To Hell in a Handcart

by Richard Littlejohn

‘I’ve been racking my brains trying to work out where Sutton got hold of Fromby,’ said Mickey, as they queued at the Dartford Tunnel, Rocktalk 99FM chattering away. ‘I mean, a little scumbag like that and a top celebrity brief.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Tyburn Row.’

  ‘What about Tyburn Row?’

  ‘That last caller, Dave, on Ricky’s show.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘When he mentioned Monkey Boy, one-man crime wave at Tyburn Row. That has to be Sutton.’

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘It fits. That’s where I know Fromby from.’

  ‘Tyburn Row, when you were stationed there?’

  ‘Yeah, Fromby worked at the local law centre. Had a girlfriend on the force. Well, I say girlfriend, I always had him down as an iron. But they were thick as, I was going to say thick as thieves, but you know what I mean.’

  ‘Carry on.’

  ‘Well, Fromby was always turning up at the nick, representing the local toerags. That’s where I came across him.’

  ‘That was donkey’s years ago.’

  ‘Yeah, but I seem to remember reading that Fromby still works part-time at the Tyburn law centre, keeps in touch with his roots, you know.’

  ‘So that’s where he met Sutton?’

  ‘Figures, doesn’t it?’

  Andi peeled a packet of Polos, popped one in her own mouth and one in Mickey’s.

  Rocktalk 99FM went quiet as their car progressed slowly through the tunnel.

  ‘Mickey?’

  ‘Yes, love.’

  ‘What went on at the police station?’

  ‘You know what happened. It was a score draw. Fromby dropped the charges, so did we.’

  ‘I know why you dropped them. Because of Terry, right?’

  ‘Yeah and I didn’t want Katie dragged into a witness box.’

  Katie was fast asleep on the back seat, Terry buried in his Gameboy.

  ‘But why should Fromby drop the charges? That’s not like him.’

  ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  He gave her the short version: Roberta Peel, Fromby, Eric Marsden, the tapes, the files, the knife.

  ‘My God,’ said Andi. ‘And you’ve kept them all these years?’

  ‘Just as well I did.’

  ‘Why have you never told me?’

  ‘You didn’t need to know.’

  ‘And where are they now?’

  ‘You still don’t need to know.’

  Mickey turned up the radio. Ricky Sharpe was agreeing with a caller who wanted asylum-seekers rounded up at gunpoint and put on the first plane out.

  ‘Has he been drinking?’ asked Andi.

  ‘Usually. But not until he’s finished broadcasting.’

  ‘What’s got into him this morning?’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Well you heard him on Friday, taking the piss out of that fella who wanted to send the Romanians home. Ricky’s always been a bit of a soft liberal.’

  ‘Up to a point.’

  ‘But he’s never been a deporter, or a hanger, or a flogger.’

  ‘Maybe he’s got a bad hangover.’

  ‘He’s your mate, you know him best.’

  ‘Something’s happened at the weekend.’

  ‘He sounds grumpy. Angry.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘You heard what he said during the news.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘At the end of it, that stuff about Eastern European gangs in central London, robbing people of their last £250, all the money someone had for a week. That didn’t sound like part of the regular news bulletin.’

  ‘And you think that someone might be Ricky, don’t you?’

  ‘Stands to reason.’

  ‘So that’s why he’s changed his tune.’

  ‘You know what they say.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘A reactionary is a liberal who’s been mugged.’

  Twenty-six

  ‘I am a racist.’

  The four hundred delegates to the Policing Diversity and Social Deprivation in a Multi-Cultural Environment drew breath. Many looked uncomfortable.

  ‘That’s right. I am a racist.’

  Deputy Assistant Commissioner Roberta Peel paused and hung her head in mock shame.

  The hall exploded in rapturous applause.

  ‘Each day I look inside myself and confront my own racism. I am riddled with subtle prejudice, preconception and indirect discrimination.

  ‘My racism may be unwitting, it may be unconscious. But it is racism. I am guilty.

