The Trigger Man by Joe Joyce

Author:Joe Joyce [Joyce, Joe]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-08-02T23:00:00+00:00

Twelve

Inspector Keerins paused to take a deep breath and calm his sense of anticipation. He had to play this coolly; he couldn't afford to expose any hint of the excitement which had taken him over from an early hour. To do so would look unprofessional and, worse, could land him in deep trouble. He was playing a potentially dangerous game but the consequences of it going wrong were not something he cared to think about. He opened the door and went in.

The superintendent swivelled his chair round from the window and raised an inquisitive eyebrow. He looked like he had simply summoned Keerins out of a sense of duty and didn't expect to hear anything interesting.

'Nothing concrete to report,' Keerins obliged him. 'There are a couple of straws in the wind I'm checking out but nothing definite yet.'

'On which?' the superintendent inquired. 'Callan or the informer?'

'Both, actually.' Keerins hoped he wasn't going to ask for details. He was committed now and there was no going back. 'But I'm afraid they're still very vague.'

'Has he flown?'

'Oh, no. All the indications point to him still being in the country.'

The superintendent rested his elbows on the desk and Keerins felt his nervousness rise under his studied stare. What if he knew? What if he had had somebody else watching Pursell and himself? He was perfectly capable of doing that.

'How do you find this work?' the superintendent asked.

'Very interesting.' Keerins tried to smother his paranoia and look innocent but eager. I'd make a lousy criminal, he thought. Even Deirdre had been able to see through him, asking anxiously what had happened when he returned from finding Pursell with Amber. She clearly did not believe his assurance that it was nothing much and had gone into a huff over his unaccustomed reticence.

The superintendent grunted and suggested that it was like shovelling mercury with a fork; very little got to where it was supposed to go. Keerins laughed politely. It was typical of life that the Super should appear willing for the first time to have a heart-to-heart talk at the one point when he didn't want it.

'I'm still learning,' he offered. 'Getting to grips with it.'

'What you have to remember,' the superintendent said, 'is that it is just the same as other police work. We are dealing with a well-organised conspiracy instead of the usual ragbag of petty thieves and the like.'

He knows, Keerins thought with alarm.

'Our methods have to take account of that,' the superintendent went on. 'Otherwise, it is the same. We investigate crimes, gather evidence, send it to the DPP and so on. We are not judges.'

Keerins nodded solemnly.

'What I am saying,' the superintendent summed up, 'is that you should not look on this job as being different from any other police work. Don't be intimidated by it. And you'll get to grips with it in time.'

Keerins thanked him and left. What the fuck was all that about, he wondered nervously on his way back to his own office. A warning? A prepared speech for raw recruits? A criticism? You'll get to grips with it in time.

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