Michael Robotham - The Night Ferry

A tired voice answers. “Yes, sir.”

“Some idiot just did a U-turn in Victoria Street. Did you see it?”

“Yes, sir, we’re onto him.”

The Chief Superintendent is talking while still peering through the telescope. “I can get his number plate.”

“It’s under control, sir.”

“Good work. Over and out.”

Reluctantly, he turns away from the telescope and sits down. “There are some dangerous bloody morons loose on our roads, Detective Constable Barba.”

“Yes, sir.”

“In my experience, the morons are more dangerous than the criminals.”

“There are more of them, sir.”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

He dips his head into a drawer and retrieves a dark green folder. Shuffling through the contents, he clears his throat and smiles, attempting to appear warmer and fuzzier. A nagging doubt hooks me in the chest.

“The results of your medical have been reviewed, DC Barba, along with your psychological evaluation. I must say you have made a remarkable recovery from your injuries. Your request to return to active duty with the Diplomatic Protection Group has also been noted. Courageous is the word that comes to mind.” He tugs at his cuffs. Here it comes. “But under the circumstances, having reviewed the matter thoroughly, it has been decided to transfer you out of the DPG. You might be a little gun-shy, you see, which is hardly a good thing when protecting diplomats and foreign heads of state. Could be embarrassing.”

“I’m not gun-shy, sir. Nobody fired a gun at me.”

He raises his hand to stop me. “Be that as it may, we have a responsibility to look after our foreign guests and while I have every confidence in you, there is no way of testing your fitness when push comes to shove and Abdul the terrorist takes a potshot at the Israeli ambassador.” He taps the folder several times with his finger to stress the point.

“The most important part of my job is shuffling people and priorities. It is a thankless task but I don’t ask for medals or commendations. I am simply a humble servant of the public.” His chest swells. “We don’t want to lose you, DC Barba. We need more women like you in the Met, which is why I am pleased to offer you a position as a recruitment officer. We need to encourage more young women into the Met, particularly from minority communities. You can be a role model.”

A mist seems to cloud my vision. He stands now, moving back to the window where he bends to peer through his telescope again.

“Unbelievable! Moron!” he screams, shaking his head.

He turns back to me, settling his haunch on the corner of the desk. A print behind his head is a famous depiction of the Bow Street Runners, London’s renowned early police force.

“Great things are expected of you, DC Barba.”

“With all due respect, sir, I am not gun-shy. I am fitter than ever. I can run a mile in four and a half minutes. I’m a better shot than anyone at the DPG. My high-speed defensive driving skills are excellent. I am the same officer as before—”

“Yes, yes, you’re very capable I’m sure, but the decision has been made. It’s out of my hands. You’ll report to the Police Recruitment Center at Hendon on Monday morning.”

He opens his office door and waits for me to leave. “You’re still a very important member of the team, Alisha. We’re glad to have you back.”

Words have dried up. I know I should argue with him or slam my fist on his desk and demand a review. Instead, I meekly walk out the door. It closes behind me.

Outside, I wander along Victoria Street. I wonder if the Chief Superintendent is watching me. I’m tempted to look up toward his window and flip him the bird. Isn’t that what the Americans call it?

Of course, I don’t. I’m too polite, you see. That’s my problem. I don’t intimidate. I don’t bully. I don’t talk in sporting clichés or slap backs or have a wobbly bit between my legs. Unfortunately, it’s not as though I have outstanding feminine wiles to fall back on such as a killer cleavage or a backside like J-Lo. The only qualities I bring to the table are my gender and ethnic credibility. The Metropolitan Police want nothing else from me.

I am twenty-nine years old and I still think I’m capable of something remarkable in my life. I am different, unique, beyond compare. I don’t have Cate’s luminous beauty or infinite sadness, or her musical laugh or the ability to make all men feel like warriors. I have wisdom, determination and steel.

At sixteen I wanted to win Olympic gold. Now I want to make a difference. Maybe falling in love will be my remarkable deed. I will explore the heart of another human being. Surely that is challenge enough. Cate always thought so.

When I need to think I run. When I need to forget I run. It can clear my thoughts completely or focus them like a magnifying glass that dwarfs the world outside the lens. When I run the way I know I can, it all happens in the air, the pure air, floating above the ground, levitating the way great runners imagine themselves in their dreams.

The doctors said I might never walk again. I confounded predictions. I like that idea. I don’t like doing things that are predictable. I don’t want to do what people expect.

I began with baby steps. Crawl before you can walk, Simon my physiotherapist said. Walk before you can run. He and I conducted an ongoing skirmish. He cajoled me and I cursed him. He twisted my body and I threatened to break his arm. He said I was a crybaby and I called him a bully.

“Rise up on your toes.”

“I’m trying.”

“Hold on to my arm. Close your eyes. Can you feel the stretch in your calf?”

“I can feel it in my eyeballs.”

After months in traction and more time in a wheelchair, I had trouble telling where my legs stopped and the ground began. I bumped into walls and stumbled on pavements. Every set of stairs was another Everest. My living room was an obstacle course.

I gave myself little challenges, forcing myself out on the street every morning. Five minutes became ten minutes, became twenty minutes. After every operation it was the same. I pushed myself through winter and spring and a long hot summer when the air was clogged with exhaust fumes and heat rose from every brick and slab.

I have explored every corner of the East End, which is like a huge, deafening factory with a million moving parts. I have lived in other places in London and never even made eye contact with neighbors. Now I have Mr. Mordecai next door, who mows my postage-stamp-size lawn, and Mrs. Goldie across the road picks up my dry cleaning.

There is a jangling, squabbling urgency to life in the East End. Everyone is on the make—haggling, complaining, gesticulating and slapping their foreheads. These are the “people of the abyss” according to Jack London. That was a century ago. Much has changed. The rest remains the same.

For nearly an hour I keep running, following the Thames past Westminster, Vauxhall and the old Battersea Power Station. I recognize where I am—the back streets of Fulham. My old boss lives near here, in Rainville Road: Detective Inspector Vincent Ruiz, retired. We talk on the phone every day or so. He asks me the same two questions: are you okay, and do you need anything. My answers are always: yes, I’m okay; and no, I don’t need anything.

Even from a distance I recognize him. He is sitting in a folding chair by the river, with a fishing rod in one hand and a book on his lap.

“What are you doing, sir?”

“I’m fishing.”

“You can’t really expect to catch anything.”

“No.”

“So why bother?”

He sighs and puts on his ah-grasshopper-you-have-much-to-learn voice.

“Fishing isn’t always about catching fish, Alisha. It isn’t even about the expectation of catching fish. It is about endurance, patience and most importantly”—he raises a can of draft—“it is about drinking beer.”