Chapter 7
"Are you serious? Who would steal it?" Pavel was standing at the door of Craig's office.
Craig could only shake his head slowly. He'd been home to have a shower and get dressed, and was sitting at his desk eating a bacon and egg roll.
"Who knows. I'm over it. There'll be more mess, more paperwork, more questions from the cops and the insurance company. We're supposed to be a SMASH REPAIR business, and I've got bugger all to show for it this week. And all I ever do is answer the BLOODY PHONE!" It rang again. He picked it up and slammed it straight back down. Pavel retreated and Craig stayed focussed on his breakfast.
The police left shortly afterwards, and the team struggled to shrug off the shock of the first ever break-in at Advanced Smash Repairs. Every job seemed to need parts and no clients were expecting to pick up their cars in time for the weekend. Not many new jobs had made their way in this week, in spite of the phone call avalanche and the wet weather that had apparently claimed the BMW.
"Boris?"
"Yeah?"
Craig slipped him a few notes. "I want double the Friday morning cake ration today. Can you arrange that?"
"Of course."
Boris returned with an elaborate gateaux, mounded high with chocolate gloop from a Russian lady who sells cakes from her home - just what they needed. Clint poured some evil looking coffees to wash it down. They were devouring it with unseemly haste, faces and hands all covered in cream, when Monahan appeared at the top of the ramp.
"No wonder you never get anything done around here. How can you work when you've always got tools down and covered in . . . ."
"Cake, Kendrick?"
"No thanks, I've got to get this BMW off again, then . . . ." He looked around the workshop. "Where is it?"
"Didn't Perrin tell you? I rang him first thing. It was stolen last night. Stolen - a written-off car. Dumb crooks."
Monahan stood there in his uniform, arms akimbo. His face went white with rage and frustration, matching his white gloves.
"Come on, don't get too down on yourself. You must have three hours budgeted to do this job, so the next one can wait. Have some cake." Oblivious to Pavel's barbs, Monahan shrugged his shoulders, and carefully removed his gloves, finger by finger, as he stalked towards the cake with intent.
They had just finished their first pieces of cake when Halphen walked into the workshop.
"Detective Halphen, join us! We're dosing up on sugar to keep us going through the day. Want some?"
Rod looked as tired as Craig. He gave a little nod, and sat in the circle around the altar of cake. He spoke before anyone could ask the obvious question.
"OK, lads, let's have a guessing competition. Everyone write down where they think we found the car this morning."
"Ooh, you found the car. OK, let's all play." Craig went to the office, and grabbed a pile of paper from his recycling bin, and some pens.
"Place your bets, gentlemen, nearest correct answer gets the last of the cake, after Detective Halphen has had his piece, of course!" Craig was cheering up a bit. He handed Rod a wodge of cake on a makeshift plate made out of a piece of A4 paper. Halphen didn't even notice that the office cake knife was shard of hard plastic that was in fact a fragment of the back bumper of a Citroen they had repaired the previous year.
They scribbled their guesses and held them to their chests.
"Kendrick Monahan. Reveal your guess!"
"Why am I first?" He turned his paper around, and it was upside down. "Stripped and burnt out within three kilometres of here."
"Bit non-specific there, Kendrick, we could have done with an address, but nice try." Craig looked over to Rod, who was hiding his expression behind his cake. "No emotions from the adjudicator, he's not giving anything away. Com'on, lay it on us Oil Spill."
"Similar to Kendrick . ."
"Mr Monahan to you son."
"Whatever. Broken down within one kilometre."
"Not bad, but I'm sure one of us would have seen it on the way in. No action from the adjudicator, so Pavel, you're next."
"Wrapped around a power pole between here and the doctor's place," said Pavel confidently, without turning over his paper, and with his eyes on Rod so he could judge if he'd hit the jackpot. He was hopeful for a few seconds before Rod shook his head.
"Interesting thinking behind that, though," said Rod after swallowing some cake.
The phone rang again. "Let the machine take it, it's too tense here. Next, Boris Batmanov, driver to the stars, what do you say?"
Boris was impassive as he turned his paper over. "Burnt out in the bush below the lookout at River Park."
Halphen had just jammed in his last mouthful of cake, and he nearly choked as Boris pronounced his guess, and managed to kick his coffee over while trying to keep it all in.
"We have a winner!" shouted Craig.
"How did you know that?" spluttered Halphen.
"Yes, Boris, how did you know that?" Clint shoved a spanner in front of Boris' face like it was a microphone. Boris palmed it away.
"Not because I did it, dumb-ass!"
"Maybe he drives past the park entrance to get here from work?" said Pavel.
A huge grin came over Boris' face. "And I saw the cop cars at the gate on the way in. And the smoke! So yeah, lucky guess."
"Still a winner!" Craig grabbed the last piece of cake, and slammed it into Boris' face before he could defend himself.
"WINNER!" they all shouted, laughing. Boris took it in good humour, and in trying to keep the cream off his shirt, was flicking it all over the place. It was lucky that there was no cake left, otherwise the frustrations of the week would have boiled over into a food fight.
The mood was lifted, though, and they quickly cleaned the place up.
"Can I have a word?"
"Sure." Craig led Halphen into the relative privacy of his office. Craig slipped his own entry to the competition into his top drawer without Rod noticing. They sat on the desk.
"If you hear anything about this car or who took it . . ."
"I'll tell you straight away."
There was a silence.
"Why were you so interested in it? Can you tell me now?"
"Not really. Something else about the good doctor came up . . . but I didn't tell you that."
"Don't worry."
Two workmen showed up at the top of the ramp.
"They'll be here to fix the security shutter downstairs. I'd better sort them out."
They shook hands, and both laughed as they felt the sticky evidence of the cake on their hands. Detective Halphen walked down the ramp ahead of Craig and the workers, with his hands shoved thoughtfully into his pockets.
Clint was jamming the used paper and cake box into the bin in Craig's office when the phone rang and he answered it. He put the handset down on the desk and went back out to the workshop.
"Craig, phone," he yelled.
Craig was returning from down stairs and the "if we have to" attitude from the shutter repair crew and had had enough of the phone for one week. "Can you take a message?"
"Tried that. It's the guy with the Alfa - reckons it's still konking out randomly."
Craig was too tired to even complain. He trudged back to the office the way a footballer does when the coach had just taken him from the field for conceding a match-losing penalty.
"Only joking. It's Melinda."
Craig's gait changed from trudge to attack as he made a direct line for Clint, looking like he was going to king hit him in a bone-crunching tackle. He pulled out at the last minute and jogged into the office to take the call.
"Good form, Oil Spill," said Pavel. "Bit risky on a day like today, but good form."
Clint went back to cleaning up, smiling to himself.
Spillage Page 7
