Free Falling More Slowly by Peter Helton

unfortunate destruction of the Skoda by tomorrow. And for Pete’s sake make it sound good. In fact make its demise sound absolutely inevitable even to the Assistant Chief Constable’s ears!’ Of course the new DI wasn’t the only source of the superintendent’s black mood this morning. For the second time in a month the windows of his immaculate 4×4 had been plastered with mud, this time in a restaurant car park in the Old Town. The crudely made leaflet that came with it claimed that If the 4 × 4s won’t go to the country the country will come to the 4 × 4s . Scores of Land Cruisers, Jeeps and Freelanders had recently got the same treatment. Someone, probably one of the Saturday traffic protesters, was waging a low-level campaign against the city’s gas guzzlers but since no actual damage was being done no action had been taken. There was even a certain level of public support for the mud throwers, which in turn was branded ‘the politics of envy’ by the 4×4-driving camp. Denkhaus knew better than most how stretched their resources were, which infuriated him even more. These days you had to fling much harder stuff than mud to attract the attention of the force.
       
    ‘What have you got for me, Jane?’ Without stopping, McLusky called into the CID room by way of sharing around some of the pressure he suddenly felt.
    Austin hit the ground running. ‘Colin Keale, the pipe-bomb bloke: he boarded a plane to Dalaman airport in south-west Turkey at 22.50 two days ago, the night before the bomb. From here.’
    ‘That leaves him well in the frame. He could easily have planted the thing, with a timer, and then conveniently gone on holiday. As an alibi it won’t wash, I want him.’
    ‘We’re working on it. It was a flight-only deal, so he could be anywhere, but the neighbours think Marmaris.’
    ‘Okay, we’ll start by applying for a warrant to search his hole.’
    ‘Right. Witness statements from the park and the house-to-house are all on your desk.’ He no longer addressed McLusky as ‘sir’ but didn’t use his first name, not so soon, even though it had been offered, not within earshot of the others anyway. It was only his second day after all and Jack Sorbie had already ribbed him about ‘his new chum’. Your new chum’s getting a right bollocking from the super, mate .
    ‘And? Close the door, tell me about it.’ McLusky sank into the chair behind his desk for the first time. It hissed as air escaped from the faux leather upholstery and creaked metallically as he settled into it. He lit a cigarette and looked around for something to use as an ashtray.
    ‘Ehm, you know this building is no-smoking?’
    ‘Good for the building.’ He reached behind him and opened the window.
    ‘Seriously. Even the custody suite went no-smoking yesterday. There’s blokes over there screaming that it violates their human rights. They called for their solicitors. They’re going to sue us.’
    ‘No win no fag. I wish them luck. Let’s get on with it, Jane.’ He was suddenly not in the mood for banter.
    Jane didn’t blink. ‘Well, one woman witnessed a man plant the bomb and she recognized him. He’s been arrested and admitted everything.’
    ‘Very funny.’
    ‘We got a pile of statements. Looks like we have a lot ofleisured and/or retired people and quite a few homeworkers living in the streets bordering the park closest to the locus. Most people who were at home around the time of the bombing did look out of the window earlier because of a bloke on a motorized skateboard. Making a nuisance of himself going up and down the paths. Apparently it made a horrible noise, they use little two-stroke engines –’
    ‘Yeah, I know the things. Bloody menace.’
    ‘Well, quite a few people got annoyed and had a look at what it was and all saw the same bloke.’
    ‘The motorized skateboarder … the boy, Joel, he mentioned him. Do we have a description?’
    ‘Strictly speaking it’s the board that’s motorized