‘I’ll nip out and fucking buy one now, shall I?’ John said sarcastically.
‘I know where I can get my hands on one today. Might cost a few quid, but I’ll have a few hours’ kip, borrow a van and sort it out for tonight.’
Before leaving they concealed their handiwork by putting up partially prepainted plasterboards to hide the hole in the café basement wall. They also took out the bricks in large cloth sacks to the yard and covered them with an old tarpaulin, with the intention of dumping them later.
David had had to continually force himself to keep awake and the effort of staying alert had drained him. With a start he heard the walkie-talkie crackle into life and then heard John say it was ‘time to get up’, which meant that work was over for the night. The lift was broken so he started to walk down to the entrance of the car park, using the wheelchair as a support, but his bad leg was so cold and numb he was in agony. He decided to sit in the wheelchair, but even that had been an effort and caused friction burns on his hands as the slopes required him to slow the wheels so much. He did try using the brake but it was already well worn and not much use. He eventually made it to the ground floor where John was waiting in the van.
John told him Danny had made his own way home as he folded the chair and put it into the back of the van.
David got into the passenger seat. ‘Christ, it was cold up there. I was freezing and me leg’s killing me.’
John rammed the van into first gear. ‘At least you were fucking sitting down all night,’ he snapped. He didn’t even mention the problems they had come across. He was so tired, he hardly said another word for the rest of the journey.
Arriving early at work, Jane was anxious about what had happened, and felt she’d let Bradfield and Gibbs down. She wanted to have all the money taken from O’Duncie’s squat counted, recorded and checked against Mr Collins’ list by the time DCI Bradfield arrived. She really hoped that some of the serial numbers would match against the money Julie Ann stole from her father.
Having grabbed herself a coffee she removed her coat, sat down at her desk and opened the drawer where she’d left her half-completed list. With mounting horror she realized it wasn’t there and she frantically searched through every drawer, tray and file in the office but could find no sign of it.
‘Oh my God, what am I going to do?’ she said to herself, panic-stricken. She took some deep breaths to calm herself. Perhaps the A10 officers had searched the office and taken her list for their investigation. Maybe they’d even seized the money as evidence.
Jane ran down the stairs to the property office, only to find it wasn’t open yet. Desperate to know if the money was still in the safe, so she could continue checking it, she went to ask the duty sergeant for his assistance in retrieving and booking it out from the store. To her dismay it was Sergeant Harris who was on a changeover to early shift after his day off. She found him in the cell area checking on the prisoners with a young PC who was handing O’Duncie his breakfast on a cardboard plate, along with a plastic knife and fork. Harris held out a cup of tea in a polystyrene cup.
O’Duncie saw her. ‘Your boss an’ his sidekick shouldn’t a messed with me. My solicitor’s gonna do ’em and get me outta here.’
Sergeant Harris deliberately dropped the tea. It hit the floor and splashed upwards. O’Duncie jumped up, dropping his breakfast of sausage, egg and fried bread. He started to shout abuse but Harris just slammed the cell door shut, pulled the metal wicket up and remarked that O’Duncie was a piece of shit.
Jane forced herself to be polite saying ‘Good morning’ and asking if, when he’d finished what he was doing, he’d be kind enough to open up the property store for her.
‘I heard A10 were crawling all over the station yesterday giving Bradfield and Gibbs a hard time, thanks to that piece of garbage in there.’
‘I don’t know anything about it,’ Jane replied rather unconvincingly as she always felt nervous in Harris’s presence.
‘Yeah right, well, I also heard they were looking for some paperwork of yours that seems to have mysteriously disappeared,’ he said, holding his hands up and making sarcastic inverted-comma signs.
Jane remembered the last entry she’d written was ‘Running total so far cash only £1,687’, which she’d timed and dated, and wondered if Harris had seen it himself. She couldn’t believe he’d be that spiteful, to stoop so low as to dispose of her paperwork just to get her in trouble, but the reality was she had no evidence as to who’d taken it.
‘Sarge, did you make out a property-store receipt for the money?’
‘Of course I did, I even counted it all for you, apart from the bag of coins, that is. There was nearly four grand, or was it nearer three, I can’t quite remember,’ he said with a cynical grin.
‘Where’s the receipt now?’ she asked, wondering if he might actually have used the opportunity to steal some of the money when he counted it.
‘I gave it to you, just before you went off duty. Don’t tell me you’ve lost that as well?’ he said in mock surprise.
Her anger rising, she stood her ground. ‘No you didn’t!’
He pointed to the three stripes on the side of his uniform jacket. ‘A mere probationer’s word against a supervising officer’s? Sounds to me like you really screwed up.’
Jane had had enough of his arrogant attitude. ‘Really, well, A10 are all over this because of you.’
He made out as if he was shaking. ‘Oh I’m really scared, Tennison. I did my job by the book, there’s nothing on me.’
‘You forgot to tell the night-shift sergeant O’Duncie was not allowed to make phone calls. He rang a crooked solicitor and started making outrageous allegations, none of which are true, but it’s got DCI Bradfield in trouble and Gibbs suspended so they are really furious. I’d say that’s two senior officers who are gunning for you. Who do you think they’ll believe about the missing paperwork and receipt, ME or you, Sergeant Harris?’
He glared at her and, lost for something to say, stormed off.
Jane was shaking with nerves but pleased that she’d finally stood her ground against Harris. Her good mood faded, though, when she realized she still didn’t know if the money was currently in the property safe. She went to the canteen and there were a few uniform constables and detectives having their breakfast. Seeing Kath carrying a tray to a table she went over and sat opposite her.
Kath looked round to make sure no one was listening. ‘Oh my God, Jane, it was all shit’s hit the fan here yesterday. O’Duncie made some serious allegations, don’t know exactly what about, but the rubber heelers were here nosing around asking questions. I heard poor Spence is suspended while they investigate the complaint.’
‘He is and I feel partly responsible.’
‘What’s going on, Jane?’
‘I’m in a bit of trouble. I didn’t complete the list of all the banknote serial numbers or check exactly how much money was there. I left it in my desk drawer and now it’s gone.’
‘What? You left the money in a drawer and now it’s been effing nicked!’ Kath exclaimed in a whispered voice.
‘No. Sergeant Harris put the money in the property-store safe. The list was in the drawer but...’ She hesitated.
‘Go on, but what?’
‘I’ve no proof, but I think Harris took the list and kept the property receipt to get me in trouble.’
‘God, that man’s a prick. Don’t get your knickers in a twist — just get the money out and I’ll help you to count and check it all again.’
‘I intended to but Harris won’t open the store for me and it’s closed at the moment,’ Jane said, adding that it was possible A10 had seized the money, but she wasn’t sure.