by Giles Ekins
Deeply frustrated by the legal ping-pong debate, Jessica made one last effort.
‘OK doctor, I must respect your decision, but please, will you tell me, off the record, were there any concerns by you or anyone else, the nurses for instant, of abuse. If you can categorically confirm to me that you are unaware of any abuse, we can close the issue without having to apply to the care trust. It would be very helpful.’
Dr Metcalfe pondered for a long minute, steepling her fingers as she considered how to answer within the framework of her ethical decision as she consulted the records on her computer.
‘I can only tell you that Julia was sexually active from the age of about 14 but that in itself, is regretfully, not so unusual there days. There were no signs of anal penetration, but even if there had been, that would not be indicative of abuse since it could have been consensual. Julia did not confide in me if there had been familial abuse. That is all I am prepared to say.’
Thank you, doctor,’ Jessica answered, wondering why the hell the GP could not have said that from the outset, instead of all the pissing about with legal semantics.
After writing up her report and sending it electronically to Fred and Grace, Jessica was ready to leave and walked out to the car park with Jessica.
Jessica did not have a car and so Emma offered her a lift to the gym, where she was going for taekwondo practice and work off some off the frustrations of the day.
They said little as Emma drove, both were mentally exhausted from the strains of the job and had little appetite for small talk.
‘Goodnight, Jessica,’ Emma called as Jessica got out the car, ‘Night’ she responded, ‘see you tomorrow, another day, another dollar.’
It was almost 9 o’clock when Emma finally arrived at the cottage which she shared with her partner Alice Hitchins in Peak Barley, a small village consisting of one church, one pub, (the ‘Green Man’+)and one general store on the moorland fringes of West Garside.
Emma had come out as gay to her parents when she was sixteen. She had known for some time that she had lesbian tendencies, that she had had no interest whatsoever in boys and had first made love, or been made love to, by an older girl at a party when she was fifteen. She did try sex with a man when she was at university in Leeds but found it unsatisfying, recalling what her first lover had told her, ‘you can never have bad sex with a girl.’
Surprisingly, it had been her father who had been the most supportive when she came out, telling her that whatever made her happy was fine by him. Whereas her mother, whom Emma had expected to be the most sympathetic, had called her ‘disgusting’ and ‘perverted,’ and only spoke to Emma in terse angry comments and so she left home as soon as she could after taking her ‘A’ level exams.
After obtaining a 2-1 degree in History, Emma did not know what to do with it. She did not want to teach and did not fancy academia as a university lecturer and then decided on a whim to apply to the police, a decision she had never regretted. She had been careful to keep her sexuality to herself and only told Terry Horton after she declined an offer to go on a date with him and explained why, begging that he keep the information to himself. And Terry had done so with the sole exception of DCI Swan, whom Terry felt ought to know as the SIO.
Emma had met Alice in the ‘Pink Flamingo’ a basement gay club on Tangmere Street in the old part of town, attraction had been mutual and after three dates, Alice invited Emma to move in with her. So, she gave up her rented apartment and moved into the cottage with Alice, paying her share of the mortgage.
Whereas Emma was a large size 20 and comfortable with her size, Alice was small, barely 5’1’’ and urchin thin, with her hair cropped short and died a luminous green. They had been together as a couple for more than four years, although Alice was profoundly anti-establishment, anti-government of whatever political persuasion, anti-hunting, anti-fracking, saw no good reason why the world required nuclear weapons or armed forces, and considered the police force to be fascist thugs. Emma Cox excepted of course.
‘Little and Large’ they called themselves and were able to happily co-exist despite or maybe because of, the many differences in beliefs between them. Emma voted Conservative, had no strong sentiments on hunting, believed the benefits of fracking outweighed the disadvantages, ‘why import expensive gas and oil from oppressive regimes in the Middle East or Russia when we have trillions and trillions of tons of the stuff under our feet’, opposed the possible scrapping of nuclear submarines and considered the armed forces should be enlarged and reinforced. And most certainly did not consider the police to be fascist thugs, not even Fred Burbage.
