‘Perhaps this is one dog you can teach new tricks,’ said Bryant, daintily pirouetting the tip of his walking stick as he danced from the room.
9
* * *
RANDOM ACTS OF SLAUGHTER
‘Whose bright idea was it to bring Jack Renfield in here anyway?’ asked Dan Banbury.
Giles Kershaw was packing the last of his belongings into a plastic crate, preparing for his move to the Bayham Street morgue, where he would take over Oswald Finch’s old post. ‘Land’s, apparently,’ he answered. ‘Part of the trade-off for allowing me to take over as pathologist. They’re playing politics upstairs, trying to set you against me and undermine the working structure of the unit at the same time. The most confounding thing you can do is make the new man welcome. If you express dissatisfaction, you’ll be playing directly into their hands.’
‘But what will happen to Janice? There’s only room for one sergeant in this outfit, and she’s got years of experience over him.’
‘There’s a difference. She’s a DS. She’ll work it out,’ said Kershaw, tamping down the crate lid impatiently. ‘As will you. He’s going to be sitting right here, at my old desk. OK, I’m out of here. See you later, old sprout.’ He threw Banbury a salute as he hoisted the final box on to his hip and backed awkwardly out of the door.
Banbury had once thought that he and Kershaw would become a team in the Bryant-and-May mould, their respective talents complementing each other, but now it was obvious that his former partner could not wait to take up his new position. Kershaw was coolly ambitious and openly contemptuous of those who stayed behind. With a sigh of regret Banbury woke his monitor to examine the Dead Diary, Kershaw’s nickname for the daily files listing those who had died in unusual or suspicious circumstances in the central London area.
It was Dan’s job to pass on any new cases which he felt required the attention of his seniors. Today, the very first one on the list caught his eye. Bryant always asked for print-outs, claiming that the computer screen hurt his eyes, so Banbury made a hard copy, collected the document and headed across the hall. As he did so, he collided with Bryant, who was carrying a full bowl of porridge.
‘God, I’m sorry, sir.’ Banbury brushed milk and oat flakes from his paperwork. ‘I thought you’d want to see this.’
‘Come into my office.’ Bryant set down the bowl, took the papers from him and dug out his reading glasses, waving Banbury to the cankerous crimson-leather armchair he kept for visitors. ‘Sit down before you do any more damage. What am I looking at? Don’t answer, it’s a rhetorical question. The Dead Diary for Monday 26th, a forty-six-year-old deceased woman named Carol Wynley, found at the corner of Whidbourne Street, Bloomsbury, died some time before midnight. And this is of interest because . . . ?’
‘It’s just that John told me you cut across Bloomsbury on the way home, and I wondered if you’d—’
‘Added random acts of slaughter to my already controversial repertoire of activities?’ Bryant completed. ‘Sorry to disappoint you, Banbury, but no. Around thirteen thousand outbursts of violence occur outside pubs and clubs in the UK every week.’ He threw the papers back. ‘Wait, show me that again.’ He snatched back the printed photograph and re-examined it. ‘Talk to Renfield. He’ll know where they’ve taken her. If she’s gone to Bayham Street, Kershaw will be about to get his first case.’
‘It probably won’t come into our jurisdiction,’ warned Banbury. ‘Not unless there’s something especially unusual about her death.’
‘It rather depends on what you regard as unusual,’ said Bryant. ‘It’s certainly a coincidence. I think I saw this woman just minutes before she was found dead. Sexual assault?’
‘No mention of that in the report.’
‘If it’s the same person, she was drunk when I spotted her. Let me have a word with our leader.’ He turned and swung into Raymond Land’s office without knocking. Land was cleaning pencil shavings out of the back of his desk drawer when Bryant made him jump, causing him to empty the drawer’s contents over his trousers.
‘I do wish you’d learn to knock,’ he muttered irritably, brushing down his seams.
‘Look here, Raymondo, why on earth are we stranding Kershaw over at the morgue? There’s no point in having him hovering about in Oswald’s old room with no one to talk to. He’s far more useful to the unit here.’
‘There’s no room here,’ Land snapped. ‘Look how much space you take up – boxes of musty old books you never read—’