Stuart Pawson - Last Reminder

Outside, I rang the Gazette. The girl on the front desk told me that the photographer was at the accident on the by-pass, but she’d see what they could do. I collected the Sainsbury’s carrier bag and wandered back to the water’s edge.

The tyre tracks led me through the flower beds, tiptoeing in the mud and trying to avoid the worst of the wet leaves that soon soaked my trouser legs. I found a plastic bag with evidence of solvent in it and a couple of butane canisters that might have been there for quite a while. Slowly, I worked my way towards the little jetty where the boats are moored.

The boats are intended for children only, and looked just like the ones that were there when I was a kid. I’ve never seen any similar ones anywhere else. They have paddles, operated by a hand-crank, and large white numbers painted on the side. To protect them from vandals a chain laced them all together, and the whole jetty was fenced off with iron railings that arced down into the water. I dropped the carrier and stared at the railings, hypnotised by the scene. I edged forwards, drawn by disbelief and horror.

Pulled over the tops of the iron spikes, like those socks that golfers use on their clubs, were the necks and heads of the four swans.

The office was unusually full when I arrived. Detective Constable David Sparkington, known as Sparky to cops and crooks alike, except when he’s in earshot, looked up from the keyboard he was tapping with all the confidence of a novice bomb disposal expert.

‘Morning, boss,’ he said. ‘Sleep in?’

‘No, I’ve been on a wild goose chase.’ It was the first time I’d been late in twenty-odd years, and everybody knew about it. ‘Heavy night,’ I explained.

‘Somebody lie on your shirt flap?’

‘Sadly, no. Home-made booze. Sloe gin, to be precise. God knows what they’d put in it, but it was good stuff.’

‘They put sloes in it. Otherwise it’s solid gin.’

‘It didn’t taste anything like gin.’

‘It doesn’t, but it is.’

‘That could explain it.’

Nigel Newley, my bright young detective sergeant, was doing his impression of a koi carp, opening and closing his mouth as he tried to interrupt us. ‘Thanks for going to the morning assembly, Nigel,’ I told him. ‘Give me twenty minutes to do a quick report and we’ll have a chat, unless there’s anything spoiling?’

‘OK, boss. There’s nothing that won’t wait.’

My little world is a partitioned-off corner of the main CID office. I hung my jacket behind the door and typed up the details of the Heckley Park massacre, in rhyming couplets to give it more impact. On the way in I’d left the beer can and other goodies with the scenes of crime boffins. When I’d finished I wandered out into the main office, looking for a cup of something hot and sweet and an update on the morning’s proceedings.

Sparky looked at his watch. ‘Might as well have one in the canteen in ten minutes, when they do the judging,’ he replied when I suggested putting the kettle on.

‘Judging? What judging?’ I asked, puzzled.

‘The silly tie contest. Don’t pretend you’d forgotten.’

The silly tie contest was the latest in a series of fund-raising exercises for the local hospital. ‘Aw, Carruthers!’ I thumped my palm with my fist. ‘Completely slipped my mind. What time does it start?’

‘Now.’

Nigel caught my attention with a wave. He placed his hand over the mouthpiece of the telephone he was holding and hissed, ‘Are you in, Mr Priest?’

I looked down, recognised what I modestly call my body, and nodded to him.

‘It’s the editor of the Heckley Gazette. Says somebody has killed the swans in the park, and that you know all about it.’

I reached over his desk and took the phone. ‘Hiya, Scoop. It’s Charlie Priest. Did you get a photographer there before the dustbin men took the bodies?’

‘We certainly did. Now all I want is a nice juicy quote from you.’

‘Right,’ I said. ‘Is your pencil poised?’

‘Yep.’

‘Have you licked it?’

‘Get on with it!’

‘OK, put this. Detective Inspector Priest, that’s spelt P-R-I-E-S-T, of Heckley CID, says, “If I catch the sadistic bastards who did this I’ll personally hang them by their knackers from the town hall clock.” Knackers starts with a K. Did you get all that?’

Nigel’s mouth dropped open, revealing a set of lower teeth whose gleaming symmetry could have graced a wall chart. Sometimes I hate him.

The editor, who I went to school with, thanked me. ‘Put it on the slate,’ I replied, handing the phone back to Nigel.

The troops were beginning to drift towards the door, on their way to the silly tie contest, so I stood there, reviewing them as they passed by. ‘Good morning, my brave young crime busters,’ I enthused, rubbing my hands together. ‘Nice to see you have all entered into the spirit of things, or are you just sloppy eaters?’

The canteen was crowded. I queued for a toasted currant teacake and mug of tea and joined two uniformed sergeants at their table. ‘Excuse me, is this chair vacant?’ I asked, in my best attempt at a Liverpudlian accent.

‘No, it’s just a bit absent-minded,’ one of them responded in a much better one, piling a couple of plates on top of each other to make some room.

I told them about the Heckley Park massacre and they agreed to round up a few glue-sniffers and take their dabs. A prosecution was unlikely, but we like to keep the pressure on them.

‘Can I have your attention, please!’ Gareth Adey, my uniformed counterpart, was standing up and using the canteen’s primitive PA system to bring the room to some semblance of order. After lots of mumblings and another request for silence he said, ‘Thank you. This won’t take long because some of you…’ He repeated himself for effect. ‘Some of you have work to do.’ It was a veiled dig at CID and an overt threat to his own men to get their butts out of there as soon as this was over. ‘As you know, we are here to announce the winner of the CID silly tie contest. This proved to be very difficult, as the depths of silliness being plumbed were extreme even for our beloved CID. So, without further ado, I announce the winner is…’ He pulled an envelope from his pocket and pretended to read the contents. ‘…the one-and-only Detective Constable Jeffrey Caton.’

Inspector Adey made an expansive gesture towards Jeff, and loud jeering erupted. Jeff strolled to the front of the room and took the microphone from Adey. When it was quiet again he said, ‘This is the proudest moment of my life. I’d like to thank the following people from the bottom of my heart: first of all, Mrs Brenda Prawn, who for many years worked the electronic testing machine at the Durex factory. If Brenda hadn’t had an off-day in June 1966, and let a faulty batch through, I might not have been here today. I’d also like to thank the midwife for having…’

‘Right, Jeff,’ Adey interrupted. ‘I think we get the message.’

‘Oh, OK.’ Jeff handed the mike back and whispered something in Adey’s ear.

Adey told us, ‘Jeff has kindly donated the first prize of ten pounds back to the hospital fund.’

Cheering and clapping all round, but we weren’t finished yet. Adey blew in the mike and asked for silence. ‘In the runner’s-up position,’ he said, ‘after a very tight contest, was our very own, wait for it, Detective Inspector Charlie Priest!’

The room burst into applause.

‘But I…’ I started, then shut up.

‘But you what?’ one of the sergeants asked, clapping and grinning like a seal in a salmon farm.

‘But never mind,’ I said, jumping to my feet. ‘I’ll take the money,’ I shouted, above the commotion.