Chapter 2.14 #2
Roberta gave her a wave, and for a moment the hard-girl act slipped, and Little Miss Sausages smiled and waved back. Before retreating inside and clunking the door shut.
Soon as she was gone, Roberta thumped Davey again. ‘What the hell was that?’
‘Will you stop hitting me!’ Rubbing his arm. ‘And I don’t—’
‘You sound like a sex offender.’ Putting on a high-pitched mocking voice: ‘“Oh, wickle girlie, is your daddy catching tasty fishie-wishies for your yummy din-dins?”’
‘I was just—’
‘And how come we didn’t know he was a fisherman?’
‘Well, how was I supposed to—’
‘Check his social media! No bugger does anything these days without posting three million sodding photos about it. Look him up!’
Idiot.
‘And no smoking in the car!’ She yanked the cigarette from his mouth. ‘You no’ got enough cancer in your life?’
Davey’s ears went bright pink, cheeks too.
Cracking her window, Roberta pinged the smouldering remains out into the drizzle. ‘Bloody things smell like creosote and singed pubes.’
There was silence as they lump-and-rolled their way back up the track. Then Davey cleared his throat. ‘How do you think Rory Hatton manages this road in his fancy Jag?’ Trying to change the subject again.
‘I gave you those names yesterday, did you do no research?’
‘Well . . . it was . . . and the house needed tidying before the carers came this morning, because Jenny’s—’
‘Honestly: I have to do everything.’ She dug out her phone and called Tufty, letting it ring and ring and ring. ‘And that’s the last time you get to interrogate witnesses or suspects. You’ve forgotten how to—’
‘Ghaaaargh . . .’ Puffing and panting and lurchy noises whoomped out of the earpiece. ‘Is this . . . important . . . only . . . only I’m sort of . . . in the middle . . . of chasing . . . someone.’
‘I need you to do your techno-geek thing on a few people.’
‘Can it . . . can it wait? . . . As mentioned: . . . chasing someone!’
‘You’re such a—’
‘HOY! STOP, POLICE! COME BACK HERE!’ Peching and heeching. ‘Flipping blip-blop. . . . Why do they . . . Never . . . Pfff . . .’
‘Fine, I’ll text you. But I want it done today, understand?’ Hanging up before he could whine some more.
Lazy wee snudge.
That was the problem with these young DCs nowadays: no work ethic.
The windscreen wipers thunk-squeeeeeealed back and forth as the drizzle turned into something far wetter.
Stonehaven’s High Street was a lot less grand than it sounded, walled-in by sandstone terraces, darkened by the slithery rain. Made gloomier by the heavy sky and general lack of trees and bushes or any living thing.
Thankfully, the car radio was off and Davey was keeping his yap shut. Probably fearing the Terrible Wrath of The Spanking Hand. Leaving Roberta free to sit there, texting the names and addresses of their three suspected adulterers to Tufty. And the cheating husband’s too. For luck.
The road narrowed, curving left as they puttered past a dumpy clock tower. Then a smear of grey appeared in the middle distance, between the buildings, and the narrow vista opened up as the soggy buildings on the right came to an abrupt end with a rumble of granite setts beneath the Polo’s wheels.
Even in the drizzly yuck it was kind of picturesque – the headland rising up to the right; a line of quaint olde worlde shortbread-box buildings on the left, bordering the Old Pier.
Just a shame the water was even greyer than the sky.
Davey leaned forward, wickerwork hands at ten-to-two on the steering wheel, as he peered through the windscreen. ‘Any idea what bit of the harbour he’s parked?’
‘Moored, you twit.’ She pointed across the car at the marina area. ‘And it won’t be that bit, will it. Nothing but noddy boats and poncy yachts. Keep going.’
The setts disappeared and they were back on damp tarmac again, drifting past the old bit of the harbour, where thick stone arms encircled a wide sandy beach.
A handful of boats were stranded there, the low tide leaving them nothing to float on.
