Stolen. Paul Finch

long appraising stare.

      ‘I wonder, DC Clayburn, if you’ve actually verified yet whether any of those missing pooches marry up with any of those in my kennels … or are you just guessing that’s the case? Because if it’s the latter, bad luck.’ He laughed again. ‘And to pre-empt your next dumbfuck question … no, I don’t own a black transit van. I’ve got three vehicles, and I’ve got documents for all of them. But don’t bother looking around my place for this mythical black van, because you’ll just make bigger arses of yourselves than you already have.’

      DI Stan Beardmore, Lucy’s divisional supervisor, was an easy-going guy in his mid-fifties, short and squat, with a head of neat, snow-white hair, and a habit of wearing shabby tweed jackets over his smart shirts and ties. At present he looked nonplussed.

      ‘I don’t understand the problem,’ he said. ‘The bastard’s coughed to everything.’

      ‘Trouble is, he’s right, isn’t he?’ Lucy replied from the other side of the connecting office between Custody and the front desk. She whipped a folded print-out from the back pocket of her jeans. ‘I’ve got a whole raft of animals here that aren’t accounted for.’

      ‘Lucy, they’re just dogs. We’ve got a longer list of missing people who we haven’t even got time to look for.’

      ‘That’s not the point.’ She shook her head. ‘We’ve got enough to charge him with the dog-fighting stuff. But unless we can hit him with a decent theft charge too, he’ll get a tap on the wrist and then go home laughing.’

      ‘He had one or two pedigrees in his collection, didn’t he?’

      ‘Yes, but I’ve already checked and none of those marry up with anything registered as missing.’ She spread her paperwork on the desk and indicated a section that she’d previously drawn a square around in biro. It contained printed details, and a poor-quality black-and-white photo of a fluffball dog. ‘I was hoping to find this one, at least. Petra. A dyed-pink Toy Poodle, she disappeared two months ago from a back garden in Cotely Barn. Her owner reported a mysterious black van in the vicinity that evening.’

      Beardmore rolled his eyes.

      ‘The point is that Petra originally cost her owner £650 when first purchased,’ Lucy said.

      ‘She definitely wasn’t in Mahoney’s kennels?’ Beardmore asked.

      ‘I think we’d know if we’d found a dyed-pink poodle.’

      ‘What about that shed where the dead ones were?’

      Lucy shook her head, grim-faced. ‘She wasn’t there either. There’s another thing though. When Petra went missing, she was wearing a pink leather collar with diamond studs in it … that alone was worth two thousand quid. Ridiculous expenditure on a dog, I know. But if we could do Mahoney for that, he’d get a few extra months, if nothing else.’

      ‘And would it be worth it? For a few extra months?’

      Lucy shook her head. ‘Stan … if you’d been there. If you’d seen what we saw …’

      ‘Okay, I know, I know.’ He looked frustrated. ‘I agree it’s a bag of shit … a bastard like Mahoney deserves the book throwing at him. He’d go down for five years if it was up to me. But we don’t make the law, Lucy. We just enforce it.’

      ‘I need something else. That jewelled collar at least—’

      ‘Excuse me, DC Clayburn,’ a voice interrupted. ‘There’s someone to see you out front.’

      It was Daisy Dobson, one of the civilian employees who worked the station’s front desk. She was a tall, statuesque girl, with a mess of blonde hair and a permanently sour countenance. She might still have made a good impression in her smart shell-blue uniform, but she was also in the habit of chewing gum noisily. She stood impatiently awaiting a response.

      ‘Is it important, Daisy?’ Lucy asked. ‘Only … I’ve got a whole raft of prisoners.’

      Daisy chomped on but didn’t move away. ‘I don’t know whether it’s important or not.’

      ‘In that case get rid of them,’ Beardmore replied. ‘We’re busy.’

      ‘It’s a nun,’ Daisy said.

      ‘A nun …?’ Fleetingly, Beardmore was lost for words.

      ‘That’s right, sir,’ Daisy replied. ‘A proper one. With all the gear on.’

      Beardmore recovered himself. ‘Get rid of her politely then. We’re still busy.’

      ‘It’s all right,’ Lucy said, knowing who this caller would be. She folded her paperwork and slid it back into her pocket. ‘I’ll go through. She’s not a real nun. I mean, she was a real nun once. Well, a sister rather than a nun. Anyway, she’s neither now, because … well, it’s a long story.’

      Beardmore was blank-faced. ‘Are we talking some kind of crackpot?’

      ‘That’s the problem.’ Lucy headed to the door. ‘With Sister Cassiopeia, you’re never quite sure.’

       Chapter 3

      Sister Cassiopeia, or Sister Cassie as she was better known, was seated on one of the benches in the waiting room. Given the lateness of the hour, she was there alone, but she’d have stood out even in a riotous crowd.

      She wasn’t particularly tall, perhaps five-foot-seven, and never wore makeup, but she possessed a natural elfin beauty, a shadow of which remained even now, in her forties and after much hardship. She was thin, these days, rather than slim, but who wouldn’t be after living on the streets for a time, and yet her distinctive female shape remained visible, in fact was almost accentuated by her monastic clothing: the long black habit and brown scapular, the white wimple, black cloak and black veil. It was only when you were close to her, and the odour of her rank, unwashed clothes reached you, or when you noticed the patches, and the ragged hems of her skirts, and the mud spattered up them, that you realised there was a problem here. By then it probably wouldn’t surprise you to learn that if her arms were ever exposed, you’d see patterns of needle tracks.

      ‘Lucy, my child,’ she said in her soft Irish accent. She got up and crossed the room, her ever-present satchel swinging by its shoulder strap. As usual, she seemed remarkably energised for such a scarecrow of a person. ‘My, my … you’ve all been very naughty, this time, haven’t you?’

      ‘Oh … have we?’ Lucy replied.

      Sister Cassie eyed Daisy Dobson with undisguised irritation. The big blonde girl, still noisily chewing, stood behind the desk openly and unashamedly eavesdropping. ‘May we speak somewhere a little more private, child?’

      Lucy nodded. ‘I think we’d better.’

      She led the ex-nun to a side-door, tapped in the combination and diverted her towards one of the station’s non-custodial interview rooms. ‘I have to tell you, though,’ she said over her shoulder, ‘I haven’t got a lot of time.’

      ‘Well, that’s always the problem,’ Sister Cassie replied, following her in, unhooking her cloak and seating herself rather primly in an armchair. ‘We’re all rushed off our feet these days.’ Then she became stern. ‘But I do think these disappearances are getting a little out of hand.’

      Lucy sat in the facing chair, which thankfully was several feet away. Sister Cassie attended to her own hygiene as much as any homeless drug-addict could be expected to, regularly using the showers available in the shelters, but she also insisted on wearing this ancient religious garb of hers, which, by the look and stink of it, probably hadn’t been laundered in two decades or more.

      Lucy shrugged. ‘Sister … we’re looking into these pet abductions as part of a larger operation …’

      ‘Pet