Alice gave Emma a hug as she came in through the door, almost disappearing into Emma’s bulk.
‘You look exhausted, pet, she said (she was from the north-east), ‘They’re driving you too hard, you should complain to your union.’
‘There’s no peace for the wicked, especially whilst this murder investigation is ongoing, you know how it is, all hands on the deck, long days and no weekends.’
‘You’re not working this weekend? It’s ‘We’re Out’, the Gay Pride march. You promised me we would go this year, that you would finally come out publicly!’
‘I know, I know I did, but I can’t I really can’t.’ Emma exclaimed wretchedly, she knew how desperately Alice wanted her to come out to the world at large and although she knew there were gay police, she really did not yet feel fully comfortable coming out in public, especially to march on ‘We’re Out.’
‘I think you’re ashamed of me, ashamed of being gay. You should be proud of it, shout it out loud and proud, stick it up their fascist arses.’ Alice said, angrily,
‘I’m not ashamed of you and we do go out together, as a couple, you know we do.’
‘Yeah, to gay clubs and pubs. Never to anywhere straight.’
‘We will go out together, to other places but I do have to work on Saturday and I am sorry to miss ‘We’re Out’, I know I did promise but what can I do, it’s the job I’m in.’
‘Yeah, the job, it’s always the job, you care more about that fucking job than you do me.’
Despite her diminutive size, Emma always felt intimidated by Alice and tried to placate her before the burgeoning row got out of hand. ‘It’s not that I prefer the job over you, but I have to strike a balance, neither is more important than the other. I love my job and I love you and I’m greedy, I want both, but I do love you. I do. And I am truly sorry about Saturday.’
‘I know pet, and I’m sorry, it’s just that I was so looking forward to us being together, so that every fucker in town can see us together and we could say ‘fuck you’ to ‘em all.’
‘Next year, I promise and if you like, we can go to Sheffield’s Gay Pride march and walk together, how about that.’ Emma suggested, bending down to give Alice a hug.
‘Better than nothing, I suppose.’ Alice answered, responding to the embrace.
‘Good, I’ll just have a cheese sandwich and a glass or two of wine and then bed. OK?’
‘OK.’
‘OK.’
Forty-Eight
As Grace and Terry walked along the almost deserted Whitburn promenade, it began to rain again, not heavily but a thin grey miserable drizzle and they quickened their pace to get to the fish restaurant.
Located halfway along the promenade, next to an art gallery displaying poorly executed seascapes on one side and a shop selling tourist crap on the other, the ‘Blue Oyster Fish Restaurant’ oozed a quality totally at odds with most of Whitburn’s other restaurants and ‘attractions.’ It was double fronted, brightly lit, decorated in muted cream paint and subtle patterned wallpaper and small crystal chandeliers.
The tables were laid with crisp white cotton table cloths, starched cotton napkins and solid Sheffield ENPS cutlery. The stainless-steel salt mill contained Himalayan Salt and the pepper grinder held a mixture of black and red peppercorns, the vinegar came in a tall white ceramic stoppered bottle with aspout whilst a fresh orchid
stood in a Dartington crystal vase. Muted classic rock played quietly in the background, audible but not intrusive
A young waitress, neatly attired in black dress, white apron and white Victorian waitress cap showed Grace and Terry to a quiet table with a view across the rain splashed promenade and the dark rolling seas of the bay, as classic cast-iron street lamps cast a yellow light onto the shimmering white capped waves of the encroaching high tide.
When they were seated, the waitress passed them each a menu, ‘When you’re ready, I’ll be right over, OK?’ she said and walked back to her station and stood alongside another similarly clad older, waitress.
The kitchen, to the rear of the restaurant, was visible through a glass screen which ran the entire width of the restaurant as two chefs in white chef’s jackets and skull caps were frying the fish and chips under the direction of a tall burly man, with the looks of an ex-biker; gym-bulked tattooed arms, short stubbly ginger beard and long hair tied back under a red bandana.
‘Wow, this is a bit different from my local chippy.’ exclaimed Terry as he studied the menu.
‘Certainly is, and such a surprise,’ said Grace. ‘Totally unexpected.’
