Power Shift

by Judith Cutler

  ‘Agreed.’ She was less reluctant than she pretended. Altogether less reluctant. Especially the way his hand was moving now. She snuggled back under the duvet. ‘I do believe my appetite’s coming back.’

  For all Rod had suggested they read the quality broadsheets and enjoy other minor dissipations, they both knew that Sunday was a day for catching up on paperwork they hadn’t had time for during the week. Rod had his study, of course. And Kate had hers. The only problem was that it was back in Kings Heath and, if she were entirely honest, she couldn’t face the prospect of driving through sleet to a cold house 70K, she’d left the central heating on, but it would feel cold anyway—to work on her own. Was it the drive or the empty house? In any case, she reasoned, she’d come back to Rod’s for the evening: he’d rented a video and promised to cook more invalid food. But she had to be there to brief the night relief. ‘It’s changeover day: early shift back to night, late to early and—’

  He laid a finger to her lips. ‘I have worked shifts, my love. Before I took to my Zimmer frame. Though as I recall we worked shifts that started later and later, not earlier and earlier.’

  ‘It’s part of some Home Office research to see which disrupts sleep patterns less,’ she explained.

  ‘Which means that soon the nation’s police will be working the most disruptive pattern possible.’

  She nodded. ‘But the point is, I need to be there to set things up.’

  ‘No. Absolutely not. And I’m speaking as one who made—makes!—mistakes through being over-eager myself, Kate. You’ve got an experienced sergeant to whom you’ve sent long, long e-mails so he knows exactly what you want doing. He’s got a team he’s used to working with, at least some of whom, you say, are good, reliable officers. What does it say about your trust in them if you turn up, pinched and ill, to tell them how to do a job they’ve been doing for years? Well?’

  She pulled a face. She knew just how much both Neil Drew and Ronnie Hale liked being treated like beginners.

  ‘It was fine playing silly buggers dashing in and out last week,—when you were trying to get to know people. Though I have to—say that if you’d worked reasonable hours you might not have succumbed to this bug of yours. You’d do the West Midlands Police far more good if you had a nice early night and turned up at a sensible hour tomorrow.’ He grinned. ‘Say, “Ja, Uncle Hans.”

  ‘Why? Oh, Christ, because you were talking like a Dutch—uncle. Goodness, does that mean we’re committing incest?’

  He looked around his study. ‘Not at the moment, I’d have thought.’ He got to his feet, taking her hand. ‘But that doesn’t mean it can’t be immediately arranged.’

  Kate insisted—and Rod didn’t argue overmuch—that she should be there to debrief the night team as they came back to base on Monday morning. She had the kettle boiling and had even boosted the office heating to welcome them in from the bitter Birmingham predawn.

  Neil Drew, however, had steam clouds of anger puffing from his ears, as he wrapped his hands gratefully round a mug of hot chocolate. ‘Fucking Bates. What the hell does he think he’s doing? I radio for assistance—oh, some kid pulls a knife on me—and he’s the nearest, since he’s in the wholesale market, and he never comes.’

  ‘Are you all right? She pointed to some blood on his cuff.

  ‘Don’t worry, gaffer. I’d played that game before. He hadn’t. The little shit’s gracing the cells at Digbeth. And because he’s now their collar, I don’t even have to worry about the paperwork.’

  ‘That’s a bonus, anyway. What does Bates have to say?’

  ‘Fuck all. I’ve tried to make contact God knows how many times and not a bloody peep from him. Not a sodding sausage.’

  Ronnie Hale looked at him with disdain. ‘He’s got the gastroenteritis bugs he? And with a stomach like his is supposed to be, he’s probably got it bad.’

  ‘Too bad to radio in?’ Kate asked.

  ‘Well, we are talking Phil Bates here, gaffer.’

  Neil grimaced. ‘So we are. OK, gaffer. Not quite all present and correct, as you can see.’

  ‘Have you had time to call Bates on his mobile?

  She was glad she’d phrased it that way. She was spared anything more than an ironic lift of Neil’s eyebrow. ‘Switched off. And his home answer phone’s on.’

  ‘I’ll keep trying,’ Kate said. ‘His numbers will be on computer?

