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'I assume you recognise this.'
It's a photocopy of a piece of TV criticism I did for the paper about fifteen
months ago. Not exactly my speciality, but the regular guy had come down with
an eye infection and I welcomed the opportunity to editorialise a bit. 'Yeah,
I wrote this,' I say, grinning. Hell, my name's at the top of the piece,
beside the headline RADICAL EQUALISER?
Inspector McDunn smiles thinly. I read the piece while the boys in blue -
well, black and blue - look on.
As I read, and remember, I feel the hairs on the back of my neck prickle. This
hasn't happened for twenty years or so.
I hand it back. 'So?' I ask.
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The inspector looks at the A4 sheet for a moment.
'"Perhaps,"' he quotes from it, '"somebody should make one of these programmes
for those of us who're fed up seeing the usual suspects get theirs (corrupt
landlords, substance-abusing youths and of course the inevitable drug dealers;
reprehensible villains all, no doubt, but too predictable, too safe
) and introduce a
Real Avenger, a Radical Equaliser who'll take on some alternative
hate-figures. Somebody who'll give people like James Anderton, Judge Jamieson
and Sir Toby Bissett a taste of their own medicine, somebody who'll attack the
asset strippers and the arms smugglers (ministers of HMG included -
listening, Mr Persimmon?); somebody who'll stand up against the tycoons who
put their profits before others' safety, like Sir Rufus Carter; somebody
who'll punish the captains of industry who parrot that time-
honoured phrase about their shareholders' interests coming first as they close
down profitable factories and throw thousands out of work, just so that their
already comfortable investors in the Home Counties and Marbella can make that
little bit extra that always comes in so handy darling when you're thinking
about trading up to a 7-series Beamer or moving the gin-palace to a more
expensive mooring."' The detective inspector smiles briefly, humourlessly at
me. 'You did write that, Mr Colley?'
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'Guilty,' I say, then give a small laugh. Neither man laughs uproariously,
slaps his thigh or has to wipe tears from his eyes. I clear my throat. 'How is
that nice Mr Anderton, anyway? Enjoying his retirement?' I
sit back in my seat, feeling the carved wood against my back. I'm cold.
'Well, Mr Colley,' the detective inspector says, slipping the photocopy of the
article into the envelope and handing it back to the sergeant, 'he's all
right, I believe.' McDunn clasps his hands on the table. 'But Judge
Jamieson and his wife were assaulted while on holiday in Carnoustie during the
summer; Sir Toby Bissett was murdered outside his home in London in August, as
I'm sure you're aware; and Mr Persimmon was murdered last month, at his house
in Sussex.'
I'm aware my eyes are bulging. 'What? But I didn't know -! There's been
nothing about Persimmon - he was supposed to have died peacefully at home!'
'There was a security aspect to Mr Persimmon's murder, as I'm sure you'll
appreciate, Mr Colley.'
'But you kept it quiet for a month
?'
'Needed a D-notice on one of the London papers,' the sergeant says, smirking.
'But they were cooperative.'
And it never got round the journo jungle-network. Shit. Must have been the
Telegraph
.
'And then on Friday night there, somebody blew up Sir Rufus Carter at his
cottage in Wales. Burned to a cinder, he was; they only just identified the
body.'
I don't react for a moment. Oh my God. 'Ah, sorry; what?'
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He tells me again, then asks, 'Mind if we ask what you were doing on Friday
night, Mr Colley?'
'What? ... Ah, I stayed in.'
Sergeant Flavell looks significantly at the inspector, who doesn't return the
look. He's watching me. He makes a strange sucking noise with his teeth, like
he's straining something through them. I don't think he's aware he's doing it.
'All night?' he asks.
'Ah?' I'm a bit distracted. 'Yes, all night. I was ... working.' I can see he
spotted the hesitation. 'And playing computer games.' I look from the
detective inspector to the detective sergeant. 'There's no law against playing
computer games, is there?'
Christ, this is awful, I feel like I'm a child again, like I'm up before the
headmaster, like I'm back being castigated by Sir Andrew for that botched Gulf
trip. That was bad enough but this is ghastly. I can't believe they're
actually asking me this sort of stuff. They can't really think I'm a murderer,
can they? I'm a journalist; cynical and hard-bitten and all that shit and I do
drugs and I drive too fast and I hate the Tories and all their accomplices,
but I'm not a fucking murderer
, for Christ's sake. The sergeant takes out a notebook and starts making
notes.
'You didn't see anybody else that evening?' McDunn asks.
'Look, I was here, in Edinburgh; I wasn't Wales. How on earth am I supposed
to get from here to in
Wales?'
'We're not accusing you of anything, Mr Colley,' The DI says, sounding mildly
aggrieved. '
Did you see anybody else that evening?'
'No; I stayed in.'
'You live alone, Mr Colley?'
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