Like This, for Ever

standing on it. Windows of the buildings that lined the river were awash with faces.
    In the forty-five minutes since Peter Sweep had posted on Facebook that Oliver Kennedy was dangling from Southwark Bridge, the news had spread round London like a contagious and particularly unpleasant rash.
    ‘It’s sodding mental,’ the chief press officer at New Scotland Yard had told Dana ten minutes earlier when she’d spoken to him on the phone. ‘I’ve counted three broadcast crews already and more will be on their way. Just do what you have to do and let us know when you have something to give us. We’ll try and keep the feeding frenzy off your back.’
    Mark had a baseball cap pulled low over his face and a scarf tied high around his neck. He’d spent his career infiltrating criminal gangs. If his face became known, even appeared once on television,that would come to a sharp end. He was risking a great deal, just by being here. In the cabin below, his uncle, Sergeant Fred Wilson, was at the helm and Neil Anderson and Susan Richmond were standing in frosty silence. As they neared the bridge, a tall man in uniform joined Dana and Mark on the flybridge. Chief Inspector David Cook was the officer in charge of the Metropolitan Police’s Marine Unit. He’d known Mark since he was a child.
    ‘The lad’s on a ledge about twenty feet above river level,’ he told them. ‘He’s in some sort of black bag, possibly a heavy-duty bin-liner. It’s difficult to see in the dark, but my lads have been under there already with binoculars and lights, so we know it’s there.’
    ‘What happened to dangling by the ankles?’ asked Mark.
    ‘Poetic licence on our friend’s part, thank God,’ said Dana.
    ‘There,’ said Cook as the boat reached the shadowed water beneath the bridge and slowed. ‘Count along four of those vertical iron struts, starting at the pillar. About twenty feet above the water.’
    ‘OK,’ said Mark.
    ‘Go directly up for about three feet, and you should just be able to make out a dark shadow. That’s it.’
    The boat passed under the bridge and the three of them looked up. A dark, shapeless mass was all Dana could make out.
    ‘How the hell did he get it up there?’ asked Mark.
    Once on the other side, Fred turned the launch towards the south bank. From overhead came the sound of a helicopter.
    ‘I hope to God that’s one of ours,’ said Cook, glancing up.
    ‘I didn’t call one,’ said Dana. ‘I think we can assume it’s not.’
    ‘Friggin’ circus,’ said Cook.
    ‘I think the question is, how did it get down there?’ Dana said to Mark. ‘David thinks it was swung on a rope and dropped from above. There might be something attached to the bag to help it snag, but basically it was touch and go whether it would catch on something or just go tumbling down into the water.’
    ‘So what’s the plan?’
    ‘The plan is to send a climber up to release it and lower it down to us,’ said Dana. ‘We’re just going to pick up and brief Spiderman, apparently.’
    Mark did his one-eyebrow trick. ‘Who else?’ he said.
    ‘Spiderman’s the nickname of our best climber,’ said Cook. ‘Young officer, not been with us long. Bit of a loose cannon, just between us, but he got his name for a reason.’
    ‘He didn’t meet us at Wapping because no one ever knows what bed he’s going to be sleeping in,’ said Dana. ‘There’s a list of young women police officers and the team have to go through them systematically. It takes a while.’
    ‘He answered his mobile on the first call and he’s on his way,’ said Cook. ‘He’s a complete teetotaller so we never have to worry about calling him out. He’s the right man for the job, Dana. That’s a tricky climb, it’s dark and it’s wet. If the kid were definitely dead, we’d be taking much more time to prepare. Possibly even waiting till morning. If I send a less experienced climber up, there’s every chance he’ll slip.’
    ‘And you don’t want footage of one of your officers dangling in mid-air from Southwark Bridge while the world waits for us to bring down a child’s body,’ said Mark. ‘The man’s got a point, Tully.’
    ‘He’s arrived, Sir,’ Fred called from below. ‘He’s just kitting up.’
    ‘I’m rather curious to meet this bloke,’ said Mark. ‘Must get his autograph for Huck when it’s all over.’
    When this was all over, they’d be transporting the body of a child exactly Huck’s age to the mortuary and