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decades of heavy-duty partying had taken their toll. Nonetheless, with his sleepy eyes and slow smile, he knew he was still a looker and had a recently acquired young wife to prove it.
    ‘They’ve just had another baby,’ Winter murmured. ‘Did you know that?’
    ‘Everyone knows it.’ Dawn was studying her fingernails. ‘What a waste.’
    ‘The baby?’
    ‘Bev. He was discussing the price of Pampers the other day. Can you imagine that? Bev Yates? Sex god? Into
Pampers
?’
    Winter chuckled softly. He’d set up the Minolta from Technical Services on a tripod a pace or two back from the window. The telephoto lens offered a close-up of the Patel shop doorway through a carefully torn rent in the flag and he leaned forward yet again to check the viewfinder. Two Bangladeshi women standing in the sunshine yakking about God knows what. Absolutely no sign of impending trouble.
    ‘They must do these secondments on purpose.’ Ellis yawned. ‘They know Bev’s really up for the World Cup.’
    ‘He’d be at work anyway, times they’re showing these games.’
    ‘Not at half past seven in the morning he wouldn’t. And the later games he’d sort somehow or other. You know what he’s like when it’s something he really wants.’
    Winter grunted, saying nothing. Even older than Yates, he had a legendary mistrust of team spirit, chiefly because he’d never seen the point of it. Winter was the detectivewho belonged in a museum, a bulky, balding, streetwise DC who made his best moves in a suede car coat and a haze of after-shave. He’d always hunted alone and the fact that he was still around was a tribute to his predatory skills. According to the likes of Hartigan, successful detection relied on good intelligence, disciplined teamwork and the scrupulous gathering of evidence. Winter, with his unrivalled city-wide sources, agreed about the intelligence but viewed the rest as bollocks.
    Dawn Ellis, who’d learned a great deal from Winter, rather liked him. Looks like hers could be a handicap in a culture as macho as CID, and the fact that she was a born-again veggie didn’t help. Why a slim, bright, attractive twenty-eight-year-old was wasting herself in the gloom of a Portchester semi was a source of perpetual mystery in the CID room but only Winter, she suspected, knew the truth. That she was lonely, as well as increasingly nervous.
    Earlier in the afternoon, she’d mentioned calls she’d been getting, two o’clock in the morning calls, the kind of weirdo calls where the line stays open and all you can hear is breathing at the other end. They’d been happening a lot recently, two or three times a week, and they were beginning to spook her. Winter hadn’t said very much, just the obvious, who might they be, but when she’d shaken her head and said she hadn’t a clue, he’d made a little joke about the length of the list and left it at that.
    Now, though, he wanted to know more.
    ‘There isn’t any more.’
    ‘Doesn’t he ever say anything?’
    ‘I don’t even know if it’s a bloke.’
    ‘Something you’re not telling me?’
    ‘Not at all. I’m not saying it’s a woman. I’m just saying I don’t know. And that’s the point really. Two o’clock in the morning, stuff like this starts to get to you.’
    Glued to the viewfinder again, Winter changed the subject.
    ‘Tell me about Andy Corbett.’
    ‘What makes you think I know anything about Andy Corbett?’
    ‘Because you’re supposed to be shagging him.’
    ‘Who said?’
    ‘You’re not shagging him?’
    ‘We’ve been for a couple of drinks. He’s a nice bloke, breath of fresh air. That’s not shagging, Paul. That’s conversation.’
    Winter eased away from the tripod, rubbing the back of his neck.
    ‘Met, wasn’t he?’
    ‘That’s right.’
    ‘Rides a big bike? Ponces around in black leather?’
    ‘What
is
this?’
    ‘Just curious. He’s another one who’s copped for the Coughlin job.’ He smiled at her. ‘I’m surprised you