Reginald Hill - Born Guilty

‘Oh shoot!’ said Joe.

Then he was off running, he had no idea where. He just hoped that the sound of his approach might scare any attacker off. Ahead loomed a clump of trees, blacker lines against the blackness. He swerved to skirt them, then one of the black lines moved and hit him so hard in the stomach he collapsed on the grass retching.

A moment later he was dragged to his feet by his collar and a torch beam shone in his face.

‘Gotcha!’ said a voice. ‘Hey, don’t I know you?’

There was something familiar about the voice … an accent … and in the light spilling back from his own face to his captor’s he made out just enough to trigger his memory.

‘You’re Forton’s mate,’ he croaked. ‘Sandy … last night … St Monkey’s … Joe Sixsmith …’

‘That’s right. Deano warned me about you but he didn’t say you were into this!’

‘Into what?’ gasped Joe. ‘I’ve just been up to the hospital … one of the nurses …’

He made the mistake of gesturing with his arm in the direction of the hospital. There was a dull thud as Little Perce shot out of his sleeve and hit the ground.

‘And what’s this? A prescription?’ demanded the constable, scooping it up. ‘Sixsmith, you’re nicked!’

In The Lost Traveller’s Guide, a page and a half of Luton’s ten-page entry is deservedly set aside for the Central Police Station. Designed by the same hand that conjured up St Monkey’s, it is as much a monument to secular law as the church is to divine. No citizen can pass by that imposing façade without feeling the safer for it. No criminal can pass beneath that blue-lamped portico without feeling the sorrier for it.

Lutonians are proud of their police station, but it must be admitted it wouldn’t have survived the bulldozing sixties if some foresighted councillor hadn’t got it registered as a listed building. From time to time plans are still put forward to build a glass and concrete blockhouse on a few acres of green belt and turn the old building into a heritage centre or DIY supermarket or something. But the City Fathers, aware that cold, draughty and damp conditions produce a certain desirable cast of mind in crooks and cops alike, wisely refuse to be moved.

Joe Sixsmith, as a good citizen, approved their wisdom. Seated in a barred-windowed, cracked-panelled, flaking-painted, musty-smelling interview room which not even the presence of a piece of hi-tech recording equipment could drag out of the Middle Ages, he felt ready to confess to anything.

What PC Sandy Mackay wanted him to confess to was being the Infirmary flasher. Joe was the young man’s first significant collar and he was reluctant to let him go without a result. In this he was actively encouraged by Detective Sergeant Chivers who, though less deeply persuaded of Joe’s guilt in this particular instance, had a somewhat démodé belief that all things evened themselves out before the Great Chief Constable in the sky, and low lifes like Joe got away with so much that sending them down for anything was a kind of wild justice.

An hour’s hard questioning had reduced even Chivers’s hoped for options.

‘Whatever happens, we’ll do you for carrying an offensive weapon,’ he assured Joe.

‘Defensive,’ said Joe.

‘Offensive,’ said Chivers grimly. ‘That’s what I reckon you are, Sixsmith. And that’s what I reckon anything to do with you is.’

The door opened. Willie Woodbine’s head appeared. He said, ‘Sergeant, a word.’

Chivers noted the suspension of the interview and the time on the tape and switched it off. Then he followed Woodbine out into the corridor.

The door which looked like it had been used as an interrogation aid in the unreconstructed past didn’t fit properly and eased back open an inch. This was enough to permit Joe and PC Sandy to overhear what was being said.

‘What the chuff’s going on in there?’ demanded Woodbine.

Chivers explained, or tried to.

Woodbine interrupted, ‘This nurse who was flashed at tonight, the one who screamed, you’ve talked to her, I presume?’

‘Yes, of course …’

‘And did she say it was a black man or a white man who did the flashing?’

‘Well, it was pretty gloomy …’

‘Come on, Sergeant, she’s a nurse. First thing they learn is to tell the difference between a black dick and a white dick. Which did she say it was?’

‘White, she thought, but …’

‘And this nurse Sixsmith claims he was escorting to the wards, she confirms his story?’

‘Yes, but she’s his fancy woman, isn’t she? Say anything to get him off the hook …’

‘That’s right. And do anything too, you’d say? Well, I’ll tell you what she’s done, Sergeant. She’s rung that bitch Butcher, and that bitch Butcher’s rung me and demanded to know if we’re holding her client Joseph Sixsmith, and has he been arrested, and on what charge? And she says this isn’t the first time her client has been harassed by my officers and this time she’s going to see he sues the arse off us. And she’s on her way now, Sergeant, and what am I going to tell her?’

‘Well, there’s always the offensive weapon, sir …’

‘Offensive weapon? That’s Joe Sixsmith you’ve got in there. You may not like the man, and maybe you ought to ask yourself why you don’t like him, but please reassure me, you’re not so far gone you don’t know he’s not violent! Offensive weapon? If you gave him a sub-machine gun, he’d probably try to get Radio 2 on it! No, you want violence, you ought to listen to that bitch Butcher! Get out of my way!’

The door swung fully open. Joe and Sandy who’d been sitting looking at each other expressionlessly turned their heads to see Woodbine smiling down at them.

‘Joe, how’ve you been? It’s good of you to help us out like this again. Sorry we had to put you in here while I was on my way, but I don’t leave Chivers the key to the executive washroom, you with me? Come on upstairs now. Sergeant, rustle us up some coffee, will you? And I daresay I can find a drop of the Caledonian Cream to keep the cold out.’

Two minutes later Joe found himself in a deep armchair in Woodbine’s office. Here the oak panelling shone with a deep sheen, the broad windows were covered with rich brocaded curtains, and the paintwork was as smooth and perfect as a model’s make-up.

‘Now, take me through it again,’ said Woodbine, putting on an expression of fascinated interest.

‘Er, through what, exactly?’ said Joe.

‘Through your very brave attempt to apprehend this weirdo who’s been terrorizing those poor nurses,’ said Woodbine.

So Joe took him through it again. When he reached the point of his arrest, the superintendent sucked in his breath and said, ‘Silly lad. But he’s young, Joe. And Scottish. You’ve got to make allowances. I’ll see he apologizes. Some more Scotch? No? So how’s life treating you, Joe? Anything I can help with, you’ve only got to ask.’

Well, you could tell me about your wife’s sex life, thought Joe. No, perhaps not. His eye ran over Woodbine’s untidy desk. There was a file open on it, and some photographs.

Joe said, ‘That boy in the box at St Monkey’s. Anything on him yet?’

‘What’s your interest?’ said Woodbine sharply.

‘Well, I found him, didn’t I?’ said Joe defensively.

The smile which had vanished from Woodbine’s face returned and he said, ‘So you did. Can’t stop running into trouble, can you, Joe?’

‘Thought I wasn’t in trouble,’ said Joe.

‘Of course you’re not. As for the boy, can’t tell you anything, sorry. Not my department really, not unless it turned out to be murder, which I doubt.’