Stephen Leather: Tango One

Fullerton had decided that if his uniform had been declared surplus to requirements, he might as well go into battle dressed stylishly. Plus it had been another way of annoying the tight-lipped driver the suit probably cost as much as the man earned in a month.

Fullerton took a deep breath and headed towards the glass doors. He had just raised his right hand to push his way through when a blurry figure on the other side beat him to it and pulled the door open.

Fullerton flinched and almost took a step back, but he recovered quickly when he saw that the man holding the door open was wearing the uniform and peaked cap of a senior officer of the Metropolitan Police.

"Didn't mean to startle you, Fullerton," said the man.

"I wasn't startled, sir," said Fullerton, recognising the man from his frequent television appearances. Assistant Commissioner Peter Latham.

The articulate face of British policing university educated, quick witted and about the only senior police officer able to hold his own against the aggressive interrogators of Newsnight. Latham was the officer most likely to be wheeled out to defend the policies and actions of the Metropolitan Police, while the Commissioner stayed in his spacious wood-panelled office on the eighth floor of New Scotland Yard, drinking Earl Grey tea from a delicate porcelain cup and planning his retirement, only two years and a knighthood away.

"This way," said Latham, letting the door swing back. Fullerton caught it and followed the Assistant Commissioner through a lobby area and down a white-walled corridor bare of any decoration to a teak veneer door where four screw holes marked where a plaque had once been.

Latham pushed the door open. The office was about the size of a badminton court, with floor-to-ceiling windows at one end. Like the corridor outside, the walls were completely bare, except for a large clock with big roman numerals and a red second hand. There were brighter patches of clean paint where paintings or pictures had once hung, and screw holes where things had been removed. The only furnishings were a cheap pine desk and two plastic chairs. Latham sat down on one of the chairs so that his back was to the window. There were no blinds or curtains, and through the glass Fullerton could see hundreds of office workers slaving away like worker ants in the tower opposite.

Latham took off his peaked cap and placed it carefully on the table in front of him. His hair seemed unnaturally black, though the grey areas around his temples suggested he wasn't dyeing it. He motioned for Fullerton to sit down. Fullerton did so, adjusting the creases of his trousers.

"You know who I am, Fullerton?" said the Assistant Commissioner.

Fullerton nodded.

"Sir," he said.

"No need for introductions, then," said the senior police officer. He tapped the fingers of his right hand on the desktop.

The fingernails were immaculately groomed, Fullerton noticed, the nails neatly clipped, the cuticles trimmed back.

"Tell me why you wanted to join the force, Fullerton."

Fullerton's brow creased into a frown. His application to join the Metropolitan Police had been accepted after more than twenty hours of interviews, a battery of psychological and physical tests, and a thorough background check. He'd been asked his reasons for wanting to join more than a dozen times and he doubted that Latham expected to hear anything new or original. So why ask the question, unless he was being set up for something? Fullerton's initial reaction was to go on the offensive, to ask the Assistant Commissioner why he was being asked the question at such a late stage and by such a senior officer, but he knew that there'd be nothing to be gained. He forced himself to smile.

"It's the career I've always wanted, sir," he said.

"A chance to do something for the community. To help. To make a difference."

Latham studied Fullerton with unsmiling brown eyes, his face giving nothing away. Fullerton found the face impossible to read. He widened his smile a little and sat back in his chair, trying to look as relaxed as possible.

"I'm not totally altruistic, obviously," said Fullerton, lifting his hands and showing his palms, doing everything he could to show the body language of someone who was open and honest, with nothing to hide.

"I don't want an office job, I don't want to sell people life insurance they don't want or spend my life with a phone stuck to my ear. I want to be out and about, dealing with people, solving problems."

Still no reaction from Latham. No understanding nods, no smiles of acceptance. Just a blank stare that seemed to look right through Fullerton.

"Frankly, sir, I'm not sure what else I can say. Everyone knows what a police officer does. And it's a job that I want to do."

Fullerton smiled and nodded, but there was no reciprocal gesture from Latham. His neatly manicured fingers continued to drum softly on the desktop.

"How did you feel when you weren't accepted on to the accelerated promotion scheme?"

"A little disappointed, but I figured that if I joined as an ordinary entrant, my talents would soon be realised. It might take me a year or so longer to reach the top, but I'll still get there." Fullerton deliberately tried to sound as optimistic as possible, but he was already beginning to accept that something had gone wrong and that Latham had no intention of allowing him to join the Metropolitan Police. Why the clandestine meeting, though, why hadn't they just written to him with the bad news? None of this was making any sense at all, and until it did, Fullerton had no choice but to go along for the ride.

"Those talents being?"

Fullerton was starting to tire of Latham's game-playing. He leaned forward and looked Latham in the eyes, meeting his cold stare and not flinching from it.

"The talents that were recognised by the interview board, for one," he said.

"The talents that got me in the top five per cent of my university year. At Oxford." He used the name like a lance, prodding it at Latham, knowing that the Assistant Commissioner had only managed a second-class degree from Leeds.

For the first time Latham allowed a smile to flicker across his face.

He stopped tapping his fingers and gently smoothed the peak of his cap.

"What about your other talents?" said Latham quietly, his voice hardly more than a whisper.

"Lying? Cheating? Blackmail?"

The three words hit Fullerton like short, sharp punches to his solar plexus. He sat back in his chair, stunned.

"What?" he gasped.

Latham stared at Fullerton for several seconds before he spoke again.

"Did you think we wouldn't find out about your drug use, Fullerton? Do you think we're stupid? Was that your intention, to join the Met and show us all how much smarter you are? To rub our noses in our own stupidity?"

Fullerton put his hands on his knees, forcing himself to keep them from clenching.

"I don't know what it is you think that I've done, sir, but I can assure you…" He tailed off, lost for words.

"You can assure me of what?" asked Latham.

"Someone has been lying to you, sir."

"Oh, I'm quite sure of that, Fullerton," said Latham.

"Whatever they've told you, it's lies. Someone is trying to set me up."

"Why would anyone do that?" asked Latham.

Fullerton shook his head. His mind whirled. What the hell had happened? What did Latham know? And what did he want?

"Are you denying that you are a regular user of cocaine?" asked Latham.

"Emphatically," said Fullerton.

"And that you smoke cannabis?"

"I don't even smoke cigarettes, sir. Look, I gave a urine sample as part of the medical, didn't I? Presumably that was tested for drugs use."

"Indeed it was."

"And?"

"And the sample you gave was as pure as the driven snow."