Rivers of London (Rivers of London #1)(41)

‘I broke it doing magic,’ I said. ‘Which reminds me: I need you to book me out an Airwave.’ Airwave was the all-singing, all-dancing digital radio handset for coppers.

‘Can’t you get one from your nick?’ she asked.

‘You’re joking,’ I said. ‘I don’t think Nightingale’s got the hang of Airwave yet. Or even radios, for that matter. In fact, I think he might be a bit hazy on telephones.’

She agreed to meet us at Neal Street.

The rain was sheeting down as I crawled up the semi-pedestrianised length of Earlham Street and stopped on the corner, where we could get a good view of the pub and the cycle-courier hangout. I left Beverley in the car and popped across to check inside the pub. It was deserted; Dr Framline hadn’t arrived yet.

My hair was soaked through when I got back in the car but I had a towel in my obbo bag, and I used it to squeeze most of the water out. For some reason Beverley found this hilarious.

‘Let me do that,’ she said.

I handed her the towel and she leaned over and started rubbing my head. One of her breasts pushed against my shoulder and I had to resist an urge to put my arm around her waist. She dug her fingers into my scalp.

‘Don’t you ever comb this?’ she asked.

‘I can’t be bothered,’ I said. ‘I just shave it down to stubble every spring.’

She ran her palm over my head and let it rest, lightly, on the back of my neck. I felt her breath close, on my ear.

‘You really got nothing from your dad, did you?’ Beverley sat back in her own seat and tossed the towel into the back. ‘Your mum must have been disappointed. I bet she thought you’d have big curls.’

‘It could have been worse,’ I said. ‘I could have been a girl.’

Beverley unconsciously touched her own hair, which was straightened and side-parted into wings that reached to her shoulders. ‘You don’t know the half of it,’ she said. ‘Which is why you ain’t going to get me out into that.’ She nodded at the rainswept streets.

‘If you’re so supposed to be a goddess …’

‘Orisa,’ said Beverley. ‘We’re Orisa. Not spirits, not local geniuses – Orisa.’

‘Why can’t you do something about the weather?’ I asked.

‘For a start,’ she said with exaggerated slowness, ‘you don’t mess with the weather, and second, this is north London and this manor belongs to my older sisters.’

I’d found a seventeenth-century map of the rivers of London. ‘That would be the Fleet and the Tyburn?’ I asked.

‘You can call her Tyburn if you want to spend the rest of the day dangling from a noose,’ said Beverley. ‘If you ever meet her, you better make sure you call her Lady Ty. Not that you ever want to meet her. Not that she ever wants to meet you.’

‘So you don’t get on with them?’ I asked.

‘Fleet is okay,’ she said. ‘But nosy. Ty is just stuck up. She lives in Mayfair and goes to posh people’s parties and knows “people that matter”.’

‘Mum’s favourite?’

‘Only because she fixes stuff with the politicians,’ said Beverley. ‘Has tea on the terrace at the Palace of Westminster. I get to sit in a car with Nightingale’s errand boy.’

‘If I remember, you’re the one who didn’t want to go home,’ I said.

I spotted Lesley’s car pulling up behind us. She flashed her lights and got out. I quickly leaned back to open the passenger door for her. Rain hit me in the face hard enough to make me splutter, and Lesley practically threw herself onto the back seat.

‘I think it’s going to flood,’ she said and seized my towel, using it to dry her face and hair. She jerked her head at Beverley. ‘Who’s this?’ she asked.

‘Beverley, this is PC Lesley May.’ I turned to Lesley. ‘This is Beverley Brook, river spirit and winner of the London Regional All-comers Continuous Talking Championship five years running.’ Beverley punched me in the arm. Lesley gave her an encouraging smile. ‘Her mother is the Thames, you know.’

‘Really,’ said Lesley. ‘Who’s your dad, then?’

‘That’s complicated,’ said Beverley. ‘Mum said she found me floating down the brook by the Kingston Vale dual carriageway.’

‘In a basket?’ asked Lesley.

‘No, just floating,’ said Beverley.

‘She was spontaneously created by the midichlorians,’ I said. Both women gave me blank looks. ‘Never mind.’

‘Has your man arrived yet?’ asked Lesley.

‘Nobody’s arrived since we got here,’ I said.

‘Do you know what he looks like?’ said Lesley.

I realised that I didn’t have the faintest idea what Dr Framline looked like. I’d been expecting to interview him at home before I followed him. ‘I have a description,’ I said. Lesley gave me a pitying look and pulled out A4 hard copy of the photo from Dr Framline’s driving licence. ‘He’d be a decent copper,’ she told Beverley, ‘if he could just keep his mind on the details.’

She handed me something that looked like the chunky mutant offspring of a Nokia and a walkie-talkie – an Airwave handset. I stuffed it in the inside pocket of my jacket. The handset is a bit heavier than a mobile phone, and was going to make me lopsided.