Summoning the Dead (DI Bob Valentine #3)(29)

‘It bloody well gave me tea when I was after coffee!’

‘Give Dino a knock. She’s got her own percolator in there. Might even give you a couple of digestives to put on the side.’

Prentice laughed. ‘No danger. I see Jimmy Greaves is up.’

‘Don’t remind me. I’ve just pressed the flesh with the bold Greavsie.’

‘Oh aye. And why are we being treated to his company? Rare as hobby-horse manure that is.’

Valentine watched Prentice wincing at the taste of the tea as he sipped from the plastic cup. ‘Put it this way,’ he said, ‘that’s the face I made too.’

‘Be the barrel-boys case, no doubt. Twitchy, is he?’

‘Assigned me a media specialist, for my own use. She’s coming down from Edinburgh.’

‘Colleen’ll be chuffed.’

‘It can’t put her nose any more out of joint than mine. It’s a bit of an unnecessary extravagance if you ask me.’

‘I’d have to agree, in these straightened times and all that. Did you put him right?’

‘You’re joking aren’t you?’ snapped Valentine. ‘I’ve just put the SOCOs on double time at the crime scene. I wouldn’t have a leg to stand on.’

Prentice grinned. ‘Have to go some way to beat the time you had all those uniforms bagging up the contents of the tip . . . would love to have been a fly on the wall when Dino found out. Or even just a fly on the tip!’

Valentine grinned along with the desk sergeant, but inwardly he was beginning to wonder if he had actually earned a reputation for being profligate with resources and cavalier with the press. He didn’t like to question himself, especially his abilities on the job – and more so when he was engaged in a case which required high levels of confidence to get anything done – but the thought had been implanted, and he knew he’d return to it. Clare had already sown doubts about the job in his mind, and he wondered how many more he could accommodate.

‘So Greavsie and Dino are in panic mode?’ said Prentice.

‘I don’t know, Jim. Between you and me, I found the whole situation very strange. I mean for Greavsie to turn up out the blue means either I’m on the watch list or Dino is. I don’t see him keeping that close an eye on our daily caseload, do you?’

‘I haven’t heard anything to that effect. But if you consider that nonsense with Rossi and then there was Flash Harris filling his pockets, you can see their thinking.’

‘But Harris wasn’t part of my team.’

‘He was working the same case, Bob.’

‘It was Dino that put him on that, not me.’

‘I’m only saying, mate.’ Prentice creased his brows; he looked like he was readying himself to fend off another attack.

‘Sorry, Jim. I must be getting jumpy.’

‘It’s all right, we all are. The job’s not what it used to be.’

‘You can say that again.’

‘At my age the alternative’s just as bad though. I don’t fancy a night watchman’s number on some building site, getting my skull stoved in for a stack of breeze blocks. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it?’

‘Wonder what?’

‘What it’s all for, if it’s been worthwhile?’

Valentine looked into the desk sergeant’s face; he’d done the job for more years than Valentine and he was a good desk sergeant. He had some room for bitterness, having sat all the inspector’s exams and never got the break to leave uniform. It was unfair, but so was life, thought Valentine. He didn’t want to ever be in Jim Prentice’s position, holding on to the job for the wrong reasons. Holding out for the pension and the gold watch. That wasn’t what the DI was about – the plaudits were never part of the reward for him. The politics of the station meant less than nothing to Valentine. But he knew the workings of the place and how the machinations in the ranks could interfere with the real work. He wondered if he had the heart for any more of it.

‘Look, I have to go and see how the squad’s getting on, break the news to them too, Jim. Can I ask you to give me a nod if you hear anything about this new media-relations woman arriving?’

‘Sure. What’s her name? I’ll ask for the SP with the Embra lads. Some of them are all right, don’t play the old school-tie trick.’

‘Stubbs – Charlotte, I think.’

‘Sounds powsh.’

‘It’s Edinburgh, isn’t it?’

‘Come with a pan-loaf accent as well, I’ll bet. Mind you, beats a fur coat and nae nickers, I suppose.’

Valentine grinned. ‘Don’t let DS McCormack hear you saying that. Very passionate about the Dear Green Place, so she is.’

Prentice turned. ‘I’ll catch you later, Bob.’

Valentine nodded, dismissing the offer of a cup of tea from the vending machine as the desk sergeant made a show of tipping the grey liquid into the nearest waste bin.

The incident room thrummed with activity as the DI entered. Fewer heads rose above keyboards and desktops now; the squad was too busy with the minutiae of the case. Valentine tried to clear his thoughts, to forget the conversation he’d just had with the chief super and the chief constable. He pushed away Jim Prentice’s comments and analysis too, because it would only lead to distraction from the job at hand.