‘Mmm,’ Wilding began, cautiously. ‘She’s not one that I recognise. That’ll be her date, I guess. Superintendent Chambers is discreetly gay. . or she was discreet about it until tonight.’ He stopped as a hand fell on his shoulder.
‘Evening, all,’ said the chief constable, smiling at Stallings. ‘How goes? You all know Alex, yes?’ He paused as his eye fell upon the other woman in the quartet. ‘Well, no, I don’t imagine you do.’ He held out a hand. ‘I’m Bob Skinner.’
‘This is Cheeky Davis, sir,’ Haddock interposed, ‘my girlfriend.’
‘Well done you, Sauce,’ said Skinner as he and the blonde shook hands. ‘You seem to be doing well on all fronts; people have been telling me good things about you lately.’ The DC’s face flushed, partly out of pride that the chief not only knew who he was, but knew his nickname. ‘This lad has potential, Miss Davis,’ he told her.
She smiled. ‘I’d worked that out for myself,’ she replied, confidently.
The chief laughed. ‘. . and don’t you be a patronising old bastard,’ he added.
It was her turn to go pink. ‘I didn’t mean that,’ she blurted out.
‘If you had you’d have been entitled,’ he countered. ‘I’m sorry, I’m still new at this job and I’ve always been lousy at schmoozing. My wife can work a room a lot better than I can. Let me simplify things: what are you lot drinking?’ He signalled to a barman, and ordered, as each one answered, a gin and tonic for Stallings, a Bud for Alex, two pints of IPA for Wilding and Haddock, a Virgin Mary for Cheeky and a bottle of sparkling water for himself. ‘You’re not in the force, Miss Davis,’ he said as he passed her the drink, ‘so what’s your line?’
‘I’m on the road to being a chartered accountant,’ she replied. ‘It takes a few years, but I’m getting there. I’ve got my degree, and now I’m doing on-the-job professional training.’
‘On the job? That’s a bit close to home for us, Cheeky,’ Wilding chuckled, ‘considering the job we’ve been on for the last couple of days.’
‘Ray,’ said Alex slowly, ‘is this something that we really need to know?’
‘You do already, don’t you? I heard you had a visit from our boy here on Wednesday.’
‘And sent him homeward to think again. Your investigation doesn’t reach into my firm. Let’s not talk about it, Ray, seriously. I still get the creeps when I think about that man Gerulaitis and his wife.’
The DS nodded, as the light dimmed, then turned electric blue. ‘I forgot that. Sorry, Alex.’
‘Gerulaitis?’ Cheeky repeated, her voice rising above the sound of the DJ as he cued in his first play, Santana’s ‘Samba Pa Ti’, ‘Tae get youse up close and personal,’ he announced. ‘Is that the man whose house caught fire?’
‘With him in it.’
‘Accidents happen,’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘But enough about our shop. Who’re you training with, Cheeky?’
‘Nobody you’ve ever heard of,’ she told him. ‘A wee firm called. .’
‘I said, what the fuck is this?’ The bellow cut across her reply, and even across Carlos Santana’s towering guitar. Every head in the room turned to stare across the still-empty dance floor, at the table close to the speakers. A tall man stood with his back to the crowd, his shoulders massive in a green rugby top with a yellow-gold collar. He was leaning forward, aggressively, ignoring the woman with short blond hair who was tugging at his elbow. ‘What are you doing here, Spring? What the fuck is this about, you playing footsie with this fucking old lesbo?’
For a few seconds the room was a frozen tableau, until Ray Wilding broke the spell. He took a few steps across the floor, but was soon overtaken by Bob Skinner. ‘Hold off,’ the chief said quietly. ‘This is one for me.’ On the other side of the dance floor, McGurk was standing, but he waved him back down.
He reached Mary Chambers’ table in a few strides, just as her companion rose to her feet, her face so pale that it shone blue under the lights. ‘Are you telling me you’re a fucking pie-muncher too, sis?’ Griff Montell shouted. ‘Wasn’t one in the family enough?’
‘Griff,’ Alice Cowan pleaded. ‘Come on, cool it.’
‘Yes,’ said Skinner, ‘quiet down, now,’ putting a hand on the raging man’s arm. Montell turned and shoved him, two-handed, square in the chest. He staggered backwards, but only for a pace or two, before reacting by snapping a judo lock on the detective constable’s right wrist, then turning him and twisting his arm round, forcing his hand up towards his shoulder blades. ‘March,’ he whispered in the South African’s ear. ‘We’re out of here now, or I’ll put you in hospital. Mary,’ he said to Chambers, ‘you two start the dancing. Get everyone moving, for fuck’s sake.’
Montell had no choice but to obey as Skinner pushed him towards a door behind the DJ’s stand. Alice Cowan saw what was happening, and went to open it ahead of them. It led into a small square area, an anteroom for the toilets, on either side. As Cowan closed the door behind him, Skinner released the restraining hold and, as he did so, pushed the South African, driving him hard and face first into the facing wall. ‘Griff,’ he said, as back in the hall a disco mix of Madonna’s ‘Ray of Light’ replaced the great Mexican guitarist, ‘you need to think very carefully about what you do next. You can leave here with a career, or you can leave here under arrest and probably the worse for wear. I don’t want to hurt you in any way, son, but you’ve only got a few seconds to make what’s going to be a lifetime decision.’ He stood, hands by his side but ready to react, watching as the detective constable turned to face him, thankful as the rage began to leave his eyes, and as the tension left his body.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he said. ‘That was unforgivable. My resignation will be on your desk on Monday.’
‘And it’ll go in the shredder. Now, are you going to tell me why you reacted that way?’
Cowan interrupted. ‘His ex-wife, sir,’ she said. ‘She was AC/DC and he never knew till she left him for another bird.’
He had not realised that she had joined them. ‘Quiet, please, Alice,’ he ordered. ‘Griff needs to talk to me. In fact, give us a few minutes alone. You get back out there and tell Superintendent Chambers that we’re all fine, then stay by the door and stop anyone coming in here until we’re done.’
‘Yes, sir.’
He waited until he heard the door close. ‘So that’s your sister partnering Mary,’ he murmured. Montell nodded. ‘And that’s why you blew up?’ Another nod. ‘You felt she was embarrassing you, in front of your colleagues, was that it?’ As the younger man stared at him, Skinner realised that there was far more to it than that. ‘Are you telling me you didn’t know that your sister was gay?’ he asked, unable to hide his surprise.
‘Are you telling me you did, sir?’ the DC responded.
‘Of course I did; it’s in your vetting report, man. You don’t think I approved your transfer to our CID from South Africa without having you checked out, do you?’
‘No, sir, I assumed that would happen. And they knew about her?’
‘Yes. So let me get this straight; you and Spring share a house, yet you had no idea, no inkling, of her sexual orientation?’
Montell shook his head, then took a breath and blew it out. ‘None at all, sir, honest. We have this deal, the two of us: we never bring partners home.’
‘Whose idea was that?’
‘Now you ask me, it was hers. But I never thought. .’
‘No, you didn’t. Some might say she’s been protecting you from your own prejudice.’ He shook his head. ‘Only you’re not really prejudiced, Griff, are you? I know what you did in South Africa; I know where you worked. I looked at your career in your personnel report, and I didn’t see the faintest sign of a bigot there. OK, you were hurt in a way you found hard to take. Now you’re angry, and you’re bitter. But anger and bitterness can be bad for you, as you’ve just found out.’