Time: three and a quarter hours later
Context: [previously classified - original classification level withheld]
‘And that’s the truth. A complete run down of what went on at his house. I swear.’
She releases the button on the side of the radio microphone and lets it drop to her lap. A thin black wire spirals over her left knee and into the console, low and dark behind the gear stick.
He is parked a few streets away, to where it has taken three uninterrupted minutes to paint a picture of how the early hours of Sunday unfolded after she’d left The Astoria. Now all she can do is wait for proof the device can receive as well as broadcast.
After abandoning him in the staff room that morning, she’d waited until their office was temporarily empty of others then declared that she was in need of some surveillance back-up. Obtaining no more than a grunted agreement, a quick phone call had secured them a couple of cars. Vehicle rostering is the responsibility of a modest Pakistani British man who, clearly, has retained a soft spot for her since she first rode shotgun during one of his watcher runs. For her part, she still values their chat that night as she’d tried to make sense of where she’d found herself working; also for his unflappable demeanour on the one occasion a sudden explosion of movement had been needed, before his team had settled back into further hours of tedium. No prima donna, she acknowledges she would struggle to operate full time in such cramped spaces, without sanitary facilities, all the while remaining unremarked by the world at large.
Ah yes, staying unobserved. Not quite what she’d managed last Wednesday near her boss’ open doorway was it? But on reflection, had she not got away lightly? Take the care with which she’d been removed from the corridor, plus Ella’s comment expressing regret that it was her of all the recent graduates who’d been caught. As merely one strand in a knot of bright young things, she can’t recall anything which might have caused her to be noticed by any of the more senior managers. Regardless, the experience had been heart-stopping. Even if the outcome, acquiring a confidante, should in future help counteract what was described to her as “the forces at work here which the two of us are going to keep a close eye on”.
Given the grief which has been dogging her, she can have no complaint that her overt reason for being out of the office this afternoon has yet to bear fruit. That said, they did have that one burst of activity when her target was seen leaving home.
Having arrived soonest, it was her friend who’d grabbed the best parking spot and established first view of the house. Within minutes, as she herself was still on approach, he called through that their person of interest was departing on foot.
|Okay. Time out. I know you’re beginning to fret that you aren’t getting descriptions or even names of all the characters, and you don’t understand everything that’s going on. Sounds like my world! The difference is you’ll get reveals at the end whereas, if the bomb goes off, we get our arses handed to us. So while I’m happy you’re following me around, until such time you score a job here you’re not authorised to spy a full face or anything which could allow someone to track us. Hopefully that’s a little clearer? Then let’s see how good you can be at the great game of Spot The Mole. Now, where were we? That’s right, the POI is disappearing on us ….|
As the only other officer, it fell to her to cover routes out of the area. Her detailed map knowledge suggested two options, equally likely. Obliged to plump for one, she cornered hard and accelerated. Seconds later, when he confirmed the actual direction of their prey, she had to accept that her guess was wrong.
Informed that the onus now rested on him alone, and with the thirty-something female he was staring at about to disappear, the young man drew out of his bay and went to follow. The woman strolled just twenty yards more before going into a shop, though seeking the next available space had him continue a short distance beyond. Never the most confident of city drivers, he was hoping to complete his reversing manoeuvre at only the second attempt when the quarry suddenly reappeared over his shoulder. Moments on, while he was still crunching an approximation of first gear, she entered another store. Hardly had he regained the spot and gone to readjust his mirror when yet again the figure manifested on the pavement, checked her watch and gazed up and down the roadway before turning towards home. This time she was moving swiftly. As a result he flung the transmitter sideways, barely registering that it had bounced from sight. Only after edging out did it dawn on him that the street was one-way and that, consequently, he must abandon the three-point turn he had just initiated. With a car sidling up behind, blinking orange light signalling its intention to replace him, he had little option but to ease forward, all the while trying to use his side mirrors for scraps of information. However, the object of their attentions immediately passed from view and it took a further minute for him to find somewhere new to pull in. With the hand-held well and truly wedged underneath the front passenger seat, tugging at the wire succeeded in stretching it badly. Only once he finally retrieved the unit did a strained-sounding young man get to confess all.