‘Like I said. I just hope that the food lives up to the surroundings. And music!’ as if on cue, ‘Don’t Fear the Reaper’ began to play and Terry air-guitared the riffs with his knife. The head chef noticed and gave Terry a cheery thumbs-up, which he reciprocated with a grin.
Cod was not on the menu, but that was not an issue, they would have ordered haddock anyway and did so along with chips and mushy peas whilst Terry ordered a pint of bitter and Grace a glass of Chardonnay.
‘Why no cod?’ Terry asked the young waitress out of curiosity.
‘Gordon says cod stocks are depleted, too low he says and so won’t order it, not until stocks have reached sustainable levels again.’
‘Good, very commendable, I like that stance, tell him so from me. And Charlotte, tell him I like the music,’ Terry told the waitress, reading the name tag pinned to her apron. Charlotte gave Terry an appraising onceover and walked back to deliver the order to the chef.
She was soon back with their drinks, giving Terry a wide smile as she placed his beer in front of him, virtually ignored Grace as she put her wine down and then sashayed back to her station, giving her backside an extra twitch as she did so for Terry’s sake, much to Grace’s amusement. ‘I think you’ve scored there, Terry. Do you want me to leave you here, so you can follow it up?’ she asked with a wicked gleam in her eye.
‘No thanks, I’m not into cradle snatching.’ he answered, somewhat embarrassed by the attention from the young waitress.
‘No? I reckon if I wasn’t here, you’d be getting a bit of extra sauce with your fish,’ she said as Terry shook his head in denial. ‘Anyway, never mind that, what do we make of Mr Sebastian Serrano?’
Terry wiped his mouth and took a sip of his beer before responding, ‘Personally. I think he was telling the truth. obviously, there was a message, a room full of people heard that message, heard those accusations. But there is something, something he did not tell us, I’m sure of that.
But having said all that, I still cannot get my head around the whole spiritualism thing. I just don’t believe that you can communicate with the dead. When you die, you die. that’s it,
You don’t reincarnate, and you don’t send messages through the likes of Stephen Nobbs, Or even Sebastian Serrano. End of. So where did the message come from? That’s the question?’
‘No. I can’t explain it either,’ Grace said reflexively, ‘I can’t say I believe in spirits and messages from beyond the grave any more than you do. For God’s sake, we’re police officers and we deal in hard fact, in solid evidence. But that message exists, and we can’t ignore that fact. So, as the Bard said, ‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy’
‘Very good, is that from ‘Macbeth?
‘No, Hamlet, but don’t ask me how I remembered that. The message exists, that we know and there are a lot of questions to be asked. We’ll review everything again at the briefing tomorrow but right now I’m going to sit back, wait for the lovely food to come and enjoy this fine Chardonnay.’
‘I’m good for that, sometimes you just need to step away from it all and clear the mind,’ agreed Terry, taking another sip at his beer,
When the food arrived, it was everything they had hoped it would be. The chips were crisp on the outside, soft and creamy on the inside, the beer batter on the firm, succulent, fish was golden brown and crispy, cooked to perfection whilst the mushy peas were naturally green, not full of that food colouring which sometimes make peas look as though they have just come out of a nuclear reactor.
‘Fred was right, these fish and chips are amazing.’ Grace said as she forked another piece of haddock to her mouth.
‘Aye, he might not know much, does our Sergeant Fred Burbage but he does know his fish and chips. I’ll give him that. Although it does seem sacrilegious to be eating ‘em with a knife and fork, fish and chips should be drenched in vinegar and eaten off a piece of greaseproof paper and newsprint.’
‘With a little wooden fork?’
They carried on eating, enjoying the food too much to indulge in small talk. Finally, with her plate clean, Grace wiped her mouth on her napkin, took another sip of wine and nodded approvingly as she swirled it around her palate. ‘Good; she said.
‘So’s this beer and as I’m not driving, I’m going to have another pint.’ and Terry waved to Charlotte and pointed to his empty glass. She nodded and quickly came back with his drink, giving Terry the benefit of another wide smile and he could not help but smile back at her.
