“Is it bad?” she asked when he still didn’t answer.
“I think so,” he said grimly. “There’ve been too many lies. They should have done something years ago. It’s going to be hard…”
A momentary fear flickered in her eyes and her lips tightened. “Yer’d better be careful, then, ’adn’t yer!”
He kept on thinking he knew her and she wouldn’t surprise him anymore, and again he was wrong.
“Have you got any cake?” he asked.
She knew she had won, and she smiled at him, taking a deep breath. She had not wanted to be right. It would have been so much easier to tell him to leave it alone.
“Yeah,” she said airily. “I got one piece left. I’ll get it for yer.”
In the morning Tellman decided to look again at other cases since the death of Tyndale, ones that Ednam had worked on, and particularly those that included Newman, Hobbs, Bossiney, and Yarcombe. He was returning down an alley toward his own station, carrying a piece of testimony that had been key to a conviction, when he heard footsteps behind him, light and rapid, like someone attempting to catch up with him. He turned as a man bumped into him, knocking him off balance. He fell against the wall, bruising his shoulder.
He righted himself immediately, regaining his stance, ready to fight. The man stood in front of him. He was young, strong, and on the balls of his feet, like a boxer.
This looked as if it were going to be ugly. He felt a sharp tingle of fear. They were alone. Tellman had learned how to defend himself. He was wiry, and very fast, but what if the man had a knife?
The man stared at Tellman unblinkingly.
“Sorry, Inspector,” he said with a very slight smile down-turned at the corners of his mouth. “Didn’t mean ter scare yer. Not a very good neighbor’ood, this. Mebbe yer shouldn’t be ’ere alone, like. I’ll walk yer to the main road.”
Tellman felt a sweat of relief break out on his body. He racked his memory to recall where he had seen the man. His face was vaguely familiar, but he could not place it. It was recently, and they had spoken only briefly. He knew the intonation, and the man had addressed him by rank. Had he arrested the man for something? There was challenge and dislike in his eyes.
Tellman swallowed, and calmed his breathing. “It’s not far,” he said, dismissing the suggestion. He did not want the man with him. More than that, he could not afford to have the man know how much he had startled him…no, that was less than the truth. For a moment he had been afraid. His heart was still hammering in his chest. It was a long time since he had walked the beat, aware of the dangers around him.
Now suddenly he knew who the man was: Constable Wayland, one of Whicker’s men.
“No trouble, sir,” Wayland said, falling into step beside Tellman as he started to move again. “Just make sure ye’re all right, sir. We gotta look out for each other, right? Even off duty…”
“Thank you, Constable Wayland.” Tellman forced his voice to be calm, level. Should he let the man know he had understood the implicit threat? If he didn’t, then maybe it would be repeated, less pleasantly. Or was he imagining it? Making himself ridiculous, as if he had a guilty conscience?
They walked in silence along the narrow pavement, matching step for step, until they came to the main thoroughfare, and then stopped at the curb.
“You’ll be all right now, sir,” Wayland said, nodding with satisfaction. “Good day, sir.”
“Good day, Constable,” Tellman replied, and then, watching the traffic carefully, he crossed the road, still uncertain, turning it over in his mind.
Neither was the following day a good one. He continued to look over records, finding even more discrepancies now that he was looking for them. There were figures that did not match, even a couple of statements that had been altered very carefully, very cleverly. He could feel his stomach knotting as he began to appreciate how deep the corruption ran.
He met with resistance everywhere, sometimes even open dislike. One constable fetched him a cup of tea and spilled it all over his jacket and trousers.
“Oh! Terribly sorry, sir!” he said, barely concealing his smile.
It was hot, almost hot enough to scald, if Tellman had not moved quickly enough to miss most of it.
There was a snigger of amusement from one of the other men, quickly changed into a cough, then another. The two other constables in the room also began to cough, as if in a chorus.
Tellman tried to make light of it, but he was sharply aware of how much worse it could have been. He was wet from the tea, and it would be very uncomfortable, not to mention embarrassing, when it got cold. It would be obvious, as if he had wet himself. Hotter, and it might have taken the skin off his belly. He forced the childhood memory out of his mind. It was unbearable. A wave of the old helplessness swept over him at the memory of the laughter, the mocking. He banished it. He was superior to all three of the men in this room. They were all pretending to be helpful when they were either guilty of changing evidence or stealing money themselves, or turning a blind eye to it.
Was his pretense not to know a mark of cowardice? They would smell fear. Bullies always did. How rash would it be to let them know he knew, face them? If he did not, was he then telling them he did not dare to?
What would Gracie think of him? What would he rather do? Face them and possibly be attacked? Or retreat, and be ashamed of himself, not be able to tell Gracie, in fact lie to her, even if only by omission?
“Don’t worry about it, Constable,” he said. “It’s unimportant.” He looked the man in the eye and saw a faint flush in his cheeks. “You seem to be afflicted with carelessness. You can’t add your figures right either. There are some very odd mistakes here. Oddest thing about it is that it’s always short! Never money over. Noticed that, did you?”
The constable’s jaw hardened but there was fear in his eyes. “Can’t say as I did,” he answered. “But when yer done a long day on the streets, ye’re so tired yer can ’ardly see straight, an’ yer feet ’urt something terrible, could be as figure work in’t perfect.” He leaned forward a little too close to Tellman.
Tellman did not retreat.
“Yer ever done that, Inspector? I ’spec you did, way back when you were a constable, like? When yer dealt wi’ people yerself, instead o’ tellin’ others to. When yer broke up the fights down by the dockside, or in the dark alleys where most folk got the sense not to go.” He cleared his throat and went on. “When yer knew that yer mates were be’ind yer? When yer’d bin in fights, got beat up, punched, sworn at, put on the ground an’ kicked. An’ yer never told on others, ’cos they was the ones as came an’ got yer, risked their own necks ter see yer were all right!” He took a hissing breath. “An’ when yer made a mistake, they picked up after yer, and kept their mouths shut. Yer know about that, do yer? Or ’ave yer forgot, like, now as yer don’t do that anymore?”
Tellman felt cold right through to his bones, as if the chill came from inside himself. There was no point in saying anything to this man, was there? They both knew what was behind the argument. If you expect loyalty, then you give it…all the time. You don’t pick and choose and give it only when it doesn’t cost you.
But there was an anger in Tellman as well, a rage for what was happening to good and bad men alike. Above all, for him at least, there was the destruction of an ideal that mattered. It had been at the heart of his purpose since he was that boy in the school yard, humiliated and needing something to believe in, to drive him forward. To get him up again when he fell, made mistakes, was too tired to think clearly.
“I understand,” he said quietly.
For an instant there was pain in the constable’s eyes, and then he smothered it. “Easy to say…” He forced the words through a tight jaw. “Got children ter feed, ’ave yer?”
Tellman wanted to lie, to protect his family; then he realized how pointless that was. Anybody could find out, in moments. Now he was really afraid.