Broken Lines

by Jo Bannister

  And the third thing he noticed was that, unlike the white saloon, all around the van stank of petrol.

  Chapter Two

  There was a long moment in which Donovan was close to walking away. Mikey Dickens was in a situation entirely of his own making. It was a miracle he hadn’t killed the woman in the car; and if he’d hit Donovan any harder he wouldn’t have been in this quandary, he’d still have been crawling round Ash Kumani’s floor wondering which end of the sky fell on him. He couldn’t think of a single good reason to risk his life for the likes of Mikey Dickens.

  Because that was what he’d have to do to get him out. Both wings of the van had been forced back by the impact, reducing the doors to mere jagged slashes in the wreckage. Not even a weasel like Mikey was coming out that way. The windscreen had been crushed by the digger to a letter-box slit. The only other exit, unless the Fire Brigade got here with cutting equipment before the thing went up like a bomb, was the back doors. And to get out that way, Mikey was going to need help.

  There were limits to what flesh and blood could do. If Donovan waited for the emergency services, and put in his report that he was unable to render assistance due to the damage sustained by the vehicle, no one would challenge it. Certain risks, even serious risks, came with the territory but this wasn’t one: crawling over a ruptured petrol tank that could explode at any second. There were police officers who went that far beyond the call of duty – Donovan had before now – but nobody had a right to expect it. It would be noted that he was concussed, and also how he came by that concussion. Senior ranks would support his decision, and even in the canteen no one would dare suggest they’d have handled it better for fear that some time they’d get the chance to prove it.

  So it was neither peer pressure nor official expectation that made his mind up. Mostly it was lacking the time and the strength of will to hammer out a rational decision. It was easier and quicker to go by gut instinct, and instinct said he couldn’t leave a man to burn, not even Mikey Dickens, not even in a conflagration of his own making.

  Where the door had been was a gap sufficient to take Donovan’s hand but not enough of his arm for him to reach the ignition. ‘Give me your keys. Mikey! – the keys. I have to get the back door open.’ Mikey’s pinched little face, the ski mask discarded now, was white with terror. But intelligence glimmered in the hunted-animal eyes, and he crawled on his elbows towards the sound of Donovan’s voice. ‘Mr Donovan, is that you? Oh thank Christ. Get me out of here, for pity’s sake!’

  ‘I will,’ promised Donovan. ‘But you have to reach me the keys. Then get yourself into the gap between the seats, and I’ll come in and pull you out.’

  Put like that it sounded nothing at all. He could have Mikey out of there in just a few seconds. Only the stench of petrol turned it from an exercise in logic into a trial of nerves, and even then there was only a problem if the petrol met a spark. The stink alone would do neither of them any harm. Donovan tried hard to hold that thought.

  Mikey was bloodier but less shocked than the woman in the car. He understood immediately what Donovan intended and what he needed. He squirmed round as best he could in the space remaining over the front seats and groped for the ignition with one gloved hand. When he had the key he put it into Donovan’s fingers as carefully as if his life depended on it.

  And Donovan dropped it. It wasn’t just nerves making him clumsy. He’d taken his own gloves off in order to reach through the crack, and the metal key seared his palm as if it had been among hot coals.

  Fortunately he was already withdrawing his hand when the heat got through to him and it fell at his feet. If it had fallen among the twisted debris inside the car it would never have been found in time.

  Mikey had his gloves on, he didn’t know that the key was hot and what that meant. Donovan did: it meant there was a fire in the engine compartment. It meant that there was no longer a margin of safety, however slim. But Mikey didn’t need to know. The man couldn’t have wanted to get out of that van any more if there’d been a kilo of Semtex under his seat and a Des O’Connor song on the radio: scaring him even more would be counter-productive. Donovan bent quickly and picked up the key with his fingertips. Mikey was in no position to notice. ‘OK, I’ll have it open in a second. Get you over them seats as best you can.’

  It wasn’t the Queen’s English but Mikey knew what he meant. Both front seats had head restraints which had halted the collapse of the roof: the space between them was the only way out. A bigger man would never have done it. An injured man in less immediate peril would not have thought he could do it. But Mikey was coming through that gap if he had to strip naked to do it: somehow, in the narrow place, he wriggled out of his heavy coat and wormed his way into the tight channel that was his only exit from hell.

