The Water Clock(40)

Other items included a desk, a basketball post, some wastepaper bins and a chemistry lab fume cupboard.

Dryden produced a banana from his coat pocket for tea and began to circle the pool. On the mobile he called Mitch, The Crow’s photographer, and told him the details. He’d just shut his shop up for the weekend and agreed to do the job.

At the far end of the building a retractable seating area had been rolled forward and a banner on the far wall proclaimed: ‘West Fen High. The Best in Sport’. Scattered over the seats were some disappointed-looking parents and some of the local ‘great and good’ looking suitably outraged.

A hand touched Dryden’s sleeve. Ben Thomas – Labour leader of the local council – was eager to see if his comments on the emergency work on the cathedral would make it into The Express. Dryden found it hard to believe it was only yesterday that they had discussed the story.

Thomas was also keen to get a quote in on school vandalism, but first he had a point to make. A party political point. ‘I blame the Tories of course.’

‘They broke in, did they?’

Thomas ploughed on, congenitally unable to spot irony. He was spindly tall and clever, disguising an Oxford education behind estuary English. Mid-thirties and serious, he taught in the city’s special needs school – a fact that cropped up in every speech he made. He wore his heart on both sleeves.

‘They’ve cut the school security bills. West Fen can only afford one caretaker – and he’s got to have some time off.’

What’s wrong with the school holidays? thought Dryden, but let the subject drop.

Thomas was a county councillor, and shadow education spokesman, as well as leader of the district council. His education brief had got him an invitation to the swimming gala. The Tories held a hefty majority on the county council – and therefore had control of the education authority budget as well. Thomas’s personal ambitions had been cruelly thwarted by democracy.

Normally Dryden dealt with rent-a-quotes like Thomas by putting his notebook away. This time he spotted an opportunity to find out some useful inside knowledge on former Deputy Chief Constable Bryan Stubbs. Thomas was Labour’s representative on the authority’s police committee.

‘So what do you reckon the damage is?’

Thomas looked around and failed to suppress a smile as Dryden flipped open the notebook.

‘Got to be fifty thousand – biggest problem is unthawing the pipes. They can’t do it quickly, they’ll burst. We might have to close the school for a few days.’

‘And you blame the tight budget? Surely the school got a million off the government – the Labour government – to set up the sports college?’

‘Oh yeah. But what about running the thing? That’s down to the council allocation of the government grant…’

Thomas set off, verbally losing himself in the maze which is local government finance. When he finally emerged Dryden closed his notebook.

‘By the way… does the name Bryan Stubbs ring any bells? Police bells?’

‘Retired two years ago? We voted through the terms – he went early, at sixty-one I think.’

‘You didn’t try to keep him?’

Thomas cast a theatrical glance around the pool and took a step closer to Dryden.

‘Hardly. Bloke was bent.’

‘Bent?’

‘We reviewed the file. Over the years at least half a dozen complaints of fabricating evidence. He’d got to the top because he knew where the bodies were buried – it was that generation. The sixties – they all went up together. Most of them grew out of it, but Stubbs was an “old-fashioned” copper. Heroes and villains.’

‘I’m looking at a case back then – in the sixties. Halfway through they called in Scotland Yard. Is that rare?’

‘No. Before they set up regional crime squads the Yard had all the expertise. But I’d be careful – sometimes they called them in to clean up dirty tricks, especially if the case is high profile. They often ended up investigating the investigation – not the crime.’

‘So you were happy to see him go?’

‘He wanted out – doctor’s report said cancer. Smelt more like cirrhosis to me. He had a reputation for boozing. We agreed terms – got him out. Best for everyone.’

‘His son is up on a disciplinary charge now – know anything about that?’

‘Not much. I read it in your paper in fact. Nothing to do with us really – down to the local tribunal unless someone appeals.’

‘What’s your guess?’

‘With the papers watching – and plenty of his dad’s enemies still around – he could get busted down a rank.’