Water's Edge

Chapter XII

1+1=2

I stood at the exit to the police station, around the back, watching cars pull in.

"You didn't like her." I said to DCI Womack.

"I don't like these freelancers. Freelance death, makes my blood curdle."

"They have to get the experience somehow. At least they didn't do fucking media studies."

She had to laugh at that, "I suppose. I just like Margaret, even though she is a drunk."

"Does she go to The Marsh & Bottle by any chance?"

"Aye, I didn't see her when I picked you up though."

"Right at the end."

"Oh..."

Two bobbies walked by, the same as the last time I was here, and another coughed "scab" was flung in my direction, a wink to the deliciously brown Yazmin. I was about to say my adieus when I found myself quite alone out front. I turned and found the bobby bent double, clutching his bollocks, "Respect, constable. Not much to fuckin' ask now is it."

The other bobby laughed at his colleague who had been rightly squared in the nuts by the ferocious DCI Womack. The thin blue line was getting thinner every day. What would my Dad think?

"I should stay on your good side. Do you have one?"

"What, a good side?" She hadn't shaken off the anger yet; good for her, "I'm on this side." She looked up at me and I turned to face her squarely, "I'd start with the environmentalists."

"That was my thinking."

It bemoaned me to think it, but it made sense. And it was my only lead so far. Two of the victims were related to Conservative Politics, an ex-mayor with a name that oozed blue, and a young lad Tory-by-proxy. I felt sorry for the kids: sins of the father and all that.

The Environmentalists, Yazmin Womack informed me, had been causing havoc ever since the plans for the dam had been brought in so many years back. Although Extinction Rebellion had been brutally relegated to the pits of illegality – anything even remotely resembling the hour glass symbol regarded as plots of terrorism – the vestiges of any ideology always remain. I mean, look at the Nazis. And although we could all see with our own eyes how climate disaster had rendered our coasts practically inhospitable, to protest against the solution – a massive dam – seemed ludicrous to me. And I could not ignore the fact two of the bodies would be regarded as their sincerest enemies. But would they really have it in them to kill kids?

I asked where they usually congregated and was given a couple of addresses, Yazmin taking two of my Marlboro's as compensation. She was a good lass, and I was pleased to be working with her, even if the coppers weren't all too pleased to be working with me.

It wasn't time to hunt down hippies yet though, I had barely finished my first half when I was taken away from it, and now I could enjoy it in the right clothes, with the right tobacco; I needed other leads, I didn't want to just end up blaming the kids.

Back in The Marsh & Bottle Margaret seemed to have picked up, swapping out her G&Ts for a pint of water. No idea where Bux had gone. I sat near her and ordered another half. I'd be bankrupt by the end of the week.

She still floated between states of well-tempered alcoholism. The proper drunks know how to manage all the kinds of depression, the flavours of it. Margaret had the countenance of a woman tired with the dead. The dead, after all, are the most needy of us all.

Lucy, bless her, brought my Daily Star back over. I had left it for whoever next wanted to read it. Small kindnesses. I flipped through the pages and found nothing of note, making sure Margaret could see the front page.

"Was she any good?" She eventually asked, ordering herself a pickled onion to finally quash the haze.

"Violet hair? Tall?" She nodded, "Yeah, pretty good. Too chipper."

"I don't understand it nowadays. Not enough jobs for pathologist so all the kids go and learn it. They complain there aren't any jobs so we all have to run freelance placement schemes." Her accent was southerly, pronounced, grumbling like an old tractor engine, fuelled with champagne, "Bloody stupid. Barely pay them minimum wage. Chipper you say?"

"I think she just likes the dead."

"You have to." She went to shake my hand, "Margaret Umberwood. Came out here so my job would be easier, five fucking bodies over night. I give up. The dead haunt us better every day. I'm sure they take night classes."

"Get you a drink?" I asked.

"Best not. I am sure I'll see you around. I'll tell the youngster she did alright." She stood up, "Bow Street Runner in bloody Thorngumbald. I've seen it all."

"I hate that term."

"Get used to it." She patted me on the back and thanked Lucy, before grabbing a furred hat and thick coat from the hooks by the door, "They call me Undertaker."

I was already fitting in too well; they talked to me like a local already. Damn. I went to sip my pint when the smell of Bux approached, "Yer know, there's a cat the size of a Ford Escort in Goxhill!"