Chapter 5
The ambulance slowed, mounting the pavement to squeeze between Sir Norman’s BMW and the cemetery wall, as Tufty opened the cordon for them.
Rainbow Frank sagged. ‘Oh, thank God . . .’
Right.
Now the paramedics were here, it was time to do something about her collection of prisoners/suspects/idiots.
Roberta stepped into the road, plucking the loudhailer from where she’d dropped it. The plastic housing was a bit scuffed, but other than that? Pressing the button marked ‘SIREN’ made the thing wail like a slapped child.
Good enough.
Soon as the screech faded, she addressed both sides. ‘LISTEN UP! SOMEONE HERE STABBED THIS YOUNG WOMAN! YOU GET ONE CHANCE: FESS UP NOW, OR I SWEAR TO WHOEVER LIVES IN THAT BIG POINTY HOUSE,’ waving at the church, ‘I WILL MAKE IT MY LIFE’S WORK TO CRUSH YOU LIKE A SODDING BUG! ARE WE CLEAR?’
The ambulance came to a halt beside Billie, the front doors sprung open, and the two-person paramedic team leapt out.
The passenger was a toothy yeti of a man with too much beard.
The driver: a wee blonde woman, her bare arms and round face a painful shade of sunburnt pork.
Both looking knackered and harassed in their kale-green uniforms.
No one said a word as they hurried toward Billie. Peeling off the crinkly tinfoil blanket as if she was some sort of ready meal.
Roberta raised the loudhailer again. ‘YOU’VE GOT TILL THEY LEAVE!’ Then hurled the thing to the ground. It bounced, the casing cracking as it blared out a tortured, discordant-electronic-feedback howl.
So she stomped on it – once, twice, three times – shattering the plastic, sending bits of circuit board and casing flying. Putting it out of its misery.
Mr Yeti knelt beside Billie. Purple-nitrile fingers exploring her hairline, searching for damage. ‘Hello? Can you hear me, Sweetheart? Hello?’
Sunburnt Blondie tried Frank instead. ‘How long has she been unconscious?’
‘I don’t really . . . fifteen minutes? Maybe? It’s all been a bit of a blur . . .’
An emergency vehicle wailed in the distance, approaching at speed. Not the medical whee-yoo-whee-yoo-whee-yoo of another ambulance, but the longer demanding tones of a patrol car siren on its first setting. More than one car, going by the racket.
Wasn’t long before two of them appeared in Kintore’s town triangle, followed by a police van caked in dust and grime.
The three vehicles blocked the road behind Sir Norman’s BMW, and out piled six officers – two from each – which had to be a good chunk of North East Division’s dayshift, given how many of the snudgers were off sick.
And every single one of them was too buggering late to do any good.
Roberta threw her hands in the air. ‘Finally!’ Taking a deep breath to welcome them properly: ‘WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?’
Tufty sidled up to her, keeping his voice down so no one else could hear. ‘Guv? Are you OK?’
She glared at him, jaw clenched, fists trembling. ‘Do I sodding look OK?’
‘Eeek . . .’ He backed up a pace. Then made himself busy somewhere else.
Because he wasn’t as daft as he looked.
‘So . . .’ Logan McRae adopted that slightly patronising tone he used when someone had been unusually stupid, ‘you arrested them all?’
‘Course I sodding did.’ Roberta grumbled her way between the graves, one hand jammed deep in her trouser pocket, the other holding her phone. Kicking at the grass and glancing over the cemetery wall.
The smaller protesters – both Polo-Shirts and T-Shirts – were being loaded into the back of the police van, while the back seats of the two patrol cars were reserved for the biggest and gammoniest lumps.
Mind you, they all seemed to be suffering from the post-riot blues, and not inclined to kick off again. Not yet, anyway.
She stepped around a squint headstone. ‘Well, what was I supposed to do? Can’t just let the buggers go: serious assault, rioting, attempted murder – which might turn into an actual one – resisting arrest, dressing up like a bunch of tits, and one count of being a chinless wank.’
‘That’s two quid in the swear jar.’
‘Shut up.’
Rainbow Frank stood all on his ownsome, by the door to campaign headquarters, arms wrapped around his chest as if trying to keep his innards from escaping. Trembling.
His shirtsleeves were drenched in dark scarlet from cuffs to elbows, the multicoloured tie stained to a gory monotone. Poor sod looked in desperate need of hot sweet tea and a dark corner to sob in.
Roberta gave the squint headstone a wee nudge with her boot.
‘And Sergeant Downie Six-Toes is moaning, cos the cells are still full after the weekend. Says it’ll take days to get the backlog through court, and “How dare I arrest another big wodge of people, just to spite him?” Pasty-faced, inbred gype. ’
‘That’s violent protests for you.’
Emma Dornoch was on her phone too, marching back and forth with her forehead all furrowed, free hand gesticulating in jabby sweeping arcs.
Doing her best to avoid the puddle of blood where Billie had lain.
