Power on Her Own (6 page)

‘Come on, sit down. Head between your knees. You look as if you could do with a drink.' Not as much as Kate herself could do with a drink. She'd meant to turn down even sherry – no true Baptist would be surprised to find a tee-totaller in their midst. But she'd have killed for a drink. As it was, she hunted for the kettle. ‘Stay there. Tea or coffee?'

‘Gin,' Maz said. ‘It's in the fridge. Unless you're –?'

‘Gin sounds great. But mostly tonic: I'm driving.' And I'm halfway down the road to being a lush. She turned to the children, so no one could see how much she wanted that drink.

‘But you must stay to lunch. Apple pie if I can find enough apples without blood. What did you cut yourself on, Jenny? I said no knives.'

‘I was trying to take the core out.' Jenny held up an old-fashioned potato peeler.

‘Ah! What you have to do is pull the blade off here, turn it round and use this round end. Pour that gin, Kate, there's a dear. See, that's how you do it.'

Kate busied herself with the fridge, finding ice cubes and a tired lemon. ‘Tonic?' she prompted.

‘Cupboard under the stairs. On your right, as you go in. Mind how you fall over the empties. Haven't been to the bottle bank for a few weeks.'

That was quite obvious. Clearly these Baptists weren't total abstainers, nor did Maz seem to feel guilty about drinking. At last she managed to unearth a couple of new bottles of tonic, so she rescued one and carried it back in triumph to the kitchen.

‘Now you see how I keep the place tidy. Shove everything into cupboards and slam the doors tight. Only problem comes when you open the doors and there's this avalanche,' Maz said, rolling out pastry she'd conjured from somewhere. She'd found another apron, this one with teddy bears all over it. ‘Cheers.' She grabbed the glass with a floury hand and drank extravagantly. ‘Hell, you're not supposed to be here! Thank God gin doesn't smell too much on the breath. Sherry's OK. It's genteel, you see. Off you go: second on the right. Here, swig that down and put some orange juice in your glass. What the eye doesn't see …'

‘Right! Over the top!'

‘Good luck. But I said lunch and I meant it. See you in a bit.'

The room must have been light, airy and welcoming, but someone had arranged dining chairs around the edge of the room, punctuated by stools or easy chairs. It had the air of a dentist's waiting room. Silence snapped into place as soon as Kate entered. She had a choice between a stool and a big leather wing chair, old enough to be an heirloom. She made brazenly for the wing chair.

Before she could sit, Mrs Walter coughed. ‘That's Mr Pugh's chair.'

There was no sign of him. Kate looked at the door – had he gone to the lavatory?

Elford shifted in his seat with embarrassment.

‘I'll remember for next time,' Kate said at last, sitting down.

Mrs Walters' mouth shrank. Robin would have said it looked like a hen's backside.

The silence became embarrassing.

Elford coughed and smiled: ‘We were just agreeing how well it went this morning, weren't we? Mrs Pritchett was saying how the choir appreciated a good lead.'

Kate and Mrs Pritchett smiled at each other. They both knew Mr Elford was lying: so for that matter did everyone else in the room. What Mrs Pritchett's smile said was that the organ had forced the choir out of its habitual funereal pace. The congregation had had to struggle to keep up.

Mrs Walters and Mrs Pritchett rose to their feet like a double act. No time for Elford to introduce anyone else. Two tall, well-dressed men – middle-aged father and son – came sharply to heel. Walters or Pritchetts? And once they were moving, the two or three others had to abandon ship too. A sweet-faced old woman smiled and said something, but her Birmingham – no, not Birmingham – accent was so strong Kate couldn't understand. Two elderly men, one as straight as the other was bowed, shook her briefly by the hand. Lastly, a strong-shouldered young man grinned and said, ‘Paul Taylor.'

That gin seemed a long time ago.

She followed them all out into the hall, wondering how to tell Elford that she wasn't leaving with the others without offending them. In the event – so promptly she might have been listening for the right moment – Maz appeared.

