by steve higgs
‘Alright, ladies,' came a voice from behind us. I groaned internally. It was not unusual for young lads to think it acceptable to make inappropriate comments or suggestions to female police officers. However, it happened in Chatham every single time as if it were a sport or as if the idiots get taught it in a class at the school they are most likely playing truant from.
As I turned around to face the voice, I grabbed Patience's arm. Her eyes were already bugging out, she hated being disrespected.
‘Young man I suggest you be on your way before I take an interest in you,' I would rather warn him and leave both he and his gaggle of spotty friends to annoy someone else, than get distracted by dealing with him. I could tell by his leering smile it would not work.
‘Hear that, fellas? The stripper doesn’t want to play today. Come on love, show us yer tits.’ There was a chorus of “Yeahs!” and “Yay, tits!” from the moronic cohort stood behind him.
I moved towards him. He darted back a few feet. I still had the cameras and laptop stuffed in a box under one arm and would need to put it down to grab him.
‘I bet those tits are smashing. I can see how big they are even with the body armour on.’ He was still laughing at me, but it vanished soon enough as Patience snatched her arm out of my grip and lunged for him.
‘Whoa, darling. Careful with the goods,' he said as he slipped around one of his friends, narrowly evading her. Patience pushed the boy he was hiding behind hard on his shoulders causing him to topple over the idiot crouching behind him. I leaned into my microphone to speak with dispatch about sending anyone else in Chatham to our location. Just in case.
‘Come here, tiny penis,' Patience growled as she grabbed him by the collar with both hands. She hefted him clean off the ground and bounced him off a handy shop window. The general crowd of shoppers passing by didn't even bother to look – young men getting slapped about by the police was a daily occurrence in Chatham.
‘Hey, babe no need to get frisky. I don't want to see your boobs, just the pretty white girl's,' he was still laughing and joking, not realising he had just kicked a bear.
‘What? You disrespectful little turd. You don't want to see my tits? You couldn't handle my tits. My tits would break your tiny little dick in two.' Then she kneed him in the nuts, but she achieved this by sweeping his feet out on either side and leaving her knee sticking out for him to fall on. Now far less resistant, Patience dragged him around the corner out of sight. Several of his friends looked ready to bolt as I tried to corral them around the corner as well. They might have done so had two more uniforms not been running towards us through the crowd.
They were armed police, there were two on permanent rotation in Chatham, often hanging out in the Pentagon shopping mall as that was where the most people were. Patience and I had spotted them in the distance on our way in.
‘Help you, ladies?’ the taller of the two asked slightly out of breath, ‘Dispatch said officer in need of assistance. Made it sound urgent.’ The two men would be from the Chatham station, so they were vaguely familiar, but I didn’t know them. Chances were though that they knew Patience as she had transferred to Maidstone from Chatham some years ago and was not the sort of person one forgot. Ever.
‘Ooh!' said the chap next to him as Patience cuffed the young man and in so doing accidentally, very much on purpose, knelt on his testicles. The poor boy let out a yelp. His now sheepish friends were looking at each other, looking at the ground. One took out his phone and held it up as if to start filming the event.
‘I would put that away unless you want it inserted somewhere,' the taller guy whispered to him. He turned to me, ‘I once heard that she caught two guys chasing a girl and she gaffer-tapped them together with their pants around their ankles and top to tail, so each had to look at the other's todger.
I raised my eyebrows but could not honestly say that the story surprised me.
Patience appeared to be done with the young man. She lifted him up using the cuffs, which is something we are not allowed to do and wheeled him around to face his friends, ‘Now, what it is that you have to say to the assembled gentlemen?' she prompted him.
The boy had tears on his face and looked quite sick. He also had dirt all over the front of his clothing where Patience had him on the ground. It was the usual expensive but crap sportswear that all his friends were also modelling a derivative of. He did not seem inclined to speak. Patience did something behind his back, most likely giving the cuffs a twist and he started talking right away.