Could be squeamishness, or maybe just not wanting to get all that sticky haemoglobin on her nice boots.
‘No’ my fault, is it. Some buggers just need banging-up.’
Sir Norman and Lady Stick-Up-The-Arse Fordyce were loitering by their fancy BMW, both wheeling and dealing on phones of their own. No doubt tag-teaming the Chief Constable to tell her what a rude, insolent, absolute disaster of a disappointment Acting Detective Inspector Roberta Steel was.
‘There’s dozens of little stations all over the division. Bet they’ve got plenty of spare cells.’
‘Oh aye? And who’ll man them, the Not-Off-On-The-Sick Fairies?’ This time the squint grave got a wee kick. ‘Bloody force is like a ghost town.’
‘Could let them go?’
‘Nah, attempted murder, remember?’ Roberta sagged her bum against a big granite slab with crimped decoration along its curved top, like a carved Cornish pasty. ‘Poor wee girl’s only twenty-one; lying there with a knife sticking out her guts.’
At least the ambulance was long gone. Billie would be halfway to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary by now. Where she’d be heading straight into surgery. Hopefully. Rather than the mortuary.
‘Should be ashamed of yourself, by the way: shirking your duty. Malingering at home, when some of us are out here working. Struggling nobly under the weight of monstrous hangovers brought about by your cheap drain-cleaner booze.’
A snort. ‘Oh no you don’t. You wolfed two bottles of—’
‘Don’t interrupt when I’m berating you. It’s—’
‘Acting Guv?’ Tufty’s pointy wee head appeared over the cemetery wall. ‘That’s them ready to go.’ Nodding at the patrol cars and police van. ‘Any idea where you want them, yet?’
‘Hold on.’ She took the phone from her ear and covered the mic with her other hand. ‘Is Downie still moaning about his sodding cell capacity?’
‘Up to his ears and sinking fast. “No room! No room!”’ A frown. ‘Think she’ll be OK?’
‘She better be, or I’m clambering up someone’s backside with crampons and a blowtorch.’ Pointing at the wee loon’s chest. ‘You get the stabbing on your BWV?’
He looked down at the little black rectangle, fixed to the front of his high-vis.
‘Won’t know till I get it back to the Palais de Police and download the footage.
What twit designed Body Worn Video units that does not has no screens?
’ Then peeled off his hat and fanned his sweaty face.
‘Pfff . . . I hates stabbings. Too sudden and easy and random. Not like guns. You need to put a bit of work in with a gun.’
Idiot.
‘Go away.’
‘No, but you do! You have to find a sketchy-criminal type who’s selling one, and you’ve got to buy it for very muchness of money – not to mention the ammunition, which isn’t easy to come by – and then you’ve got to go out and shoot your victim, getting all covered in blowback and leaving wads of forensics behind.
And even worse: every bullet that comes out the shooty end bears a scratch-etched fingerprint that’s unique to the gun what fired it.
’ Nodding away, as if agreeing with this nugget of daftness.
‘Whereas most people’s cutlery drawers are full of knives.
And once you’ve stabbified someone, you can give the thing a quick squirt with bleach, ditch it in the river, and buy a new one at your nearest supermarket. ’
She made a wafting gesture. ‘Away. Go. Now.’ Then back to her phone call. ‘So, when you coming back to work, Skiver?’
‘Got to keep the leg elevated for a couple of weeks.’ Logan made a hmmmmm-ing noise. ‘Could wheel me about in a bath chair, I suppose? Might make operational duties a bit difficult, though.’
‘Meh: long as no one commits an “upstairs crime” we’ll be fine. Tell you, it’s . . .’ She narrowed her eyes, because the wee loon was still hanging about like a wet fart. ‘Thought I told you to sod off.’
Tufty shrugged. ‘Yeah, but you has not answered The Big Question: where am we taking all these peoples?’
Did she have to do everything?
‘Find out if there’s enough space at Inverurie. If not, distribute the buggers through the . . .’ Oh for goodness’ sake: the halfwit had his notebook out, scribbling away. ‘Why are you writing that down? It’s easy enough to remember!’
‘No: is your running total. For the swear jar.’
She jabbed a hand at the vehicles. ‘Go! Before I throw a gravestone at you!’
‘Eeek . . .’ And away he scurried.
Honestly.
Roberta raised her phone again. ‘That boy could numpty for Scotland. Where was—’
‘Listen: you’ve got no CCTV, right? Have you confiscated everyone’s phone? Maybe somebody got the stabbing on film.’
She let the sarcasm rip. ‘Of course I didn’t, because I’m a simpering imbecile who’s never run a murder inquiry before!’ A haughty sniff. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got tossers to interrogate.’
Roberta hung up and stuffed her phone in her pocket. Glowered at the pie-topped gravestone for a moment. Then took a deep breath. ‘HOY, TUFTY!’
The wee twit stopped, turned. ‘Guv?’
‘CONFISCATE EVERYONE’S PHONE.’