  He got just far enough to think he had it licked, then he stuck fast. Even with his mind racing it took him a second to figure out how. His shoulders were already through the gap and they were the widest part of him: the rest should have followed. But whatever it was that stabbed into his thigh had torn a rent in his jeans that had now become snagged on the gearstick.

  He fought so fiercely to free himself that anything other than denim would have given way. But Mikey robbed petrol stations to keep himself in a manner which included top quality jeans and the fabric resisted all his efforts to rip it. When Donovan got the key turned in the back door he met the frantic waving hands and terrified face of a man trapped in his worst nightmare.

  And the reason he could see the terror on Mikey’s face was that there was now some light inside the wrecked van. A flickering rosy glow was emanating from under the remains of the dashboard.

  There was no time left: either he went in or he got out. It wasn’t a conscious heroism that made him kneel on the platform immediately above the punctured tank and grab one of Mikey’s hands in his own, but it was heroism just the same. He knew what could happen – what would happen, the only question was when. But the longer he waited the more danger he was in, so he flung the door out of his way, got just as far into the van as he had to to reach the trapped man, gripped the gloved hand tight and yanked with all his strength.

  With the leverage he had Mikey’s jeans stood no chance. There was a ripping sound, a sudden loss of resistance, and Mikey came at him as if he’d been shot from a cannon. Donovan had no time to avoid him: their heads clashed – sending new stars spinning through Donovan’s vision – their limbs tangled and they fell out of the back of the van like a pair of overexcited wrestlers falling out of a ring. Donovan landed on his back with Mikey on top of him and all the breath gushed out of him. Mikey, his injuries notwithstanding, hit the ground running.

  He travelled three, maybe four paces, and then he slid to a halt and looked back. Donovan was still on the ground, plainly stunned, sitting up now but either unaware of the giant petrol bomb he was sitting beside or unable to get away from it. The leaked fuel was all around him.

  Mikey screamed his name and Donovan looked round, a little vaguely, as if he didn’t quite know where he was.

  Then Mikey Dickens did something no one would have anticipated – not his father, not his best friend, least of all himself. He went back. He wasted no time. He grabbed Donovan without ceremony and dragged him away, stumbling on his hands and knees and then at least approximately on his feet.

  And the van blew up.

  Flame fountained into the dark sky. Bits of the van lanced through the air like fighter planes. When the force-front of the explosion caught the stumbling men it hurled them forward then slammed them down face-first on the tarmac and poured over them in a maelstrom of sound and smoke and shrapnel and flames.

  The first Donovan knew that he was on fire was Mikey battling to get his jacket off. It was leather, it protected him from injury, but there were a lot of fastenings to unclip and unbuckle, and by the time he was out of it the jacket was past saving. Mikey flung it away from them, back into the inferno, along with his own gloves that had caught li
ght while they struggled. Then, keeping low, they helped one another out of range.

  By then the first of the cars from Queen’s Street had arrived. WPC Flynn took in the mayhem open-mouthed, then busied herself at the white saloon whose occupant was still lying trapped on her side. Helpless to escape or protect herself, the explosion had terrified her; now she was crying hysterically.

  While Cathy Flynn did what she could to calm her, PC Stark hurried towards the burning van, meeting the men staggering away from it half-way. ‘Was there anyone else? Donovan! – was there anyone else inside?’

  It would have been too late to matter if there had been. Donovan shook his head wearily, then wished he hadn’t. ‘Just your man.’ In moments of stress he reverted to an almost impenetrable Ulster vernacular.

  ‘There’s an ambulance on its way,’ said Stark. ‘You’d better sit down till it gets here.’ He’d spotted the blood still pulsing from Mikey’s leg. ‘I’ll stick a bandage on that while we wait. What about you, Serg – are you hurt?’ The gaping wound on Donovan’s cheek that had so alarmed Ash Kumani had disappeared under the smoke and dirt.