Gauging his mood following this harried account, she’d chosen not to let him know how concerned she was by his lengthy period of silence. Instead she drove straight to obtain a vantage point of the target returning to her house. The ensuing hour passed with customary torpor, awkward small talk between the two of them petering out to nothing more than minor adjustments to their respective positions. In the end it was sheer impatience which made her grab the mike and launch into her current attempt to smooth things over.
There has now been a pause of several seconds since she completed her monologue. Reaching down, she snatches up the radio once again.
‘For crying out loud. Don’t you think I’ve already copped enough from the others for deserting them in the club Saturday night? Plus the fact that by buggering off early I missed hearing Holloway spin his stuff.’
She manages to depress the small button a split second before exasperation overpowers her. The noise of her yell and both hands gesticulating furiously at the windscreen startles a passing au pair. Thankfully a glance is sufficient to reassure that the occupant of the car isn’t under attack, before a violently rocking pram reclaims the younger girl’s focus.
The reaction of the passer-by calms her instantly. Realising she needs to take a break from her stewing, she resolves to distract herself by absorbing her surroundings. Gawping up at the Westway flyover, she appreciates for the first time the extent to which the major arterial road dwarfs the residential area underneath. This northern end of W11 seems quite mixed to her; council flats jostling with terrace renovations; pockets of squalor increasingly bumping up against emerging signs of wealth.
It was in a pub just around the corner from here that, soon after arriving in the capital, fellow students had roared with laughter at her gushing about the table decorations – candle wax deliberately dripped down empty wine bottles to resemble garish-coloured gothic trees. Having never previously entertained the possibility that city slickers might view her as parochial, even now she feels somewhat put out by the reaction to her that night.
As she has also learned since moving south, Notting Hill is a district synonymous with its Carnival each August Bank Holiday. And for the reputation that, once night falls, celebrations can morph into trouble.
When first attending the festival, she’d had an incredible time. Wandering away from the crowds surrounding the parade of calypso floats she had run into numerous unofficial street parties. Chatting to the grandma of one family, she’d been astonished to hear how they would save up all year in order to rent a huge sound system which they’d then set up in their tiny front yard. Far and away the most popular music selections echoing around the neighbourhood were traditional dub and dancehall standards, often fused with contemporary raggamuffin beats or older Jamaican ska and rocksteady classics
|Bringing to mind me own childhood soaked in Northern Soul and Two Tone. Skank dancing alongside me teenage brother and getting booted into the back laneway each time little sister knocked over the framed photo|
That year she’d watched on amazed as, in minutes, a side-road gathering snowballed from half a dozen friends to a hundred or more exuberant dancers. Soon enough she was joining in, jumping onto low walls, rubbish skips or whatever else could double as a podium. Utter delight at discovering such benign anarchy was why she’d returned last year. And why she’d therefore found it so disconcerting to be caught up in the ensuing street violence.
After observing a skirmish between two youths, she had written this off as a random happening. However, from her elevated vantage point, she then started spotting handfuls of wannabe Yardies steaming through the dimming light, mugging passers-by or seemingly settling scores against individuals from rival gangs. While not trained in the same manner as the police, to her this had the look of orchestrated behaviour. With night falling, the mood of revelry swung between restless and antagonistic. Though she felt no particular trepidation, instinct had propelled her towards the periphery of the now-milling crowd when she spied a thin blue line of all-white Bobbies. Before long the mood had turned ugly, insults increasingly replaced by missiles hurled from behind the backs of those massing opposite. As the first snatch squads had stirred into action, she moved for the exit route which she’d reconnoitred earlier. Not until she’d returned to her apartment and switched on the all too familiar news footage of a riot in progress had she realised how fast things must have deteriorated.
҉
A crackle from the receiver yanks her back into the present.
Comments (0)
See all