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Authors: Jo Bannister
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bridge took the Coventry road over the canal, someone had parked a chip van. The legend on the side read WINKWORTH’S MOBILE CATERING , but it was still a chip van. With lunchtime imminent, Hazel bought sausage and chips for two, then remembered there were three of them and asked for extra sausages. But she was damned if she was buying the dog a mug of tea as well.
Winkworth was doing a roaring trade in the sunshine, and all the nearby benches were taken. They wandered a little farther up the towpath and, on the far side of the bridge, sat down on the edge, dangling their legs over the water and defending their chips from a particularly determined swan.
Finally Saturday said, “You handed the laptop in, then.” Hazel nodded. “Anybody claim it?”
“The DI worked out who it belonged to and sent it to him.”
There was a longer than expected pause. Had Saturday been hoping to get it back? It wasn’t as if he had anywhere to charge it. “So he got into it?”
Hazel dipped her sausage in ketchup. “There wasn’t much of a password. There were plans on it, for a development here in town. It belonged to someone from the architect’s office.”
“And the coppers gave it back to him.”
“’Fraid so,” said Hazel, briskly unsympathetic. She could have gone on to tell him about her break-in, but there seemed no point. And Saturday would never be a reliable confidant. If she’d wanted any more doing about it, she’d have done it herself; and if she didn’t want anything doing, she certainly didn’t want anyone gossiping about it.
There was a long pause. So long that she began to think the conversation was over and the youth was simply hanging around in the hope of getting an ice cream to follow his sausage and chips. But no. Saturday wasn’t here because he was interested in narrow boats. He’d come looking for her, and he hadn’t yet got around to saying why.
Finally, with the air of someone being forced to play both sides of a chessboard because his opponent was too dim to do her share, he said, “What about the pictures?”
Hazel hadn’t guessed he was interested in architecture, either. She shrugged. “I told you. They’re redeveloping Dirty Nellie’s. Offices, shops, flats. Why?” She grinned. “Thinking of putting your name down for one?”
As soon as it was out, Hazel wished it unsaid. It had only been a bit of banter. If she’d said it to Ash, or Ash had said it to her, it would have been obvious as such. But both of them had homes, and Saturday did not, and that meant it wasn’t a joking matter. You have to be a very close friend before you ask a man with no legs when he’s trying out for Manchester United.
Saturday gave her a long sideways look. But before she could marshal an apology he said, with a kind of heavy patience, as if he was going to make her understand if it killed him, “Not those pictures. The other pictures. The pictures he shouldn’t have had. The ones he had hidden behind the second password.”
CHAPTER 9
D ISTRACTEDLY, HAZEL WENT TO GIVE THE REST of her chips to the swan. It was only the dog’s reproachful look that stopped her. So she gave them to Patience, but really she didn’t care who ate them as long as she could concentrate on Saturday’s bombshell.
She turned to face him, and waited until his shifting gaze settled somewhere near hers. “There was a second password?”
“Sure,” he said negligently. As if none of this really mattered. As if he hadn’t been walking up and down this towpath, possibly for hours, in order to have this conversation with her.
“How do you know?”
“I hacked it.”
This was the first she’d heard about the boy as computer wizard. But then, he was from the generation that had grown up with computers. Before he was a street kid, he was just a kid, going to school and doing IT classes and learning even more from his mates behind the bicycle sheds.
“How?”
He looked at her askance. “A guy who uses
Winkworth was doing a roaring trade in the sunshine, and all the nearby benches were taken. They wandered a little farther up the towpath and, on the far side of the bridge, sat down on the edge, dangling their legs over the water and defending their chips from a particularly determined swan.
Finally Saturday said, “You handed the laptop in, then.” Hazel nodded. “Anybody claim it?”
“The DI worked out who it belonged to and sent it to him.”
There was a longer than expected pause. Had Saturday been hoping to get it back? It wasn’t as if he had anywhere to charge it. “So he got into it?”
Hazel dipped her sausage in ketchup. “There wasn’t much of a password. There were plans on it, for a development here in town. It belonged to someone from the architect’s office.”
“And the coppers gave it back to him.”
“’Fraid so,” said Hazel, briskly unsympathetic. She could have gone on to tell him about her break-in, but there seemed no point. And Saturday would never be a reliable confidant. If she’d wanted any more doing about it, she’d have done it herself; and if she didn’t want anything doing, she certainly didn’t want anyone gossiping about it.
There was a long pause. So long that she began to think the conversation was over and the youth was simply hanging around in the hope of getting an ice cream to follow his sausage and chips. But no. Saturday wasn’t here because he was interested in narrow boats. He’d come looking for her, and he hadn’t yet got around to saying why.
Finally, with the air of someone being forced to play both sides of a chessboard because his opponent was too dim to do her share, he said, “What about the pictures?”
Hazel hadn’t guessed he was interested in architecture, either. She shrugged. “I told you. They’re redeveloping Dirty Nellie’s. Offices, shops, flats. Why?” She grinned. “Thinking of putting your name down for one?”
As soon as it was out, Hazel wished it unsaid. It had only been a bit of banter. If she’d said it to Ash, or Ash had said it to her, it would have been obvious as such. But both of them had homes, and Saturday did not, and that meant it wasn’t a joking matter. You have to be a very close friend before you ask a man with no legs when he’s trying out for Manchester United.
Saturday gave her a long sideways look. But before she could marshal an apology he said, with a kind of heavy patience, as if he was going to make her understand if it killed him, “Not those pictures. The other pictures. The pictures he shouldn’t have had. The ones he had hidden behind the second password.”
CHAPTER 9
D ISTRACTEDLY, HAZEL WENT TO GIVE THE REST of her chips to the swan. It was only the dog’s reproachful look that stopped her. So she gave them to Patience, but really she didn’t care who ate them as long as she could concentrate on Saturday’s bombshell.
She turned to face him, and waited until his shifting gaze settled somewhere near hers. “There was a second password?”
“Sure,” he said negligently. As if none of this really mattered. As if he hadn’t been walking up and down this towpath, possibly for hours, in order to have this conversation with her.
“How do you know?”
“I hacked it.”
This was the first she’d heard about the boy as computer wizard. But then, he was from the generation that had grown up with computers. Before he was a street kid, he was just a kid, going to school and doing IT classes and learning even more from his mates behind the bicycle sheds.
“How?”
He looked at her askance. “A guy who uses
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