Dead Man's Time

down.
    *
    Such a man, right now, was sitting in his car, in front of an antiques shop that specialized in fireplaces, opposite the gates of a smart town-house development in the centre of
Brighton.
    He had a grudge against one particular Sussex Police officer, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace.
    The cop’s baby was in there, in the third house on the left. He’d obtained plans of the house from the Planning Office where they were filed in the original building application,
fifteen years ago, to turn the old warehouse into a courtyard development of seven town houses.
    The baby would sleep in the tiny room opposite, with the window overlooking the courtyard.
    But what interested him most of all right now was an estate agent’s sign, fixed to the wall to the right of the wrought-iron gates to the courtyard, advertising, TOWN
HOUSE TO RENT .
    What fun to be Roy Grace’s neighbour. And how convenient?
    He’d be able to watch every movement. And bide his time.
    Happy days again!

10
    Two hours after first entering Ralph Meeks’ flat, Susi Holiday and Dave Roberts were back out on the streets of Brighton in their patrol car. Susi drove. She loved her
job. Hunting was what she liked to call it, all the time they weren’t actually on a
shout
– as calls to incidents were known colloquially.
    Dave, at forty-six, was one of the oldest PCs on the unit. Response was considered a young person’s game, and it could at times be extremely physical – intervening in violent
domestic fights, pub brawls and chasing after robbers and burglars. But he’d been on this unit for twenty years and had no interest in promotion and the desk work that would involve, or in
any other area of policing.
    If anyone were to ask him what he most loved about his job, he would have replied that it was never knowing what was going to happen in five minutes’ time. That, and ripping through the
city on blues and twos, which almost every police officer with a Pursuit Driving ticket he had ever talked to admitted was one of the greatest kicks of the job.
    They were driving up North Street towards the Clock Tower, one of the city’s most prominent landmarks. Watching the faces of people meandering along the pavements on both sides of the
road, recognizing the occasional villain among the crowds. And all the time monitoring their radios, clipped below their shoulders. Waiting for the next shout from the Control Room.
    It was coming up to midday, on a fine late August Thursday morning. They’d started their shift at 7 a.m. and would be on until 4 p.m. So far they’d attended a call to a potential
firearms incident up at Brighton Racecourse, which had turned out to be a man shooting rabbits. That had been followed by a rip across the city to attend a collision between a motor scooter and a
bin lorry, which had, fortunately, been less serious than it had sounded. Then another shout to attend a report of a woman screaming for help. Which had turned out to be an infant having a tantrum.
Then the Ralph Meeks G5.
    For the past thirty minutes all had been quiet. They were thinking about returning to John Street police station to eat their packed lunches, have a comfort break and fill in the paperwork on
Meeks.
    ‘What are your plans for the weekend?’ Dave Roberts asked Susi. They crewed together regularly and got on well.
    ‘Going to the Albion with James,’ she said. ‘You?’
    ‘It’s Maxim’s fifteenth birthday on Saturday,’ he replied. ‘Marilyn and I are taking him and some of his friends for fish and chips on the pier – to the Palm
Court. Best fish and chips in Brighton!’
    ‘Tiffany going, too?’
    Tiffany was his teenage daughter.
    As he was about to reply, their radios crackled into life.
    ‘Charlie Romeo Zero Three?’
    ‘Yes, yes, Charlie Romeo Zero Three,’ Dave answered.
    ‘Charlie Romeo Zero Three, we’ve a call from a concerned individual. A man who normally speaks to his elderly sister every day. Says he’s not been able to reach her for two
days. He’s out of the country, otherwise he would have gone round to check on her himself. Her name is Aileen McWhirter. The address is 146 Withdean Road, Brighton. Please check this out,
Grade Two.’
    All Control Room calls were graded One to Four.
Grade One
was immediate response, with a target time of within fifteen minutes.
Grade Two
was prompt response, with a target
time of within one hour.
Grade Three
was a planned response, by appointment, which could