Of course, it was the Raglan case that was the sole reason for his posting to Stainforth, A balls-up, the classical clanger that a copper on a Manchester beat should not have dropped. He'd picked up Raglan, the man who had committed a dozen horrific sex murders and questioned him. He should have held the bastard, but at the time the man's story seemed genuine enough. The policeman had fallen for a false name and address and a volume of lies thrown in, a few scribblings in his notebook that he had not thought worth the paperwork so he'd let it go at that, and Raglan too. Three months and six corpses later the CID had nailed Raglan and everything came out. You could have saved us millions of pounds and six lives as well, copper, if you had done your job properly on the night of 10 January. Every rookie makes a mistake, some bigger than others. This will go against you.
'It wasn't your fault," Shirley had said. She had stuck by him as she invariably did in everything. 'They can't blame you, you weren't to know.'
Kick PC Aylott's arse. Hard. If it hadn't been for an acute shortage of manpower due to the police commitment on manning picket lines Ken might well have had his arse kicked even harder, right out of the Force. He spent weeks away from home in the daily turmoil of shoving, yelling crowds, had a week in hospital when he was unfortunate enough to have a half-brick land on his head. And then, within a fortnight of the settlement of the long dispute, he received the Stainforth posting.
They even tried to make a meal out of that, "This is your big chance, copper, your opportunity to prove yourself.' There was the odd case of sheep-worrying by dogs (there weren't even any rustlers around Stainforth), threatening to nick the Rising Sun because one night there were half a dozen in there drinking after eleven. Keeping an eye on one or two suspect vehicles that might not get through their MOTs and could just be used on the roads when their owners were in possession of a failed certificate. Oh, Mother of God, big deal!
It wasn't Ken Aylott's week on nights but he clicked for it just the same. They had taken the two boys from the town off the night shift—they should have covered Stainforth from 8 P.M. to 8 A.M.—because they needed them on 'days' to man the road-blocks. 'It'll help if you'll cover the night shift, Ken. There won't be much happening.' There never bloody well was, that was the trouble. Keep on your toes, copper, this is your big chance.
Ken lit a cigarette, sat looking at this pig-hole of an office, even thought about tidying it up, restoring some semblance of order. He'd get a bollocking from the super for sure if he did that. You seem to think this is jour office, Constable.
He half-considered jacking it all in, typing out his notice and leaving it on the desk for Burlington to see when he arrived in the morning. Stick that where the monkey sticks his nuts, I finish on Saturday week. But he didn't, and not just because Shirley was expecting their first baby and the monthly jobless tally, according to the television last Monday, had risen by another 2,000 in the month of May. That alone wouldn't have stopped him, it was his personal pride that did. You failed, copper, so you threw in the sponge, hadn't the guts to see if you could make it all the way back, claw yourself out of demotion and Stainforth. You took the easy way out, didn't you?
But how, for Christ's sake, tell me how? He knew the answer without waiting for it to echo back off those four walls in taunting whispers. You know how, copper, go out and find those snakes. Nobody else has so far. You'll be a national hero, they'll have to give you your stripes then because if they don't the people of Stainforth will petition for your promotion. Like bloody hell they will! The villagers don't petition for anything except against somebody making too much noise on a Sunday.
It'll still count for a lot. Yeah, maybe you're right but I don't stand much chance, not in the dark. You won't get your opportunity in the daytime, you know that; stop here and mind the phone, Constable. Radio us if there's anything really important.
Ken Aylott was sweating just at the thought of going out there. He could smell his own body odours, a sour stench that highlighted his fears, stopped him from kidding even himself that he was not afraid. A good copper's one who does his duty even though he's scared to hell, only fools and liars kid themselves.
He looked at the clock on the wall. Twenty-seven minutes past twelve. He took a swig of lukewarm coffee, lit another cigarette. It was no good just rushing blindly out there into the night, he needed to work out some plan of campaign; look what happened to that clever bastard Eversham. Don't think about him or you won't go. Or Barbara Brown. You're different, Ken Aylott, you've got a tidy mind, you plan.
All the facts pointed to the snakes being somewhere in the village. Well, if the fuckers weren't on the moors or in the fields, and hadn't gone elsewhere (no sightings reported yet apart from scaremongers and those seeking to waste police time), then they had to be still in the vicinity. Every garden in the village had been searched, the sandpit and the churchyard (the old disused cemetery adjacent to the current graveyard included), so logically there wasn't anywhere else left.
It's just a bloody waste of time, you're fooling yourself. Coward! You won't know for sure if you don't go out there and look. And if they're not around you won't be in any danger, will you? You will have been seen to have done something positive, not just sat here all night on your arse as you're perfectly entitled to do. Well done, Constable, you didn't find the snakes but at least you did your best. A fraction of the way towards getting your stripes.
Ken Aylott swallowed the rest of his coffee at one gulp and stood up. He'd better take a pair of those rubber boots off the heap in the corner, size nines, just to make his feet sweat and stink. A torch, too. He thought about a shotgun out of the armoury in the back and decided against it; too many complications if anything went wrong. The police weren't allowed to arm themselves except on written instructions from the Chief Constable. I was hunting snakes, sir. All the other officers carried guns in the daytime. In the daytime, Constable, but you had no right to be prowling about the village in the dead of night with a gun. It amounts to armed trespass for which you will be disciplined. Bloody hell, better leave the gun and play safe. I'm not out to shoot the snakes or enrage them like Eversham obviously did, I'm only going to try and locate them. I've discovered their lair, Superintendent, they're in the ... Ken could not for the life of him think where they might be. It didn't really matter, suffice it that he had had the guts to go out there in the dark, prove himself to himself.
The occasional streetlight broke up the pitch blackness of a summer night, created its own atmosphere of gloom. Eerie, the night was nowhere near so balmy as it had been a short time ago. Insects dive-bombed a lamp, seemed intent on kamikaze attacks. Aylott looked upwards, was aware of a myriad of stars, searched for the moon and detected a silver sliver, barely discernible. A full moon would have been helpful. With a torch you felt so vulnerable, gave your movements and position away.
Further down the main street he had to use his flashlight. Now why the devil hadn't they continued with the street-lighting down here? The houses were more isolated now, modern dwellings erected after the line of stone-built cottages petered out, but the council had not yet got round to providing full amenities for the occupants.
He shone his beam on the towering rickety church lych-gate; it was a wonder that it had not collapsed years ago, rotting and broken timbers, a half-torn notice of church service times hanging on by a single drawing pin. When the winds and rain came again (if ever they did) it would be whipped away to lie rotting in the bottom of the cemetery hedgerow.