Could just get Lund or Barrett to detain Shand under a Section Fourteen...
But why deny herself the pleasure of making the dirty wee sod squirm? Tommy Shand would keep.
She popped the last chunk of pie in her mouth. ‘We’re going to be a while, tell him to come back later. I want to be there when he gets it.’
‘But of course, Your Majesty. Anything else while I’m running around after you?’
‘Bye, Gary.’ She hung up. Frowned down at the water crawling by underneath.
Tufty stuffed a couple of Skips in his mouth. Sooked the prawn-cocktaily dust off his fingers. ‘Problem?’
‘Tommy Shand wants his phone back. Because of course I’m going to let him get away with an amateur porn shoot starring a fifteen-year-old model. Trouble is, if I do him for the phone now, I can’t catch him dealing drugs round the back of Airyhall Library and do him for that as well. Decisions, decisions.’
‘A sex offender in the hand is better than two in the bushes.’
Roberta sighed. Picked up a stick lying on the bridge deck. ‘Why does the world have to be full of perverted funkbiscuits?’ She turned, reached through the metalwork and dropped her stick on the upstream side. Sauntered over to the other side to watch it float by. ‘You really think we shouldn’t go after Jack Wallace?’
Tufty nodded. ‘They’ll fire you and they’ll screw me. Besides,’ a shrug, ‘DI Vine’s a professional pain in the bumhole: no way he’s going to let whoever raped Beatrice Edwards get away with it. Even just out of sheer bloody-mindedness — he’ll get them.’
‘Yeah. Probably.’ Maybe.
She sent a second stick after the first. ‘Doesn’t mean we can’t go after Philip Dog-Murdering Innes, though.’
‘True.’ Tufty tried a stick of his own. Scuttling over to the other side and poking his head and shoulders through the metalwork railings. ‘Mind you, it’d help if we had some evidence. Maybe we could try going door-to-door again? Someone might change their mind and talk to us.’ He made a wee boat out of the paper bag his samosa came in and dropped it at the exact same time Roberta released Stick Number Three.
They looked at each other for a heartbeat, then raced to the other side.
‘Come on, Boaty McBoatface!’
‘Come on Sticky McStickface!’
Tufty stuck his arms in the air. ‘I has a win!’
‘What else have we got?’
He dug into the carrier bag and came out with two Eccles cakes.
She took her one and held it out through the railings. ‘On three, two, one... go!’
Rush to the other side.
‘Ha: two-nil to the Magnificent Detective Constable Quirrel!’
‘Yeah? Well I know something that’ll wipe the grin off your smug wee face.’ Roberta marched back to the car and popped the boot. Rummaged through the bits and bobs gathered there. Where the hell were... Ah. Bingo. She grabbed two of them and hurried back to the bridge. Held one out to Tufty.
He recoiled. ‘That’s a massive dildo!’
‘Don’t be such a wet blouse, it’s no’ been used.’
He stuck his hands into his armpits. ‘Why...? What?’
‘From the Great Rubber Willy Burglary last year. Two blokes broke into Ann Summers and filched half the stock. I sort of forgot to sign three or four into evidence. Oops.’
‘Never been used?’
‘No’ so much as a dry humping.’
‘OK, then.’ He took the big purple one and they rushed to the side of the bridge again.
‘On three, two, one...’
Sploosh!
‘Oh.’ He leaned out through the railings, frowning down at the water below. ‘I was expecting them to float.’
Roberta hit him. ‘Waste of two perfectly good—’ Cagney & Lacey wailed out from her phone. ‘No’ again! Leave me alone, it’s lunchtime!’ But she pulled it out anyway, holding her other hand above the screen to block out the sunlight. ‘UNKNOWN NUMBER’.
She pressed answer. ‘Hello?’
‘Miss me?’
Took a second to place the voice, but there it was — like a sour taste in her mouth: ‘Wallace.’ Dirty raping wee turd. ‘What the hell do you want?’
‘Did you enjoy grovelling this morning? Feel good to be on your knees?’
‘Listen up, sunshine, you’re going to screw up sometime and when you do I’m going to ram my boot so far up your...’
Tufty was staring at her, pointing at the phone and mouthing, ‘Jack Wallace?’
She pressed the button to put it on speaker.
‘—never learn, though. Do you really think I’m stupid enough to...’ Pause. ‘Did you just put me on speakerphone?’
‘Course no’: I’m in the car. Hands free.’
‘Yeah, I’m not a moron, Sergeant.’
And the line went dead. He’d hung up.
Roberta wiggled the phone at Tufty. ‘You heard that.’
‘Yeah... Well, I heard you threaten him, then him say he wasn’t stupid. It’s not exactly Watergate, is it?’
Of course it wasn’t. Because there was no way Jack Wallace was going to say anything incriminating with witnesses present.
‘Sodding hell.’
‘No chance.’ Mrs Galloway’s neighbour crossed her arms and jerked her chin up. Her toddler clung to her tracksuited knee, staring at them — thumb in his mouth.
Tufty held out the photo of Phil Innes again. ‘Please, just think about it, OK?’
Steel sniffed. ‘Come on, Helen, you know who this is, and I know that you know, so why no’ save us all a heap of time and talk — to — me.’ Really leaning on the words, forcing them in like a blunt knife.
‘You don’t get it, do you?’ She nodded at the sooking toddler. ‘I’ve got a wee boy. You think I’m putting Justin at risk?’
‘Has Innes threatened you?’
The round cheeks darkened, pink spreading upwards from the neck of her T-shirt. ‘No one’s threatened me. And they won’t, because I’m not doing your bloody job for you!’
‘My job? Have you forgotten what he did to Agnes Galloway?’ Teeth bared. ‘Have you?’
Tufty stepped between them. ‘OK, let’s all just calm down a little.’
Steel thumped him on the arm. ‘Calm?’ She marched away a couple of paces, then back again, arms jabbing away for emphasis. ‘How can I do my job when none of you buggers will say a sodding word? They won’t give me a warrant unless I’ve got corroboration! Witnesses! Evidence!’
The chin came up a little higher. Voice a little louder. ‘That’s not my fault!’
‘You won’t bloody speak to me! I can’t even search the bastard’s house because of you lot!’
The toddler made whingy gurning noises.
Steel shoved Tufty out of the way. ‘I can’t get forensics from Innes without a warrant. No forensics, no evidence. And I can’t arrest him with no bloody evidence! Help me! If you don’t help, we can’t do anything!’
‘Don’t you dare!’ They were almost nose to nose now, eyes bugging. ‘You’re the police, you should know what you’re doing! That poor woman’s nearly dead because you poked your noses in and didn’t arrest the bastard!’
Steel’s right hand curled into a fist.
Tufty grabbed her sleeve. ‘All right, come on, this isn’t helping.’
‘Do you want him to keep doing it? Is that what you want? Philip Innes running this place like his own private gulag?’