  ‘I have myself been a victim of discrimination, of the institutionalized sexism that runs through the body of the police service in Britain like a cancer. I was a victim, but at the same time I have been guilty of victimization.

  ‘Thanks to the Macpherson Report I have been able to come to terms with my racism and the institutionalized racism which pervades our entire society.

  ‘There has been a collective failure of our organizations to provide an appropriate and professional service to people of ethnicity and gender and social disadvantage because of institutional prejudice, ignorance, thoughtless and disadvantageous stereotyping of minorities.

  ‘We must bring about a paradigm shift in social awareness and challenge the parameters of our accountability, transparency and sensitivity.

  ‘In our inner cities we must stop seeing crime as a problem and look upon it as a challenge. A challenge to all of us. I am a racist, yes, but I am also an oppressor.

  ‘Our unequal society is to blame. When we are confronted with a young offender we should not be seeking to punish but to understand the pernicious forces of conservatism that stigmatized him.’

  More rapturous applause.

  ‘The Prime Minister has spoken bravely about the forces of conservatism preventing our nation from becoming a modern and progressive 21st-century European democracy.

  ‘Those same forces of conservatism are at work in the police service. They must be confronted and defeated.

  ‘We must first confront those forces within ourselves.

  ‘That’s why I say to you today – and challenge you to say the same:

  ‘I am a racist.’

  The applause lasted for a good thirty seconds before it was spent.

  Roberta milked it.

  The last handclap bounced off the walls and died.

  There was a low hum of conversation.

  Roberta stepped back towards the microphone.

  She placed both hands on the dais and said: ‘I can’t hear you.’

  All eyes were upon her.

  ‘I said I can’t hear you. Is this just to be another self-congratulatory seminar? Have these speeches we have heard here today been just empty words?’

  From the body of the hall, a male voice called out: ‘I am a racist.’

  ‘That’s good.’

  ‘I am a racist.’

  ‘Come on.’

  ‘I am a racist,’ more voices joined in.

  ‘I AM A RACIST. I AM A RACIST. I AM A RACIST.’

  ‘BETTER,’ shouted Roberta.

  ‘I AM A RACIST. I AM A RACIST. I AM A RACIST.’

  They chanted, over and over again, as Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peel looked on approvingly, part headmistress, part evangelist, admiring herself on the giant TV screens suspended around the hall.

  ‘Now go from this hall and build a police service of which we can all be proud,’ Roberta commanded.

  The delegates filed out to spread the gospel.

  Roberta stepped down from the podium. A grey man in a grey suit approached from behind the stage.

  ‘Magnificent, my dear, if that’s not being sexist.’

  ‘Not at all, Home Secretary.’

  ‘You’re the future of policing in Britain, Roberta.’

  ‘I’d like to think so.’

  ‘I don’t want to be presumptuous; after all these things aren’t wholly in my gift.’


  ‘I understand.’

  ‘But it won’t have escaped your notice that the old man is due for retirement.’

  ‘Indeed not, Home Secretary.’

  ‘Well, in the normal course of events the succession would pass to his immediate deputy.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘But we, the Prime Minister, too, feel that in this case, good man though Jarvis is, he is, um, perhaps a little 20th-century.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘We thought it would be best all round if we were to skip a generation.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Look here, Roberta, what I’m trying to say, and this isn’t official, but the job’s all yours.’

  ‘Home Secretary, I’m flattered.’

  ‘Flattered you may be, my dear. But not wholly surprised.’

  ‘Modesty forbids.’

  ‘No need to be modest. I’ve studied your career, from Bramshill, through the ranks, your crime management initiatives, your inclusivity strategies, your anti-sexism and anti-racism programmes, your pioneering bridge-building with the gay community, your zero-tolerance of motoring offences when you were at county.’

  ‘We must not be judgemental. We must be pro-active as well as reactive, but always with compassion. I encountered a great deal of resistance in those early days.’

  ‘You’re pushing on an open door now.’

  ‘Thank you, Home Secretary.’

