‘Thanks, mister,’ he said. Then he turned on his heel and flew the helicopter, complete with sound effects, back along the corridor and in through a set of double doors.
Stratton stood up, smiling as he watched George go.
Vicky had watched him throughout and when he looked at her she realised that she was staring at him and looked away. ‘You completed the form?’ she asked.
‘It’s on your desk.’
She nodded. ‘What happens now is I submit it to administration and then Mister Myers will decide if you can see Josh.’
Stratton put his hands in his pockets and looked at the floor in disappointment, biting his lip. ‘Okay,’ he said.
‘However,’ she said, lowering her voice. ‘I’m going to break the rules and let you see him now.’
Stratton looked up at her.
‘A reward for fixing George’s helicopter. I’m a soft touch, Mister Stratton, but don’t push it.’
‘I won’t.’
‘Follow me,’ she said, leading off down the corridor past Dorothy behind her desk. The receptionist gave him a wink.
Stratton followed Vicky to the double doors which she pushed open. They went inside.
At least two dozen young children were spread around the large room. Some were seated around a staff member who was reading a book to them while others were drawing or just playing with the numerous toys that covered the floor. Every wall was plastered with some kind of childish drawing or painting.
Stratton spotted Josh immediately. The boy was sitting by himself across the room, his head down. He looked dejected.
‘He’s been like that since he got here,’ Vicky said. ‘It’s too early to try and get him involved in any activi ties. We don’t leave him alone for too long at a time – he’s had a very traumatic experience. He’ll visit a child therapist this afternoon who’ll decide how best to care for him.’
Stratton left her, walked across the room to the boy and crouched down beside him. ‘Josh?’
Josh looked up, sprang to his feet and dived into Stratton’s arms. In one of his hands was the little carved camel.
Vicky was touched by the reunion and watched as Josh kept an iron grip on Stratton, nuzzling into his godfather’s neck.
A nurse stepped into the room behind Vicky and saw Stratton with Josh. ‘That his father? Poor kid.’
‘Let him stay as long as he wants,’ Vicky said. ‘If Myers asks about him send him to me.’
Vicky left the room.
An hour later Stratton appeared in her office doorway. ‘Thanks,’ he said.
She looked up at him and smiled.
‘What now?’ Stratton asked.
Vicky’s smile faded. ‘There are several scenarios,’ she said, sounding as if some of them were not going to be welcome to Stratton. ‘I should warn you that these things can take time. Because of the number of children we get rolling into these centres we like to get them placed outside as soon as possible.’
‘You talking about a foster home?’
‘That’s the general routine here. It may take a while to get you cleared as a legal guardian. They’re going to have to check your records back in England, make sure you are who you say you are, and that you have no criminal record. I don’t know how long the bureaucratic snail takes in the UK but if it’s anything like ours … I’m being straight with you because I don’t want you to get your hopes up. I can only promise you that I will expedite my side of things but I don’t have much to do with the administrative process. Josh has grandparents,’ said Vicky, glancing at his form.
‘I talked to them this morning. They’re getting on a bit. The old girl would find the trip hard. I told them I’d take care of things. They trust me. When can I see Josh again?’
‘I get the feeling I can trust you too. Can I?’
‘Yes.’
‘We’ll work something out … Do you have a number I can call?’
Stratton took out his phone, hit a key and placed it in front of her. She scribbled the number down on a pad.
‘That a UK number?’
‘Yes.’
‘Maybe you should check in with me. Our budget doesn’t stretch to international calls.’ She handed him a card. ‘Call me tomorrow.’
Stratton nodded. ‘Thanks.’
Vicky was suddenly filled with sympathy for him. He was in a strange town, knowing no one and uncertain how long he was going to have to go through all this. A little boy he clearly loved was in terrible emotional pain and Stratton was unable to help the child as soon as he’d like. But her heart was already pretty much filled with the woes of so many other children: she warned herself that there was little room there for a grown-up who could look after himself.
Stratton walked away. A second later Vicky heard the front door close. She looked through a gap in the window blinds and watched as he walked out through the gate and away down the street. Then she sat back for a moment, dismissed him from her thoughts, and got back to her pile of work.
8
Twenty minutes after Stratton arrived at the Santa Monica Police Department, Sergeant Draper elected to grace him with his presence. The policeman was wearing the same suit as he had the day before.
‘How’s it going?’ Draper asked, his tone uncaring.
‘Fine,’ Stratton replied, remaining polite despite his annoyance with the man. On the drive over he had considered calling his boss back in Poole to see what could be done at that end to move things along. But he doubted that such a move would be effective at this early stage. The British Consulate in LA would be worth a visit and he could probably engineer a useful introduction there by using his contacts in military intelligence. That would be his next move, he decided, as soon as he had gathered a little more information to provide a baseline of knowledge to work from.
‘You shoulda called me, like I said, before you came down here. You’d’ve saved yourself a trip. I don’t have any more to tell you than I did yesterday.’
‘You don’t have a single thread of information?’ Stratton asked, unable to hide completely the contempt that he was beginning to feel for the man.
‘Like I said, it was gang-bangers. They ain’t exactly gonna hand themselves over. We have people who work the streets but it’s gonna take time for word to get back to us. We may eventually get a name we can start on, a witness if we’re lucky. People in that neighbour-hood are always wanting to make deals with us for one thing or another.’
‘That’s it? That’s how you work?’
‘That’s how it works, pal,’ Draper said, not liking Stratton’s tone.
Stratton couldn’t guess at the number of unsolved crimes in LA but he imagined it must be high. ‘Can you tell me where it happened, at least?’
‘Venice. In back of Gold’s Gym. That area is getting cleaned up, big money moving to the beach, but there’s still a lot of lowlifes there. Hey, twenty years ago even we wouldn’t go in there at night. Sorry, pal. Check in before you come down, okay? Save us both a hassle.’
Draper’s mobile phone rang.
‘What about Sally’s body?’ Stratton asked.
‘See the desk officer and he’ll give you the paperwork,’ Draper said as he checked the screen of his phone. ‘I gotta take this,’ he said, raising it to his ear and walking away.
Half an hour later, having lined up to see the desk officer, Stratton stepped onto the street outside the police department, folding several sheets of a form into his pocket. He looked at a map of the city that he had bought the night before. Venice was less than a mile from the Police Department and he decided to walk.
He took Main Street south. It paralleled the beach a couple of blocks east of it and was lined with restaurants, bars and various clothes, art and antique shops. A window cleaner washing a shopfront gave Stratton directions to Gold’s Gym. It was tucked into the backstreets a couple of blocks past the last of the shops and after finding it he headed around the back into a more decayed residential part of the city. The multicultural atmosphere of Main Street gave way to a predominantly black and Hispanic one: graffiti was everywhere and each house and apartment block, new and old, had some kind of visible security, usually heavy-duty bars over windows and entranceways.