James Craig - Buckingham Palace Blues

Leaning against the doorframe, the woman folded her arms. ‘Which one d’ya mean? I’ve got five of them here at the moment.’

‘The one that Hilary brought here earlier. The Ukrainian girl.’

‘Ukrainian, is she?’ The woman sniffed. ‘Why am I not surprised? We get all sorts here.’

‘Look,’ Carlyle snapped, ‘I don’t need the social commentary. I just want to see the girl.’

Shocked, the woman took a step backwards, as if getting ready to slam the door in his face. He quickly jumped up a couple of steps and put his foot in the door.

The woman eyed the rabbit in Carlyle’s hand then stared at him suspiciously. ‘Who did you say you were again?’

With a sigh, Carlyle took out his warrant card a second time and thrust it in her face. ‘Carlyle,’ he said slowly. ‘I work out of the Charing Cross police station. Maybe I should ask you for your ID.’

‘Okay, okay.’ The woman moved back out of the way. ‘Keep yer hair on.’

‘Now,’ Carlyle hissed through gritted teeth, ‘can I see the girl?’

The woman edged back further. ‘She’s not here either.’

‘What?’

‘Your colleague took her about an hour ago. Not long after Ms Green left.’

Carlyle frowned. ‘What colleague?’

‘The other policeman.’ The woman still gripped the handle of the door tightly. ‘He was far more polite than you.’ She looked Carlyle up and down. ‘Far better dressed too. Much more of a gentleman.’

‘For fuck’s sake!’

‘He didn’t swear either.’

‘Fuck!’ Carlyle hurled the rabbit at the woman, who ducked out of the way.

‘Hey!’ she cried. ‘I’ll report you for that. Wait ’til I tell Ms Green what you did.’

Carlyle stepped inside, slamming the door against the wall. Ignoring some whispering at the top of the stairs, he demanded of the cowering woman: ‘This ‘‘colleague’’ — what did he say his name was?’

She made a hissing noise, but said nothing.

Carlyle had to resist the almost overwhelming temptation to give her a kick. ‘Did he show you a badge?’

Arms wrapped around herself, the woman nodded.

‘What did it say?’

‘I don’t know,’ she whimpered. ‘It was like yours.’

‘What did he look like?’

‘I dunno.’ The woman gingerly lifted a hand to her face and wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. ‘Like I said, he was smarter dressed than you.’ She began edging away from Carlyle. ‘Taller. Blond hair. Younger.’

‘English?’

‘What?’

‘Was he English or was he a foreigner?’

‘Oh, he was English. He had a very polite accent.’

‘Posh?’

The woman nodded. ‘Very posh.’

‘Where did he say he was going?’

The woman thought about it. ‘He said he had to take the girl back to the police station for some more questions.’

‘Which station?’

‘He didn’t say.’

‘And you just let him go?’

‘He was a policeman,’ the woman whined.

‘How many posh policemen do you know?’ Carlyle snarled. ‘And what about the girl?’ he asked. ‘How did she react? Was she happy to see him? Did she go willingly?’

The woman said shamefacedly, ‘I didn’t see her. I was in the back making a cup of tea. They’d gone before I returned.’

‘Jesus fucking Christ!’ Carlyle sat himself down on the bottom stair with a thud and the woman scuttled into the rear of the house. If she’s going to try and raise someone from Social Services, good luck to her, he thought. Breathing deeply, he waited for the anger inside him to subside so that he could start to think.

‘Mister?’

Carlyle looked round to see a girl, maybe the same age as Alzbetha, standing at the top of the stairs. ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Sally.’

‘Nice to meet you, Sally,’ he said, giving her a limp wave. ‘I’m John. I’m a policeman.’

‘I know. I heard you tell that woman.’ Cautiously, she came down towards him. ‘Can I have those pens?’

Carlyle looked at the packet in his hand and passed it over. Picking up the rabbit from the hall floor, he tossed her that as well.

‘Thanks.’ The girl held her new presents tightly to her chest and retreated slowly up to the top of the stairs. ‘I saw the man take that girl.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘She didn’t want to go. She tried to hit him, but he stuck her under his arm and carried her down.’

‘This man,’ Carlyle said gently, ‘what did he look like?’

The girl looked him straight in the eye. ‘He looked like a prince.’

‘I see.’

‘Yes.’ Sally turned and disappeared. Moments later, she came back with a colouring book. Carlyle recognised it as one of the books he had bought for Alzbetha the night before. She pointed to the cover, where a prince and a princess were dancing in front of a castle. ‘He looked like him.’

‘Intervals’ in the Queen’s official programme allowed opportunities for the State Rooms of the Palace to be opened up to the public. With more than four million people taking the tour, it was a nice little earner for one of the richest families in the world. Helen had taken Alice there the year before and had come back moaning about the cost and the petty officiousness that had seen the child’s bottled water taken away from her on ‘security grounds’.

Today there was still more than an hour to go before opening time, and the queue of tourists patiently waiting outside Buckingham Palace Mews numbered only a dozen or so. Walking quickly past them, Carlyle headed for a small side entrance twenty yards further along Buckingham Gate. As he approached, the door opened and a small man in a green cap and uniform ushered him inside. Nodding to him, Carlyle carried on down a passageway and round a corner. Five yards further on, he showed his ID to another guard sitting in a small Perspex booth. Next to the booth stood a metal detector. Behind that was a floor-to-ceiling turnstile, of the kind you usually saw at football grounds.

‘Who are you here to see?’ The man in the booth said it into a small microphone, his voice tinny and distorted by feedback.

‘Charlie Adam.’ Carlyle glanced at the CCTV camera above his head and waited as the guard consulted a list of names printed on a sheet of paper. ‘He’s expecting me.’

After some searching and a bit of head-scratching, the man finally located the right name. ‘Carlyle, yes.’ He picked up a phone.

‘Don’t worry,’ Carlyle smiled. ‘I know where I’m going.’

The man shrugged. ‘Protocol.’

‘Fair enough.’ Be cool, Carlyle told himself. You don’t want to get thrown out of here again.

Someone answered at the other end of the line. ‘I’ve got Mr Carlyle here,’ the guard announced. ‘Yes, Inspector Carlyle. Okay, I will.’ He put the phone down carefully, as if he was scared that it might break, and nodded to Carlyle. ‘You can go in.’

‘Thanks.’

After emptying his pockets, Carlyle stepped through the metal detector which, happily, did not go off. After first recovering his keys and his change, he was clicked through the turnstile by the guard. On the other side, the passageway continued for a few yards before he proceeded through another door, emerging into a cobbled courtyard about half the size of a football pitch. The smell of fresh horse manure told him that the stables were still where he remembered them. Glancing to his left, he could see a couple of horses happily munching on some hay. To his right was the Royal Mews, and on the far side of the courtyard was a collection of offices used by members of the Royal Household and other Palace workers. Dodging several large piles of horse shit, he set off across the courtyard, heading for a flight of stairs in the far left corner.