  ‘His numbers are in my head—no, engraved on my heart, more like. Here, I’ll write them down.’

  ‘And his address, too, please. Just in case.’

  Neil wrote, but said quietly, head hardly raised so she had to strain to hear him: ‘Don’t put yourself out over this, Kate. He’s a bleeding rotten little skiver, always has been, and a pain in the arse to boot.’

  ‘Point taken,’ she murmured back. ‘But even so.’

  Kate was making her sixth attempt to phone Bates when Jill Todd breezed in wearing a new perfume. ‘Feeling better, gaffer? I hear you had quite a moment of drama at Digbeth.’

  Well, a civilised question deserved a polite answer—even if she found it hard to notch up to friendly. ‘Much, thanks. It was only this stomach bug. You’re all right? Your team?’

  ‘All here and raring to go.’ Jill added an ironic smile.

  ‘I can guess. Has the sleet turned to snow yet?’

  ‘Yes—and we’ve had the first couple of shunts on the Holloway Head island.’

  ‘Already? I’d have thought that would have been a priority for gritting and salting. So we’re in for an exciting day. Now, you remember that Mr Choi warned us about people-trafficking via the wholesale market? Well, we may not have people in the plural, but we do have a person in the singular.’ She explained about Natasha.

  ‘Not the ‘sort of thing Mr Choi was on about, surely,’ Jill objected coolly.

  ‘Possibly not. But just in case it is, I want to prioritise ‘the wholesale market again for today’s beats. I know, I know, but the girl arrived at the market in a container lorry, and people may have seen something useful.’

  ‘There are quite a lot of container lorries at the market.’ Jill might have been talking to a kindergarten child.

  Best to ignore it. ‘And it looks as if Phil Bates succumbed to the bug last night. He never finished his stint there.’

  ‘He bothered to turn up at all? Well, that’s a first, in weather like this Has to look after his sinuses or some such’

  ‘Well, I’d like to find out why he didn’t bother phoning in sick. And why he hasn’t answered his phone.’

  ‘Well, he couldn’t, not if he’s throwing up and shitting.’ The words came slightly oddly from such a delicate-looking woman.

  A delicate-looking woman who may have taken two letters from your desk, Kate. Another job for today: talking to Graham. And chasing Mrs Speed for a key. And speculating whose number Todd here might have been dialling if she took the bait of the phone number.

  ‘Well, I shall keep trying until I have to go down to Digbeth, to talk to the Romanian kid.’

  ‘I could do that,’ Jill objected.

  ‘Of course you could. But you’ve got a full in-tray and the silly girl seems to think the sun shines out of my ears.’

  She might have heard the other woman mutter, ‘Or somewhere lower.’ Might.

  ‘So I’ll be off at about nine forty-five. It seems interpreters don’t get up at the same time as the rest of us. Meanwhile…’ She picked up the phone and pressed the redial button: she held the handset so Jill could hear the endless ringing. ‘Who’s the least busy in your team? Because I’d like these numbers dialled alternately every ten minutes till we get a reply. In fact,’ she patted her own in-tray, ‘whoever you choose could take over from me right now. I’ve got to get my head round these figures about half an hour ago.’

  She couldn’t fairly have used the verb ‘snatch’ to describe Jill’s action, but she came close to using the verb ‘flounce’ as the sergeant left the room. On impulse—and, on reflection,
she should have done it much earlier—she posted a missing-letters note for everyone on the e-mail system. She wanted to make sure she’d not misjudged her sergeant. She seemed to have misjudged one of her staff. As soon as she neared her desk, Mrs Speed held up triumphantly a pair of shiny new keys.

  ‘Two?’

  ‘One to wash and one to wear, my mother used to say. Or one to use and one to lose.’

  ‘Good idea. So I keep one and you lock the other away.’

  ‘You’re sure you wouldn’t rather have both of them?’

  Kate smiled, handing over the spare. ‘I’m sure you’ve got a system. So long as I know what the system is.’

  Mrs Speed gave the side of her nose a conspiratorial tap. ‘In here.’ She produced an old-fashioned cashbox. ‘Hitherto only I have ever had a key. But I think you should have a duplicate, don’t you?’

