Bryant & May and the Bleeding Heart

by Christopher Fowler - Bryant

  ‘You moved from Metropolitan jurisdiction to City of London and I was able to transfer here by applying directly through Orion Banks.’

  Longbright racked her brain but came up with nothing. ‘Is that an observatory?’

  Roseberry laughed. It was the sound of wind chimes in cherry trees. ‘No, she’s the City of London Public Liaison Officer. She went to my old school. She said she’d speak to you.’

  ‘Well, she hasn’t, at least to my knowledge. Never mind. Get your coat off while I find you a desk, then make yourself useful.’

  ‘How shall I do that?’ Roseberry smiled sweetly. She had only been here two minutes and the smile was already becoming unnerving.

  ‘Can you make tea?’ Longbright asked, suddenly aware how patronizing the question sounded.

  ‘Well – I suppose so.’

  ‘It’s a good way of ingratiating yourself around here.’

  ‘I hope I won’t need to “ingratiate” myself.’ She made a little air-quotes gesture around the word. ‘I had the highest pass-mark of my class.’

  ‘Trust me,’ said Longbright, ‘brewing a decent cuppa will stand you in good stead. There’s a lot they don’t teach you up at Hendon. You can show off your operational skills later. Come with me.’

  ‘There seem to be kittens everywhere,’ Roseberry said as Longbright ushered her from the room. ‘There were half a dozen on the stairs as I came in.’

  ‘Yes, there are nine or ten of them. Don’t worry about it. You’ll have to duck under a few ladders around here, too, so I hope you’re not superstitious.’

  ‘No, but I have allergies. I’ll need to take some medication if the cats are to stay.’

  If they’re to stay? thought Longbright. ‘We’re trying to find them homes. Tea-making lesson, you, right now.’ As she pushed the girl out of the door, she began to wonder what else the day would bring.

  4

  THE NEW BROOM

  ‘A new-found respectability, that’s what I thought we’d get,’ said Raymond Land, fussily lining up the pens on his desk. ‘City of London jurisdiction over the Met? It had to be a good idea. City nicks have their own bars. You can go for a quiet drink without an Old Bailey defence brief tailing you to see if his strategies are working. And they do lovely breakfasts. Lower crime rate, too, except around those huge new nightclubs they’ve opened by Smithfield Market. And nice uniforms with proper county helmets, and height restrictions. Grace and order. What a pleasant change, I thought. But now it looks like they’re going to micromanage us. It’s going to be tougher than ever to get any kind of autonomy for the unit.’

  ‘I know you, Raymond,’ said John May, turning from the murky window in Land’s office. Outside, the traffic was at its usual standstill. ‘You thought it would be a cushy number. The City of London Police were always considered to be nothing more than glorified security guards. Given the tiny residential population inside the Square Mile, all they had to do was plod around a bunch of empty buildings and turn off the odd faulty alarm. They never saw a living soul from midnight until the tubes started again the next morning. Well, it’s not like that any more. I heard they were about to be incorporated into the Met until the terrorist bombings changed the game. Then they had to deal with the so-called Ring of Steel until number-plate recognition and National Mobile Phone Register technology came in. But now that the licensing laws have changed, the Square Mile is getting to be as rowdy as the West End. And it’s where the bulk of the city’s major fraud takes place. Their CID seriously punches above its weight. The CoL regulars have their hands full. We’ll have to take on everything else.’

  ‘You misunderstand me, John. I don’t mind a bit of supervision, but this’ – he lowered his voice and wagged a forefinger at the door – ‘this isn’t what I had in mind at all. I haven’t the faintest idea what she’s on about. God knows what Arthur will make of her.’

  ‘Who?’ May suddenly understood to whom Land was referring. ‘You mean the new Public Liaison Officer? Isn’t she some kind of ex-marketing guru?’

