James Craig - Buckingham Palace Blues

Carlyle swallowed. He felt the chocolate from the second Jaffa Cake melting on to his fingers. ‘It’s a girl’s phone number,’ he replied as casually as he could manage, resisting the urge to make a grab for the card itself. He knew that his only way out of this situation was a careful blend of insouciance and full disclosure. ‘She’s a Ukrainian prostitute. I met her yesterday.’ He took a nibble from Jaffa Cake number two. ‘On business.’

‘Yours? Or hers?’

‘Mine, obviously.’

Somewhat reluctantly, she handed him back the card and he slipped it into the pocket of his jeans. He waited patiently as Helen sipped her green tea and made a show of looking her husband up and down. She had never tried to set any rules when it came to his job, but she had always been secretly relieved that he had managed to steer clear of working in Vice. There were plenty of other things he could do on the Force where there was much less in the way of temptation. This latest case was making her uneasy, but she knew that she had to try to keep things light. He was a policeman, after all. He had always been a policeman, even before they had met. There were limits to how far she could circumscribe his career. ‘Do many working girls give you their phone number, Inspector?’

‘Only when they’re on the game,’ he deadpanned, confident — well, reasonably confident — that she was taking things in the right spirit.

Helen looked at the card again. ‘Why did Olga hand it over to you?’

‘I dunno,’ Carlyle shrugged, careful not to mention precisely how it had been handed over. ‘Maybe she can tell us something about the missing kid. God knows, we need a break.’

‘There’s something else.’ Helen abruptly changed the subject.

‘Oh?’ Carlyle’s heart sank. He didn’t need ‘something else’ at the moment.

‘Yes,’ she said, cradling her mug of green tea while gazing out the window. ‘They’ve had more problems at Alice’s school.’

‘That’s not really a surprise.’

All schools had their dramas, but Carlyle had to admit that his daughter’s school — City School for Girls in the Barbican — really did seem to push the boat out in that respect. He thought back to the time when the police had been phoned after two of the pupils had called in a bomb warning. Happily there was no actual bomb, but a subsequent police sweep of the classrooms had turned up no less than eight bags containing dope of one sort or another. The headmaster had implemented a very public crackdown. More than a dozen girls had been expelled, and all the parents had received a letter informing them that anyone found in possession of cannabis or any other drugs would face a similar fate. With cannabis being reclassified from a Class C to Class B drug, the headmaster added that ‘any student found to be in possession of cannabis will be arrested and taken to a police station where they can receive a reprimand, final warning, or charge depending on the seriousness of the offence’.

Helen had forbidden Carlyle from writing back and pointing out to the headmaster that no police station in the city would welcome the receipt of his errant charges, and that he should maybe look to try and put his own house in order by himself. On reflection, he realised that Helen was right: this was not the kind of issue to pick a fight over. Anyway, if Alice ever got involved in drugs while at school, the headmaster would be the least of her worries.

‘What’s happened now?’ he asked wearily.

‘Another two girls have been expelled.’

Carlyle shrugged. That was hardly hold-the-front-page news.

‘One of them,’ Helen continued, ‘was in Alice’s class.’

‘Shit.’ Carlyle frowned. ‘She’s what — not even a teenager.’

‘I know.’ Helen stepped away from the window and stood beside him, resting against the workbench. ‘I spoke to one of the other mothers today, and she says that they think that girls as young as eight could be involved.’

‘Bollocks.’

‘I don’t know, John.’

Carlyle stuck an arm round his wife’s shoulder. ‘Come on. .’

‘I know, it seems ridiculous. But everyone’s getting a bit paranoid about it.’

Carlyle grinned. ‘Maybe some of the parents have been smoking too much skunk themselves.’

She gave him a gentle punch in the ribs. ‘That’s not funny.’

‘Sorry.’ He stood up straight and folded his arms, as if to show that he was taking it seriously. ‘Have you spoken to Alice about it?’

‘We had a chat.’ Helen reached over and placed her mug in the sink. ‘She didn’t tell me much, but at least we had a bit of a conversation. She didn’t storm off in a huff — which makes a change these days.’

‘So what did she say?’

‘According to Alice, everyone in the class knows about it. The girl who’s been expelled isn’t one of her friends, and had been hanging out with some older kids. She says no one else in her class has tried anything.’

‘So far.’

‘Anyway, Alice says she’s really not that interested.’

‘I can easily believe that.’ Carlyle leaned over and kissed the top of his wife’s head. ‘She’s basically a sensible kid — gets it from her dad.’

Helen didn’t smile. ‘I know, but. .’

‘Shall I talk to her?’

She gave his arm a grateful squeeze. ‘When it comes up, and only when she’s happy to have the conversation. Don’t just jump in there and force her to clam up.’

Me? Carlyle thought. When did you become the expert in communicating with our little tweenager? He felt a familiar bubble of frustration in his stomach, and waited for it to pass. ‘Okay.’

She was obviously alert to the dark look clouding his face. ‘Promise?’

‘I promise.’

Halfway down Wilfred Street, a two-minute walk from Buckingham Palace, Alexa Matthews propped herself up against the wall in the alley next to the Drunken Friar and lit the last cigarette from the packet of twenty Lambert amp; Butler Silver that she’d bought from the machine inside the pub barely three hours earlier. Inside, she could hear the bell being rung for last orders. Alexa groaned and took a greedy suck on her ciggie. A ‘quick drink’ after work with a few colleagues coming off shift had turned into a proper session. After five or six pints of Stella, and a couple of vodka chasers, Alexa had to admit that she was well and truly bladdered. The two pork pies she had scoffed half an hour earlier hadn’t been such a good idea, either.

In her jacket pocket, she could feel her mobile buzzing. Alexa didn’t have to look at it to know who it was. Heather, her girlfriend — who had been expecting her home four hours earlier — was well pissed off. Reaching into her pocket, Alexa read the latest abusive text.

Where are u u stupid cow?

‘Fuck off!’ Alexa slurred to herself. Given the turn of events, she wondered if it would be worth going home at all. Would it be better to grovel tonight? Or in the morning? If needs be, she could kip in one of the empty stables back at the Palace — it wouldn’t be the first time. Taking a long drag on her fag, she tried to think herself sober.

‘Hey, Alexa!’

‘Shit!’ Cursing under her breath, Matthews looked up to see three men, all wearing jeans and bomber jackets, coming out of the side door of the pub and walking towards her. The group was led by the avuncular figure of Tommy Dolan, a sergeant in SO14. Dolan had been drinking with them for an hour or so. The other two she didn’t recognise. She didn’t even remember them being in the pub earlier in the evening.

‘Not going to puke, are you?’ Dolan stopped five feet short of Matthews, ready to dodge any flying vomit.