On the way back to the home they sang, “Why am I always the bridesmaid, never the blushing bride?” vying with each other to sing the silly bits and breaking into giggles.
Moyra was doing the ironing. While George put the kettle on he was singing “Why Am I Always the Bridesmaid?”
“Every time you go to see her you come back singing those stupid songs,” Moyra complained.
“That was by way of a proposal,” he said as he put coffee in their mugs and poured the boiling water. “I reckon it’s time I made an honest woman of you.”
“Not if your mother has any say in the matter; I was never good enough for you in her eyes!” Moyra retorted. “And I notice she gave the papers that photo of you in your posh school uniform…”
He handed her a mug of coffee. “Did I ever tell you about-”
She interrupted him. “How beautiful she looked at the school prize-giving? How all the lads said she looked like a movie star? Yes, you did!”
“But I’ve never told you about afterwards, after the prize-giving.”
“I dunno why you go on about it, you were only at the school two minutes.”
“I walked Mum and Dad to the gates. They were all hanging out of the dormitory windows, giving her wolf-whistles. Mum was being all coy, you know, waving to the boys. She didn’t want them to know we didn’t have a car, that they were going to catch the bus. And then, just as we got to the gates, the wind blew her wig off. They all saw it…”
Moyra spluttered through her mouthful of coffee. “You’re kidding me! Blew her wig off!” She laughed aloud.
Offended, he blinked. “It wasn’t funny, Moyra. My dad ran down the road to get it back, and she just stood there, rooted to the spot…” He raised his hands to his own hair. “I didn’t know her hair had fallen out. Dad helped her put the wig back on, but the parting was all crooked. Underneath all the glamour she was ugly; an ugly stranger.”
“And everybody saw it? Did she ever talk about it?”
“She never even mentioned it.”
“I always thought it was just old age, you know. I’ve never said anything to her, but it’s so obvious. How long has she been bald, then?”
“I don’t know. She still pretends it’s her own hair, even to me, says it needs trimming and so on.”
“Well what do you know! Underneath it all the Rita Hayworth of Warrington is really Yul Brynner in disguise!”
He looked at her for a moment, then laughed his lovely, warm, infectious laugh. He slipped his arms around her and kissed her on the neck.
“Did you mean it, George? About getting married?”
He lifted her in his arms and swung her around. “I love you, Moyra-what do you say, will you marry me?”
“Will I? I’ve had the license for two years, George, and you won’t get out of it.”
He smiled at her. Sometimes his resemblance to his mother took her breath away. He was so good-looking, every feature neat and clean-cut. Doris had been a real looker, and George was the most handsome man Moyra had ever known. Held tight in the circle of his arms she looked up into his dark eyes, eyes a woman would pray for, with thick dark lashes. Innocent eyes…
“I love you, George, I love you.”
His kiss was gentle and loving. He drew her towards the bedroom.
“George! It’s nearly dinnertime!”
“It can wait…”
DCI Tennison stared at the headline, furious. Then she ripped it down from the Incident Room door. She took a deep breath, crumpled the paper into a ball and entered the room.
The men fell silent, watching her. She held the ball of paper up so they could all see, then tossed it accurately into a waste-paper basket.
“OK, we’ve all read it, so the least said about it the better. But it’s not just me with egg on my face.”
She crossed to her desk and dumped her briefcase. “It makes our surveillance operation look like a circus.”
“Any word on what their readers’ survey came up with, ma’am?” asked Otley with a snide smile. “For or against female officers on murder cases?”
She gave him an old-fashioned look. “Oh, you’re a biased load of chauvinists, and there’s thousands more like you!”
“Don’t worry, ma’am,” chipped in Dave Jones, “you could always get a job in panto!”
He was holding up the photograph of her from the paper, but it had been added to in felt-tip. She started laughing and clipped him one.
Maureen Havers walked in as he raised his hands to defend himself. She tapped Tennison on the back.
“Why me? I didn’t draw all over it. It was him!” Jones pointed to Burkin, who hung his head, although he couldn’t really give a fuck. When she’d gone, Jones would get a right clip round the earhole.
Tennison turned to Havers, who told her she was wanted on the top floor.
“Oh well, here it comes. See you all later.”
Otley claimed everybody’s attention as soon as she had gone. “Right, we’ve all had a jolly good laugh, now get yer pin-brains on this lot. We want all these unsolved murders on the computer, so we can cross-check them for any that occurred when Marlow was in the vicinity.”
As they went reluctantly to work, Maureen Havers had a word with Otley.
“You finished with the Oldham files? Only they haven’t been put on the computer…”
“I’ll sort ’em, love. Haven’t had a chance to look through them yet.”
Havers began to distribute more files around the Incident Room, which was greeted with moans and groans. Otley rapped his desk.
“Come on, you lot, settle down. Sooner you get this lot sorted, sooner we’re in the pub. As an incentive, first round’s on me!”
But a pint wouldn’t compensate for the tedious slog of sifting through hundreds of unsolved murders. Otley opened the Oldham file he had already checked over; he knew there was a problem, and now he had to work out the best way to deal with it.
The bar was full of familiar faces. At one of the marble-topped tables several of the lads were discussing the unsolved murders.
“I’ve looked at twenty-three cases,” Muddyman said, “all around Rochdale, Burnley, Southport; and I’ve got one possible but unlikely…”
Rosper cut in, “There was a woman found in a chicken run in Sheffield. Reckon she’d been there for months. The chickens were knocking out record numbers of eggs!”
“You know they’ve been feeding the dead ones to the live ones, that’s why we’ve had all this salmonella scare. Got into the eggs,” Lillie contributed.
“This woman was seventy-two, an old boiler!” Rosper chuckled.
They were suddenly all aware that Tennison had walked in. She looked around, located Jones and went to lean on the back of his chair.
“Next round’s on me, give us your orders,” she told them. “The bad news is: I’m asking for volunteers. They’ve withdrawn the official surveillance from Marlow, so I want four men to cover it.”
Lillie stood up. “Excuse me…”
“Great, that leaves three…”
“I was just going for a slash…”
Rosper laughed and she nailed him. “Two! Come on, undercover’s a piece of cake. Two more…”
She handed Rosper a twenty and sent him to the bar. “Let’s get those drinks in. I’ll have a large G and T.”
Lillie pulled out a chair for her. “How did it go, boss?”
The others pretended not to listen. Tennison said quietly, “If I don’t pull something out of the bag very soon, I’m off the case.”
Her gin and tonic arrived. She thanked Rosper and he handed her back her money.
“What’s this?”
Rosper shrugged. “It’s OK, Skipper coughed up.”
“Is this a truce? Ah well, cheers!” She raised her glass to them, but Muddyman and Rosper were looking towards Otley, who was sitting at the bar.
“Cheers, Skipper!” Muddyman called.
Otley turned and grinned, as if he had got one over on Tennison, even in the pub.