  ‘She wants to modernize the unit, and I don’t think she’ll have much time for your partner. She wants hard-nosed young go-getters, not some old fossil creeping around museums on a walking stick. We’re going to have to buck our ideas up. Ssh, I think I can hear her. We’d better go in before there’s trouble. Apparently she’s a stickler for timekeeping. For heaven’s sake don’t mention this … disinterment business, or whatever it is.’ Land rose and made a hopeless attempt at straightening his tie. Since his wife left him he had been coming to work in unironed shirts and the occasional mismatched socks. The other morning he had had shaving cream behind both ears. In an odd way, it made him fit in for the first time.

  Together, the detective and the unit chief headed for the common room. The others were already seated before a large whiteboard. Longbright had agreed to let the intern attend the briefing, which would bring the personnel total to ten when Bryant arrived, give or take a few cats. The mewling black furballs were rolling and scratching between the chairs, getting under everyone’s feet.

  The City of London’s new Public Liaison Officer entered with a look of ill-supressed distaste on her face, probably because she had put her hand on one of Bryant’s mildewed petri dishes, and was trying to wipe off something brown and gelatinous that appeared to have stained the heel of her palm. From her glossy jet fringe, protractor-perfect, through tiny pearl stud earrings to patent black shoes, via her tailored grey cotton suit and tightly buttoned black shirt, Orion Banks’s look suited an advertising agency more than a public service unit. She could not have been unaware of this – and perhaps that was the plan; she wanted to make them conscious of outward appearances.

  Longbright was no stranger to the wilder excesses of fashion, but drew the line at co-ordinated monochromes. Jack Renfield glanced back at the flowery, fragrant intern, then forward to the styled-up liaison officer, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. He had the nervous look of a man suddenly surrounded by too many women.

  ‘Are we all here?’ Banks asked, checking her list.

  ‘There’s just Mr Bryant to come,’ said Land. ‘He’s always late.’

  ‘That’s not really acceptable, I’m afraid. Ah, Mr Bryant, you’re just in time.’

  Arthur had slipped into the back of the room. He had made an effort, doing up the top button of his shirt and tightening his tie in a look that could only be described as ‘Grandfather of the accused photographed outside Old Bailey’. Flicking a cat from the only remaining chair, he seated himself and began emptying his pockets on to the floor in front of him.

  ‘When we have your full attention perhaps we can start?’ asked Banks.

  ‘Oh, you go right ahead, don’t wait for me,’ said Bryant. ‘I’ve lost a bag of pear drops.’

  ‘I’m sorry, we don’t know who you are,’ said Colin Bimsley, raising his hand as if he was requesting a bathroom break.

  ‘It’s all right, Mr Bimsley, you can put your hand down, you’re not at school now,’ said Banks testily. ‘You should have found an e-intro on your laptops about this meeting.’

  ‘We don’t have laptops,’ said Meera Mangeshkar.

  Banks ignored her. ‘Read it and you’ll see I’ve objectivized an agenda for an informal intra-communicational face session. I’m Orion Banks, and I’m here to discuss administrative flexibility and workforce incentivization, bringing you up to speed on the public-interface components of your skill sets.’

  Everyone stared blankly back at her.

  ‘You’re probably aware that the CoL’s consultants are running a top-down initiative recommending parallel management contingencies in which this unit will be upgraded to offer a more blue-sky approach to what we shall be terming, for the sake of argument, functional modular processing.’

  She attempted to make eye contact with each of them in turn, as she had been taught in her match-and-mirror behavioural patterning course. Jack Renfield was staring fascinatedly at the ceiling. Colin Bimsle
y had seen something out of the window. Meera Mangeshkar had become hypnotized by the ends of her hair. The intern was taking frantic notes. Banks decided to soldier on. ‘Hopefully,’ she said, ‘with enough ambient management alignment we can generate more interactive asset innovation.’

  Bryant tapped at his hearing aid. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said loudly, ‘I think this thing’s on the blink. I can see your lips moving but all I can hear is rubbish.’

  ‘Ah, of course. I was warned – informed, rather – that some of you had … how can I put this? Exceeded your optimal efficiency timelines.’

  ‘What?’ asked Bryant, screwing up his face as if listening to someone speaking Swahili.