  Donovan considered for a moment. ‘Nothing a cup of tea won’t cure.’ But he lurched against Jim Stark as if he had no idea whether his feet were touching the ground.

  ‘Right, sure,’ agreed Stark, steering him to the bench against the wall where Chevening’s three senior citizens waited for the bus on pension day. ‘They make a decent brew down Castle General, so I’ve heard.’

  Donovan cranked up an eyelid in order to scowl at him. He knew he wasn’t going to win this argument, but nor was he going to let a downright lie pass unchallenged. ‘I’ve had better tea out of a gypsy’s welly.’

  Stark applied himself to Mikey’s leg. ‘Is somebody going to tell me what happened here?’

  Mikey Dickens, discovering a sudden interest in church architecture, couldn’t take his eyes off the lych-gate. Donovan sighed. ‘Mikey made a slight error of judgement: he mistook Chevening roundabout for the straight at Silverstone. I yanked him out of the van, he yanked me out of the explosion. Jesus, he threw my jacket in the fire! That’s why I’m so cold. I thought it was shock.’

  Cathy Flynn came over with a blanket which Donovan shrugged around himself. He sat on the bench looking like a vulture whose last antelope disagreed with him.

  Soon after that the ambulance arrived, and on its tail the fire engine. When the fire was out no more remained of the red van than a few tangled spars of blackened metal sitting in a hole in the road.

  The paramedics helped Mikey into the back of the ambulance. By then firemen with cutting equipment had freed the woman from the white saloon and they went to check that she too was fit to be moved. She was: she had escaped virtually without injury. With a little support she was able to walk to the ambulance.

  One of the paramedics peered at the angular figure on the bench with its smoke-blackened face and blanket. ‘It’s Detective Sergeant Donovan, isn’t it? Are you coming with us?’

  Donovan nodded and climbed creakily to his feet. ‘Better had. There’s something I have to say to Mikey.’

  His head was clearing all the time. In the ambulance he found a seat opposite where Mikey Dickens was stretched out. His battered face ventured a fractional smile. ‘Mikey—’

  Now he was out of danger Mikey was high on adrenalin. For possibly the first time in his life he’d behaved better and achieved more than anyone could have expected. For possibly the first time in his life he was not merely pleased with himself but proud of himself.

  He propped himself up on one elbow and his pinched little face glowed. ‘That’s all right, Mr Donovan, you don’t need to say it.’

  But Donovan did. ‘Michael Dickens, I am arresting you for the armed robbery of Ashog Kumani’s Garage, Cambridge Road, on January the fifth. You are not obliged to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention now … er … something which you later wish to rely on … um … Will be taken down.’ Even when he wasn’t concussed he had trouble with the new caution. He thought for a moment longer, then gave up. ‘Hell, Mikey, you’ve heard it before, you know what it means. It means you’re nicked.’

  Chapter Three

  ‘You do not have to say anything,’ said Detective Superintendent Frank Shapiro sternly. ‘But I must caution you that if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court it may harm your defence. If you do say anything it may be given in evidence.’

  ‘Uhhuh,’ said Donovan.

  Shapiro bristled. ‘Never mind Uhhuh: this matters. The first time I have a case thrown out of court because you couldn’t be bothered to caution the suspect correctly I’ll have you directing traffic. Why is it a problem, anyway? Twenty-year-old kids in their first week of basic training have it off word-perfect. So, for that matter, have old codgers like me and Sergeant Bolsover who learned the old one when Adam was under the age of criminal responsibility. In God’s name, Sergeant, what is your problem?’

  Donovan mumbled something, avoiding his eyes.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I was concussed,’ Donovan said defensively. The cut over his cheekbone was held together by butterfly plasters and the whole orbit of his eye was black. ‘First the sod hit me in the face, then we clashed heads. I’m sorry I wasn’t up to giving the Gettysburg Address under these circumstances but I have to say, I doubt Lincoln would have been either.’