‘I am very sorry for my lewd comments. Err, I have no right to objectify women of any age and most especially ladies in positions of responsibility such as police officers.’
‘And?’
‘And I want all my friends to learn from my poor example and the consequences I have suffered for my ill-thought choices.’
‘And?’
The boy turned his head miserably to look at her. He didn’t want to say anything more.
‘And?’ she prompted again, a little venom in her tone.
He hung his head, unable to look at anyone, ‘And I have a tiny penis.' His friends burst into laughter until Patience shot them a wide-eyed look of warning.
‘Very good, Antony. See how easy that was?’ Patience fiddled behind his back and the cuffs came off. Now you and your friends can go play but remember to be nice to ladies and be gentlemanly at all times.
I picked up the box of cameras.
‘That was fun,’ the taller guy said, ‘You two should come down here more often.’
‘Feeling better?’ I asked Patience as she brushed dirt from her palms.
‘Much better, thank you. Shall we get this done then?’
We arrived at the first bank of lifts and pressed the call button to bring it to us. The door pinged immediately and opened. The lifts were not sophisticated enough to have a screen that showed what floor it was on. I got in and turned to press the button. We were on the ground floor so the only way to go was up. I noticed that Patience was not with me. Nor was she stood in front of the open doors.
I stuck my head back outside, holding the door open with one hand. ‘Patience, what are you doing?’ she was skulking just a few feet away, looking guilty.
‘I will wait here for you. You don’t need me in the lift, do you?’
I stared at her, ‘Are you afraid of the ghost?’
‘I can feel its evil presence from here, Amanda. You wanna be a Ghostbuster now, that's your business. Patience ain't getting in no ghost lift.' Her eyes were bugging out a bit and she was shaking her head.
‘You have got to be kidding me. Look, I need your help, I cannot fit the cameras by myself, so you’re going to have to put your brave girl pants on and ride the lift with me for ten seconds.’
‘Uh-uh,’ she replied backing away.
I put the box down to trap the door and went to grab her. ‘Get in the damned lift.' She danced away, but I snagged her protective vest and pulled her off balance. We were tucked down a short corridor, so not visible to the people walking through the shopping centre but several people had now stopped at the mouth of the corridor having seen movement and were watching us tussle.
I finally pushed her into the lift, the first of eight that I needed to go in and the lift doors shut. Patience was backed against the far wall now, eyes darting in every direction.
‘It’s cold in here, Amanda. Why is it so cold?’
I opened my mouth to assure her that it was the same temperature as everywhere else, but she cut me off.
‘Because the ghost is coming to get us, that’s why.’ Her legs appeared barely able to support her bodyweight. She was slumped into the corner holding herself up with a hand against two walls.
Ignoring her, I took the first camera from the box and discovering that the ceiling was lower than I thought, I fitted it in place. It had a magnetic attachment. I turned it on and quickly checked the feed to the laptop Tempest had given me. This was the lift that had scored the most incidents,
the one next to it the second highest number. I fitted an infrared camera next to the first one. Doubling up the cameras like this meant I could only cover six lifts but I was gambling that these would be the ones that would score me a result. Now I would get an image whether the lights were on or off.
The lift pinged, and the doors opened. Patience burst into action, bolting for the exit. She hit the doors before they were even halfway open, her equipment clanging against both sides as she forced her way through the gap. Sighing, I picked up the box and followed her out.
‘I need to fit cameras in another five lifts, Patience.’ Patience was ten feet away across the car park that the lift had opened on.
She waggled a finger at me, ‘I am not going back in any stupid lifts. I can’t believe you made me do that.’
‘Patience it is just a lift. A big steel box.’
‘Yeah. With a ghost in it. You go ahead and do what you got to do, girl. I am going back to the car. Matter of fact, I am taking my lunch break. Patience needs some chicken.' And with that, she stomped off towards the stairwell.
A lot of help she turned out to be. It was a good thing I had overestimated the height of the ceiling in the lifts. I could reach it easily on my toes.
