told you, Guv, I’m not convinced,’ said Sam. ‘That bomb in the toilet – it was a message of some kind. It meant something. It was more symbolic than a genuine threat.’
‘Unlike this,’ snapped Gene, raising a balled fist in front of Sam’s face.
Sam ignored him and carried on: ‘And what about the red hand painted on the wall, and the letters RHF?’
‘And what about the report I found on my desk this morning from Bomb Disposal?’ countered Gene. ‘They’ve examined the explosives from the khazi and confirmed it’s a classic bit of IRA kit.’
‘Maybe it is,’ said Sam, shrugging. ‘But I’m still sceptical.’
‘I don’t care what you are,’ barked Gene. ‘I’m still head honcho round here and until you convince me otherwise I’m going to pursue this investigation on the not unreasonable assumption that it’s the Paddies we’re after and not the bloody RHF. What is the bloody RHF anyway, for God’s sake? Royal Horticultural Faggots?’
‘Red Hand something?’ suggested Annie, suddenly. ‘Just a guess. What do you reckon?’
‘Red Hand something – of course!’ cried Sam. ‘Of course!’
‘Red Hand something?’ said Gene, looking unimpressed. ‘So what’s the F stand for?’
‘I know what F stands for,’ put in Ray suddenly, sticking his head round the door and winking at Annie. He flapped a sheet of paper onto Gene’s desk. ‘Here you go, Guv. The Deerys’ address. Dowell Road on the other side of town.’
‘Nice work, Raymondo,’ said Gene. ‘Right, playmates, let’s start proving to Special Branch that we know how to behave like proper grown-up coppers. Annie, see if you can find out what the letter F stands for. It sounds like a task of about your level. Use Chris’s wooden bricks with the letters on ’em if it helps. Sam, you’re coming with me. We’re going to pop round the Deerys’ place and see if anything’s cooking.’
‘Want me to drive, Guv?’ Sam asked.
Gene looked blankly at him and said, ‘And why the hell would I want you to drive?’
‘Well, you know, seeing as you’ve … You’ve had a couple of, um …’
Sam was going to say something about the Scotch glass on Gene’s desk, then reminded himself that nobody gave a toss about that sort of thing, not here. There was some part of him, some corner of his brain, that would always be 2006, no matter how long he lived in 1973.
‘Sorry, Guv. Forget I said anything.’
‘I always do,’ said Gene, jangling his car keys and grabbing his coat.
They sat in the Cortina at the end of Dowell Road. Number 14, the home of Michael and Cait Deery, was a just another unremarkable semidetached among many, with a trim little garden and a Vauxhall Cresta parked in the driveway.
‘Are we going in?’ asked Sam.
Gene flexed his hand on the wheel, making the leather of his driving glove creak ominously.
‘Nope, we’re staying put,’ he said. ‘If the Deerys are middlemen in the IRA chain, let’s sit back and observe, just like the Home Office recommended. Sooner or later they’ll lead us to the terrorist cell they’re supplying.’
‘Guv, I know you’re not interested in this, but I don’t think what happened yesterday—’
‘—was the work of the IRA. I know, Sam. You think it was part of the Pinky Palm Brigade’s campaign against khazis. Maybe it was. Fact remains, our boys across the water have pissed rather too heavily in the hornets’ nest and stirred up trouble. If we can blag an IRA unit by trailing the Deerys, that scores me and my department a handful of much-needed Brownie points.’
‘Um, Guv, I didn’t quite follow all that. What did you mean about “pissing in the hornets’ nest”?’
Gene turned his head and stared at him, and then said, as if speaking to a deaf idiot, ‘Bloody. Sunday. You. Dozy. Pillock.’
Bloody Sunday. Of course. For Sam, Bloody Sunday was something very much from the past, like the Apollo moon landing or Blue Peter in black and white. But here, in the world of Gene Hunt, it was fresh news, a raw and open wound. In 1972 – only last year – the British Paras opened fire on a civil-rights march in … Belfast, was it? Or Ulster? Or Derry? Damn it, he couldn’t remember. Wherever it had taken place, it had left a dozen or more dead and brought the IRA right out on the offensive. The repercussions of ‘pissing in the hornets’ nest’ would still be reverberating in the far future – even in 2006, when a young detective from CID, recently recovered from a life-threatening accident that had left him in a coma, would inexplicably jump from a rooftop to his death.
Sam shook these thoughts from his head. He was here now – in 1973 – with a job to do, a duty to fulfil, a life to lead. The future was history. All that mattered was the here and now.
‘You know, Sam,’ said Gene, ‘now we’ve got a cosy moment together, just the two of us, I’d like to have a little chat with you about summat.’
‘Yes, Guv?’
‘I was thinking about what you said the other day in the pub, about the way I handle cases. You said I was irresponsible. You said I treated the job like a game.’
‘What I said, Guv … What I meant was that I was brought up with a very different approach to policing than you. I was taught – and I’ve always believed – that the rules of conduct and behaviour laid down for us aren’t there to make our job difficult or give villains the opportunity to get off the hook. Those rules are there because they’re right, and they’re fair, and they stop people getting killed.’
‘Go on, Tyler, I’m listening.’
‘I know it sounds poncy to you, Guv, but if the police don’t play by the rules what’s the point? We might as well bring back lynch mobs and string fellas up in the street just because they come across as wrong ’uns.’
‘And you wouldn’t go for that, then?’
‘Would you?’
Gene thought for a moment, then said, ‘Depends on whose feet end up dangling. I can think of some right naughty boys I wouldn’t shed no tears over.’
‘You’re just saying that, Guv. You don’t really believe it. Look, the point I was making is that I don’t want to end up dead, any more than you do, or Chris or Ray or any of us. And, as much as it offends your freewheeling sensibilities, Gene, I think that sticking to the rules – at least, to the spirit of the rules – is the best way of keeping us alive. We’re not here to take undue risks, we’re not here to dish out justice from the end of a gun, and we’re certainly not here to make ourselves feel more like real men.’
‘That’s what you think I’m about, is it?’ Gene asked, without sarcasm. He seemed to genuinely want to know. ‘You think I’m trying to prove something?’
‘Sometimes, Guv, yes.’
Gene