  Perhaps Kate was winning. She hoped so. Because it was clear she’d have to have further words with. Thelma—she was beginning to agree with Neil’s description of the cleaner—about the state of the washbasins, so mucky she couldn’t even understand how they’d ever got that way.

  The interpreter who presented herself at Digbeth wore a huge, shapeless fur coat and a battered turban, skewered in place by a dramatic hatpin. She looked so like a teddy bear that Kate almost laughed out loud. But she was reassuringly female, which was all that mattered to Natasha, she hoped. And when she removed the coat, she looked a normal enough elderly lady, face pinched with cold despite the deplorable hat.

  But before they could get under way, there was a very long exchange between the two Romanians. Natasha didn’t seem to find the new interpreter at all to her taste, but Kate was determined to stick with her, all other things being equal.

  ‘What’s the problem?’—she asked Madame Constantinou.

  ‘She wanted to know all about my family and the region I came from.’ Madame Constantinou shook her head and jowls sadly. ‘It seems to me that our young friend may have been betrayed by people she thought she could rely on.’

  ‘But she’s happy to trust you?’.

  ‘She seems to think me acceptable,’ she replied. Her voice was heavy with irony, which intensified as she added, ‘For the time being Why does she have that paper and all those felt-tip pens?’

  Kate explained about Saturday’s communication exercise

  ‘And I think Natasha likes drawing anyway. It’s nice she’s got something to keep her happy in the safe-house. Poor kid.’ Madame Constantinou nodded. ‘She has been treated more like a woman than a child.’

  At last Meg Walker bustled up, absolutely transformed by a new haircut and highlights Kate ventured an unobtrusive thumbs-up, but Natasha bounded across the room, laughing and touching the blonde streaks with delight. Kate felt a frisson of relief: if Natasha took a shine to Meg, then the questioning could be left in her hands while Kate turned to other Scala House cases.

  Natasha shot a couple of questions; Madame Constantinou sniffed with disapproval.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘She wants to know when she can have her hair done like Sergeant Walker’s. And when she can have her breakfast.’

  Now they had Natasha talking, it was impossible to stop her. But whereas Kate wanted, at this stage, a brief explanation of the events Natasha had depicted on Saturday, the girl wanted to dwell on the details. It took almost an hour to get through the first part of her story. It was bad enough, and Kate felt guilty for wanting to urge her on when Natasha seemed to need the sheer therapy of sharing her experiences.

  She’d been the only daughter of a minor civil servant. He had never been a calm man. Her mother had been truly a saint, enduring his bad temper and occasional violence, except when it was directed at Natasha. From time to time she’d had to send her away to her cousins-in Oradea, but she’d always come back, of course. At last she’d realised her mother was ill, and she described her protracted suffering and eventual death from breast cancer.

  Natasha broke down and cried. She couldn’t be patted better by all three women, so Kate slipped out to organise more food and ring back to Scala House: no, still no news of Phil Bates. From Jill Todd’s offhand response, she couldn’t be sure how much effort had been made to run him to earth, but that wasn’t her problem now.

  The next hour was occupied with Natasha’s father’s response to his wife’s death. Drink, almost predictably, and violence. And, of course, there was no mother to protect her. Natasha and Madame Constantinou drew a combined veil over what Kate strongly suspected was an episode of at least attempted sexual abuse. So she went of her own accord to stay with her northern cousins, only to have her father turn up, yelling and breaking things. While he cooled his heels in the town gaol, her cousins sent her to safety, to some dear friends in Yugoslavia.

  Was the irony in the word ‘dear’ Madame Constantinou’s own, or had it come from Natasha?

  Before such essentials as school could be organised, or work, for that matter, Natasha—‘I was quite pretty then’—attracted the attention of what she called ‘nasty people’. She glossed over how this came about. Perhaps she was lured by the promise of money; perhaps her contact betrayed her. However it happened—Natasha’s fatalistic shrug was grotesquely echoed by Madame Constantinou’s—she had to become a dancing girl in a nightclub.