Then, past the old harbour wall to the newer bit, driving by the public loos, harbour office, and a bulky lump of white steelwork – where a single orange lifeboat hung, so people could practise not dying in a catastrophic offshore disaster.
This outer bit of the harbour must’ve been deeper, because there was no sand on display here, just a slick green line of algae and seaweed growing on the harbour wall to mark the usual tidemark.
The first human being they’d seen since turning onto the High Street was an auld mannie in yellow wellies, blue ovies, and a fluorescent-orange waterproof. Loading blue plastic barrels into the back of a rusty pickup.
All the berths here were empty, the only vessel: a solitary fishing boat, puttering away from the quayside.
A tiny thing, no more than twenty feet long, with a small wooden wheelhouse at the front and a stack of empty creels in the back.
Red, with a white stripe, and ‘The Nippy Partan’ painted across its stern.
Buggering heck.
‘Stop the car!’
Davey did and Roberta struggled free.
No time to sod about with umbrellas. She limped as fast as her legs and stick would carry her, to the harbour’s edge. Waving both arms at the departing boat. ‘HOY! COME BACK HERE!’
But either The Nippy Partan’s captain couldn’t see/hear her, or he didn’t care. Either way, he kept on going.
She whipped out her phone, firing off some snaps as the boat puttered around the breakwater and out to sea.
Davey shuffled up beside her, sheltering beneath his stupid golf brolly. ‘Told you we should’ve called first.’
‘Oh aye, because what we really want is to give the buggers plenty of notice, so they can come up with lies and excuses.’
Hmmm . . .
There was nearly sod-all water in the old harbour bit, and you could see the green line where the sea should’ve been, and the only vessel still here was that survival-training lifeboat. And it wasn’t going anywhere.
She hobbled over to the auld fisher mannie.
Up close, his face was craggy as an elephant’s scrotum, with a grey-and-white Captain Birdseye beard.
He’d accessorised his wellies-overalls-and-waterproof ensemble with a crumpled fisherman’s cap and a rollie cigarette that smouldered evil-smelling smoke out into the rain – even worse than Davey’s.
His blue plastic barrels were peppered with holes not-quite big enough to post a tin of Irn-Bru through. As if he’d cobbled together DIY creels from old cooking-oil drums.
He tied the last one into place, thunked the pickup’s tailgate shut, then turned to find Roberta standing right behind him. Flinched. ‘Gaaaaaagh . . .!’
‘Aye, see the boy in the boat?’ She pointed at the empty harbour. ‘Is it no’ a bit low-tide to be heading out? That usual?’
‘Hrrrmph . . .’ The auld mannie’s voice was gravel deep, but stuffed with posh-boy plumminess. ‘Man’s free to sail whenever he wants, no matter how stupid it is.’
‘You know him? Rory Hatton?’
A drip formed on the end of that wrinkly nose.
‘They say time and tide wait for no man – some men think they’re better than the sea.
’ Sniff. ‘They tend to end up on the bottom. Feeding the crabs.’ Frowning off into the rain.
‘I suppose that’s the circle of life for you.
You’ll excuse me if I don’t burst into an Elton John number, though.
’ A final draw on his burnt-down rollie, then he ground the stub out on the bed of his truck.
Ferreted a wee tin out of his overalls and lit another. Not offering her one.
Probably just as well.
He looked her up and down. ‘You police?’
‘That a problem?’
A shrug. ‘Not for me.’ Puffing away as he stared out at the briny deep. Motionless as a carved figurehead. ‘That’s the thing about the sea, you never know what you’re going to catch . . .’
And with that unhelpful bit of fortune-cookie wank, he climbed into his truck and buggered off.
Davey wandered over. ‘What did he say?’
‘Sod-all, useful. You stick an auld mannie in a fisherman’s cap and he thinks he’s Captain Flipping Ahab.’ She gave herself a wee shake.
Getting soaked here, standing in the rain like a halfwit.
‘Gah . . . Back to the car. Let’s go see the next numpty on your list.’