The Cold, Cold Ground

three of you,” he said stiffly, not liking my tone at all.
    “Can I put in a secondment request for a couple of constables f—”
    “No, you cannot! We’re tighter than a choir boy’s arse around here. You’ve got your team and that’s your lot. In case you hadn’t noticed, mate, civil war is a bloody heartbeat away, après nous the friggin flood, we are the little Dutch boys with our fingers in the dyke, we are the … the, uh …”
    “Thin blue line, sir?”
    “The thin blue line! Exactly!”
    He poked me in the middle of Che’s face. “And until the hunger strikes are over, matey-boy, you’ll get no help from Belfast either. But you can handle it, can’t you, Detective Sergeant Duffy?”
    “Yes sir, I can handle it.”
    “Aye, you better or I’ll bloody get somebody who can.”
    He yawned, tired out by his own bluster. “Well, I’ll leave this in your capable hands, then. I have a feeling this one is not going to cover us in glory, but we have to file them all.”
    “That we do, sir.”
    “All right then.”
    Brennan waved and walked back to his Ford Granada parked behind the police Land Rover. When the Granada had gone, I called Matty over.
    “What do you make of it?” I asked him.
    Matty McBride was a twenty-three-year-old second-gen cop from East Belfast. He was a funny-looking character with his curly brown hair, pencil thin body, flappy ears. He was little was Matty, maybe five five. Wee and cute. He was wearing latex gloves and his nose was red, giving him a slight evil-clown quality. He’d joined the peelers right out of high school and was obviously smart enough to have gotten himself into CID but still, I had grave doubts about his focus and attention to detail. He hada dreamy side. He wasn’t fussy or obsessed, which was a severe handicap in an FO. And when I had politely suggested that he look into the part-time degrees in Forensic Science at the Open University, Matty had scoffed at the very notion. He was young, though, perhaps he could be moulded yet.
    “Informer? Loyalist feud? Something like that?” Matty suggested.
    “Aye, my take too. Do you think they shot him here?”
    “Looks like it.”
    “March him out here and then chop his paw off with him screaming for all and sundry?”
    Matty shrugged. “Ok, so they killed him somewhere else.”
    “But if they did that, why do you think they carried the body all the way over here from the road?”
    “I don’t know,” Matty said wearily.
    “It was to display him, Matty. They wanted him found quickly.”
    Matty grunted, unwilling to buy into the pedagogical nature of our relationship.
    “Have you done the hair samples, prints?” I asked.
    “Nah, I’ll do all that once I’m done with the photos.”
    “Who’s our patho?”
    “Dr Cathcart.”
    “Is he good?”
    “She. Cathcart’s a she.”
    I raised my eyebrows. I hadn’t heard of a female patho before.
    “She’s not bad,” Matty added.
    We stood there looking into the burnt-out car listening to the rain pitter-patter on the rusted roof.
    “I suppose I better get back to it,” Matty said.
    “Aye,” I agreed.
    “Is the cavalry coming down from Belfast at all?” Matty asked as he took more pictures.
    I shook my head. “Nah, just you and me, mate. Cosier that way.”
    “Jesus, I have to do this all by myself?” Matty protested.
    “Get plod and sod over there to help you,” I said.
    Matty seemed sceptical. “Them boys aren’t too brilliant at the best of times. Question for ya: skipper says to go easy on the old snaps. Do you need close-ups? If not I’ll skip them.”
    “Go easy on the snaps? Why?”
    “The expense, like, you know? Two pound for every roll we process. And it’s just a topped informer, isn’t it?”
    I was annoyed by this. It was typical of the RUC to waste millions on pointless new equipment that would rot in warehouses but pinch pennies in a homicide investigation.
    “Take as many rolls of film as you like. I’ll bloody pay for it. A man has been murdered here!” I said.
    “All right, all right! No need to shout,” Matty protested.
    “And get that evidence lifted before the rain washes it all away. Get those empty suits to help you.”
    I buttoned my coat and turned up the collar. The rain was heavier now and it was getting cold.
    “You could stay and help if you want, I’ll give you some latex gloves,” Matty said.
    I tapped the side of my head.
    “I’d love to help, mate, but I’m an ideas man, I’d be no use