Twenty minutes later, I had the last of the cameras in place and had only once had to quickly stop what I was doing because someone was trying to get on. I found Patience happily sitting in the same booth as yesterday tucking into another bucket of chicken. Her hands were greasy all the way to her wrists, but she looked content.
‘Hey there, partner. How are you doing now?' I asked sliding into the booth opposite her.
‘Mmmm,’ she said through a mouthful of chicken, ‘Much better. Sorry about before. I kinda freaked out a bit. Do you really think there is no ghost?’
‘Yes, Patience. I have no doubt whatsoever that it is not a ghost stealing people's shopping. I'll tell you what. When I work out who is behind this, I will get you to perform the arrest. Ok?'
I had her attention now, ‘Really? You would do that? Just turn them over for me to have the collar?’
‘Sure. I don't need it. It will not help my career in the Police with only a couple of weeks left. Besides, I will be performing this investigation as the employee of a private investigation firm and as such my remit is to determine the solution to the case, not to make the arrest. In a couple of weeks, my powers of arrest are gone along with my Police ID, so I might as well get used to it.' This was something Tempest had gone over a few times. Clients needed to understand that we found out what was going on, we presented an explanation for their mystery but if there was a criminal perpetrating the odd goings on then we handed it over to the police. Every time.
‘Well, you could have said that before. I could have helped with the cameras if you had said that.' Patience was rooting around in the bottom of the bucket, scooping out the last few fries. Quite how she put it all away without bursting out of her uniform I had no idea. She carried a few extra pounds but no more than that, yet she ate like a bear preparing for hibernation.
The radios squawked again. There was a traffic accident they wanted us to attend. Dispatch wanted to know our ETA. The accident was at the top of Bluebell Hill – somewhere that accidents occurred all too regularly, and we were at least fifteen minutes away. I lied and told them five.
Patience and I locked eyes for a second, then jumped out of our seats to run back to the car.
‘Dammit! My hat!’ Patience yelled as we got outside. She had left it in the booth. I left her to fetch it while I went to get the car.
In My Flat. Wednesday, October 20th 1917hrs
The RTA had taken up the rest of the shift. It had been a proper pile-up. Five cars had been mashed into one enormous mess with a further six cars suffering damage as they tried to avoid the carnage in front of them. At the top of the Bluebell Hill, the road leading from the motorway merged onto the dual carriageway leading from Chatham to Maidstone. Traffic on the dual carriageway was always fast moving and to compensate, the cars trying to merge did so at speed. Sometimes someone gets it wrong and auto-violence ensues.
Despite that, our shift had ended more or less on time and I had taken myself home looking forward to three days off. I stopped on the way back to my flat to buy wine and a pizza, dropped the pizza by the oven as I walked through the house and had the top off the wine and the bottle to my lips before I got to the bathroom to turn on the bath.
Soaking in the bath with a book and a goblet of wine, I remembered the cameras. I had forgotten about them with the trauma and drama of the afternoon.
The laptop and the box the cameras came in was still in the boot of my car. It would have to wait, but I was curious to see if I had captured anything. As it turned out I had.
Half an hour later I was finishing off my glass of wine, which was now getting warm and I was sitting on my small sofa, in my small flat with the laptop perched on my lap. On the sofa next to me were the remains of the pizza which consisted of four crusts and a few crumbs. I called up the camera feed and set the time back to when I had put them in earlier today. I had the feed from all eight cameras going at once and the speed set to ten times normal. Mostly I was looking at empty lifts, but with the clock whizzing along, a blur would occur periodically as someone, or several someones, got on and then got off again. I could not tell, of course, if the lifts were going up or down, only that people were getting on and off. The two infrared cameras showed a glassy white image in which I could detect vague movement but nothing else.
