The bodywork was dented and scratched from the front wheel arch to the rear door, but to Jones’s eye the problems were cosmetic. The flat tyre was genuine, but he was highly doubtful that an untidy chassis would have prevented Jackson from changing the wheel.
‘You hit the kerb good and hard,’ he said, pointing to a four-inch distortion in the alloy rim. ‘A tyre can’t hold air when the rubber loses contact with the metal.’
Jackson took a breath. ‘I’m aware of that,’ she said, struggling to keep the irritation out of her voice.
Jones smiled. ‘Interesting accident, Doctor. The lieutenant has some strange injuries for an offside collision. Nearside or front-on, I might accept because of the seat-belt burn –’ he touched the left side of his own neck – ‘but offside? If the impact was hard enough, he should have spilled to the right.’
She shrugged. ‘I expect he did initially. I wasn’t looking. I was more interested in trying to control the car.’
‘Trying?’
‘Controlling the car,’ she corrected herself. ‘What I was trying to do was avoid the bollard.’
‘Naturally, but why were you driving towards it in the first place?’
She didn’t answer.
‘Doctor?’
‘Temporary loss of concentration,’ she said, ‘for which I hold my hands up. I was looking at Charles when I should have been looking at the road. I’ll inform my insurance company and the council that any damage to public property is my responsibility. Do you want me to take a breathalyser to prove that I was competent to drive?’
‘Not my area,’ he said with an amused smile, ‘but if Inspector Beale’s called the traffic police, you may have to.’ He bent down to inspect the wheel arch. ‘You’re lucky the bollard wasn’t concrete or you wouldn’t have driven away from it. Which bit needs levering out?’
‘It’s not as bad as I thought.’
‘No. More of a scrape than a collision, wouldn’t you say? The only real damage is to the wheel rim . . . and to Charles’s face, of course.’ He straightened again. ‘I think the best thing we can do is take him off your hands. Will Ms Wheeler have any objection to keeping an eye on him if we return him to the Bell?’
‘She won’t be able to. She’s running the bar.’
‘The same applies to Mr Hardy.’ He paused, waiting for an answer. ‘It’s a genuine offer. The inspector and I can drop the lieutenant off on our way back to the station.’
‘He’ll need help getting upstairs.’
‘I’m sure we can provide that.’
‘He needs to lie down as soon as possible. If you’re really willing to help, then give me a hand getting him into the Crown. I don’t have time to debate alternatives.’
Jones smiled slightly. ‘Why do I get the feeling you don’t want to leave Charles alone with your partner, Dr Jackson? What are you afraid he’ll do?’
‘I’m a lot more worried about how Daisy will react,’ she said tersely. ‘If we end up in another row over the stresses Charles is putting on our relationship, I could find myself homeless.’ She bared her teeth in a sarcastic smile. ‘It’s a lesbian thing, Superintendent.’
*
Beale’s reaction to the damaged bollard echoed Jones’s view of Jackson’s car. Not as bad as he’d been expecting. It was on a raised island in the middle of the road, one of two indicating a pedestrian crossing point between them, and if its twin was anything to go by it had been illuminated before Jackson hit it. The white plastic casing had split longitudinally and the steel structure underneath leaned drunkenly to one side. But it was hardly a hazard to the irregular passing traffic. He phoned the information through as a low priority, then, much as his boss had done, read the accident from what he could see. Visible tyre tracks before the still-intact bollard suggested Jackson had been braking hard as she approached the first island; fresh scarring along the concrete kerb suggested contact with one or both of her offside wheels; while the state of the second bollard suggested the car had still been steering to the right when she impacted with it.
Intrigued, he approached a young couple who were standing at a bus stop on the other side of the road. ‘How long have you been here?’
‘Long enough.’
‘Did you see a car hit that bollard?’
They both nodded. ‘It was two blokes fighting,’ said the girl.
‘What kind of fighting?’
‘The guy who was driving smashed the other one in the face.’ The girl shivered. ‘We’d be dead if he hadn’t. The car was coming straight for us.’
Beale phoned Khan as he walked back towards the Crown. ‘Ahmed? Yes, yes . . . still with the boss. I need a couple of favours, mate. Can you get hold of Dick Fergusson and find out if he knows of any crack operations in Kitchener Road? Alongside or behind a pub called the Crown. Right . . . ASAP. The next one’s a long shot. Have you ever seen the film Gattaca? No? Then you’ll have to Google it for me.G–A–T–T–A–C–A. Put in Uma Thurman and bring up her movies.’
He came to a halt while he waited. ‘That’s it. You should have a cast list with Jude Law and Ethan Hawke at the top. Great. What’s the name of the character Uma Thurman plays? Irene Cassini? How’s the Cassini spelt?’ He listened for a moment. ‘Yes,’ he agreed slowly, ‘that’s what I’ve been wondering. The boss and I saw her an hour ago and she was wearing an identical outfit to the one Uma Thurman wears in the movie. Right . . . try the hostess sites first.’
He was about to ring off when Khan spoke again.
Beale sighed. ‘No, of course I haven’t read the Evening Standard. I’ve been working non-stop since I left the house twelve hours ago.’ He listened again. ‘Chalky? Only the description Dr Jackson gave us. Dark-haired . . . bearded . . . mid-fifties. I can’t remember the rest of it but it’s on the computer. I put out a general alert to the neighbouring forces.’
His face tightened with irritation as Khan went on. ‘And you’re seriously telling me you only know about this body because you read it in a newspaper!’
*
The superintendent was alone when Beale resumed his seat beside him. Pat, the elderly man, had left, the only member of staff on duty was serving a customer at the other end of the bar and there was no sign of Jackson, Hardy or Acland. Jones pushed Beale’s untouched pint towards him. ‘Drink up,’ he said, ‘we may have something to celebrate. The doctor parked the lieutenant on a seat over there before she and Mr Hardy took him upstairs, and Pat recognized his undamaged side. Says he saw him in here several times last year when Harry Peel was still alive.’ His number two took a tentative mouthful of beer, expecting it to be flat, and it was. ‘With his girlfriend?’ Jones shook his head. ‘Always alone, but Pat’s fairly sure he would have spoken to Harry. Harry used to hand out cards for his taxi service, apparently . . . claimed face-to-face contact was the best advertisement.’ ‘What are we going to do? Take him back to the station?’ ‘He’s in no fit state to go anywhere at the moment, and not just from migraine either. He’s sporting a cut lip and a seat-belt burn.’ Jones raised a questioning eyebrow. ‘How hard did they hit the bollard?’ ‘More of a glancing blow. They can’t have been going very fast. The doctor was braking hard enough to leave rubber on the road.’ Beale repeated what the young couple had told him. ‘At a rough guess, I’d say the lieutenant grabbed the wheel and the only way the doctor could regain control was to punch his lights out. They missed one bollard and hit the other.’
Jones nodded. ‘I came to the same conclusion. Any ideas on why he’d want to grab the wheel?’