Val McDermid - Crack Down

Polly looked interested. I winced. I knew what was coming. ‘You’re a private investigator?’ Polly asked.

‘No,’ Alexis butted in, unable to resist her joke of the month. ‘She’s Politically Incorrect!’ She hooted in mirth. In anyone else, it would wind me up to some tune, but Alexis’s humour is so innocently juvenile she somehow manages to be endearing, not infuriating.

This time, I managed to dredge up a smile. ‘Actually, I am a private investigator. And I’d be fascinated to have a chat with you some time about what you do.’

‘Ditto,’ said Polly. Unusually for a psychologist, she had some people skills, for she took the barely indicated hint. ‘But it’ll have to be another time. I’ve got to dash. Perhaps the three of us could do lunch some time soon?’

We all made the appropriate farewell and let’s-get-together-soon noises, and a few minutes later, Polly was just a memory. Alexis had ordered more coffee somewhere during the goodbyes, and I sat staring at the froth on mine as she lit a cigarette and settled into her seat. ‘So, Sherlock,’ she said. ‘What’s the problem?’

I reckoned I was about to ask her something that would test our friendship to the limits. But then, the last time she’d asked me a major favour, it had nearly got me killed, so I figured I didn’t need to beat myself up about it too much. I took a deep breath and said, ‘I need to talk to you about something important. It’s personal, it’s big and it’s got to be off the record. Can you live with that?’

‘We’re friends, aren’t we?’

‘Yeah, and one good turn deserves the lion’s share of the duvet.’

‘Go on, girl, spill it,’ Alexis said. She opened a shoulder bag only marginally smaller than mine and ostentatiously pressed the button that switched off her microcassette recorder. ‘Your secret is safe with me.’

‘Why d’you suppose that line terrifies me?’ I said, in a weak attempt at our usual friendly banter.

Alexis ran a hand through her wild black hair. Coupled with her pale skin and the dark smudges under her eyes, I sometimes think she looks worryingly like one of Dracula’s victims in the Francis Ford Coppola version. Luckily, her linguistic vigour usually dispels such ethereal notions pretty damn quick. ‘Shit, KB, if that’s the best you can do, there’s clearly something serious going down here,’ she said. ‘C’mon, girl, spit it out.’

‘Richard’s been arrested,’ I said. ‘He was technically driving a stolen car that not-so-technically had two kilos of crack in the boot.’

Alexis just stared at me. She even ignored her burning cigarette. The woman who had heard it all could be shaken after all. ‘You’re at the wind-up,’ she finally said.

I shook my head. ‘I wish I was.’ I gave her the full story. It didn’t take long. Throughout, she kept shaking her head in disbelief, smoking so intensely it seemed to be all that was keeping her in one piece. When I’d brought her up to speed, she carried on smoking, head weaving like a Wimbledon spectator.

‘It could only happen to Richard,’ she finally said in tones of wonder. ‘How does he do it? The poor sod!’ Alexis and Richard play this game of cordially disliking each other. I’m not supposed to know it’s a game; things must be bad if Alexis was letting me see she actually cared about the guy. ‘I take it you want me to dig around, see what the goss is out on the streets?’

‘I don’t want you to take any chances,’ I said, meaning it. ‘You know as well as I do that most of the drug warlords in this city would blow you away at the slightest provocation. Don’t tread on anybody’s toes, please. I don’t want you on my conscience as well as Richard. What I’m after is more practical.’ I broke the news about Davy’s imminent arrival.

‘Sure, we’ll help out. I like Davy. He’s good fun. Besides, it gives me and Chris a great excuse to bunk off a weekend’s labouring and have a giggle instead.’ Alexis and her architect girlfriend Chris are members of a self-build scheme, which means they spend most of their spare daylight hours pushing wheelbarrows full of cement along precarious wooden planks. A dozen of them bought a piece of land, and Chris designed the houses in exchange for other people’s skills in exotic areas like plumbing, wiring, bricklaying and roofing. It’s my idea of hell, but they love it, though not so much that they’re not glad of an excuse to give it the body swerve from time to time. I knew taking care of Davy fitted the bill perfectly; it had a high enough Goody Two Shoes element to assuage any guilt at skiving off the building site.

Hearing Alexis confirm my hopes almost brought a genuine smile to my lips. ‘So can you be at the house tonight about eight?’

Alexis frowned. ‘Not tonight I can’t. I’m having dinner with a contact.’

‘No chance you can rearrange it?’

‘Sorry. The guy’s only in town for a few days.’ She stubbed out her cigarette and washed the taste away with a swig of coffee. She must have felt the need to justify herself, for when I didn’t respond, she carried on, ‘I was at college with him, and we stayed in touch. He’s one of your high-flyers, a whiz-kid with the Customs and Excise, if that’s not a contradiction in terms. Anyway, he’s in Manchester for a briefing session with the Vice Squad. Apparently, there’s been a new range of kiddie porn mags and vids hitting the market, real hard-core stuff, and they think the source is somewhere in the North West. Can you believe it, girl? We’re actually exporting this shit to Amsterdam and Denmark, that’s how heavy it is. So my mate Barney’s up here to tell the blue boys what they should be looking for, and I’ve pitched him into letting me buy him dinner. Sorry, Kate, but I’ve already promised the editor a splash and a feature launching a campaign for Monday’s paper.’

I shrugged. ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll get someone else lined up for tonight, and you can weigh in when you’re clear.’

‘Don’t do that. Chris’ll see you right tonight, I’m sure she will. All she’s got planned is a night in front of the soaps and a bottle of Muscadet in the bath. You got the talking brick with you?’ Alexis held out her hand, and I passed her my mobile phone. I couldn’t help thinking I’d be less than thrilled if Richard had offered me up for a night’s baby-sitting when I’d got my heart set on a night in with Coronation Street and a Body Shop selection box.

‘All right, darling?’ Alexis began the conversation. ‘Listen, Kate needs your body tonight…Girl, you should be so lucky. No, it’s a bit of a crisis, you know? I’ll fill you in later. She needs somebody she can trust to mind Davy round at Richard’s…Eight, she said, is that OK?…Darlin’, you’ll get your reward in heaven. See you at home about six. Love you too.’ Alexis pressed the ‘end’ button with a flourish. ‘Sorted. I’ll give her my keys for your house so she can let herself in.’ She folded the phone closed and handed it back to me.

‘I appreciate it,’ I said. I meant it too. I hoped I wasn’t going to run out of favours and friends before I managed to get Richard out of jail. ‘One more thing — when you’re chatting up your porn expert, can you ask him if there’s any suggestion of a tie-in with drugs?’

‘Why do you ask?’ Alexis demanded, her brown eyes suddenly alert.

I groaned. ‘It’s not a story, trust me. It’s just that there’s an outside chance one of the people involved in this business of Richard’s might be into paedophilia.’

‘What makes you think that?’ she asked, suspicious that she might be missing out on something that would plaster her by-line across the front pages of the Chronicle .