  ‘Thank you, Commissioner.’

  ‘It’s still Deputy Assistant Commissioner, for now.’

  ‘For now, yes. But you’d better get used to it, Roberta. Goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye.’

  The Home Secretary headed for his official car.

  Roberta packed her briefcase and turned to go.

  Her car was waiting, too.

  As she left the building, a young PC saluted. She acknowledged his salute.

  There was a vibration in her pocket.

  She took out her pager.

  ‘Ring JF, pronto.’

  Her driver had the rear door of the Rover 75 already open in anticipation. She settled onto the back seat and pressed the stored number on her mobile. After three rings, Fromby answered.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You left a message.’

  ‘Something has come up. We need to talk.’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘My place.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Bring a bottle, we’ve got something to celebrate.’ Roberta sounded excited, like a schoolgirl.

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Talk, you said. Anything urgent?’

  ‘Er, not right now. It’ll keep.’

  Twenty-seven

  ‘You’re nicked, chummy.

  ‘I said, you’re NICKED.

  ‘You are not obliged,

  ‘You are NOT obliged,

  ‘Oh my god,

  ‘Oh my GOD!

  ‘But it may harm your defence if, JEESUS!

  ‘It may harm your defence …’

  Roberta breathed deep, hard, straining against the police-issue handcuffs manacling her wrists and ankles.

  ‘It may harm your defence if you do not mention, AAAGH!

  ‘Something which you later RELY ON IN, IN, IN!

  ‘OH GOD, OH GOD!

  ‘later rely on in court. Anything you DO SAY!

  ‘will be taken. TAKEN, TAKEN, TAKEN!

  ‘CHRIST!

  ‘taken down, DOWN! DOWN! and may,

  ‘SLOWLY, DAMN YOU, SLOWLY.

  ‘taken down and may be used,

  ‘OH SHIT, OH GOD!

  ‘May be used in, in, IN, IN, IN, IN, IN!

  ‘HARDER, HARDER, HARDER!

  ‘May be used in EVIDENCE!

  ‘SLOWER! NO, FASTER!

  ‘FASTER! HARDER!

  ‘May be used in evidence AGAINST YOOOOOU!

  ‘OH MY GOD! PUSH! HARDER! FUCK YOU! FUCKING FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK JEEEEESUS! FAAAAAAAAA-AARK!’

  The handcuffs dug deep into Roberta’s flesh. The police helmet she was wearing thudded into the bedhead and was forced down over her eyes as her body arched a full eighteen inches above the pillows supporting her arse and her lower back.

  She thrashed around and convulsed as if strapped into an electric chair, then collapsed into a sweating, panting heap.

  The man standing at the end of the bed gently withdrew the police truncheon.

  Roberta lay motionless, her movement constrained by the handcuffs, which had drawn blood as they fought to contain the ferocity of her violent orgasm, her body pegged out like Gulliver on the white bed sheets.

  The man was naked, except for a balaclava, borrowed from the Black Museum at Scotland Yard and rumoured to be the former property of one of the Great Train Robbers.

  He took a key from the night stand and, one by one, unlocked the handcuffs restraining Roberta.

  She drew her knees up to her chest and purred contentedly.

  ‘You can take that off now.’

  Justin Fromby removed the balaclava and threw it onto a chair.

  ‘I thought you were going to come quietly,’ he laughed.

  No chance.

  The bust of Karl Marx stared back from her dressing table.

  Since she discovered the delights of Marx all those years ago, as a young WPC, no ordinary man could satisfy her.

  During her weapons training, she pleasured herself regularly with the steel barrel of a Smith & Wesson handgun.

  She still, occasionally, dusted off Karl, smothered him in baby lotion and gave him a run-out for old times’ sake.

  But nothing compared to the old-fashioned police truncheon she was first issued with at Tyburn Row.

  She kept the mahogany surface lovingly polished and lubricated with KY Jelly.

  She called the truncheon Dixon.