  ‘You’re of a more senior sensibility than I’m used to,’ said Banks, attempting clarity but looking as if she was speaking through a pane of glass. ‘It makes the transactional process more challenging. Well, I think we can still get on-message as far as strategic programming, don’t you? We can monitor the system in a more holistic manner, perhaps via one-on-one encounters.’ She checked her tablet. ‘I’m sure I can find a window.’

  ‘Young lady,’ Bryant piped up. ‘I’m old but I’m not stupid. I appreciate that you may hold an MBA in Advanced Gibberish but that won’t help when you’re stuck on the roof of a suspect’s apartment at two in the morning and you need to go to the toilet.’

  Banks raised her chin and lowered her eyelids to an angle that was just enough to be really annoying. ‘This isn’t about the practicalities of real-time assignment,’ she explained. ‘It’s about synchronizing capabilities and transitional organization options. Taking into account logistical contingencies—’

  ‘I think Mr Bryant would like you to speak a tad more plainly,’ said May. ‘If you don’t he’ll simply turn off his hearing aid. Maybe I can translate for you. You’re not happy with what you see here.’

  ‘Most certainly not.’

  ‘And you’d like to change things.’

  ‘I’d like to oversee a paradigm shift, yes.’

  ‘Then perhaps you could be honest and tell us what you think is wrong.’

  Banks started to speak, stopped and began again. ‘There needs to be some administrative reprogramming that’s more responsive and forward-looking in terms of—’

  ‘What is it you don’t like?’ May interrupted. ‘In plain, simple English.’

  Banks sighed. ‘I fell through a hole in the stairs,’ she said, regarding her laddered tights. ‘Then I electrocuted myself in the toilet. Half of the lights are out and the rest are making a funny noise. There are two men, both answering to the name of Dave, who are sitting in the corner of the second-floor operations room boiling a kettle on a primus stove. Could somebody tell me what they are doing there?’

  ‘The Daves are handling the building repairs,’ Land explained. ‘They were meant to finish several weeks ago but … they didn’t,’ he ended lamely. ‘They’re very nice, and sometimes they chip in with bits of advice.’

  ‘I’ll have to speak to them myself about possible breaches of security.’ Banks tapped at her tablet, making a note. ‘There’s something very wrong with your plumbing. I don’t think it meets European health and safety standards. If the public were to see—’

  ‘That’s just it,’ said Land, ‘they don’t see. This unit is only accountable to the general public insofar as it is here to protect them. And we have to work in a way that we see fit.’

  ‘Fit?’ said Banks, her eyes widening. ‘Is it fit to have cats running all over the building? None of the computers are password-protected. Your filing system is incomprehensible. I have no idea what anyone is working on or how anyone gets assigned cases. The door to the evidence room has no lock on it. There’s a fortune teller in a glass case at the top of the stairs and a dead squirrel on the landing.’

  ‘About our caseload,’ said Bryant slowly and patiently, as if talking to an upset child. ‘We only handle serious crimes, but sometimes that definition is debatable. For instance, last night a teenager saw a corpse rise out of a grave just down the road from here. Obviously that’s impossible, but we don’t know what we’re dealing with yet. It could have been a practical joke or something more sinister. Nobody knows what we’re working on until John and I decide whether the case is suitable.’

  ‘But how do you define that?’ Banks was visibly struggling with the vagueness of it all.

  ‘We ask if it meets our criteria. In the advent of a suspicious death it used to be that the Met – or in your case the City of London Police – would call in a Home Office forensic pathologist. Now it’s fielded to us. If we think the situation is unique enough to cause public distress or a loss of trust in government bodies, we take it on. First and foremost we’re police officers, but among our number there are also creative and academic freethinkers. And although it may appear that you have wandered into a building full of mad people, we consistently achieve the kind of results that regular policing units can’t match. This is because we’re not required to meet the same targets. Do you understand now?’

  Banks nodded dumbly, but Bryant could see she was far from happy. She had been prepared to confront old-school working practices, but found herself inside an analogue world of Victorian throwbacks. How on earth were these people allowed to operate untouched? What magical incantation protected them from the bracing forces of modernization? Were there other pockets of cobwebbed antiquity scattered throughout the City of London, protected by hereditary peers and sorely awaiting a new broom? She resolved to take a look, after she had dealt with these Cro-Magnons. ‘And that is your total caseload at the moment? A graveyard prank?’