Replete, Grace leaned back in her chair and Terry could not help but notice how her white blouse stretched enticingly across her chest. ‘So, Ds Terry Horton, tell me about yourself,’ she asked, ‘I told you all my dark secrets on the way over, so now, tell me yours.’
‘Dark secrets, eh? Well, I suppose you could say that my Dad and Granddad were black.’
‘What?’ Grace spluttered, wiping her mouth with her napkin again, leaving smears of red lipstick across the crisp white cotton.
‘Yeah,’ Terry said with a broad grin, ‘they were …miners.’
‘Miners! You bastard, you really had me going there.’
‘Sorry Grace, but I couldn’t resist it. Yeah, they were miners. Worked at Garside Main pit, just outside town where we lived at the time. They worked there all their lives until the pit closures, well Granddad had retired before then, but the pit closed not long after the strike. Between them, Maggie Thatcher and Arthur Scargill really did for the mining industry.’
Terry took another swig of his beer before continuing, recounting issues about which he obviously felt strongly about. ‘You know what totally pissed the miners off? he asked. ‘No? Well the miners were on minimal strike pay but the union leaders still drew full salary, leastwise that’s what everybody believed.
And do you know what else the union bosses said, my Dad told me this, miners were told, almost ordered, not to buy British cars but support the Russian economy and buy those shitbox Lada’s instead. The union leaders got them for free, of course He never wanted to go strike, my Dad, most of the lads didn’t but you couldn’t defy your union. Not unless you want a brick, or worse, through your windows.’
‘Incredible, no, I did not know any of that’, Grace said, ‘I mean, I always thought the miners’ strike was politically motivated, but I didn’t realise that that some miners were against it.’
‘Not some, most. Most, if not all of my Dad’s workmates were agin it.’
Charlotte came back to the table and offered them the dessert menu but they both declined and just ordered coffee.
‘How about you, would you have gone down the mine if it were still open? Grace asked, taking a tiny sip of her wine, as if determined to keep some as long as possible.
There was a clatter of plates from the tab
le behind them and they both looked around. The older waitresses had dropped greasy plates onto the table when they slipped out of her fingers, but without damage.
‘Me, no never fancied it myself, the thought of all that earth and rocks would freak me out, I’m claustrophobic, come out in a sweat just thinking about.’
‘So, you become a copper?’
‘Well, yes, obviously, but not right off, I worked on building sites, a bit of this, a bit of that, you know. Then I joined the force and never looked back. End of life story.’ Terry, a took a drink of his black coffee, grimacing at the sudden bitterness.
‘Married? Kids?’
‘What is this, the third degree. David Jarrett’s police state? Have you got thumbscrews in the big handbag of yours?’
‘No. just curious, is all.’ Grace responded, taking a sip from her milky coffee.
‘Well, since you ask. Yes, And no.’
‘What, yes married. No, no kids?’
‘Yes, kids. No marriage. Divorced a few years ago.’
‘You’d been a naughty boy, is that it?’
‘Jesus, Grace, such questions. Actually. no, t’other way about. Sheila, she worked part-time as a secretary for solicitor’s on Denmore Street. She went off with Gerald, one of the partners. But the truth is, I think, she couldn’t hack the hours we have to put in at times. The broken promises to the kids, long shifts and all that. Never knowing what time I was going to get home. All those meals ruined and burnt.’
‘You sound bitter, are you?’
Charlotte came back with the coffee pot and refilled their cups, not looking at Terry, probably deciding that he was not interested in her, much more interested in the other woman he was with. His mother?
‘Thank you, Charlotte,’ he said, ‘Am I bitter? No, it was for the best really. She’s happy. The kids, Samantha and Josephine, that’s Sam and Jo-Jo. are happy. Gerald’s a good Dad to them, he’s got a son Owen from his first marriage and all the kids get on great. There are no issues with maintenance or visitations. I can have them whenever I want. We go trampolining, swimming, camping, you name it, and I often as not I take Owen along as well. In fact, I probably see more of Sam and Jo-Jo now than I ever did when I was married.’