  At first she would always fly solo, but later persuaded Justin to come along for the ride, as co-pilot.

  She’d experimented with bondage, but the necessity of leaving one hand free to manoeuvre the truncheon spoiled the effect.

  Justin adored Roberta but was glad that Dixon relieved him of the obligation of rising to the occasion.

  He sat on the bed next to her.

  She stroked his thigh with her index finger.

  He failed to respond. Neither of them expected him to.

  ‘I really wish that I could, you know,’ Roberta said.

  ‘Shhhh. I’ve told you a thousand times, there’s no need. Just so long as you’re fine.’

  ‘Good old Dixon. I just wish that I could return the compliment.’

  ‘Not necessary. Never has been.’

  Roberta rolled over and pulled up the duvet. She drained the last of the champagne Justin had brought over.

  She hadn’t been able to wait to tell him about the conference and her conversation with the Home Secretary.

  ‘It’s what we’ve always worked for.’

  The excitement of the day demanded a sexual release. Dixon was soon on the case.

  ‘Justin?’

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘Have you ever?’

  ‘Have I what?’

  ‘You know, with another woman?’

  ‘Don’t be daft.’

  ‘Another man, then?’

  Justin sipped his champagne.

  ‘Justin?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Is that it?’

  Justin tapped the side of his nose with his finger and smiled.

  Roberta prodded him in the ribs.

  ‘Come on, tell me, I wouldn’t mind.’

  ‘Nothing to tell.’

  ‘I thought we agreed that there would never be any secrets between us,’ she teased.

  ‘I’m glad you raised that,’ Justin changed the subject.

  ‘Secrets?’

  ‘We did agree that there would never be any secrets between us, right?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then why didn’t you tell me about Tyburn Row?’

&nb
sp; ‘What about Tyburn Row?’

  ‘That night, Trevor Gibbs and that fat, racist cop. Remember?’

  Roberta’s face dropped in blank, terrified uncertainty.

  ‘Guess who I bumped into at the weekend,’ said Fromby.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘An old friend. An ex-PC from Tyburn Row. Ring any bells?’

  ‘Oh shit.’

  ‘You do remember.’

  ‘PC French. Mickey French.’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘Where? How?’

  Justin told her the full story. Wayne ‘Monkey Boy’ Sutton, Mickey French, Jez Toynbee. Goblin’s. The knife, the files, the tape.

  ‘Why on earth didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘You asked me to do it.’

  ‘That’s not the point. You didn’t tell me that French caught you in the act.’

  ‘I panicked.’

  ‘You also didn’t tell me that he’d got the whole lot down on tape. You should have kept your mouth shut. Denied everything.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s a bit late for that.’

  ‘I didn’t think he’d ever use it. After all, he was implicated, too. The moment he failed to report me, he became part of a criminal conspiracy. He had just as much to lose as we did.’

  ‘Had. Past tense. He’s out of it now.’

  ‘I know. Took a bullet.’

  ‘Lincoln Philpott.’

  ‘You came up against him then, didn’t you? You got Philpott off.’

  ‘One of my better days.’

  ‘So why didn’t French expose it back then? He had a motive, he had a grudge.’

  ‘He was still in the force. And Marsden, the racist Plod, was still alive and living on a police pension.’

  ‘French is still implicated.’

  ‘But now he’s angry and he doesn’t give a shit.’

  ‘He’s still got a family to support. Shall I talk to him, try to reason? We always got on well.’

  ‘That was over twenty years ago. Have you ever come across him since?’

  ‘Briefly, when he was on weapons at Hendon.’

  ‘I remember the Smith & Wesson.’

  ‘That’s beside the point. Whatever problem he’s got is with you. Why should he want to do anything to harm me?’

  ‘Can you think of anything?’

  ‘Off the top of my head, no.’

  ‘You realize this could destroy everything. I mean absolutely everything. You, me. The Commissioner’s job. Everything we’ve ever worked for. Everything we ever wanted. This could jeopardize the whole Project. Shit, it could mean prison.’