‘Kate, could you have just one more look at your patient? And Paul, if you go off without seeing the kids, there'll be hell to pay.' She smiled equally at the others. ‘Sorry I couldn't join you earlier. There was a bit of domestic crisis. Lots of blood. Kate saved yet another visit to casualty. I think we should take up residence there, don't you? Tim last week, Lynn the week before that.'

Probably before they knew it, the others were smiled outside.

Paul turned to Kate: ‘What's been going on?'

‘Just an incident with an vegetable peeler. Nothing major.'

‘Major enough,' Maz said, coming back into the hall and dithering. ‘Rain any moment. Won't be too many at the evening service, I should think. And my poor Giles has prepared a knock-out sermon.'

‘He can always recycle it,' Paul said. ‘How major? They're my flesh and blood, Maz!'

‘Let's just say that there's still the same amount of flesh but rather less blood, in Jenny at least,' Kate said.

‘What –?' He frowned, apparently more stressed than Maz had been.

Maz laughed. ‘Kate flew in like Superwoman. Giles, come and kiss Jenny better. And – both of you – remember that a bandage is a fashion item.'

Giles' shirt was spattered with rain. ‘Why do people always find it necessary to talk when they get outside?'

‘Because they've got coats on. Come on, all of you. The table's laid, the soup's bubbling and I'm afraid the lamb will dry out.'

Kate discovered over the soup – carrot, but with something extra – that Paul was Maz's brother. They were a striking looking pair, though neither had the classic good looks of Giles. The children were seraphic-looking: Kate hoped they wouldn't behave like little Lord Fauntleroys. Lynn was the oldest: she'd just taken her eleven plus.

‘I'd no idea such an exam still existed!'

‘It's alive and kicking in Birmingham, all right. All the bright kids are creamed off so what they call comprehensives are really –'

‘OK, Paul. It's my day for sermons, not yours,' Giles said. ‘Any more meat anyone? No? Does this mean we shall have one of your cold lamb curries, love?'

‘Are you a teacher, Paul?' Kate asked. She liked people with passions.

‘I'm in FE. Further education. So we see the effect on the kids of this so-called comprehensive education. It's no more comprehensive than – OK, Giles. What about you, Kate? How do you earn a crust?'

How would his expression change when she told him about her job? Sometimes she would pussy-foot: ‘I work for the police.' Or she could aim to shock: ‘I'm a detective.' But whatever she said, a glimmer of fear? suspicion? challenge, even? flashed momentarily in the questioner's eyes. This time she went for the middle ground: ‘I'm in the CID. Based in the city centre.' And she could have sworn she saw fear in Paul's eyes. Just for an instant. Less. Within a second they were interested, amused, even. And she knew he'd come out with the line about not expecting to see good-looking women like her in uniform.

He did.

‘I'm not in uniform. Plain clothes.' As she was sure he knew. ‘Come on,' she laughed, ‘you must have seen
The Bill
often enough.'

Maz, laughing with her, shook her head. ‘To be honest, Kate, I doubt if he ever watches TV. He's doing something every night of the week.'

Giles nodded. ‘He's a bastion of the Boys' Brigade apart from anything else.'

‘Boys' Brigade? You're a bit grown up for that, surely.' He'd deserved that after his silly quip.

‘People often find themselves making a lifetime commitment,' Giles said gently. ‘You join when you're a kid for the uniform. It gives you somewhere to go and people to meet when you're in your teens. Many people want to repay what others have done for them.'

‘I was unclubbable,' Kate said.

‘It's odd you've joined the Fuzz then,' Paul said. ‘I'd have thought that thrived on comradeship. Or is it throve? All mates together.'

‘True. But we don't have to work for badges! And I thought I was too musical in those days – a bit too snobby for the Girls' Brigade Band. Maybe I'd have enjoyed it.'