  ‘It’s our first day,’ said Land plaintively.

  ‘I want a total press blackout on this,’ she warned. ‘Nothing gets out; nothing is leaked. The CoL Police have worked very hard to be taken seriously, and I will not have our efforts undermined. Is that understood?’

  ‘So we’re to continue looking into this “prank”?’ asked May, seeking confirmation.

  Banks considered the question. ‘You honestly think it falls within the remit?’

  ‘Without a doubt. The park is a public space. At the very least, this was a criminal offence and an act designed to cause outrage.’

  ‘Very well. But no more courting the press. I know that in the past you had connections with someone at Hard News. As far as I’m concerned, from now on you’re a stealth agency. I’ll decide what gets leaked on a case-by-case basis. And make sure this thing is wrapped up by the middle of the week.’ She held up a hand. ‘Wait. Explain something to me.’

  ‘If I can.’

  ‘Your job titles.’ She flicked a painted nail between Bryant and May. ‘You’re both just detectives. Your sergeants never made inspector. Didn’t any of you ever put in for promotion?’

  ‘We made a collective decision,’ May explained. ‘We didn’t want to come off the street. None of us wanted to end up stuck behind desks fielding emails and organizing PowerPoint presentations. You lose touch with what’s happening in the real world.’ There was rebuke in his voice. He softened it a little. ‘It’s one of the hardest things to do: halting your promotion progress; but we managed it as a group.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Banks, ‘but remember this. The old ways can’t stay in place for ever. I’m the new broom.’

  Once the meeting was over, May laid a friendly hand on his partner’s arm. ‘I have to say that you handled that with a degree of sensitivity for once,’ he said.

  ‘I am trying,’ Bryant answered as they walked back to their own office. ‘It’s not Banks’s fault, poor love. She’s been insulated by all that jargon. Once she sees that there’s a simpler way to get results, she’ll come around. She might even turn out to be an ally.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘I suspect she has the potential for peculiarity. She’s just a little too tightly wound at the moment. It’ll be interesting to see what happens when we start disobeying her orders. She’ll either have a meltdown or s
he’ll come around to our way of thinking. Let’s get to work.’

  They passed Meera Mangeshkar, who had been studying the new intern with annoyance. ‘You couldn’t take your eyes off her all through the meeting,’ she hissed at Colin Bimsley. ‘You were making a right fool of yourself.’

  Bimsley grinned. ‘It’s nice to have a fresh face around the place,’ he said. ‘Maybe I’ll ask her out for a drink.’

  Mangeshkar released a hoot of derision. ‘She’s out of your league, pal. You’d be punching above your weight. Look at her, all teeth and cheekbones. She can probably trace her family back to the Magna Carta, not as far as Brixton nick.’ She knew Bimsley came from a long line of coppers, boxers and prison wardens.

  ‘I’m not working class any more,’ he said, ‘I’m lower middle. I use three types of oil in my kitchen. Admittedly one of them is WD40, but that counts, doesn’t it? We all move up over time; it’s like karma. Anyway, if I make a fool of myself, so what? What do you care? You never give me a tumble. You don’t want to go out with me, but you don’t want me going out with anyone else. How does that work?’

  ‘She’s interning here. It’s inappropriate.’ Mangeshkar scowled. ‘And she’s too young. And her legs are too long.’

  ‘Ah! Now we get to the truth,’ said Bimsley. ‘You’re jealous. Admit it. You think she’s too good for me just because she’s tall and posh.’

  ‘What, and I’m short and common? Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘Amazing as it sounds, this isn’t about you, Meera. And I never said you were too good for me.’ Colin had had enough. He was tired of being told what he could and couldn’t do. No woman had the right to be that prescriptive unless she was going out with him, and Meera had always turned him down.

  ‘Go on then, ask her on a date. See if I care. You’ll only be hurting yourself because she’ll laugh right in your face.’