‘Oh no you don’t!’
‘Oh yes I do.’ She hopped over the little wooden rail thing and marched out across the road towards the hospital entrance. Weaved her way through the clump of smokers. In through the main doors.
‘How is that fair? You nearly kill me and I’m the one gets the blame for it!’
She smiled over her shoulder at him and slipped into the wee shop just inside the doors. ‘You heard DCI Rutherford: my crimes will be your crimes. Might as well cut out the middle man.’ She stopped and pointed at the shelves. ‘Now, see if you can find the novelty teddy bears.’
Somehow, Steel didn’t look so scary with a ‘Naughty Nurse’ teddy bear tucked under one arm; a big Toblerone, a couple of magazines, and an oversized get-well-soon card under the other; and a silver helium balloon with a happy face printed on it bobbing about above her head.
The lift doors pinged open and Tufty followed her out into the corridor. Institution-green with strips of duct tape holding patches of the floor together. Framed tapestry things on the wall.
They marched all the way down to the end, where the words ‘AGNES GALLOWAY’ were printed in wobbly red letters on a small whiteboard.
Steel breezed straight through into the private room.
Mrs Galloway lay huddled in the bed, a drip running through a blue boxy machine on a stand and into the back of one hand. If anything, she looked even worse than last time. The bruises had merged and aged, developing a patina of greens, blues, and yellows around the edges, dark plum-purple in the centre. They must have changed her bandages recently, because they were all shiny and white. That cast on her other arm was a dirty grey, though — a bright orange and green flower drawn on the fibreglass surface in childish felt pen.
‘Hello, Agnes.’ Steel arranged their purchases on the bedside cabinet with the couple of cards already there. Tied the balloon to the end of the bed, then sat on the edge of the mattress. ‘You’re looking well.’ She took hold of two of Mrs Galloway’s fingers, steering clear of the cannula. ‘Be out of here in no time.’
Mrs Galloway stared down at her cast. ‘I don’t...’
Silence.
‘And look at all the lovely cards you got.’
A floor polisher whummed past in the corridor.
Someone a few rooms down tried to cough up a lung.
Steel shoogled a little bit closer. ‘I need a favour from you, Agnes. I need you to tell me what happened so Constable Quirrel here can write it down. And then we can go arrest the nasty flap of skin who did this to you.’
Tufty got out his notebook. Pen at the ready.
‘I...’ Mrs Galloway looked at him for a moment, eyes all bloodshot and swollen. Then went back to staring at her cast. ‘I used to work on the railways. Was the RMT union rep. I ran marathons. I did karate...’
Steel shoogled closer. ‘Who was it, Agnes? I need you to tell me their name.’
‘When did I get so old and useless?’ Her voice got a little mushy; a couple of tears pattered down onto the starchy white blanket.
‘They won’t give me a warrant without corroboration, Agnes. You don’t want him to hurt anyone else, do you?’
She wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her hospital robe. ‘In my twenties I could’ve kicked his arse from here to Stonehaven! Could’ve done it in my thirties and forties too.’
‘Then help me kick his arse now.’
‘I just... I just sat there...’ A sob jagged through the words. ‘He killed... killed my poor wee Pudding!’
‘Hey, hey.’ Tufty put a hand on her shoulder. ‘It’s not your fault, it’s the guy who did it. He broke your arm. He...’ Deep breath. ‘We’ll take good care of Pudding, sort everything out for the funeral. I promise. You just take care of getting better.’
‘I just want it all to be over.’ She put her cast across her eyes, hiding her face. ‘The real me died years ago. I died and I went to hell. This is hell.’
Steel forced a smile. ‘Come on, Agnes. We can beat him, I know we can.’
But Mrs Galloway turned away in the bed, face creased up into a bruised pain-filled knot. ‘Please, just leave me alone.’
Steel barged out through the main entrance doors, yanked out her fake fag and puffed on it. Leaving a trail of fruity vape behind her. She got three steps out from beneath the portico and stopped. Stared up at the sky.
OAPs, pregnant people, people with various limbs in casts, one cadaverous man with a drip on a wheelie stand, clumped together on one side. All smoking. Some texting. About as much joie de vivre as an asthmatic hamster.
Tufty stopped beside Steel. Shrugged. ‘Maybe she’ll change her mind?’
A deep breath, then: ‘AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!’
Everyone stared as she stormed off.
Yeah, she was definitely losing it.
He hurried after her. ‘Look, maybe we should—’
‘How the goat-buggering hell am I supposed to catch Philip Innes if no one will sodding talk to me? ARSEHOLES!’
‘Actually, the word of the day is “crudweasel”, so—’
‘Do not fuck with me today, Tufty!’
OK...
She marched across the road, to the car park. ‘Did you see the state of that poor woman? Am I supposed to just let that go?’
‘Well, maybe we could—’
‘Cos I’m no’ letting it go!’
An Audi estate turned into the row from the boundary road and slammed on its brakes, scrunching to a halt inches away from hitting her. Its horn brayed out, the driver making watch-where-you’re-going! faces through the windscreen.
She stuck two fingers up at them. ‘Awa’ an’ boil yer heid!’ She marched on till they got to the pool car. Stood there, snarling at it. Then turned. Narrowed her eyes at Tufty. ‘You know what? There’s nothing I can do to make people talk. Nothing at all. Nothing legal, anyway.’
‘If we give her time, I know Mrs Galloway will change her mind. Innes killed her dog. She can’t let him get away with that.’
Steel twisted her head, eyeing him the way a lion eyes a particularly tasty-looking zoo keeper. ‘So maybe what we need is something that’s no’ legal? Maybe...’ She drifted off into silence and stared into space.
A slow evil smile spread across her face.
Oh no.
Tufty backed up a couple of paces. ‘Sarge? Please tell me you’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do.’
‘Get in the car.’
III
Birdsong chittered through the garden centre, the frrrrrrp of little wings marking the passing of tiny little birds as they flitted from the rafters to the floor and back again. Tufty turned on the spot, following a chaffinch, or blue tit, or whatever it was popping along the back of a ‘PARK-STYLE BENCH ONLY £159.99!’
The air was sharp with the smell of vegetation, underpinned by the yeasty-stale-bread scent of compost and fresh-turned earth. A coffee shop took up one corner of the massive warehouse space. The delicious welcoming aroma of something pastry-ish baking wafted out like a grandmother’s hug.
The rest of the place was packed with bedding plants, fruit trees in pots, ornamental box hedges, roses in tubs, ferns, flowers and all the rest. A huge collection of ugly earthenware animals and uglier gnomes.
Yeah, not quite what he’d been expecting, given the evilness of Steel’s smile.
She marched ahead, stopping in front of a young woman transferring seedlings from a tray into individual teeny pots. Hair pulled back in a pair of Heidi pigtails. The garden centre logo sat right in the middle of her blue apron, just beneath a big red badge with ‘STACEY IS ALWAYS HAPPY TO HELP’ on it.