‘Funny,' Maz said. ‘I hated it too. But Paul lived for it. Even stayed in when he was at university. And Tim won't join, but Jenny can't wait till she's eight and old enough, can you, love?'

‘Boring kids' stuff,' Tim muttered. ‘Can we get down, now, Mummy? I want to do some more work on my train set.'

‘If you'll say grace first.' Giles folded his hands, and lowered his eyes.

Tim stood. ‘Thank you, God, for the really bad food and Mummy's wicked cooking. Amen.'

So why had she told Maz she was driving? She'd walked, hadn't she? Why hadn't she simply said she didn't like to drink too much at midday? Other people said that, made cryptic references to the yard arm. Why had she lied?

‘Can I give you a lift?' Paul asked, after their third coffee.

‘She's got her own car, love. Where have you parked?'

Deep breath time. Truth time.

‘You get so used to people offering you booze,' she began, ‘you have to say something. Automatic. At least I didn't say not while I was on duty!'

‘That's my usual line,' Giles said. ‘But I usually get offered cups of tea. Stewed tea.'

‘You're lucky. I get to make endless cups of tea while people wait for you. A minister's wife could get GNVQ'd in tea making.'

‘To return to my original question,' said Paul, ‘can I offer you a lift?'

‘I'm six hundred yards down the road, but if you're going that way, yes please.'

They said very little – hardly had time, to be honest – but as he parked, Paul said, ‘I know this is a bit of cheek – I mean, I hardly know you – but I wonder if you're busy in the evenings?'

Kate could feel herself blushing: this was turning into a cliché. Hell! Had Maz set this up? She said coolly, ‘It depends how busy the squad is. It's frantic at the moment.' That sounded too equivocal. But she could hardly tell him she'd lost her man and didn't want to be cheered up the way every red-blooded man would want to cheer her up.

‘Well, it might not be too many evenings. It's just that my lads need to study the community for their badges, and it'd be good to get someone from the police to talk.'

‘OK. Give me some dates and I'll see if I can fix it. Just me or a number of officers?' Thank goodness she hadn't snubbed him.

‘Just you, I should think. For a start, at least.'

They consulted diaries, found some spare evenings, closed the deal. And then there was a polite goodbye.

At least she'd have something to tell Aunt Cassie.

Bloody car! It sat there on the road outside her house declaring as clearly as if it could speak that this was a nasty, damp Monday morning and it was damned if it was going into work. Kate had tried everything she knew to make it start. And now there wasn't even time to call the RAC.

Changing her jacket – already soaked through by the thin, vicious drizzle – for a raincoat, no time even to button it, she ran down to the High Street and the buses. Seven-forty-five! The traffic heading for town was solid as far as she could see. Ignoring the pedestrian lights, she dodged between cars and hurtled to the stop with the shortest queue. Two buses went past full. A third, its windows streaming inside and out, crept at last to the stop and took aboard more than it should; but in weather like this no one was going to moan about overcrowding, especially when the driver, already pulling out, stopped to let on a man with a heavy limp. Most people flashed passes; she had to fumble for her fare. She'd forgotten about paying on entry, assumed that she'd be given change, then remembered that Birmingham's one-man buses didn't rise to such sophistication. At least she'd only lost a few pence.

Better find a rail to hang on.

A sudden jerk flung her staggering along the aisle. The bus was moving forwards, was it? She grabbed the back of a seat more firmly. The conversation from its occupants – two teenage lads who should be offering the man with a stick a seat – was about how they'd scored with their women last night. She tapped the nearer one on the shoulder and pointed to the lame man. She half expected to be sworn at; but the lad got up promptly. The man nodded his thanks. She shifted her grip. Not so bad, after all, these Brummies.

‘… did think about calling the police, but then, what could you say?'

Kate's ears pricked. She leant forward to hear better.

‘I mean, it's not against the law, is it, to buy a house and not live there? I mean, they keep it nice enough, no doubt about that, at least since we complained.'