it's just a
lark
, you know?”

“When was the last time something happened?”

“This morning. My car. All four tyres. I'm supposed to be at work right now, but I just can't face it.”

Frank looks at me. Only a quick glance, so Mrs Sadler doesn't pick it up, her face buried in the tissue as she goes in for another blow. I shake my head at him. Irritation flickers on his face, then he turns back to her.

Doesn't matter that I think it's a waste of time. Frank's heartstrings have been tugged, and there's nothing I can do about it.

“Look,” he says, “maybe there's something we can do.”

“Sorry?” She sniffs. “I don't understand.”

“We can find out who's doing this to you.”

She looks across at Paulo, then at me. Weighing us up. “No, I'm sorry. I really don't have that kind of money.”

I want to tell Frank to shut up right now, but the words don't hit my mouth quick enough to interrupt.

“We could consider this
pro bono
,” he says.

That fucking calendar, I swear to God …

“Free? Really?”

A favour case, fine, but it's
his
fucking favour. I chuck my empty coffee cup into the bin.

“I don't see why not,” says Frank. Then, to me, as I push past him: “Where're you going?”

“Out.
Paying
work.”

Truth is, I can't hang around here much longer even if I wanted to. If Donkey's been round once, he'll be back soon enough. Besides, I've got to chase up a few leads on Mo. And by my watch, it's time for early doors at the Harvester.

DONKIN

Course, the first thing I heard when I got back to the station was that bastard Bowie song.

Nothing against the man personally, but I couldn't say that being screamed at by a dodgy tranny with two different coloured eyes and fucked teeth was something I wanted to suffer on a regular basis. And it didn't help his case that he wrote that fucking song, which I hated even more now that it came out of the mouth of a proper arsehole.

Detective Inspector Colin Kennedy — call him by the initials DICK — a Scouse twat who obviously couldn't hack it on the Mersey beat, and Greater Manchester was starving for DIs, so they chucked him out here for us to deal with. Came to us last year, breezed in through the doors like he owned the place, and he took a fancy to me in particular, been riding us ever since. He was a right fucking comedian, more gags than Monkhouse, and ninety percent of them were at my expense.

Including that fucking Bowie song, “Life On Mars”.

Hilarious. Especially that stuff about the law man beating up the wrong guy, because that was what stuck in my head. Not just mine. It was a catchy song — I might not have had much time for Bowie, but I could admit that much — and it wasn't just me it caught. It got so Kennedy didn't even need to sing it anymore. It was like that Russian bloke's dog, the rest of the bastards in the office would sing it soon as they saw us walking in the door. Wouldn't have minded so much, but the fucking programme it was off wasn't even on the telly anymore.

It was time to knock it on the head, mind. I was getting sick of it. So when I came in the office, and Kennedy started humming away, I had to say something.

“Y'alright?”

Kennedy stopped humming, nodded. “Yeah, Iain. How're you?”

I looked at him hard. He gave nothing away, the twat. Probably prided himself on that, if I knew him right. A calm sea, not a ripple showing, but the other bastards in the office looked like their heads were going to explode from keeping in their laughter. I chucked my bacon and sausage barm onto my desk, turned to Kennedy. “You got something to say?”

“You what?”

“With the humming.”

“I don't get you,” he said, smiling. “I'm just humming.”

“That tune.”

“What tune?”

I didn't answer him. Kept staring. This close to putting his head through his fucking desk.

“Look, it's a catchy tune,” he said.

“Too fuckin' right it is.”

I went to my desk, a plywood piece of shit covered in paperwork, some of it mine, most of it other people's because they liked to use my workspace as a dumping ground for anything they couldn't be arsed filing. But when I got there, it wasn't the papers I was bothered about.

“Alright,” I said, nice and loud so everyone could hear. “Who's had it?”

A sea of blank faces, those that were brave enough to make eye contact with us. Then I looked at Kennedy. The fucker had this oily smirk on his face.

“Well?” I said.

He shook his head, playing innocent again. “Sorry?”

“You had a fuckin' stroke or something? What's with your face?”

“I'm not doing nothing with my face, Iain.”

“You know something or not?”

