Lynda La Plante: Tennison

‘I dunno, Jane, it always happens to you, don’t it?’

‘I thought she was going to faint, so I ended up taking her home to Ashburn House on-’

Kath raised her eyebrows and interjected. ‘The Pembridge Estate, another of Hackney’s delightful areas.’

‘Actually her flat was surprisingly well furnished and the kitchen had some really new appliances. She must’ve got the stuff from the Green Shield Stamps catalogue.’

Kath looked bemused. ‘What sort of stuff?’

‘A front-load washer, tumbler-drier, dishwasher, cooker-’

Kath laughed at Jane’s naivety. ‘The stamps are a rip-off. It would take years, not to mention spending a fortune, to get the thousands and thousands of stamps needed to buy that lot. More than likely the stuff was nicked off the back of a lorry, or taken from a warehouse break-in and then sold around the estate. You’d be surprised how many villains live on estates like the Pembridge. What was her name?’

‘Irene Bentley – although she asked me to call her Renee – and her son was called John. He was an aggressive sod, not even so much as a thank-you for helping his mum. He didn’t want me in the flat so frogmarched me out.’

‘Villains can smell the Old Bill a mile off. You need to be careful, Jane. Never go on the rough estates without backup.’

‘It was a lesson learned, Kath. Anyway, what’s this about a dead body? Sergeant Harris mentioned something.’

Kath said that she didn’t know too much, but handed Jane a copy of the teleprinter message sent to the Yard.

‘Poor thing was-’ Kath began before breaking off to answer the phone.

Jane sat down behind the desk and started to read the message. The body was found early morning on the recently built Hackney Marshes Adventure Playground, close to the Kingsmead Estate. The victim was an unknown white girl with blonde hair, believed to be fifteen to eighteen years old, wearing hot pants, a white blouse and blue platform boots.

Kath finished dealing with the phone call. ‘You read it? Poor kid, just awful, so young.’

‘It doesn’t say how she died,’ Jane noticed.

‘They’re waiting for the post-mortem, but I heard it was pretty obvious… the bastard used the girl’s own bra to strangle her to death.’

‘How horrible.’

‘From the way she was dressed, and the junkie tracks on her arms, they think she was on the game and may have been turning a trick at the playground. They’re setting up the crime squad office as the incident room for the murder.’

The door to the comms room opened and Sergeant Harris stuck his head in. ‘DCI Bradfield wants to see me in his office about the murder and he’d like a cup of tea, Tennison, milk and two sugars with some digestive biscuits. Same for me as well, and when you’ve done that take over from me on the duty desk and cover the front counter as well.’ He left, banging the door shut behind him.

‘Pleasant bugger, isn’t he?’ Kath said, giving Jane a smile.

‘Key to getting on his good side is to keep your head down and “Yes, Sarge, no, Sarge, three bags of grovel, Sarge.”’

The canteen was closed so Jane went to the small kitchen annexe instead. As usual it had been left in a mess and she was revolted by the state of it. Above the sink there was a water-splashed, hand-written notice taped to the wall: ‘Leave it as you’d expect to find it… TIDY & CLEAN!’ She shook her head in disgust. The sink was full of old tea bags, dirty mugs, cutlery, and plates caked with crusted HP and tomato sauce. She put the kettle on the gas cooker, rolled up her sleeves, picked out the used tea bags, tipped out the greasy cold water from the plastic bowl and filled it with hot water and washing up liquid. As she washed the dirty dishes a male officer walked in, dropped three dirty mugs and plates in the sink, said, ‘Thanks, love,’ and walked out. Jane sighed, finished the washing up, dried the dishes and then stacked them on the open shelves.

Jane carried the two mugs of tea and the biscuits on a tray to the DCI’s office and, balancing it on one knee, she tapped the door which immediately swung open, almost causing her to drop the tray. Cigarette smoke billowed from the room and the stench was repulsive.

‘About bloody time, I thought you’d gone AWOL again.’ Sergeant Harris grabbed the tray from her. ‘Take these Polaroid photos of the murder scene back to the incident room next door and give them to Sally the indexer.’

Outside the DCI’s office Jane had a quick look at the six small pictures Harris had given her. She hadn’t yet been to a murder scene. She had attended a non-suspicious death of an eighty-year-old man with angina. He’d been found dead in his bed from a heart attack, but that was nothing compared with this. The pictures of the young female victim shocked her, particularly the close-up shot of the heroin-needle marks on the girl’s arms. Worse was the close-up of the victim’s face, with the bra wrapped round her neck. Her bulging eyes were dotted with red spots and her swollen tongue protruded from her mouth. Blood trickled down from where she must have bitten it whilst being strangled.

Jane felt queasy as she walked into the incident room, only to find it empty. She assumed that the detectives must be down at Hackney Marshes or out making enquiries near the scene. The medium-sized room looked cramped with eight old wooden desks and chairs taking up most of the floor space. There were two telephones and a large carousel on top of one of the desks, with a pile of indexing cards next to it. On the wall a map of Hackney Police Division was dotted with different-coloured pins denoting where robberies, burglaries, assaults and other incidents had taken place in the last few months. Next to the map was a large sheet of white paper with a description of the victim, the location, date and time of the discovery of the body, and the name of the lab sergeant dealing with the forensics. A note pinned to the wall stated that the postmortem would be at Hackney Mortuary.

Worried about leaving the Polaroids on the desk, Jane decided to take them downstairs to the front office and return them to the incident room later when Sally was there.

Sitting down at the duty desk she put the photographs face down. She noticed that one of the red lights on the phone console linked to the comms room was flashing and another was white, which meant Kath Morgan must be using that line.

‘Don’t stare at it, woman… answer it.’

Jane jumped and snatched up the phone. She hadn’t seen Sergeant Harris approach from the side. ‘Hackney Police Station, can I help you? Just one moment, please. I will need to take some details. Can you state your name?’

Aware Harris was watching over her shoulder she took a pen from her shirt pocket and drew the message pad towards her, writing down the caller’s name. At the same time she checked her watch to note exactly what time the call came in.

Jane listened as Harris breathed heavily beside her. She then placed her hand over the mouthpiece explaining that it was a Mrs Hardy reporting that her purse had been snatched outside a pub.

‘She sounds drunk,’ Jane said.

‘Give it here,’ Harris said, grabbing the phone.

He leaned his elbows on the desk. ‘Mrs Hardy, this is the duty sergeant. You will need to come to the station so WPC Tennison can take a full crime report. Good day,’ he said bluntly, and flicked the call button off. ‘There, job done. Let’s see if she can be as bothered when she’s sober.’

Then Harris saw the crime scene pictures. ‘What are these doing here? I told you to take them to the incident room.’

‘I’m sorry, Sergeant, but there was no one there and I didn’t want to leave-’

‘I’ll bloody do it myself.’