  Shapiro sighed. Tearing strips off Detective Sergeant Donovan was a thankless task. For one thing, it was like painting the Forth Bridge: you’d barely finished when it was time to start again. For another, although you could always find something to criticize about the way Donovan did his job he did it well. He put himself out, he got results, in all the important ways he was a good policeman. Whenever Shapiro was dragging him over the coals, which he did at regular intervals, half-way through he started feeling foolish because what he was complaining about didn’t matter as much as the things Donovan got right.

  ‘How’s the head now?’ he asked.

  ‘Fine,’ said Donovan. ‘I’ll be in to work tomorrow.’

  It was Monday evening, they were talking in the saloon of Donovan’s boat on the Castlemere Canal. In January only a handful of boats remained on the water and only one other was occupied so Broad Wharf seemed like a ghost town. Shapiro had left his car on Brick Lane and cut through on the footpath. It always made him nervous, leaving his car so close to The Jubilee. The half-dozen streets of black Victorian brick made a sort of walled city which much of Castlemere’s criminal fraternity, the Dickens clan among them, called home. In fact, the car was quite safe. The nice thing about old-fashioned criminals, as distinct from the yuppie kind who used mobile phones and joined golf clubs, was that they had a sort of respect for the enemy. They called him Mr Shapiro. They even called Donovan Mr Donovan.

  ‘There’s no rush,’ said Shapiro. ‘Apart from Mikey the ungodly are still on their holidays.’

  ‘Just the same.’ Donovan only took today off because the doctor insisted. He hated being sidelined. He seemed to think crime would grind to a halt if he wasn’t there.

  Shapiro nodded and struggled to his feet. Donovan favoured low furniture because of Tara’s low ceilings, but Shapiro had reached an age and a shape which called for a nice upright chair with stout arms. ‘Good enough. I just thought I’d stick my head in, see how you were.’

  Donovan uncoiled from the low sofa like a snake rising; behind him, shadow-silent, rose the dark shape of the dog.

  Shapiro said, ‘Lost any fingers yet?’

  Donovan gave his saturnine grin. ‘Him? He’s a pussycat.’

  ‘Sure he is,’ agreed Shapiro. ‘Till one morning you’re late with his breakfast.’ He smiled into his chest. ‘Never mind, those big white gloves cover a multitude of sins.’

  Donovan didn’t understand. ‘Big white gloves?’

  ‘The ones for directing the traffic.’

  Detective Inspector Liz Graham was i
n charge of the investigation, and a baffling case it was too. One minute the room had been full of valuables, a flick of the curtain later they were all gone. The open boxes full of diamonds and rubies, the stacks of gold ingots, the strings of pearls: all vanished as if by magic.

  At least she had a suspect: a thirteen-year-old wearing a cut-down Lurex evening dress and a pink velvet turban. She herself was wearing a plastic helmet held under her chin by a length of elastic. ‘Ali Baba,’ she intoned solemnly, ‘I’m arresting you for the theft of the Wazir’s treasure. You do not have to say anything, but I must caution you that if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court …’ One thing about Castle High School pantomimes: they were good on detail.

  Another thing about them was that, by and large, the adults involved enjoyed them more than the children. More into pop groups than Middle Eastern myths, they went along with the nonsense amiably enough because it amused their parents and teachers and was a high point of the Christmas holidays for younger siblings. For themselves, they’d just as soon have been in Philadelphia.

  After the children had been packed off home, those unencumbered by sprogs with bedtimes gathered round some bottles of wine and some cheese straws in the staffroom. They were still in costume. Brian Graham, who was the Wazir, was wearing burnt-cork whiskers, a long brocade waistcoat and something that might have been a Victorian smoking cap. Liz thought he looked more like Mr Mole than the Wazir of Baghdad. But then, she didn’t look much like a chief of detectives either.

  The part does not figure prominently in the original story. It was created specially for her when she saw a rehearsal a couple of weeks ago and laughed herself silly. It was the funniest thing she’d seen since Donovan took her to a pub where folk music was perpetrated. She only came to admire the scenery – as head of the art department Brian had a dual contribution to make to the festivities. But by the time she’d hooted her way through a couple of scenes – comedy, love interest, the death of Ali Baba’s mother, the lot – it was generally agreed that she’d better be given a part to play since the alternative was probably having her in the audience.