Ten Days. Gillian Slovo

6. 15,’ she heard, ‘and the temperature in London continues to climb.’

       1.45 p.m.

      All Joshua had to do was ask for coffee and it would be instantly supplied. But hours of speed-reading through seemingly unending piles of urgent for-his-eyes-only documents made him want a short break, and, as well, it would be good for him to be sighted by some of the thousands who worked in the building, especially on his first day.

      He made his way down the corridor, reaching the lift just as the door began to glide shut. The policeman inside the lift jabbed at a button and the door slid open.

      ‘That’s all right, officer. I’ll take the stairs.’ As Joshua turned away, he took with him a frozen image of the man’s rictus grin.

      He pushed through the swing doors and made his way down, two steps at a time, to the senior canteen on the third floor.

      It was a quiet room, and luxurious, its windows lining the whole of one wall to look out on the Thames, and with plush tables and chairs that wouldn’t have been out of place in a five-star restaurant. Another of his predecessor’s extravagances, although, from what he’d read that morning, a comparatively small one. Even so, given the dire state of the Met’s finances, it would have to go.

      No need, anyway, for silver service, especially when all you were after was a coffee. ‘No, thanks,’ he told the waiter who was bent on ushering him to the Commissioner’s special table, ‘I’ll get it myself.’

      There was a queue by the takeaway counter, which evaporated at his approach. ‘Go ahead,’ he said to an officer who should have been in front of him, but she smiled and slunk away.

      ‘Coffee,’ he said. ‘Strong and black,’ and when the woman behind the counter reached for a cup from above the coffee machine, he added, ‘Takeaway.’

      ‘We can easily fetch the cup, sir. When you’re done.’

      ‘I’ve no doubt that you can. But why should you have to? A paper cup will do.’

      Although she had a state-of-the-art espresso machine, the coffee she poured into the Styrofoam cup smelt stale. Still, she made it strong to suit his taste.

      ‘Thanks. How much is that?’

      ‘Oh no, sir, you don’t need to pay.’

      ‘Yes,’ he said, thinking that this was another thing he was going to have to change, ‘yes, I do.’

      Turning to leave, he saw his deputy, Anil Chahda, sitting at a corner table with what looked to be half of the senior management team. They were clearly well settled in, the table littered with empty plates.

      By the way they were sitting and not talking, he knew they must have been watching him. Probably thought he should have lunched with them. And also bought them lunch.

      Well, they needed to start thinking differently.

      He nodded in response to Chahda’s dipped head.

      One of the group, a man he didn’t recognise, perhaps someone on secondment, lifted up his cup and called, ‘Why not come and join us, sir?’

      It was a friendly gesture, especially from a group who must have expected him to have them in first thing – something that he had decided against doing.

      He knew he should go over now. But his pile of reading beckoned, and he could do without the discomfort of sitting amongst them and not giving away his plan to prune the team.

      ‘I must get back,’ he said.

      Silence – although he could feel all eyes on him – as he made his way across the room. He pushed the door.

      ‘Stuck-up twat,’ he heard as he went out.

      If that was the best they could come up with, they wouldn’t be giving him any trouble. Smiling, he held his cup aloft as he climbed the stairs, two at a time again, and soon was back in the cool solitude of his grand domain.

       2 p.m.

      After Cathy got off the bus, she felt the sun so hot she knew it would soon burn through the white cheesecloth of her loose shirt. She pulled up her collar to protect the back of her neck and walked down Rockham High Street, feeling the hem of her long skirt fluttering against her ankles and hearing her sandals slapping against the pavement.

      Every door on the High Street was open and every shopkeeper out on the pavement on boxes or fold-out chairs, and although they were normally a garrulous bunch they now sat silently, as if the humidity and the traffic fumes had drained them of all life.

      Her route took her past Rockham police station, a fortified brick one-storey in the midst of run-down shops. They’d tried to pretty it up by grassing the front and then ruined the effect by planting an oversize ‘Welcome to Rockham Police Station’ noticeboard on the lawn. Now a couple of workmen were levering out this board while a third was up a ladder manoeuvring a CCTV camera. The sight perplexed her. Were they shutting the police station, as it was rumoured they planned eventually to do, even before the Lovelace had come down?

      ‘That’s it.’ The men prised the sign from its chained surrounds. They dropped it in the midst of glass that, once a protection against the elements, was now littering the lawn. That’s when Cathy saw that someone had graffitied on the sign, so that it now read: ‘Welcome to Wreck’em Police Station’.

      ‘Witty,’ Cathy said.

      ‘Think so, do you?’ One of the men shot her a dirty look.

      There was a new sign on the edge of the lawn near Cathy, which the men went to fetch. It was clearly very heavy. As they turned, one of them stumbled. The sign teetered. Without thinking, Cathy put out a hand to stop it falling.

      ‘Keep off,’ one of the men yelled. Seeing how she jumped, he lowered his voice. ‘Didn’t mean to frighten you. It’s this paint, you see. It’s AI – Anti Interference. Dyes your hand.’ He used a forearm to wipe away the perspiration that, having collected on his forehead, was beginning to drip down. ‘Not that you’d know you’d been marked, not until they flash you with an infrared gun and your hand lights up like it’s Christmas. Sticks to your skin for a week – fuck knows what chemicals have ate into you in the meantime. No washing it off neither. That’s why we’re wearing gloves in this fucking heat.’

      ‘What happens if somebody touches it by mistake?’

      ‘No chance of that. We’re gonna glass it in and then embed the post in concrete – the lawn is history. And after that we’ll fence the lot in.’

      ‘That’s overkill, isn’t it?’

      ‘You think so? It’s the badlands around here, and from what we’ve heard it’s only going to get badder.’ He grimaced. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, we have to get on.’

      She left them to it, walking along the High Street until she turned off to go down the market. There the ice was melting almost as fast as the fishmongers could lay it down, so that water was dripping off the trays onto the pavement and into the gutters, flavouring the air with the stink of fish. Careful to hold her skirt up, she stepped onto the pavement and kept going, passing a pound shop, one of three along the parade. She stopped by a display of plastic boxes of various sizes, and mops and brooms that had spilt out onto the pavement and almost into the road.

      ‘Jayden?’

      Jayden, who had been picking up the fallen brooms, looked up. A taciturn boy, he nodded to her.

      ‘You were out early this morning.’

      He shrugged and said something that sounded like ‘I dunno.’

      ‘Not at school?’

      He shook his head and didn’t speak, but whether this was because he was truanting and didn’t want to say so, or because he couldn’t summon up the energy for an explanation, she couldn’t tell.