three extra men. Use them.”
“Correction, I have four! Dalton.”
“I know how many, Chief Inspector,” Halliday said testily. “You wanted to retain the murder inquiry, didn’t you?” He bit the top off the egg.
Tennison went to the door. She cast him a dark look under her brows. “Any more due? Or is this it? They have a few spare dog handlers at Hammersmith!”
Halliday laughed, mouth full of egg. He tapped another on the desk and peeled it, tossing the shell fragments into the wastebasket.
Tennison left the office, hoping he damn well choked on it.
6
O tley had nothing personal against Dalton—he hardly knew the bloke—but there was something about the young detective inspector (not a day over thirty-five, Otley judged) that irritated him. Not his good looks: Otley had no personal vanity whatsoever. It was more Dalton’s impulsiveness. He did everything at the gallop, instead of taking his time and sizing up a situation. And he had no streetwise sense, not a scrap. That’s what got to Otley, the fact that the bloke was deskbound for most of his working life, far removed from the seedy pubs and afternoon drinking clubs that were part of Otley’s daily round.
That was it. Otley had placed him. An eager-beaver Boy Scout dressed up as a police inspector.
They parked the car and set off on a tour of the Bullring and the Waterloo underpass. This area, south of the river, between the Royal Festival Hall and the National Theatre, was notorious for the hundreds if not thousands of people who inhabited its concrete walkways, its brick viaducts near Waterloo Station, dossing down in cardboard boxes, huddling near the heating vents, constructing little shelters out of bits of timber and plastic sheeting. Dossers, winos, junkies, bag ladies, the physically sick and the mentally ill, kids on the run from home and institutionalized care, and on the game: the hopeless and dispossessed and forgotten, the new London poor of 1993.
It wasn’t Otley’s patch, though he knew the area and its floating population of misfits well. Trouble was, a lot of them knew him, so it was difficult to wander about incognito. And in broad daylight, two o’clock in the afternoon, there weren’t any shadows to skulk around in, creep up on them unawares.
They walked through the Bullring, a huge concrete bowel wrapped around by a network of roads heading north across Waterloo Bridge and south to the Elephant and Castle. The noise was horrendous, the continuous streams of traffic shattering past overhead. Dalton spied a group of kids in a concrete cubbyhole behind one of the massive arching supports. They were crouched in a circle on the filthy, rubbish-covered ground, empty spray cans, squeezed-out tubes of glue, and broken syringes and needles everywhere.
“We’re looking for a kid nicknamed Disco Driscoll—” Dalton made a grab as they scattered, and collared one. “Hey—I’m talking to you!” The boy was squirming. Dalton wrenched the aerosol can from his grimy hand. “What’s this?”
“Makin’ a model airplane, mate!”
Dalton tried to swipe him as he ran off, and missed. Otley looked away, hiding a grin.
The squalid brick viaducts of the Waterloo underpass housed a community of down-and-outs, living in patched-up shelters tacked to the walls. Groups of them sat around campfires on the pavements, passing the bottle, and mingled with the smoke was the sharp reek of meths and cleaning fluid. It was gloomier here, under the arches, and the two detectives were able to approach without being observed. Otley touched Dalton’s arm, making him slow down, and said in a low voice, “Kid with the lager cans, that’s Kenny Lloyd. What I suggest we do . . .”
He was about to suggest they split up and circle in, one head on and one behind, blocking the kids’ retreat, but he never got the chance. Dalton was off and away. He ran fast, charging along the greasy pavement, but the group Kenny was in, their instinct for
“Correction, I have four! Dalton.”
“I know how many, Chief Inspector,” Halliday said testily. “You wanted to retain the murder inquiry, didn’t you?” He bit the top off the egg.
Tennison went to the door. She cast him a dark look under her brows. “Any more due? Or is this it? They have a few spare dog handlers at Hammersmith!”
Halliday laughed, mouth full of egg. He tapped another on the desk and peeled it, tossing the shell fragments into the wastebasket.
Tennison left the office, hoping he damn well choked on it.
6
O tley had nothing personal against Dalton—he hardly knew the bloke—but there was something about the young detective inspector (not a day over thirty-five, Otley judged) that irritated him. Not his good looks: Otley had no personal vanity whatsoever. It was more Dalton’s impulsiveness. He did everything at the gallop, instead of taking his time and sizing up a situation. And he had no streetwise sense, not a scrap. That’s what got to Otley, the fact that the bloke was deskbound for most of his working life, far removed from the seedy pubs and afternoon drinking clubs that were part of Otley’s daily round.
That was it. Otley had placed him. An eager-beaver Boy Scout dressed up as a police inspector.
They parked the car and set off on a tour of the Bullring and the Waterloo underpass. This area, south of the river, between the Royal Festival Hall and the National Theatre, was notorious for the hundreds if not thousands of people who inhabited its concrete walkways, its brick viaducts near Waterloo Station, dossing down in cardboard boxes, huddling near the heating vents, constructing little shelters out of bits of timber and plastic sheeting. Dossers, winos, junkies, bag ladies, the physically sick and the mentally ill, kids on the run from home and institutionalized care, and on the game: the hopeless and dispossessed and forgotten, the new London poor of 1993.
It wasn’t Otley’s patch, though he knew the area and its floating population of misfits well. Trouble was, a lot of them knew him, so it was difficult to wander about incognito. And in broad daylight, two o’clock in the afternoon, there weren’t any shadows to skulk around in, creep up on them unawares.
They walked through the Bullring, a huge concrete bowel wrapped around by a network of roads heading north across Waterloo Bridge and south to the Elephant and Castle. The noise was horrendous, the continuous streams of traffic shattering past overhead. Dalton spied a group of kids in a concrete cubbyhole behind one of the massive arching supports. They were crouched in a circle on the filthy, rubbish-covered ground, empty spray cans, squeezed-out tubes of glue, and broken syringes and needles everywhere.
“We’re looking for a kid nicknamed Disco Driscoll—” Dalton made a grab as they scattered, and collared one. “Hey—I’m talking to you!” The boy was squirming. Dalton wrenched the aerosol can from his grimy hand. “What’s this?”
“Makin’ a model airplane, mate!”
Dalton tried to swipe him as he ran off, and missed. Otley looked away, hiding a grin.
The squalid brick viaducts of the Waterloo underpass housed a community of down-and-outs, living in patched-up shelters tacked to the walls. Groups of them sat around campfires on the pavements, passing the bottle, and mingled with the smoke was the sharp reek of meths and cleaning fluid. It was gloomier here, under the arches, and the two detectives were able to approach without being observed. Otley touched Dalton’s arm, making him slow down, and said in a low voice, “Kid with the lager cans, that’s Kenny Lloyd. What I suggest we do . . .”
He was about to suggest they split up and circle in, one head on and one behind, blocking the kids’ retreat, but he never got the chance. Dalton was off and away. He ran fast, charging along the greasy pavement, but the group Kenny was in, their instinct for
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