I stared at the screen for fifteen minutes. It was getting boring. I did some mental calculation. I had roughly six hours of footage, but the shops had shut at six o’clock so probably only four hours were worth looking at. Therefore, I should only have about twenty-four minutes of footage to scan at high speed.
Was that right?
I did the maths again and decided I was correct. Then one of the screens went black, it was just a blip that had lasted perhaps one second but watching it in fast forward meant at least ten seconds had passed. I clicked pause and ran the footage back. Then played it at normal speed. In the lift was a middle-aged lady. She was standing still in the middle of the lift, both hands by her sides with heavy shopping in them. Then she put the bags in her left hand down and began fishing in her handbag. Probably looking for her car keys.
The lights went out and it was pitch black. I could see nothing on the screen at all. It was not one of the lifts I had fitted an infrared camera in, so I continued to watch until the lights came back on. The lady was now flat against the wall to her right, her mouth open like she had been screaming. As I watched, her head turned to the right and she darted out of picture clearly exiting the lift. I rewound it and played it again. Then again and then again.
I mapped out the event on an A4 pad.
Victim puts down her bag
One second later the lights go out
Twenty-two seconds later the lights come back on
Four seconds after that she runs out of the screen when presumably the lift doors open
The bag she put on the floor is not in either of her hands and is not visibly in the lift either
I watched it one more time but decided I could learn very little from it. I elected to email Martin Miller though and ask if the lady had reported the incident. I would interview her if she had.
I went back to watching the footage at ten times speed. The number of people getting in and out of the lifts increased for a period. I reasoned that it was probably close to closing time, so I was witnessing the rush to leave. As the numbers tailed off and I was about to give up, another lift went black. I pressed pause and my heart skipped – it was one of the lifts with an infrared camera fitted. What had been a glassy white blur was now a weird other-worldly image, but it was sharp and clear. With the screen paused I could see the two people in the lift, a young couple in their thirties were caught midway through their shocked reaction.
I took the footage back again as
I had before and watched it at normal speed. The couple got in as a mother and her two small children got out. They were talking, their faces relaxed, so not arguing but having a conversation as a couple might. The chap had bags in each hand, his petite girlfriend was carrying nothing although I could see when he turned, that the bags were all from ladies’ fashion shops. He put the bags in his right hand down and shot his cuff to check his watch. Then the lights went out.
I moved my gaze down to stare at the infrared screen. The girlfriend was clearly screaming and had clung to the man who was also looking panicked. Then, as I watched, a panel in the wall of the lift opened and a figure climbed out. All the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. It was wearing dark clothing and had on a balaclava and gloves. It leaned out, took a short pace, snagged the shopping bags from the floor and retreated inside the panel. Two seconds later the lights came back on. The figure was distinctly male.
I rewound it and watched again, this time at half speed. The cameras were not sophisticated enough to allow me to zoom in – they were designed to be small and unobtrusive over other features plus I was watching it recorded not live. The man in the mask could be anyone at this point, but I had a good idea who it was already. I smiled a smile like the Grinch at Christmas, plotting my cunning plan and looking forward to solving the case. It had been easier than I had expected, but I had not caught anyone yet.
I closed the laptop, drained my wine glass and wondered if I could have another and not have a buzzing head in the morning. The clock on my wall was saying that it was only half past eight, so I picked up the remote and found some trashy TV to watch.
I would catch my first ghost tomorrow.
Ghostbusting. Thursday, October 21st 0745hrs
I awoke with a dryness to my mouth that I put down to the wine I had guiltily finished last night. While I was slouched on the sofa with my feet curled under me, I had found a favourite movie from years ago that had just started and had stayed up later than I had intended. The lateness led to another glass of wine, the wine led to a bag of M&Ms, so now I was lying in bed wondering if the calories last night need to be worked off this morning. I knew that they did, of course. I was just trying to find the effort to do something about it. The clock by my bed told me it was quarter to eight. What I really wanted to do was roll over, go back to sleep and wake up to find that I had only dreamt of drinking a whole bottle of wine and eating chocolate.