“What's up?”

I showed him the empty space where my chair used to be.

“Nothing there,” he said.

“I know there's not.”

Shook his head again, pulled a face like he didn't understand what I was driving at.

“Where's my fuckin' chair?”

“Oh, right, yeah,” he said. “I get you now. You've lost your chair somewhere.”

“Uh-huh. That's right. And I'm guessing you're the cunt that knows something about it.”

He squinted then. Didn't like being called a cunt, did Kennedy. Touched a nerve. Probably his mam called him it once, it was that psychologically raw for him. “What'd you just say?”

That was when I saw DS Adams move for the door. He was a milksop twat, reed-skinny in a cheap suit and what they used to call Cuban heels, but what I wanted to call platforms every time I saw him. He was proper lairy about his skin, pretty much ducked his head any time someone looked at him straight. Didn't help he was so blonde as to be almost albino, and when you got him in a corner, he blushed so hard, you could toast bread on his cratered cheeks. The bloke was a mess, but he was trustworthy. So I watched him slink around the edge of the room, waited until he got to the door, then grabbed his arm. Kennedy laughed at us, but I didn't care.

“Derek, you seen my chair?”

He pulled away from us, shaking his head, but I followed him until he hit the filing cabinets. Looked like he was trying to retract his head into his collar, which meant he knew exactly what was going on.

“I've not seen it, no,” he said. “Look, Iain, I'm really busy.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I'm positive. Can I just squeeze past you there?”

“Where you going?”

He nodded towards the door. “It's just an interview.”

“Let him go, Iain.” That was Kennedy, and the smirk was gone. “You heard him. He doesn't know anything about your chair, he's got someone in interview, and you're holding him up. Bloke's got a job to do, you might want to do the same.”

“Did I ask you, son? I'm talking to Derek, didn't call out for a fuckin' three-way, did I?” Back to Adams. “And who the fuck have you got in interview that's more important than my chair?”

He cleared his throat. “I'm not saying he's more important—”

“Who is it?”

“Bloke's name is Brian Conroy.”

Adams moved away from us. I dogged him.

“Conroy? What you got him on?”

One hand on the door, Adams looked confused, like he didn't understand how I knew the name. “Uh, fenced goods. Nothing major.”

“He's a fuckin' smackhead.”

“He's a smackhead with a stash of twenty boxed and hooky IPhones.”

“Where the fuck did he get them?”

“Well, that's what I'm going to ask him, Iain.”

“No, you can't do that,” I said.

“Excuse me?”

I lowered my voice. “He's one of mine.”

Adams looked me right in the eye. “I don't follow.”

“He's one of mine.” I nodded at the door. “Brian Conroy's one of my” — paused it here, knowing fine well that Kennedy was having a beak, so I had to whisper — “
confidential informants
.”

Somewhere behind us, Kennedy let out a single, barked laugh. I let it go. Didn't want to deal with him just yet. More important things.

“Well,” said Adams. “That is a problem.”

“He's your collar, is he?”

He looked up at us. “Yeah, he's definitely caught.”

“He given up his source? Guarantee you he never had the opportunity to nick that many. He picked 'em up from someone.”

“He wouldn't do that, he's not daft. And he's used to how it works in here, obviously.”

“So what're you going to do?” I said. “You have owt to offer?”

“Offer? No.”

“That's what he's waiting on.”

Adams frowned. “No, we're going to
charge
him, Iain. If he wants to give up his source, that's fine, but it's a clean collar. I'm not going to
offer
him anything.”

“Tell you what, let me talk to him.”

He shook his head. “I can't do that.”

“No, it's okay. I'll go in there, have a little word with the lad, get you something a bit juicier to hang a charge on than a bunch of hooky fuckin' phones.”

“I don't think so, Iain.”

I got in between him and the door, pushed it for him. Held up my hands, gave him the smile. “Ten minutes, mate. Tell you, won't be a single second longer.”

“Iain, really, I can't—”

“Donkey, leave the lad alone.”

Kennedy again. This time trotting out the fucking nickname.

“What you doing, Colin, sticking your fuckin' oar in when I already told you this is between me and Derek here?”