  It had to be spelt out, no matter how much they’d have preferred the euphemism for Natasha’s sake. Dancing meant stripping and having sex with the clients.

  Time for another break.

  ‘We’re going to need all sorts of support here,’ Kate murmured to Meg Walker as they left the room. ‘I don’t mean just obvious things like rustling up some winter-weight clothes. She’s going to need counselling and—’

  ‘I’ve already spoken to some of the women in the Steelhouse Lane rape team. And I’m on to Social Services. And the DSS. And I’ve raided my girls’ wardrobe’

  ‘You’ve actually brought in some clothes? Meg, you’re a star.’

  Meg shrugged. ‘It’s last year’s fashion to them. I hoped it might be up to the minute for her. But the poor girl’s as worldly as they come.’

  ‘But she is still a kid—look at the way she loves those felt-tips.’

  ‘I nicked some makeup for her too. When shall I hand it over?’

  ‘How, about at lunchtime? We’ll need a break from all this emotion and I’ve got to shoot back to Scala House to—’

  Meg folded her arms. ‘Does that mean you’re skipping lunch? Well, let me tell you, Gaffer, you don’t do that after the bug you’ve had. A nice light lunch, maybe, but how can you expect to get better if you don’t look after yourself?’

  ‘There’s no sign of him?’ Rod echoed over a glass of wine that evening.

  ‘None. He’s just vanished. And I’m worried. Really worried.’

  ‘Talk me through this slowly. You’ve got a constable who’s a total waste of space who buggers off for the day and you go dashing off to Erdington to look for him?’

  ‘Before you ask, I am not off my head. I know the obvious person to do it is someone from the same team. But they’re working nights, and it’d look very good, wouldn’t it, if they started banging on Bates’ front door and hollering their heads off in a nice residential road—’

  ‘Are there any in Erdington? Are we talking about the same place?’

  ‘—in the middle of the night? He’s spoken to me about his health problems; I was about to contact Occupational Health about him. Seems to me it’s my job. Plus,’ she added, tongue in cheek, ‘to lose an officer may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose one at a possible scene of crime looks like carelessness.’

  Obligingly Rod threw back his head and laughed. ‘Nothing from the neighbours?’

  ‘Nothing. Neither next-door neighbour has a key, either. Salad?’

  ‘Please. We’ll talk about this properly while we drive over to see Aunt Cassie.’

  ‘You’re coming too?’ She was both pleased on her own account and touched on Cassie�
��s.

  ‘I saw quite a lot of her while you were working in Devon, remember. And I fancy it’s easier with two people.’

  She put her head on one side, grinning. ‘You wouldn’t have an ulterior motive? Such as if you drive me you can make sure I don’t stop off at Scala House and spend half the night there?’

  ‘Hmm. Now, no more shop while we eat. Not for the next half-hour. Remember our pact: meals to be crime-free zones. It may be honoured more in the breach than the observance—I think Shakespeare caps Wilde, by the way—but we have to stay sane.’

  She nodded, lifting her wineglass. ‘To sanity!’

  Chapter 10

  ‘There’s no ice.’ Aunt Cassie’s fingers worked in her lap. ‘I kept reminding whatshername…’

  ‘Your care worker? Izzie?’ Rod prompted her. He squatted beside her.

  ‘That’s her. Izzie. Bright enough girl for all she’s got those rings and things in her nose and goodness. knows where else. But she wasn’t herself today,’ Aunt Cassie grumbled. ‘She even left Mrs Nelmes on her commode for half an hour this morning.’

  ‘A commode! Ugh! Why didn’t Mrs Nelmes use the lavatory, like everyone else? It’s en suite, after all. She can’t expect care assistants to—’ Kate stopped. Her stomach wasn’t as clever as she’d thought it was.

  ‘You tell me. Mrs Nelmes claims she was poorly, but she was up in the dining room at six o’clock. And a jolly good meal she had, too—an extra sweet. Anyway, there’s no ice, as I was telling you. And I did fancy a nip of gin,’ she added, as wistfully as if she didn’t have one every night. ‘Especially with these nice fresh lemons. And a lime!’ Which had come courtesy of an open-all-hours Asian corner shop.