‘I don’t have time for this,’ she said curtly. ‘I’m on call. We need to talk to Detective Superintendent Jones or DI Beale as a matter of urgency –’ her eyes narrowed – ‘and you know perfectly well who I am. The WPC on reception gave you my name over the phone.’
The man looked at her with the same half-amused expression that had been on the faces of the people in A&E. ‘I still need your details, Ms Jackson.’
‘It’s Dr Jackson and Lieutenant Acland,’ she told him. ‘The Bell, Gainsborough Road. I guarantee the superintendent will not object to being woken if you inform him that we have Kevin Atkins’s mobile. It was on a homeless lad who’s been taken to St Thomas’s. Walter Tutting’s in the same hospital.’
He filled in their names and address. ‘Telephone number?’
‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ she snapped, losing her patience. ‘Just call the superintendent.’
‘When I’ve satisfied myself that it’s necessary.’
‘Then try DI Beale.’
‘Same answer.’
Jackson eyed him for a moment. ‘What time does the superintendent usually come in in the morning?’
The man shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t know. It depends on his shifts.’
‘Where can I leave a message for him?’
‘With me.’
She leaned forward. ‘Then put this: “Can’t get past the arrogant dickhead on night duty who has a problem with dykes. Urgent you contact Jackson ASAP at the Bell re gay murders. She has evidence linking a homeless man to Kevin Atkins.” Add the time and tell your boss we’ve taken the evidence with us because we don’t trust you to look after it properly.’ She handed the rucksack to Acland and stood up.
‘I’m merely following standard procedure, Dr Jackson,’ said the constable. ‘If I phoned the superintendent every time someone claimed to have important evidence, he’d be dead of exhaustion by now. Do I take it you’re terminating this interview because you no longer wish to report a crime?’
‘No. I’m terminating it because I haven’t the time to play up to your image of yourself. You can add that at the bottom of the message.’
‘What about you, sir?’ he asked Acland. ‘Have you anything to add?’
‘Only that, in your shoes, I’d consult with someone else before Dr Jackson and I leave.’ He paused. ‘I was signed off by a custody sergeant called Laver or Lavery. If he’s still on duty, you might do yourself a favour by talking to him.’
*
‘You should have let Jones eat him for breakfast,’ said Jackson after the door closed behind the constable. ‘Why so helpful suddenly? What’s a middle-aged Gruppenfu¨hrer to you?’ Acland shrugged. ‘He’s out of his depth. It’s obviously a big deal to wake the boss in the middle of the night.’ ‘He’s a small-minded bully with a power complex.’ ‘You’re not much better. You only took him on because he was an easy target. I didn’t notice you lamming into any of the patients in A&E for sneering at you.’ She leaned against the wall and crossed her arms. ‘It’s bad business practice to attack customers. Policemen are in a different category altogether. They have professional standards to uphold, which don’t include treating members of the public like a subspecies.’ Acland allowed a silence to develop. He still couldn’t decide what he thought about this woman. There was so much about her that repelled him – the forcefulness of her character, her outspokenness, her need to dominate every situation – and little to earn his sympathy other than admiration for her as a doctor and a nagging resentment at the negative reactions she seemed to attract from strangers. He looked up to find her staring at him.
‘What?’ he asked.
‘Is it me you have a problem with or women in general?’
Acland gave another shrug. ‘You enjoy intimidating people. Maybe the guy did know your name . . . and maybe he is a small-minded bigot . . . but he wasn’t going to think any better of you for being called an “arrogant dickhead”.’
Jackson refrained from pointing out that this wasn’t an answer to her question. Instead, she said, ‘Why should it matter what he thinks of me?’
‘It doesn’t.’
‘He’d have cocked his leg even higher if I’d been wearing a skirt and make-up,’ she responded lightly. ‘Most people take me for a bloke in drag...or a male transsexual going through gender reassignment. I receive fewer sniggers dressed like this –’ she uncrossed her arms and gestured towards her masculine attire – ‘than if I wear women’s clothes. A butch dyke in trousers and workman’s boots is less alarming than a muscular transvestite weightlifter in pastel pink.’
Briefly, humour creased the undamaged side of Acland’s face. ‘You wouldn’t wear pink in a million years. Not threatening enough. I bet you get a real buzz from seeing people move out of your way.’
Jackson watched him for a moment. ‘Is that what the scars and the pirate-patch do for you? Who moves aside faster? Men or women?’
He didn’t answer.
‘You want to be careful how you exploit that, Lieutenant. Some men get a taste for seeing fear in women’s eyes.’
*
The speed of events moved up a pace as soon as the superintendent arrived. He ignored the detective constable’s explanations about how he couldn’t guarantee the mobile was Kevin Atkins’s because he hadn’t been allowed to see it and addressed his remarks to Jackson and Acland. ‘Where is it?’
‘Here.’ Jackson flipped the locks on her medical case and handed him the envelope. ‘The battery was dead but I used a Cellboost to fire it up because I thought it belonged to a homeless kid who’s in a diabetic coma in St Thomas’s. I was looking for next-of-kin details. It’s still switched on.’
Jones slipped the gadget on to the table. ‘Where did you find it?’
‘In this.’ She lifted the rucksack to show him. ‘It belongs to the boy – we think his name’s Ben Russell – although we haven’t been able to confirm that yet.’ She watched Jones touch the end of a pencil to one of the buttons to light up the LCD. ‘I went into ICE, which gave me Belinda Atkins, and then into Atkins. The number recorded under Kevin is the number of that phone. I recognized the name.’
‘His daughter’s name’s Belinda.’ Jones used the pencil to scroll down the screen. ‘Geoff and Tom are the sons, and Sarah’s his ex-wife . . . still recorded under Atkins. It’s definitely his.’ He looked up with a frown. ‘How did you unlock it? Or do we have Lieutenant Acland to thank for that?’
Jackson shook her head. ‘It was me.’ She described how she did it. ‘I’m not so au fait with other makes of phone, otherwise I might have had an attempt at the other one as well.’
‘Which other one?’
She nodded to the rucksack. ‘In here. Also a BlackBerry and some iPods.’
‘Quite a haul.’ He glanced from her to Acland. ‘Where does the lieutenant fit in?’
‘He’s staying with me.’
‘Meaning what? That you returned to the Bell to pick him up before you came here?’
Acland stirred when Jackson hesitated. ‘She came looking for me,’ he said. ‘I was with the boy and another man when she found me. We were sleeping rough in an alleyway. The kid went into a coma and Dr Jackson had him admitted to St Thomas’s when she realized how serious it was.’
Jones nodded. ‘Inspector Beale phoned to say you’d gone in the opposite direction. How well do you know this boy?’
‘I don’t know him at all,’ said Acland.
The superintendent gave a sceptical smile. ‘You expect me to believe that? You come into contact with two complete strangers in under twenty-four hours . . . Walter Tutting and this kid . . . both apparently connected with the same murder inquiry . . . and you claim you didn’t know either of them previously. That kind of coincidence doesn’t happen, Charles.’
‘Obviously it does or it wouldn’t have just happened to me.’