Strangers. Paul Finch

both as bad as each other. Every time you have a drink, you have a fight, usually over nothing … and you wake the whole neighbourhood up. And it’s not just every Friday and Saturday. Now it seems it’s weekdays too.’ She glanced at Rob. ‘And what’ve you got to say for yourself? And don’t give me some bollocks excuse about kids’ cartoons!’

      Rob regarded her hollow-eyed. ‘She’s right. I need locking up. Even if she withdraws her complaint, you can do that, can’t you? You said that last time.’

      ‘That’s right, Rob … but this isn’t a straightforward assault, is it? You’re going to need at least as many stitches as she is. Your brief’ll have a field day. Unless I lock you both up, of course.’ Lucy knuckled her chin. ‘I could charge you both with wounding, breach of the peace, causing damage to council property … that might get a result.’

      ‘Both of us?’ Rob looked startled.

      ‘Both of us?’ Dora echoed, as if this had never been part of the plan.

      ‘It’s the age of equal opportunities, love,’ Lucy replied. ‘Spousal abuse works both ways these days.’

      Dora’s mouth slackened into another bewildered gape.

      ‘Course,’ Lucy added, ‘ultimately, it’d be a waste of all our time, wouldn’t it? Not to mention expensive … when what you really need is to go and get some counselling.’ She stepped across the wreckage-strewn room, and took a framed photo from the cluttered mantelpiece. It depicted a little blond boy, smiling happily despite his missing front teeth. ‘When Bobbie died, it changed everything for you two, didn’t it?’

      Rob slumped onto the couch. He shook a can, sipped out a last dreg and discarded it onto the floor. ‘I can’t remember a time before that,’ he said.

      ‘You need to try,’ Lucy replied.

      In response, he reached into a carrier bag next to the couch, took out a fresh can and ripped it open.

      ‘What do you mean counselling?’ Dora asked.

      ‘Grief counselling,’ Lucy said. ‘Look, I know Bobbie’s death changed your lives, Dora, because I never had to come here in the middle of the night before then. But it’s five years ago, love. And it’s still tearing you apart. So you need some professional help. There’s something else. You need to stop hitting the pop.’ She snatched the can from Rob’s grasp and placed it on the mantel. ‘You can get some help for that too … but you’ve got to want it first.’

      Rob gazed blearily up at her. ‘So … I’m not getting locked up?’

      He seemed puzzled rather than relieved, though perhaps now that he’d calmed down a little, it was dawning on him that the advantages of being allowed to sleep in his own bed outweighed the disadvantages of being cooped up in a vomit-stained police cell.

      ‘That depends.’ Lucy indicated the broken door. ‘What about this?’

      ‘Suppose I can fix it.’

      ‘Definitely?’

      ‘Yeah.’

      ‘When?’

      ‘Soon as I get round to it.’

      ‘Not good enough, Rob. I’m back on duty tomorrow afternoon. I’ll make this my first port of call. Will it be fixed by then?’

      ‘Yeah.’

      ‘Sure? Stare me in the eye and say it.’

      ‘Yeah,’ he said again, though he looked too haggard to be totally convincing.

      ‘Okay …’ Lucy pondered. ‘Before I leave here, I want a solemn promise from you two jokers that, for the rest of tonight … no, let’s not cheapen it … for the rest of this year, I won’t get a call-back to this address.’

      ‘Promise,’ Dora said quietly.

      Rob nodded again.

      ‘You have to get some help, you understand?’

      ‘Yeah,’ he said.

      Lucy knew they wouldn’t. It might be all quiet now, but in a few days’ time tempers would flare again over something completely ridiculous. The Hallams were too stuck in this rut, too damaged by events, too drunk on misery and hopelessness to effect any kind of change in their own fortunes. For anyone to keep proceeding down a dark, dank tunnel there had to be at least a flicker of light at the end. But in truth, Lucy didn’t really care a great deal. She couldn’t afford to. At times she was so tired out by these mini disasters in the lives of others that all she wanted to do was shut them down any way she could, even if it was only temporarily.

      ‘Alright …’ She put her radio to her lips. ‘1485 to Three, receiving?’

      ‘Go ahead, Lucy,’ Comms crackled back.

      ‘Yeah, I’m finished at Clapgate Lane. No offences revealed. All parties advised, over.’

       ‘Roger, thanks for that.’

      ‘That was so cool,’ Peabody said, as they climbed back into the panda.

      ‘Cool?’

      ‘The way you defused that situation.’

      ‘It defused itself.’ She put the car in gear. ‘They were too knackered to keep fighting.’

      ‘Yeah, but we could’ve locked them both up. Plenty of reason. Instead, you calmed it down, had a few words, put them right, spared them a difficult time …’

      ‘And saved us a raft of paperwork.’ Lucy drove them away from the kerb. ‘That was my main motivation.’

      Peabody chuckled. ‘Can’t fool me. You just didn’t want to bring any more crap down on them … you’re getting soft-hearted in your old age.’

      He was a rangy, raw-boned lad, red-haired and freckled, and to an outsider his tone might have seemed a tad impertinent given that Lucy was a ten-year veteran of the job and he’d only been in it a few months, but a few months on the beat in a town like Crowley counted for a lot. Even a few days spent side-by-side on the frontline could bond coppers together like no other job outside the military.

      ‘Well …’ Lucy swung them towards the south end of the estate. ‘It’s not like they haven’t had a lot to deal with.’

      ‘What happened to the kiddie, anyway?’

      ‘Run over.’

      ‘Christ!’

      ‘On the way home from school. Horseplay with his mates … ends up stepping off the pavement in front of a bus.’

      ‘Sounds messy …’

      ‘It was.’

      ‘You were there?’

      ‘First responder. But there was nothing anyone could do. After that, I had to deliver the death message.’ She sighed. ‘Not among my favourite memories.’

      Before Peabody could say more, the air was shattered by a burst of static from the radio.

       ‘November Three to all units, urgent message … female reported under attack in the telephone kiosk at the top end of Darthill Road. Anyone to attend, over!’

      ‘1485 and 9993 en route from Hatchwood Green!’ Peabody shouted as Lucy spun the car in a U-turn and blazed back across the housing estate, activating the blues and twos as she did.

      They were three miles from Darthill Road, which ran from top to bottom of a steep hill; on its south side it was lined by houses but on its north it gave way to arid spoil-land. As such, there was only one real approach to it, but other patrols had been closer and by the time Lucy and Peabody arrived at the phone-box, Sergeant Robertson in the Area Car had got there ahead of them. A Traffic unit was also in attendance, alongside